Permanent Sunset (3 page)

Sean led the way down the stone steps into the subterranean area of Villa Nirvana. Henry thought of it as “the Cave.” Below ground level, there was a huge storage room, a cavernous wine cellar, a roomy media and business center, and a commercial kitchen that served as a food prep area. Henry checked the storage room while Sean ducked into the wine cellar and kitchen.

“Nothing,” Henry said.

“A bottle of wine missing from the front rack, but no Elena.”

They opened the door to the media room that had an enormous screen on one wall, which was now dimmed with the DVD menu to
Breakfast at Tiffany’s
displayed. The glow of the screen fell on Lisa, asleep on the first of a collection of black leather couches and lounge chairs, curled up under a colorful, West Indian–style throw.

“One mystery solved,” Henry said, hitting a light switch as Sean moved toward her and gently shook her shoulder.

“What? Oh my God, did I fall asleep? What time is it?” Lisa asked, springing to her feet as the throw fell to the floor, exposing her bare arms and fresh black-and-blue marks that Henry thought looked like thumbprints.

“Are you okay?” Sean asked.

“Of course,” Lisa said, pulling the throw around her like a shawl. “I couldn’t sleep, so I came down to watch a movie. I’d better get to the girls.”

“They’re waiting in their room so you can take them to breakfast. Did you happen to see Elena on your nocturnal travels?” Henry asked.

Lisa hesitated, looking from Henry to Sean.

“I can’t find her, Lisa. I want to make it right,” Sean said.

“She watched the movie with me for a while. We had a little girl talk, that’s all.”

“What was she wearing?” Henry asked.

“Her wedding gown. It’s gorgeous. Very fifties, tea length. I told her to be careful not to spill the red wine, so she opened a bottle of champagne from the wine cellar and gave me the bottle of red she’d been drinking. Bad idea, I guess, because I’d already had plenty of wine on top of a Xanax earlier, when there was all that shouting over the prenup. That’s probably why I slept until now. I’ve got
to get going. Gavin will kill me when he finds out,” Lisa said, moving toward the door.

“Do you know when Elena left?” Henry asked.

“Where did she say she was going?” Sean added.

“I don’t know. I must have fallen asleep during the movie. We put
Breakfast at Tiffany’s
on after our little chat. I told her it was a good movie if she needed to cry. I’ve seen it a gazillion times. I’ve never thought of Elena as emotional, but I guess canceling a wedding would do that to anyone.”

Henry knew they needed to continue the search for Elena, and he also had to let Sabrina know they had found Lisa safe. But he sensed Lisa might know more than she was saying, or was even aware she knew.

“Did she actually say she was going to call it off?” Sean’s voice cracked.

“Sean, I never thought I’d see you so crazy about a woman. I thought you’d never settle down. I’m sorry this has gotten so ugly for you. I told Elena she should just sign and have her beautiful wedding. I said after a few years and a couple of kids, she’d forget she even had a prenup. I know I have. Look, I’ve got to go. The girls are spending the day at the Westin with their grandmother after breakfast,” Lisa said, placing her hand on the door handle.

“Wait, Lisa. What did she say to that?” Henry asked.

Lisa looked at Sean and then back at Henry.

“Go ahead, Lisa. Tell us. I brought this all on myself. You don’t have to spare me,” Sean said.

“She said I didn’t understand. That you and she weren’t going to have any kids. And that she wasn’t signing any prenup.” Lisa left, careful not to look at Sean as she walked by him.

Sean slumped into the nearest chair.

“Look, we still have time to find her. When you tell her you don’t care about the prenup, everything will be fine. You’ll see,” Henry said, not sure if he believed what he was saying but knowing it was what Sean needed to hear.

“No, I’ve lost her. I know that for sure now.”

“How? You can’t be certain,” Henry said.

“Henry, Elena and I had very specific plans for our life together. Neither of us have ever been married or in a committed relationship like this before. Everything we’ve decided has been intentional, with a lot of thought and discussion. It’s what made me fall in love with Elena. She taught me to respect women as my equal. We were going to wait three years so Elena and I could continue to grow the business before my father’s retirement. And then we were going to have two babies. We even had names picked out for them. No, I must have hurt her so badly, she couldn’t forgive me.”

Henry took the white linen hanky he always carried and handed it to Sean to wipe the tears that were rolling down his cheeks.

