The Tell Tail Heart

by Cate Conte

  Maybe whoever had shut the door had been on their way out, not in?

  This whole thing was ridiculous. If someone was in here, there’s no way they didn’t hear us. We weren’t that quiet. Then again, the place was big and old and drafty. Maybe noises didn’t bother whoever it was, especially if he or she was used to it. Maybe they were breaking into a safe right now. Were any of these ships in safes?

  I turned to ask Ava-Rose that question, but I didn’t see her. Or Val. Maybe they were being better at undercover than I was.

  Then I heard a noise from down the hall. I saw a shadowy figure going through a door in the back. Lights flared on for a second, and I could see the outline of a man from behind. Then the door shut behind him.

  Ava-Rose sprang from her position behind the bar. “I knew it!” she exclaimed in a triumphant whisper as Val came out behind her.

  I glanced at my sister. “Knew what?”

  “Shhh. It’s Drake.”

  This still seemed very anticlimactic to me, considering he worked here. “I don’t think we’re going to prove anything on him being here alone, since he works here and all. Maybe he’s been at the hospital all day with his sick kid, and had to come at night to take care of business. Did you know he had a sick kid?” I whispered to Ava-Rose.

  Before she could answer, the front door creaked open again. We all ducked. I took cover behind a replica of a wooden ship’s steering wheel and peeked out through the spokes. And almost fell over in surprise when I saw Craig poke his head through.

  “Hello?” he called out, stepping into the main hall, one hand hovering over his gun.

  We all froze. Before I could decide to give him a heads-up that we were up here, the door to the office opened and the infamous Dr. Drake stuck his head out. “Hello. Can I help you?”

  “Officer Craig Tomlin. I had a report of suspicious activity over here,” Craig said. “Your name, sir?”

  I hid a grin. Craig hadn’t let me down after all.

  Drake stepped out of the office. “Alvin Drake. I’m on the board of directors.” He took a few steps down the hall toward Craig, who kept his hand hovering over his gun.

  I leaned forward as far as I could to hear.

  “I’m not sure who would’ve called in suspicious activity, but unless a board member being on premises is suspicious there’s nothing wrong here,” Drake said. “I’m sorry you had to come out.”

  “Understood, sir,” Craig said smoothly. “Just making sure whoever is in here is supposed to be in here, that’s all.”

  “Yes, I’m here working on a few things. And as a board member, I’m here whenever I need to be. I can assure you that all is well.”

  I knew Ava-Rose wouldn’t be so sure of that. I turned to see if she was going to jump out of her hiding spot—and accidentally knocked over the knee-high statue of the ship’s captain standing next to the wheel. It went crashing to the ground. Luckily, his head didn’t break off. Drake and Craig both spun around in the direction of the sound. Craig’s gun was suddenly in his hand.

  Crap.

  Chapter 38

  “Who’s there?” Drake barked, taking a step forward before Craig could do anything.

  Craig motioned him back. “Police! Show your hands and step forward slowly.”

  I sighed and stood up. “It’s me, Craig. Val’s here, too. And Ava-Rose.” I motioned for them to stand up.

  “Maddie?” Craig feigned surprise. “What are you doing here?”

  “The real question is, what is he doing here?” Ava-Rose came out from behind the bar, pointing an accusing finger at Drake. I half-expected her to shine her flashlight in his eyes for some real, old-fashioned interrogation. I wondered if she’d been watching old Agatha Christie movies in preparation for this.

  “Ava-Rose?” Drake squinted up at the bar. “What on earth?”

  “Oh, don’t what on earth me.” Ava-Rose clamored down the stairs into the main floor of the club, flicking lights on when she reached the bottom, illuminating the space in which they stood. “And you.” She pointed at Craig. “You should put that gun away, young man, before someone gets hurt.”

  Craig frowned. “I’m a police officer, ma’am. I’m fully trained in how to use this.”

  Ava-Rose stared at him, hands on her skinny hips, until he finally holstered his gun.

  “About time,” she muttered. “Are you going to question him?”

