A Candidate For Murder (Old Maids of Mercer Island Mysteries Book 2) (8 page)

Chocolate was my alcohol. It relaxed me and made me feel comforted. I glanced at my alarm clock. It was now 2:20 a.m. I sighed and threw my legs over the side of the bed. There were no sweets in my apartment because I was trying to lose a few pounds now that I had an admirer. But the thought of chocolate was too strong, and I had to have it. So, I slipped my feet into my slippers and donned my robe.

My destination was the Inn’s main kitchen, where I knew April had stashed the chocolate chip cookies for the snack tray we put out for the guests every day. I usually get up a couple of times a night to go to the restroom, so Mickey and Minnie merely looked at me from the center of the bed as I headed for the bedroom door. As soon as I stepped into the hallway, however, their little internal alarms went off. They scurried out from under the blanket and flew off the bed, shaking and wiggling to wake themselves up.

“Okay, but you have to be quiet,” I warned, looking down at them.

They watched me eagerly. They were both long-haired miniature Dachshunds, with short, stubby little legs. Mickey was black and tan, while Minnie was a copper red. Mickey plopped down into a prone position and let out a pathetic groan, as if he thought I was going to leave him behind.

“Oh, c’mon,” I said.

The hallways in the Inn are floored in dark hardwood, softened with red and gold carpet runners. Small plug-in night lights lit my way. My slippers made little sound as I padded toward the kitchen, but the dogs’ nails clickety-clacked as they wandered off the carpet.

My apartment sat down a curved corridor, with only a public restroom and the laundry past me. I wound my way around to the front entryway. No one was about. It was the middle of the night after all – or the early morning, however you chose to look at it.

As I passed the Inn’s front door, I could hear my big grandfather clock ticking softly in the entryway. It was one of the few antique pieces
not
for sale at the Inn. I used the area to the right of the door and next to the clock to display small collections of other antiques that were for sale. Currently, I had crafted a shipboard themed display, including two steamer trunks, an old ship’s wheel, a captain’s cap and a solid brass ship bell. We always leave one small lamp lit on a table in the entry, and another one on the reception desk for anyone coming back late. The rest of the ground floor was left in shadow.

Ahab’s cage sat next to a patio door on the far side of the breakfast room, but I always draped it at night. I glanced that way as I tip-toed into the room, hoping I wouldn’t wake him. The breakfast room was shaped in the half of an octagon, which jutted out onto the back deck. Each of the four angled walls held paned windows. We always drew the lightweight drapes at night, so I was startled by the flash of a light from outside.

I stopped and stared a moment, wondering if I’d seen it at all.

The breakfast room looked out onto Lake Washington and the South Seattle shoreline. To the right was a grove of trees and a path that led to Goldie’s home.

I couldn’t imagine anyone out for a stroll at this time of morning, especially because it was so cold. The rain had stopped, so more likely it was a boat out for some early fishing.

I shrugged it off and turned for the kitchen, pushing through the swinging door. The dogs scooted in after me as the door swung closed. I headed straight for the big Tupperware container that sat on the counter next to the sink. I didn’t have to turn on a light, because April always left a small hurricane lamp lit on the kitchen table.

My first task was to give the dogs each a dental stick. That would keep them busy, while I grabbed a couple of cookies and a glass of milk. They settled in on opposite sides of a big dog bed we kept in the corner, and I sat at the center island to enjoy my snack.

The cookies were divine. If I didn’t know better, I would have sworn they were still warm, but I knew that was just my over-active imagination.

Thunck!

A soft noise made me glance outside nervously. A flowering cherry tree hugged the window, and I looked past that to the stake lights, which dotted two small lawns on either side of the deck. The dock was lit by a string of lights along the railing so that boats didn’t ram into it in the dark.

I surveyed the area, looking for moving shadows, but didn’t see anything. No one was about.

The lights from the far shore glistened and a breeze rattled the branches of the cherry tree, scraping them against the window. Another storm was probably moving in. No doubt tomorrow would be wet and blustery again.

I relaxed and glanced over at the dogs, who were oblivious to all else but making mincemeat of the dental chews. Give them a bone, a chew toy, or something with a squeaker in it and they entered a state of complete nirvana. It was like drugging them.

That’s why the second thud was only acknowledged by Minnie, who glanced at the kitchen door and then went right back to her dental stick.

It was time to investigate. Perhaps someone had, in fact, come in very late and was knocking at the front door.

I went to the kitchen door and listened first. A rattling sound raised the hair on the back of my neck. Then I heard a squawk.

I pushed the kitchen door open and stepped through, allowing it to swing closed behind me.

The shadow of a large man wearing a hoodie stood at Ahab’s cage. The patio door was open behind him, letting in a draft of cold air. Ahab’s drape was off, and the cage door was open. Ahab squawked again, and the intruder reached in and grabbed him and stuffed him into a bag.