The rocks had been deep enough below the surface for Sabrina to glide the paddleboard over them but were still high enough to snag the lace on the wedding gown Elena had drowned in. Sabrina knew Elena was dead, her limp, lifeless body floating and twirling in whichever direction the waves dictated. Should she try to bring the body back to shore? Was it possible she just had hypothermia and could be revived? She’d read countless stories about people surviving in water for hours. But wasn’t that cold water? And hadn’t most of those stories been urban legends? On some level, she knew she was thinking crazy.

Sabrina wasn’t sure if she even could or should bring Elena back on the paddleboard, but if she didn’t, somehow she would be blamed for what happened to her—just like she had been blamed for her husband’s death and had been a person of interest in the death of a villa guest several months ago. No, Elena was getting on the paddleboard and going back.

Sabrina tugged at lace that was affixed to something below the water. The lace felt odd to the touch, almost scratchy. She pulled and pulled at what she imagined was the bottom of the skirt of the dress until she felt the resistance released. Next, she grasped Elena around the waist, grateful that Elena’s long straight black hair was covering her face, and moved her toward the paddleboard, hoisting the tiny woman partially up on it.

Holding Elena with one arm and the board with the other, Sabrina flutter kicked them toward the shore. She kicked hard and fast, fueled by anger at the dead woman, who had killed herself over a man (something Sabrina couldn’t understand), thereby inflicting trauma on the lives of everyone around her, including Sabrina. Why hadn’t this shrewd businesswoman just dumped Sean and moved on? Why kill herself?

Kate ran into the water to help pull the paddleboard to shore.

“Oh dear God, it’s Elena. My Sean will be devastated. Why would she do this?” Kate asked, kneeling beside the slumped pile of lace. Kate rolled Elena over on to her back and grabbed one of her wrists to feel for a pulse.

“I was a nurse before I married Jack. That’s how I met him,” Kate said, now reaching under Elena’s hair to find her carotid artery, but not exposing the face neither of them wanted to see. Sabrina noticed bruises on Elena’s neck. Several oval spots and then a linear mark. But she didn’t want to think what the implications of that were.
She bent over, retching and coughing up salt water she didn’t remember swallowing, knowing Kate was confirming that Elena was gone.

Sabrina found the flip-flop where she had left her cell phone and dialed 9-1-1, grateful for her new and improved relationship with Detective Leon Janquar, who had presented her with a certificate for heroism for saving a young woman’s life. At least she knew the police wouldn’t be hostile toward her this time and that they no longer blamed her for making the police in Nantucket look foolish when they investigated her husband’s death.

She told the dispatcher who answered that there had been a drowning at the cove out on Ditleff Point Beach and to please let Detective Janquar know.

“Oh, he’s not on today. He’ll be out for the next month. He’s having knee replacement surgery.”

Shivering in her wet clothes despite standing under the blast of the Caribbean sun, Sabrina saw she had a text message from Henry.

“Found L safe. No E. Think she’s dumped S.”

Sabrina looked over at Kate Keating, not knowing what to say. She decided the best thing she could do was clue Henry in and contain the situation.

“E drowned. Am at cove with Kate K. Keep S at house. Cops coming.”

But it was too late, Sabrina realized. Lisa Keating, who was driving down the driveway with her three children, paused when she saw Kate and Sabrina standing at the top of the beach. She got out of the rental car, keeping the children waiting in the jeep with the air conditioning going and windows rolled up.

“What’s going on, Kate? Is everything all right?” Sabrina wanted to tell Kate to say nothing, but she had already begun to sob, rushing up to Lisa’s waiting arms.

“She’d dead, Lisa. Elena’s dead. She drowned. In her wedding gown.” Kate’s sobs became howls so loud that the children could surely hear them, even with the windows up.

Lisa looked up at the car and then back at the beach past Sabrina, where all that could be seen was a pile of white lace. “Were you on your way to the Westin to drop off the girls with your mother?” Sabrina asked. Sabrina had an entire notebook filled with the itinerary and activities of all the family members staying at Villa Nirvana. She might not remember names as well as Henry, but once she wrote anything else in her notebook, she never forgot it. She knew the Keating girls were scheduled to spend the day with their grandmother until late in the afternoon, when they would return to be flower girls in the wedding.

Lisa stared at her without responding for a moment, reminding Sabrina that she must look frightful with her wet hair hanging in limp curls and soaked-through clothes.

“Yes, I mean no. I mean they’re staying with Gavin’s mother,” Lisa said.

“Gavin’s mother?” Sabrina looked at Kate puzzled. She’d assumed it would be Lisa’s mother with the grandchildren over at the Westin.

