by L. J. Parker
Maybe the Police Detective couldn’t say why he asked, but that wouldn’t stop Cassie from trying to find out why it mattered.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Traffic on Bayside Boulevard was light, but Sandy Lane was crowded with cars parked bumper to bumper on both sides of the street. Several small groups of people walked toward the beach on the narrow sidewalk, but no one was carrying beach towels.
Cassie drove slowly, keeping an eye out for children, afraid she would not see one darting from between parked cars into the street. As she came nearer the high fence where the baseball field bordered the street, she began to see the reason for the crowd.
Portable bleachers filled with spectators cheered for boys in baseball uniforms on the field; Lincoln JHS in green and white, opposing Jefferson JHS in orange and white, with Jefferson up at bat. Some of the fans held banners, others held strings tied to balloons.
Cassie smiled and slowed to a stop so she could watch one little guy run toward 1st base. She didn’t see where the ball went, but the crowd was roaring for him to hurry.
Her attention did not move to the cars parked in front of the apartment complex until a flash of light crossed her windshield from that direction. She turned and saw a woman with her driver door open, laying a towel over the steering wheel.
Just then a man came from the Bayside View Rental Office – dark pants and white shirt, something shiny reflecting on his belt several inches left of his buckle.
“What . . . ?” It was startling enough to see him at the apartment complex, but Cassie’s heart jumped right up between her back teeth watching him climb into the driver side of a dark blue Lincoln Navigator.
Quickly she put the Explorer in reverse and backed into an empty driveway two doors up from Emmet’s place, and sat between the houses as though she belonged there. Then she pulled down the visor to shield her face.
She peered around the visor’s edge, watching the street until she saw the roofline of the Navigator over tops of cars parked at the curb. The big blue vehicle approached slowly, steadily, and just as steadily drove on to the corner at the top of the grade. Then it turned left toward downtown.
Cassie took a deep breath and shook her head. She honestly could not handle much more adrenaline roller coaster today. She needed to take a couple aspirin and go to bed.
She drove to the gated entrance of Bayside View and into her own parking space next to the stairs.
Melanie Swaffar burst through the back door of the Sales Office to stand at the front of the Explorer. As Cassie opened the door, Melanie said in a tight voice, “I wish you’d gotten here ten minutes earlier. There was a man from the Health Department looking for whomever your phone number belongs to. I hope you’re not bringing any problems here!”
The look she gave Cassie was a warning, not a question. Maybe she thought Cassie was cooking Mary Jane Brownies in the apartment or selling contraband with her new phone number?
But even if Cassie could guess why the Health Inspector might look for her, she didn’t know how he could have traced her here to the apartment complex. Or how anyone could be looking for her from the phone number she’d had only a couple days.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Cassie told her.
Melanie huffed. “I didn’t give him your name or your apartment number, but--”
“You mean he came in here with nothing but a phone number and set you off like this?”
“He knew the number was registered to the Bayside View complex; he wanted to know which apartment it was issued to and the name of the registered resident. I told him I could not give out confidential information without a court order. He wasn’t happy about that, but he said he would get one and be back. I want to know what this is about!”
“Sounds like you need to check on whoever had that number before me.”
Melanie shook her head. “This is the first time that number’s been used in more than three months. If the last tenant was doing something illegal I’m sure we’d have heard about it before now.”
Cassie shook her head right back. “Are you sure he’s really an Official?”
Melanie produced a business card from her pocket and held it out to Cassie. “He left this,” she said, thrusting her chin. “And the badge was real. I recognized it from the other Inspector who comes to check the pool every month during tourist season.”
Cassie focused on the text without much surprise -- Cordell County Health Department, Inspector Carl Fozzi, and the Cordell County Texas government logo. But that still didn’t explain what he was doing here. “Doesn’t make sense to me,” she told Melanie, handing the card back. “I guess it could be a problem related to the job I’m working on. If it is, I’ll find someone who can make sure they keep it there. I promise you it has nothing to do with my personal apartment, and no one has any business coming here looking for me.”
