DUNE, DOCK, and a DEAD MAN: A Ravenwood Cove Cozy Mystery

by Carolyn L. Dean

“And then I whacked him with the fireplace poker.”

  Amanda’s mouth dropped open, admiration on her face. “You’re awesome.”

  Jennifer’s voice was a bit shaky. “I took two years of tae kwon do, and I’ve got a brown belt. We did a lot of practice on self-defense skills.” She took a shuddering breath. “After Evelyn was attacked on a date and I saw what it did to her life, I realized that I didn’t want the same thing to happen to me. I had to learn how to protect myself.”

  A faint prickling began at the back of Amanda’s skull. “Evelyn? You know a young woman named Evelyn? Was she from around here?”

  Jennifer plopped down on the nearby chair, the adrenaline from her encounter apparently overwhelming her. “Um, yeah, she’s Mrs. Bitterman’s granddaughter. We went to school together.”

  Mrs. Bitterman’s granddaughter. It all started to make perfect, horrible sense. “Jennifer, listen. This is important. Was she attacked while she went to university?”

  Jennifer had been keeping an eye on the unconscious Loomis, but she looked up in surprise. “Yes, how did you know?”

  Amanda could feel the headache gathering behind her eyes as she started to put the puzzle pieces together. “Do you know who assaulted her?” she asked, trying to keep her breathing calm and even.

  “I don’t know his name, but he was some guy training to be a pharmacist. A real creep, I guess.”

  Evelyn. Amanda knew now that she would never forget that name. Mrs. Bitterman’s granddaughter was a victim of Anderson Bowles, and she was also the woman that Truman had dated a couple of times.

  Truman must’ve been enough of a threat that Anderson did anything he could, including accusing him of cheating in college, so that he could pursue Evelyn without interference.

  She’d found a connection to Truman, but she’d also discovered that Mrs. Bitterman, who talked of her granddaughter was such love in her voice, had a motive to kill the man who had done her such harm.

  “Do you know what he was trying to find?”

  Jennifer grimaced. “Might’ve been the keychain from Disneyland that my Dad gave me a few years back. Loomis seemed really happy when he found it in my purse, and there’s nothing exotic about the keys, so I figure there must’ve been something important about the keychain itself.”

  Amanda glanced at the fireplace, the flames starting to die down a bit. “Well, if there was something in the keychain it won’t be any use to anyone after it’s been burned like that, but I guess we’ll have to tell the authorities.”

  When the police arrived they found the women sitting side-by-side on the sofa, calmly watching the still prone Richard Loomis.

  Chapter 22

  The fallout from Richard Loomis showing up at the Ravenwood Inn was swift and satisfying, with a string of events that answered some questions about the mysterious Mr. Loomis.

  The Inn had been crawling with cops, from the moment the first one burst in the front door. Amanda had seen a lot of the same faces investigating the lakeside crime scene, where Loomis had jumped his sedan off the embankment and into the dark water. Apparently it had been his backup escape plan, as a scuba tank was found abandoned near the edge of the lake, and tire marks that matched a car parked down the street from the Inn were discovered. A .38 revolver was found in the car at the bottom of the lake, an unexpected loss for Loomis when he’d hit the water.

  After he was taken to the hospital, James had made sure that the police officer in charge took a set of fingerprints from the groggy Loomis. Within two hours, James was back, standing on the welcome mat of the bustling Ravenwood Inn.

  “Well, well, well. Come on in, Detective,” Amanda said wryly. “Join the party. We’re going to send out for pizza, so you’re just in time.”

  Of all the reactions James had anticipated, Amanda’s calm greeting and her dark sense of humor weren’t on the list.

  “I don’t know whether to hug you or shake you.” He had waited until they were in the parlor alone, away from the two remaining investigators, before he had said what was on his mind.

  “I’m sorry?”

  “How do you keep getting in these sort of situations? Lady, you are a walking hazard!” She could hear the tone of frustration in his voice.

  “No, I’m not, and I’ll tell you why.”

  He looked at her suspiciously. “Have you been drinking?”

