Stabbed in the Baklava

by Tina Kashian

  “Well, I think it’s a good thing and I admire you a lot for it.”

  She felt a lurch of excitement. It was one of the nicest compliments he’d given her. She cleared her throat. “Azad, I need to ask you more about Cressida.”

  He stuffed his hands into his pockets. “She’s in my past, and I thought we said all that had to be said.”

  “We did. But this is about the investigation.”

  Two deep lines of worry appeared between his eyes. “What do you want to know?”

  “Has she always lived in Ocean Crest?”

  “No. She lived with her mom when I knew her back then, a couple of towns over in Baytown.”

  “Her mom?” When Lucy had questioned Cressida at Pages Bookstore, Cressida had mentioned she’d been born in Baytown and that her mother had died several years ago.

  “Yeah. Cressida was raised by her mom. Mrs. Connolly was a nice lady, but overprotective of Cressida. She used to call Cressida when we were out to be sure what time she came home. From what I can tell, she’s still overprotective. I ran into her about four months ago at Holloway’s. I remember because she asked me the strangest thing. She suspected her daughter was dating someone and wondered if I knew who he was.”

  “You saw Cressida’s mother a couple of months ago? She’s still alive?”

  “Sure is. I bumped into her in the produce section of Holloway’s. She’s only in her fifties. I know because Cressida had taken me to her mother’s surprise fortieth birthday party in Atlantic City back then. Her full name is Catherine Connolly.”

  Cressida had lied and said her mother had died. Why? Did Cressida have a falling out with her mom? Or was there another reason? Did she not want her mother to know about her affair with an older, married man? It made sense if Mrs. Connolly was asking Azad if he knew the identity of her daughter’s significant other.

  “Why are you asking? Is Cressida’s mom important to the murder investigation?” Azad asked.

  Lucy rubbed the gooseflesh rising on her arms. “I’m not sure she is. I’ll let you know.”

  Lucy left the walk-in refrigerator and passed through the kitchen. She waved to Butch on her way. “Great lunch service, Lucy Lou!” he called out as he lifted the lid from a stockpot to add spices.

  Once in the storage room, she headed for her tiny corner office, picked up the landline, and dialed.

  Katie answered on the first ring. “Ocean Crest Town Hall.”

  “Katie, it’s me. I just learned from Azad that Cressida’s mother is alive. Her name is Catherine Connolly and she lives in Baytown.” Lucy had already informed Katie all about Holly’s alibi late last night. She’d also informed Bill, who in turn had spoken with Detective Clemmons. That was one conversation she hadn’t wanted to be a part of.

  “You think it’s important?” Katie asked.

  “It may be. Can you search her name?”

  “I’m already on it.”

  Lucy heard the tapping of computer keys and she knew Katie was accessing the county tax records. “One-thirty-three Crestview Drive in Baytown. Catherine Connolly is listed as the original owner and last paid her property taxes in March.”

  “She is still alive! I need to find out why Cressida lied.”

  “I get off at five.”

  Lucy knew exactly what Katie meant, and this time she was in full agreement. “I wouldn’t dream of going to see Mrs. Connolly without you.”

  “Good. You should know Clemmons released Holly early this afternoon. I stopped by to see Bill for lunch, and I could hear her screaming for her clothes and jewelry from outside the station.”

  Lucy could picture an irate Holly Simms accompanied by her expensive defense attorney. “I almost feel sorry for Investigator Clemmons.”

  “Don’t. Now that Holly has a solid alibi, Bill said that Clemmons has turned his attention back to Azad.”

  CHAPTER 23

  Baytown was two towns north of Ocean Crest. On the bay side rather than the ocean, the town wasn’t a huge draw for summer tourists and had only a few summer rentals. The houses were cookie cutter colonials built in the early sixties, with one-car garages and long front porches with rocking chairs. It was trash collection day, and garbage cans stood at every curb like shiny, aluminum sentinels. Seagulls soared above looking for food from cans that had lost their lids.

  An orange and black cat darted past Lucy as she sat in Katie’s jeep outside Catherine Connolly’s home. “That looked like Gadoo.”

