Dying Echo: A Grim Reaper Mystery (Grim Reaper Series)

by Clemens, Judy

“Here?”

  “No.” She walked forward and stood across the table from him. “I was just out for a run and stopped by.”

  “Why were you hiding?”

  “I wasn’t. I was looking for something.”

  “What?”

  She sat down and waited for him to follow suit. He didn’t. “Wayne. Please. Sit down.”

  He looked around, then sighed heavily and sat sideways on the bench, not facing her.

  “What’s going on, Wayne?”

  “I don’t know what you mean.”

  “Are you really going to try that? You’ve been missing all day—have you even told your wife you’re back?—you didn’t go to work, your son has admitted to exposing Elizabeth’s secrets—”

  “What?”

  “And a strange man has been in town asking if anyone knows where ‘it’ is. I don’t suppose he’s asked you?”

  He sat up. “He’s here today?”

  “No. Last week. You didn’t see him?”

  He was quiet for so long Casey thought he wasn’t going to answer. But he slumped, hanging his head. “Of course I saw him. Do you really think he’d come and talk to the boys, but not me?”

  “So what is it, Wayne? What is he looking for?”

  “I don’t know—”

  “Will you stop? Of course you know. You know more than anyone else about this whole mess, and it’s been eating at you all these years. The look on your wife’s face told me that.”

  He flinched, as if Casey had struck him. Which she wouldn’t necessarily have been opposed to doing.

  “It’s not important anymore.”

  “Not important? I’ll tell you what’s not important.” She half-stood, leaning so far over the table that she was in his face. “Not important is you living your pathetic life down here, wishing you still had Elizabeth, wishing it all away, when my little brother is in jail for killing her. Which he didn’t do, and you know it. And if I have to drag you all over this town, you will tell me what the man is looking for and where it is.”

  Wayne swung his leg over the bench to escape, but Casey grabbed his ankle. He stood hopping on one foot. “Let go! I’ll tell you, okay? I’ll tell you.”

  She glared at him for several seconds before throwing his leg down, cracking his ankle on the bench. He hesitated, rubbing his foot, then took off limping toward the main part of the park. Casey heaved a sigh and chased after him, dodging branches and rocks and tree roots. Wayne made it to the sidewalk, but Casey caught him, grabbing him from the back and pinning his arms to his sides. He tried kicking her, so she swept his feet out from under him and flipped him onto his stomach, grabbing his arm and twisting it straight out behind him, her hand on the back of his elbow.

  “Stop!” He arched his back upward. “Stop! Please!”

  Casey knelt over him until he let his head drop forward onto the ground, and his body relaxed. She let go of his arm, but stayed there, squatting beside him, one knee on his back, in case he tried to run again.

  He turned his head to the side. “Can I get up?”

  “No.”

  “I won’t run.”

  “Uh-uh.”

  He closed his eyes. “Fine. What did you want to know?”

  “You remember. What was the man asking about? What is ‘it?’”

  “Plans.”

  “Plans? What do you mean? Plans for what?”

  “Can I get up?”

  “No.”

  “Can I call my wife?”

  “When we’re done.”

  “Cyrus was a woodworker, right? He was really good at it, designed things, built them.”

  “I know, he had his own business, ran it into the ground. You told us all that already.”

  “Right, then he went to work for a houseboat business down in Whitley. Rich folks wanted boats as comfortable and luxurious as their houses. Maybe more. He was the go-to guy. But he got laid off, not sure why, and he couldn’t find anything else.”

  “Why couldn’t he? The early nineties weren’t like now. There were jobs all over.”

  “Not that suited him, I guess. Elizabeth always said he was picky about where he would work. Wanted to be his own boss, pretty much, even though it didn’t turn out so well when he was. Can you take your knee out of my back now?”

  Casey eased off. “So what were these plans you were talking about?”

  “I don’t know for sure, but from what Liz heard it sounded like plans for a special houseboat.”

  “Wait, this was while he worked for the houseboat company?” Bells were ringing in Casey’s head.

