Death by the Sea

by Kathleen Bridge

  Prior to the murder, David had been loading up on painkillers, so that when Edward stabbed him, the pain wouldn’t be as intense—he was “premeditatedly medicated.”

  After Liz told Edward about the ring Brittany was wearing, he got a call from an irate David Worth, who’d just confirmed with Detective Pearson and Fenton that the ring was Regina’s. David told Edward to meet him on the dock so they could come up with a plan. When Edward arrived, David whacked him on the head and dumped him in the water, planning on planting evidence that Edward was his wife’s killer. Luckily, Liz and Nick showed up shortly afterward.

  Liz also found proof of Edward and David’s collusion. In the video Kate had texted to Liz while she was still in Manhattan of the Emporium by the Sea’s grand opening, there was background footage of Edward handing something to David in a small box. No doubt, it was a forgery of a piece of jewelry from the San Carlos.

  A week after David Worth’s death, Agent Pearson’s officers also found something interesting on Regina’s father’s yacht—a bottle of her father’s heart medication. It was found in Regina’s stateroom, under her mattress. The only fingerprints on the bottle were Regina’s and her father’s. No one would ever know whether Regina had kept the bottle from her father that day on the yacht, ultimately causing his death, but there were odds-on that she had.

  “Here they are, Lizzy!” Aunt Amelia said excitedly, as she dug through her TV costume trunk. She pulled out an unopened package of what looked like small, white oval pillows and held them up in the air. “I stuffed two pairs of these babies in my brassiere for the episode of The Wild Wild West in which I played a saloon showgirl. I didn’t have a speaking part, but I did get to stand next to President Grant’s Secret Service agent extraordinaire, James West, I mean, Robert Conrad. I gazed into his ice-blue eyes, then gave him a wink and a great big smacker on his cheek. He was only an inch taller than me. Did you know he did all his own stunts?”

  Liz would have sworn that over the past twenty-three years, she’d seen every part her great-aunt played. “No, I didn’t. You never told me about that role—just the one in which you and Artemus Gordon had a three-episode flirtation.”

  “Ahh, Ross Martin. Boy, did we have more than a few laughs. I adored his sense of humor.”

  Liz opened the package, reached under her cropped T-shirt, and stuffed one of the pillows inside her bra. “My favorite part of the series is when the drawn pictures are filled in after each cliff-hanger scene, right before the commercial break.” She stepped toward the full-length mirror hanging from the back of the door. “What do you think?”

  Aunt Amelia said, “Bigger. Go bigger, I always say.”

  She looked at her great-aunt’s colorful floor-length Japanese kimono embroidered with silk butterflies and cherry blossoms, and her brightly made-up face. Her long, wavy flame-red hair was held back by a large braid that was really a headband. If Aunt Amelia was going for demure, subservient geisha girl, something had gotten lost in the translation. But, as always, the total look was 100 percent Amelia Eden Holt.

  Aunt Amelia handed Liz another package of falsies. “That should do it. Those Mary Quant hot pants look great on you. I can’t believe I was once your size. Guess there’s just more of me to love now.”

  “You’re as beautiful today as you were the first time I saw you, Auntie.”

  “Now for the perfect wig,” she said, wiping away a tear. “What color hair are you in the mood for?” She moved toward a stack of hat boxes and removed the lids. “I think chin-length brunette would be perfect. Although with what you’ve packed into the chest area, I don’t think anyone on your covert mission will be looking anywhere else.”

  Liz put on the wig and looked in the mirror. She didn’t recognize herself.

  Aunt Amelia came at her with a large compact of makeup and a powder brush. “All you need is a little sparkle on your décolletage. Draw a little more attention. Too bad you can’t borrow my white patent-leather go-go boots, but I think that might be a bit much. Nancy Sinatra gave them to me after I did a skit with her on The Ed Sullivan Show. I was in the background dancing the frug. But those wedge sandals will do nicely.”

  “The frug?” Liz asked.

  “A very groovy dance, like the chicken dance,” Aunt Amelia said.

  Liz laughed and took another peek at herself in the mirror. “Let’s go to the lobby and see if I can fool anyone.”

