by Carrie Doyle
Larry Lipper gave her an obnoxious smile. He slowly walked around to the driver’s side and tapped on Antonia’s window. She reluctantly rolled it down.
“I’ve been waiting for you to get out of there.”
“I almost killed you.”
“You would never kill me, Antonia. We still haven’t had sex yet.”
“And we never will. Why did you stand in front of my car? I could have run you over.”
“Ah, but I knew you wouldn’t.” Larry walked over to the passenger side of Antonia’s car and got in.
“What are you doing?”
“We need to talk,” said Larry. “Pull the car to the side of the road, we don’t want to get into an accident.”
“Oh, now you tell me.”
After being detained most of the morning with the police, the last thing Antonia wanted was to deal with Larry Lipper. Each officer had grilled her as they arrived on the scene, forcing her to retell her discovery ad nauseam. She’d repeated countless times that she saw no signs of forced entry, nothing was amiss other than the fact that Warner was dead in Eleanor’s bathroom, and she had no reason to believe it was foul play, or anything more nefarious than simply an unfortunate accident in the bathtub. There were so many cops that they all blended together, with the exception of Sergeant Flanagan. She could tell he was good at his job because he was the only one who seemed to sense that Antonia was not being entirely truthful when she insisted she had not removed anything from the crime scene. The fact was, she had removed something. It was so unlike her to do anything like what she had done, and quite honestly, she was stressed about it. The whole situation made her sick. But the only thing that gave her sanity was that she knew it had to be done. It’s like a white lie—sometimes you have to tell a lie in order to make everyone feel better. Nonetheless, she had been tempted to confide in Sergeant Flanagan—it was literally on the tip of her tongue—but then she remembered her past experience with the police. And although Sergeant Flanagan seemed decent enough, he was a cop, and as far as Antonia was concerned, cops couldn’t be trusted.
“Alright, lady. I’m ready for you,” said Larry.
“You know, you’re really infuriating,” said Antonia, her voice rising.
“But you love me,” he responded smugly.
“I know you think that’s true,” responded Antonia.
Larry Lipper covered the crime beat for The East Hampton Star. He was excellent at his job and she knew he would squeeze her for information. To Antonia, he was not unlike one of those annoying yap dogs that keeps barking and barking at everything and everyone until you tune them out and grow totally immune to their noise. Antonia attributed it to Larry’s short stature: he stood about five feet two inches high, which was amazingly small considering the powerful personality that lurked inside.
“Thou doth protest too much. Always telling me how you don’t like me when every interaction between us is simmering with sexual tension.”
“Simmering with queasiness is more like it,” said Antonia.
She recalled the time in November when she had (reluctantly, after much cajoling) agreed to attend an event with him socially. They were standing watching the concert one minute and then the next he had shoved his tongue down her throat making a break for her esophagus. It was so revolting that it took her a second to regain her senses; when she finally did, she glanced down and saw that Larry was standing on his tippy toes. Antonia had pushed him away in disgust. Larry shrugged off her rebuff, always taunting her that she would come back for him. She was amazed that he thought so highly of himself. She would feel slightly flattered if he didn’t have this weird rapport going with several other women in town. He was hedging his bets.
Antonia put the car in park and turned and stared at him.
“What do you want from me? I’m tired and late and have to return to the inn.”
“You found the body. This is your lucky day. I want to hear all about it.”
“I have nothing to add.”
“That’s not going to work. I’ve already lined up Page One.”
Antonia sighed. “I can’t go through this again.”
“Quit your complaining! A little murder now and then spices up everything in this dreary town.”
“You just want to get a book deal.”
“You know I’m relentless. And this is a major story! A suspicious death on Lily Pond Lane? This is not some domestic dispute in Springs or some loony nobody killing local innkeepers. This is rich people, the most expensive real estate in the United States, the most beautiful beaches in the world. This is the stuff of TV movies.”
“That’s gross.”
