A Killer Ending

by Karen MacInerney

  "Progress?" Bethany asked, looking up from the desk, where she was poring over a psychology textbook.

  "I've got a batch of cookies done and dough in the fridge, but I've got to do an errand, and I can't take Winston." I looked down at the little white Bichon mix, who was wagging his tail at me hopefully. "Can you keep an eye on him and take the cookies out when the timer goes off? I put a cooling rack on the counter; the other pans are ready to go. You can put them in for 8 minutes or wait for me to get back, whatever works for you.”

  "I think I can handle it," she said. "Thank goodness you put the bell on the door!"

  I looked up at the ship's bell I'd bought from an antique store in town; it tolled every time someone opened the door. Handy if I was upstairs when a customer came in. Maybe I should put one on the back door to scare off intruders, too, I thought to myself.

  "Thanks," I said, feeling confident about leaving the store in her hands as I headed out the door to visit the bane of my existence in Snug Harbor.

  If Scooter Dempsey had a copy of a will deeding half of Seaside Cottage Books to Loretta, I wanted to see it.

  13

  The afternoon had warmed up, and although I felt a stab of guilt leaving Winston behind, I knew he'd be in good hands with Bethany.

  As I walked up Cottage Street, admiring the shop windows of Snug Harbor Souvenirs and Coastal Potters and savoring the feel of the cool ocean breeze on my face, tinged with (once again) that tantalizing whiff of fried clams from the Salty Dog, I checked my phone for Scooter Dempsey's address and oriented myself.

  His office was only two blocks off the town green, and it only took ten minutes of walking before I was standing on the sidewalk outside of a brown house with a sign bearing the words DEMPSEY DEVELOPMENT.

  Squaring my shoulders and taking a deep breath, I walked through the front door, which opened into a small reception area lined with pictures of horses. Beyond it was a narrow hallway flanked with doors. A small, dented mahogany desk with a bored-looking young man sitting behind it stood to my left. The young man eyed me with minimal interest, then picked up a beeping phone and said, "Dempsey Development." As he spoke, he twirled a rollerball pen in his right hand. When he'd pushed the button to forward the call, I smiled at him and said, "I'd like to speak with Scooter."

  "Do you have an appointment?" he asked.

  "He'll talk to me," I informed him. "I'm Max Sayers."

  "Well, I'll tell him you're here," he said, pushing himself back from the desk and strolling down the hallway as if he had all the time in the world.

  I took advantage of that time to peruse the desk.

  There was a stack of listings for sale, of course, including an eye-popping one for another property on Cottage Street that was selling for three times what I'd spent on Seaside Cottage Books. But there was also an old-fashioned message pad, with those pink "receipt" slips that record the message for posterity.

  I glanced at it, looking for something relevant and trying to banish a twinge of conscience. There were several messages from contractors about drafts that hadn't come through. Most of them were marked URGENT. There was a message from CP for Scooter, saying he needed to talk ASAP. Cal Parker? I wondered.

  And a message from Agatha Satterthwaite to Scooter, saying she couldn't find something and needed to talk about it RIGHT AWAY. That message was from two days ago... not long before Cal Parker was murdered.

  I quickly snapped a photo. I heard a noise down the hallway and stepped back from the desk just as the receptionist reappeared.

  "He'll see you in ten minutes," the young man announced and sat back down in a languid movement, then proceeded to clean his fingernails with a paperclip. Crisis averted, at least for now.

  I sat in one of the three wooden chairs across from the desk, hearing the low voices of people on phones behind closed doors and wondering how this meeting was going to go. Not well, I imagined.

  Twenty minutes passed, during which I had ample time to examine the art above the desk—a painting of Seabiscuit with a jockey astride his back, the horse's name embossed on a brass plate on the frame (which was the only way I knew what horse it was). A second painting, this one of a horse called Blue Moon, hung above my head, matted and framed in heavy, dark wood. Scooter had evidently acquired a passion for horses over the years since last I'd seen him, or else he was trying to project some kind of cultured image.

