by Lyndsey Cole
“No,” Hannah managed to squeak out. “Samantha Featherstone thinks Sally could be in town.”
“That old lady who’s pretending to be a private investigator?” Pam snorted. “I did some research on her and it might do you some good to look into her background before you get too chummy.”
Hannah looked at Jack, hoping for some details about that comment.
He shrugged.
Hannah stood up and reached for her drawing.
Pam pulled the paper out of Hannah’s reach, folded it carefully and tucked it in her own pocket. “I don’t think so. This is evidence now.”
Jack shooed Hannah away. “Thanks for checking on me. Skedaddle now so I can get some rest.” He winked.
Pam turned her back to Hannah. Her method of dismissal.
Hannah checked the signs in the hallway and found her way to the waiting room. Samantha was in a deep conversation with another hospital visitor as she beckoned Hannah to join them.
“I’ve got a coffee here for you, too, my dear.” Samantha reached under her chair for Hannah’s coffee. “And guess who I have the pleasure of chatting with?”
Hannah smiled at the woman sitting on the other side of Samantha. She wasn’t feeling particularly social, especially after the treatment she received from Deputy Pam Larson. She wanted to leave the hospital smells and sounds, and fill her lungs with the salty ocean air instead.
Samantha’s voice brought her away from her beach vision.
“This is Essie Holmes, Leah White’s next door neighbor.” Samantha patted Essie’s knee. “Leah and Essie walk together every morning.”
“Yup, that’s right, except, of course, for the past few mornings since Matt and Leah haven’t been home. But all those pushy news people are still camped outside on the road. Hoping for a sighting, I guess.” Essie stirred her drink and took a sip. “Such a terrible situation for Leah.” Essie leaned in front of Samantha to get a clear view of Hannah. “I’m not surprised about poor Sally though. She and her dad—” Essie didn’t finish her thought but shook her head back and forth.
“They didn’t get along?” Hannah prodded.
“Ha. That’s putting it mildly. He didn’t let that poor girl do anything on her own. He said it was for her own good so she didn’t end up like his loser sister Jan.”
Hannah caught Samantha’s sideways glance with her eyebrows raised.
“I’m sure that’s the reason Sally took the job at The Chowder House working for that better-than-everyone-else, Gavin Abbott. Sally had to know her dad would lose it.” Essie tsk tsked her disapproval. “And now she’s gone and vanished. Of course I suspected Gavin did something to that girl, but now he’s dead and we’ll never know.”
“Unless Sally turns up safe and sound,” Hannah suggested.
“I suppose that could happen, but these cases don’t usually have a happy ending. Of course, I didn’t tell Leah that. I always said, Leah, Sally will walk right through that front door one of these days.”
“And what about Gavin? Did he have a lot of enemies?”
“I don’t know about enemies, except for Matt White and maybe Matt’s sister Jan. It was more like people just didn’t like the guy. You know, he didn’t fit in with the rest of us.”
“Do you have any idea who might have killed Gavin?”
Essie patted her already perfectly coiffed hair into place and looked up at the ceiling before she lowered her voice. “Well, I hate to start a rumor, but you did ask my opinion. Mind you, this is only my opinion.”
“Of course,” both Hannah and Samantha responded together.
“If I was a bettin’ gal, and I assure you I’m not, I’d put my money on Matt White. He hated Gavin Abbott ever since, well, I don’t know exactly when it started because it’s been for as long as I’ve known Leah. It started even before I met her. And those two had that argument at The Chowder House last night.”
“You were there?”
“Oh yes. Everyone in town was there. And I imagine everyone came to the same conclusion I came to about Matt White killing Gavin Abbott. Matt had murder in his eyes, if that’s such a thing. Everyone saw it, same as me. Everyone except for the police,” Essie said with disgust lacing her voice. “I don’t know what they’re waiting for. If Matt gets locked up maybe poor Sally would feel safe enough to come home to her mama. If she’s still alive.”
Chapter 11
Essie’s friend arrived to give her a ride home.
Finally.
