A Deadly Pair O'Docks

by Nicole Ellis

  I gathered up all of the pages that I could. I certainly didn’t want to tell Becca and Bill that I’d let my four-year-old destroy my record of all of the requests they’d made for their rehearsal dinner and wedding. I’d have to remember everything that I could and hope for the best. I consoled myself with the thought that there hadn’t been too many major things, and I was sure I could piece most of it together from memory.

  Just then, Adam walked in from the garage holding an armful of bags of frozen vegetables and meatballs. I held out the notebook to him, pages hanging haphazardly from the coiled wire spine.

  “I thought you were going to watch him.”

  He looked from Mikey’s guilty face over to me and then back again to Mikey. His face turned white.“I was watching him. I went into the garage to get some veggies for dinner, and I got distracted by cleaning out the freezer. I swear I was only gone for five minutes though.” He peered at my face. “Was there something important in there?”

  I sighed. “Yeah, kind of. It had all the information about what the client wanted for their rehearsal dinner tomorrow.”

  His lips turned downward. “I’m sorry, honey. I didn’t think he would get into trouble that quickly. He’s been sitting there playing Legos all day. I figured he would be there until I came back.”

  I thawed a little. It wasn’t like I had eyes on Mikey 100 percent of the time when I was in charge either. Sometimes I had to get things done.

  “It’s ok. I’ll figure it out.”

  “Is there anything I can do to help? Maybe piece together some of the scraps?”

  I stared down at the notebook and the strips of paper in my hand. The edges were twisted unrecognizably. It would take a professional CSI unit to put it back together properly. I didn’t have that kind of time. “I don’t think so.” I changed the subject. “How was everything today?”

  He looked relieved. “The kids were good. I didn’t get as much done on planning out my office as I’d hoped, but all in all, it was a pretty good day.”

  “Did you fill out the paperwork for the office lease?” I set the notebook down on the counter and perched on the edge of a barstool.

  Brenda, one of my good friends who was a local real estate agent, was helping my husband find a space for his solo law practice. He’d cut down to part-time hours at his old firm and was now making progress on opening up his own office. When he’d been full-time, between work travel and long hours, the kids and I had barely seen him. I liked that he was now home more to help with the kids, but having him underfoot most of the time was taking some getting used to. I was happy I had my work at the Boathouse to get out of the house, and soon he would have his own business to occupy his time.

  “I did. Brenda said she’ll turn it in, and we should know something by Friday. She said to say hi to you.”

  “Good, I’m glad you were able to touch base with her. Is there anything I can do to help with dinner?” I scanned the kitchen. The sink was almost empty, and the counters were reasonably clean. Adam was turning into Super Dad.

  He smiled. “I think I’ve got it under control.” He stuck frozen green beans in the microwave and punched some buttons, then flipped on the burners of the gas stove to heat some water. “Why don’t you go sit down at the table and see if you can repair some of the damage from our little tornado over there.” He motioned to Mikey, who had now demolished his brick town and appeared to be pretending that a King Kong–like monster was taking over everything.

  I grinned. “That sounds like a good plan.” It was probably best to get everything down on paper before I forgot what the client had told me. Our cat, Fluffy, wound herself around my feet, wanting to be fed. I took care of her, then quickly jotted down everything I could think of—extra people (call supplier), dog as ring bearer, and separate the cousins at dinner. By the time Adam approached me ten minutes later, I felt confident that I’d remembered all of their requests and changes.

  “You know, honey,” he began, “we may need to think about finding a more permanent babysitting solution for the kids.” He looked over at Mikey and Ella, who was still asleep in the bouncer. “Once I get my practice up and running, I’m not going to have much time to watch the kids during the day, and you’ve been really busy with your work.”

  He quickly added, “I’m very happy you’ve found something you enjoy, but we can’t always depend on my mom to watch the kids because she has responsibilities at the Boathouse too.”

