“Yes, you’re free to return, but I don’t advise it. You’re better off taking shelter until Finn is found.”
I yawned in response to that. I wasn’t going anywhere and Agent Cooper would never understand. There was no point in arguing. So I didn’t. Instead, I thanked him for the information and suggestion, and clicked off the phone.
It was just after eight o’clock in the morning. I had a little under an hour before I was scheduled to meet Inez and Marion for our little search party at the docks. After that, who could forget the float-building party at the fire station? Better hop to it, I thought to myself. Captain Jack didn’t agree. After letting him out to go potty, he jumped back up in bed and curled up in the thick, down comforter.
“Sorry, buddy, it’s time to go back home,” I said, scooping him up. I swear my pup sighed. Oh yeah, he had a taste for the finer things in life.
I felt mighty guilty on my drive over to meet the ladies, but what could I say? “No need, ladies, Finn is perfectly safe. He’s just hiding out from the cops. No worries.”
No, that clearly wasn’t an option. All I could do was play along and hope that we would discover a clue that would help me out and not somehow incriminate Finn further.
There was also the issue of Kat. Where had she gone?
With a small amount of time to spare, I walked Captain Jack down the dock and back to our houseboat. A little remnant of crime tape was still stuck to the side dock. I untaped it as I stepped on board and put Captain Jack down. It’s one thing to know that your house is back to being yours, and it’s entirely another to walk into your home and see it completely disarranged. While the police hadn’t trashed it, they had definitely collected plenty of evidence. Looking at my stripped-down, bare bed was only the start of it. Captain Jack, having followed me into the bedroom, seemed to sigh once more.
“Don’t worry, buddy. I’ll buy us some nice new bedding. You like Egyptian cotton?” I asked, bending down to scratch his ears. He sneezed on my hand. I took that as a yes. In the meantime, I grabbed our set of winter jersey sheets in the hall closet and remade the bed. Standing back to admire my handiwork, I realized that it would take a lot more than clean sheets and new bedding to make the bed feel comfortable again.
I didn’t have much time to think about it as Marion knocked on my door a minute later.
“We’re here,” Marion said.
I slid open the living room’s glass door and poked my head out to the deck above.
“I wasn’t sure if you wanted us to come meet you over here or upfront, so I volunteered to come and ask,” Marion said. Her expression was a mixture of concern and sympathy. Like I said, if anyone could understand what I was going through, it was Marion. Even though her husband had ended up murdered, she still got the happy ending she deserved. I was hoping for a fairytale ending as well.
“Let me just grab my sweater, and we can walk over to Murphy’s. The house is still a mess,” I said.
“Oh, I remember that. It’s an unsettling feeling, isn’t it?” Marion said.
“Yes, yes it is.” In fact, I couldn’t think of a better way to describe it.
A moment later, I met her dockside and we walked the short distance down the dock to where not only Inez was waiting but also a dozen other people. Vicki and her boyfriend, Jeffery, Marion’s new husband, Dr. Rich Michelson, Aria and Vince, Marigold, even Mrs. J. was standing by.
“I’ve been looking for him since day one,” Mrs. J. reminded everyone. Yes, because she thought he was guilty.
Vicki had a binder in her hand, which reminded me of my old beauty bible that I used to carry around with me. It had contained clients’ orders, product catalogs and contact information. I wondered what she had in hers?
I didn’t have to wait long to find out. When we approached, she pulled a piece of paper from it. It was a flyer with Finn’s picture on it. “I hope this is okay. I took it off of his website,” she said to me.
It was a cropped photo of Finn on his boat. While the picture was a close-up of his face, it was from a photo I knew well of him proudly displaying the mahi-mahi he had caught. A broad grin lit up his expression. Even though I knew he was missing on his own accord, it still brought a tear to my eye. The photo had been from a happier time, and it was something I longed for with such intensity, it was hard to explain.
