A Ghost for Christmas (Destiny Bay Cozy Mysteries Book 1)

by Winters, J. D.

  “Be careful,” he said, like a breeze passing my ear. “There’s danger nearby.”

  And I knew he was gone. I could feel it. I turned off the water and looked into the mirror on the off chance—but no. He was gone. And I hadn’t seen him at all.

  I heard Bebe crying in her room and it broke my heart, but when she came out, she was putting a brave face on it. She left right after breakfast to do some Christmas shopping. I went out into the back yard, restless and nervous. There had to be something I could do to get this impossible situation cleared up or we would all go nuts.

  Aunty Jane was waiting for me, leaning against the fence. She gestured for me to come closer, and when I did, she said, “I tell you this, you go see Ginny Genera. She one smart wahine and she see everything in this valley. You go.”

  She turned and started off.

  “Wait,” I said, running after her. “Wait, I need to ask you some questions.”

  And then it was as though she’d never been there.

  But Sami the black cat came sashaying out of the daisies, looking pleased with himself. I bent down to give him a scratch behind the ears and he purred as loud as a locomotive coming through.

  It was frustrating trying to communicate with Aunty Jane. But she’d given me some advice. Maybe I ought to take it. I went inside and found some binoculars, then scanned the hills and lanes all around until I spotted where Ginny was running today. I got my bike and went after her.

  I was still stiff from the trip up to the castle. I was going to somehow gather the discipline to work out every day so that I could ride with Bebe when she needed me. I figured that would be about the time Caroline, her best riding partner, got indicted. So I had to be prepared.

  “Hi Ginny,” I said as I rode up beside her and cut my speed to match with hers. “How are you today?”

  “I’m fine, Mele. Good to see you out and about.”

  She was in silver colors, a sign of good luck as far as I was concerned. But I had to tease her a little.

  “You need a Santa running suit for the season,” I pointed out.

  She laughed. “Not me. Red is too flamboyant. I’m a shrinking violet, I am.”

  “Hah.” Sure. The lady everybody and his brother knew and loved. “Listen Ginny. I’m trying to get a handle on these murders. It drives me crazy that Bebe keeps being named as a suspect. I want to find the real killer and take her out of the limelight.”

  Ginny nodded. “Good for you. But I’m not sure how I can help you do that.”

  “You run these trails every day, Ginny. You must see a lot and hear a lot that the rest of us don’t have a clue about.”

  She smiled a secret smile. “Possibly.”

  “So give, lady,” I said, trying to keep my tone friendly and bantering. “Tell me your secrets. Or better yet, the secrets of the occupants of the valley. Something you haven’t been asked about by the police. Like, for instance, Caroline. What do you know about her that I don’t know?”

  Ginny thought for a minute and I was relieved to see that she might just consider playing along for awhile.

  “Okay, here’s something.” She stopped where she was and began to jog in place. “Lately Caroline has been hiding things in Bebe’s birdhouses. I’m not sure if it’s notes to a secret lover or what. But she’s always popping up, raiding the birdhouses or slipping something inside, usually just before dawn.”

  “You run before dawn?”

  “That’s the best time. And honey, I run all the time.”

  “Okay. That’s interesting.” I bit my lip. It really was. Now I was pretty sure that had been Caroline I’d seen the other night. But why? For what? And why did Adrian get interested in it? I looked at her again. “Anyone else doing anything strange?”

  “Well, Hank spends a lot of time up at the top of that bit of land that goes through the vineyards.”

  “You mean up by Caroline’s house?”

  She nodded. “I see his golf cart up there all the time. If you know what I mean.”

  I frowned. “Was this before Kyle was killed?”

  She nodded. “He’s been hanging around up there for weeks.”

  “Huh.” I looked at her. “I heard that area had more problems than any other and needed more of his attention. You don’t buy it?”

  She rolled her eyes but didn’t say a word.

  “Okay,” I went on. “How about Michael? What does he do that’s interesting?”

