Live and Let Chai

by Bree Baker

  The party would’ve been easy to find, even if I hadn’t seen Lucinda outside the place this morning. Bistro lights hung in swoops along the wooden backyard fence, only a few dozen feet from where I’d met her on the sidewalk. The measured notes of a waltz lifted gently into the air and couples streamed arm in arm up the cobblestone path to her home.

  I filed in behind the ranks, heading for the front door.

  A buffet had been set up in the room left of the foyer, Mr. Paine’s furniture pushed against the walls or removed entirely to allow for rented tables and seating.

  A man in traditional livery stood behind the overloaded buffet, hands clasped behind his back. “May I make you a plate?”

  I blinked. Buffets were normally self-serve, but then again everything at this party seemed a little extra.

  He smiled. “You have your hands full.”

  I followed his gaze to the forgotten dessert in my grip. “Oh,” I said stupidly. “I brought a cake.” My cheeks warmed at the obviousness of the statement.

  I’d erroneously assumed this party would be a normal one, where the hostess hauled in extra seating and maybe linens if it was a big deal, otherwise everyone brought something to share—even if the invitation said dinner was provided. It was just customary. Courtesy. Good manners. Southern tradition.

  “No one’s eating,” the man whispered. “I think it looks all right. Do you?”

  I scanned the thoughtless spread: mini meatballs, tuna on rye slices, flat-bottomed spoons filled with garlic and mushroom mashed potatoes.

  “Meh,” I said. Hopefully Lucinda hadn’t overpaid. I could’ve put this boring menu together on a dime—though I wouldn’t have. Maybe I should offer catering to locals for events like this. Showers, graduation and anniversary parties… That would be fun.

  The buffet man leaned closer. “Well, the food looks better than the desserts. I’m sure of that.”

  A table on the opposite wall held tiers of marshmallows, graham crackers, pretzels, and strawberries by an erupting chocolate fountain.

  A balding man in a black polo shirt stuck a pretzel rod under the fountain, then bit into it with a smile; he did it again a moment later. Same pretzel.

  “That’s not a dessert table, that’s a bacteria incubator,” I said to the buffet guy.

  I ferried my cake to the table and removed the cover. A guest took notice and pointed, whispering. I waved at some familiar faces, stepping away so folks could help themselves.

  Most of the people in line at the open bar had been at my place earlier and nearly wiped my buffet clean. No wonder Lucinda’s spread was virtually untouched—not to mention the fact that it was all unimaginative food in various shades of tan.

  Lucinda stood among a cluster of women with champagne flutes and I backed away, suddenly uncomfortable with the possibility of being yelled at in public, accused of party-crashing or something worse. I kept assuming Lucinda would be cordial and behave the way I would in her shoes, but she hadn’t so far, and I had no reason to think she would now.

  I scolded myself internally for thinking that crashing her party was a good idea, blaming all the warm and fuzzy feelings from a successful grand opening. Lucinda hadn’t come to Sun, Sand, and Tea tonight. She hadn’t forgiven me, and asking her to do it publicly seemed beyond risky.

  I longed to turn and run out the front door, but that would only draw more attention. Instead, I decided to slip out the back and try making amends with Lucinda later, in a more private setting. Putting as many guests between us as possible and attempting to look at ease, I made my way to the back of the house. It was comfortably full of friends and neighbors, chatter and laughter, with interesting conversations, but I didn’t hear anything interesting about Mr. Paine’s death. Also, praise the waves, no new gossip about me.

  In the backyard was a string quartet playing Vivaldi from a stage. Tall bar tables draped in black linen stood on the small lawn.

  It was the first party I’d attended in Charm that didn’t feature margaritas, piña coladas, and barbeque—and if anyone had live music, it was karaoke or a bad Jimmy Buffett cover band. The whole setup Lucinda had going on was weird, over the top, and completely out of place in our little island community. I supposed fancy was the only available option from a company called Modern Elegance.

  Maybe I was being a beach snob. Everyone seemed to be having a nice enough time, even if they weren’t giving me any new information to work with.

