It was just after nine and Bo was sipping on his third cup of coffee when Claire appeared in the kitchen. She wore a pair of denim shorts and a red T-shirt and brought with her the scent of minty soap and fruity shampoo.
“Sleep well?” he asked and watched her beeline to the coffee.
“Surprisingly well, considering everything.” She poured herself a cup of coffee and then joined him at the table. She nodded toward the notebook. “What’s that?”
“You said you like notebooks, so that’s the one for our new investigation. From here on out I’ll be the boss of this operation and the investigation into who killed Shelly has once again become a cold case. We need to focus on your secret admirer.”
She held up a hand. “Let me have a couple drinks of coffee and process the shock of you being in charge before we talk about anything else.”
Bo grinned, finding her charming. He was grateful that she obviously had no intention of talking about what had happened between them the night before.
She took two sips of her coffee and then set her cup back on the table. “If I don’t get to be boss, then can I still be the official note-taker?”
“Absolutely,” he replied and reached out to pull the notebook closer to her. “You told Trey last night that the only person you could think of in your life who could potentially be your secret admirer was Neil Sampson.”
“He was the only person I could think of, and actually I can’t imagine Neil being my admirer. The anonymous notes and flower thing just isn’t his style.”
“Maybe he stepped out of his comfort zone to get cutesy in an effort to win you back,” Bo relied. He motioned toward the notebook. “His name should go on our suspect list.”
She reached across the table to grab the pen and then opened up the notebook to the first page. In neat lettering she wrote “Suspects” across the top of the page and then placed Neil’s name on the first line.
“What about your coach friend, Roger?” Bo asked.
She shook her head. “Roger is a good friend and coworker, but he has the hots for Mary Armstrong who works at the diner. He has no romantic interest in me.”
“Write his name down anyway,” Bo said. “Right now we need to view any man who has any interaction with you as a potential suspect.”
She took another sip of her coffee and then wrote down Roger’s name. “I hate this. I hate to think of one of my friends being a nutcase who wants to kill me.”
Bo knew exactly how she felt. He’d felt the same emotion in the months following Shelly’s death. He’d hated that he’d looked at everyone with suspicion, that an innocence he hadn’t even known he possessed had been shattered and had never been regained.
He took a drink of his coffee, knowing the next name he was going to throw out would shock her. But he’d played and replayed what she’d told Trey had happened the night before and he still had so many questions that he knew she couldn’t answer.
“I think you need to add Eric Baptiste,” he said and watched her beautiful blue eyes widen and then narrow in disbelief.
“Why would I put him on the list? He’s been like a big brother to me. He saved me last night.”
“Did he?” Bo countered. “Did you hear him yell at your attacker like he told Trey he did? Did you hear the sound of your attacker running away?”
She slowly shook her head. “I couldn’t hear anything in that plastic bag except the terrified beating of my heart and my own screams.” She wrapped her slender fingers around her cup, as if seeking warmth as she gazed at him curiously. “Exactly what are you implying?”
“I’m just wondering if maybe Eric was the person who attacked you and then saved you.”
“And why on earth would he do something so crazy?”
“To be your hero,” Bo replied. “If he’s your secret admirer then he obviously has or had a romantic interest in you. He sees you spending all your time with me and he gets worried that we have something romantic going on so he sets up a scenario where he can save you from the bad guy and you’ll see him as a hero, and every woman loves a hero.”
She stared at him as if he’d dropped to the table from another planet. “I should be worried that you could actually come up with that take on the situation.”
“I’ve had a lot of time and a lot of coffee to fuel all kinds of thoughts. I even wondered about Mac Sinclair potentially being your secret admirer.”
“But he’s married,” she protested.
Bo raised a dark eyebrow. “That doesn’t always stop a man from wanting a little on the side. I know that sounds crass, but the fact is some men cheat.”
Claire leaned back in her chair and frowned thoughtfully. “If Mac was leaving me love notes and flowers, then he’d be particularly enraged by me hooking up with you, the man he thinks killed his sister.”
“You need to write down both of their names and then we need to call Trey to let him know that you’ve thought of more people who might guilty.”
“There’s one thing I’d like to do today,” she replied. “I want to stop in at Mama Baptiste’s shop. If I remember right the doll last night was from a kit that she sells to tourists in her shop.”
“A kit?”
She nodded. “It comes with a couple of markers, some yarn to make hair and the pins to stick into the doll. They’re a silly, harmless nod to voodoo that appeal to people who don’t live in the South and think voodoo is still alive and well in all the Southern Gulf states.”
“She should be selling pirate stuff since the legend of the town is that pirates once used the area as their stronghold.”
“Trust me, she has plenty of pirate items to sell, too. Of course her real business is her herbal skills, and there are people in town who depend on her homeopathic remedies.”
“I imagine Trey will be investigating where the doll came from and will talk to her.”
“I’d still like to talk to her myself. Besides, it’s been a while since I’ve seen her.”
“Okay,” Bo agreed. “We’ll eat breakfast and then go to her shop.”
