Anchor Management

by Ellis Quinn

  Marcus said, “Just hold on a minute,” still watching the video. Then the video was done.

  Charlotte stood with her son, her claws hooked into his arm, wanting to lead him out of the break room.

  Marcus stood again, said, “This video I just watched was enlightening, Stephen. It seems like I might have the first glimmer of truth out of anybody that’s in this room.”

  “Hey,” Bette said, offended, glaring at the side of his head and trying to catch his eye.

  Marcus held up a finger to stop their bickering so he could continue. She quieted.

  Marcus said to Stephen, “Did your brother Jack take the Crockett Anchor from the Foundation building?”

  “I want you to tell him the truth, Stephen,” Charlotte urged.

  “Charlotte,” Marcus said, “right now is a good time for you to stop interfering with my investigation.”

  Stephen said, “Jack took the Crockett Anchor. He took it for Cherry.”

  Charlotte hissed to Bette: “See?”

  “And you took it from him,” Marcus continued with Stephen.

  “I took it from my brother. I didn’t want him to get in trouble. He’d been drinking. He wasn’t drunk, Marcus, I swear. But what happened at the crab feast got him riled. He had a beer, maybe two. It was a momentary relapse. A simple mistake. I guess . . . The next thing he knew, he was back to his wilder ways. He went and stole the anchor and was going to bring it to Cherry. He thought it would be funny.”

  “And you didn’t think so?”

  Stephen looked up to Marcus. “I looked out for my brother. I took it from him.”

  “Where did you put it?”

  “On my dad’s boat.”

  “The Mayor Mayknot.”

  “Right.”

  “And then?”

  “Just like I’ve been saying, I went to Cherry’s café,” he said, nodding his chin toward Cherry, the two of them looking at each other for a moment. His handcuffs clinked as he gestured her way. “I only wanted to make sure Cherry was okay after what Mom did to her.”

  “I did nothing to her,” Charlotte said. “She brings trouble on herself.”

  Stephen rolled his eyes. “All Cherry and I did was hang around her café and talk. Then we left.”

  Marcus said, “How did the anchor get on Jack’s body, Stephen?”

  Bette could see the points of Charlotte’s fingernails press into Stephen’s arm. She said to Charlotte, “Let Stephen speak.”

  “My mom put it under Jack’s body.”

  Marcus said, “Why didn’t you tell me that, Stephen?”

  “She . . .”

  Charlotte looked like she wanted to scream or race out of the room, maybe throw a chair through the window and jump right out. She said, “We’re going. Let’s just go, they’ve got nothing on you. This is ridiculous. You’ve been treated terribly from the beginning. Jason, I demand you get these cuffs off my son.”

  Stephen pulled from her and they separated and stood a foot apart. Stephen said to Marcus, “She threatened me.”

  Marcus said, “Threatened you with what?”

  “She’ll tell my dad something that I didn’t want him to know.”

  “He’s making this up,” Charlotte said.

  Stephen’s eyes lit up, and he snarled at her: “I’m making this up? I’m making it up?” He turned to Bette, looked at her for a moment, his eyes trembling, and said to Marcus, “My mom threatened me she’d tell Vinnie about my brother.”

  “What about him?”

  “Jack was with his mom when his mom died. They were doing drugs together.”

  The room got quiet again, no one saying anything. The heater hummed.

  “I don’t even know what you’re talking about,” Charlotte said, her voice quiet.

  Stephen said, “It would kill Dad if he knew. That’s what brought Jack around. That’s what made him turn a new leaf. He saw how low he could be.” Now he looked to his mother. “You held that over Jack’s head.”

  Nobody said anything again for a long moment, then Bette looked to Charlotte and when Charlotte raised her chin, Bette said, “You are truly rotten.”

  Charlotte closed her eyes, gathered her thoughts for a moment, opened her eyes and said, “I keep my family in line. This is my empire, and if I don’t control everyone’s vectors, they’ll go off on egregious tangents. I maintain a well kept garden. Some day, maybe they’ll thank me.”

  Marcus said, “Maybe they will.”