“You know it’s true. It’s ‘“Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous’” over here. And anything about them is a juicy read and you know it. We locals love them and hate them. They’re our bread and butter but they also have so much entitlement when they waltz into town and take up our parking spaces and gobble up all the beach permits.”
“I don’t feel that way…”
“Of course you don’t! You own an inn. You rely on these vultures. But there are a lot of people who resent the summer people.”
“You make it sound like ‘“West Side Story”.’ That’s hardly the case. People are annoyed by traffic for sure, but I can’t name one local who has that sort of anger towards a summer person.”
“Because you’re not looking.”
“So you’re saying some disgruntled Bonacker killed Warner? He didn’t even live here. He was a guest.”
“I don’t know who killed him. Right now it’s game on. This guy wasn’t popular with anyone. I’ve already got enough shiz on this dead A-hole to write a book.”
“He wasn’t an ‘A-hole,’ Larry.”
“That’s not what I hear.”
Antonia was genuinely surprised. She shook her head. “I don’t believe you.”
“Whoa, you two must have been pretty tight for you to be so defensive. Were you sleeping with him?” Larry leered.
“We weren’t tight,” Antonia corrected him. “Or sleeping together, for God’s sake. But he was best friends with Luke Masterson, who is a fantastic kid. There was no way Luke would be friends with a jerk. And my limited interaction with him was very pleasant.”
“Maybe he was pleasant to you, but he was a problem.”
“How so?”
“Oh, now you’re not so tired,” said Larry with a maddening smile. “Well, tit for tat, lady.”
“Then you go first.”
“It’s not even noon and I’ve already tracked down a whole bunch of people that were pissed off at him.”
“Really?”
Larry started to rattle off his information. “Warner Caruthers and Sidney Black loathed each other. In fact, they both filed restraining orders against each other.”
“Hang on a second. Sidney Black? Who’s that?”
“Some corporate raider who makes Bernie Madoff look like Santa Claus. He owns Black, Black and Kendall. Swoops into little family-owned companies, promises to help, then destroys them.”
“What does he have to do with Warner?”
“Has a house out here. Warner claimed Black was harassing him. Black denies it, filed charges against Warner saying he was harassing him.”
“Does it have to do with the documentary?”
“Yes. What do you know about this documentary?”
“The police asked me the same question. But the fact is I really don’t know anything about it other than Warner was convinced it would be a big deal. I admit, I tried to gently cajole him into telling me what it was about, but he was pretty tight-lipped. I think if I had a little more time with him, I would have gotten him to talk…”
“Now that he’s dead, I’ll let you in on the secret: it was about embarrassing the rich people in East Hampton. Making them say rid
iculous stuff. Now granted, they are responsible for their actions but this guy had one agenda: to make them all look like assholes. They probably deserve it, but talk about biting the hand that feeds you.”
“Are you sure?” It was hard for Antonia to reconcile the animated and enthusiastic young film student with a cynical, nefarious mini-Michael Moore.
“Yes. Warner had been bugging everyone. Just the other day, security threw him off the grounds of the Dune Club. Members caught wind of what he was doing and shut him down. They do not like that sort of thing there.”
The Dune Club, established 1899, was one of the oldest and most exclusive clubs on the East End of Long Island. It had an eighteen-hole golf course, twenty grass tennis courts, an Olympic size swimming pool and a big chunk of beachfront. Antonia had only been there once in January after it had closed down for the winter when her friend, Len Powers, the head of security, gave her a brief tour.
“I’m sure private clubs nail people all the time for trespassing.”
“There’s more,” said Larry, licking his diminutive index finger and turning the page of his notebook. “I’ve also got a pool guy two houses down saying he saw Warner sneaking through the neighbor’s hedge.”
“Really? That seems weird.”
“Makes total sense to me. The guy was a voyeur.”
“Pot calling the kettle black.”
“I’m a reporter,” said Larry defensively.
“A nudge, more like it.”
“This is a murder case, fair and square.”
