by Agatha Ball
But from the moment I flipped the door sign from "Closed" to "Open," I realized that no one else was going to let me pretend it had all been in my imagination.
It seemed like the entire town had decided our shop was Ground Zero for the emergency of last night. Granny's posse was the first to arrive and they arrived in full force—Marnie, Wanda, and Holly. I bit my tongue and stopped myself from asking them if they didn't have their own shops to run.
"Oh Paige," clucked Marnie, tossing her grey braid over her shoulder. "We heard what happened! If you need anything... anything at all... you just let us know," she said, patting my hand sympathetically as I passed her a roll and her cup of coffee.
Wanda barely bothered with the pretense. "Just AWFUL!" She leaned over the counter. "And no one knows who he was, is that right? Some stranger who was just drifting through town and murdered?"
"I don't really know," I said, trying to rush through their orders so I'd have an excuse to not talk about it anymore. "It was very dark."
"And near your cottage!" squeaked Holly, sipping her tea as she held it in both hands like I was some riveting TV show. "I wouldn't be able to sleep at night knowing a murderer might be right outside my door!"
I took a deep breath as I rang up their charges on the till, reminding myself that Granny's posse were good people. But I felt like I was just a few moments away from telling them that maybe they should all go get a good look of the outside of the Bitter Beans door.
Instead, I just decided not to give them the "friends discount." Wanda stared suspiciously at the change I put in her hands and bobbed it up and down like she knew it should weigh more.
We were interrupted by Granny coming out of her apartment. Gone was her funky sweaters and kooky shirts. She was dressed in a magenta button-down shirt that matched her magenta hair and magenta mules. You know things were serious when Granny pulled the business casual out of the closet.
"Now now, girls," Granny said in a no-nonsense tone. "You're not hounding my granddaughter, are you? We'll have none of that."
Her friends took the cue.
"Just here to let her know that if she needs a place to stay," squeaked Holly, pushing her old-fashioned, brass-rimmed glasses up on her nose, "I know that we all have couches and spare rooms and, Paige, you are COMPLETELY welcome."
I knew that if I took up any of them on their offer, I could look forward to my life being the subject of all the village gossip until I left town. It was a bad idea to show fear.
"I'm fine," I said. "Really. I can hardly wait to get back to my little cottage. This was just a fluke."
"She's so brave!" Wanda exclaimed to Granny. "A fighter!"
"Yes, she is," affirmed Granny, her hand upon my shoulder in solidarity. "Now, she has a lot of baking to do, and I'm sure you all have work to be done before the morning ferry. I'll let you know as soon as we hear anything."
The three of her friends nodded and clucked and cast me sympathetic looks as they walked out the door.
"Bunch of nosy biddies," she said as the last of them left. She turned to me. "Do you want the day off? Because if I were you, I might want to spend the day watching TV."
"We only get two stations," I reminded her.
"You really don't need to stay at your cottage. I would like it so much better if you stayed here."
"I LOVE my cottage!"
"You should see if Johnny wants to stay with you."
"I'll totally ask him today if he wants to crash on my couch," I assured her.
She held her arms out wide. "I have a shop full of books that are looking for a reader."
I could see she really wanted to do whatever she could to make me feel okay. I smiled. "I think that being distracted by work will do me good."
She squinted at me, trying to figure out if I meant it.
"I mean it!" I insisted.
She seemed to believe me, because she exhaled and said, "Fine. FINE! But I don't want you telling your mother I made you run a cash register on a day that I thought you should spend at the beach."
"It will be good for me to be here."
"Okay," she replied, reluctantly walking back toward the door to her apartment. "I'm going upstairs now. But you come get me at ANY point you start feeling like you need to sort out your head. You promise?"
"I promise," I said.
She suddenly rushed over and kissed me on the forehead, and then went back to the door. "Good. I love you."
"I love you too, Granny."