  She smiled. “He visits Bebe a lot. But I like them both and I’m not telling any tales on them.”

  “Okay.” That was an answer I could appreciate.

  “I will tell you Hank doesn’t like him.”

  “Who? Michael?”

  She nodded. “He’s always angry at him. Thinks Bebe shouldn’t allow him to use the greenhouse for the 4-H program he runs here. Hank is always complaining that Michael doesn’t clean up after the kids.” She shrugged. “And you know, he’s right. But since I like Michael….”

  “You don’t want to tell tales.” I grinned at her. “Anything else?”

  She frowned. “I can’t think of anything offhand.” She shook her head. “Catch up with me later, I might think of something.”

  I thanked her and waved as she sped off. Turning my bicycle back toward the Miyaki Farm, I rode slowly, thinking over what Ginny had told me.

  At least the suspicions about Caroline were pretty much bearing out. She was putting something into the birdhouses at least, and maybe other places in the front yard. But what? And why? And had she stopped? Because we hadn’t seen anything yet. As far as we knew it was all myth and legend.

  Her info about Hank was also interesting. He’d been spending a lot of time hanging out at the top of the spit of land that reached almost into the Madronna household. If he was working on pipes and irrigation and the like, that was one thing. If he was hanging out, watching Caroline and…lets face it..lusting after her, that was another.

  I rode into the yard and hopped off the bike. I was getting stronger at the riding—I could feel it. One little bright spot in an otherwise dreary day.

  I went in and fixed myself some soup for lunch, then took my time sipping it down. Warm and nutritious, it filled a cold spot inside me and I felt a lot better. For a few minutes, I thought about Detective McKnight and the parade of lights the night before, and I felt even better. That had really been fun.

  And then it hit me. I didn’t know Detective McKnight’s first name. That was no good. I needed to know that. I tried the yellow pages, then went to the internet. I couldn’t find it. Maybe it was on some papers he’d signed for Bebe. I searched her desk. Nope. Still no luck. By now I was frantic. I had to know what his first name was. I couldn’t go on thinking of him as Detective McKnight. That was ridiculous. I called the station.

  “Can you tell me what Detective McKnight’s first name is?”

  “Who is this?”

  “My name is…” I thought fast. “My name is Rachel Loveless. I’m writing an article for the Daily Treacle. I need the detective’s first name.”

  “No, you’re not.”

  “What? Wait a minute. How dare you…”

  “Rachel Loveless sounds like a porn star. I will not give a porn star Johnny’s first name. Goodby.” And he hung up.

  I grinned, then my grin faded. He couldn’t be that stupid. He’d done that on purpose, hadn’t he? I sighed, straight and deep from the heart. I was going to have to go straight to the man himself, wasn’t I? Darn.

  But not now. Now, I needed to work on the case. My case. Hah. Take that Detective whatever-your-name-is. I got back to thinking over all the relevant features and clues.

  I couldn’t shake the feeling that Caroline had to be involved somehow. With Kyle gone, and now Adrian, there was only one person beside my aunt who might know something on that score. Hank. So what was I waiting for? Why wasn’t I hammering down old Hank’s door?

  Something, some thread of caution, was saying, NO! But what the heck—I didn’
t listen to caution. I had a mission to perform. I went out back into Bebe’s garden and looked over toward Hank’s office.

  “Be careful.”

  Aunty Jane was suddenly standing very close to me, looking over there as well. “That man can be mean sometimes. I seen him.”

  “Do you think he knows something?” I asked her.

  True to form, she didn’t answer. Instead, she began to fade away. But I was strangely comforted by the fact that she’d cared enough to warn me. I felt like at least somebody had my back.

  Now, having a ghost protecting you in any way is a pretty iffy thing. They usually can’t actually do you much good. Oh, they can cheer you on and maybe knock down a few noisy artifacts. But other than that, they’re not very effective. Scary, but not too strong. I knew I was actually on my own.

  Taking a deep breath, I headed for Hank’s place. He came out just as I reached the porch. And he wasn’t smiling.