  Finally, Scooter called down the hall that he was free. The receptionist stood up and led me out of the reception area, past a copy room that smelled of burnt coffee and copiers, to a door at the end of the hall. Scooter was there, sitting at a massive desk, wearing the same satisfied smirk I'd seen the other night at the store, more pictures of horses festooning the walls.

  "Glad to see you, Max," he'd said. "I hear you made a nasty discovery."

  "I did," I confirmed. "Your business partner, yes?"

  "Not since he took office, of course, but in the past, yes. Tragic." Scooter didn't look all that broken up about it; his doughy face was impassive, except for those slitty eyes.

  "Any idea who might have wanted to do him in?" I asked.

  "Who knows?" he shrugged. "We did business, but we weren't close friends. Speaking of business... Come to talk about selling the place?'

  "Not exactly," I said, still standing in the doorway.

  "No?" His eyebrows rose in an expression of surprise, but his eyes told me this was just what he'd expected. "Come on in and we'll talk about it. Did Rupert offer you a drink?"

  My eyes slid to Rupert, who was standing in the hallway eyeing me with some interest for the first time. "No," I said, "but I'm okay."

  "Well, if you change your mind, let me know," Scooter said as I walked into his office, looking at the horse pictures lining the walls, paired with photos of retail developments—evidently projects his company had worked on—and thinking how out of place they'd be in Snug Harbor. His desk was massive and squatted like a mahogany toad in the middle of the room. Behind him was an imposing wall of bookshelves containing encyclopedias, horse books and property code tomes: light reading for a sunny afternoon. His visitors' chairs were small and spindly, all the better to make their occupants feel intimidated when Scooter sank back into his enormous studded leather chair.

  "I didn't know you had so much interest in horses," I said, glancing at another painting of the same horse I'd seen above my head in the reception area. "This one in particular, Blue Moon."

  "She's my lucky horse, actually," he said, puffing up a bit.

  "You own a race horse?" I asked.

  "No," he said. "She just made me a lot of money a few years back, so I'm fond of her. But I'm guessing that's not what you're here for. You're going to try to make a go of it with the old bookshop, eh?" he asked, leaning back with his hands behind his head.

  "I came because I'd like to see a copy of the will you told me about."

  "Ah," he said. "Rupert should be able to put his hands on a copy." He jabbed at the phone on his desk and loudly requested the office manager/receptionist find the necessary paperwork, then jabbed it again and turned his attention back to me. "Still as pretty as ever," he commented.

  "Thank you," I said stiffly, the compliment making me feel even more uncomfortable.

  "Single again, I understand. That was your ex-husband who was with the author, right? Theodore Sayers: he's a mortgage broker in Boston."

  "That's right."

  "They looked like regular lovebirds, didn't they? He sure didn't wait long; you've been divorced for less than a year, haven't you? And she's hot, too." When I didn't answer, he said, "I don't know how he let you get away, though."

  "I'm sorry," I said. "Is there a point to this line of conversation?"

  He shrugged, but didn't look cowed. "I'm just making small talk while we wait for Rupert. I guess you'll be moving in with your mother once this all gets squared away, right?"

  "I plan to stay in the store," I told him, folding my arms over my torso.


  "I'm sure we can come to some arrangement," he said. "But you'll probably have to get a mortgage. You paid cash for the place, right? Not a smart move, actually, with interest rates being this low."

  I didn't like debt, but I wasn't going to tell him anything more than I had to. Obviously, he'd done his research. What else did he know about me?

  "I heard you've got some permitting violations going on, too. Although with Cal Parker out of the way, I don't imagine the town will be going after you anytime soon," he added, his mouth quirking up into a suggestive smile. "Convenient, though, isn't it?"

  "Could you just check on the documents?" I asked. "I have to get back to the store."

  "Of course," he said. "It'll take a minute or two, since they're in the back room. In the meantime, what did you think of our offer?"

  "I don't see why I should pay a second time for something when I already signed a contract and paid for it," I said.