The rest of the day was a blur, and we completely sold out of my baked goods. I guess nothing pushes product quite like drama and gossip. There was the normal influx of tourists, plus every single person I ever met in town. The till was full by the time Stan stopped by to drag me off for my statement. Granny shooed me out, as if it weren't a complete hassle for her to hold down the fort while I said into a tape recorder everything I told Stan the night before.
He sat me across the desk from him, and Fred kept popping his head into the office to eavesdrop. When I was done, Stan folded his arms and sat back in his chair. "If you hadn't been so insistent that Nate was innocent, we might not have wasted such valuable time holding him," he said.
"What?" I replied, not following his logic at all.
"A person comes along, saying someone is innocent, and I have to waste all my time proving that they aren't," he clarified with exasperation.
"That's kind of how the law works," I oh-so-gently reminded him. "Innocent until proven guilty?"
Stan began shuffling papers into a manila folder defensively. "Well, if I didn't have to waste all that time proving Nate guilty, I could have been out there looking for the person who really WAS guilty." He then gave me a hard glare.
I needed to make sure I was understanding the subtext of that glare correctly. "You're blaming me for the death of a stranger who was killed practically on my doorstep?"
"Did you kill him?" asked Stan, pointing a finger at me.
The man had been watching too many episodes of CSI. "Of COURSE not," I replied, completely aghast.
He seemed disappointed. "You sure? It was dark out."
"I am absolutely, positively sure that I did not kill the man whose death I called you to report."
"Where were you last night?" he asked sharply, like he was a detective in some black-and-white movie.
"Over at Jake's with the rest of town celebrating Byron's life."
"Because you're happy he's dead?"
"NO!" I answered, unable to comprehend the way these questions were turning. "I went to Jake's Tavern along with the rest of the town because they were serving $1 shots. Then I walked Johnny back and put him to bed—-"
"You sure he went to bed? That kid has always been trouble."
"His DAD has always been trouble, Stan. Johnny has been one of the sweetest kids in the world," I retorted.
"But you're SURE he went to bed?"
"He passed out before I left," I replied. I have no idea if Johnny actually passed out or not, but I was sure he didn't head off into the countryside to start murdering strangers.
"And then what?"
"I went home. Granny called. Her cat was missing."
"That's definitely out of the ordinary." He stopped me to take a few notes. "Captain is a good cat. Not like him to go missing."
"Yes, a very good cat who likes to sit inside Granny's apartment," I replied. "So, I went out to find him and I found him. And as I was carrying him back, I stepped on the hand of the body."
"No chance the cat could have killed him?" he asked, not looking up from his notepad as he continued to scribble. "Accidental homicide? Cats are always tripping people."
I blinked at Stan. "You said the man had been garroted. Are you saying the cat garroted him?"
With a disappointed sigh, he crossed off something on his pad.
"Did you really write Captain's name on your list of potential suspects?" I asked him.
He shrugged. "Everyone is a suspect until proven otherwise.
As Sherlock Holmes says, the remaining answer, no matter how improbable, is the truth. Seemed like a cat accidentally strangling someone would fall under the improbable."
"The cat didn't kill him," I restated. "Do we even know who him is?"
"Not yet," said Stan, tapping his pencil next to an item on his to-do list. "But it is next on my to-do list." He shook his head. "I still think it is that Nate fella is mixed up in this somehow."
"He was barely in town when Old Man Byron was killed," I reminded him. "And he was locked up and in your jail when this other guy was killed."
"Probably a red herring. A detail he orchestrated to throw me off the scent. Seems pretty open and shut if you ask me,” he replied.
“How can you say that?” I asked. "There’s nothing open and shut about it.”
“Well," Stan responded, folding his arms and leaning back in his wooden chair. "That’s why I’m the town’s police officer and you’re not.”
“You didn’t answer my question.”
He shifted uncomfortably. "Well...”
I suddenly saw that he didn’t have a good answer for me. I realized that he didn’t actually know what he was doing and this was the problem. He didn’t want anyone to know that he didn’t know. And that's what made him an idiot.