“Now don’t you go crying, dear. He’s just fine,” said Inez. She wrapped me in a one-armed hug. “I know he is. What we’re going to do is put these flyers up all over town and check in with shops on Main Street. People just don’t disappear. Someone had to see something. They probably don’t realize what they know. We’ll figure it out.”
Vicki also had a flyer with Kat’s picture on it. “I know she doesn’t live in town, but I thought we could ask around,” Vicki was saying as she passed the flyers out to the volunteers.
Randy, from Red’s, stepped up to shake my hand. “Don’t go thinking I’m a nice guy now, but I thought I could take some of ’em flyers. See if anyone saw anything.”
“That’s a brilliant idea. No one’s seen either one of them since they left your place.” Even Finn had no idea where Kat was. I then thought of something, “Was Kat seeing anyone?” I asked Randy.
He looked at me like I was crazy. Not to speak ill of my sister-in-law, but remember how I said she was a firecracker? Most of her relationships were the same way—explosive. They seemed to start out hot and bright but fizzled out just as fast.
“I’ll give my son a call. See if he’s seen her,” Randy said.
“Kyle’s back?” Last time Kat broke up with him, he headed out of town for cooler waters up north. I didn’t blame him.
“Two weeks ago. Let me give him a call,” Randy added.
“Where do you want me, boss?” a voice called behind me. I whipped my head around so fast I made myself dizzy. Standing in front of me was my dear friend and Tampa store manager, Izzy.
“You know you couldn’t keep me away with those strong mental vibes you kept sending out through the ether,” she said. Did I mention she was psychic? Only problem was, she didn’t deal with death, and I found myself with a whole lot of morbid energy finding me.
“You know he’s okay, right?” Izzy whispered in my ear when she leaned forward to give me a hug. I knew she meant literally.
“Yeah, I know. But I’m not sure about his sister.”
“Do I know her?” Izzy asked.
I handed Izzy the flyer of Kat. Izzy scrunched up her face in intense concentration and then her face went blank.
“What, what is it?” I asked, horrified at what she was about to say. “Is she—”
“Dead?” Izzy filled in for me. “No. Well, I don’t think so. She’s out of range.”
“What? But you picked up my vibes all the way in Tampa,” I said.
“You’re also one of my best friends. I’m tuned into you. This chick I’ve never even met.”
I let out a sigh.
“It’ll be okay. We’ll find her. Does Finn know where she’s at?” Izzy asked.
“He didn’t even know she was missing,” I replied.
“Okay, let me do some research. In the meantime, where do you want me?” Izzy asked.
“Um, I…” I closed my eyes and rubbed my forehead, trying to think about what needed to be done here. I wasn’t good at coordinating such events.
“How about I go check in with the shop here,” Izzy offered.
“Yes! That would be awesome,” I practically shouted. “Wait, what about Tampa?” I asked, which should’ve been the first thing out of my mouth when I saw her.
“Smooth sailing. I even have backups on standby in case someone calls in, which they won’t.” Izzy tapped her forehead in a knowing way. What I wouldn’t give to be intuitive. It would save me a ton of stress, that’s for sure.
After the flyers were handed out, the groups paired off lickety-split. In two seconds, Mrs. J. was the last person standing. That wasn’t a surprise given her recent over-th
e-top attitude.
“We gonna do this, Sug’?” she asked, strolling over to me. I saw for the first time that Mrs. J. had dressed for the occasion. Black shirt and camo army pants, complete with a magnifying glass tucked in the cargo pocket. Her sneakers had been jazzed up with rhinestones to read P.I. on the front. Again I had to fight the urge to roll my eyes.
“Where are we headed?” I asked Mrs. J.
Across the parking lot, people had set off on foot and in their cars, headed out to their assigned locations. Mrs. J. scrolled down the list to see where we should go. “This is a bunch of hogwash,” she said after reaching the end. “I was watching one of them true crime shows on cable TV. They said we need to get ourselves some D. N. A.” Mrs. J. said each letter separately.
I tried not to laugh. “Mrs. J., that’s what the police do. I’m sure they took all the samples they needed from the house.”
