Key Lime Crime

by Cassie Rivers

  A steady stream of questions flowed through my head, like a rushing river. I needed answers, or I’d drive myself insane. So I decided to go straight to the source. Since I couldn’t interview the victim for obvious reasons, I’d have to interview the next best option, an eye-witness.

  Only one person in town was an eye-witness to the incident, and that was Ol’ Willie Wylan.

  Willie was an older Jamaican gentleman. He’d moved to Sunny Shores during the period that I was away at college, so I knew very little about him. He was tall, lanky, and had long, charcoal grey dreadlocks.

  His attire left little to be desired. Willie wore the same off-white dingy Tommy Bahama shirt with cut off jean shorts every day. If you didn't know any better, you would mistake him for a homeless person. At least, I didn't think he was homeless.

  Regardless of his unkempt appearance, Willie was cordial each time I encountered him. Willie never missed an opportunity to say hello. With his loud, thick Jamaican accent, he stood out.

  Putting my prep work aside, I decided to walk over to the boardwalk area to try to catch Willie.

  Although most of the citizens described him as loony, Willie was an extraordinary artist. He painted portraits for tourists strolling by. Most days, Willie set himself up on the boardwalk. He only required a wooden stool, his paint, brushes, canvas, and an easel.

  As I walked along the boardwalk, many of the vendors in town were setting up their booths. Like most mornings, Willie was sitting on his stool, painting. You couldn’t miss him if you tried. He was smiling and singing “Under the Sea.” As he painted, he rocked back and forth, dancing to his own melody.

  "Ahh, Miss Kara," Willie said as he flashed a big smile across his face. He had a beautiful smile, if you didn't mind the fact that half of his teeth were missing. "Wonderful morning to ya, dear."

  "Good morning, Willie,” I replied. He continued to sway back and forth, stroking his brush across the canvas. “What are you painting?"

  You couldn’t have asked for a more gorgeous morning overlooking the Atlantic Ocean. The sun rising over the ocean shone a beautiful shade of orange. My first thought was that he was painting this picture-perfect sunrise.

  I should’ve known better.

  “It be a chicken ridin’ a turtle,” Willie said, laughing, as he picked up the canvas and turned it around for me to see.

  “It certainly is…” I said as I stared at his painting.

  "What can I do for ya?" he asked as he picked up his paint brush. "Would ya like a painting of yourself? No charge."

  "That's very sweet of you, but I'll have to take a rain-check."

  "Very well. All you youngins only want self-sees with ya cell phones nowadays."

  I laughed. "I think you mean selfies, Willie."

  "Selfies or self-sees, doesn't matter, dear,” he replied, shaking his head. “Dem devices gonna put Ol’ Willie out of business."

  "I've seen your work, and I highly doubt that’ll happen anytime soon. What I really came here for was to ask you about the other morning. Chief Martin said you were the only one to witness the explosion."

  "Dat's right," Willie said as he put his paint brush down and stood up. "I be taking my mornin’ walk, I tell ya. Then it happened."

  "What?"

  "Dat truck went BOOM, I tell ya. BOOM!" he said as he gestured wildly with his arms.

  "Did you see anyone else, or anything unusual besides that?"

  "I did see a man dressed in all black runnin' like da wind out of Grove Park."

  "Really?" I asked as my ears perked up. Finally, it was a lead. "Are you sure it was a man?"

  "I couldn't see his face clearly, but I’m positive it be a man. He be havin’ a lime green ski mask on, but took it off while he be runnin’," he said in a very convincing and matter-of-fact tone. "I tell ya, that fella was runnin' nonstop. I be out of breath just watchin' him."

  "Did you tell the police?"

  "I told that fella, Martin, the police chief,” Willie explained. “But he not be interested in what Ol’ Willie be sayin’.”

  “Hmm… That’s interesting.”

  “I’ll tell ya, somethin’ smell mighty fishy in dis town, and it ain’t da low tide.”