  “You don’t think your restaurant cat travels this far, do you?” Katie asked.

  “Who knows? I’ve often wondered if numerous families feed him.”

  “I doubt it. No one feeds people or animals quite like your mom,” Katie said. “Bill wants to move into your parents’ house.”

  Lucy laughed. “He can have my old bedroom. He’d gain ten pounds in a week.”

  “Don’t encourage him,” Katie chided. She leaned back in her seat. “Are you ready to do this?”

  Lucy nodded. “You bet. Let’s find out why Cressida lied about her mother.”

  Katie shut the door to the jeep and they walked up the sidewalk toward a tan house with blue shutters and an American flag flying in the breeze.

  “This is it. One-thirty-three Crestview Drive.” Katie pointed to a mailbox by the curb.

  “It looks like a nice enough place,” Lucy said.

  “Have you figured out what you’re going to say?”

  “Yes. Just let me do the talking and you follow along.”

  “I’m impressed,” Katie said. “You’re much better at this now.”

  “Better at lying? I’m not sure that’s a compliment,” Lucy retorted.

  “It is if it gets Azad off the hook.”

  A knot tightened in Lucy’s stomach, and she struggled with an unexpected uncertainty. If she was getting better at misleading people in order to gather information, what did that say about her?

  You don’t have a choice, Lucy, she told herself. Think of Azad.

  Taking a breath, Lucy reached for the brass knocker and rapped on the door twice.

  Moments later, the door opened. A tall, auburn-haired woman who was an older version of Cressida stared down at them. She was attractive and dressed in a simple, floral sundress and wore light makeup. “May I help you?”

  Lucy smiled. “I’m Lucy Berberian and this is Katie Watson. We went to Carlton High School with Cressida Connolly, and we are on the reunion committee. We were wondering if Cressida still lives here. We would like her to join our committee.”

  “How nice,” Mrs. Connolly said. “I wish I could help you girls, but Cressida doesn’t live here anymore. She’s been away for quite some time.”

  “Oh, what a shame,” Katie said.

  “You can still help,” Lucy said. “Our homes as well as the school basement were flooded by the horrible hurricane a few years ago and our yearbooks were damaged. Do you know if Cressida left her yearbook at home or if you have any pictures at all? It would be a great help.”

  “Of course.” Mrs. Connolly opened the door wide. “Please come inside.”

  “Thank you,” Lucy said as they made their way inside. The home was tidy, with beige walls and country-style oak furniture. A piano was situated in the corner with framed pictures of Cressida as a baby. The decor was neat but slightly outdated, and certainly not lavish and costly compared to Cressida’s current standard of living.

  Mrs. Connolly motioned for them to sit on a sofa. “Would you girls like iced tea?” she asked.

  “That would be lovely,” Lucy said.

  Mrs. Connolly left to go into the kitchen. Moments later they heard the sound of ice rattling in glasses.

  “Now what?” Katie whispered.

  “I don’t know, but I’d like to look around.”

  Mrs. Connolly returned with a tray holding two glasses filled with ice and a pitcher of fresh iced tea. She poured two glasses and handed them to Lucy and Katie.

  “I’m sorry I don’t have any c
ookies. I used to bake all the time, but now I don’t bother, with Cressida not living at home.”

  “Does she visit?”

  A wistful look crossed Mrs. Connolly’s face. “Oh, not as often as I’d like. She’s busy taking college courses and she runs with a different crowd now.”

  “Pardon our saying so, but we remember her hanging out with Scarlet Westwood in high school.”

  Mrs. Connolly smoothed her dress and picked at an invisible piece of lint. “Yes, they met in school. I was never thrilled with their friendship. Too much partying and not enough studying. Cressida’s grades weren’t good enough to get into college, and now she’s trying to make up for it with online college classes.”

  “She was always smart in high school,” Katie said.

  Lucy’s fingers tensed in her lap. They had no idea if Cressida had been a good student or not.

  But Mrs. Connolly merely smiled. “She is a bright girl.”

  Lucy cleared her throat. “Can we look at the pictures?”

  “Oh, yes. Of course. They are all in Cressida’s old bedroom. Why don’t you girls follow me and I’ll let you sift through her bookshelf to see what you can find.”