  “I guess, but afterward, too, when they were living in the car. Those men, the ones in the picture, they came to him and he spent all this time designing something. I got to the park one time, and he had his stuff spread all over the picnic table. He had a big sheet of plywood he would use as his drafting table, and he had blueprint paper spread out on it. I walked up and surprised him. He got all mad and told me to go away. Liz wasn’t there, so I didn’t want to stay, anyway, but it was weird.”

  “What was on the blueprints?”

  “What I told you. A houseboat. Or stuff he was designing for one, anyway.”

  “And you think those blueprints are what they’re looking for?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe. I guess they could incriminate somebody somehow, or else whoever commissioned the boat is still after these men to get it done.”

  “That’s unlikely. There’s got to be somebody else who could design something. And after all this time they probably wouldn’t need it anymore.”

  “Can I get up now?” Casey let him sit up, and he rubbed the elbow she’d overextended. “Liz swore me to secrecy about what I saw, because she didn’t know what kind of trouble her dad could get in for whatever he was doing, and after he was killed and she disappeared, I didn’t think it mattered anymore.”

  “You never thought it might have something to do with his death?”

  “A houseboat? No. I never thought a houseboat was worth killing over.” She watched him until he said, “What?”

  “How long have you told yourself that?”

  He ran a hand over his face and replied quietly. “Ever since that night.”

  “You never told anyone about them? Not the police?”

  “I knew they didn’t find any blueprints when they searched the car, so I figured they were long gone and out of the picture. That maybe the job was even done. So I thought it would just make Cyrus look bad if I talked about how he’d reacted when I’d seen them. I know, I know, it was dumb. I was a teenager who’d just lost his best friend. His girlfriend.”

  “But even now, as an adult, you never thought you should tell?”

  “What good would it do? Cyrus is long dead, and until yesterday I thought Liz was gone, too. Not dead, necessarily, but just…gone.”

  Casey hauled him to his feet. “It’s going to do some good now.”

  “Now? In the middle of the night?”

  Would it really help anything to tell him about the blueprints she’d found in Betsy’s box? Was it worth it to wake them all up and look? Casey wanted to do it. She wanted to wake up the whole town. But nothing could happen quicker than if she just waited until everyone was awake—Betsy, Chief Kay, her lawyer Don, even Ricky. “Okay, in the morning. I guess now you should let your wife know you haven’t skipped town.”

  “She wouldn’t think that.”

  “Great, so she thinks you’re dead.”

  He yanked his arm from her grip. “Can I go now?”

  “You need to tell the cops tomorrow morning.”

  “I will.”

  “First thing.”

  “I said I will.”

  Casey let him go, watching as he flickered from lamp to lamp along the path, until he was gone.

  Chapter Thirty-eight

  Casey ran back toward the motel, every fiber in her being wanting to make a detour past Betsy’s house to scour the blueprints. No one had ever considered the
blueprints, because no one knew they were there, except Betsy, and she just figured they were old portfolio type things for Cyrus. She’d gotten them after the investigation was over and had stuck them in the attic. Billy didn’t know. Robbie didn’t know. And, most importantly, the three men didn’t know.

  But Casey knew. And she was going to be at Betsy’s door at the break of dawn, demanding to be shown the thing that could get her brother out of prison. She shook herself. No, the blueprints couldn’t get him out of prison—they wouldn’t say anything about the murder up in Colorado. But they were going to point her toward the people who killed Elizabeth Mann. She knew they would. Somehow.

  With each footfall, Casey felt something within her rising up. Something foreign. Something new. Something almost like…hope.

  No. It couldn’t be that.

  Could it?

  By the time she arrived at the motel it was almost two. She remembered in time to be quiet so she wouldn’t wake Eric, and shut her door quietly.

  “Where have you been?” Death stood in the middle of the room, fists on hips.

  “Like you couldn’t have found me.”

  Death frowned. “I couldn’t find you.”

  “What?”

  “I was going to see what you were up to. Join you, hang out, help with clues, like always. But it was like…like you’d closed me off.”