“What are you doing?” I erupted, starting forward. “You can’t do that!”

The intruder glanced at me, but his face was draped in shadow. He hurriedly drew the bag closed, trapping the frantic bird inside. As I rushed across the room, he started to turn toward the open door. He was about to escape, but I snagged the back of his hoodie and yanked him backwards.

“Come back here,” I yelled. “You can’t take him.”

The man whipped around and shoved me away, but I came at him again, grabbing his left arm. He dropped the bag and whipped
me
around and put me into a headlock. I kicked over a chair and managed a short cry, which was enough to set off the dogs.

“Shut up!” the man whispered, his forearm pressing against my windpipe. “Or I swear I’ll kill you.”

This man was a good six inches or more taller than me and had the strength of a bull moose. I made a feeble attempt to loosen his grip around my neck, all the while gagging from the chokehold and his cheap cologne, with the dogs barking frantically in the background.

I finally managed a strangled cry and the kitchen door swung open. Mickey rocketed into the breakfast room. Unfortunately, Mickey goes into a frantic spin when he gets excited. So my would-be hero stopped at my feet, turning like an egg beater and barking in circles.

Good dog, Mickey.

Minnie was still in the kitchen squealing like a stuck pig at being left behind. The man’s leg shot out and kicked Mickey, eliciting a cry of pain, which sent Minnie into overdrive.

She must have finally taken a run at the closed door, slamming her tiny body against it. She shot through like a bullet and used the springs in those back legs to leap onto one of the chairs, launching herself at the man’s face.

I saw her coming and pulled my head to the side just before she slammed into my attacker. There was a cry of pain, and a warm liquid ran down my neck.

Blood!

He let me go and began to howl louder than the dogs. I fell forward gasping for air, while he struggled with Minnie, who had attached herself to his face. Mickey continued to turn circles and bark.

Then a cannon went off.

“I have another barrel just for you!” a voice called out.

My ears rang as the intruder finally flung Minnie free and grabbed Ahab. He ran for the front door, followed by two very fast miniature Dachshunds who were mad as hell.

The dogs followed him out the front door and into the night, their very high-pitched barks ringing through the neighborhood.

I took a deep breath and stumbled to my feet, one hand to my throbbing throat, and the other to my ear. A light went on, and I glanced up to find a gaggle of guests staring at me from the entryway with a mixture of fear and alarm etched on their faces. I turned to find Goldie, standing behind me with her shotgun in her hand, a look of sublime satisfaction on her face.

“You okay, Julia?” she asked.

I looked from her and back to my guests and thought,
Damn! Here we go again
.

I left Goldie in the breakfast room and went to address the guests.

“It’s okay,” I lied, breathing heavily and massaging my throat. “Someone…uh…someone broke in and stole our parrot. But no one was hurt.”

“But that woman shot off a gun,” an older woman said in an accusing tone.

Her name was Mrs. Fenster, and she was in town for her granddaughter’s christening.

“Yes, just to scare him away,” I said, turning toward Goldie. “But no one is in any danger. We’re fine.”

“Well, I called the police,” she stated, straightening up. “As soon as I heard the dogs bark.”

“Very good,” I replied. “That’s good. Now maybe everyone should go back upstairs.”

A new guest, Mr. Dalton, appeared at the open front door. “What’s going on?” he said upon seeing the gathered crowd.

He wasn’t much over twenty-five and was in town for a conference at Microsoft. The cold air made me step past him to close the door.

“There was a thief,” an elderly man named Mr. Brewster said. “You missed all of the excitement.” He and his wife were in town for a second honeymoon, and he looked pleased to have a story to tell.

Mr. Dalton’s face was flushed, and he smelled of alcohol. He looked around warily. “Too bad. I was…uh, out with a friend.”

“Did you see anyone running away from the Inn?” I asked him.

He paused and glanced around to the anxious faces. “No. Sorry. Is everyone okay?”

“Yes,” I said. The sound of sirens made me look out the sidelight window. “Um…the police will take care of things. Maybe you all could just go back upstairs.” I made a motion to usher them along.

“Won’t they need to interview us?” Mrs. Fenster asked.

“I doubt it,” I said, thinking she was just a busybody who wanted in on whatever gossip she could muster. “Unless you saw something, of course.”

I stared at her for a moment, but she shrugged. “No. Of course I didn’t.”

She turned and retreated up the stairs, followed by the Brewsters. Mr. Dalton was last to go.

“Are you sure you didn’t see anyone as you were coming in?” I asked him anxiously.

“Uh…no. I heard some dogs barking, but my friend dropped me off at the street. Sorry. Well, I’m going to bed,” he said, and climbed the stairs.