Mel blinked a couple times. Cassie grabbed that chance to simply thank her again and head up the stairs before she could say anything else.
Cassie’s body paid her back for every step that was nothing short of robotic drive. By the time she reached the third floor landing she was panting for air and ready to collapse. She did not turn around to see whether Melanie Swaffar was watching; she didn’t care. She wanted nothing more than to fall into bed and remain unconscious for at least ten hours.
A folded paper titled BAYSIDE VIEW NEIGHBORS was hanging by a rubber band from the door handle – typical small association newsletter printed on yellow paper. Cassie dropped the rubber band into the drawer beside the phone book, and tossed the newsletter onto the breakfast bar.
The blinking message light on the phone caught her eye . . . Bea Morgan . . ? Grandma Noreen . . ? Detective Baxter . . ?
She laid the satchel on the breakfast counter and pressed the “Play” button.
“Hello . . . Cassie? . . . this is Sydney Owen . . . hello? . . . Okay, I hope you get this message in time . . . I need to warn you about something. Meet me at the IHOP on the corner of Bayside Boulevard and Sailfish Road. I’ll go there right after work, probably get there about four-twenty, but I have to pick up my grandson at daycare before five o’clock so I can only stay a few minutes. Well . . . I hope I see you there. Bye.”
Cassie glanced at the clock – already five minutes past four. Damn! She ran back down to the car and had the engine started before she even looked at the map. Where was Sailfish Road? She hoped it was close.
It wasn’t. And it wasn’t a fast trip, either. Sailfish Road was the main street leading to the causeway bridge to Padre Island, and two blocks beyond Center Street. Traffic to that intersection from all directions inched along three miles an hour for the final three blocks.
By the time Cassie made it to the IHOP the dashboard clock glowed 4:38. She peered through the windows trotting to the door, but no one looked like Sydney Owen. Damn! Damn! Damn!
As soon as she walked in the door and smelled real food, her stomach began its siren of ‘feed me or I’ll make you sick’.
She tried to ignore it, walked past the cashier desk and straight down the main aisle checking from side to side, and then around a corner to peek into the back dining room. Still no sign of Sydney Owen.
One of the wait staff met Cassie in the aisle as she turned around. “Can I help you find someone?” she said with a big smile.
Cassie tried to breathe without smelling the plate of spaghetti and garlic toast wafting from the table beside her. It didn’t work; her mouth watered enough to tell her she couldn’t avoid it any longer. “Looks like I missed her,” she answered, trying to sound cheerful. “Guess I’ll have to eat alone.”
The server pointed to an empty duet booth and Cassie sat down quickly, ordered water to drink, and without wasting time looking at the menu, ordered the Spaghetti Plate Special with a fresh fruit salad on the side.
She planned to eat slowly; actually hoping Sydney might come back after picking up her grandson. Whatever she wanted to tell Cassi
e had to be important. Fozzi had come and gone before Sydney got off work, so it wasn’t about that. But she said she needed to ‘warn’ Cassie about something, and the tone of her voice had sounded serious.
Food arrived. While Cassie ate in small bites she struggled to sift through what she thought she understood -- which was very little.
Her head hurt from trying to think, and the second meatball in her stomach made her eyelids heavy. She had a sudden case of chills and it had nothing to do with biting down on cold watermelon. It was pure exhaustion trying to take over.
The hot plate of spaghetti and the cold fruit salad went into separate to-go containers with nice tight lids. Cassie doubled her usual tip for the server. Then she left.
Traffic was even worse than before. She had to make a right hand turn out of the parking lot, away from where she needed to go, actually pushing her toward the long causeway bridge to Padre Island. If she wasn’t so exhausted it might have been a nice scenic drive to go all the way over and come back.