He leaned forward. "The thing is, we never had a murder in this town until he showed up. I mean, we might have had a missing person or two, but it was years ago.”
“Okay, so because Nate was here and a murder happened, you think he did it?” I repeated back at him slowly.
Stan shrugged his shoulders. "Listen, I don’t tell you how to do your business. You don’t tell me how to do mine." He put down his pen to take a sip of his coffee. He blew on it and scalded his tongue. "Should have gotten an ice cube...”
"Can I go now?" I asked, so done with this conversation. "Granny is all by herself at the coffee shop and it's a Saturday afternoon."
He nodded reluctantly. "Just don't go skipping town! I've watched a Sherlock or two in my day and it is always the one you least expect. You're not off my list yet."
"I really, really didn't kill that man," I reiterated, hoping he might understand how much I really didn't kill him.
"All the same," Stan replied. "Don't leave town."
"I'll be here all summer," I responded, getting up. "You know where to find me."
I walked out the door and heaved a gigantic sigh. If this is what Nate had been going through, I owed him a visit to see how he was doing.
I got back to the coffee shop to relieve Granny. The more time passed, the madder I got. By the time the last customer left and I flipped the sign to "Closed" I was fit to be tied. I cleaned the coffee bar and swept up the shop with a fervor I don't think I'd ever displayed. I took off my apron. Granny had caught on I wasn't in the best of moods and had gone upstairs, leaving me to my cleaning therapy.
I walked out of the shop and locked the door behind me. We always stayed open late on the weekends, and the sun was already down by quitting time. I could hear the sound of people in the restaurants down the road as I wandered down to the empty beach with no Stan around to harsh my mellow.
The moon hung full overhead. The sound of the waves washed over me and I closed my eyes. This was my peace. This is where I felt whole. I collapsed onto the sand and just let the sound of the wind and the waves crashing on the shore wash over me.
I heard footsteps in the sand and looked over, figuring it was just a tourist.
But it wasn’t just a tourist. It was Nate, the one person who, I am sure, was having a worse day than I was. He hadn’t seen me yet. He just stood at the top of the bluff, gazing out into the ocean. I saw him heave a huge breath and then his shoulders collapse with sadness.
I didn’t know what to do. It was such a private moment. But if he saw me and I didn’t say anything, it would seem like I was some sort of crazy voyeur.
“Hey!” I said softly.
His head jerked up and he brushed away his cheeks. He saw me and relaxed. "Hey, Paige!”
I patted the sand beside me and he seemed grateful for the invitation.
"So, you busted out, huh?"
"A regular jailbird," he replied in a weak attempt at a joke. He sat down and stared out at the ocean. "Thanks again for coming to see me," he said, grabbing up a fistful of sand and then watching as it sifted through his fingers. "I really appreciated it."
"I might need you to return the favor," I replied, shaking my head.
"What?" he asked.
I waved away his question. The man had just gotten out of jail and the clutches of that jerk of a police officer. "It's nothing. How are you doing?" I asked. "Are you okay?"
He brushed away some grains that had landed on his pant leg. I could see his brain scrolling through the five million things he wanted to say. He finally settled on: "It has been a tough couple days."
I rested my hand on his shoulder. "It’s okay now.”
“It’s not,” he said. "It really isn’t." There was a crack in his strong, silent veneer and I caught a glimpse of the vulnerable man I had witnessed in his private moment. "To be accused of doing... to be..." He stopped himself. "To have someone you cared about die horribly and then be locked up in a prison and accused of doing it. And to know the real killer is out there and no one cares. And you know that if you just had a chance you'd at least try to find out the truth since the idiots guarding you are never going to figure it out... but you're stuck sitting in a cell... powerless... it doesn't make for the best end of the week.”
It came out of my mouth before I could stop it. It was that word "powerless." I had sworn last night I would never let myself feel that way again, and I wasn't about to let someone like Nate feel that way. "I’ll help you find whoever did it.”