  Willie’s story was captivating. I almost lost track of time until I glanced down at my watch. It was almost 9:30 a.m., and I needed to get back to work.

  "I better get back to the truck, and start prepping for the day," I said. "Thank you, Willie. This was a big help."

  As I walked away, I began to realize that Willie's story confirmed my suspicions all along. The murder wasn't an accident. John Harmon’s goose was cooked on purpose. Not only was there video evidence, but an eye-witness account.

  A new question began to burn inside me. Why did Chief Martin blow off Willie's story?

  "One more thing, dearie," Willie shouted as I was walking away.

  I stopped quick and turned around to see what he wanted.

  “What’s that?”

  "Dis town be full of crooks from top to bottom. Be careful who you be trustin’."

  As I walked back to the Burger She Wrote truck, Willie’s words pierced through me like a sharp knife of truth.

  Was there anyone I could truly trust? At this point, I wasn’t sure.

  “I’ve been up most of the night thinking about this case,” I said.

  “Slow down, Speedy Gonzales. How many cups of coffee have you had this morning?”

  I walked over to the dry erase board used to display our daily menu and wiped it clean. Ty’s jaw dropped as I erased the menu of the day that was just completed.

  “Are you kidding me?” Ty said as he watched me clear off the dry erase board with a few quick swipes. “That took a lot of time to write out. I don’t even remember it all now.”

  “It’s not that hard to remember,” I pointed out. I called out the entire menu by heart. The look on Ty’s face didn’t show him being impressed.

  “I understand you have your freakish photographic memory, but did you not realize that the board has a back side?” Ty explained as he flipped the white board over.

  “Anyway, to get back to the subject at hand,” I replied. "It looks like we have ourselves an old-fashioned mystery."

  Being a fan of mystery books and television shows growing up, it didn't take much to get me excited about the prospect of solving my very own mystery. So I picked up the dry erase marker and began to scribble on the whiteboard.

  "Everyone knows the first step to solving a mystery is to figure out who the suspects are," I said.

  Ty sarcastically replied, “Sure, Kara, everyone knows that.”

  “Obviously,” Star replied, mockingly, as they both laughed.

  "I'm serious, you guys," I said. "Since the police aren’t willing to do anything about this, it's up to us to solve this case."

  “Why us? Who really cares about John Harmon?” asked Star. “He’s a jerk.”

  “None of that matters,” I said, taking a deep breath before continuing. “It’s not right. If he was murdered, the killer should be brought to justice. His family or friends deserve closure.”

  I knew more than anyone the pain of losing a family member. On top of the pain of losing my father, a slew of unanswered questions surrounded his death.

  Ty could sense how serious it was for me. Being my best friend since the third grade, he was the one person I could share anything with. I shared more about my father’s death to him than to my ex-boyfriend. We had a special connection.

  “We’re just messing with you, Kara,” Ty replied, as he put his hand on my shoulder. “If this means that much to you, I support you all the way. I’m here for you, as well as Star.” He turned to her and said, “Isn’t that right, Star?”

  “I guess so,” Star said, not appearing as convinced as Ty. “I’m on the clock for this, right?”

  “Awesome. You both are in?” I smiled as I turned back towards the board. “On to the suspects…”

  I drew a large number
one on the board in lime green ink. The task at hand should’ve been finishing our prep work for the day. We needed to cut potatoes and change the fryer oil before opening. Those tasks were now on the back-burner and could wait.

  I pressed the dry erase marker against the board and said, “Suspect number one is…”

  “That gold-digging wife of his,” Star said, interrupting my big reveal.

  “Yep,” Ty interjected, as he was quick to agree with Star. “There’s no question about it.”

  “Missy Harmon it is,” I said as I wrote her name down on the board.

  1. Missy Harmon

  Missy was suspect number one. To say Missy was unpopular around town would’ve been an understatement, to say the least. She was as well liked as a swarm of mosquitoes in summer. Although, she was likely more of a pest to the locals.

