The Upstaged Coroner

by Paul Austin Ardoin

  The Upstaged Coroner

  The Upstaged Coroner

  A Fenway Stevenson Mystery Number Four

  Paul Austin Ardoin

  Pax Ardsen Books

  THE UPSTAGED CORONER

  Copyright © 2019 Paul Austin Ardoin

  All rights reserved.

  ISBN 978-1-949082-11-1

  * * *

  No parts of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the copyright owner.

  * * *

  This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser. Under no circumstances may any part of this book be photocopied for resale.

  * * *

  This is a work of fiction. Any similarity between the characters and situations within its pages and places or persons, living or dead, is unintentional and coincidental.

  * * *

  Edited by Max Christian Hansen

  Additional copyediting by Kiyle Brosius

  Cover design by Ziad Ezzat of Feral Creative Colony

  Author photo by Monica Toohey-Krause of Studio KYK

  Find information about the author at http://www.paulaustinardoin.com

  To Murph

  Table of Contents

  I. Wednesday

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  II. Thursday

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  III. Friday

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  IV. Saturday

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Acknowledgments

  Want More Fenway?

  The quality of mercy is not strain’d,

  It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven

  Upon the place beneath: it is twice blest;

  It blesseth him that gives and him that takes:

  ’Tis mightiest in the mightiest: it becomes

  The throned monarch better than his crown;

  His sceptre shows the force of temporal power,

  The attribute to awe and majesty,

  Wherein doth sit the dread and fear of kings;

  But mercy is above this sceptred sway;

  It is enthroned in the hearts of kings,

  It is an attribute to God himself;

  And earthly power doth then show likest God’s

  When mercy seasons justice.

  —William Shakespeare, The Merchant of Venice, Act IV, Scene 1

  I

  Wednesday

  Chapter One

  Fenway Stevenson sat up in bed. She grimaced and tapped her fingernails against her teeth, then turned to her bedside table and looked at the clock—3:43.

  Oh, what the hell. She picked up the mobile phone on the bedside table.

  Before she could unplug it from its charger, it rang and vibrated in her hand. She almost dropped it and blinked hard. The screen read Craig McVie. She chuckled and pictured him tossing and turning for the last few hours, too, wondering if he should call her to finish what they started last night—before Fenway found out her father had been arrested for murder.

  She cleared her throat and answered, her heart fluttering.

  “Hey, Sheriff,” she said in her best sultry voice. “Couldn’t sleep either, huh?”

  “It’s not that.” He sounded professional and serious.

  Fenway’s heart sank.

  “The night janitor at Nidever University called. There’s a body at the bottom of a stairwell in the theater department. We need to get over there right away.”

  Fenway filled the coffeepot with water and started the coffeemaker. It took her twenty minutes to shower and throw on one of her less rumpled business pantsuits. She grabbed a commuter cup, pulled the carafe from the coffeemaker—it was just hot water. She’d forgotten to dump the coffee in the filter.

  She walked out of her apartment before she remembered that the crime scene unit hadn’t processed her Accord yet.

  Fenway frowned as she ordered her Uber. Not many drivers were up this early and the closest one was fifteen minutes away. She confirmed the pickup and went back into the apartment. She was getting her coffee, dammit.

  She scooped the coffee into the filter and turned things over in her mind. Her Accord should have been the first car processed—surely there were other cars with more ash, with some real evidence from the explosion. She’d have to speak to the idiots who ran the impound yard.

  She shook her head as she pushed the start button. This was no way to start off the day. She knew the people who ran the yard. She liked the people who ran the yard. They weren’t idiots.

  What the hell was wrong with her?

  Maybe it was the interrupted romantic evening. After having to spend the whole election season apart, Fenway and McVie could finally, finally, finally date. He’d just been served divorce papers, and she’d won her election, and no one would care that they were dating.

  Before the election, it had been too risky. McVie wasn’t technically divorced, and the voters could reject both of them, although it probably would have affected his candidacy for mayor more than her candidacy for coroner. There was the age difference too, but fourteen years’ difference hardly seemed like anything to clutch one’s pearls over.

  Neither of their campaign managers said it, but they didn’t have to: he was white and she was black. Half black. Perceived as black. Whatever. Fenway’s nose twitched as she poured the coffee into a mug. That didn’t seem like anything to worry about either, but elections brought out the worst in people.

  She was halfway through her second cup when her phone dinged. The Uber was here.

  The ride was devoid of conversation; the driver had Johnny Cash on the sound system, but at such a low volume Fenway could barely hear it.

  The last several hours had been surreal. McVie was right to leave the apartment. When Fenway had seen her stepmother’s name on the screen at midnight, she thought Charlotte wanted to bug her about dinner or maybe congratulate her on her election victory.