Antonia remained silent. The police hadn’t confirmed anything, but Antonia had been around cops enough to know they would look at all the angles. Nothing would be determined until the autopsy, but perhaps that’s why they had pushed her so hard with their questions. She made a mental note to ask Len Powers what happened with Warner at the Dune Club.
When Antonia didn’t respond, Larry continued. “Warner was making problems, poking around houses, going through people’s garbage, no doubt, looking for incriminating stuff. Someone got tired of it, and took action.”
Antonia sat for a minute, digesting this information. She was still quite certain that Warner’s death was an accident, and she had proof of that. But the fact that Warner had a set of powerful enemies here in town was a new twist. A knot formed in her stomach. Maybe she had been hasty removing something from the scene if it really was a crime scene? Antonia couldn’t believe it.
“I don’t know, Larry. Just because Warner annoyed people doesn’t mean they would kill him.”
“Sure it does. Karma is a bitch.” Larry turned and gave Antonia one of his obnoxious grins. “So, now tell me what you saw. And start from the beginning.”
* * * * *
Antonia was stressed out by the time she returned to the inn. Just as she was pulling into the driveway her cell phone rang. She slid into her parking spot, turned off her car and answered.
“I’m FREAKING out.”
It was Genevieve. Of course she had heard; it was hard to keep anything quiet in a small town, let alone, a possible murder. And Genevieve did always claim to be “the eyes and ears of the Hamptons.” Antonia was so relieved to hear her voice, a friendly buoy bobbing in the midst of such an awful day. She slid back in her seat.
“I know. I’m still shaken. I mean, I can’t believe it! It’s surreal. What a nice guy…” Antonia let her voice trail off.
“I know! And so hot. I mean, without his shirt on, mamma mia.”
Antonia thought back to Warner in the tub. She hadn’t even noticed his body, so horrified was she by the fact that he was dead. “I guess.”
“Oh no, I’m telling you. Rocking bod.”
“I’ll take your word for it. I wasn’t really looking at that, I was more shocked by the whole thing.”
“I’m shocked, too. After three solid weeks of pursuit, I crept into the house and got him.”
Antonia felt her stomach drop. “Wait, what?”
“Let’s just say that when I was through with him he was naked and not moving. Not even breathing!”
Antonia shot upright. “Genevieve, what are you saying?”
“Oh, I forgot, you’re little miss conservative. Don’t always be so prissy, Antonia.”
“Genevieve, what did you do to Warner?”
There was a pause. “Warner? You mean that guy who was staying at the Mastersons’?”
“Yes, the guy whose body I found dead in their bathroom this morning.”
“WHAT?” screamed Genevieve so loud that Antonia had to hold the received away from her ear. “He’s dead?”
“Yes, isn’t that who we were talking about?”
“No! I was talking about Carl!”
“Carl?”
“Carl? That hot guy I met at Citta Nuova? The one who works in real estate? I’ve only been obsessing over him for two weeks. What the hell happened to Warner?”
Relief flooded Antonia’s body. It was a classic Genevieve and Antonia misunderstanding.
“You almost gave me a heart attack, yet again, Genevieve,” said Antonia.
They were unlikely friends: Antonia, the maternal, mature and organized mother hen type and Genevieve, the free-spirited, childish and disorganized party girl type. But when they had met as fellow caterers years before in Los Angeles something had clicked. Genevieve made Antonia laugh and despite generally being flighty she had been a rock in Antonia’s darkest hour; in return Antonia was the eternal stable presence in Genevieve’s life.
After filling Genevieve in on everything that had transpired with Warner, an emotionally wrought Antonia returned to Genevieve’s news for a happy distraction.
“So tell me about Carl.”
“He’s awesome. Took me to dinner last night at 1770 House.”
“Fancy.”
“I know. Then we went to the Talkhouse and shut it down. Didn’t sleep a wink all night, if you know what I mean, then he left around nine for an appointment to show a house. Not until I ravaged him one last time, though. He literally had to escape my clutches, I didn’t want him to go!”