“Well, there’s got to be more around, don’t you think?” Mrs. J. whipped out her magnifying glass and proceeded to look on the ground.
“We all have DNA, Mrs. J. It won’t do us any good to find any if we don’t know who belongs to.”
“Well, that’s a fine how do you do.” Mrs. J. was just about to pick up a wad of chewed bubble gum but seemed to think better of it.
“Let me check out that list. What is our assigned location?” I asked.
Mrs. J. handed the list over unceremoniously. I saw that we had been assigned the immediate area surrounding the marina, which was the 1100th block of Main Street. Living here and being a local business owner, I knew the area very well. On our way toward the first business, I saw that our fellow search partiers had already begun stapling up the flyers. It made my stomach feel all jittery knowing that Finn was purposely on the run, and here we were plastering the town with his picture. There wasn’t anything I could do about it, though. I would’ve loved to rip them all down, but it was way too risky. It was smartest to play along. I knew Finn would agree. I just hoped that he was cunning enough to evade notice. Wherever he was.
Then, right at that moment, I decided that I needed to take down The Sugar King and fast. Cut the head off the snake so to speak. No bounty, no threat. The question became how to do that? I was thinking a girls’ night was in order. No, not one that involved dancing and fruity cocktails, but more of a crime-solving, sleuthing girls’ night. Finn might have had his crew, but I had mine too. I was already mentally putting it together. Aria for sure and hopefully Izzy could join us, too. It wasn’t just The Sugar King we needed to tackle, but Alexia too. She was going to go down for Cody’s murder. I knew she was close by just waiting to make her move. I was going to be ready.
I thought Mrs. J. and I were going to strike out.
No one had heard or seen anything suspicious. Thankfully, they also hadn’t spotted Finn. I was extremely grateful for that. People insisted on it, even after Mrs. J. threatened them, “You know it’s a federal offense to lie to the mayor,” she told one group of teenagers who had stepped out of the arcade.
“No, it’s not,” I told the group and gave Mrs. J. the eye to cool it.
“Humph, it should be,” she replied under her breath as we walked away.
Our last stop was the Quick & Go market at the end of the block. I was thinking this was a fine place to finish as I could use a chocolate pick-me-up after walking the block with Mayor Jackson. I skipped interviewing the clerk and headed right to the candy aisle. Bonus. King-size chocolate bars were buy one get one free. Talk about winning.
Mrs. J. had abandoned the candy aisle in favor of the slushie machine. I liked her thinking. I bought one of those too.
With our purchases, we headed up front to check out. I went through my spiel and waited to see what the clerk would say.
“I was working that night,” she said after thinking about it.
“You see this boy right here?” Mrs. J. tapped her long red fingernail right in the middle of Finn’s forehead.
“No, I didn’t see Finn,” the clerk said. It was obvious she knew who he was without needing his picture thrown in her face. In fact, the one thing I learned today was most people knew who we were and thought well of us. That was a relief.
“But there was this guy. I don’t know ... something seemed off about him.
“Off? How so?” For the first time, I felt my sleuthing detector buzz. This could be a clue.
“He was jittery. Maybe even paranoid. He kept looking over his shoulder and fumbled in his wallet for cash even though he had a handful of credit cards.”
“Do you remember what he bought?” I asked.
“Gas and a pack of cigarettes,” the clerk replied.
“Well, that all don’t seem so suspicious,” Mrs. J. said.
The store clerk continued. “He changed his cigarette order three times. As if he couldn’t remember what type of cigarettes he liked to smoke.”
“Or maybe he was buying them for someone else,” Mrs. J. offered.
The store clerk shrugged her shoulders “He lit up when he stepped outside.”
“Did you see which way he went?” I asked.
“He was riding a motorcycle. That part I remember clearly. The pipes were loud, and his helmet had wicked green flames. My boyfriend would’ve been jealous.”
“Does he ride?” I asked her.
“We both do, but I hadn’t seen this guy in the area before.”
“Huh. Well, thanks for the info. If you think of anything else, will you give me call?” I asked, scooping up my candy.
