Killer Colada: a Danger Cove Cocktail Mystery (5 page)

"What about the son? Ian?" Vernon asked. "By all accounts, Pandora had money from her husband's business. Who stood to inherit from her?"

"As far as I know, the only surviving relative is Ian. I phoned him earlier," Ruby said. "He seemed genuinely shocked about what had happened. He lives in Seattle but said he was driving down early tomorrow morning to make the funeral arrangements. He said he'd speak to you about arranging the wake here," she said to me.

"Seattle's not that far," Vernon said. "He could've easily got down here and back to bump her off. What does he do for a living?"

"Um…he's a doctor," Ruby said. "A cardiologist who works at a private practice."

"A doctor? That means he could've got hold of the pentobarbital too," I said. I'd been convinced that Pandora's death was linked somehow to Jenna's, but maybe not. Maybe it was just about greed, and Ian wanted some of Pandora's money.

"Perhaps Tim's telling the truth, then," Vernon said. "Perhaps he really was set up."

I was awakened early by a banging on my door. The apartment had two entrances, one internal door with access from the tavern, and one that led directly out to the side of the building. This is where the noise was coming from. I dislodged Zen from his usual lounging position around the top of my head, and he gave me an indignant huff. I was hoping it was Harvey. I'd been having a very nice dream where Harvey and I had been traveling on the
Ocean's Revenge
, when it had sunk just off a deserted island in the middle of the Caribbean. Karma and Zen were with us too, and we all managed to make it to the golden shores, sheltering under the lush mango trees and banana plants as we worked together to build a house while the cats caught us fish for dinner, heading out to sea with their snorkels and masks on, which was a bit weird. At night we made love under the moonlit sky, stars so abundant it seemed as if they were falling into the sea on the horizon.

Unfortunately, it wasn't Harvey at the door. It was Lester Marshall. Bummer.

"Oh, hi." I leaned on the doorframe, wiping my eyes.

"I need to ask you some more questions."

"Right." I stepped back. "You'd better come in."

He followed me up the stairs into the lounge and glanced around disapprovingly. At one time he'd been involved with Bob's daughter, Elise, and I knew he still held some kind of grudge against me because Elise had now left town. "You've done all right for yourself, haven't you?"

I bit back a swear word and said, "I'd get rid of it in an instant if it meant bringing Bob back."

Zen walked into the lounge, hissed at Lester, and bristled up his tail. Even Zen was a good judge of character.

"Get that thing away from me," Lester snarled at Zen.

"The cat stays." I rested a hand on my hip and tilted my head. "Now, do you want to sit?" I indicated the sofa. He was just about to sit down when Zen beat him to it and jumped up onto one of the cushions. He sized Lester up, eyes half-closed, wiggling his rear end like he was about to pounce.

"Er…no, I think I'll stand." Lester eyed Zen warily and took a step toward the window.

I sat, curled up my legs, and stroked Zen's chin.

Lester looked out of the window, his back to me. "Did you see anyone else hanging around Pandora's house when you arrived?"

"No, just Tim Baxtor. Do you think someone could've sneaked in the back patio door?"

He swung around and folded his arms across his chest. "
I'm
asking the questions here." He paused for a moment. "Do you think someone could've sneaked in the back patio door?" he asked me as if he'd suddenly thought of it himself.

I looked at him for a few seconds. Did an inward sigh before answering. "Yes, it's possible. I heard that Tim said he was framed."

"Where did you hear that?" he snapped. "That's not common knowledge. We haven't released a statement yet."

Oops!
I wasn't about to expose Vernon or his contact. If in doubt, change the subject. "Er…" I waved a hand vaguely in the air. "What about Ian, Pandora's son? Do you think he could be involved?"

"Highly unlikely."

"Does he have an alibi? If he inherited Pandora's estate, that would also be a motive."

"What, like you inheriting Bob's estate?"

I thought back to how Lester had tried to pin Bob's murder on me for the very same reason. And how annoyed he was to be proved wrong.

Zen growled at Lester.

Good boy!

"But he's a doctor. He'd have had access to the pentobarbital that killed Pandora, too."