  But no. It had been serious.

  Fenway sank lower in the back seat. She didn’t want to think about it. But she couldn’t help it. She hadn’t been able to stop thinking about it since the midnight call.

  She shut her eyes tight.

  A decade earlier and a thousand miles away, at Western Washington University, Fenway had approached Professor Solomon Delacroix after class about her upcoming essay in Russian Lit. The professor had invited her to his office. And he had locked the door.

  Fenway shut her eyes tighter.

  Fenway had switched majors and gone into nursing. She hadn’t told a soul about it before her mother passed away and she moved here from Seattle. She hadn’t even told her mother. She’d pushed down the
humiliation, pushed down the anger and sadness.

  But three months ago, Barry Klein—the opportunistic narcissist on the county board of supervisors—had approached her. No, he’d tried to blackmail her. He’d found a video of her assault on the dark web. Delacroix hadn’t just raped her, he’d recorded it, and Klein threatened to go public with it if she ran for coroner.

  All the humiliation and the pain and the powerlessness and the hurt came flooding back. As much as she hadn’t wanted to, she’d told her father. She’d gone through that humiliation again, telling her rich, white, entitled, spoiled brat of a father. As much as she hated telling him, she didn’t want him finding out from anyone else.

  And as far as Barry Klein was concerned, she wasn’t worried about him. It was mutually assured destruction. It was illegal for him to possess the video. It would be humiliating for her if it got out. It would kill his career, too, if anyone found out he’d tried to blackmail a rape victim.

  Ignoring Barry Klein. Informing her father. Those were the right decisions. The high-road decisions, even.

  Within days of those right, high-road decisions, Professor Solomon Delacroix’s body was found floating in the Squalicum Waterway, right near where the Western Washington crew team practiced.

  Last night, they’d arrested her father for his murder.

  She opened her eyes.

  Charlotte could barely get the words out when she called a few hours ago, ping-ponging between anger and worry and panic and shock.

  Fenway had tried in vain to calm Charlotte down. After ten minutes, Fenway looked up at McVie, and saw it in his eyes: their romantic evening was over. She knew he could see it in her eyes, too.

  “I’ll see you tomorrow,” McVie had said.

  “I’m so sorry, Craig,” Fenway whispered, and he kissed her on the cheek. “No,” Fenway said into the phone, as McVie let himself out of her apartment, “Charlotte, don’t mess around with this. Get a criminal lawyer. My father’s corporate attorneys must have some great contacts. Get one first thing tomorrow morning, and he’ll be out by the end of the day. His money and power still count for quite a bit in this town.”

  Charlotte had finally stopped crying. “I’m so impressed how calm you are under pressure, Fenway. I know this is hard for you, but I appreciate it.”

  But Fenway wasn’t calm. She’d had to pretend. Every mention of the murder of Professor Solomon Delacroix started playing the humiliation over and over and over in her head.

  Fenway stared out the window as they passed the exit for Highway 326. She tried to slow her breathing and relax, but she could feel her veins pulsing, as she was both wired and exhausted from lack of sleep.

  She’d wanted to call McVie as soon as Charlotte hung up. Have him come back over. Get him to stop the images playing. But, it had been so late by then.

  Besides, McVie had been through enough with the mayoral race. The night before, McVie had a glimmer of hope as he won the late voters, but Klein’s lead had officially been insurmountable. McVie, decent, kind, Eagle Scout McVie, had lost.

  Mayor Barry Klein. The bile rose in Fenway’s throat and she almost screamed in frustration.

  Ah, what those right decisions had wrought.

  And what would McVie do now? With the impending divorce, the loss in the mayoral race, and his term as sheriff expiring on January first, would McVie even want to stay in Estancia?

  The driver exited onto the George Nidever Expressway.

  The darkness and artificial lights played havoc with the shapes in the shadows on the side of the expressway as Fenway watched the trees and hills go past. She looked out the driver’s side too. Beyond the evenly spaced palm trees, with no hills on that side of the car, lay a footpath running parallel to the ocean. She closed her eyes and tried to hear the ocean’s thunder.

  Some days she just wanted to sit still, or take a run through the butterfly grove, out to the ocean cliffs. Out to where her mother had painted the seascape two decades ago, now hanging on Fenway’s wall. To see the cypress jutting from the rock—the impossible tree taking root in the midst of saltwater and sand, battered by the Pacific Ocean and the sea winds, but still standing tall and proud.

  The Uber maneuvered through two roundabouts and pulled into a yellow zone in a nearly empty parking lot in front of DiFazio Hall. A blue Acura ilx stood in a space marked Reserved, next to McVie’s beige Highlander. McVie waited by the double doors at the hall’s entrance, his tall, muscular frame silhouetted against the lights in front of the theater.