“Gavin’s mother decided to come to St. John to help with the children during the wedding weekend,” Lisa said.

“A wedding to which she is not, was not, invited.” Kate stopped sobbing for a moment. Sabrina took some comfort in hearing once again that hers was not the only
screwed-up family. But she knew there was no time to waste on family politics if the Keating kids were to be spared the sirens and ambulance, paramedics, and cops. And there was just no reason for them to be exposed to what was about to ensue.

“Lisa, I’d hop in that jeep and get the kids out of here before—”

“You’re right. Say no more. I’ll be right back, Kate. I’m so sorry,” Lisa said, rushing to the jeep and taking off just in time to miss the arrival of St. John Rescue and three cruisers.

With the sirens blasting, the vehicles raised enough dust from the dirt road leading to the cove and the Villa Nirvana driveway to make it difficult to see the faces of the people who had emerged from the villa to check out what was going on. Sabrina saw Sean race toward his mother. Henry followed close behind, giving Sabrina a look that said, “I couldn’t hold him back.”

“What’s going on? Are you okay? Why are they here?” Sean asked as the rescue workers and cops surrounded Elena. Only then did he seem to comprehend that the situation did not directly involve Kate but centered on the person lying still on the beach.

Sabrina was relieved to see Lucy Detree, who had worked directly under Detective Janquar when Carter Johnson, a guest at Ten Villas, had been murdered several months before. The statuesque, young black officer was directing guests to move back to the house, including
Jack and Gavin Keating. Detree’s name tag revealed that she’d been promoted to sergeant since Johnson’s murder had been resolved. Sabrina hoped this was a sign that the newer, enlightened faction within the Virgin Island Police Department was making progress against the publicly denounced corrupt band of cronies that had ruined the reputation of the department.

“We own this villa, Officer. If there’s an emergency on the premises, we are entitled to know what it is, in order to act accordingly,” Gavin told Detree as he stepped around her, his father following right behind with Heather on his heels. Heather stepped up to Detree as the others were being guided back to the house by a uniformed officer.

“Officer, that’s my mother,” she said, pointing her finger over at Kate Keating. “I need to be there for her.” She walked past Detree and over to Sean and Kate.

Kate had her arms around her son, who was sobbing like an inconsolable child. Heather walked over to them both and swept them into a huge hug.

“How can she be dead? She’s supposed to get married in a couple of hours. I can’t believe she would do this. How did it ever come to this?” Kate said, now joining Sean in sobbing, leaving Heather to comfort them both.

In the distance, guests who should have been arriving to join the brunch and island tour before the wedding were being turned away from the gatehouse. Guests who had already arrived had been ushered inside the villa, leaving Sabrina, Henry, and the immediate Keating family as
the only people left at the beach, other than the rescue workers.

Jack and Gavin Keating approached Kate and her children. Somehow Sabrina suspected the circle of mourning wasn’t wide enough to fit Gavin Keating. She wasn’t sure about Jack.

“What’s going on?” Gavin practically shouted over the crying.

“Elena is dead. It looks like suicide,” Heather said.

“Oh no,” Jack said, moving nearer to Kate, placing an arm on her shoulder.

“That’s ridiculous. That can’t be,” Gavin said, sounding more insolent than incredulous.

Sean broke the circle and lurched toward Gavin with his fists ready for a fight. “What’s ridiculous, you asshole? You know what’s ridiculous? That you, more than anyone in the family, pressured Elena to sign that goddamn prenup, even though she made better decisions in the company in the six months she worked there than you did in the past six years. You’re the reason she’s dead. And me, because I didn’t tell you to lay off.”

“Are you saying she’s really dead? That she killed herself?”

“What about dead don’t you get, Gavin? Can’t you even pretend to be a little sensitive at a time like this?” Heather said, raising her voice over her mother’s sobs.

“Folks, I’m sorry about what’s happened here, but I’m afraid you’re all going to have to simmer down,” a very deep
voice bellowed. It came from a uniformed officer whose nameplate identified him as Detective Vernon Hodge.

“Fine. I’m out of here,” Gavin said, turning to leave.

“Not so fast, sir. No one will be leaving for a while. We have a sudden and suspicious death of a young, seemingly healthy woman. The fact that she is wearing a bridal gown makes it all the more questionable. My men will be gathering information from each of you, so just follow Sergeant Detree back to the house and follow her instructions.”

Sabrina watched Lucy Detree’s jaw tighten at the sound of “my men.”