  “Lucinda,” a woman called. She lifted her arm to draw the hostess’s attention.

  Lucinda moved through the back door, scanning the crowd and smiling. She waved as she moved gracefully across the lawn.

  I stiffened, then ducked on instinct.

  “Is that lemon cake?” Grady’s voice cut through the night. His head bobbed above the crowd several feet away, a determined expression on his brow. Oh sure. He left my party early to come to hers. And just like everyone else I’d talked to before Mr. Waters tonight, Grady hadn’t mentioned it, either.

  Lucinda hugged several guests, before heading purposefully in my direction. “Well, Detective Hays,” she called, “I’m so glad you could make it.” She smiled demurely, an entourage of older women in tow.

  I scooted behind a crowd of men who hadn’t noticed me, unready to face her, and I couldn’t talk to Grady without risking Lucinda’s wrath.

  Grady moved in a slow circle, sharp eyes hunting for me, before giving up to meet the woman of the house.

  “Come. I have someone who wants to meet you.” She locked her arm in his and led him back inside.

  I inched toward the rear gate Mr. Paine had probably used to put out the trash. I wasn’t in love with the analogy, but I slipped through the gate anyway and crept through the shadows toward the street like a ninja.

  I did a double take at the line of bags and cans along the curb. Lucinda hadn’t wasted any time moving herself in or Mr. Paine’s memories out. Piles were prepped and tagged for disposal. A few were marked as donations. The rest was stuffed into lidless garbage bins: fishing rods, tackle boxes, pool cues, stacks of Historic Home magazine. It was sad to think the things that were important to him were so clearly unimportant to her.

  I peeked into a box filled with rolled-up blueprints, and the hair on my arms and neck stood at attention. I checked to be sure no one was around before thumbing through the contents. Maps of Charm were intermingled with the blueprints, and Sam Smart’s company logo was stamped on the back of every document.

  My mind raced with a new set of questions: Why would Mr. Paine have had all these maps and blueprints? Was he working on something that had gotten him killed? Something that had to do with Mr. Metz and his colonial renovation, perhaps?

  I wanted to take a closer look, but could hardly have a seat near the trash and read by moonlight. I’d have to take the box home, so I hefted the box onto one hip.

  Sleuthing was hard, frustrating work. No wonder Grady was grumpy so often.

  A soft meow drew my attention to the neighbor’s driveway, where my raggedy white cat stood, her bright green eyes eerie and luminous under the light of the full moon.

  “Don’t be judgey,” I told her. “These could be important. Plus, they’re on the curb. I’m allowed to take them.”

  She meowed again.

  I took a few quick steps, struggling to balance the awkward box, and my fitness band trumpeted obnoxiously. Good grief! I froze, tummy clenched and heart hammering. As if a grown woman could simply vanish by holding still enough.

  A long beat of silence stretched though the night. Even the band had stopped playing.

  Applause erupted, and I sucked in fresh air. Oh, thank goodness. For a moment, I’d imagined a hundred faces peering over the fence at me. I dared a look at the closed gate as a new song began. My gaze drifted higher then, to Lucinda’s home beyond.

  A curtain dropped in a
n upstairs window. The whole town might not have seen me take the box, but someone had.

  Chapter Sixteen

  I hightailed it home with the cat at my side. The night seemed darker than usual, though it could’ve been my imagination. It was after ten o’clock and well past the slivers of twilight that had struggled on the horizon as I’d made my way to the party. The stars and watching moon had tucked themselves in behind the dark velvet blanket overhead, and the air crackled with a strange new feeling, ominous and foreboding.

  “I know what you’re thinking,” I told Maggie as she trotted along at my feet. “Someone saw me take this box, but there’s a chance they couldn’t identify me because it was dark in the alley.”

  She continued on without response, highly focused on our trip down the boardwalk, as if she knew where I was headed.

  A brisk evening wind flipped the ends of my hair over my shoulders, sending shivers along my spine. I moved a little faster, hyperaware that most people on the island who weren’t already in bed were probably at Lucinda’s, which made it a prime time for crime everywhere else. I could be chased, kidnapped, or clobbered and no one would hear me scream. Even Grady would be none the wiser until a jogger found my body at sunrise. I held the box more tightly to my chest, prepared to use it in self-defense if necessary.

