Dark Path

by Melissa F. Miller

  Philomena raised her hand. “Can I say something?”

  “Please,” Bryce told her.

  “That might be all well and good for the residents. But speaking for myself, as an employee, I don’t want to be interviewed without somebody there in my corner. I was on shift when those people died, you know.”

  Bryce flicked his gaze to Cleo, who wore a thoughtful expression.

  “I suppose, that, upon request by an employee, having a representative with them would be fine. Assuming legal counsel signs off, of course.”

  “Of course. We pay them too much not to take their advice,” Bryce intoned.

  Philomena was nodding eagerly. “I’d also like you to be there if I’m interviewed. I’m afraid people aren’t going to understand our outreach, especially after what happened at the beginning of the month with Mr.—”

  “I understand. Unless the lawyers tell me I can’t, I will personally sit in the room with each of you,” Bryce promised. “Plus, I’m fairly certain you can’t be compelled to talk to anybody if you really don’t want to.”

  Beside him Cleo’s eyes narrowed with just the faintest tightening of the skin right at the corners.

  After a moment, she said coolly, “If no one else has any additional questions for me, I do need to leave. I have a meeting on Sugarloaf Key.”

  She glanced at her bracelet watch. Bryce took a moment to wonder what kind of meeting she could be having at this hour of the night then pushed the thought away. Cleo Clarkson’s personal rendezvous was not his concern.

  “That’s really all I had. Does anyone else have any further business?” he asked, looking around the table.

  Nobody spoke.

  “Hearing nothing, the meeting will adjourn after a brief prayer.”

  Cleo stopped gathering her purse and belongings and lowered herself back into her chair.

  Eight heads bowed.

  “Heavenly Father, thank you for guiding us in our decisions during this meeting. We will go forth and glorify Your Name and Your Kingdom through our abundant and prosperous lives. Please bless us and shower us with riches. Amen.”

  Chapter Nineteen

  Arthur hung back as the others filed out of the room.

  Cleo Clarkson swept out first, her high heels clattering hurriedly along the hallway. She was followed by Philomena and Charlene who left engaged in conversation about where to get a piece of pie and a cup of coffee at this hour. Ron and Roger stuck around to chat with Pastor Bryce about some golf outing.

  Arthur shifted his weight nervously from side to side, wishing they would wrap up their conversation before he lost his nerve. Finally the three men slapped one another on the back heartily and the others left. Now it was just him, Pastor Scott, and his assistant Becki.

  Becki was powering down her device and packing up her bag. Pastor Bryce scrolled through his messages on his phone. Arthur crossed the room.

  “Pastor Bryce, if you have a minute?”

  The pastor looked up from his phone. “What can I do for you Arthur? Is this about your buy-in?”

  Arthur glanced at Becki who was studiously avoiding his gaze, her attention focused on the table.

  “No, it’s not about that. But I’m going to have it soon. Very, very soon.”

  “Let’s hope so, Arthur.”

  Arthur wasn’t sure how to respond to that, so he forged ahead. “Sir, I just wondered if I could ask … Well, Ms. Rivers mentioned that something happened at Golden Shores earlier this month.”

  “Yes?” Pastor Scott said blankly.

  Arthur shoved his hands in his pocket and balled them into fists while he screwed up his courage. “Well, what did happen?”

  Pastor Scott didn’t answer for a moment.

  Arthur could hear the fast beat of his heart and the slow tick of the clock on the wall. Sweat beaded on his forehead.

  Finally, after an interminable pause, Pastor Bryce said, “I have no idea. I imagine the first death.”

  Then he turned to Becki. “Let’s go.”

  Becki’s eyes darted from Pastor Bryce’s face to Arthur’s and back again. “Yes, sir.”

  They headed for the door.

  “Wait.” Arthur winced at his own commanding tone.

  Pastor Bryce turned slowly on his heel. “Yes?”

