Sunset Bridge (28 page)

Maggie fingered the paper; then, on a whim, she folded it and put it in her purse to examine more closely when she had a free moment. Was it possible Harit had discovered Blake’s gambling addiction from the toys Blake had given him? Had he tried to blackmail him? It seemed so unlikely, yet it also seemed possible.

Harit.

Maggie realized she had never downloaded Harit’s book to her own computer. Now she found the emails she had sent herself with the chapters of his novel attached and downloaded them all, taking time to put the files on a CD so she could give it to Janya tomorrow for the children.

She debated turning off the computer. It was late, and she was finally tired enough to go to sleep. Instead, she opened the first file of Harit’s novel. She began to read and immediately was caught up in the prose and the story. A young man, searching for truth in a place and time she knew nothing about.

The chapter’s ending was most surprising. There were several spaces, then notes, segmented into paragraphs. She read a few and realized Harit had used the chapter end as something of a diary. Notes to himself about what he needed to do in the next chapter and research he needed to conduct. But not everything was about the book. With surprise she saw a list of groceries he’d apparently needed to buy. Another had to do
with a doctor’s appointment for Lily the next day. A third was a long rambling account of a philosophical debate with Rishi. Everything around him had been fodder for Harit’s fiction, and he hadn’t wanted to lose or waste any of it.

She paged forward to the end of the next chapter. Again, more notes. Chapters three and four were the same. She imagined the others were, too.

Maggie stared at the end of chapter four. There were dates, although no year. She had no idea how long it had taken him to write these chapters, but she suspected that tomorrow, after some sleep, when she read them all and especially when she read the notes at the end, she would know a lot more about Harit Dutta. And if she was really lucky, she would know something about the person who had killed him, as well.

M
aybe Maggie slept well because she knew that when she awoke, she had something interesting to investigate. Or maybe she was simply tired from a long day at the shop and an evening that had only really gotten interesting at bedtime. Whatever it was, she woke up earlier than usual, feeling rested. She rose and stretched just as raucous banging started outside her house. Rumba yowled loudly in protest as she slipped into shorts and a T-shirt. She opened the front door and found two tattooed men in cutoffs and three-to-a-pack white undershirts nailing plywood over her living room window.

“What’s going on?” she asked, although the answer was perfectly clear.

“Miss Deloche told us to start with yours and work our way down.”

“Why? Did that stupid storm turn into a hurricane?”

“Depends on what station you listen to,” said the first guy, who had a red, white and blue bull stampeding down his forearm.

The second added his piece. “Miss Deloche said she doesn’t want to take any chances.”

“Bang away,” Maggie said.

Inside, she noted the time. It was only six, and while she normally got to the shop by seven, she suspected today wasn’t going to be just any day. Did people buy more pies before a tropical storm? She imagined her mother was asking the same question. She dialed her parents’ number, and Wanda answered after one ring.

“Are you going to open today?” Maggie asked on the edge of a yawn. “Earlier? Later? On time?”

“What do you think?”

Maggie could probably count on the fingers of one hand the times her mother had asked her that question. “You don’t have a generator, so you might start early, but I wouldn’t make too many. Use up what you have and see if the supplier will cancel today’s order. If the electricity goes off, you don’t want pies in the oven and stuff spoiling in the coolers.”

“Did that part already, but we’re thinking alike on this.”

Maggie wasn’t sure thinking like her mother was a good thing, but she felt a warm glow at what amounted to praise from Wanda. She wondered if this was something a woman never outgrew, the need for her mother to be proud of her.

“When do you want me in?” Maggie asked.

“Take an extra hour, and pack up whatever you might need for a few days and anything too precious to lose. Your dad says they’ll be going door to door on the key telling people to leave and find shelter inland.”

“Ordering?”

“Suggesting, at least for now.”

Maggie knew the difference. Nobody was terribly worried. Yet.

“I’ll throw a few things together, then I’ll be in,” she said. “I’ll probably leave my stuff here with Rumba, then I can come back for everything if I have to evacuate. What are they saying about the storm? Somebody’s outside nailing plywood over my windows.”

“Winds low seventies, turning this way and picking up speed. Technically still Tropical Storm Phyllis, but only just.”

Maggie didn’t need a storm in her life. Not when things were just starting to get interesting on the Dutta murders. On the other hand, maybe a storm was
exactly
what she needed. Especially if Blake left the island and she didn’t.

While Wanda detailed her plans for the day, Maggie turned on her computer, determined to read a few chapters of Harit’s notes before she made the trip to town. She wondered if Blake’s name would show up; then she wondered what kind of woman was most excited by a man when she thought he might be involved in a murder.