"Are you telling me how to do my job?"

Yes?
"Um…no."

"Good.

"What about you?" Lester asked me.

"What about me?"

"Maybe you had a motive."

"I'd never met her before!"

"It's just that people who come into contact with you have a habit of dying."

"No way. Don't even think about trying to blame me for this. We had an appointment with Pandora."

"Tell me again exactly how long it was between seeing Tim Baxtor leave the house and finding Pandora dead."

"About five minutes."

Lester wrote that down on a pad he pulled from his pocket and underlined it several times with large slashes across the page. "Did you see Tim carrying anything when he left? Like a pair of gloves?"

"No, I didn't notice anything in his hands, but I guess they could've been in his pockets. He had dress trousers on."

He paced up and down in front of the window for a while, then turned to me. "I think it's pretty obvious what happened."

"Really?" It wasn't to me. It was far from obvious.

"Yes." Lester gave me a smug smile. "Tim called himself on a disposable cell and fabricated the story that Pandora called him saying she had evidence about what had really happened to Jenna. I think he went to her house with the express intention of killing Pandora."

I frowned. That didn't make sense either. The timing of it all was strange. "But why kill her after all these years though? It doesn't fit."

He gave a nonchalant shrug. "It's just a question of making it fit."

If Lester Marshall wasn't going to investigate any other possibilities, then it was up to us to discover the truth. And I had an idea of how to find out more about this drug that had killed Pandora. I called my vet's office and booked an appointment for later in the morning to take Karma for his last inoculation.

Zen and Karma sat at my feet, watching me as I made the call. Zen looked at Karma with an
uh-oh!
look on his face. I swear Zen was a human in a past life.

I channeled some positive energy after Lester's visit, with a revitalizing flow of sun salutations, followed by meditation, green tea, and what Tara would call rabbit food. I was just rebraiding the front of my hair to keep it out of my eyes when my cell rang.

"Morning," Harvey said. "How's things?"

My heart did a little triple loop at his voice. "Good, thanks. Where are you?" I felt a pang of longing.

"Still in Seattle, I'm afraid. I stayed overnight at the apartment of one of the guys from the uni. It's taking longer than I thought to catalogue everything I've recovered. Hopefully, I'll be back later today though. I'll pop into the tavern. Have you found out any more about Pandora?"

"A little." I told him what had happened so far.

"Please be careful. If Tim didn't murder Pandora, then there's still a dangerous killer on the loose, and I don't want anything to happen to you. It was bad enough last time."

I thought back to that night when both of us came so close to dying after we'd discovered who'd murdered Bob. It wasn't exactly on my bucket list to repeat, either. "I will—don't worry."

Three hours later, I was in Adam Whitaker's office at the Danger Cove Vet Clinic. Every time I'd been to see him before he'd been very quiet and reserved, and I didn't know how easy it was going to be to get any useful information out of him. He wasn't unfriendly, exactly. I just think he preferred talking to animals rather than humans. Half the time I didn't blame him. I could totally relate to that.

"And how are you today, Karma?" Adam opened Karma's travel cage and lifted out my three-legged friend, putting him on the treatment table..

"I'm fine!" I squeaked in my best kitten impression. "I'm just here for my nasty little injection. Please be gentle with me."

Adam gave me an odd look. What? Was it just me who put voices in my cats' mouths? But seriously, why ask Karma how he was if you didn't expect an answer?

I coughed. "Er…he's fine. Just needs his final jab."

Adam read Karma's notes while stroking the length of his body. Then he nodded, opened a drawer, and pulled out a prefilled syringe.

I held on to Karma and gave him a reassuring scratch around the ears while Adam got ready. It was quickly administered, and Karma was licking his hand.

"All done." Adam wrote on an inoculations card for me and handed it over.

"Great. Um…I wanted to ask you a couple of questions, actually, while I'm here. It's about the drug pentobarbital. I understand it can be used to euthanize animals and prevent seizures."

He blinked rapidly. "Do you think Karma has had a seizure?"

"No."