  “Ava-Rose, you need to settle down please. Then we can all talk.”

  “Question me about what?” Drake asked, incredulous, spinning toward Craig.

  Val poked me. “Seriously?”

  “What?” I asked, indignant. “Come on, we better get down there.” I started down the steps, Val close behind.

  “Can we find somewhere to talk?” Craig asked Drake.

  I had just reached the bottom of the stairs when I heard Drake say quietly to Craig, “I think she’s beginning to suffer from dementia, poor woman. Perhaps you could take her home?”

  “Dementia?” Ava-Rose shrieked. “The only dementia I’ve ever had is voting to add you to the board. Where is the Mayflower replica?”

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about,” he said, and eyed me and Val. “Are you still planning this party?”

  “Don’t you worry about my party!” Ava-Rose took a menacing step forward.

  “Hang on a second,” Craig interrupted, holding up his hands between Drake and Ava-Rose like he was about to break up a fight. Which he might have to. “Let’s all take a breath.”

  I expected them both to yell, He/she started it! No one did, but Ava-Rose kept glaring at Drake.

  “You want to tell me what’s going on here?” Craig demanded.

  Before either of them could answer, the front door opened again and a man stepped in. All our heads swiveled toward him.

  “Hi. Michael Blake. I saw the police car,” he said, looking curiously at the eclectic assembly in front of him. “I’m with the Chronicle. Thought there might be a story.”

  I watched the calculations on Ava-Rose’s face. It took her a split second to make her decision. Like a hawk sighting its prey, she zeroed in on the reporter, turning her back on Craig and Drake.

  “There most certainly is a story. Someone’s stealing from our centuries-old, historical establishment,” Ava-Rose announced. “And I think it’s him.” She pointed dramatically at Drake.

  “Now wait a second!” Drake exclaimed, his face turning red.

  Craig expertly stepped in front of him. “Step back,” he commanded. “Or I’ll have to put you in handcuffs until you cool off.”

  Eyes wide, Michael Blake whipped out his notebook, taking in the unfolding drama. “Is there merit to these allegations?” he asked, glancing at Craig.

  “Of course there isn’t,” Drake said, sounding outraged.

  “No comment,” Craig said. “I’m going to have to ask you to leave.”

  “Oh, sure,” Ava-Rose sneered. “What, did he pay you off?”

  “Ava-Rose,” Val hissed.

  I could see Craig was not happy about any of this. Which meant I was going to get an earful about him doing me a “favor” on his night off that appeared to be turning into quite a cluster.

  “Mrs. Buxton. I need you to settle down,” Craig said, fighting to keep his tone neutral.

  “I don’t have to leave. This is a public place,” Blake said.

  “We’re closed for the season,” Drake and Ave-Rose said in unison, then glared at each other.

  Craig gritted his teeth. “Fine. Then we’ll leave.” He looked at Drake. “I’d like you both to come to the station with me so we can sort this out.”

  “You have got to be joking,” Drake said.

  “I’m not going anywhere,” Ava-Rose said with a sniff. “I need to call Simon.”

  The latest husband, I assumed. I’d lost track of their names.

  “Well, then call him,” Craig said. “Because we’re getting this resolved, and we’re not doing it here.”
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  “We have to do it here,” Ava-Rose said. “Because here I can show you everything that’s missing.”

  “Missing?” Craig asked.

  She glared at him again. “Young man. Don’t you listen? I just told you someone was stealing some of our replicas.”

  “Have you reported it?” Craig asked.

  Ava-Rose hesitated. “No. I wanted to be absolutely certain no one had misplaced them. But I know that’s not what happened.” She marched over to the back wall of the large room. The best way I could describe it was like a built-in bookcase, only for ships. The entire wall from ceiling to floor was ships, with varying shapes, sizes, and sails, built into their own little compartments. And on closer perusal, sure enough, a few of the little compartments were empty.

  We all trailed over to the wall to look more closely, even Drake. Blake tagged along.

