Poisoned Prose (A Books by the Bay Mystery) (11 page)

“Ask them for one of their magnets. Then you can hang some of Caitlyn’s artwork in this kitchen,” Harris suggested and turned back to his computer.

He’ll make some woman very happy one day
, Olivia thought. She wished that woman could have been Millay because Harris was good for her. Perhaps she’d realize what she’d had in him once he’d moved to Texas, but Olivia doubted it. Millay wasn’t one to dwell on the past. She shut it in a box and walked away without looking back.

Olivia phoned in the order and poured herself a drink while Harris pivoted his laptop to show her images of blue-skinned people.

“There’s such a range in hue.” She leaned closer to the screen, fascinated. “That man has just a bluish tinge while that woman is a deep indigo.”

“And here I thought having braces, acne, and rosacea was rough.” Harris’s face was full of sympathy as he scrolled through the images. “You know, none of these photos are recent. Look at the dates. However, most of the American ones were taken of families living in Appalachia.”

Intrigued, Olivia carried her tumbler of Chivas Regal over to the sofa. “I wonder why.”

Harris’s eyes flew across the text of an article on Appalachian history. “Interbreeding. That’s the answer, pure and simple. The mountain communities were really isolated. Cousins marrying cousins wasn’t uncommon back then. It didn’t carry the stigma it does now.”

Olivia nodded. The mountain people wouldn’t have been the first to follow this custom. Throughout history, dozens of secluded societies passed down unique and often detrimental genetic traits as a result of too much intermarriage within a small population. “Josiah found a good place to hide his condition. It was probably a good place to hide his children’s blue skin too. I wonder if that’s why his father left New York. Maybe he was exposed. Even if his skin color were only a little off, he’d have trouble finding work or renting an apartment. Not many people would accept a man who looked so different back then.”

“I know you’re thinking aloud here, but there’s no way I’m going to be able to track down that kind of needle-in-the-haystack detail. I’d be totally thrilled to find out what street Josiah lived on or where he worked during his years in New York.” Harris finished his beer and carried it to the sink. After he rinsed the bottle and tossed it into the recycling bin, he froze. “Violetta mentioned a curse in the opening of her act. I bet she was talking about having blue skin. Look what it did to her. To avoid being stared at like a circus freak, she had to wear makeup and move around at night like some kind of vampire.”

Olivia sipped her drink and stared out the window. The stretch of beach was white. Nearly all of the brown and yellow had been bleached away by the sun. The sand was hot enough to scorch. Looking at it now made her think of her closet full of pickle jars. Her treasures. Very few of them were valuable—a handful of old coins or pieces of gold jewelry—and yet she kept things most people would consider trash.

“What if Violetta’s treasure was sentimental?” Olivia suggested. “Something that only had value to her?”

Harris touched the top of his chest near his shoulder. The scar from his bullet wound was there, hidden beneath his shirt, and he often rubbed it when he was troubled or lost in thought. “I don’t know. She said the clues were in her stories. Why toss out bread crumbs if you don’t want someone to follow your trail? I think she saw someone in the audience that night at the library—a threat, an enemy, a sister, a person from the past, who knows—and she was, like, taunting them.”

Outside, Olivia heard the crunch of car tires on gravel. “That must be our supper,” she said and got up. However, she didn’t open the door to a young man wearing a Pizza Bay delivery shirt. Instead, she found Rawlings standing on the welcome mat.

“Am I interrupting?” He smiled wryly and jerked his thumb at Harris’s car.

Olivia knew he was teasing, but she chose to ignore the jest. “Drink?”

“I’d kill for a beer
.
”

“You won’t have to get violent. I think Harris left you one or two.” She touched him on the arm. “Come on in.”

He followed her into the cottage and greeted Harris with a tired smile and a firm handshake. After telling Olivia to forgo the pint glass, he took a long pull of beer right from the bottle and sighed. “Now if only I had a slice of pizza, I’d be a happy man.”

At that moment, the Pizza Bay delivery car pulled in front of the cottage. “Hot damn,” Rawlings whispered and stared at his beer. “Is there a genie in this bottle?”