It was an hour later that they left the house in Claire’s car and headed to Mama Baptiste’s shop on Main Street. They’d called Trey to give him the list of names they’d come up with over coffee and Trey had vowed to check each man’s alibi for the night before.
A bell tinkled as they walked into the small shop, which held enough items that it could have used three times the space. The front of the store had shelves and wall displays with a variety of tourist-type items.
Overhead and throughout the entire store, herbs and roots hung over exposed wooden rafters, apparently used in the magical concoctions Mama Baptiste brewed up for her customers.
She stood behind a counter in the center of the store and Claire made a beeline for the woman who had helped her get through her difficult childhood.
Mama Baptiste was a tall plump woman with long black hair shot through with shiny silver strands. She was clad in a bright yellow peasant-style blouse and a long multicolored skirt that gave her a gypsy aura.
She stepped out from around the counter and greeted Claire with a big, long hug. “I heard what happened last night,” she said as she finally released Claire. “Thank goodness you’re okay.”
“I’m fine,” Claire replied.
Mama Baptiste’s dark eyes turned to focus on Bo. “Only a foolish or an innocent man would come back here and stir up old wounds. Which are you, Bo McBride?”
Her gaze was so intense it was as if she were looking right into the center of his heart, his very soul. He felt as though he were strapped to a lie detector machine. “Innocent,” he replied without hesitation.
She held his gaze for another long moment and then nodded, seeming satisfied. She looked back at Claire. “You rarely come to my shop so I’m assuming this isn’t a social stop.”
“Actually, I’m here about the voodoo doll kits you sell,” Claire replied.
Mama Baptiste motioned toward a wall display toward the f
ront of the store. “There are the kits, but I can’t tell you the last time I sold one. As you know, we don’t get many tourists coming through town.”
Bo followed Claire to the display and immediately recognized the dolls in the kits as the same kind that had been left on Claire’s porch the night before.
He turned back to Mama. “Is there any other place in town that sells these?”
“Not that I know of,” she replied. “There aren’t many places in town that sell tourist items, although I’m sure that will change once the amusement park is up and running and we actually have tourists wandering in and out of the stores.”
“You said you don’t remember the last time you sold one of the dolls. Do you keep records that you could look at or keep an inventory list that would tell you if perhaps one was stolen?” Bo asked.
“Bookkeeping isn’t my strong suit. I don’t keep those kind of records except for my apothecary business.” She looked at him apologetically. “Unfortunately, I can’t help you with the doll.”
Bo was disappointed, but he also knew how easy it would be for Eric to take one of the dolls without his mother ever knowing. For that matter, they hung close enough to the door of the shop that anyone could steal one.
Mama Baptiste and Claire visited for a few more minutes and then left, nearly bumping into Mac Sinclair, who was about to enter the shop.
Mac was shorter than Bo, with the Sinclair dark hair and brown eyes... Eyes that narrowed ominously at the same time his hands balled into fists at his side.
“Well, if it isn’t the town’s newest happy couple,” he said with a half sneer as his gaze locked with Bo’s. “Come back to town to find another beautiful, innocent woman you can use and then throw away in the lagoon?”
Bo remained silent, refusing to be baited. Mac turned his gaze to Claire and instantly his features softened. “Claire, what are you doing with this scum? Don’t you know that there are people who would be happy to see him dead? I’d hate to see you get caught up in any cross fire if and when bad things happen.”
He didn’t wait for a reply, but shoved past them and into the shop. Bo stared after him and for the first time in his life he wished he had a gun, because he felt that danger was inching closer with every minute that passed.
*
“WAS THAT A direct threat?” Claire asked as they got back into her car.
“I don’t know if it was a threat or a warning,” Bo replied. “I wonder how his marriage is going?”
“What does that have to do with anything?” she asked.
“Mac said you were beautiful and there was a tenderness in his eyes when he looked at you. You’ve never had any interaction with him?”
“Just the casual kind. He stopped into George’s burger joint about once a week and we’d visit but nothing about him ever gave me the heebie-jeebies.” She definitely had the heebie-jeebies now, not just about Mac but about every man in town. Who was after her? Who wanted her dead?
“What do you want to do now?” he asked.
She looked at him with a small smile. “I thought you were boss of this operation.”
“I am, but I’m open to suggestions.”
“Let’s go get an ice cream cone,” she said impulsively. “It’s not quite as hot today and we can sit at one of the umbrella tables outside and people-watch.”
“Is this part of a master plan to identify your admirer or an avoidance of the issue altogether?”
“Maybe a little bit of both,” she admitted. She’d love to be able to forget that somebody had an unhealthy obsession with her. She’d love to pretend that she and Bo were partners not just in crime, but also in love.
She froze as she realized the dangerous path her thoughts had taken her. She was falling in love with Bo despite all of her wishes to the contrary. Making love with him last night had not only been a physical need, it had been an emotional one, as well.