“See you in a little while,” she said as Wanda wound down.

“This will be a good day to be a baker and not a cop.”

Maggie didn’t tell her mother that she planned to be a little of both.

If Wanda had been paid a nickel for every hurricane and tropical storm that fizzled out before it did any real damage, she figured she would be rich in her own right, and able to hang up her apron and pot holders. Not that she would, but maybe she would hire a little more help and just concentrate on recipes.

Recipes were the center of the fun at Wanda’s Wonderful Pies, and now she knew that for the truth it was. Oh, sure, she
liked the other parts all right, talking to customers, making ten crusts at a time in her industrial-size food processor, then rolling them out by hand the way God had intended. But the part that made having the shop worthwhile was developing her very own, one-of-a-kind, completely extraordinary pies.

Now that she finally had the Orange Blossom Special just right, she felt like a million bucks. Nothing better—well, maybe sex was better, and that first time a grinning nurse brought you a new baby with ten fingers and toes—but next to that, nothing was better than knowing you’d created something other people would enjoy for years to come.

Windy old Phyllis wasn’t sparking any real fear in Wanda’s breast. She was more worried the power would go off before the pies in the shop oven were finished. People hunkering down to ride out the storm would probably be out shopping for the long haul. One of those pies would taste mighty good to a houseful of people with nothing to do but eat and wait for their roof to blow off.

The door tinkled and Maggie blew in, a suitcase in one hand, an umbrella in the other. Rain was falling steadily now, and every minute or so a particularly strong gust of wind rattled the front windows. Ken had promised to come over on his lunch break and install the hurricane shutters, and Wanda wouldn’t be sad to see him. This could be the last time for a while, if Phyllis caused any real problems for the Palmetto Grove police force.

“Pies already in the oven, apple and pear,” Wanda said. “You have a problem getting over the bay?”

“The light at the intersection on the key turned red three times before I could get on the bridge.” Maggie shook her umbrella dry behind her with more energy than Wanda had
felt in years. “Lots of people evacuating already. Do you know what the neighbors are doing?”

“I haven’t talked to everybody yet, but Tracy’s planning to leave, and she advised me to do the same. I can’t imagine anybody will want to stay now that our windows are boarded up.”

“She called me, too. What are you doing?”

“Oh, my stuff’s more or less together. I’ll go home and get the rest of it once we close, get Chase and the stuff I didn’t throw in the car this morning.” She was about to ask Maggie if her plans had changed when the door flew open and Derek Forbes filled the doorway behind her daughter, with dour Larry close behind him.

Maggie greeted them before she turned her attention back to her mother. “Want me to start moving stuff from the bottom shelves up higher?”

Wanda didn’t expect flooding, but she knew almost anything could happen. Maybe most of the storms that whipped through came to nothing, but she had also lived through Hurricane Andrew, and Maggie, who had only been a bit older than Olivia was now, obviously remembered the aftermath.

“You do that.”

Once Maggie was on her way back to the kitchen, Wanda smiled brightly at Derek, then at Larry, who flopped down at a table and slipped off his wet sneakers.

“You’re a tad early for pie right out of the oven. But I made half a dozen cold pies last night so I could serve them up today. Unless you came to say you’re heading back to California. If the airport’s still open.”

“Open long enough to send back everybody who’s not essential. We’re close to finishing what we need here anyway. Just a couple more scenes before we head back to California.”
Derek was practically dancing with excitement. “A big one on the bridge. You have no idea how perfect this storm will be! We tried the scene in a regular thunderstorm, but I want the real thing, not special effects. It wasn’t big enough, grand enough.” He swept his arms out and around to make his point.

“You want
that
big, you’ll be here a long time. Phyllis won’t amount to much. You mark my words. And how can you film in a storm, anyway? It’ll ruin all your equipment.”

“We’re professionals, so we know all the tricks. We have everything we need. We’re going to wait as long as we can, then pop over to the pedestrian walkway, jump the police barriers and film the scene one more time. The local cops have told us we can’t, of course. So we’ll have one chance and one chance only before they catch up with us.”

Wanda put her hands over her ears. “Don’t tell me that!”

Derek wrapped his arms around her for a huge hug. “You’re not going to report me, Wanda. And we’ll pay our fines and make a nice contribution to the police benevolent league in penance.”

Wanda’s knees were weak, but, of course, they were weak whenever Ken hugged her, too. Still, this hug would be good for a whole lot of conversation in her future.

“Just don’t tell me another thing,” she said as she came back to earth.