But with her heart feeling heavy and the few bites of dinner fermenting vinegary in her stomach, Cassie focused only on getting home without getting lost. She had to drive east nearly a mile before she came to an intersection with a left turn signal so she could turn around.
Ten minutes later she turned back onto Bayside Boulevard and passed the high billboard touting Bayside Pier 6 Miles ahead. She took a deep breath and willed her headache to subside. Traffic was manageable as long as she didn’t care how long it was going to take to get anywhere.
Moving slowly from block to block and fighting to stay alert, Cassie’s attention wandered to the tree lined brick sidewalks and small shops facing the street. Some of them actually had driveways and signs proclaiming “Parking Available in Rear”. Too bad she didn’t see one of those when she was trapped in the rain a few days ago.
Traffic came to a dead stop at one driveway where the sign advertised “Park Here for Bayside Book Store; Simpson Dry Cleaner; Andy’s Hobby Shop; Radio Shack; Morton Shoes”.
Radio Shack? Cassie turned in, and half an hour later drove out with an activated cell phone complete with pre-charged battery. AmEx rides again! She merged into heavy traffic without a problem; she had her second wind now.
The next time she found herself behind a line of stopped cars, she was at the parking lot entrance for Bayside Pier. The signal turned green. The line of cars didn’t move. The signal turned red again.
This was not a good sign.
She sat through another full rotation. Green. Yellow. Red. Green. Still no movement.
She turned into the parking lot and wound around rows of cars until she found an opening into the lot next door for Bayside Park. That got her past the signal and past the fender bender holding up traffic, but not past the tow truck blocking this driveway too. Half a dozen other cars already waited in that line to get out.
Stuck! But not useless. Cassie used the new cell phone to call Las Vegas – and of course the answering machine spoke to her. She left a message. “Hi Mom and Dad, it’s me here in Texas just checking in to give you my new mobile phone number.” She gave the number and hung up before their machine could cut her off.
She called the hotel voicemail account praying there were no messages from Dorothy Kennelly. There was one new message – from Insurance man Dale Acton. He wanted Cassie to call as soon as she returned to the hotel so he could trade cars with her.
The tow truck driver slowly walked around his rig, manually checking the load.
Cassie returned Acton’s call. “I’ll be at the side door in twenty minutes,” she told him. Then she put the phone away; the tow truck was easing forward.
But the cars in front of Cassie still couldn’t move because the line behind the tow truck wouldn’t let anyone cut in. She didn’t blame them.
The group in Bayside Park waited until the light cycled to red. Then the first car pulled out, and the rest followed like a slow freight train. Cassie squealed out half a second before another line turning left from West Bend could block her in again. Next time she would know this isn’t a shortcut.
Dale Acton stood at the hotel’s side entrance door. Cassie pulled into the loading zone beside the door and got out. He didn’t say much. Neither did she. They exchanged keys, and this time she signed his clipboard paper. Her eyes burned with fatigue so her vision wasn’t so good; she hoped the facts were all in order.
When she handed the clipboard back, he pointed to a car sitting in a ‘No Parking’ zone next to the first row. “That one,” he said.
Cassie was too tired to argue about it. She walked to the driver door and climbed in. The replacement was a Hyundai Santa Fe, equipped with the same upgrades as the Explorer, minus dew spots and dust; also minus the unremarkable silver gray color.
This one was bright Christmas red.
The option to call the rental agency and complain would be available tomorrow if she had a problem with it. First, she needed a good night’s sleep.
Finally, Cassie pulled the shiny red Santa Fe into her assigned spot at the apartment complex, and for the final time that day she dragged herself up three flights of stairs, this time with no attempt to ignore how bad her legs were burning. It was still daylight, only 7:20 p.m. even by Texas time, but Cassie didn’t care. She took a hot shower, slid into a clean sleep shirt, and went straight to bed.
She didn’t even see the blinking light on the answering machine this time.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Cassie woke at 4:05 the next morning, totally rested for a change. This was the seventh day since she’d left home in Las Vegas; her body clock was finally caught up with Texas time and so was her head.