  Charlotte said, “Now, take the cuffs off my son.”

  Marcus said, “Jason?”

  “Yes, sir?”

  “Will you remove the cuffs from Stephen Dawson, please.”

  Charlotte said, “You will?”

  “Stephen has retracted his confession already. Cherry is his alibi, and he’s hers. For now, I’m willing to believe them.”

  “I believe them,” Bette said, and they all grumbled agreement.

  Marcus said, “Take the cuffs off Stephen and put them on Mrs. Dawson, would you, please, Jason.”

  Charlotte jumped back. “Me? Don’t you dare!”

  Jason took the cuffs he’d removed from Stephen and held them up for Charlotte to see.

  Charlotte demanded to know: “For what charges?”

  Marcus said, “Interfering with an investigation, tampering with a crime scene, and, what the hey, let’s throw in blackmail too and see if we can get it to stick.”

  “This will not stand,” she shouted, neck veins rising again. She backed against the closed break room door and Jason followed her with the cuffs up and ready. “This is unacceptable. Beyond the pale! What makes you think you can get away with this, Marcus?”

  But the bulk of Jason Mitchum had eclipsed Marcus.

  Bette said, “The law, probably.”

  Jason said, “The cuffs are going on, Mrs. Dawson, and you know it. Whether we tussle is up to you.”

  Charlotte said, “You touch me, and I’ll have you working at a gas station by tomorrow morning. Don’t you know who I am?”

  Cherry said, “We all know who you are, Charlotte. You’ve just shown us.”

  THE NEXT MORNING

  The turnout the next morning for The Steaming Bean’s reopening was impressive, a testament to how fast word could spread in Chesapeake Cove. A lineup to get in had formed about fifteen minutes before the café doors opened.

  Bette and Vance and Pris and Buster had come down to help set up and to give Cherry emotional support—you know, in case nobody showed up. As soon as they saw friendly faces lingering at the front door, moods lifted. The café opened early, orders were taken, Terry and Cherry worked double time as a team behind the counter. Vance even rolled up his sleeves and helped clear tables to keep things moving, because people kept streaming in. It was like all the badness that had lingered around the café these last days had dissipated, and all the people who were staying away had missed the place. Everyone was glad it was open.

  As Vance bustled past with a tray loaded with empty teacups and a teapot and stacked plates, another familiar face sidled alongside Bette. Calvin, the friendly tourist who she figured might have a thing for Cherry.

  He said, “I’m glad to see things are back in order.”

  “Me too,” she said, “Cherry doesn’t deserve all the bad that fell around her the last two weeks.”

  “I agree with that,” he said. “And good to hear that Charlotte woman’s in jail. Who would’ve thought . . .”

  “I don’t think the mystery’s solved just yet,” she said. “Charlotte’s guilty of something, but it isn’t murder.”

  The guy nodded, then looked around, saying the place sure is spotless.

  “We busted our humps cleaning yesterday, even after we had to go down to the police and spring Stephen.”

  “I wish I’d known, I’d have come to help out.”

  “Aren’t you on vacation?”

  “I am, but this is my favorite place in town,” he said, looking over at Cherry serving customers,
“I hated those days when it was closed.”

  “Me too,” she said, sunlight fall on a conch shell on the front window sill behind Cherry. The one Vance had given her for good luck.

  Out front now she could see people seated at the patio tables rising and moving to the railing divider to shake hands with Vinnie as he approached the front of the café. Stephen was with him, hands in his pockets, nodding and smiling at people who were wishing him well.

  She said to Calvin, “They let him out after they concluded he’d done nothing except try to return the stolen anchor.”

  “Terrible to be in jail for something you didn’t do.”

  “Excuse me a minute,” she said, walking to the front door to hold it open and greet them when they came in.

  “Bette, you’re an angel,” Vinnie said, and put his hands out for a hug. She hugged him back, and then they stepped aside so Stephen could enter the foyer of the café.

  “Bette,” Stephen said, “I can’t thank you enough.”

  She shook his hand, and he pulled her in for a hug as well. Stephen said, “Can I buy you breakfast?”