  “Even if whoever I saw at the window knows it was me who took the box, I can always explain myself,” I told Maggie. “I’ll say I’m a map collector.” Of course, then I’d have to run out and buy a bunch of old maps from another town and pretend I’d had them all along. So, maybe not. “Deceit is hard.”

  Maggie gave me a condescending look.

  I sighed with relief as my beautiful, historic home came into view. Thankfully, the porch light over my front door was on, though the rest of the place was dark. My aunts must’ve called it a night at Sun, Sand, and Tea. I jogged up the front steps, maneuvering the box on my hip to free my hand for the key. The tumbler rolled easily, and I was instantly relieved that my aunts had remembered to lock up.

  Maggie slid between my feet as I checked the street for stalkers before jetting upstairs without waiting for an invitation.

  I followed her in, then kicked the door shut behind me and flipped the dead bolt back into place, feeling my way through the café without turning any lights on and stumbling up the stairs to my private quarters. By the time I reached my living room, I was ready to drop.

  I lowered my burden onto the floor, then stretched out beside it. The soft fibers of my carpet cushioned my aching limbs. I’d walked more this week than I had in months, and my body felt it everywhere.

  I stared at the elaborate crown moldings and painted tin panels on my ceiling until my eyelids drooped, grateful to be alone and safe in my house. Maggie leapt onto one arm of my thrift-store couch and gave a long, judgmental meow. She was right—I needed to get started.

  “I’m glad you decided to come up here,” I said. It was weird and a little funny that she had stalked me until I noticed her and fell in love, but I was glad for it. I’d heard of dogs following people home, but never a cat. Cats were picky. The fact she’d chosen me of all people to judge and ignore made me feel special.

  I’d never had a pet before, though this particular animal didn’t seem much like a pet. More like a college roommate who came home late and refused to answer questions about where she’d been. Pet also implied a certain amount of reliance on me, and this cat didn’t have that problem.

  “Did you live here before?” I asked, thinking back to Aunt Clara’s crazy story about a raggedy cat as the embodiment of the two suicidal women who’d died here. “You can live here now, if you want,” I offered. “I could use the company, and I have at least a million fish and tuna recipes.”

  Her eyelids drooped lazily.

  “Must be hard being trapped in that cat body for a hundred and seventy years,” I said. “You want to talk about it?”

  She flopped on her side and licked her paw, completely disinterested.

  “That’s fine. I have things to do anyway.”

  Apparently, rejection was my middle name tonight. First Grady slipped away from my appropriately relaxed and beachy party to attend Lucinda’s over-the-top schmancy soiree, then Sam ran off on me while I was in the middle of talking to him, and now the cat wouldn’t even look at me.

  There were at least a dozen maps and blueprints in the box. I needed a pot of black coffee or gallon of sweet tea, because I hadn’t slept well in a few nights—it had been a long day, and my eyelids felt as if someone had tied little weights to them.

  I blew out a long breath. “First things first.” I rolled the first map open and pressed it to the floor. It promptly rewound itself. I gave it another shot, this time concentrating on the corners and ends, but the paper spiraled back faster than I could stop it.

  Narrowing my eyes at the uncooperative paper, I considered my options. There were bunches of maps and blueprints in that box, and I needed a way to look at them without having to hold them in my hands. The nearest bookshelf provided me with an armload of books, which I used to secure the corners.

  The sight of half a dozen seminaked cowboys spread out on the floor made me shake my head in dismay. Despite my personal experience and the fact that no woman in my family ever found a lasting love, I was a sucker for happily ever after…especially if the hero wore boots and had good manners.

  Not even knowing things hadn’t worked out for sweet Amelia and her husband could keep me from dreaming about love. Somewhere deep down inside of me there was a tiny ember of hope that I would meet my soul mate, like in the books.