  Aunt Amelia said, “You go on ahead. It will look less conspicuous if I’m not tagging along.”

  Liz left the hotel via her father’s office and went around to the front of the Indialantic. Betty and Captain Netherton were tossing a Frisbee to each other, laughing every time Killer leapt up and intercepted it. He was no “monkey in the middle.” Liz smiled as she passed them. Betty winked as Captain Netherton frantically waved in her direction. Liz heard him ask, “Who’s that? A new guest? She married?”

  Would the captain ever learn not to let his libido lead the way?

  Liz entered the revolving door, but she pushed too hard and almost broke her neck as she stumbled into the lobby, teetering on her five-inch wedges. Greta Kimball sat in a wheelchair clicking and clacking away with a pair of knitting needles, the heel of a thick wool sock taking shape. Venus, the hairless cat, slept by her feet in her leopard cat bed. This was the fifth pair of socks Greta had made for her daughter, Iris. Like Betty and her granny squares, Greta liked to make multiples of her needlework projects.

  Greta looked up and said, “Good morning.” There was no sign she recognized Liz.

  After Liz’s father had gotten Iris off on a technicality for stealing the earring and cat collar, Iris had signed up for a tour of duty, training navy divers in Alaska. Instead of a romantic liaison, the champagne bottle and two glasses Liz had seen in Iris’s room had really been from a celebration between Iris and Nick Goren, after Iris had helped him get his diving certification. The times when Iris had been missing around the hotel, she’d actually been moonlighting as a diving instructor, trying to save money for her mother’s operation. Aunt Amelia had taken it upon herself to spring Greta from the Sundowner Retirement Home. Greta and the orphaned Venus immediately bonded, and Aunt Amelia allowed Greta to keep Venus with her in the Swaying Palms Suite. After Greta’s operation, which Fenton would finance until she received the settlement he’d procured from her insurance company, Greta promised to take over her daughter’s job as housekeeper and would live at the hotel rent-free. Liz had grown fond of Greta and had no problem helping out until after she was healed.

  Pierre was on the other side of the lobby on a bamboo chaise reading Peril at End House, one of her favorite Christies because it took place in Cornwall, England, Liz’s great-grandmother’s birthplace. Cornwall had also been the setting for Liz’s novel, Let the Wind Roar. Aunt Amelia had taken Pierre to a wonderful doctor, who’d checked all of their criteria. Dr. Helmer was both an MD and a homeopathic healer. There was no definitive diagnosis as of yet, but Liz prayed daily for a positive outcome.

  Pierre looked up at Liz and took off his toque. “Hi, Lizzy. Here’s your next book.”

  Drats, he recognized her.

  Obviously, Barnacle Bob hadn’t. He did one of his sailor’s whistles and said, “Va-va-voom, Take it off. Take it all off.”

  Liz didn’t know the midcentury jingle, but she got the gist of the bird’s comment.

  She took After the Funeral from Pierre’s hand and put it in her handbag. Ryan was due to pick her up any minute.

  Pierre said, “Does your father know how you’re dressed, young lady?”

  She laughed. “Yes, he does. It was his idea.”

  Pierre raised a furry eyebrow, and his left hand twirled the end of his mustache. “Okay. Father knows best.”

  Hopefully, Liz thought. She heard the sound of a horn and saw Ryan’s Jeep pull up under the canopy. She kissed Pierre and blew a kiss to Barnacle Bob.
The parrot ruffled his feathers in delight. As she went out the revolving door, she heard a litany of catcalls—a gaggle of construction workers couldn’t have done better.

  Ryan got out of the Jeep. “You ready?”

  “Ready as I’ll ever be.”

  He walked to the passenger door and opened it. “After you. That is, if it’s really you?” He brushed the brown bangs out of her eyes. “Yep. Same gorgeous cornflower-blue eyes.”

  Liz smiled, thanked him, and got inside.

  As they pulled away, Ryan said, “You nervous?”

  “A little. How about you? What if someone catches you?”

  “I’m a trained assassin, didn’t I tell you?”

  Liz looked at his fit physique. He did look lethal.

  “You distract,” he said. “I’ll infiltrate.”

  “Next time, you distract and I infiltrate. This is the twenty-first century.”