  I leaned back against the couch cushions. When I first started working at the Boathouse, Beth had told me that it would only be a part-time position. Well, during the busy summer season, part-time had turned out to be over forty hours per week. I knew my mother-in-law was happy to watch the kids when she was available, but Adam was right—she had her things to do.

  “I know. I’ll look into it.” I felt a little twinge of guilt and worry at the thought of finding a non-family member to babysit my kids on a regular basis. We’d sent Mikey to the Busy Bees Preschool for two years now, but for some reason that seemed different than having a stranger in my house watching my children. Before having kids, I’d never given a second thought to how difficult it would be to find good childcare. I’d somehow assumed we’d easily find a good daycare and be able to happily drop them off every morning. No one had warned me about how complicated all the arrangements would be or how much it would affect me emotionally.

  However, even with all of those considerations, I knew in my heart that going back to work now was the right choice for me and my family. Without my income from the Boathouse, it would be financially difficult for Adam to strike out on his own. Having him leave his busy corporate law job would be better for our family in the long run. We just had to make it through the growing pains of our new roles.

  Adam walked into the kitchen and busied himself at the stove, stirring the noodles and what I assumed was a pot of spaghetti sauce. The timer binged and he expertly drained the spaghetti noodles in a strainer in the sink. The aroma of tomato sauce and pasta filled the air, and I realized how hungry I was.

  “Time for dinner,” he called out. “Mikey, go wash your hands.”

  Mikey bounced up from the floor and ran into the bathroom and back again impossibly fast. “I’m starving, Daddy.”

  Ella banged her fists against her chubby thighs and babbled to tell us she was hungry too.

  Adam looked over at me. “I did feed them lunch, I swear.”

  I laughed. Ella stared at us and I plucked her from her bouncer.“I’m going to go change her. Can you and Mikey set the table while I’m gone?” I left without waiting for a response.

  When I came back downstairs, I found Adam serving up our dinner at a nicely set table while Mikey waited patiently in his chair, already wearing a bib to guard his shirt from the spaghetti sauce. It was a picture-perfect family scene. Maybe, just maybe, everything would work out well with our new careers. I crossed my fingers that that would be the case.

  4

  For Becca and Bill’s rehearsal dinner, the Boathouse’s staff had set up a long table in the main room and covered it with a navy blue tablecloth. The table was set with white linens and silver-trimmed dishes. With the sun starting to sink outside, we’d opened the barn doors to the deck to allow everyone to see what promised to be a gorgeous sunset. All that was left was for the attendees to arrive.

  “It looks great, Jill,” said a voice from behind me. I spun around. Desi had snuck up on me and was examining the setup. She was flying solo tonight, and Tomàs was home with the kids. I watched her assess the room, eager to hear what she thought of it. She’d managed many more events than me when she’d worked at the Boathouse.

  “Do you really think it looks ok?”

  She gave me a quick hug. “Of course. It looks great. Just as good or better than my mom could do it.” She smiled at me.

  I sighed with relief. This was one of the first events that Beth had given me to manage completely on my own, and I didn’t want to mess it up
, especially because it was for friends of Desi.

  “Are we rehearsing first or after dinner?” Desi asked.

  I looked at my watch. “Becca wanted to have the dinner first because we had to schedule the event so late to accommodate work schedules.”

  She nodded, then smiled and waved at someone behind me.

  “This looks wonderful.” Becca clapped her hands together and beamed. “Will the buffet table be in the same place for our wedding reception?”

  I checked my notes. “Yes, it will be. Do you want it somewhere else? We have a few more options, but I thought with the large number of people you have, it would be better to have it off to the side.”

  “Works perfectly. Our head table will be up there though, right?” She motioned to a location on the raised platform. “I want to be able to see all of our guests.”

  “Of course.” I jotted it down in the notebook.

  “Oh, there are my parents. Thanks, Jill—I’m so excited to see what this will look like for our reception.” She hurried off to meet an older couple at the door, escorting them to a place of importance near the head of the table.