I stood for a moment, listening to the sirens as they got closer and dreading the approaching encounter.

“Sorry about your ceiling,” a voice rang out from the breakfast room.

“Goldie,” I said, whipping around and putting a hand to my chest. “Sorry, I forgot you were here. But then how could I? You just blew a hole in my breakfast room.”

Goldie was dressed in a baggy hooded sweatshirt thrown over a long nightgown, with a pair of hiking boots peeking out from beneath. She was a good two inches shorter than me, which made the enormous shotgun in her hand look like a bazooka.

“Psshaw,” she waved the bazooka in the air. I flinched backwards as the barrel rounded towards me. “I didn’t point it at anyone.”

“Yes, but, my wall,” I said, pushing past her to look for holes in my walls.

She followed me as I studied the walls, and then tapped me on the shoulder and pointed an index finger to the ceiling above Ahab’s cage. I rolled my eyes upwards and groaned. My hammered copper ceiling looked like Swiss cheese.

“See? I was very careful, Julia,” she said. “Besides, that fella looked like he was about to kill you.”

My hand reached for my throat. “I know,” I said, flinching at the tenderness. “I’ll be black and blue tomorrow. I owe you my gratitude. You just scared the hell out of me. You do have a license to carry that thing, don’t you?”

She puffed up her chest indignantly. “Don’t need one.”

The front door flew open and April rushed in, limping. “Julia! Are you okay?”

“Yes, yes, I’m fine, but what happened to you?”

“I twisted my ankle getting over here. I was in a hurry. I heard a gunshot.”

“Yes, someone broke in and took Ahab.”

“Ahab’s gone?” Her eyes darted toward the cage and then the open patio door behind us.

“Yes,” I said, wrapping my arms around me to ward off the cold.

April turned to me. “It’s what I saw. Remember? My dream?” She glanced around her feet. “But where are the dogs?”

My head came up. “I don’t know. They followed the guy out the front door.” I turned and ran into the entryway and opened the front door again. “Mickey! Minnie!” I yelled.

Nothing.

A moment later, red and blue lights flashed across the pine trees as the police swung into the Inn’s circular drive, their sirens dying. After Martha’s death, having police at my front door had become a common occurrence, and I suspected my neighbors weren’t amused.

April had followed me onto the front veranda and said, “The dogs just came back to the patio door. I put them in the kitchen.”

“Okay, I’ll take this.”

April limped back to the kitchen, while I crossed my arms over my chest and shivered from the cold. Two young patrol officers emerged from the squad car with their hands ready to draw their weapons. I assured them all was well and led them into the breakfast room where Goldie had planted herself at a table, the bazooka lying in front of her. The taller, dark-haired officer introduced himself as Officer Graver. He introduced his blond counterpart as Officer Capshaw.

“What happened here?” Officer Graver asked.

“Someone broke in and stole my parrot.”

“We had a report of a gunshot,” he said, as if he hadn’t heard me about the theft.

I turned toward Goldie. He followed my gaze and stepped forward. “Did you discharge the weapon?”

“Sure did,” she said.

“And your name?” the officer asked.

“Goldie Singleton,” she said with pride. “I live next door.”

I saw his eyes momentarily flare, as if he’d heard that name before.

“Why did you fire the gun?” he asked.

“Because someone was stealing our parrot,” I said again.

He turned to me with his lips parted, and I had the feeling he was about to say, “You’re kidding?” He must have thought better of it, because he merely cleared his throat. Just then, April came in from the kitchen.

“Was the bird valuable?” Officer Capshaw asked. He had a notepad out, ready to write.

“Not to anyone but us,” I replied. “He was just a parrot.”

“What about the alarm system?” Officer Graver asked. “We saw a sign out front that you have one.”

I groaned. “It malfunctioned over the weekend. We had the repair guy out yesterday, but he had to order a new keypad.”

“Pretty convenient,” he said. “What’s the name of the company?”

“Island Security. It’s owned by Roger Romero.”

“Okay, we’ll talk to him. You’re the owner here, I take it?” Officer Capshaw asked.

“Yes. This is my business partner,” I said, nodding toward April.

“I live in the guest house,” April offered.

“The guy attacked Julia,” Goldie said. “She left that part out. He had her in a choke hold when I got here.”

“I don’t understand. Did you see him break in?” Officer Graver asked her.

“No, of course not. Like I said, I live next door.” She pointed in the direction of her house. “I saw someone through the trees. I was just going to bed. Our bedroom is in the back, on the second floor.”

“You saw someone in the dark, through some trees?” Officer Graver said skeptically.