“Well, since we’re practically business partners, you’ve got to be on my side. Right?”

She felt herself nodding, but she wasn’t sure to what. “But no more revelations. I don’t want my loyalties tested. I don’t need trouble at home.”

“Not another word about it, then.”

“You’ll be careful? Even if Phyllis isn’t something to stick
in your memoirs, these storms can stir up some gusts. Don’t want you sailing off to Key West on one of them.”

“I hope somebody remembers to film it if I do.”

“You can bet we will,” Larry said with a trace of venom, as if that might be a wish come true. Clearly the daredevil moments ahead were not ones he looked forward to.

She had to smile, because Derek Forbes, for all his macho good looks and considerable charisma, reminded her not of Ken, the man she loved and counted on for everything important in her life, but of Junior in his early adolescence. She supposed it was no wonder none of Deke’s marriages had lasted more than a few years. His enthusiasm, vigor and charm were delightful, but along with them came a restlessness and penchant for risky behavior no woman would tolerate for long.

How long would he be interested in pie shops, and at what point would he turn his attention to something totally alien?

“You’ve been thinking about my offer?” he asked, as if he were reading her mind.

“A woman doesn’t get an offer like that more than once in her life. It’s taking up a lot of real estate in my head.”

“Well, it should.”

She smiled, because he was so clearly in love with the idea—and life right along with it.

“We’ll have that conversation when this storm’s over,” she promised.

He looked confident things would go his way. “So will you give me all the pies you’ve got ready? We’re hanging out in our trailers on the key, and I’ve got to keep everybody happy while we do.”

She was glad he hadn’t pressed harder about the franchise. She was in no mood to make a decision.

Maggie came out, and they packaged all the pies while
Derek chatted on about the movie, and plans to fly back to California, then return to Palmetto Grove in a few weeks to wrap up final camera work and other details.

He left, trailing good spirits and enthusiasm behind him, along with the unsmiling Larry, who had pies stacked under both his flabby arms.

Maggie spent the morning organizing and moving everything perishable. The shop was some distance inland, and she didn’t really expect it to flood, so she figured she could leave the one suitcase she’d hauled in up on a table, since there was nothing in it she needed for the next few days.

Most likely any water damage would come from above, holes in the roof or shingles blown off to funnel water below, but preparation was mindless work. While she squeezed things in on the higher shelves, she considered what little she knew about the Duttas’ deaths.

She was nearly finished when Wanda came into the kitchen. The pies were cooling on racks, but the oven was off now. With the wind picking up, she had told Maggie they were finished cooking for the day.

“Your dad’s here.”

“Putting up the shutters?”

“Nah, now he’s got somebody coming later to do that. He doesn’t have time.”

Maggie followed her mother out to the shop, where her father was sitting at the counter with a slice of pear pie and a mug of coffee. Since Maggie’s adolescence, Ken Gray had been her role model. He was the quintessential good cop, convinced his job was important and that it was important to do it right. He was fair, thoughtful and always on the alert for the best way to defuse any dangerous situation. There was
a genuine rapport between her father and mother, too. Her mother talked and her father listened. It worked for them.

“Any news?” Maggie asked after she walked around the counter to kiss his cheek. “Sounds like you’re going to be busy.”

He pointed at the pie. “Lunch, dinner and tomorrow’s breakfast. And I should be out on the roads already. Came to talk some sense into you and your mother while I eat.”

Wanda sniffed. “I have good sense to spare.”

“Then you’ll close up right now and get back across the bridge, pick up whatever you can, along with that greyhound of yours, and go stay with the Greens. They’re far enough inland you won’t have problems there. By this afternoon at some point, the bridge will be closed to traffic in both directions.”

“I’m way ahead of you. I told them I’d be there by five. Even saved them a couple of pies.”

Stu Green had been a cop with Maggie’s dad in the old days and had retired with his wife to a lake about thirty miles northeast of Palmetto Grove.

“What’s wrong with
now?
” Ken held up his mug for more coffee.

“I got pies to sell, and Maggie’s getting things put up, in case we get a little water.”

“What are the chances the storm will amount to anything?” Maggie asked her father.

“Well, it’s officially a hurricane now, and it’s turned in our direction. Not the biggest on the block, but you know how these things work. We could get clobbered, and a bad storm can spawn most anything. We’re in emergency mode.”

The telephone rang, and Wanda went to take the call. From the sound of things, it was one of her suppliers, who wanted
to moan at length about how the storm was affecting his business, so Maggie knew she had her father to herself for a few minutes.

“What about you?” Ken asked her. “You going with your mom?”