  “Listen Hank,” I said nervously. “I wanted to…to thank you for showing me around the other day. I really enjoyed it.”

  “No problem,” he said brusquely.

  “But…but right now I wonder if we could talk for a minute. I’ve got some questions and I thought you, being such a fixture here, maybe you could help me with a few things.”

  He didn’t look receptive. “I’m going into town,” he said. “I’ve got something I need to do.”

  “Oh this will only take a minute,” I said. “It’s about the…the murders and ….”

  “I’ve got no time for that.”

  “But I just wanted to ask you, since you spend so much time up on the spit of Miyaki Farms that goes right up practically into the Madronna Winery mansion, I thought maybe you could tell me something about…”

  “No,” he said, glaring at me. “I can’t. I don’t watch people. I don’t gossip. And I’m not going to tell you what I see. So get lost. I’ve got things to do.”

  “But…”

  Oh well. He wasn’t going to listen. Instead, he got into his dark green car and roared off, leaving a cloud of dirt behind him.

  That was annoying. I could understand his position, but he didn’t have to be so rude about it. His attitude had me steamed and I looked around, thinking about what I could do since he wouldn’t talk. I looked at the Kamehameha statue and it warmed my heart, but then my gaze fell on the pack of golf carts waiting beneath it like good little soldiers. So cute, so helpful. I should be able to handle one—you think? It seemed to be a fairly simple machine. Surely I could drive it. And lookee here! The keys were dangling in the ignition of the first one. It was like a message from above.

  Here, Mele. Take this little vehicle and look into things yourself. Go with our blessing. Find that murderer.

  Okay, I said.

  Not aloud, of course, but to myself. Okay.

  I hopped into the golf cart with the key and experimented for a moment or two, and then I was roaring off myself, only I went in the direction of the Madronna mansion. In minutes I’d made the climb and was staring into the grounds of the estate. There was the room where Ardrian had stayed. It looked like a cabin in the woods. There was the swimming pool with its fancy columns and slides. Hank must have had a pretty good view of anything going on there every time he took his golf cart up and parked here to work on the peninsula of Miyaki land that intruded right into the heart of Madronna vineyards. Then there was the house itself, set up higher, but with walls of glass facing this way. Another intrusion right into Madronna family life. No wonder Kyle had been so obsessed with getting control of that piece of land. You could hardly blame him.

  Still, it was wrong to try to strong-arm and cheat Bebe out of it.

  Suddenly I had a vision of what it must have been like for Hank. He came up here to work on the land and to work on the plants, the pipes, the machinery. And all he heard was the happy sound of pool parties, with beautiful women in bikinis playing and flirting and living the sort of life he wasn’t, with his shovel and his sweaty shirt and his water bottle. I could just imagine him fixating on Caroline, wondering what it would be like to be a part of her world.

  As I understood it, he’d recently let Caroline know how he felt about her, and she hadn’t turned him away—not completely. So he’d begun to hope. And then, maybe Kyle had come down hard on him or threatened him, warning him to stay away from his wife. And maybe Hank got mad and did something about it. Maybe. It all seemed to make sense right now. But it was all conjecture. How would I ever know for sure? And how was this any more likely than all the other scenarios I’d conjured up?

  I looked back down at the valley spread out below. A movement caught my eye. Hank was back. Hmmm. Too soon for me. But wait, what was he doing? He was getting into a golf cart. Ooops. Looked like he was coming up to join me.

  Something told me that wouldn’t be good. A picture was beginning to form in my little brain—a picture of Hank as the murderer. Really? Could that be?

  Why yes. It seemed to fit quite nicely, now that I’d thought of it.

  I didn’t know for sure, but I had a feeling he was definitely on some other side than the one I was on. And from the look of the way he was rocketing toward me, he was taking no prisoners.

  Chapter Thirteen

  I turned on my little engine and started back down, taking a different trail than the one Hank had chosen. Hank changed over. He was coming right at me. No! This was scary. I had a feeling he was going to take things out on me one way or another. I couldn’t let that happen.