Nate looked at me like he was seeing me for the first time. "Really?” he asked. "You’d do that?"
“Of course,” I replied. I then decided I owed him a little more explanation. "Stan just accused me of killing a dead guy I found last night."
"There's been a second murder?" asked Nate, in shock.
I couldn't believe Stan and Fred. "They didn't tell you when they let you go?"
He shook his head. "They just said the hold was up, and not to leave town."
"Jerks."
"Yeah," he laughed without humor. He looked at me with concern. "Are you okay?"
I took a deep breath, not wanting to lose control. "I didn't have such a great day, either," I admitted.
"Oh, Paige," said Nate, reaching out to give me a comforting awkward side hug. It's hard to angle your body right when you're sitting side-by-side in the sand with someone. But I appreciated the effort.
"I came down here to see where it happened," he confessed. "I wanted to do it when there weren't a ton of people around to stare at me. But I'm glad that you were here. It sounds like we both really needed the company."
"Ain't that the truth," I replied, pulling my knees to my chest and wrapping my arms around my legs.
"So...what happened?" he asked.
I really didn't want to bring up all of the memories, so I just gave him the abbreviated version. "That's the real reason why they let you go," I finally finished. "It looks like we've got a serial killer on the loose."
"Great," said Nate. He then looked at me. "And you're sitting here alone by yourself on a beach?"
"I'm a tough broad," I tried to joke. From the look on his face, though, I could see that my own veneer was cracking and I was showing off my inner marshmallow. I tried to push past it. "Stan keeps swearing that he's going to pin this on you somehow. He was mad at me because I kept insisting you were innocent. He accused me of doing it. He even accused my Granny's cat."
"A cat. For real?"
"Said that maybe the cat tripped the guy. You know. Tripped him and then strangled him to death."
"As cats do."
"Stan is not going to help us. But if we're not careful, he's going to invent some story he's going to pin on us becau
se he doesn't want people to figure out he's a train wreck."
"I'm glad you believed I was innocent, Paige," said Nate sincerely.
"I knew you couldn’t do something like that. Murder someone. I knew it wasn’t in you.”
He leaned back and regarded me. “And how did you know that?” he asked.
“You have kind eyes,” I replied with a smile.
They were full of tears and red and puffy, but there was a crinkle that came to the corners. He reached up and brushed back a wisp of my hair that had come free from my ponytail. "Of all the people here, you’re the only one who thought that.”
“Well, it is easier for them to think an outsider did it,” I said. "Otherwise, they’d have to admit it was someone they know. But there's only one way in and out, and that's by boat. So, either the murderer has already left... or is still here.”
We stared out at the ocean together, lost in thought.
Nate finally broke the silence. "We'll find him. If he's here, we'll clear our names and find him."
Chapter Twelve
The next morning came entirely too soon. Mondays are never anyone's favorite day, but for me, it wasn't too bad. Since weekends are our busiest times, I got my day off on Tuesday, and we closed up early during the week since there was no reason to stay open. The tourist crowd headed home on the afternoon ferry, and all the locals stopped by yesterday to ogle at me, so it was just the normal, run of the mill hassles as opposed to the sympathetic and curious looks from the day before.
In fact, by the time it was time to shutter up the place, there wasn't a single customer I needed to shoo out.
But I spoke too soon. As I was walking to the front to flip the sign to "closed", a gentleman walked in. He caused every single red flag in my soul to start waving for my attention. Something was really, really wrong with this guy.
His face was weathered and sunburned and his dirty blonde hair would have been bleached white by the sun except it was covered by a layer of dirt that left it an awful shade of grey. There was brown dirt clogged in his pores. His face sported a beard, but no mustache. He wore a navy blue turtleneck and dirty, white jeans. Atop his head, he wore a ship's captain hat that I might have dismissed as a Halloween costume, except that it was so authentic.