  I exited the room to check on the new arrivals in the lobby. The front door opened and Isabel came in, along with a man I assumed was her husband. She made the introduction and then said, “This is such a beautiful location. I can’t believe I’ve never been in here before.”

  “Thank you. The other guests are right through there.” I pointed at the main room. Isabel and her husband drifted away to examine the prints of historic Ericksville that hung on the lobby walls.

  Another guest came in, and I repeated the directions. Angry voices drifted in from the parking lot through the open door. Was something wrong? I ducked outside to check out the situation. When I saw who was making all the ruckus, I slid behind a post, out of sight.

  Lindsay, Jared, and a couple of other people were standing in the parking lot next to a BMW that I recognized from the lake house. About ten feet away, near the sidewalk, Declan stood next to a slim woman with frizzy blonde hair. She wore Lycra pants, a tank top, and running shoes. At the moment, her face was flushed, not from jogging, but from the exertion of arguing with Declan. I couldn’t hear what they were saying, but she was waving her arms around passionately. His face was as red as his polo shirt, but his expression was stony.

  While I was at Lake Elinor, Lindsay had made some crack about him having tons of affairs and ruining their marriage. Was she one of Declan’s extramarital affairs? The woman held up her hand dismissively and jogged away. He stood there for a moment, swigged from a flask he pulled from his pocket, and then joined the rest of the group. I slipped inside, hoping they hadn’t seen me. For some reason, Lindsay wasn’t fond of me, and I didn’t want to give her anything else to complain about.

  When all the guests arrived, they were seated according to name cards at each place setting, just the way Becca had wanted it. The catering staff took drink orders and staffed the buffet. I watched from the doorway as everyone chattered amongst themselves and ate happily. Everything was going according to schedule, and the actual rehearsal would start as soon as everyone was finished.

  When most of the guests were finishing up their desserts, heated voices erupted from one end of the table. Suddenly, I knew what I had forgotten from the destroyed notebook. Icy dread spiraled up through my torso, numbing my brain.

  In Becca’s original seating chart, Lindsay and Declan were seated across from each other. But she had made that decision before she knew they were getting divorced. When I’d met with her at the house on Lake Elinor, she’d specifically requested that I seat them as far away as possible—a request that I’d noted and that had later been torn apart by the little but oh-so-destructive hands of a four-year-old before I could review my notes and commit it to memory.

  Now Lindsay stood with a wine glass in her hand, shouting over the table at her soon-to-be ex-husband. Wine sloshed out of her glass as she punctuated each word with hand movements. The man closest to her leaned in toward the woman next to him to avoid being hit by flying crimson droplets.

  Lindsay seemed to be berating him about some other woman, and I wondered if the woman from the parking lot had been the source of their separation. The catering staff huddled in the corner with their mouths agape. Everyone’s eyes were fixed on the squabble. I caught the eye of our catering manager, Lizzie, and she surreptitiously cleared away the alcoholic drinks from that end of the table. Orson came over to Lindsay and put his hand on her arm, but she shrugged him off.

  Becca and Bill exchanged glances, and she rose from her seat at the head of the table to approach their friends.

  “Lindsay. Can you please come and help me with some of the props for our rehearsal? I need help from my bridesmaids,” she said in a beguiling voice.

  Lindsay glared at Declan. “Gladly. Anything to get away from this cheating jerk.”

  “It wasn’t about that, and you know it.” Declan threw his napkin down on the table and pushed his chair away from the table. “But it doesn’t matter anyway—I’m leaving.” He stalked out of the room, weaving a little as he walked. Bill chased after him, but came back a minute later. Becca gave him a questioning look, but he just frowned and shook his head.

  I glanced at Desi, but like most of the other guests, she wore an expression of shock over the spectacle she’d just watched. I walked up to the microphone.

  “All right, everyone, I think now would be a good time to start the rehearsal.”

  Everyone got up, and the catering staff made short work of clearing the dishes and tables away to allow room for the rehearsal.