  I saw my opportunity and I switched, racing toward the bottom on a completely different trail. My heart was beginning to pump with adrenalin. If he caught me, this could be bad.

  He switched again. No matter what I tried, he kept changing and coming straight at me—and he knew these trails better than anybody. I had to beat him. I had to make it back to the exit before he did.

  I held down the accelerator as hard as I could and took a curve at full speed, almost going over. Plants whipped at me, cutting the skin of my face. I tried to go even faster. I’d never been this scared before.

  On and on I raced. I couldn’t believe that the little cart kept taking corners the way it did. I expected at any moment to be thrown out on my ear. But she kept doing it, taking curves like she’d been to Le Mans. Crazy little golf cart—I owe her my life!

  I was almost to the bottom, to the entrance where the statue stood. I could see Hank closing in out of the corner of my eye. I said a little prayer and aimed for the exit.

  We reached the bottom at the same time and he crashed right into me—just like that. We crunched and I went spinning, almost hitting the statue. I yelled at him, “Are you trying to kill me?”, and then everything went black for a second or two-I must have hit my head. He’d meant to stop me and that was exactly what he did.

  As I got my consciousness back, I stared at him, ready to run but not sure I was able. My cart was crunched and I was going to have to contort my legs to get out of the cart. He didn’t seem any worst for wear from the crash, but for all I knew, we‘d both been incapacitated for a minute or two. Then he jumped from his cart and pulled out a gun. And that was when I really got scared.

  “It was you, then,” I said in a strangled voice.

  “Shit,” he said, running a hand through his reddish hair as though he was totally frustrated. “What the hell are you doing sneaking around here? Why can’t you leave me alone?”

  “You killed Kyle.”

  His mouth fell open and he swore obscenely. He glared at me. “Sure I killed Kyle. He was making Caroline’s life a misery. Why wouldn’t I kill the bastard?”

  “Because it’s wrong.”

  “Says who?”

  I didn’t bother to answer that stupid question. I knew I should probably try to get him talking. Play for time. Maybe someone would come out this way and I’d get some help.

  “Tell me how it happened.”

  He growled as though he didn’t want to do it. But to my surprise, he start
ed off explaining everything, as though it might somehow relieve his own conscience to do it.

  “I saw him prowling around in Bebe’s front yard. I knew what he was doing. He wanted to know what Caroline was putting in the birdhouses.” He swore softly. “I told her to stop doing it. I told her he’d see it and know what was going on. But she was obsessed with getting what she thought she was owed, before he divorced her.”

  I really had no idea what he was talking about, but at least he was talking. “So what was she putting in the birdhouses?” I asked.

  “You know. The artifacts.” He stared at me. “Or didn’t you know?”

  He was going to regret talking if I didn’t think fast.

  “Oh sure. But I just didn’t know all the details. Go ahead. What was she dealing with mostly?”

  “The jewelry. All the things Kyle had collected on the continent, the treasures. She was taking them to a copy artist, making copies so that she could sell off the originals and collect the money. When Kyle found out what she was doing, he was livid.”

  “No kidding.”

  He was waving that gun around in a way that made me very nervous. “What did he care? They looked the same.”

  “But they weren’t the same.”

  “So what? He was so mad about it, he threatened to divorce her and charge her with a crime that would put her in jail for years. I couldn’t let that happen.”

  He said it, and looked at me, as though he really cared whether I understood his reasoning or not. He wanted to make sure I knew he wasn’t a bad guy. He just was forced by circumstances to do bad things. That was all.

  “So you killed him.”

  “Well, yeah. What else could I do?”

  “Let her go to jail?”

  “Not possible. I love her.”

  “I see.”

  Love. That universal addiction.

  But something else was going on. I’d been watching him, and the funny thing was, he was making the statue shake. There were wooden walkways around the statue, and he was walking on them, stomping on them, making it shake. If he didn’t watch out, he was going to knock it down himself. Or was that the plan?