  “Seriously?”

  “Casey…” Death was like a statue. “Do you want to live?”

  Casey took a long, deep breath. Did she? Did she really feel like living another day would be a good thing? Something she should look forward to?

  “I don’t know. I think…maybe.”

  “Casey…what does this mean?”

  “You tell me. You’re the supernatural being.”

  “I couldn’t find you. How supernatural is that?”

  “It’s not. It’s just weird.”

  Death flickered, like a bad hologram in a science fiction movie.

  “Oh, God,” Death said. “Are you deserting me?”

  Casey stepped forward, reaching for Death.

  And Death disappeared.

  Chapter Thirty-nine

  Casey woke Eric at six. He came to the door in a wrinkled T-shirt and shorts.

  “Come on,” Casey said. “We’ve got things to do.”

  He blinked. “Can I have a few minutes?”

  “Make it quick.”

  Nine and a half minutes later, during which Casey was completely alone except for the cars passing on the other side of the motel, they were walking very quickly downtown.

  Eric smoothed down his still-wet hair. “Where are we going?”

  Casey explained what she’d found out the night before. Eric listened, then said, “What do you think we’re going to find?”

  “What could we find in designs for houseboats?”

  “I think it’s obvious. Hidden compartments for smuggling. We’re right across the Gulf from Cuba, and that was the early nineties. All kinds of stuff went down then with smuggling. People coming over illegally, cops taking down boats full of drugs, causing tons of deaths on both sides, all sorts of violence and betrayal and theft. Nasty stuff.”

  Casey remembered Robbie talking about smuggling when they’d first gotten to the hotel, although he was talking partly about human trafficking. “I guess it depends how big the boat is.”

  “Or how big the inventory is. Could have been anything. Drugs. Cigars. Diamonds. Even cash. You could squeeze a lot of those things in small spaces.”

  “But don’t they usually use speed boats to smuggle? Or bigger yacht-type things? Houseboats aren’t exactly fast, or even seaworthy, not out in the middle of the ocean.”

  “Guess we’ll have to see what’s on the plans.”

  They arrived at the Betsy and Scott’s house. A light was on in one of the upstairs rooms, so they wouldn’t be waking everyone. Casey rapped lightly on the door, and listened for footsteps. When they didn’t come, she tried again, a little louder.

  The door opened, and Scott stood there, looking much like Eric had twenty minutes earlier, in shorts and a stretched-out T-shirt. “You’re up already?”

  “So are you.”

  He smiled. “True.”

  “Can we come in? Is Betsy up?”

  “Sorry, of course, come in. I’m not quite awake. I’ll go get Bets.” He shut the door behind them and padded up the stairs.

  Betsy came rushing down, tying her housecoat. “What is it? It’s not Wayne, is it?”

  “No, he’s fine. But he gave me an idea of what the men were looking for. Can we have another look at your boxes?”

  “They’re still in the dining room.”

  Casey went right to the memento box and popped the end off of the mailing tube. She breathed a sigh of relief when she saw the blueprints right where she’d left them.

  “Those?” Betsy said. “They’re just some of Cyrus’ old stuff.”

  Casey shoved the boxes aside and lay the blueprints flat on the table. Eric held down one half while she held the other.

  “I guess it’s a houseboat,” Eric said. “But it kind of looks like a yacht.”

  The first drawing showed the dimensions of the outside of the boat, as you would see it from the side if it were floating up above the water. It was a typical pontoon-style houseboat, just like Casey had imagined. In the lower right hand corner was a logo which said simply, “Private Boats, Inc.” Casey peeled that top sheet off and let it slide to the floor. The second drawing showed the same outside view, but from the front and back, while the third showed the opposite side. Each of them had the same logo imprinted on the bottom corner. Casey got rid of them, too, and finally saw the interior.

  The top sheet was an overview of the entire layout. Kitchen, bar, lounge, bathroom, two bedrooms, and two bunk rooms. Lots of room, but then, if someone was really living on it, it would have to be somewhat sizable. All of the rest of the papers were individual sections of each room, as well as electrical, venting, and water pipe diagrams.