  Craig looked from Ava-Rose to Drake. “And these are usually filled?”

  “Of course,” Ava-Rose said. “We created this wall specific to the number of replicas we had. As we expand, we’re going to make another replica wall over there.” She waved behind us at one of the side walls, currently a tacky reminder of the seventies with its wood paneling. The whole place felt like a time warp to me, with its red leather decor in the bar and all the dark wood and tight spaces. Then again, I guessed they were trying to make it feel like the inside of a ship. “But for now, this is what we have. And my family had a hand in creating some of these replicas, so the loss is even more obvious.”

  Craig’s eyes met mine over Ava-Rose’s head. I could read the look on his face easily. It said, Thanks, I really needed this on my night off. Or maybe, This is the last time I listen to your insane ramblings.

  “When did you notice they were missing again?” he asked her.

  “Over the past couple of weeks,” she said.

  Drake made a sound kind of like a snort of disbelief. She gave him a filthy look.

  “And why didn’t you report it immediately?” Craig asked.

  For the first time, Ava-Rose looked defensive. “Because I wanted to make sure I had my facts straight,” she said. “I checked with the cleaning crew to make sure nothing had been broken, or that they hadn’t been asked to polish the boats by the regular staff. Then I checked with our management.”

  “Did you notify Bruno?” Drake asked.

  “Who’s Bruno?” Craig asked.

  “Bruno Schaefer. Our board president. And no,” Ava-Rose said. “He’s out of the country for the winter. He left me in charge.” She puffed out her bony chest importantly.

  “Maybe one of the staff members stole them,” Drake pointed out. “They have young people working here.” His inflection on the words young people indicated that he did not hold this group in high esteem.

  “It’s winter, you fool,” Ava-Rose said. “We’re closed. We have a couple of managers and bartenders on a skeleton crew for certain events. If you paid attention, you’d know this.”

  “Okay,” Craig interrupted, his voice weary. “This is what we’re going to do. Ava-Rose, I’d like you to file a report on the missing items and we’ll look into it. Mr. Drake—”

  “It’s Dr.,” Drake corrected.

  Craig gritted his teeth, just a little. “Dr. Drake. I’d like you to come with us while she does that. I have a few more questions for you.”

  I held my breath, waiting for Drake to pitch a fit, start yelling for an attorney, or just walk out. But he didn’t do any of those things. Instead, he kind of deflated. With a glance at his watch, he adjusted his shirt sleeves again.

  “Fine. Let’s get it over with, then,” he said. “So we can all move on with our lives.”

  Chapter 39

  “That was exciting,” I said once we were back in the car. Craig had basically thrown us out and had Ava-Rose lock the place up. He asked her to follow him to the station, then invited Drake to ride with him. He didn’t put him in the back seat, but still. I got the sense he didn’t trust him to not drive away. Although there weren’t many places he could go right now, with the ferry service halted.

  The rain had turned into sleet. The water was rising dangerously high behind the yacht club, nipping at the stone wall lining the parking area. Tonight was supposed to be the worst of it, with the high winds causing potential flood conditions. I wondered how bad it would get.

  “For sure,” Val agreed. “And pretty coincidental, too, huh?” She looked at me, eyebrows raised.

  “Which part?” I asked casually. Obviously, I hadn’t tipped Val off that I’d told Craig about this sting operation, but she was a smart girl.

  “The whole Craig happening by to see why the lights were on.” Val started the car. “You told him.”

  “I may have mentioned it.” I tried to look sufficiently sorry about that but probably failed. “Hey, I didn’t know what would happen, Val. This is serious. Someone died. You’re saying someone is stealing things. These are high stakes, don’t you think?”

  “Hmmph.” Val pulled onto the street with a little more gas than necessary. She didn’t have a good answer to that, but she didn’t want to say it. “You’ve always kind of minded everyone’s business, Maddie.”

  “I have not!”

  “Of course you have. You did it over the summer with me and Cole.”

  “Val. Seriously? I’m your big sister. You were falling apart. Someone needed to step in and give you a push in the right direction. And look how well things turned out once you saw the light!”