"Well, it's not our policy to euthanize healthy animals. If you need to rehome him, we can put up a notice in the waiting room. Or you could take him to the Second Chance animal shelter." A look of disgust crossed his face.

"Oh, no, it's nothing like that. I'm keeping Karma." I stroked him more vigorously—Karma, not Adam—just in case he knew what we were talking about, like Zen always seemed to. I'd been racking my brain trying to decide how to broach the subject and decided that honesty was the best policy. Lying to people didn't sit comfortably with me, and I was already in deep karma doo-doo from the huge amount of lies I'd told during my last investigation. In my defense, I had been trying to save myself from being wrongfully accused of murder, but still, I didn't need any more, thanks. "I don't know if you heard about Pandora's death?"

He frowned. "No. I don't think we have a patient called Pandora. What kind of animal was she?"

"Pandora Williams," I said. "She lived in town. She did holistic therapies from her home. She was murdered with pentobarbital."

"How awful." He blinked rapidly this time, his face turning pale. "I didn't know her, I'm afraid."

"I was wondering how long it would take to work," I said.

"To kill someone?" His eyes nearly bugged out of their sockets.

"Yes."

"Well, that depends on how it's administered and in what dose. It comes in tablet and liquid form. Tablets would take longer to work. With animals it's given intravenously and euthanizes them in seconds. It would be the same for humans, given the right dose."

"Right." My brain cells fired up, mind replaying the scene. Pandora was already dead when we'd arrived after seeing Tim hurrying out of the house. Despite my initial reservations, he had to have been the one to kill her. I doubted there was enough time for someone else to sneak in the rear door after Tim left, give her a shot, and then leave in the time it took Ruby and me to get inside. Was there?

"It's worrying that you should mention pentobarbital though." Adam's voice interrupted my thoughts. "We had a break-in here a couple of weeks ago, and some of it was stolen."

"Really?"

"Yes. One vial was taken. I reported it to the police, and they sent out some crime scene people to check for fingerprints."

"Did they find any?

"They did, but apparently they weren't a match to anyone in their database. And no witnesses came forward, so they have no viable leads or suspects. It happened in the early hours of the morning."

"How did they get into the building?"

"A window was smashed in the bathroom, and they crawled through."

"Do you have any CCTV cameras?"

"We didn't think we needed to in a town like this. We've installed them now, of course. The alarm system was very old and had apparently developed some kind of fault we didn't know about. We've updated that too. Gosh, I hope it wasn't
our
pentobarbital that resulted in Pandora's death!"

I finished fixing a champagne cocktail for a couple who were traveling around the state on their honeymoon. They'd just been out snorkeling around the rocks at Two Mile Beach and enthusiastically told me about every fish they'd spotted. I poured their drinks and added a maraschino cherry and a slice of orange peel to the edge of the glasses, thinking that my Smugglers' coladas would definitely be off the menu for the foreseeable future. All I could see when I thought about them was the glass in front of Pandora's lifeless body and the empty bottle of white rum on the table.

My cell rang as the couple drifted away to a booth. It was Harvey.

"Hey!" I said. "What are you up to?"

"I'm up to my eyes in paperwork and bones and gold coins. I love the hands-on stuff of my job. When you get to recover ancient artifacts—things that no one else has clapped eyes on for centuries—it's mind blowing. But then all the paperwork involved in cataloguing everything does my head in!"

"Hmmm…I didn't know eyes could clap." I chuckled. I was still getting my head around some of Harvey's Brit-speak.

He laughed back, warm and throaty. I felt a stirring deep inside.

"Will you be back later?"

"No, I'm afraid not. That's why I'm giving you a bell now. You know I said my boss thought he could spare some help from the museum? Well, a colleague is on their way right now. I'm picking them up from the airport tonight, so I won't get time to see you, I don't think."

A twinge of disappointment kicked in, but at least this was good news. Hopefully, if he had more help, it meant Harvey and I would get to spend some more quality time together. "That's fantastic." My mind wandered to what we could start doing with said quality time. Breakfast in bed. A romantic walk along the beach, stargazing. Snuggled up together on the sofa watching a movie.

