Murder at the Beach: Bouchercon 2014 Anthology

by Patricia Abbott

  “Are you okay?” “Where are you?” “Please come back.”

  Ashley stood, brushed sand off her butt, turned, squared her shoulders and headed up the beach. A wave chased her and sloshed at my feet.

  I searched for evidence of Mr. and Mrs. Greene. Found nothing. That was odd, but I had a theory.

  Another wave hit me. I grabbed my backpack, lifted it above the water. It was time to go. I slung the backpack over my shoulder, followed Ashley’s slow slog up the beach. The tablet vibrated in my hand. Another message.

  Get your ass up here!

  Somebody was impatient. Ashley increased her pace and so did I. I walked past her, reached the seawall first and sat. I needed to test my Facebook theory. I clicked through Ashley’s privacy settings and found I was right. Ashley had blocked Donald Greene and Amy Greene. Since they were blocked, she couldn’t see them and they couldn’t see her. I unblocked them.

  Heard a guy over my shoulder say, “Ashley, this is Stu.”

  Ashley said, “Hullo.”

  Stu said, “Jesus, you are a pretty little thing.”

  Ashley asked, “Where should we go?”

  The guy making the introductions said, “The house. First floor.”

  Stu’s Red Sox T-Shirt spread across his gut, leaving a hairy little strip of flab resting over the spot where the T-shirt gave up and the bathing suit presumably began. I imagine Stu hadn’t seen his own crotch in years. Ashley took Stu’s hand, led him across Revere Beach Boulevard, looking more like his daughter than his whore.

  Back on Facebook, Ashley’s wall lit up with increasingly desperate pleas from the now unblocked Donald and Amy looking for their daughter. “We love you Ashley.” “Come home Ashley.” “If you know where we can find Ashley.” “Go to findashley.info.” The amber alerts, shared pleas for information, expressions of forgiveness all painted the same picture.

  I typed, letting Ashley and Stu get some distance between us, then I closed the tablet, put it in the backpack, and slipped off the wall. A twenty-something guy wearing a backwards Bruin’s cap caught my eye. I looked away, crossed Revere Beach Boulevard following Ashley and Stu. I could see them on the other side of the MBTA tracks, walking towards a triple decker.

  I trotted after them, backpack on my shoulder. Lost them for a moment as I cleared the bridge over the tracks, but saw the door to a brown triple decker swinging shut. Ran towards it and slipped inside.

  The triple decker’s hallway smelled of cat piss and mold. I tried the door to the first floor apartment. As I had guessed, it was unlocked so that Bruin’s-cap could have the only key. The door opened into a hallway. Doors opened off the hallway. One was closed. I threw it open, bashing it against the wall.

  Ashley kneeled on mattress in front of Stu, her bikini top tossed to the side next to Stu’s florescent orange bathing suit.

  I said, “For Christ’s sake, Stu, put that thing away. She’s only sixteen.”

  Stu backed away, covering himself. “Who are you?”

  “I’m the police, that’s who.” I’m not, of course, but Stu didn’t know that.

  “I never touched her!”

  I said to Ashley. “Put on your top. We’re going.”

  Ashley said, “But what about Mike?”

  “I’ll take care of Mike.”

  A voice behind me said, “You fucking will, huh?”

  I turned. Bruins-cap stood right behind me holding an aluminum baseball bat. I backed away from him into the room.

  Stu said to Mike, “Careful. He’s a cop.”

  “He’s no fucking cop,” said Mike.

  Ashley had retrieved her top and started to put it on.

  “What are you doing?” Mike asked her. “You go blow that guy.”

  “She’s just a kid, Mike,” I said. “Her parents are looking for her.”

  “I’ve had enough of you,” said Mike. He launched himself at me swinging the bat over his head. The bat arced up, glinting in the sunlight filtering through the dirty windows, came down right at my head. I turned, spinning away from the barrel to take the blow on my shoulder.