  When all of the wedding party was in place, Bill said, “I need someone to fill in for Declan so we don’t get the order of the groomsmen mixed up.”

  Becca scanned the room, her eyes landing on me. “Jill, can you take Declan’s place tonight? That way, on our wedding day, you can tell him what he needs to do.”

  I didn’t really want to be a groomsman for the night as I had a hundred things to do—monitor the staff, work on the table arrangements for their wedding, and check on the food supplies for the next week, among other things—but how could I say no? It was my fault that they were short a groomsman in the first place.

  “Sure,” I said. “I’d be happy to.”

  I kept a close watch on the door, but Declan never came back inside. Later, when all of the guests were gone and I’d locked up to go home myself, I noticed someone down on our floating docks. I moved closer to get a better look.

  “Hey, Declan!” I called out from the deck as I walked toward him. “Are you ok?”

  He was sitting cross-legged on the dock, surrounded by beer bottles.

  “I’m fine,” he said, slurring his words. He stood to prove his point but was so unstable that he almost fell over into the inky blackness of the water.

  He was in no condition to be alone out there, and I could tell I wasn’t getting home any time soon.

  I held out my hand. “C’mon. I’ll help you get up to the deck.”

  “Fine, I’ll go, but I don’t need any help.”

  I rolled my eyes. This wasn’t the first time I’d had to escort an inebriated guest to a safer location. Usually it was because they were doing something stupid like trying to re-enact the scene in the movie Titanic by leaning out over the deck railing and pretending to fly.

  When he was safely on the deck behind the railings, I went back down to collect the beer bottles before they fell into the water. In that short period of time, Declan disappeared. I hadn’t heard any splashing, so I was fairly confident he hadn’t pulled a Titanic.

  I deposited the bottles in the trash receptacle and searched all of the outdoor areas on the Boathouse property, but there was no sign of him. My car was the only one in the parking lot, and I hoped he’d called someone to come pick him up because he was in no shape to drive.

  5

  After searching fruitlessly for Declan on the Boathouse property, I headed h
ome. I unlocked the door and stepped into the house. Silence. The kids were asleep.

  I dropped my keys on the entry hall table and entered the living room, sniffing the air. Something smelled good.

  “Hey.” Adam sat in the recliner, balancing his laptop on his legs, with Goldie at his feet. “There’s lasagna left over from dinner. Do you want some?”

  “No, I ate earlier. Thanks.” I sighed dramatically and flopped onto the couch, pulling an afghan over me.

  He raised an eyebrow. “Ok, what happened?”

  I groaned and burrowed deeper into the pillows on the couch. Finally, I looked up at him. “Remember how I told you one of the bridesmaids and a groomsman were going through a nasty divorce?”

  He nodded. “Did something happen between them?”

  I closed my eyes, as if I could wish away the memories.“I sat them across from each other at the rehearsal dinner.”

  Adam gave me a strange look. “Why was that such a bad thing? Surely they’re able to be civil to each other.”

  I groaned again. “Apparently not. They specifically requested not to sit next to each other, or rather, the bride had requested that they be seated as far apart as possible.”

  “And you forgot about this.” He set his laptop on the coffee table and gave me his full attention. “Ouch.”

  I glared at him. “It was all in the notebook that Mikey tore up.”

  He had the good grace to flush. “Honey, I’m so sorry. I swear I was only gone for a couple of minutes when he did it.”

  “I know,” I said. “I don’t know how he gets into things so quickly. It’s not your fault. Anyways, what’s done is done.” I threw myself backward into the couch cushions again.

  “So what happened? Did they get in a huge fistfight? Was there blood spilled?” He laughed at his own words, then sobered when he caught my expression.

  “Well, not a fistfight, but Declan and Lindsay pretty much ruined the night. Because the rehearsal dinner was later in the evening, we were planning on having the actual rehearsal take place after dinner. So when Declan stormed off, somebody had to fill in for him.”