Olivia and Harris laughed. Olivia paid for the pizza and gave the gawky teenage delivery boy a generous tip. The trio then settled down to eat, and Olivia refrained from peppering Rawlings with questions until he’d had at least one slice of ham and pineapple. Harris, on the other hand, didn’t grant the chief the same luxury.

“How was your interview with Amabel?” he asked.

Rawlings chased a bite of pizza with a swallow of beer. “She’s a hard one to read. When I asked why she hadn’t come forward and identified herself as Violetta’s sister, she told me she didn’t think the information was relevant.”

Olivia served him a slice of Florentine pie. “Where was she following Violetta’s performance?”

“In the lobby,” Rawlings said with a hint of annoyance. “At one point, everyone was in the lobby, and so every person I interview can use that answer and someone will collaborate it. And it’s not like the attendees were checking the time or paying attention to whether someone slipped off down the hall or not. The restrooms are there, so even if someone went missing for five or ten minutes, it wouldn’t seem unusual.”

Harris pointed his pizza crust at Olivia. “Especially considering how you women chitchat in the ladies’ room. What exactly are you doing in there?”

“Talking about you men, naturally.” Olivia grinned and then turned to Rawlings. “Go on.”

“I asked Amabel about her childhood, her schooling, her career, you name it. She kept her answers as terse as possible, and I had no cause to press her. I only saw a flicker of genuine emotion when I mentioned Elijah’s name.”

Harris got up, grabbed his laptop, and brought it back to the table. He showed Rawlings the image of Elijah’s death certificate. “This is all I could find on him. This and his birth certificate.”

Rawlings stopped eating. He gazed at the screen, his pond-green eyes solemn. “In the end, is that all we are? A life described on two pieces of paper? That little boy was more than a pair of documents.”

His words hung heavy on the air. Olivia couldn’t help but picture Anders—round, rosy, and dimpled. She imagined so many different futures for him, each more wonderful than the last. And she was just the boy’s aunt. Olivia couldn’t begin to comprehend what it would feel like to be a parent, to be forced to watch a life so full of promise ebb like the outgoing tide. She wondered how Ira and Josiah had handled such agony. How anyone could handle it.

“Did Amabel react when you mentioned the treasure?” she asked Rawlings.

“Not so much as a twitch. She said that Violetta was not only fanciful, but enjoyed manipulating people as well. Created a persona using her stories and her condition.” He explained Violetta’s medical condition to Harris, who managed to look completely fascinated all over again. “The ME told me the actual term, but it’s about twenty syllables long.”

Harris tapped a few keys and showed Rawlings his screen. Olivia could read the word “methemoglobinemia” just above the arrow-shaped cursor. “This it?”

“That’s the one,” Rawlings said. “And as interesting as the condition is, I have no idea if it’s relevant to my investigation. What I need and what I’m lacking at this point is a motive.” He stared at the images of the blue-skinned people on the computer screen and then gently closed the lid. “We’ve gone through Violetta’s room at The Yellow Lady. Everything appears in order. Lowell still had her props and makeup kit in his car and has given us permission to search and fingerprint the lot.”

Olivia was surprised that Rawlings was being so open about the case. He must truly be stymied, must genuinely be in need of help. “What about Hicks? Any anomalies in the file you got from the sheriff?”

Rawlings hesitated and then seemed to come to a decision. “In fact, there was something in the report that troubled me. A few days after Hicks’s death, the head of his department at Western Carolina asked that his research be sent to the university. I think they were hoping to find something worthy of publication.” He flipped the pages of the notebook he always carried in his shirt pocket. “According to the sheriff’s findings, there were no journals or papers in the cabin Hicks was renting, and his computer had disappeared.”

Olivia could feel the food sticking in her throat.

“What does that mean?” Harris asked.

“I believe Lowell saw something on that mountain that night. Something that frightened him,” Rawlings said with a quiet fierceness. “If I were a betting man, I’d wager that Hicks recorded all of Violetta’s stories and pored over them until he believed he had discovered the location of the treasure. And I think he was killed because of his discovery.”

Harris snorted. “By a ghost?”

“By Lowell or Dewey Whitt?” Olivia said.

“Then it has to be Dewey,” Harris declared. “Violetta pointed out into the audience. The ghost was in front of her. Lowell was behind her.”

