Double Dog Dare (The Raine Stockton Dog Mystery Series) (13 page)

Rita said, “I hope you don’t feel you have to sit here with me, Raine.  If you’d rather go to the beach…”

“Miles and Melanie need some father-daughter time,” I said, stretching out in the lounge chair and kicking off my sandals.  “And I could use the rest.”  And then I glanced at her quickly.  “But don’t let me keep you here.  If you’d rather be doing something else…”

She laughed, acknowledging the mild awkwardness of two people who didn’t know each other very well trying to be nice.
I grinned back, and the silence that fell between us was easier this time.  She sipped her wine and I stretched my toes out to the sun and enjoyed the ocean breeze.  In a moment, I said, “Do you mind if I ask you about Susan?”

“Not at all.”  She seemed unsurprised and unconcerned.  “But I’m afraid I can’t tell you very much.  To be perfectly honest, I only met her once before the wedding.”  She frowned a little, thoughtfully.  “She was an odd type.  Nice enough, but I don’t know, reserved.  Very ambitious.
  Of course, Miles is ambitious too, which should have made them well suited, I guess, but sometimes it doesn’t work that way.  I can’t really explain it, but I always had a peculiar feeling about her. It just seemed like a strange match to me, and I remember thinking at the time…”  She glanced at me with an expression of rueful apology in her eyes.  “It’s awful of me, I know, but I remember thinking at the wedding that I’d be surprised if the marriage lasted until Christmas.  And I was right.  It didn’t.”

“Was it a bitter divorce?”

“Not at all, at least as far as I knew.  Miles never talked about it much.  He seemed… I don’t know.  Embarrassed about the whole thing.  He doesn’t usually make impulsive decisions, and I suppose he doesn’t like to be reminded about the impulsive marriage that didn’t work out.”

“Do you think…”  I ventured a careful look at her, worried I was about to go too far
, “do you think he might still have feelings for her?”

She gave a startled laugh.  “Oh my, I shouldn’t think so. In fact
, I’m sure of it. As for how she might feel about him, on the other hand…”  She shrugged.  “It was odd, don’t you think, that she should come to Miles to help her brother out of trouble?”

I gave a decisive nod of agreement.  “
I do think so.  But even odder that Miles was actually willing to do it.”

“Oh, I don’t know
about that.”  She sipped her wine, unconcerned. “That actually makes a bit more sense to me.”

“That he would loan money to an ex-wife and a man he doesn’t trust?”

She chuckled.  “That he would want to keep his options open.  I would have been very surprised if he hadn’t at least followed up.  He’s naturally curious.”  She smiled at me.  “Like you.”

I blushed a little.  “I guess I really shouldn’t be grilling you about your son behind his back.”

She waved a dismissive hand.  An emerald glittered on her finger and I knew without asking that it had been a gift from Miles.  “He left us alone together.  What else should he expect?”

I laughed, and knew she was right.  Miles rarely did anything without being fully aware of the consequences.   

She dipped a shrimp in cocktail sauce, guarding her white shirt with a paper napkin. “Miles tells me you were married to a policeman.”

So now it was my turn.  I nodded.  “And my uncle was the sheriff for thirty years before that.  I guess that’s why I tend to ask too many questions.”

“There’s no such thing as too many questions,” she replied, “as long as you’re asking the right ones.”

I ventured a small,
puzzled smile.  “Funny.  That sounds like something my father used to say.  He was a judge.”

“Yes.” 
Her eyes twinkled, and she reminded me very much of her son at that moment.  “Miles mentioned you come from an impressive family of defenders of the law.”

I tried to smile but it felt uncomfortable and sad.
“I used to think so.”  I looked for a moment at my barely touched glass of wine.  Then, without knowing I was going to say anything at all, I added, “When my father died he was the most respected man in the county, maybe even in the state.  The governor came to his funeral.  He had the kind of reputation on the bench that made you think the words ‘honest’ and ‘fair’ had been invented to describe his courtroom.  But it turns out he let an innocent man go to prison to cover up his own adultery, and in the process he  broke so many laws and betrayed so many people I can’t even count them all.  It kind of makes you wonder what you can believe in after that, you know?”

I glanced at Rita, but she said nothing.  She didn’t pretend to understand, or make meaningless sympathetic noises.  She just waited for the rest of the story.  I figured I might as well tell it.