  This suited Lucy just fine. She wasn’t interested in old yearbooks, but in snooping around to learn more about Cressida. With Holly out of the picture, Lucy was convinced that Cressida was most likely the murderer.

  She just needed sufficient evidence to prove it.

  They followed Mrs. Connolly up the stairs to the second floor. Passing two bedrooms, she stopped at the last room and opened the door. They stepped inside. The room was decorated in shades of pink, from a pink flowered bedspread, to matching curtains, to a shaggy carpet. The walls were painted a Pepto-Bismol pink, and framed prints of flowers hung on the walls. The only pieces of furniture that stood out were two white bookshelves with children’s bookends of Winnie the Pooh holding a row of photo albums in place.

  “I haven’t changed it much. All of Cressida’s old belongings and photo albums are still on these two bookshelves,” Mrs. Connolly said, motioning to the shelves. “Take your time and call out if you need anything.” She turned to leave.

  They spent a good half hour flipping through photo albums and Carlton High School yearbooks.

  Lucy reached for an album and flipped to a page showing Holly and Scarlet with thumbs-up at a football game. Their eyes were wide and glassy.

  “Looks like they smuggled beer into the high school game,” Katie said, glancing at the photo.

  Lucy chuckled and closed the album to return it to the shelf when a photograph slipped from the pages and fluttered to the carpet. She bent and picked it up, then took a quick breath of utter astonishment. “My God. Look at this.”

  “What?”

  The photograph was old, taken on a Polaroid camera, and Lucy was careful to hold it at the edges. “It’s Cressida around four years old with her mother and a man. A much younger Henry Simms.”

  “You sure?”

  “There’s no mistaking his face. He has a fuller head of hair and is even thinner, but it’s him.”

  Katie looked at her in surprise. “You’re right! It’s Mrs. Connolly and Henry Simms, and they’re hugging Cressida as a toddler. They look like . . . like a family.”

  “They are.” The shock of discovery hit Lucy full force now.

  “That means—”

  “Henry was Cressida’s father, not her lover.”

  A soft gasp escaped Katie. “Wow! We had it all wrong.”

  Lucy’s brows set in a straight line. “Everyone had it all wrong.”

  “Do you think Cressida murdered her own father?”

  “I don’t know.” Lucy turned the photograph over, but there was nothing written on the back. No names or dates. Making a quick decision, she unzipped her purse.

  “What are you doing?”

  Lucy whipped out her phone and took a picture of the Polaroid. “I’m collecting evidence. It’s time I had another chat with Cressida.”

  CHAPTER 24

  Lucy kicked up sand as she sprinted away from the boardwalk and ran onto the beach. Her nerves had been tense since leaving Catherine Connolly’s house. She still found it hard to believe that Henry Simms was Cressida’s father.

  Why keep it secret after all these years?

  Her mind turned back to when she and Katie had broken into Cressida’s home. Framed pictures of Cressida and Henry had been displayed on the end table. Henry had his arm around Cressida and she’d been smiling and gazing up at him. Lucy had assumed they were lovers, but thinking back, the position wasn’t a romantic one; it had been merely affectionate.

  Like a father hugging his daughter.

  Lucy’s mind had seen what it expected to see rather than seeing the truth.

  After Lucy and Katie had left Mrs. Connolly’s home, they’d driven by Cressida’s house but Cressida’s car hadn’t been in the driveway. It was Lucy’s evening off and she’d decided to go for a jog. The exercise was a good way to relieve stress and to gather her thoughts.

  After jogging for thirty minutes, she slowed down by her favorite lookout—the jetty overlooking the Atlantic Ocean. It was well after five o’clock, and the tourists had left to shower and change for an evening on the boards. The day visitors had long since departed for their drive home. She was alone, save for a man with a metal detector and earbuds scanning the abandoned beach for coins or jewelry lost by unfortunate tourists.

  Breathing in the ocean air, she sat on the jetty and sipped from her water bottle. Seagulls circled above, and a crane searching for its next meal skimmed the water. Her body was exhausted, but her mind kept chugging away.