  “Yes, boss.”

  As they crossed the bridge over the Indian River Lagoon. Liz glanced out the window at the postcard-perfect day: Sailboats and cruisers passed beneath them, and fishermen lined the north side of the bridge, casting for a dinner of redfish or sea trout. Liz thought about Travis. They had tried to collaborate on a few writing projects, but both of their egos had gotten in the way and their projects were abandoned. Working with Ryan was easy, and she knew her father appreciated his help.

  “Did you read in Florida Today about Edward’s sentencing?” Liz asked.

  “Yes. Your father told me. I think he should have gotten longer, but there was no proof he had anything to do with killing Regina. And dead men—as in, David Worth—tell no tales.” Ryan looked over at her with a searching gaze.

  “Eyes on the road, buddy.”

  He cleared his throat, then said, “Speaking of newspapers, have you seen today’s Daily Post?”

  “No. I’m allergic to that rag.”

  “Well, you might not be anymore, if you check page six. There’s a copy on the back seat.”

  Liz reached behind her, then opened the paper to the headline, “Author’s After-Rehab Apologetic Recant.” Instead of vilifying Liz, Travis Osterman had told the true story of what had happened the night Liz got the scar. Staring back at her in black and white was everything she’d ever wanted in a confession—so why didn’t she feel satisfied? When she reached the last line, it became clear: “Travis Osterman’s new novel, Glass and Blood, will be out in August. The novel is a work of fiction, but insiders say it is not far from the truth about the Pulitzer Prize–winning Osterman and author Elizabeth Holt’s days of wine and roses—and the night that culminated in violence and broken dreams.”

  Liz folded the newspaper and threw it back into the back seat.

  Ryan took her hand. “I desperately owe you an apology for the way I treated you when we first met. But I want you to know that once I got to know you, I knew that what was being said about you wasn’t true. The McAvoy Brothers was both my and most of the guys on at the FDNY’s favorite male-bonding novel. I guess I was sticking to bro-code by believing every word that ‘Pulitzer Prize–winning’ Travis Osterman said about you was true.” He squeezed her hand. “I promise to atone for myself. I’ll do the dishes the next time we have a cook-off.”

  “The next three times, mister!”

  “Deal.”

  They left the rest unsaid. Liz could understand the resonance readers felt with their authors. If Liz’s favorite author had become embroiled in such a scandal, she would probably stick her head in the sand, too. No, that wasn’t entirely true. Nothing would surprise her after what she’d gone through. She touched her cheek and felt a new sense of comfort as she traced the scar. She also realized that, if that night hadn’t happened, she wouldn’t be here now with her father, Aunt Amelia, Betty, Pierre, and Kate. Or Ryan.

  Chapter 38

  “We did it,” Liz said, clinking her champagne glass against her father’s and Ryan’s.

  “A job well done, team,” Fenton said. “I had a hunch you two would work well together.”

  Liz took a sip of champagne. It was her first drink of alcohol since the night of the scar. When Liz had told her therapist that she’d sworn off drinking, her therapist had wisely said, “You weren’t the one with the addiction to drugs and alcohol, Mr. Osterman was. It’s okay not to drink for a while, if it makes you feel better. Just remember, the only time to drink is when you’re feeling good with where you are in this world. Never drink when you’re sad or depressed, because it will only lead to more of the same.” Wise therapist, Liz thought.

  Music filtered out from the speakers tucked under the eaves of the beach house. Kate and Pierre were nearby playing chess. Kate rarely let Pierre win, but Liz loved that it was Kate’s idea to have a daily chess game with Pierre to keep his mind sharp. Every weekday after lunch, Pierre would walk to the emporium for a game with Kate at one of Deli-casies by the Sea’s bistro tables. Liz had watched them yesterday when she’d brought over her conch ceviche for Ryan to try. He’d grudgingly admitted it was delicious, and Pops added it to his Friday seafood menu.

  It was cooler than usual for Memorial Day. The ocean was calm, the temperature was in the low eighties, and there was a slight offshore breeze. Soon the weather would become so steamy, they wouldn’t be able to catch their breath when stepping outdoors. Liz didn’t mind, because she planned to be in the Indialantic’s library, writing her next novel. She was five chapters in and might make her deadline after all. Not even Betty had seen her manuscript yet. Liz needed it to be hers alone for the time being.