Rawlings rubbed the bristles on his chin. “Whitt’s supposedly on a fishing trip in West Virginia. I spoke with his wife, but I won’t cross his name off my list until I talk with him directly. He doesn’t carry a cell phone, so I have to wait until he comes home.”

Harris ran his hands through his ginger-colored hair. “Well, if the bad guy isn’t Dewey, then who stole the professor’s research?”

“The same person who came to Oyster Bay to get answers from Violetta,” Olivia said. “Someone who couldn’t solve the riddles the way Hicks did.” She put a hand on the chief’s arm. “I know the last thing you need is another fly in the ointment, but Flynn’s also from the mountains. He said so at the children’s program at Through the Wardrobe.” She went on to describe the odd exchange she’d observed between Flynn and Amabel as she was leaving the bookstore.

Rawlings took a few notes and then got to his feet. “I need to get back to work. I only stopped by to spend a little time with you, Olivia.” He smiled at Harris. “Having you here was a bonus. Being able to bounce ideas off both of you has given me fresh insight. Do me a favor, Harris, and put that massive brain to work on behalf of the citizens of Oyster Bay. Find me some details on the Devereaux family’s heritage, no matter how small.”

“I already tracked down a few things,” Harris said with false modesty. “I can tell you about them on our way out.”

“Good man. Thanks for the meal and the company.” Rawlings leaned over and gave Olivia a peck on the cheek. He then ruffled the fur on Haviland’s neck and strode from the cottage. Harris collected his things, waved to Olivia, and followed him.

Olivia cleaned up after their meal and walked back to her house. Feeling restless, she paced around the ground floor. The rooms felt empty all of a sudden. They had never felt empty before.

I wish Rawlings had stayed
, she thought.
I wish we could sit together and talk until we were both too tired to think. I wish I could fall asleep to the sound of his breaths.

Taking a notepad and a fresh cocktail out to the deck, she stood at the railing as Haviland trotted over the dunes. The sun had lost some of its intensity, and a low bank of clouds was moving in from the Atlantic at a sluggish pace.

“Could we actually see rain?” she asked the ocean and sniffed the air. It smelled gritty and dry. “Something’s got to give,” she said darkly, wondering if she’d been talking about the weather or the investigation.

Uncapping her pen, she wrote a list of names on the paper:
Amabel, Lowell, Flynn, Greg, Dewey
and then added the word,
Motive
.

She couldn’t think of any reason for Flynn to kill Violetta, so she moved on to Lowell. Money was the most obvious motive, but why would he wait until Violetta was in Oyster Bay to murder her? It made no sense. Perhaps Amabel or Greg was guilty. Maybe they’d chosen this place solely because it was where the retreat was being held. But what of Dewey? Was he really on a fishing trip or was he here? In Oyster Bay?

“Violetta called it her Gethsemane.” Olivia set her notepad down and went inside to fetch her mother’s Bible. After examining the index, she turned to the fourteenth chapter of the Book of Mark and skimmed to verse thirty-two. Twilight descended as she found the verses about Jesus in the garden. Tracking the red font with her index finger, she read his prayers and the words he spoke to his disciples. She said the last line of the passage aloud: “‘Here comes my betrayer!’”

Closing the Bible, she stroked the soft leather cover and stared out at the horizon.

“People don’t usually betray strangers,” she mused quietly. “In order to betray someone, the person you betray has to trust you. There has to be an existing relationship between the two of you.” She thought of Judas’s kiss. “You may even love each other.”

Something about the Biblical passage evoked an image of Violetta onstage, the blue light shining around her head like a crown of glowing stars. Olivia recalled the power and majesty of her voice and her incredible ability to transport her listeners directly into her stories.

“Who did you love, Violetta? Who did you trust? Who came to kiss you on the cheek before killing you?” Olivia’s questions floated away on the dry air.

Far off in the distance, lightning flashed over the water. Olivia saw Haviland abruptly raise his nose and then turn back toward home. When he reached the deck, he gave a vigorous shake of his fur and then pawed at the mat, asking to be let inside.

Olivia slid the door open but did not follow him into the house. She sat on the deck, witnessing a storm gather far offshore. Unfortunately, it was too far away to bring her town any relief.

As night fell, Olivia sipped her scotch, watched the lightning burn the sky, and thought about betrayal.