  I shifted onto my hands and knees in front of the flattened maps and tried to make heads or tails of whatever I was looking at. “I don’t suppose you can read these?” I asked Maggie. “There’s a whole lot of blue with a bunch of white lines, plus a few curves and scribbles.” And, of course, Sam Smart’s company logo stamped on the back of each one.

  I grabbed my phone to snap several photos. I wouldn’t have to haul the box to Sam’s place for lunch tomorrow if I had the pictures—I could just show him my phone and see what he had to say, and I congratulated myself for finally planning ahead.

  Even if Sam wasn’t involved in Paine’s death, which I truly hoped was the case, he would be able to tell me what I was looking at.

  Sam’s troubled face came to back mind. He hadn’t been himself tonight, and he was unquestionably weird at his office yesterday too.

  It was probably a waste of time, but I opened the browser and plugged Sam’s name in. Hundreds of hits came back, all of them applying to different people. Lawyers. Scientists. None had anything to do with the man I wanted to learn more about. I tried again, this time adding some other key words like “Realtor” and “North Carolina.”

  This time, the results were more interesting.

  I curled against the couch and scrolled through the hits. Sam Smart wasn’t just a high-strung small-town real estate agent—he was a thief! Article after article from newspapers and criminal justice websites popped up, dozens of cases of Sam Smart the Fraud all along the east coast.

  I flipped through the headlines, mouth open.

  ILLEGAL GAMBLING CHARGES FILED AGAINST VIRGINIA BEACH REAL ESTATE AGENT

  SUCCESSFUL ATLANTA REAL ESTATE AGENT PLEADS GUILTY TO IDENTITY FRAUD

  SAVANNAH’S FAVORITE REAL ESTATE AGENT REMOVED ON FOURTEEN COUNTS OF EMBEZZLEMENT

  I thrashed my head side to side, hoping to clear my brain Etch a Sketch style. Gambling? Fraud? Embezzlement? I pored over the articles with greedy eyes. Sam got the charges dropped just as often as he was found guilty and slapped with fines, community service, or both. From the looks of it, the fines must be adding up. I couldn’t tell how much he’d paid off so far, but I was sure he didn’t make enough selling homes in Charm to put a dent in the bill he had going. Whatever amount of cash he’d accumulated fro
m fraud and embezzlement couldn’t have been worth the penalties. He’d practically have to keep up the illegal stuff just to pay the piper.

  That thought got stuck in my head like barbecue on a spit. What if Sam had gone back to his old ways, forced to make bad choices if he wanted to pay the restitution installments and stay out of jail? What if he’d gotten into trouble again and Mr. Paine had found out? Would Mr. Paine have threatened to go public with Sam’s past? Would he have blackmailed him?

  Or what if Sam was plotting with Mr. Metz to turn all the massive old properties in town into exclusive bed and breakfast locations, or spas, or any number of things that would’ve made them richer, and Mr. Paine had protested? If Sam and Metz were in cahoots, it would explain why Sam had pointed a finger at Lucinda and not at Mr. Metz.

  I rubbed my temples. The ideas came at me faster than I could accept or reject them. Sam and Mr. Paine were at odds the day Mr. Paine died. I’d noticed, but barely paid attention. I had assumed it was silly, like most of Mr. Paine’s arguments. My imagination soon went from clever and creative to downright scary as it wove together endless scenarios that made Sam Smart a heartless killer.

  Suddenly, lunch together in his office seemed significantly less appealing.

  My phone buzzed, and I nearly screamed in surprise. I swiped the screen to reveal a new text from Grady, a message as direct as the man himself.

  Are you home?

  The doorbell rang before I could respond.

  Thank goodness! I’d scared myself half-senseless thinking of reasons Sam or Mr. Metz could’ve killed Mr. Paine and put me next on their hit list. I barreled down the staircase to the first floor, typing my quick response and nearly breaking my neck on the crazy cat who darted between my feet.

  Yes! I’ve got something you’ll want to see!

  I flipped the dead bolt and yanked the door open. A cool gust of wind whooshed in. Maggie ran screeching into the night, and my heart rate accelerated.