  She patted her stomach and said, “I’m jittering with caffeine already, and I’ve had about four cinnamon buns. You might have to give me half an hour.”

  They stood for an awkward moment, not knowing what to say next. A lot had transpired between them, a lot of good, but there was a lot of bad that she was now privy to regarding their family. But she meant them no harm, and their secrets were safe.

  But there was still a murderer out there, in the list of suspects had dwindled. Vinnie was about the only name left, though no one could figure out why on earth he would want to harm Jack.

  She said, “You talked to Stephen about what happened, I’m sure. Marcus explained it all to you?”

  Vinnie got closer so he couldn’t be overheard, and he said, “I can’t believe she’d hold a secret over my son like that,” looking to Stephen with sympathy. “I’m so sorry, Stephen, I shouldn’t have looked the other way all those times.”

  Stephen said, “I know you could be under the gun as much as I am.”

  He said to Bette, “It was a terrible secret. Terrible to find out Jack had been with Delilah, the two of them doing drugs when she overdosed. But I couldn’t ever blame Jack. Both of them were addicts. I saw what it did to Delilah, I know what it could do to him. When Jack turned his life around, I could never be prouder of him. I let him know. I let him know, but now I’ll always wonder if I could’ve done more. Really let him know how proud I was of him.”

  “I’m sure he knew,” Vinnie.

  Vinnie shook his head, and said, “Maybe if I’d done better as a father, he wouldn’t have relapsed, gone and stolen that anchor.”

  In the silence that followed, Bette contemplated whether that could be a motive. Could Jack’s relapse have enraged his father so much he would stab his son? It was an outrageous thought, another retelling of father-son quibbles gone nuclear like Royce and Troy Murdoch . . .

  Then Vinnie brightened and said, “Best of all, I think that’s the end of the anchor.”

  “The Crockett Anchor?”

  “I think it should have a permanent home, and maybe not make it such a big deal. It was just supposed to be a fun thing. It’s not worth all this fuss, and you can see the trouble it would cause. It’s fake, Bette. It’s not a real anchor. No anchor like that could hold down a real fishing boat, so what purpose does it have?”

  She said, “The only weight it’s got is what we give it.”

  Now Prissy was slipping in from behind Bette, coming from the table where they had been sitting by the front door. “Hey now, Vinnie,” she said, and gave Vinnie a lingering hug. She did the same with Stephen, patting his back, then holding on to Vinnie’s upper arm she said, “Tell me now what we’re going to do about that wife a yours.”

  Vinnie rubbed his forehead and looked pained. “I know, I know . . . She’s been angry for a long time, and I’ve known how she could be, but I could never imagine she’d do something like she did. All of us in our grief, and she’s working behind-the-scenes that way . . .?”

  “I think she needs help,” Pris said, and Bette agreed.

  Vinnie said, “She was with our lawyer all last night. She agreed to court-mandated anger management and some therapy. My part—because I’m guilty as well in my own way—my part’s to make sure I don’t look the other way anymore. I let her behavior slide for too long. It got to where it’s me and the kids against her. That’s no way for a family to be, I need to have my children’s back, and all of us need to work together to bring Charlotte back in with us.”

  Bette said, “That’s going to be up to Charlotte.”

  Stephen nodded and said, “We all know it.”

  Pris waved over Cherry, who checked with Terry to make sure she could handle the counter for a moment on her own, then she came around from the back, drying her hands on her crisp apron front. “Hi, Mr. Dawson,” she said, and Pris put her arm around Cherry’s shoulders. Cherry stepped forward and hugged with Stephen. “You doing okay?” she asked him.

  “I’ve been better, but I think we all owe you a lot of thanks.”

  Cherry looked embarrassed and returned to Pris, who put her arm around her shoulders again. Cherry said, “I didn’t do much of anything.”

  Vinnie said, “I understand you’re a big part of the bargain the lawyers managed for my Charlotte.”

  “I heard she didn’t like it, though.”

  Vinnie nodded and said she didn’t like it. “But I insisted that if she wanted to be welcomed back home and still be on the town council and still hold her head up high in Chesapeake Cove, she better do what’s right.”