  Had Cressida murdered her father?

  Cressida didn’t strike Lucy as a cold-blooded killer, but what did Lucy really know about her? Catherine Connolly had raised Cressida as a single mother. Henry had been married to Holly at the time Cressida was born, which meant Henry and Catherine must have had an affair.

  Henry hadn’t publicly acknowledged Cressida. If they’d reconciled, maybe Cressida was bitter that her father had abandoned her and her mother. Surely that was motive for murder.

  But where did the life insurance policy come into play? Had Henry felt guilty for not being a part of Cressida’s life, and decided to look after her in death?

  And why did Cressida lie about her mother being dead? Was it because Mrs. Connolly wouldn’t have approved of Cressida reaching out to her biological father after all these years?

  Lucy still couldn’t fathom killing a parent, but if Cressida wasn’t the killer, then she was running out of suspects. She’d have to come up with others, but she had no idea where to start.

  She left the jetty, took off her running shoes and socks, and dipped her toes in the water. The ocean water was cool and refreshing. The ocean temperature had reached seventy-two degrees, good swimming temperature for July in Lucy’s opinion. Carrying her shoes and socks, she walked back on the beach, her feet splashing in the surf, her thoughts turning.

  Her cell phone rang.

  After her experience of jogging without her phone when Scarlet had scared her, Lucy had made it a point to carry her cell phone. She answered on the third ring. “Hello.”

  “This is Cressida Connolly. My mother left me an interesting message today.”

  Lucy’s stomach tilted. “Oh?”

  “Funny, I didn’t know we went to Carlson High School together.”

  Lucy’s throat closed up. This didn’t bode well. Lucy had planned to visit Cressida and catch her off guard with the picture on her cell phone. Now Cressida knew Lucy had lied to her mother and visited her childhood home.

  “How did you get my cell phone number?” Lucy clutched the phone tight.

  “Scarlet gave it to me. You did cater her wedding, after all.” Bitterness spilled over into Cressida’s tone.

  Good grief. First Holly, now Cressida. Had Scarlet given her private cell phone number to everyone in town?

  Lucy chose her wo
rds carefully. “I think we should talk.”

  “I’m home,” Cressida said tersely. “Don’t make me wait.”

  The line went dead.

  * * *

  “You sure about this?” Katie asked.

  Lucy nodded. “I am. Cressida called me. This is my chance to get to the bottom of this once and for all.”

  They stood outside Cressida’s home on Oyster Street, but this time, they hadn’t walked, and Lucy had parked her Toyota in the driveway.

  “What if she’s dangerous?” Katie turned to her from the passenger seat.

  Lucy put the car in park. “That’s why I’m not here alone.”

  Katie nodded, as if that made perfect sense. “Okay. Let’s do this then.”

  Stepping out of the car, they made their way to the porch steps. The door opened before Lucy had a chance to knock. Dressed in an old Phillies T-shirt and black sweatpants, Cressida stood in the doorway. Her red hair was pulled away from her face in a simple ponytail and, for the first time since Lucy had ever seen her, she wasn’t wearing any makeup.

  Lucy was still in her running gear, capris and an Eagles tank top. It looked like they were both Philadelphia sports fans.

  “Come in.” Cressida turned and walked inside.

  Lucy closed the door, and they followed Cressida into the family room. Cressida sat on one of the oversized chairs, and Lucy and Katie settled on the sofa in front of the coffee table. The family room looked the same as the last time Lucy and Katie had broken into the house. Glass paperweights held down stacks of papers on the coffee table. Lucy glanced at the paperwork, wondering if the life insurance documents were still there.

  Cressida’s eyes narrowed. “Why’d you show up at my mother’s house?”

  “Why’d you lie and tell Lucy your mother was dead?” Katie countered.

  Lucy raised a hand to stop the two from arguing. “None of that matters now. We know the truth. Henry Simms was your father.”

  Cressida looked pained, but she didn’t try to deny it. “How did you figure it out?”

  “We found a picture in your mother’s home.” Lucy took her cell phone from her purse, pulled up the picture, and set her phone on the coffee table. “It’s of you, your mom, and Henry, and you look about four years old.”