“Sure thing, Ziva.”
“You can call me too,” Mrs. J. said, not wanting to be left out. The clerk nodded absentmindedly.
“Well, honey girl, are we done here?” Mrs. J. asked when we stepped out into the afternoon sun. I was still thinking about what the store clerk said. It could be nothing, but I had a feeling it was something. What though, I wasn’t sure.
“You hear me, Sug? We have a parade float to get building,” Mrs. J. added.
“Yeah, I know. How about you drop me back off at the docks, and I’ll meet you at the fire station.”
I wanted to get back and hear if anyone had any leads and catch up with Aria. She had been gone overnight last night for an impromptu trip with Vince. She said it was business related, but I wouldn’t be surprised if Vince told her that just to get her out of town for the night. He was big on protecting those he loved. Finn was too. Only I was too much of an independent girl boss to back down. You could say it was a character flaw.
“How was your little trip?” I asked Aria after she greeted me with a hug. Vince had already left for the office.
“It’s was good. We needed to get away. The kids, work—”
“Your best friend bringing about trouble,” I added.
“Stop it. You know that’s not why we left,” Aria said.
“I wouldn’t put it past Vince, and that’s okay. Disaster does have a tendency to follow me. Besides, you’ll be happy to know I’ve got the all clear to come back home.”
“You did?” Aria asked.
“Yeah, I checked out the place a bit this morning.”
“How bad?”
“Eh, it doesn’t feel like home at the moment,” I answered truthfully.
“Seriously, you can stay with us for as long as you want.”
“I appreciate the offer, but I need to be back home, which reminds me we need to catch up.” I gave Aria a knowing look. I hadn’t told her anything from my meeting with Detective Brandle yet. Truthfully, I was still processing it all myself.
“Got it. We have this work dinner tonight that I can’t flake out of, but what about tomorrow? Does that work?” Aria asked.
“Yeah, tomorrow’s perfect. Let me check with Izzy and I’ll hit you up with the details,” I said. Plus, it would give me time to hash out a tentative plan.
8
I would have loved to stay and chat with Aria, or better yet, run off to lunch, but I had that pesky float to build. I stopped back on the houseboa
t and popped an antihistamine just in case and headed off to the fire station.
“Hey, Chief Brody,” I said when I walked through the station’s front door. I was immediately greeted by Darla, the station’s furry mascot.
“Did you hear the good news? I’m a grandpa!” Chief Brody exclaimed. This news caught me by surprise on several different levels. For starters, I didn’t even know Chief Brody had any children let alone one that could’ve been pregnant. A second later, I heard all the yipping coming from his office and I put two and two together. “Darla had a litter of puppies,” the chief added.
“Oh my goodness. Let me see!” I was a sucker for cute little puppies. Chief Brody opened his office door the rest of the way and revealed a play yard set up with six roly-poly Dalmatian puppies playing inside of it. He had set newspapers on the bottom along with a handful of toys that the puppies were having a blast shredding and playing with. I picked up the smallest of the lot, and he immediately began chewing on my fingers. I forgot how sharp the little puppy teeth could be.
“They’re adorable.” I wondered if Captain Jack would like a playmate. Perhaps in the future that was something Finn and I could talk about. I’m not sure a large breed dog would do well on the houseboat, but maybe another small pup. Even better, we could rescue another type of poodle mix.
“Did I hear Ziva come in?” Mrs. J. asked from the garage, sticking her head into the office doorway.
“Yeah, I’m here.”
“Good, we got some work to do. Looks like a lot of folks are busy today, so we’re short on help. It’s all hands-on deck.” Mrs. J. disappeared back into the bay.
Busy? More like they were irked by Mrs. J.’s bossiness.
“Oh boy, Guess I better get to it,” I said to Chief Brody.
“I’m right here if you guys need anything,” he said.
“Lucky you. Let me know if you need any help.” I was thinking manning the fire station would be much more enjoyable than spending the afternoon building a parade float.
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