She padded barefoot into the dark kitchen, and saw the tiny red light blinking on the telephone. She ignored it; nothing was important until she had coffee.
When she heard steady gurgling sounds from the pot, she picked up the neighborhood flyer tossed onto the counter last night, and glanced at the long Welcome letter with a list of pool rules, a note of thanks to some tenants who volunteered for Beach Patrol during a party, a couple recipes, and the courtesy request for more ideas. On the back page was an amateur horoscope written by someone who lived in the complex and who would do a Tarot Reading on request.
Cassie traced down the list to her Libra birth sign: “Your mind is urging you to take the initiative in a current project, so give yourself permission to do so. Don't feel like you absolutely need approval from others before tackling the issues you wish to tackle”.
Really? Now that was either worth a good laugh or downright spooky.
When the coffee machine hissed its last drops, Cassie poured a cup and dropped the newsletter into the trash. She carried the steaming cup to the telephone hoping Sydney Owen had called again. She opened her notebook to a clean page and pressed the PLAY button.
But it wasn’t Sydney Owen’s voice that rumbled into the room. Detective Rob Baxter’s honey coated baritone came through the speaker with an electrifying effect on Cassie’s metabolism.
“Hi Cassie, I work the noon to midnight shift, Thursday nights off. I understand your schedule is different, but I’d still like to see you. If you can spare me some time, give me a call.”
He left a different phone number than before. The message ended, the machine announced the date and time received – yesterday at 6:04 p.m.
Cassie thanked her Karma she hadn’t seen the message light when she came in last night. She might have called back in her overly frustrated state and said something she would regret this morning.
She played the message back twice more and finally wrote the number on the inside cover of the steno notebook. This time she did not press ‘erase’.
An hour later she was showered and dressed, sitting over a plate of pan-baked veggie frittata with a dash of Cajun Spice, topped with shredded jack cheese, sour cream, and avocado slices -- a slight alteration of the version in her mother’s diet cookbook where she found the original idea.
While she ate, Cassie worked up a timeline chart in ten-year increments for Rosalie’s book. Then she penciled in notes for the unfinished sections, hoping the right questions would bring the needed answers. Rosalie Baylin’s declining health wasn’t going to wait for Cassie to find the right moment to ask them.
She arrived at Baylin House at 7:55 ready to put everything else aside and focus on the job she was being paid for.
Rosalie looked well, dressed in a maize knit polo over khaki slacks. Her color was good; her plate of grits and eggs pushed aside was mostly empty.
But two wadded papers sat on the table in front of her. Another page sat blank in the typewriter. The whole time it took for Cassie to set up the computer, Rosalie just stared at the blank sheet of paper.
“Can I show you something I worked up this morning?” Cassie asked.
Rosalie looked relieved. “Yes, please do.”
Cassie handed her the timeline chart. While Rosalie looked it over, Cassie suggested, “Dr. Baylin told me about your mother deciding to go to London for her pregnancy, and a little about the society ladies in her day. I’ve been working it into a chapter I think makes a good background piece. Especially if it influenced the choices you made later?”
Rosalie nodded, looking at the chart. Then she handed it back, and sat staring at the typewriter with a strange expression. The lines in her face deepened and her eyes closed; her mouth twisted into a grimace. She was in pain!
“Should I go find Bea?” Cassie asked cautiously.
Rosalie shook her head and exhaled slowly, her features softening as more seconds passed. When she opened her eyes, she looked at the blank page in front of her.
“Maybe it would be best to start with what Lawrence told you and I’ll just add what I can remember,” she suggested.
“Okay. Would you like to read what he told me?”
“No, he’s told me that story so many times I’m sure I know it by heart. And if it’s all right, could I just tell it to you as Lawrence does? You can put everything down in writing better than I can. Especially the way my hands are cramping this morning.”