  “Um, maybe just a bit of wine.”

  “Right.”

  “Or a lot of wine. Good for my nerves, and after today I deserve it, doncha think?”

  He winced and pinched the bridge of his nose, obviously frustrated. “Maybe you do, but I think you’ve had enough, okay?”

  “I’m not a walking hazard.” She grinned at him.

  “Oh, you’re not, huh?”

  She poked him in the chest with a jabbing finger. “You know what I am? I’m a woman who’s been attacked by a mob guy who pretended to be dead and who wasn’t dead and now he’s in the hospital and he’s going to jail, so it’s all good.”

  James tried not to laugh, but it didn’t work.

  “You know what else?”

  “What?” He was dying to know.

  “My only employee is actually a super-secret warrior ninja. Don’t mess with her.”

  “I won’t.”

  “And if she ever says she’s gonna kick ya, I suggest you run.”

  At that sober pronouncement he cracked up, giving in to the laugh that he’d been trying to suppress.

  “I’ll do my best to remember that. Let’s see what we can do about getting some food in you, okay?” and with that bit of insistence, James escorted her to the kitchen to see what he sort of dinner he could make for his very relaxed friend.

  ***

  She couldn’t believe it. They didn’t match.

  James had called Amanda first thing in the morning and let her know the results of the lab tests run on the gun they’d found in Loomis’ car. After firing a test bullet and comparing it to the bullets found in Anderson Bowles’ boat, they definitely did not match.

  It was discovered, however, that the gun had been used in two other homicides; one in Vegas two years earlier, and a second in Seattle just three weeks ago. Once the fingerprints were compared against the national database, Richard Loomis’ fate was sealed.

  Except that he wasn’t actually Richard Loomis. It turned out he was a well-known hit man in a West Coast organization of criminals, mostly trafficking in drugs and gambling. His name was Wes Baden, and he had felony warrants that made sure he was going to be in jail for a very long time. Combined with the new arrests for assault and attempted murder, James had been happy to let Amanda know that she’d never need to worry about him being out on the streets again.

  James had also made clear to Loomis, now Baden, that the thumb drive that had been hidden in Jennifer’s keychain had been completely destroyed when Baden had accidentally thrown it into the fire. With no data, there was no reason to pursue Jennifer or come back to Ravenwood Cove.

  Maybe she should’ve been happy about all this, but there was one problem. If Loomis didn’t kill Anderson Bowles, then who did?

  A couple of days later Amanda was down at Cuppa, sitting with Meg and James and talking over everything that had happened. A lot of the information was now public knowledge, so Amanda was able to speak more freely about what she knew, and it was definitely less stressful to be able to kick around ideas with her friends.

  She’d had to tell James about Evelyn, and her connection to Mrs. Bitterman and Truman, but she’d made sure to do that when they were alone so that no one else would know. He’d grimaced when she told him, as though her words actually hurt, and she knew that now he’d have to consider Mrs. Bitterman as part of the puzzle of Anderson Bowles’ death.

  They were enjoying their coffee and talking about everything and anything when Meg suddenly added a piece of information they hadn’t heard before.

  “Did I tell you that my grandmother’s gun is missing?”

&n
bsp; Amanda’s eyebrows went up. “Mrs. Granger’s .38?”

  That caught James’ attention. “Someone stole it from her purse?” Apparently, he knew Mrs. Granger’s habit of carrying the snub-nosed gun in the black bag she had hanging from her walker.

  “No, she lent is to Owen Winters and he said someone stole it off his fruit stand while his back was turned.”

  “How long ago?” James was leaning forward, intent on the answer.

  “Um, I don’t know. You’d have to ask him.”

  “Meg, do you know if your grandmother ever fired that gun?”

  Meg looked surprised and shrugged. “Sure. After Grampa Hubert died she started going out to that fallen tree by her compost pile and using it for target practice. Says it helps her be ready if there’s ever a burglar.” She turned to Amanda. “Says she’d never let them outta her place alive. Can you believe it?”

  Amanda definitely could believe it. “Meg, how long ago did she use that tree for target practice?”