Rumors were interesting, Hannah told herself, but she was more concerned about finding the truth. Essie Holmes, and all of Hooks Harbor by the tone of her opinion, had Matt White guilty of Gavin Abbott’s murder.
Of course Matt was angry. And worried. And half out of his mind. His daughter was missing. Didn’t anyone else see the bigger picture?
Samantha and Hannah walked through the automatic doors into the late morning sunshine. Hannah shaded the sun from her eyes with her hand.
“That was an eye opener,” Samantha said as she slid behind the steering wheel of Mini May. “How was your visit with Jack?”
“He’ll be fine, but . . .” Hannah hesitated.
“But what? I’m feeling a bad vibration at the moment, Hannah. And it’s not coming from Mini May. What happened?”
“Pam arrived while Jack was looking at the drawing. She took it; snatched it right out of Jack’s hand and gave me the third degree for concealing it. I felt like my teacher in third grade just caught me handing a note to my best friend.”
“That’s an unfortunate turn of events. Did Jack recognize the person in the drawing before his daughter interrupted?”
“He said it looked like a female Matt White. So there is that confirmation of your conclusion about Jan being in town.”
“We have to find her before her presence leaks out. Sean Payne is bound to blow her cover with some ridiculous article before long. The very last person who can know is Matt or there might be another murder in town.”
“Matt will kill her? His own sister?” Hannah’s voice sounded skeptical.
“Or she’ll kill him,” Samantha replied. “At least, that’s the impression I got from the tone in Jan’s information.”
“Can you contact her? Don’t you send her regular updates?”
“I do, but she doesn’t send anything back unless she has information for me. It’s pretty much a one-way correspondence. I suspect she has herself hidden somewhere. And if she’s even still in town, she won’t take any risks until tonight at the vigil.”
“One more thing that Pam said.”
Samantha parked Mini May in the Holiday Hideaway parking lot and Hannah waited for her full attention again.
“Jan is the person who identified Matt leaving The Chowder House at the time of the murder.”
“Pam didn’t question why Jan she was there? That’s suspicious, too.”
“Pam didn’t recognize the name—Janice Jones. She did question her, but without knowing who she was at the time and the connection to Gavin and Matt, it didn’t raise any red flags in Pam’s mind. Now that she knows, she’s definitely on the lookout for her.”
Hannah decided not to share that Pam ordered her to help find Jan. For now, she needed to be a bit more careful about what she shared. At least until Hannah discovered more about Samantha’s past. Pam certainly knew how to plant suspicion on someone. Conquer and divide—was that Pam’s intention?
Jerry Sewall’s wholesale fish truck filled up the back loading area of The Fishy Dish.
“This seems like an odd time for a delivery,” Samantha observed.
“You’re right. It’s not the normal day or delivery time,” Hannah replied. “Maybe he stopped to visit with Meg.” Hannah hoped this budding relationship wasn’t going to interfere while Meg was swamped with work.
Hannah heard raised voices as she got closer to the snack bar and Samantha continued toward her cottage.
“Come on, Meg. Help me out. I have this whole order for The Chowde
r House that I’m stuck with after last night. Gavin was my biggest customer.”
“And you made it very clear that The Fishy Dish is your smallest customer. How do you expect me to absorb this much extra fish?”
“I’ll give you a deal, sweetheart.” Hannah gagged when she heard Jerry’s fake sugary sweet voice patronize Meg.
“You have to wait until Hannah returns. I can’t authorize a big order like this,” Meg hissed.
Hannah smiled to herself. Meg had been right when she said she kept business and pleasure separate. And Jerry Sewall probably made a big mistake when he called Meg, sweetheart. His chances of a relationship with Meg dropped to the basement level.
Hannah poked her head in the back door. “Problems?”
“Oh, just who I was looking for.” Jerry smiled a big, have I got a deal for you, smile. He escorted Hannah to his truck as she tried to keep her gag reflex under control. “I’m sure you know about what happened to Gavin Abbott?”
“I do. I think everyone in town is in shock.”