She’d just been fooling herself into believing she was in complete control of her emotions where he was concerned. With his gentle kisses to her boo-boos, with that slow, sexy grin of his that heated her through and through and the quick wit that either kept her questioning things or laughing, he’d sneaked beneath her defenses.
“Earth to Claire.” His deep voice broke through her thoughts and she realized they had parked in front of the ice cream parlor. “You disappeared on me for a moment there.” He shut off the car engine.
“I was just trying to decide what kind of ice cream sounded good,” she said with a forced lightness.
Minutes later they sat at one of the small colorful umbrella tables on a small patio just outside the parlor. Claire held a chocolate mint ice cream cone while Bo had opted for a peanut butter blend.
As he licked his cone she tried not to think about how his tongue had felt against her skin the night before. Dammit, she was supposed to be thinking about the possible identity of her attacker and instead she couldn’t help herself from thinking about a one-night stand with a man who was certain to break her heart.
She looked out at the sidewalk and sat up straighter in her chair as she saw Roger walking toward them, a wide grin on his face.
“Claire...Bo,” he greeted them. “Mind if I join you for a moment?”
“Pull up a chair,” Bo replied.
Roger grabbed a chair from another table and pulled it up to theirs and sat. “Claire, I stopped by your house earlier to see if you wanted to meet me at the gym and get in a little workout.”
She licked the quickly melting ice cream cone and then replied, “This is the only workout I have in mind for the day.”
Roger leaned forward slightly. “I also wanted to tell you that I did it. I asked Mary out.”
“Roger, that’s great!” She held her hand up for a high five. “When and where?”
“Day after tomorrow,” he replied. “She’s off that night and I promised her I’d take her someplace where she would be served rather than her doing the serving.”
“Not many fine restaurants to pick from in this town,” Bo said.
“We decided to do casual at the pizza place. That’s good for a first date, isn’t it?” He looked at Claire with a touch of concern.
“It’s a perfect choice for a first date,” Claire assured him.
Roger appeared relieved. He jumped up out of his chair. “Well, I’ll just leave you two to enjoy the rest of the afternoon.” He moved his chair back to the table where it belonged and carefully aligned it in place, then waved to them and headed on down the sidewalk.
“There’s no way he should be on my list of suspects,” she said and then popped the last of the cone into her mouth. It was as if that last bite held more than a little bit of discouragement.
She’d been excited to help Bo clear his name and identify a killer, but she wasn’t so eager to do anything to try to find her stalker. She couldn’t believe that anyone she had written down on her list of potential suspects was guilty, and she didn’t know where else to look for a creep.
“What next?” Bo asked as they got back into her car.
“To be honest, I think I’d just like to go back to your place. I think maybe I need some more downtime to process everything that has happened.”
“Whatever you need, Claire,” he replied gently and it didn’t take long for them to be back at his house.
Jimmy was up and in a chair with the television tuned to a talk show. “Did you solve all the mysteries already?”
“No, we just decided to take the rest of the day off,” Bo replied.
“Let Trey and his men do the work,” Claire said and sank onto the sofa. She felt oddly vulnerable, with the horror of the near-kidnapping the night before and the realization that she was more than half in love with Bo weighing heavily on her mind.
“In fact, if nobody minds I think I’m going to take a nap,” she continued. After the short night maybe a nap was just what she needed to get herself into a better frame of mind.
“Are you okay?” Bo asked
in obvious concern.
She got up from the sofa. “I’m fine. I’m overtired and maybe a little overwhelmed by everything. A nap will set me right.” She offered Bo a reassuring smile and then headed for the bedroom.
Once there she kicked off her shoes and curled up in the center of the neatly made bed. She closed her eyes but her mind refused to quiet.
Her thoughts didn’t race to make sense of her feelings for Bo, but rather what her attacker had intended for her the night before.
The pins in the heart of the voodoo doll definitely indicated somebody who wanted her dead, but why hadn’t the attacker simply stabbed her in the yard or shot her as she’d made her way to her mailbox?
The assailant hadn’t wanted her dead by her mailbox. His intention had been to carry her off somewhere. And do what with her? Kill her at another location? Chain her up in some cellar or isolated place where he could rape and beat her before finally killing her?
The note she’d received warning her to stay away from Bo McBride she now believed was a warning from her secret admirer and not some note from a concerned friend or neighbor. And that note and her continuing relationship with Bo had transformed obsessed love into mad rage for somebody.
Who? Who had killed Shelly Sinclair two years ago and who wanted Claire dead now? She finally drifted off to sleep and dreamed of being held in a dark, dank cellar with no hope for rescue.
They stayed in Bo’s house for the next two days, their only information about the attack on her coming from Trey. There had been no fingerprints found on the doll, the note or the garbage bag.
He’d checked the alibis of the men on the list Claire had provided with a variety of results. Mac Sinclair had been at home with his wife. Roger had been home alone, as had Neil Sampson. Eric, of course, had been at the scene.
Basically the investigation was going nowhere, but in the two days she and Bo had spent together their relationship had deepened as their close proximity had been conducive to heart-to-heart talks about their past and present.
Carla Cassidy Page 11