  “This summer, I think. Why?”

  James smiled and put a hand on Meg’s shoulder. “Because I’m trying to match a bullet from an outboard motor and a murder investigation. If someone stole that gun and it matches the bullets from the boat, then it takes us in a whole new direction.”

  Chapter 23

  Mrs. Granger was only too happy to let her favorite police detective dig several bullets out of the fallen tree in her backyard. She’d kept up a running stream of conversation while he dug around in the rotting wood with a knife, carefully prying out the bits of metal and sealing them in separate evidence bags. After extracting a promise from James that he’d be able to come by on Saturday for lunch, which would probably be pickle and bologna sandwiches, he’d kissed her on the cheek and promised to let her know the results of the ballistics tests that were going to be run. If her gun was the one that had fired the bullets in Anderson Bowles’ rented boat, she’d be one of the first ones to know, and that thrilled her no end.

  When the woman at the ballistics lab hand-delivered the results to James, he scanned the paper quickly and gave a deep sigh. It was time to go visit Owen Winters.

  Ignoring the ‘keep out’ warning signs on his fence, James calmly rapped on Owen’s front door, then knocked louder, remembering that sometimes his hearing wasn’t very good.

  Owen popped his head out the door and looked at the tall detective with unbridled suspicion.

  “What do you want?”

  “I came to talk to you about Mrs. Granger’s missing gun. Do you have some time, Mr. Winters?”

  He could almost see the old man flinch, but Owen finally stepped out onto his front porch and gestured to one of the sagging plastic chairs. “Have a seat and ask your questions. We might as well get this over with.”

  That wasn’t the reaction James had expected. It didn’t seem to be belligerent at all, but sounded almost apologetic. He sat down carefully in the rickety chair and turned toward Owen, who was sitting and staring blankly out at his fruit stand.

  “Why didn’t you tell the police that you’d borrowed Mrs. Granger’s gun and that it had been stolen?”

  “Have you checked my records?”

  James frowned. “What records?”

  The old man shut his eyes, as if remembering something from long ago. “My prison records.”

  James waited, then asked. “Felon?”

  A deep sigh. “Yes, over forty years ago for car theft.”

  Finally, James understood. “So you’re a felon and you’re not allowed to possess or use a gun. Is that why you didn’t tell us about it?”

  “Would it have mattered? What would you have done to me that hasn’t been done before?”

  James leaned toward Owen, his voice strong and sincere. “It would’ve helped with our investigation into Anderson Bowles’ murder, Mr. Winters. Hiding your involvement just makes things worse for you. We now know that gun was shot in the boat Bowles’ died in.”

  “I had nothing to do with that!” Owen’s voice climbed higher with desperation. “You can test my clothes, my hands, whatever you need, but I swear to you that I did not pull the trigger on that gun to kill Bowles!”

  “I guess we’ll see. So you say that it was stolen from your fruit stand. Did you see anyone steal it?”

  Owen sagged in his chair, all the fight in him seemingly gone. “No. I had several people come by for pears but when I saw that kid next door climbing over my back fence I turned around to yell at him and drag him home to his parents, and by the time I got back the gun was gone.”

  “Where was it?”

  “I had it on the very top of the fruit stand. I had just put it up there and poof! Five minutes later it’s gone.” He turned to James, his face reflecting his fear. “I only borrowed it to shoot the squirrels who were eating the nuts from my trees. I would never shoot a person.”

  James looked into the old man’s eyes, seeing desperation. “I’ll need you to wait here, Mr. Winters. I’m going to call for a search warrant.”

  Owen sat back in his chair, his mouth now a thin, hard line. “Do what you’ve got to do.”

  ***

  After the police had thoroughly searched Owen Winter’s house, he was told not to leave town, and James had to admit that they hadn’t found a single thing that tied him to the murder. There was nearly a week where Amanda didn’t see James, and there was nothing new in the investigation until a break in the case came from the most unexpected of places.

  It came from the police chief’s eight-year-old daughter, Danielle.