Antonia frowned. Genevieve always came on a little strong and scared the men away. “I hope you played a little hard to get, Gen. You know what happens…”
“No, this is different. I can tell he’s into me because he wants to take me to dinner tonight! I suggested your restaurant, so make sure there is a table.”
“For you, always.”
“Thank you. Now I have to go shower and make myself get to work. And sorry to babble about myself, are you sure you are okay? I can’t imagine what this is like for you. Do you think he was murdered?”
Despite their closeness, Antonia didn’t want to reveal to Genevieve that she had taken something from that bathroom that would prove that Warner had fallen. Genevieve was not the most discreet person when it came to information like that. And Antonia was now becoming increasingly afraid that she had really messed things up. If only she could leave things alone. But that wasn’t her character. “I hope he just fell. What I really hope is that maybe he had an aneurysm or a pre-existing heart condition. Something that nothing could have been done about anyway, so it wasn’t an accident …”
“Or murder.”
“Right.”
“I guess. I’ll see what I can find out today around town.”
“I’m sure you will,” said Antonia.
After hanging up the phone, Antonia made her way through the reception area and dropped her handbag on the desk in her office. She quickly scanned her messages before walking down the hall to the mudroom. The Windmill Inn, built in the late 1840s, was a rambling white-shingled house framed by green shutters. It stood three stories high and boasted eight guestrooms, as well as one suite and several public common and dining rooms. The décor was cozy and inviting, and the architecture full of nooks and crannies w
here guests could curl up with a great mystery novel and spend hours relaxing. Antonia tended to spend most of her time in the kitchen, which is where she was supposed to have been hours ago.
In the mudroom, Antonia exchanged her Merrells for a pair of pink Crocs. She could almost hear Genevieve groaning. Genevieve insisted Antonia would never land a man if she walked around town in those ‘ugly excuses for footwear that completely cancel out your great boobs.” Antonia would retort that she had “no interest in landing a man right now, thank you very much.”
As she reached for a double-breasted chef’s jacket there was a soft stirring outside the side door to her left. It led to a little used patio that backed up to the corner hedge. Antonia moved towards the door and listened. Only the soft chirp of birds could be heard. But suddenly she heard the sound of footsteps on gravel. They were becoming fainter. Antonia whipped open the door and looked to her left. No one. She glanced right. She saw someone turn the corner quickly, but all she could make out were dark pants and a dark jacket. Perhaps it was a lost guest? She wasn’t going to sweat it. Today had been full of enough anxiety.
When Antonia entered the kitchen, Marty, her sous chef, already had things underway with assistance from Kendra, the station chef and Soyla, the prep cook. As Executive Chef, Antonia’s responsibilities included menu creation, plating, and management. Marty was her second in command. He was a cantankerous old goat who drove her crazy; still, he did a fabulous job.
“Where the hell have you been?” he demanded.
“You’re not going to believe it—I found…Did you meet that young man, Warner Caruthers? He came here a couple times. Well, I found him…dead.”
Soyla and Kendra glanced up with surprise.
“What?” exclaimed Kendra, eyes ablaze.
“You okay?” asked Soyla nervously. She was Rosita’s cousin and her husband Hector was the head gardener, who also helped with maintenance. “You want to sit down?”
Marty shrugged. “Ah, come on. Cry me a river. You’ve seen one dead body, you’ve seen them all.”
“Well, I had never seen one before,” Antonia announced.
“Congratulations! Let’s buy you a goddamn medal,” snapped Marty. “Now while you were out earning your First Dead Person badge, I was here making the unpleasant discovery that those idiots from that goddamned organic green grocer you insist on using forgot the freakin’ ramps and artichokes! Oh, and not only that, but that fish recipe that Kendra came up with? It’s goddamn disgusting. That’s why you can’t take suggestions from a fattie who likes to eat everything.”