  “Let's be real. There’s no way a woman like her would be with him unless money were involved,” said Star. “That marriage screamed of being a sham. She wasn’t fooling no one.”

  Although Missy was our unanimous number one suspect, my intuition was sparked with an ounce of doubt. It almost seemed too obvious and cliché.

  “If Missy’s a suspect, you’d need to consider this person as well,” Ty replied as he reached his hand out, wanting me to hand him the marker. “May I?”

  Ty took the marker from my hands. I anxiously watched as he wrote the name down of suspect two. It was a relief to see Ty actively participating in something that meant so much to me.

  2. Chris.

  “His stepson?”

  “It’s no secret that those two had issues,” Ty explained. “Also, was it a coincidence that he was late to the park the day his step-father was murdered?”

  “I want to play too,” Star said as she ripped the marker out of Ty’s hands. She went over to the board and wrote a name under Chris’s.

  3. Carlos

  She stepped back and smiled. “That’s the man who did it. It’s obvious.”

  “Carlos?” I asked. “You really think he could have done it?”

  “Don’t get me wrong, he’s been nice to me. You can’t discount the evidence that surrounds him.”

  Star’s point about Carlos possibly being the killer seemed valid. First, John Harmon stole Carlos’s food truck location. Second, he ordered an extra propane tank.

  10

  There was just too much evidence to ignore. First of all, Carlos had been publicly outspoken when it came to Councilman Harmon. Everyone in town knew that Carlos was angry with him. Not only did he steal his spot, he caused Carlos’s business to tank. Not to mention, he ordered an extra propane tank a day before the explosion.

  Even worse, the rumors of him previously being in jail only added more fuel to the fire. Pardon my pun.

  When I approached Carlos's food truck, he was inside chopping jalapenos. He already seemed angry—he was muttering something under his breath as he loudly sliced each pepper.

  “Good morning, Carlos,” I said as I knocked on the door. "Crazy couple days around here, huh?"

  "You're telling me," Carlos said as he shook his head in agreement. He stopped chopping and lifted the knife in the air. "If you ask me, that gringo deserved it."

  As he spoke, he kept shaking the knife. It made me a bit nervous, so I backed up just a bit.

  "There's a lot of rumors going around town about who might have done it."

  "Oh really," Carlos said as he placed the knife down on the counter. That caused me to breathe a sigh of relief. "He had a lot of enemies. I'm sure that there were more than a few to do him in eventually."

  "He did have quite the reputation. Some names around Grove Park have been thrown around as potential murderers."

  "You don't say," Carlos said as he chuckled a bit. "Next you'll tell me I’m one of them."

  "To be honest, Carlos, some people think you did it."

  "Wait, you're not one of those people, are you?"

  "Of course not. I don't think you're capable of that. Although, there are a few suspicious things."

  "What do you mean?"

  "According to the propane delivery guy, you ordered an extra propane tank a day before the explosion happened."

  "That's ridiculous," Carlos said. "The reason I ordered an extra tank is because I was hired to cook for the Swansons’ family reunion."

  "Oh…"

  "Plus, I still have the tank out back," Carlos said as he started to walk out of the food truck. "Follow me and I'll show you."

  I followed Carlos as we walked around to the back of his truck. Although I respected and admired Carlos, my mind questioned whether or I could trust him. Unfortunately, that trust continued to fade. The empty spot where the propane tanks were held didn’t help.

  “I don’t understand,” he shouted as he frantically looked around. “I left the tank right here, in this spot.”

  “You didn’t have it locked up?” I asked.

  “No, I never had a reason to before.”

  I found it strange that Carlos would leave a full propane tank outside his truck in the open. The first thing I was told when I ordered propane was to keep it locked up. My friend Len insisted on it before he would even deliver.

  “Don’t worry about it, Carlos. I’m sure it’ll turn up,” I said to help ease his nerves. I noticed him getting angrier by the second. I knew he had blood pressure issues. The last thing I wanted to do was cause him to have a stroke.