  "Again, it's just too bad you didn't get a title search," he said, shaking his head. "Trying to save a few bucks; I understand. Pennywise and pound foolish."

  Before I could leap across the desk and rip off his head, thankfully, Rupert knocked lightly and appeared in the doorway holding a sheaf of paper. "I think this is what you're looking for," he said.

  "Give it here," Scooter told him, and the younger man slid it onto the desk before giving me a suspicious look and disappearing back out through the door. Had he figured out I'd been sorting through the papers on his desk?

  "Here's the will deeding the building to both Loretta and Agatha," Scooter said, flipping through the pages before closing them up and sliding the sheaf across the desk to me. "All signed, sealed, and delivered."

  I took the papers and looked at them; as he said, the house was split evenly between the sisters, and had been signed and witnessed.

  "I don't understand," I said. "If this will is valid, why is Agatha only making noise about it now? Loretta's been running the place for years."

  He shrugged. "My understanding is that she was fine with her sister running the store, with the understanding that she'd get half the value of the land and building if it was sold."

  "But why do this now?" I said. "Why not address this months ago, when Loretta sold it to me?" And why hadn't Loretta mentioned that her sister owned half the property? She didn't seem like the type of person who would hide something like that from me, or enter into a transaction that wasn't on the up and up.

  I thought about the message from Agatha. What couldn't she find? Something related to the will?

  And then a thought popped into my head. Was there another will I didn't know about? One signed after this one?

  Scooter, hands still behind his head, leaned back further in his chair and put his feet on the desk, reminding me of a lion claiming his territory. "Be that as it may, as you can see, you don't have clear title to the property. And it doesn't look like anyone registered the new deed." He paused, giving me a conniving look that infuriated me. "Our offer might ease your pain."

  "Thanks," I said, "but I need to talk to my attorney."

  "Oh, did you hire Nicholas?" he asked, his voice laced with sarcasm. "I didn't know you two were talking."

  I couldn't resist. "You mean after what you did all those years ago?"

  He widened his eyes. "I don't know what you mean."

  "Really," I snorted. "All those rumors you spread about me?"

  He spread his hands in mock innocence, but that smirk was still there. "I'm at a total loss."

  "Right," I said. "I need a copy of this."

  "It's not going to change anything. Rupert!" he called.

  Rupert didn't answer; he walked down the hall to look for him. "Must have gone for a coffee break. I guess you can use the copier down the hall." He waved dismissively toward the door. "I've got a meeting in five minutes. Although I'd be happy to discuss this further..." He took his feet off the desk and leaned toward me "...over dinner."

  "No thank you," I bit out, repulsed, and headed for the door.

  "Be sure to give that back to Rupert," he called after me. "There's a copy filed at the courthouse, but I'd hate to charge you for Rupert's time going over there to copy another one."

  I didn't bother answering; I just left the office and headed to the copy room, wrinkling my nose at the smell of old coffee.

  I was still riled up as I slapped the papers down on the copier and hit the "start" button. By the time the last page was copied, I'd calmed down some, but I wasn't exactly in a Zen state of mind. I turned through the pages to make sure I had them all; on the sixth page, next to the paragraph deeding the house to both Agatha and Loretta, was a tiny yellow post-it note. All it said was "DDFLD? CKW/AS. NTY?" I looked to see if I had copied the cryptic note. I had.

  I was about to leave when I spotted something in the TO BE COPIED box: it was the first page of a will, and the person in question was Loretta Satterthwaite—NOT Loretta and Agatha's mother, Laverne. I picked it up and glanced through it. Everything she had went to charity... not a dime went to her sister.

  Was this what had prompted the claim on the property? I wondered.

  As I stepped out of the copy room, I heard Scooter's low voice.

  "Look again," he was saying. "If we can't put our hands on it, the whole deal is off. I want to help you, you know I do, but it's got to be taken care of." I paused and listened.

  "By the end of the week," he said. "I don't want to take any chances." Another silence. "No! Of course I didn't have anything to do with it. Probably some woman he broke up with, crime of passion, and all that." He paused for a moment, then said, "All right. Remember. By the end of the week."