“The worst part was,” I said, “that the woman he was having an affair with all those years—the one he was covering up—was my mother’s best friend.  No,” I corrected myself in a sharp, tight voice, “the worst part was that she was my best friend.  She was at our table every Sunday and every holiday since I was a little girl.  She gave me my first golden retriever.  She stood up for me at my wedding.  After Mother died, she was the one I went to with all my problems, and all the good things too.  It was her idea to start the kennel business, not mine, and she taught me everything I know about dogs.  We worked together, we trained together, we traveled together.  I told her everything.  And all the time she was keeping this secret from me.  This huge, ugly secret.”  I took a sip of the wine, but it tasted sour in my mouth.  I put the glass on the table.  “You know what’s funny is that I can’t imagine what my life would have been like without her.  I mean, every part of it is connected to her in one way or another, and now when I look back, it feels like my whole life was just a lie.”

Rita said, “How did you find out?”

I shrugged uncomfortably.  “She told me, a few weeks back.  She never would have said anything at all if it hadn’t been about to come out in a police investigation.  I don’t know.  Maybe I would have been better off if she hadn’t.”

“That must have been a horrible conversation to have.  What do you say to a confession like that?”

I picked up my glass, and put it down again.  “I think I said, ‘Get out of my house’.  She did, and that was it.  Everything else was just paperwork.”  Again I shrugged.  “She called a couple of times before she moved to Florida, but I just deleted the messages without listening to them.”  

Rita sipped her wine quietly, gazing out over the pool and the ocean beyond.  Cisco snored softly under my chair.  She said
after a moment, “You know Miles’s father was an alcoholic.  It’s dreadful, living with that disease.  For years after he died I wouldn’t allow alcohol in the house, or even go to parties where it was served. And then one day it struck me. The man with the drinking problem was dead and gone, but he was still controlling me.  His mistakes were defining my life, not my own.”  She smiled.  “It turns out I enjoy a glass of wine now and then, and I like going to Christmas parties where eggnog is served.  It’s a small thing, I know, but it’s a shame to miss out on even one small thing because of someone else’s problem.  Something that didn’t even have anything to do with you.”

She looked at me.  “What your father did was despicable, Raine.  And as for your friend—in some ways that was even worse. I don’t know if you can forgive them for it.  But it’s worth trying, because you’re not doing it for them. You’re doing it for you.”

I said, “Has Miles ever forgiven his father?”

She lifted her glass again.  “I don’t think so.  Instead, he buys me diamonds and beach houses, and although there’s definitely something to be said for that...”  The flash of her smile had an undertone of regret to it, like the sour taste that lay beneath the brightness of my wine.  “What he’s really doing is trying to rewrite the past.  And that’s pointless, isn’t it?  All you can do is to treasure the good things, and learn to live with the rest.”

Cisco stirred beneath my chair, stretching forth his front legs and yawning broadly before crawling out.  He shook himself, spraying tiny motes of gold-dusted hair
into the air, and turned  to me with a happy, tail-waving grin that spoke of nothing but his joy at seeing me again. I couldn’t help grinning back as I dropped my hand to his head, massaging his ear.  He was definitely one of the good things.

 
I helped myself to a shrimp from the platter, then served one to my dog.  He gulped it down ecstatically and then sniffed the deck for dropped crumbs.  “So,” I said, picking up my wine again,  “what do you suppose one wears to have a sunset dinner on a sailboat in the Caribbean?”

~*~

NINE

D
on’t get me wrong.  I’m as romantic as the next girl, and Miles, if I haven’t mentioned it already, is one sexy guy, particularly the way he looked that night in jeans and a silver silk shirt that was the exact color of his eyes.  But by the time we parked at the marina that evening, I wasn’t thinking as much about lobster and champagne under the stars as I was about tides and currents and how far the reef really was from shore, and what might have inspired Rachelle Denison to make up such an outrageous story.  That is just the way my mind works.   I would be going home in a few days to my dogs and my kennel and my mostly ordinary life, but this incident was likely to be referenced more than once between now and the time Rachelle’s new movie came out.  It would be fun to be able to say I had actually been to the place where the whole thing started.

The sun sets late in the
Caribbean, and by the time we left the house, Melanie, Rita, and Cisco had already had their dinner and were preparing for one last walk on the beach before settling down to watch a movie on television.  The azure sky was overlaid with a faint trace of pink clouds as we walked down the dock, and the breeze was warm and salty, ruffling through my hair pleasantly. Miles looked tanned and relaxed and he smelled of Polo, which had recently become my favorite scent. He held my hand.  A few of the dogs who had greeted Cisco so enthusiastically during the day peered over their rails to watch us pass, but we didn’t stir up nearly as much excitement without Cisco along.  In the distance, some poor dog whose owners had locked him in the cabin while they went to dinner barked the bark of the lonely and the bored.