  “Please, Pastor Bryce. What’s going on at Golden Shores? My grandmother is there. She’s beside herself with fear. I need to know if she’s safe. I have to give her some comfort, some assurance—”

  “What you have to do—if you truly love your grandmother and you want to help and protect her—is convince her to give you the money to buy into the ministry. God will bless her for doing so, Arthur. It’s that simple.”

  “I’m trying. But she’s scared. I need to ease her fears.”

  Pastor Bryce gave him a look that was a mixture of disappointment and wonder. “No, Arthur, you don’t.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Fear is a great motivator. You know the saying, it is better to be feared than to be loved. Well, a fearful heart is a heart that will pay a price to find love. Your grandmother needs the Lord’s protection. Her Catholicism can’t help her. Not now, not with the evil forces that have been unleashed at Golden Shores. She needs the grace that only our church can give her. You need to convert your grandmother and she needs to invest in your ministry. Use that fear. Use it and close the deal.”

  Pastor Bryce strolled out of the room with Becki trailing along behind him.

  Arthur stood stock still and slack-jawed. So much for his Saint Sebastian candle.

  Chapter Twenty

  Cleo hesitated in the doorway and surveyed the noisy bar. A smattering of off-season tourists sat at tables on the patio, laughing and singing along with the steel drum band. Inside, the tables were closer together and occupied by locals, most of whom nursed their drinks with necks craned back and their eyes fixed on the sports channels that played on the televisions hanging near the ceiling. For a moment, she thought she’d been stood up. Then she spotted him.

  Bodhi King sat at a small table squeezed into a dim corner behind the long bar. He was reading. His head was bent over a computer printout. He held a pen in his right hand and a sweating glass in his left.

  She ran her hands down her thighs in a useless effort to smooth out the linen fabric, flipped her hair over her shoulder, and marched past the row of solitary drinkers who lined the bar on stools.

  One benefit of the volume level was that she couldn’t quite make out the leering comments lobbed her way. She sidestepped a harried waiter balancing a heavy tray of food and came around the end of the bar.

  As she reached the table, Bodhi looked up. He put down the pen and stood to greet her.

  “I can’t believe you can get any reading done in this place,” she said as she slipped into the chair across from him.

  “It’s just a matter of focusing.” He eased the papers into a folder and placed it inside a duffle bag that had been jammed under his chair.

  “Is that your luggage?”

  “Yes. I’m staying with Dr. Ashland across the street, so I figured I’d just carry it over with me.”

  She took in the empty beer bottles on the table then scanned the room. “Have he and Detective Williams left?”

  “You just missed them.”

  Finally. At last, something had gone her way.

  She’d been dreading facing Felicia Williams ever since she’d left the miserable church meeting. To say the detective didn’t like her was a wild understatement.

  A waitress swung by. “Can I get you something? Joel said to just add it to his tab,” she said as she cleared the empty bottles from the table.

  Cleo eyed Bodhi’s glass. He slid a menu across the table.

  “I’m having club soda, but please, get what you want. And you should take advantage of Dr. Ashland’s offer—the food’s pretty good.”

  She scanned the entrees. “It has been a long week—and it’s only Tuesday. I’ll have a gin and
tonic and the fish tacos, please.”

  “You got it.”

  As the waitress walked off, Cleo rolled her shoulders to release some tension then tilted her head, first to one side then to the other, to stretch her neck.

  “You’re under a lot of stress,” Bodhi observed quietly.

  She shrugged. “Sure. I mean, wouldn’t you be? I’m the director of a facility that’s losing, on average, 1.25 patients a week.”

  “It’s more than that, though. Your eyes have a haunted quality.”

  “I’m worried. I don’t want any more of my guests to die,” she stammered. “I care about them. And they’re scared. It’s casting a pall over the entire place.”

  The waitress returned with her drink. “Your tacos’ll be up in a flash.”

  Cleo smiled and sipped the tart drink. “Thanks.” She waited until the woman had left then said, “I can’t stop wondering …”

  “What are you wondering?”