“Well, I was all set last night with an extra delivery. Gavin had more business than he expected and called me for a last minute order.” Jerry opened the door of his new truck. “The bottom line is, for obvious reasons he wasn’t available to take delivery, and now I need to find a home for all this.” He gestured at the boxes of frozen fish. “Can you help me out?”
“I could take a little more frozen haddock I suppose, but I don’t have a ton of extra freezer space to make much of a dent, I’m afraid.” Hannah felt sorry for Jerry, her sympathy extending only to his business dilemma. She wasn’t sure, but she didn’t think he worked on much of a markup and losing a big order could certainly hurt his bottom line.
“Thanks, Hannah. Every little bit helps.”
“Were you at The Chowder House last night then?”
“I went to make my delivery, but when Chef Belair stormed out the back door and told me he was fired, I got nervous about giving Gavin any more credit. How was he planning to keep the restaurant going without a chef?”
“Did Chef Belair have anything else to say?”
“You bet he did. But it was all in French so I could only imagine it was a lot of swear words aimed at Gavin. He was furious.”
Jerry loaded Hannah up with several boxes of haddock filets and slammed his door closed.
“Did you see anyone else?”
Jerry thought for a minute. “Lots of people were walking on the sidewalk. I did see a woman head toward the back door but she quickly turned around when she saw me talking to Chef Belair. I didn’t get a good look at her, except I did notice that her bangs fell over the top of her big glasses.”
“How about Chef Belair? Did he act nervous at all?”
“Nervous? No, just furious.” Jerry gave Hannah the bill. “I’ve gotta run. Thanks for your business. Tell Meg I’ll see her tonight at the vigil. Sad about that girl, isn’t it?”
Hannah touched Jerry’s arm to get his attention. “How well did you know Gavin? Try to remember as much as you can. Who knows? Maybe you saw the murderer and didn’t realize it.”
Jerry shuddered. “Gavin Abbott was, well, I’m not sure what the right description would be—stand-offish? Or maybe, more accurately, overly confident. Like he always expected things to go his way no matter what.” Jerry shrugged. “I needed his business and he knew it. That sort of put me at a disadvantage and I felt like I was always the one helping him out to keep him happy.” Another shrug. “Now I’ll need to find a bunch of small accounts to make up for the business he promised me.”
“Good luck with that.” Hannah offered her heartfelt encouragement. “I’m learning how hard it is to run a business. There are parts I love and parts I hate and those are the parts I have to keep the closest eye on.”
Jerry rewarded Hannah with a genuine smile. “I’m glad I can count on you and Meg. It’s customers like you that make what I’m doing enjoyable.”
Hannah watched Jerry’s truck disappear. Maybe he wasn’t such a jerk, Hannah decided. He might even be a respectable date for Meg. Not that it was any of her business. She laughed.
Hannah pushed the extra frozen haddock into her small freezer. She supposed there was a strong possibility that her business would benefit from The Chowder House closing. Not that the thought gave her much satisfaction, given the circumstances for the closure.
She gave Meg and Ruby a quick update about Jack’s situation and they were both relieved at the good news.
“You’ve got an admirer waiting at one of the tables outside. He’s been taking up that space all morning. Can you charge him rent?” Meg suggested.
Hannah peeked through the front window. Just as Hannah suspected, Sean Payne sat hunched over his laptop, under the umbrella with his back to the ocean view, and at least half a dozen coffee mugs lined up in front of him.
“Before I go out there,” Hannah said to Meg, “Pam hinted about something in Samantha’s background that I should look into. Any clue what she might have been referring to?”
Meg looked away. “It’s not really for me to share, but since Caroline can’t tell you, I guess I should.” Meg dumped hot fries from the deep fryer onto three fish platters before she wiped her hands on her Catch of the Day apron. “Samantha and Caroline always had a ton of fun together and I didn’t say anything about this before because I thought maybe Samantha changed.”
“Quit stalling and just tell me. How bad can it be?”
“She never was a private investigator, at least, not a legitimate one. She always pretended—made up clients, cases, and all kinds of wild stake-outs she supposedly was on.”