  “Exactly what I’m saying.” She stopped at a red light. The car coming from the other direction caught my eye as it passed under the streetlights directly in front of us. The lights illuminated it just enough that I could see it was a gray Toyota Corolla. I peered through the sleet for a glimpse of the license plate and felt my heart do a flip when I saw SKY.

  I sat up and grabbed Val’s arm. “That’s her. Thea Coleman. Follow her!”

  “What? What do you mean, follow her?” Val watched the car drive slowly down the cross street, in the total opposite direction of where we were going.

  “Follow. Her. Go!” I squeezed her arm.

  She shook me off, put her blinker on, and turned left to follow the car.

  I looked at her. “Wow. I can’t believe you actually listened to me.”

  “I should drop you off at the hospital,” she grumbled. “So they can give you a psych evaluation. Where are we going?”

  “Wherever she’s going,” I said.

  “Well, what do you think you’re going to find out by tailing this woman?”

  I wasn’t sure. I had some ideas, but nothing I wanted to voice just yet. “I don’t know. Where she’s staying, maybe. Or who she knows around here. Maybe we’ll catch her doing something else totally illegal and we can get her arrested.”

  “Sure. Sounds rational to me,” Val said dryly. “And how is this any better than Ava-Rose’s stakeout idea?”

  I squirmed in my seat. I hated when Val threw my own words back at me. “It’s different.”

  “Why, because you aren’t almost eighty?”

  “Just trust me. She’s turning,” I said, pointing in front of us.

  Val braked to give the car a little headway. The roads were getting slippery, and the car fishtailed a bit. She muttered a curse and let up on the brake, regained traction, and turned right. Luckily, this time Thea wasn’t driving like she was qualifying for the Daytona 500 and no other cars were interfering with our detective work.

  We followed my nemesis down a bunch of winding side streets until we ended up on Sand Dune Avenue on the east side of the island. This was a one-lane road in both directions that ran parallel to the ocean. It was quite beautiful in the daytime. And if you followed it all the way, it ran along the coast of every town on the island and was basically one big circle.

  Where was she going? First, it could hardly be for a scenic drive, since it was pitch black out, sleeting and windy tonight, and you couldn’t even see the ocean, except for th
e places it had risen and was lapping at the roads. You could only hear it pounding against the dunes in the distance.

  And second, while you could get to every town, this route was a roundabout way of getting anywhere on the island, except to any of the beaches. Which, again, seemed an odd place to be headed on a cold November night.

  Now I was really curious.

  Val glanced at the clock on her dash. “Maddie. I’m starving. And I can barely see with this stupid weather. Half the roads out here are flooding. It’s all over the news. Do we really need to follow this woman around the whole island?”

  She was right. Both our phones keep signaling news alerts and flash flood warnings as the angry waters pounded past normal boundaries. The beach roads, like the ones we were on, would be the first to suffer.

  “Hey,” I said indignantly. “What if Craig hadn’t shown up and cut our stakeout short? We might’ve still been stuck up in that bar, listening to Drake work on books or whatever he’s doing.”

  Val sighed. “I guess you have a point.”

  “I know I do. Let’s keep going for just a couple more minutes,” I said. “If she ends up just taking a drive, we can abort. But she has to be down here for a reason. I feel like she might be going somewhere we’d want to know about.”

  “Not me,” Val muttered, but she kept driving anyway.

  I kept my eyes glued to her taillights, even though ours were the only two cars on the road right now. I wondered if she was suspicious. Or if she’d even noticed.

  My phone dinged a text. I glanced down and saw Lucas’s name.

  Hey, babe. Been a long day. Wish I could get home. Miss you.

  Miss you, too, I texted back. You wouldn’t believe the night we’re having.

  But before I could finish my thought Val stomped on the brake. I grabbed the dash to keep from being thrown forward.

  “Whoa. What’s up?” I peered ahead and realized our fugitive had her brake lights on. Had she realized she was being followed?