  One night at dinner George was talking to his children about their schoolwork, and when his wife, Amy, chimed in with a story about a boy in one of her classes years ago who had cheated on a test, Danielle squirmed a bit in her chair and piped up.

  “Daddy, what if someone stole something bad? Would that be cheating?”

  Her father’s eyebrows went up. “Well, yes, Danielle, it would be a type of cheating. Remember how we talk about the commandments and how we’re not supposed to steal?”

  Danielle looked down at her plate and sucked a bit of air through the gap where her front teeth were missing.

  “If I saw someone steal something, do I have to tell? Is it tattling?”

  By now her siblings were looking at each other, wondering which one of them the little girl was going to out. George nodded at Danielle.

  “Yes, Danielle, you need to tell someone about it. It’s not tattling.”

  The story that Danielle told that night shook George’s normally cool composure, and he had to focus on keeping calm as his daughter told him that she’d seen a tall blond man take a gun off the top of Owen Winter’s fruit stand. She’d been riding her bike and noticed the man reaching onto the top of the stand when Owen was escorting his unrepentant neighbor boy back home. Danielle had looped her bike around a second time to take a look at the tall man, but when he glared at her she took off, pedaling like mad for the safety of home.

  When George had shown his daughter a few photos, she’d instantly identified Anderson Bowles as the man who’d stolen the gun. A quick phone call to James, and Owen Winters was officially off the suspect list.

  James carefully listed his reasoning on the report. The evidence supported the theory that Anderson Bowles had taken the gun into the boat with him, and when he’d started to hallucinate he’d stripped his clothes off and shot wildly, sometimes from the bottom of the boat, finally throwing the gun and all his belongings except a sweatshirt into the waves.

  It was a sad ending to a bad life but it only answered questions about the bullets. Why was Anderson Bowles hallucinating in the first place?

  Chapter 24

  Some rainy days are best spent with a friend eating pizza and solving everyone else’s problems. Crammed into a back booth at Heinrich’s, Lisa and Amanda split a medium size pizza with the works, still steaming from Heinrich’s brick pizza oven. Amanda had tried to balance out the calories by ordering one of Heinrich’s fabulous green salads
, but the handmade dressing and garlicky croutons on the top definitely didn’t help her plan.

  “I can’t believe Owen Winters is a felon. Did you know about that?” Amanda handed a plate to Lisa so she could shovel a gooey piece of deliciousness onto it.

  Lisa shrugged. “It was over forty years ago. I figure he’d paid his debt to society and he’s been a solid citizen here, so there was no need to talk about it.”

  “Even the police didn’t know.”

  “No reason for them to know. It was over and done with.” Lisa’s voice was firm, her mind obviously made up. She could see that Amanda disagreed with her, so tried to change the subject. “Did I tell you no one’s seen Truman in over a week? His store’s been locked up tight.”

  “Really?” Amanda frowned. That wasn’t like Truman at all.

  “Oh, and one last thing. Did I tell you that I did some research on the heart medicine you told me about? Digoxin?”

  Amanda set down her slice of pizza. “No, you didn’t. What did you learn?”

  “It turns out that it isn’t very easy to detect. I’m actually impressed that the medical examiner found it at all. Its half-life is just over a day.”

  “Really? Anything else?”

  “Yeah, it turns out that it’s been in use at one time or another for years. They used to grind up plants to make it.”

  Amanda felt the hairs on the back of her neck stand up. “What did they call it?”

  “Um, digitalis.”

  Amanda pulled out her phone and started searching the internet. With the very first page of results, her mouth turned down at the corners. She knew that plant. It was beautiful, and she’d seen it before.

  “Could someone use pieces of digitalis to make Digoxin?”

  Lisa looked surprised. “I don’t think they’d have to. It’s basically the same thing.”

  Amanda closed her eyes, the image of the plant and its cascading flowers burned into her memory.

  “I’ve got to go,” Lisa said, shoving a hand down the sleeve of her coat and shrugging it on. “I promised I’d pick Mrs. Bitterman up from the garden club meeting, and then give her a ride down to Petrie’s to get some straw for mulching her garden.”