  “What if the cause of death isn’t some environmental factor or shared trait? What if … what if someone’s killing these people, deliberately?”

  He studied her face. “Do you have some reason to believe there’s a murderer working at Golden Shores?”

  “No. I mean, I don’t know. I know the police are investigating the staff—that seems to suggest there could be. Doesn’t it?”

  “Maybe. Not necessarily. It’s Detective Williams’s job to run down all the angles. Of course she’s going to look at the people who work there. Is it possible there’s a killer on the staff? Sure.”

  She picked up her glass and took a long swallow.

  “But I’d say it’s unlikely.”

  “Why?”

  “There just aren’t any signs of foul play. Let’s say one of your nurses or aides was killing patients in a way that left no obvious, outward signs. Maybe poisoning or smothering them with a pillow.”

  He paused, and she nodded. Her throat was too tight, she couldn’t speak at the moment.

  “I’d still expect Dr. Ashland to find forensic evidence of toxicity or asphyxia.”

  Her morbid curiosity loosened her tongue. “Such as?”

  “It’s hard to establish asphyxia from smothering. I suppose that’s why so many movie villains or killers in mystery novels choose it. There’s no mess, no blood or visible bruising. And if the victim had a weak heart and died quickly from cardiac arrest, there might not be signs of asphyxiation because the heart would quit working first. But, assuming the actual cause of death was asphyxia, I’d expect to see cyanosis—that’s the blueish discoloration of the skin. There’s some disagreement in the field as to whether smothering asphyxiation would cause the petechial hemorrhages we see in strangulation or positional asphyxiation, but none of the dead had cyanosis or petechial hemorrhaging—broken blood vessels.”

  His matter-of-fact certainty surprised her.

  “But that’s not determinative, is it? The absence of a thing?” She pressed him as she dug into the tacos that had appeared on the table without her noticing during their conversation.

  “Is the absence of a thing determinative? That depends on whether I answer as a forensic pathologist or as a Buddhist.” He laughed quietly then grew serious. “But, no, I wouldn’t rule out smothering on that basis. I would rule it out because of those rictus grins … I can’t see how the facial muscles could form that mask while being compressed with a pillow. Generally, a smotherer would close the victim’s lips and mouth first, anyway. Otherwise, it would take a very long time.”

  “Oh. Right.”

  The surreality of eating fish tacos at a local bar near the water while casually discussing methods of murder with a guy like Bodhi King suddenly hit her. Or maybe it was the gin. Either way, she felt woozy and warm.

  “Do you need air?” he asked right away.

  She shook her head and took a slow, deep breath. Then she said, “No. I’m okay. Sorry about that.”

  He leaned across the table and pierced her with a long look. “Don’t apologize. This is a lot to take in. And it’s got to be hard for you. I can tell you really care about your guests.”

  “I consider them to be friends. Actually, some of them are more like family to me,” she said softly. Her appetite gone, she pushed the plate away.

  “Cleo, I understand. I’m here to help. Tomorrow, Detective Williams will talk to the employees who were working when these people died. You, and they, shouldn’t think that’s because they’re under suspicion. They’re simply the ones who are likely to have the most information to offer. And I’d like to start talking to residents.”

  She snapped back to attention. “Right. I have a list. I’d suggest starting with Julia Martin, Lynette Johnson, and Hector Santiago. They were all close with the guests who died. Well, four of them, at least.”

  “Oh?”

  “Yes, Mr. Gonzales—the first person who died—wasn’t in their group.”

  “What sort of group?” he probed.

  “They’re all Catholics—I mean, we have lots of Catholic guests. Father Rafael actually comes over and says a Mass for them. But, the seven of them used to get together and do service projects like they used to when they were in the parish. They call it their social group.”

  “But not Mr. Gonzales?”

  “Right,” she confirmed.

  “Hmm.” He fell quiet, obviously lost in thought.

  She twisted her napkin in her lap while she waited for him to look up.

  It’s now or never, she told herself.

  “You know how I said some of my guests are like family to me?”