  Bette asked what Cherry suggested in exchange for no charges, and Cherry said, “The lawyers and the prosecutor asked me for a statement and I gave one that I thought might compel them toward leniency.”

  Stephen said, “You didn’t have to do that.”

  “While she framed me for murder, she was protecting her son.” She smiled at Stephen. “That’s you.”

  Stephen looked hurt and gazed up toward the ceiling. “I can’t believe she did that to you.”

  Cherry said to Bette, “There’re no blackmail charges they’re holding her on. Charlotte agreed to a year of therapy plus she has to do sixty hours of community service.”

  Vinnie added: “And that doesn’t include any of the things she already does for the town. This has to be extracurricular.”

  Pris chuckled and said, “Cherry let her off easy.”

  Cherry said, “It wasn’t up to me.”

  “You didn’t have to put in a kind word for her,” Stephen said.

  Cherry said, “Or maybe I’m rubbing it in her face that I’m the better person.”

  Pris snorted, rubbed the back of Cherry’s neck, and Bette laughed too. Even Vinnie and Stephen joined in, appreciating the humor at Charlotte’s expense.

  An awful sight outside over Stephen’s shoulder soured Bette. Tall Marcus coming up alongside the patio toward the café door, and walking next to him, twenty-five-year-old pink scrunchy Stacy. The two of them not even working together today—both of them in street clothes. Marcus in a flannel and a work jacket, those good-looking jeans again, and Stacy with her long legs in cowboy boots, bundled up in a leather jacket. Quite the cute couple.

  She didn’t open the door for them, just watching and waiting to see Marcus’s face when he came in and saw she was standing there.

  He didn’t give her the expression she expected.

  He nodded her way, held the door for Stacy, the two of them making eye contact for a moment before Stacy went over to stand in line for their order. Marcus looked around for a moment, and Pris greeted him.

  Vinnie turned, and Marcus stooped to say something close to his ear. He patted Vinnie on the shoulder, and without turning around or saying bye, Vinnie lead Stephen out the front door.

  Marcus then nudged his head sideways looking at Chris, and Pris
said nothing, just followed behind Stephen and Vinnie.

  “Good morning, Bette,” he said, not looking at her, his eyes going up and around the Bean’s big crowd.

  She said, “I know, it’s quite the turnout, isn’t it? . . . It’s so rare to see you out of uniform, I would’ve thought—”

  He shushed her. Absolutely shushed her.

  She could feel her cheeks blaze and she clenched her jaw. Shush me, will you?

  He put his hands in his pockets, got close to her, and said, “We might’ve wrapped this up sooner if it wasn’t for Charlotte.”

  “Why would you shush me?”

  “Would you knock it off?”

  “It’s rude, that’s all I’ll say.”

  “I said we would’ve wrapped this up sooner if it hadn’t been for Charlotte.”

  “Yeah?”

  “The recording you brought me was what we needed.”

  “I know. I’m great at what I do.”

  “You are,” he said, still not looking at her, eyes over her shoulder. “Charlotte told you about that sympathy card.”

  “Right. Stephen left a sympathy card or something. It didn’t make sense.”

  Marcus said, “It doesn’t make sense. But I’ll tell you what, Charlotte still had the card, and we got it from the Dawson’s place. I called a friend of mine in the FBI last night, and now it makes a lot of sense.”

  “Look at you, Mr. Hot Shot with your friends in the FBI. Soon you’ll be off gallivanting in Langley.”

  “You’re sore about something and I’ll figure it out later, but I’m here on business.”

  “Always working.”

  He pulled his phone from his pocket and swiped the screen. He said, “The sympathy card changed everything. If Charlotte hadn’t hidden that evidence, we'd have figured this out a long time ago. Her arrogance put many people in danger, maybe even including your son.”

  Now a certain flood of embarrassment washed up from her feet. She hadn’t been listening. Her brain had been clouded by the sight of him walking up with a twenty-year-old woman, and then she was off to the races. But now she was all business again. “Tell me.”