  “Why is it important?” Betsy asked.

  Casey didn’t know. There was nothing obvious. Nothing saying, “Hidden compartment for smuggling drugs.”

  “Give me a minute,” Eric said. He flipped back and forth between several sheets, muttering to himself, for several minutes. “Hand me those other sheets, will you?”

  Betsy grabbed the ones on the floor and put them on the table.

  “The dimensions,” Eric said. “They don’t add up between the outside and the inside.”

  “What else?” Casey was used to looking at set blueprints from back in her theater days, but that part of her brain had rusted, and these drawings just looked like a bunch of lines and angles with no real meaning.

  Eric scanned the sheets again. “I need more time.”

  “Can I help?” Scott was standing in the doorway. He’d taken a shower, and was wearing khakis and another blue button-down. Things you’d expect a high school teacher to wear.

  “Please.” Eric stepped aside. “You’re physics, right? Maybe your kind of brain could figure this out better. We think these are plans for some kind of smuggling boat. Cyrus drew them.”

  Scott leaned over the drawings, saying things like, “Um-hmm.” And “Oh, sure.” And even, “Huh.” “Okay,” he finally said in a normal speaking voice. “Look here.” He ran his finger along the outer shell of the layout overview. “There’s a buffer all around the sides of the boat. Space in-between the inner walls and the shell.”

  Casey followed his finger. “They were hiding things between them?”

  “Ingenious, really. That way no police could find things just by going through the boat. The cupboards, storage spaces, closets—they’d all be filled with legal belongings. There would have to be an opening somewhere…I don’t see it yet.”

  He took his time looking over the schematics, going back and forth between sheets. “There. This paneling. It would look like solid wood paneling, but see here? He’s drawn
in sliding sections. He would have had it constructed so no one would even think it was anything but a normal seam. You can see them all over—in the closets, behind the kitchen cabinets, even the breaker box. Behind each storage space is a hidden compartment. Fairly small.”

  “But plenty of space for drugs or gems or cash.”

  “Absolutely.”

  Casey and Eric looked at each other.

  “What does this mean?” Betsy asked.

  “It means your uncle really was a criminal,” Casey said. “Or was at least working for some. And that opens up all sorts of possibilities as to who would want him dead.”

  Chapter Forty

  “So where exactly are we going?” Eric pulled onto the road heading southeast.

  “Cyrus’ old workplace.” Casey wished she could have access to all of the files Death had scanned, but it seemed those were out of her reach now that she’d apparently become more okay with the idea of living. She was sure there would be information about Cyrus’ old workplace that she could use.

  “I thought they went out of business, and that’s why Cyrus lost his job.”

  “No, Wayne said he was laid off, but I don’t think it was because they closed down. Maybe they just couldn’t afford his services anymore. His expertise made him expensive.”

  “So why wouldn’t he just lower his rates?”

  “I don’t know. Made him feel taken advantage of?”

  “This from a guy who wouldn’t accept charity? You’d think he’d be glad to have a job at all.”

  “These were the nineties, remember. Not today, when folks will take anything they can get. But maybe it was something else. Supposedly, like people have told us, he just wanted to be his own boss and had trouble working for someone else. He wouldn’t be the first person fired for not playing well with others.”

  Signs for Galveston Bay began decorating the side of the road, and Eric followed them across the flat, marshy land toward the coast. The GPS on Eric’s iPad took them south of the bay, as far as a marina, before saying they were at their destination.

  “This is it?”

  Casey understood Eric’s confusion. The Gulf sparkled under the sun, and extended as far as she could see, into the horizon. Beautiful. Amazing. But the marina itself, tucked into a marshy inlet, was not the hub of busyness they had expected. A floating dock bobbed on the water alongside several old fishing boats and a pontoon. One old houseboat was moored to a different, permanent dock, and looked like it had seen better days. Many of them. Casey didn’t see anyone out and about, except on the other side of the inlet, too far in the distance to recognize faces, or even genders.