“No Sam Stone?”
“There is a Sam Stone, but Samantha isn’t him. She pretends. I assumed at her age it was a harmless bit of fantasy she liked to indulge in.”
“So, this client she’s,” Hannah used finger quotes, “working for, isn’t real?”
Meg shrugged. “Probably not. Did she give you any details?”
Hannah lowered her voice. “She said she’s working for Matt’s sister, Jan. She didn’t meet her in person but Samantha said she was hired to find Sally.”
Meg whistled. “That seems farfetched. I bet she’s been following the news and decided if she can find Sally, she’d finally make a name for herself. Either that or it’s just an interesting game.”
“The bottom line is, I should be extra careful what I share with her.” Hannah summarized. “Oh, I almost forgot, Jerry asked me to tell you that he’d see you tonight at the vigil.”
Meg shrugged as if she couldn’t care less. “I don’t want to disappoint him, but he called me sweetheart earlier and it really rubbed me the wrong way. I can’t tell if he actually likes me or if he’s using me to make a sale to you. I’m losing interest in playing his game.”
Chapter 12
Hannah couldn’t avoid Sean Payne any longer. At least, she needed to encourage him to leave so the table would be free for paying customers.
“Working on your story?” she asked innocently, hoping for a tidbit of new information.
Sean closed his laptop. When he looked up at Hannah, his eyes were shining. “Yes. Something exciting happened this morning.” He pointed to the seat opposite him. “Join me?”
“I have a minute.” She sat.
“I got a most interesting phone call earlier,” he offered. He sat with his arms crossed over his chest and a Cheshire cat grin on his face.
“The killer confessed and wants you to do an exclusive interview?” Hannah asked, already knowing the answer.
“Not that great but darn close.”
Hannah could see his excitement and could feel his need to share his information before he burst apart at the seams.
“Sally White’s aunt called me. I set up a meeting with her.” He lowered his voice and cupped his hands around his mouth. “She’s Matt White’s sister.”
Hannah’s pulse quickened. She hoped her face didn’t betray her excitement. “That doesn’t s
ound too unusual. Isn’t it normal for the whole family to rally at a time like this?” She feigned ignorance about knowing anything about Matt’s sister.
“But this isn’t a normal, so to speak, family. Matt and his sister, Jan, haven’t spoken or seen each other in years. Jan is extremely concerned about what Matt could do if he finds her in town. There’s very bad blood between those two.”
“She told you all this?”
Sean sat up straighter. “I’ve done my homework. It took a lot of digging but Jan could be a key player in Sally’s disappearance.”
Hannah folded her arms on the table and leaned toward Sean. “I’m impressed. Tell me more.”
“I’d like to but I’ve probably already said more than I should. But, mark my words; the vigil tonight will be an interesting affair.”
“Oh, come on Sean,” Hannah shamelessly prodded with her best eyelash flutter.
She knew her charm would work and he kept talking. “I’ll tell you this much. I think Jan knows where Sally is but Sally is afraid to come home.”
“Afraid of what?”
Sean hesitated. “Afraid for herself and her aunt’s safety.”
“But Gavin is no longer a threat.”
“Gavin never was the problem.”
“According to Sally’s aunt?”
“According to what Jan says she knows about her brother’s actions on the night of Gavin’s murder.”
“Shouldn’t she be telling all this to the police?”
“Maybe she will after she talks to me. Of course, after I hear what she has to tell me, I’ll still have to confirm the information.”
“Why you Sean? Why did Jan contact you?”
A self-satisfied grin slowly spread across Sean’s face. “I saw her at The Chowder House and confronted her when she rushed out after the argument between Gavin and Matt. I caught her by surprise when I called her name, but by the look on her face, I knew my guess was accurate. I think she called me to keep me quiet and I demanded the meeting. She knows I’ll blow her cover if she doesn’t cooperate with me.”
“She could just be leading you on. No one even knows what she looks like. Maybe she’s an imposter.” Hannah challenged Sean’s story.