I said, “I should call Melanie and remind her to keep Cisco on leash if they’re going to the beach.”

“You reminded her twice.  You also reminded Mom.  She’ll think you don’t trust her.”

“I trust Melanie fine.  It’s Cisco I’m a little iffy on.”

Miles put his arm around my waist and drew me close, hip to hip.  “Do you know why I brought you here?”

“For a vacation?’

“Right.  And what do you suppose people go on vacation to do?”

I pretended to think about that. “Relax?”

“Wrong.,  People go on vacation to  be, for a few days, somebody they don’t get to be the rest of the year.”

“And what do you want me to be?” I teased him, bumping his shoulder playfully with mine.  “Tall, blond and leggy?’

He threaded his fingers briefly through my tangle of curls which were, in fact, beginning to take on a blond tinge, then let his fingers rest upon my neck, caressing.  “I prefer mid-sized brunettes, and I like your legs the way they are.  This is what I want you to be.”

He surprised me by taking out his phone and turning it toward me.  A picture of me, holding up a blue ribbon with  Cisco by my side, filled the screen.  I had never looked worse—tangled hair held back by a baseball cap, no
makeup, sweaty, bloody and bruised, grinning like a banshee.  Instinctively I put my hand out to cover the screen.  “Miles!  I can’t believe you kept that picture.”

“It’s my screen-saver,” he said.

I stared at him.  “I hate you.”

He winked and kissed my hair, then put the phone away.  “I want you to be the girl you were when you won that ribbon.  You had a black eye and a bloody nose, but you were laughing.  I haven’t seen you laugh like that since that day.”

My step faltered a bit as I looked up at him.  I wanted to deny it, but I thought he might be right.  And what kind of man would take a woman—and her dog—  on a Caribbean vacation just because he wanted to see her laugh?  My voice was a little subdued when I said, after a moment, “I know why you really invited  your mother here.”

“Oh?”  His tone was cautious.

“So that I would have someone to talk to.”

His smile was gentle as he caressed the back of my neck.  “Family is important,” he said.  “Everybody needs one.”

My throat got suddenly, ridiculously tight, and my voice was husky as I looked up at him.  I probably should have said something profound, but all I could manage was,   “You know something?  You’re a really good boyfriend.”

“A fact I sometimes think you don’t fully appreciate,” he agreed.

I slipped my arm around his waist and pressed my head against his shoulder, and the moment might have turned really sloppy except that I happened to glance up just then and I noticed the deck of the boat we were passing.  My step slowed.  A man was sitting there at a small table with a bottle of scotch and a glass in front of him, staring, not at the ocean or the gorgeous sunset that was beginning to glow overhead, but at the dock where we were.   “Miles… isn’t that Alex Barry?” 

The reason I was unsure was because he seemed to have aged ten years in the few hours since we had seen him.  The glow of the sun etched unflattering lines on his face and his eyes looked blank, glazed over.  Except for rhythmically lifting the glass to drink, he was motionless.

Miles glanced in the direction of my gaze. “Quite possibly.  That’s his boat.”

I started to wave and call out, but Miles caught my hand.  “Whoa, baby, this isn’t downtown Mayberry.  Leave the man alone.”

I pulled my hand away, a little annoyed about the Mayberry remark, although I shouldn’t have been.  I was a small town girl with small town values and small town curiosity; that was supposed to be one of the things Miles liked about me.  “I think he’s drunk,” I said.

“I think so too, which is why we’re going to leave him alone.”

He urged me forward, and I took a few steps before looking back. “He doesn’t even see us,” I observed.

“Good.”

“I wonder why he’s not at home, celebrating with Rachelle.”

“I’ve never known why Alex does anything.”

I watched as Alex Barry refilled his glass.  To the brim.  Of course this shouldn’t have concerned me, particularly after the stunt Alex and Rachelle had pulled that afternoon. But one of the most inconvenient things about having small town values is that in a small town, we don’t leave the wounded behind—even when they’re on the other team.

“Miles,” I said, a little worried, “I don’t think anyone else is on the boat.  He’s been drinking all day.  You should go see if he’s okay.”

A flash of impatience crossed his face.  “I don’t even like the man.  And I particularly don’t like him right now.”

“What if he tries to drive home?” I insisted.  “Or take the boat out?”

His lips tightened, but I could see a wavering in his eyes.  I managed to put just the right mix of plea, charm and promise into my own expression.  I had been around Cisco long enough to get it right.  “It will only take a minute,” I persuaded, caressing his arm.

He muttered an oath under his breath and turned back to the boat.  “Good evening, Alex,” he called.  “Everything okay?”  His tone, to the passing observer, might even have been construed as pleasant.