  Fenway got out of the car, grabbing her forensic kit and putting the strap of her small purse over her shoulder. She looked up at the squared-off four-story building of graying concrete and adobe brick.

  McVie walked toward her with a quizzical look on his face. “Fenway? What are you doing here?”

  “What?” She looked at McVie as if he were crazy. “Don’t you remember? You called me.”

  “Well—yeah, but I assumed you’d give this one to Dez or Mark.”

  “You said we needed to get over here right away.”

  “I meant—I meant ‘we’ as in the police, the authorities, the csi units. Not you.”

  “Then why didn’t you call Dez or Mark?”

  A frown played at the corners of McVie’s mouth, and the realization hit her.

  “Oh,” Fenway said. “Because I’m their boss. Not you. I’m the one who needs to decide who to assign to this case.”

  “I’m sorry, Fenway—I guess I wasn’t clear. But you’ve been running nonstop for almost a week, plus you’ve run an election campaign, plus your father is in jail. You need to go home. Give yourself some time. Delegate.”

  Fenway nodded. “You’re right—I wasn’t thinking. I’ll call Dez now.” She shifted her weight. “But—the university will get busy in a couple of hours, right?”

  “Well, yeah.”

  “I’m here. I might as well tag and bag stuff until Dez gets here.” Fenway motioned to the building. “Is this the theater?”

  “No,” McVie said. “Well, kind of. The theater itself is around the other side—DiFazio Theater. It’s connected to this building, which is all classrooms. Drama and English, a few other classes in liberal arts.”

  “You went here?”

  “No. Fresno State.”

  “Why do you know so much about it?”

  “Megan took a tour a few months ago. Loved the drama department.”

  “Oh, she wants to go to Nidever?”

  McVie shook his head. “We don’t have the money.”

  Fenway grimaced. There was that we. Craig and Amy. Even in the middle of the divorce, they were a family. She toyed with her hair. “She wants to major in drama?”

  “If you’ve seen her latest parade of loser boyfriends, you’d think she was already majoring in drama,” McVie said under his breath. “Anyway, Dr. Pruitt said he’d meet me at five. Let’s head over to the theater.”

  They walked along the side of DiFazio Hall. Fenway pulled out her phone and called Dez.

  It rang three times before Dez picked up. “Roubideaux.” Dez sounded like she just woke up.

  “Hey, Dez. It’s Fenway.”

  “Hey, rookie. It’s early. Something going on?”

  “Yes. There’s a body at Nidever University. At DiFazio Hall, near the theater.”

  “All right. Do you know who’s responding?”

  “Uh—yeah. McVie and I are both here.”

  “You’re… you’re there?”

  “I know, I know.” Fenway grimaced. “McVie already told me.”

  “Yeah, well, I’ll tell you again. You’ll burn out if you keep going like this, Fenway, and you won’t do anybody any good if you have a nervous breakdown.” She paused and chuckled. “And don’t expect me to visit you in the loony bin, either. Those places give me the creeps.”

  “I got it, Dez.” Fenway coughed. “How long till you can get here?”

  “Let’s see—it’s almost five, right? I can be there in half an ho
ur.”

  “All right. I’ll hold down the fort till then.”

  “Fenway?”

  “Yes?”

  “Next time, you call me right away. You can’t take this all on yourself.”

  “Okay, Dez. Sorry.”

  “You don’t need to be sorry. Just do better.”

  They hung up as McVie and Fenway came to a large quad. The DiFazio Memorial Theater jutted, loud and unapologetic, from the rest of the building.

  A slender white man, sporting an unkempt salt-and-pepper Vandyke on his chin, walked across the quad to meet them. He was in a parka, crisp dark blue jeans, and penny loafers, and he carried himself like he’d be more comfortable in a suit. Fenway didn’t recognize him at first, and then he opened his mouth and his thin, reedy voice kicked Fenway’s memory into gear. “Sheriff, hello,” he said, reaching out and shaking McVie’s hand. “I’m so glad you could come on such short notice.”

  “Dr. Pruitt,” Fenway said. “I’m so sorry. Where do you need us to collect evidence?” After six months, Fenway knew there was no variant of “Where’s the dead body?” that made people feel at ease. She was still trying different tacks, and it wasn’t even out of her mouth before she winced internally.

  “Ah, Coroner,” Dr. Alfred Pruitt said. “I didn’t think I’d be seeing you again so soon.” The words came out of his mouth with barely contained contempt, as if Fenway could have somehow prevented the disastrous evening at the university’s political dinner. “Poor Jessica is this way.”