  “Yes.”

  She tried to ignore the rapid flutter of her pulse. “Actually, one of them is family, but he doesn’t know it.”

  Bodhi tilted his head and gave her a questioning look.

  “Mr. Santiago is my biological grandfather—he’s my father’s father. But I was adopted as a baby. He doesn’t even know he has a granddaughter.” Tears filled her eyes. “Bodhi, I just found him. I can’t lose him to … whatever’s happening at Golden Shores.”

  Chapter Twenty-One

  But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such there is no law.

  Galatians 5:22-23

  We will develop and cultivate the liberation of mind by loving kindness, make it our vehicle, make it our basis, stabilize it, exercise ourselves in it, and fully perfect it.

  The Buddha, Sutta Pitaka

  Bodhi sat crossed-legged on the iron bench and arranged his limbs into a comfortable position. He softened his face. He took note of the slight chill that blew across the water on the pre-dawn air. Finally, he relaxed his breathing and allowed his eyelids to close.

  Once his mind was clear of thought, he began the loving kindness (metta bhavana) meditation.

  He began by silently reciting the words that set a calm mind and a kind heart as his intention for the day. Then he turned his thoughts toward loved ones—family and friends, old and new, wishing them well in his mind.

  He thought of the people he’d met in the past twenty-four hours—Detective Williams, Dr. Ashland, Cleo, Lynette, Chef Tonga, and Stacey. He extended warm wishes to them. And then to the families of Mr. Garcia, Ms. Morales, Mr. Gonzales, Mrs. Ruiz, and Mr. Caldron—the men and women who’d died at Golden Shores. He held each of them in his mind and hoped for peace for them.

  Finally, he thought of the residents and employees of Golden Shores who were strangers to them. He considered the turmoil and uncertainty they might be feeling, the fear and anxiety. He shifted his focus to how those stressful feelings might be eased.

  His mind returned to Felicia Williams and Cleo Clarkson and the enmity between them. He felt his brow furrow, and he smoothed it. He wished the two women could find peace and happiness and, perhaps, even make peace. Could he be a bridge between them? He set the thought aside for now.

  When he felt certain he could approach everyone he met during th
e coming day with appropriate empathy and kindness, he opened his eyes.

  The sun had just begun its journey over the water. Low, heavy clouds created bands of pink and orange light that hung over the glistening water. He heard the slap of flip-flops against skin and turned to see Joel Ashland crossing the beach with a mug in each hand. Steam rose from his hot beverages in wisps that vanished into the chilly air.

  “I thought I might find you down here,” Dr. Ashland said in a low voice, as though he didn’t want to wake any nearby birds or fish.

  “There’s something about seeing the sun come up over the water that seems to help a person start the day in the right frame of mind,” Bodhi said.

  “Yes, there is. It’s my routine to come down here with my morning coffee and get myself set for the day ahead.” He thrust one of the mugs toward Bodhi. “Here you go. I didn’t imagine you’d be a coffee drinker. But I had some good tea from India in the kitchen. I made you a mug.”

  “Thank you.”

  Bodhi cupped his hands around the mug and let its heat radiate through him. He sniffed the steam rising from the liquid and caught a hint of spice that woke his senses. He sipped the beverage and gave a small sigh of pleasure.

  “Told you it was the good stuff. I was dating a woman for a while who brought it back from Agra. The romance didn’t last, but I’m still finding her things all over the camper.” Dr. Ashland laughed ruefully.

  They sat in comfortable silence for several moments drinking their hot drinks and watching the sun fully rise and its rays paint the water with light.

  After a few minutes, Dr. Ashland spoke again. “I was asleep when you got in last night from your hot date.”

  Bodhi opened his mouth to correct the medical examiner. Then he noticed the twinkle in Dr. Ashland’s eyes and said nothing.

  Dr. Ashland went on. “But while you were living it up at Mangrove Mama’s, some of us were working. I logged into my case files remotely and took a close look at the photographs I took of each of the deceased.”