  Betty called out, “Liz, these Mexican chorizo and shrimp burgers are delicious. I’ve had two.”

  “Chorizo?” Kate asked. “Vegetarian chorizo, right, Liz?”

  “Of course,” Liz said, laughing. Kate was as much of a vegetarian as she was. “Don’t thank me, Betty—thank Ryan.” Liz looked at Ryan, with his Kiss the Cook apron that she’d loaned him. It certainly gave her ideas.

  Ryan held up his glass to Betty. “Thanks, Betty. Not as good as the meal Liz made for Pierre’s birthday, but I appreciate the compliment.”

  Liz smiled, because Ryan had actually been Liz’s sous-chef for Pierre’s eighty-first birthday dinner. Liz knew all of Pierre’s favorite Julia Child recipes. Like a well-oiled machine, Liz and Ryan had turned out a meal of Pissaladiere, Moules Marinières, coquilles St-Jacques à la Provençale, and Soufflé aL’orange, which translated to savory onion tarts layered with anchovies and olives, mussels steeped in white wine and herbs, sea scallops in a creamy cheese sauce, and an orange soufflé.

  She felt her spirits free-fall at the thought that Ryan would be leaving soon. Pops’s second operation was scheduled for the following week. She excused herself and walked to the railing overlooking the beach. Aunt Amelia and Captain Netherton were both barefoot, running into the waves like children. Killer was behind them, digging a tunnel to Australia. His front legs were in a frenzy, spraying sand into the air. Maybe he, too, would find treasure and Aunt Amelia wouldn’t have to worry about the Indialantic’s bills.

  Ryan came up behind her, lifted the brim of her straw hat, and said, “Your father just made me a proposition.”

  Liz turned to face him. “What kind of proposition?”

  He pushed his sunglasses up onto his head. “He wants to hire me as his investigator. I’d work part-time for him and part-time for Grandad.”

  “You’d give up your job in New York to live here?”

  “You don’t think it’s a good idea?” He took a step back.

  She grabbed his arm. “Wait. I didn’t say that. I just know what it’s like to walk away from a career. Things are pretty slow and boring around here.”

  He looked at her hand on his arm. “I don’t know about that. A murder, treasure, and…”

  “And what?”

  “You.”

  Her heart
skipped a beat. “Welcome to barrier island living, partner!”

  Acknowledgments

  Thank you to my loving husband, Marc, for supporting my career, and for his wonderful editing on my new series. Thank you to my supercalifragilisticexpialidocious agent, Dawn Dowdle at Blue Ridge Literary Agency, for taking a chance, years ago, on a newbie author; your insight has been invaluable. Martin Biro, editor extraordinaire, it has been such a pleasure working with you and James at Kensington/Lyrical Underground. Your suggestions were spot-on, and I am looking forward to our future collaboration in the By the Sea mystery series. Thanks to my early readers, Mom, John, Lindsey Taylor, Ann Costigan, Michelle Mason Otremba, and Ellen Broder. And special thanks to gourmet home chef Lon Otremba for sharing his wonderful recipes.

  Once again, I am in awe of all the support for the cozy mystery authors I’ve found on social media—from bloggers to readers, your passionate devotion to our COZY, warm community has been stellar and much appreciated.

  Pops’s Kalamata Hummus

  1½ c. of canned chickpeas, drained and rinsed

  ¼ c. tahini

  2 cloves garlic

  ¼ c. fresh lemon juice

  1 tsp. cayenne pepper

  2 Tbsp. olive oil

  ½ c. pitted Kalamata olives

  1 small red pepper, seeded and sliced

  1 tsp. ground cumin

  1 tsp. curry powder

  2 Tbsp. chopped fresh parsley (or snipped chives)

  Combine chickpeas, tahini, garlic, lemon juice, cayenne, olive oil, olives, red pepper, cumin, curry powder, and parsley (or chives) in food processor and purée. Add enough cold water to achieve a spreadable mixture. Serves 4.