Alex did not answer for the longest moment.  He just stared at us.  Then he lifted his arm in a sloppy beckoning motion and called back, “Come aboard.”

Miles gave me an annoyed look.  “Great,” he said.  “My dinner is waiting
four slips down.”

I responded with a shrug and an apologetic smile, and followed him
across the ramp onto Alex Barry’s boat. 

Alex lifted his glass to us as we approached.  “You brought your pretty lady.  Welcome, pretty lady.”  Alex’s voice was clear, his enunciation precise, and his gaze stone hard, expressionless.  “Can I get you a drink?”

Before I could answer, Miles said, “I doubt you could stand up long enough to get anything.”

Alex laughed.  “I believe you may be right.  Why don’t you sit down, then?”

Miles glanced around.  “Is anyone here with you?”

A tight little smile.  “Besides yourself?”

Miles took out his phone.  “I’m calling a car for you.  You shouldn’t be on the water.”

Alex sipped his drink with movements that were as controlled and precise as his voice.  “Where, pray tell, should I be?”

Miles started to dial.  “How about at home with your wife?”

“That woman,” said Alex, lifting his glass again, “is not my wife.”

Miles didn’t bother to respond, but Alex seemed just serious enough to arouse my curiosity.  “What?”

“You heard correctly, my dear,” replied Alex.  He took another sip of his drink.  “The woman you saw this afternoon is not the woman I married.  She is not Rachelle
Denison.”

I
sat down at the table across from Alex, intrigued.  “Why do you say that?”

“Because it’s true.”  Another sip.  “The woman is an imposter.”

I glanced at Miles, but he didn’t even look up from his phone.  I said, “Why would someone pretend to be your wife when she’s not?”

He lifted his glass to me again in a slight toast.  “That, my
lovely, is the question of the hour.”

I tried again.  “What makes you think she’s not your wife?”

One of the lines beside his mouth deepened, that was the only indication of what was supposed to be a smile.  “Because she told me so.”

Even Miles glanced up from his text at that. 

I looked at him closely, but how could I read anything on a face like that?  His eyes were so glassy that I could actually see the colors of the clouds reflected in them.  “She told you that she was not Rachelle Denison,” I said, just to be clear.

He waved a hand in a slight dismissive gesture.  Unfortunately it was the hand that held his glass, and some of the
scotch splattered on the table.  “I accused her,” he said.  He swallowed more scotch.  “She just laughed and said, ‘prove it’. That’s what she said. 
Prove it
.”  He drank again.  “But without the real Rachelle, I can hardly do that, can I?”  He shrugged.  “Then Susan came back in the room and she was back in the role again, hanging on me, playing out her story, talking about the press conference she was going to give in the morning, calling her agent… I couldn’t stay.    Couldn’t watch it.”  Another drink.  “So here I am.”  

I glanced at Miles.  He was checking the screen on his phone.  I said, “What do you think happened to the real Rachelle?”

“I know damn well what happened to her.”  His tone was harsh.  “I told you.  I told everyone.  She drowned.  But without a body I can’t prove that.  Do you know why burials at sea are so efficient, Miss Pretty Lady?”  He drank again. “Marine life and salt water can strip a carcass bare in a matter of hours. That’s the truth.”

I said, “H
ave you told the police about your suspicions?”

“Of course he hasn’t told the police.” Miles put his phone away, his expression impatient.  “The next time he sets foot in a police station it will be because he’s under arrest for fraud.  Alex, you’re drunk and I’ve had enough of your drama for one day.  A car is on its way for you, and if you take my advice
, you’ll get in it and go home, where you will at least pretend to be glad to see the wife you supposedly thought was dead for the past two days.  Because after the stunt you pulled, she may be the only friend you’ve got left.”

A vague and rather tragic smile touched Alex Barry’s lips.  He drank again. “He’s right, you know,” he told me.  “I can’t go to the police
.  She made sure of that. It really is the perfect crime.”

Miles said, “Raine, let’s go.  I want to get the boat out of the slip while we still have daylight.”

I stood reluctantly, mostly because I suspected he was about to pull me to my feet and drag me off the boat, and that would have been a mistake neither one of us wanted him to make.  I followed him to the ramp.

“He didn’t come back,”  Alex said.

I looked back at him.  “What?”

“The dog,” he said
, gazing out at nothing at all.  “He didn’t come back.”

I started to say something, but felt the pressure of Miles’s hand on my back and
held my tongue until we were off the boat.  “Miles,” I said, “that doesn’t make sense.”