  The bat smashed down onto my backpack, shattering the WIFI hotspot and laptop inside. Mike had lost his balance from the force of the swing and stepped forward. I whirled back towards him, planted the toe of my sneaker square between his legs. He grunted, stumbled onto his knees. I slipped the backpack from my shoulder swung it in my own arc, and finished destroying my laptop by mashing it into Mike’s head. The ancient Dell with its massive battery did the rest of the work.

  Ashley stood, bra in hand.

  I said, “You put that on.” Then to Stu, “You stay here.”

  Ashley did as she was told. I took her hand, dragged her out front.

  She asked, “Where are we going?”

  “We’re getting you home.”

  “I can’t go home,” she said, “My parents hate me.”

  “No,” I said, “they love you. Check your Facebook page.”

  A police car pulled up, no doubt a response to the Facebook message I had sent on Ashley’s behalf to Donald and Amy naming the street where they’d find their daughter.

  The cop asked me, “Is this Ashley Greene?”

  I said, “Yeah.”

  “Who are you?”

  “Just a guy who got stuck in the middle.”

  Back to TOC

  Nightshade

  Tanis Mallow

  For the past half hour, I’d studied Ivan Sadovsky through a thicket of privileged tourists. His huge head stood out as though he were another animal altogether, his face a slab of meat, fleshy, seared by too much time in the sun. The girl was late and his fingers, manicured but marred, knuckles knobby with scar tissue, tapped to the rising tempo of his rage.

  She would pay for it later.

  He narrowed his eyes at the bodyguard next to him as though the girl’s tardiness was the man’s fault. The bodyguard switched his considerable bulk back and forth, foot to foot, his obvious discomfort overriding any sense of menace he might have hoped to project.

  Doing a much better job in the composure department, Rajani Dhar sat alone at a table near the door, hiding his deadly physique in a loud Tommy Bahama shirt, baggy plaid shorts and wire frame glasses despite the fact his eyesight was perfect. Props, all of it. He flashed a goofy grin at the hostess and engaged her in friendly banter, a thick Indian accent rolling across the room in an oral fog. More BS. He spoke with no accent and was neither goofy or friendly.

  Why was he here? Part of Sadovsky’s entourage? Doubtful. On the job? Likely. Here for me or someone else? A troubling question.

  I slouched as far in my seat as my short sundress would allow, out of Dhar’s line of sight and sipped on my glass of freebee wine courtesy of the Ritz-Carlton Naples. Within the private sanctum catering to their wealthiest guests, eager club lounge hostesses fluttered about with their decadent offerings of hors d’oeuvres and liquor and God knows what else. Delicate, artful desserts stood on display like rows of debutants posing on a staircase.

  From the hall, the click-clacking of towering heels called our attention to the girl, Tatiana, the fifth player in this tragic production. I took advantage of her arrival, to slip onto one of several small balconies under the guise of making a call. I wasn’t using my cell phone. I was watching her.

  She nearly pulled it off. The pencil skirt. The blond chignon, no roots. The expensive handbag. She almost looked as though she belonged. Almost. The small details gave her away, her choice of foundation too sheer to disguise either the rainbow of bruises or the serpent tattoo running from her right ankle bone to mid-calf, the piercings obvious despite removing the studs and hoops. More than anything, however, the darting eyes, the timid mouth, that terrified I-don’t-belong-here expression served as a neon road sign. Here she is, it announced, the naive young thing about to take the fall for your crime.

  She looked like a child next to Sadovsky. Too innocent—as ironic as that sounded—to be in his company. Too young to
be his child let alone his companion. She winced as he snatched at her wrist and pulled her close, whispering in her ear. She paled noticeably in reaction to whatever he was saying and nodded emphatically. He released her abruptly and his vicious leer followed her to her seat.

  I felt eyes upon me and without glancing up, raised the phone to my ear, mouthing gibberish and gesturing in an animated fashion. Sadovsky might be considered one of the most feared men in Florida—nix that, in the whole of the U.S.—but there was only one person in this room capable of unnerving me and it wasn’t him.

  When at last I met Dhar’s gaze, he didn’t bother to look away. Instead, he narrowed his dark eyes and smiled, the wiry Indian baring his teeth like a wolf snarling at its prey. I shuddered and turned to the calming ocean view with its cathartic rolling surf. I closed my eyes and inhaled long and deep like that single breath may have to sustain me for hours.