  “You don’t think I’m capable of murdering John Harmon? Do you?”

  “Not exactly.”

  “What does that mean?” he said as he became more defensive. His face turned red and he tapped his foot.

  As usual when I’m nervous, I began to talk at light-speed. “It’s just that you were so angry at him the other day. Plus, the missing propane tank, and how you were in jail…”

  As soon as I muttered that last line, I knew I went too far. I had no intention to blurt that last fact out. It wasn’t uncommon for my mouth to outrun my mind.

  “Who told you that?” he said as his voice rose.

  “I didn’t mean to offend, but I heard…”

  “You don’t have any idea what you’re talking about. You need to leave. Now!”

  Carlos turned away and walked back to his truck. A loud thud echoed through Grove Park as he slammed the door behind him. I had no intention of getting him angry, but what I’d said had touched a nerve. The last thing I wanted to do was stick around and find out what happened next.

  11

  Cooking and preparing dishes had a calming effect on me. After the confrontation with Carlos, I needed it. Focusing on preparing the menu for the day helped take my mind off it.

  You wouldn’t think a burger food truck would require much work, but you’d be surprised. All of our ingredients were fresh. After finishing the desserts, we would spend the morning patting fresh hamburger patties, chopping lettuce, slicing tomatoes, and everything else that took part in making the perfect burger.

  My real secret was the meat. Instead of sprinkling the garlic, salt, and pepper on the outside of the patty, I would mix the patty up. This way, the spices mixed throughout the hamburger patty. I would pat out enough patties to last until dinner.

  Star would do various prep jobs while I patted out the meat. She was an efficient worker, but couldn’t stay quiet for more than a minute. She loved to give me life advice, which was funny coming from someone four years younger.

  “So tell me about his ex-boyfriend of yours. Why did he break up with you?”

  “I’d rather not talk about it, Star. But I broke up with him.”

  “Then why do you still take his calls?”

  “Dustin and I were together for eight years. It’s hard to just turn it off, like it’s a light switch.”

  With impeccable timing, as usual, my phone rang. Sure enough, it was Dustin calling again. Before I could answer the phone, Star interfered.

  “He’s your ex for a reason,” Star exclaimed as she wrestled the phone aw
ay from my hands.

  “I know, Star,” I said as I continued to struggle to take back my phone. “Something might be wrong. He may need my help.”

  “Doesn’t matter now,” she said sternly. “I’m doing this for your own good.”

  Without a moment’s notice, Star threw my phone out of the front window of the food truck. It flew about a hundred feet and bounced before settling in the grassy quad in the center of the parking lot.

  For a split second, I was more impressed than mad. Star had quite the arm on her. Maybe she was in the wrong line of work. Those thoughts suddenly faded when I realized she’d chucked an eight-hundred dollar electronic device I was still making payments on.

  “What the heck?” I screamed at her. “Do you realize how much that phone cost?

  “Relax, Kara. Your phone insurance will pay for it,” she said as she put her arm on my shoulder. “You purchased the insurance on your phone, right?

  I didn’t respond, but turned my head away from her. I tried avoiding eye contact with her, especially when I knew she was right.

  “You were too cheap to pay the extra ten bucks a month for insurance?”

  “That’s beside the point, Star.”

  She shook her head in agreement and said, “You’re right. Instead of focusing on some creep from the past, you should look forward and notice what’s in front of you. More specifically, that dark-haired hunk walking this way.”

  The 6’2” handsome hunk she referred to was one of the co-owners of the Cover Your Buns hot dog truck. Both owners were new to Sunny Shore, so I knew little about them. They both seemed friendly, not to mention handsome.

  “I think one of you may have dropped this,” the hunk said as he placed my phone on the counter in front of us.

  “Thank you so much,” I said. “It slipped out of my friend’s hand.”

  He laughed. “That was quite a slip.”

  “I’m Will,” he said. “I’m not sure we’ve been properly introduced.”