  I could hear the click of the phone being hung up, and strode down the hallway to where Rupert was sitting. "Here," I said, handing him the will, then put on my nicest smile and said, "Hey... could you tell me who just called Mr. Dempsey?"

  "No," he said flatly. Then, "Have a nice day."

  Oh, well. It was worth trying.

  I let myself out of his bitter-smelling office and took a deep breath of the cool air, thinking about that note on the will. What did those letters mean, anyway? I had no idea... but I had a feeling if I could figure it out, it would help me understand why Agatha had chosen to stake her claim so suddenly. And what was it that she was looking for that she needed to talk to Scooter about? It made no sense.

  And it took me no closer to explaining what had happened to Cal Parker.

  As I walked the fresh-scrubbed brick sidewalks toward Main Street, enjoying the cool breeze playing with my hair, my thoughts turned back to the grisly discovery I'd made outside the shop. Already I was getting the impression that not only the police, but ordinary folks in Snug Harbor suspected I had something to do with it. After all, I wasn't totally "local," and he had been found on my property the morning after he'd threatened to shut me down. With my flatiron embedded in his head, no less, although that supposedly wasn't common knowledge.

  Whoever Scooter had been talking to had seemed to be asking if he had anything to do with it. He'd denied it... but why would someone think that?

  And who were the women Cal had been dating?

  I rounded the corner onto Main Street, where I was met with the flashing stained glass ornaments outside of Snug Harbor Suncatchers, along with the chiming of the clock outside the bank. I caught a whiff of coffee—the delicious, non-burnt variety—and glanced over to Sea Beans, which seemed to be doing a booming business, I was glad to see. Maybe we could serve their coffee at the bookstore? I wondered. I took two more steps and decided coffee was definitely in my immediate future.

  Because parked right outside was the green Jaguar I'd seen at Windswept.

  14

  The hum of the espresso machine and the chatter of animated voices mingled with the sound of jazz coming from the speakers as I pulled the door to Sea Beans open.

  I'd been in the coffee shop a few times before—I was watching my budget, so didn't spend much on food and drink I hadn
't made myself these days, but I’d treated myself a couple of times—and today, as always, I was struck by the cheerful, lively vibe of the place. The front case was filled with luscious pastries, including cinnamon rolls, bagels, muffins like the one Denise had brought over yesterday, croissants, and other carbohydrate-infused delights. A young barista at the old-fashioned espresso machine was pulling two shots of espresso, while another woman closer to my age handled the cash register.

  I scanned the little shop, which was filled with a delightful hodgepodge of tables and chairs, including four squishy armchairs in the front corner and a couch and love seat toward the back, and I spotted my target immediately. She was facing away from me, at a small table along the back wall, still wearing her sunglasses even though she was inside and facing away from the windows. The pendant diamond in her ear sparkled as she tilted her head to sip from an espresso cup.

  Denise wasn't there. I ordered a drip coffee and paid for it, smiling at the barista, then drifted over to the table next to where the mystery woman sat nursing her espresso.

  She was an attractive woman—regal, almost—with dark hair pulled back into a loose bun. She wore jeans that looked tailored (if jeans can be tailored), expensive-looking brown suede pumps, and a red silk blouse, her small waist cinched in by a belt. Her phone, nestled in a silver case, lay face-down on the table; she kept picking it up and checking it, as if waiting for something.

  I sat at the table next to hers, sipping my coffee and trying to act nonchalant. She took another sip of her espresso, leaving a russet lipstick print on the white cup. I was about to try to engage her in conversation when there was a buzzing sound from the phone on the table. She grabbed for it, her other hand touching her hair with a nervous gesture as she pressed it to her ear.

  "What did you find out?" she asked. A moment later, her chin quivered. "Are you sure?" Silence. "I just... I still just can't believe it," she said, swiping at her eyes beneath the dark sunglasses. More silence. "I know," she said in a low voice. "I should have expected it. He was all talk, but I loved him. I... I'm sorry. I have to go."