“No, first I saw someone cut across the beach, heading towards Julia’s. We’ve had a bunch of burglaries in this neighborhood, so I got out my binoculars and watched him. After all, it could have been one of Julia’s guests, too. Anyway, he stopped in the trees in between our houses and waited. I saw the flare of a light through the trees. I figured it was someone lighting up a cigarette. I got curious because he was there so long. So I sat down and waited. I could just barely see the shadow of him standing there,” Goldie continued. “It looked like he was facing the Inn while he smoked. He lit up at least twice. I thought it was weird.”

“And how long did he stand there?” Officer Capshaw asked.

She shrugged again. “A good thirty minutes or more. I finally got my boots on.”

“And you never thought to call us?”

“No. Why would I? I have old Betsy here. She takes care of things.”

He sighed with annoyance. “Could you tell what this man looked like?”

“It was too dark. All I saw was his silhouette. Look, Julia’s had some trouble here before. That plus the burglaries made me suspicious. So when he finally moved out, I grabbed my gun and snuck over here after him. When I got here, that door was open,” she said, pointing to the patio door. “And he had Julia by the neck. As I got to the door, one of her dogs attacked him. Got him right in the face,” she said with a smile. “Anyway, I came up behind him and shot into the ceiling to scare him off.”

She sat back with satisfaction, her gray eyes glistening. I had the feeling she’d been waiting her entire life for this moment.

The two officers glanced at each other. “In the future, Mrs. Singleton, we’d prefer it if you’d call us first,” Officer Graver said.

Goldie’s eyes flared this time. “Look,” she said, standing up. “I…”

She knocked the table off balance as she stood, and Old Betsy slid off the edge. The gun butt hit the floor and it discharged. Everyone ducked for cover as a spray of buckshot slammed into my breakfast room wall, shattering the framed picture of a garden scene and sending shards of glass across the room. The dogs went ballistic again in the kitchen, as the room filled with smoke.

I thought Officer Graver was going to throttle Goldie. He stood up from his crouched position, glared at her and then yanked the gun up off the floor.  “I’ll take that, if you don’t mind.”

“Wait a minute,” Goldie said, stepping around the end of the table. “I do mind. That was an accident. That gun belongs to me. I have a right to carry it.”

“Yes ma’am, but not to shoot it indoors. So I’ll be taking it down to the Mercer Island PD to have it checked out for a faulty trigger mechanism. You have a problem with that?” he said, challenging her.

This guy wasn’t kidding. His dark eyes were boring holes into Goldie’s. She matched his stare for a moment and then relented. “Okay, maybe we should have it checked out.”

Officer Graver handed the shotgun off to his partner. I looked up and realized the entryway had filled with guests again. I hurried over and waved them all back upstairs.

“Everything’s okay. The gun just went off accidentally this time. The police are here. They have things under control.” But I could tell Mrs. Fenster wasn’t buying it.

“Well, this is really too much,” she spat. “The threat of ghosts is one thing. But guns going off and people breaking in are quite another. I’ll be checking out first thing in the morning.”

With that, she spun around and marched up the stairs. The rest of the guests just stood awkwardly glancing back and forth between her retreating figure and me.

“I’ll understand if anyone else feels the same way,” I said.

There was a pause, and then Mr. Brewster smiled. “Are you kidding? We haven’t had this much excitement in twenty-five years,” he said with a grin. “Now if we could only see a ghost, we’d have our grandkids attention for months.”

I smiled. “Well, let’s keep our fingers crossed that when Jason Spears, the paranormal investigator, is here this weekend, you’ll get your wish.”

Everyone returned to their rooms, while I went back into the breakfast room. April had come out from the kitchen and was pulling out a broom and dustpan from a long cupboard in the corner. Officer Graver was inspecting the patio door jam, while Officer Capshaw was looking at Ahab’s cage.

I sidled up to April. “That time it was an accident,” I said.

She turned concerned eyes my way. “Are you kidding, Julia? She could’ve killed someone.”

“I know. But the police are taking the gun this time,” I said.

The officers asked me a few more questions, but I wasn’t much help. I hadn’t heard a car, seen anyone other than the man who attacked me, and couldn’t give them a description. The door’s lock had been jimmied, but it appeared that nothing else had been taken other than Ahab. Dusting for fingerprints seemed useless since so many different people stayed at the Inn, and we have so many special events.

Forty-five minutes after they’d arrived, the police were gone, telling me that these kinds of thefts were rarely solved. I was left with bruises on my neck, matching buckshot in my breakfast room ceiling and wall, and an empty bird cage. I turned to Goldie.

“Well, I don’t know about you, but I’m exhausted,” I said, hoping she’d leave.

She took the cue and began to move towards the patio door. “Glad I could help, Julia. Maybe I’ll get one of those Hero of Mercer Island awards.”

I smiled, despite the fear that Mayor Frum might actually bestow one on her. “Could happen,” I said. “Thanks again, Goldie. Can I get the dogs and walk you home?”