  Fire.

  I’m playing with fire even occupying the same room as him.

  Endangered loggerhead turtles take refuge along Florida’s gulf coast where they lay their eggs in the warm sands at night. After nine p.m., the hotel clears the beach of furniture, dims landscape lighting and closes the beach bar.

  More important to me, they darken the balconies.

  Wearing head-to-toe beige, the sandy color of the hotel’s stucco walls, I tugged on lambskin gloves and leaned over the iron railing. Vertigo played with my adrenal glands, releasing that tantalizing buzz. Below, a fountain hidden somewhere in the lush foliage babbled away and surf pounded the shoreline. Further along, traffic roamed the strip under the watchful eye of condo buildings and hotels vying for pristine beachfront. Above stars winked as though they thought this was all a joke.

  Some joke.

  Five floors down, a couple sat out on their own balcony enjoying the night, their words rising on the hot humid air. From here I could see the top of the woman’s head. Blonde. Black tank top. If she tilted her head back she’d see me and she’d most certainly notice if I plummeted past her, a theory I had no desire to test.

  Maybe four feet of air hung between my balcony and the one next door. That and a fourteen-story drop. Between them, a six-inch drain pipe ran from roof to ground. I wiggled it for the third time and once again, it gave no indication it could support anything more than a few pounds. Unfortunate.

  Earlier in the evening, Sadovsky had stood on that same adjacent balcony, smoking a cigar and belittling Tatiana with vicious taunts, precursors to the real fun, the sharp commands and sharper slaps, muffled cries and banging furniture.

  Such a gentleman.

  I stretched my shoulders and rolled my head, feeling the grind of vertebrae. With a final look to the concrete path below, I slipped over the railing to the outside of the balcony, feet jammed between iron bars. In my head, I’d practiced the move a dozen times. My imagination had nothing on the rush of reality.

  Holding on with one hand, I leaned out to a forty-five degree angle, testing my resolve as much as the strength of the railing. I flexed my bicep, pulled in flush and shoved off, leaping to Sadovsky’s balcony with a nimbleness I didn’t know I possessed.

  A car honked and I lost my grip, flailing for a brief second in empty air before regaining my balance. I scrambled over the rail and pressed tight to the wall.

  Well, that was fun.

  The hardest part—other than leaping between balconies—would be convincing the girl. Much easier to take them all out: the target, the companion, the bodyguard, but I was never one for collateral damage.

  Through the glass, I heard the shower running and Sadovsky yowling something I’m sure in his mind sounded like the finest of arias. Tatiana sat crumpled, a tiny island on a sea of sofa cushions, clutching a white towel around her body and sucking hard on a cigarette like she wanted to consume it all in a single drag. Her hair was piled in a messy knot on top of her head, the tips spiky with water. She’d been crying.

  I stepped through the slider, held up an index finger and made a shushing sound. Wide-eyed, her mouth opened and the cigarette dangled as if glued to her bottom lip. She looked like she might run and I touched the knife in my pocket, hoping I wouldn’t have to use it on her.

  “I’m here to help you,” I said. The soothing cadence of my words kept her in place as I approached.

  “Tatiana!” Sadovsky bellowed over the running water, dragging out the name, Ta-tee-a-naaah. She flinched at his voice.

  “He hurts you,” I said, standing over her.

  “He’s a monster,” she said, swiping at tears. Without makeup, she looked even younger. More vulnerable.

  “I can make it so he will never do this”—I pressed a fingertip to a fresh bruise on her neck—“to you again.”

  “Where are you, my little suka?” Sadovsky’s sing-song voice turning to a growl, showing signs of his temper. The shower stopped and Sadovsky barked a string of curses in both English and Russian followed by a massive coughing fit. The shower door slammed.

  Time to move.

  “Let me save you,” I said, extending a hand.

  Tatiana stubbed out her cigarette. “Thank you,” she said.

  Fuelled by the intense mania that always followed a job, the second time over the balcony was easier than the first. I threw a flamboyant muumuu over my clothes, donned a grey wig and, after a quick call to the front desk alerting security, let myself into the hallway, head down, ostensibly searching through an enormous tote bag. Moving slow and stiff-limbed as though suffering in the angry grip of arthritis, I battled my natural inclination to sprint to the elevator, away from the body.

  In a large public restroom on the ground floor, I changed, combed out my dark hair and applied makeup. I hacked the wig apart with my knife and flushed the pieces. The muumuu, tote and gloves found new homes in various garbage cans between there and the pool bar where I spent the next hour drinking some fruity concoction and exchanging flirty words with the young bartender. When the hushed gossip surrounding the sudden appearance of both police cruisers and an ambulance died down, I returned to my original suite, as far from Sadovsky’s as possible.

  The lotion smelled of lemon and sugar and made me think of meringue pie as I rubbed it into my skin still damp from the shower. I pawed through the closet and selected a night gown the muted pink color of the inside of a seashell. Tossed it to the bed and untied my robe.

  He cleared his throat and I froze.

  Rajani Dhar sat in the dim light, no longer in tropical costume but rather wearing a tight black T-shirt and dress pants. A living shadow.

  “Please,” he said, unfolding himself gracefully from the chair. “Do not stop on my account.” His voice poured over me like liquid chocolate, rich and deep and flawless.

  I retied the robe and crossed my hands over my chest, gripping the lapels as though the terrycloth could shield me. He prowled forward, holding my gaze like a cobra.

  “Did you have a successful evening?” he asked, closing in. I nodded once and he grinned, white teeth against dark skin. “Did you not think to consult with me ahead of time?”

  I glanced toward the hall, the door. Escape.

  “Don’t,” he said. “There is no need to run from me.” The mania returned, pouring into me like acid, the need to move, to flee, struggling in vain against the need to obey him.

  He fisted a handful of my hair—hard enough, painful enough, to show he meant business—and forced me face first against the wall. He pressed his full length against mine until I could feel every hard muscle in his body.

  “Yet,” he hissed into my ear, planting my hands flat against the wall, fingers splayed. “Stay still,” he said, the warning inherent, floating like an ice cube in the cocktail of his voice. “Are you armed?”

  “No.”

  “We will see.”

  His hands skimmed over my torso, belly, hips, searching for a weapon I hadn’t had the foresight to keep close, my pockets empty. I closed my eyes as he searched, his body rubbing against mine, his hand
s taking liberties.

  “Do not move.” He knelt and slid his hands down my legs one at a time. “Turn around.”

  “Please.” I didn’t even know what I was begging for. His mercy? My life? Something else entirely?

  “I asked you to turn around.”

  I did as instructed. He laced his fingers in mine and raised them in two arcs as though painting snow angels on the wall. Crossed my wrists over my head and trapped them in one hand while he traced the neckline of my robe with an index finger, following the edge diagonally across my chest to the tie at my hip. He plucked the bow and slowly unwrapped me like a gift, eyes roaming. His fingers traced the lace of my lingerie. Ignoring his earlier command, I dug my hands into his thick coarse hair and whimpered as he sunk his teeth into the soft spot where my neck met my shoulder.

  “I have missed you, Olivia,” he whispered, kissing the bite mark. “It has been far too long since I have had you under me, shaking like a scared rabbit.”

  Filtered by the sheer drapes, dawn light warmed the pale yellow walls. Curled on my side, he held me loosely, my back to his chest. I wasn’t ready for the day but apparently Dhar’s curiosity demanded the conversation we’d so aptly avoided the night before.

  “Imagine my surprise when first the police”—he said the word with some distain—“and then the medical examiner showed up outside Mr. Sadovsky’s door.” I said nothing. “You have deprived me of some fun. I suppose I will need to find a new client.”

  “As if that’s a problem for you. As if you even need the money.”

  “I am easily bored,” he said. “Idle hands and all of that.”

  “I can think of something to do with your idle hands,” I said, trying to distract him. I wasn’t sure what he knew or the extent of his anger, an emotion always hidden beneath his cool facade. He grazed my shoulder blade with his mouth, stubble scratching my skin.