"Yes," Harvey said, although there was something in his voice that sounded a little off. "I'm so knackered at the moment, I could do with a night in front of the box, snuggled up with you, but looks like that won't happen tonight."

"Box? What box?"

"The telly."

"Huh? You've totally lost me now."

"The TV!" He laughed again. "Anyway, better go. See ya later."

As I was hanging up, Vernon walked in to start his shift. I grabbed him and pulled him behind the bar. Ruby took a food order out to the pub garden and then joined us. I told them what Adam had said.

"What if Tim didn't kill Pandora, and he really was set up?" I said. "It can't just be a coincidence that someone broke into the vet's and stole the same drug used to kill her. Tim wouldn't have needed to
steal
it when he had access to it at his pharmacy."

"Maybe Tim stole it to throw suspicion on someone else," Vernon said.

"Yeah, I suppose that's possible," I agreed. "But then Ian could've also done the same thing."

"What about Tim's wife, Donna?" Vernon asked. "She could be a suspect. Maybe she had some kind of grudge against Pandora, especially if she'd been bad-mouthing her husband. What do you know about her?" he asked Ruby.

"Donna was born in Danger Cove, and when Tim was studying to be a pharmacist at the university, Donna was on the same course, so I guess they knew each other there. Tim started going out with her about five years after Jenna disappeared. Then they got married, and they now work together in the store. Pandora told me she was devastated that Tim was happily married, getting on with his life as if nothing had happened. I think she probably hated Donna as much as Tim. She couldn't understand why someone would marry him after he'd been so obviously linked to Jenna's disappearance."

"But he was cleared of any involvement at the time," Vernon said.

"Yes, but mud sticks, doesn't it?"

"There's no accounting for true love, though. It makes you oblivious to everything else," Vernon said, avoiding Ruby's gaze.

"I've only met Donna around town a few times, just to say hello to in passing," Ruby added. "I don't really know much about her, but I can't imagine she'd be too happy if Pandora was about to start publicly accusing Tim again. It would affect their business, wouldn't it?"

Vernon rubbed his stomach, his face scrunching up as if he was in pain.

"What?" Ruby glanced at him. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah, yeah. I'm fine." He stopped rubbing.

"You don't look fine, actually. You've gone all pale."

"Maybe you're overdoing things, working here," I suggested.

"I'm sixty-two, not a hundred and two. There's still plenty of life left in me. I'm fine." Vernon wiped a few beads of sweat away from his forehead. "Anyway, what were we saying?"

I eyed him carefully. He still looked pale, but Vernon wasn't the type who liked sympathy or being babied. He made a hand gesture for me to carry on and perched on the edge of a barstool.

"If Tim wanted to make it look like someone else, he wouldn't have gone to her house in daylight to do it when there was a risk of being seen," I said.

"Don't forget the phone call," Vernon said. "Tim claims Pandora called him and wanted to talk to him about finding some evidence about Jenna's disappearance. That's the reason he said he was there."

"But then when he got there, he could've seen the perfect opportunity and killed her," Ruby said.

"If she called him, where's the cell phone?" I asked. "The police said she didn't have one."

"Anyone can get hold of a disposable phone," Vernon said. "My contact said the police searched the house but didn't find one. And Lester Marshall's in charge—don't forget, and he's a few fries short of a Happy Meal."

I nodded my agreement. "Remember when he was investigating Bob's murder and he got the crime scene people to search Bob's office for evidence but not his apartment, and we had to do it ourselves? They probably didn't look hard enough."

"He gets fixated on who he thinks the suspect is and only does half a job," Vernon said. "Maybe the phone call is the key to this. We need to get into Pandora's house and have a good look around. Not just for the phone, but if Pandora really did make that call, then we might find some kind of 'evidence' that Jenna is still alive."

"And if she didn't make the call? How does that fit?" I said. "It would mean Tim just happened to go to her house at a time when she was drunk, with a lethal dose of pentobarbital already in his pocket, and that sounds too opportunistic to me. There are so many flaws with that plan. You said yourself Pandora hated Tim. She wouldn't have just opened the door to him, would she, unless they had some kind of prior arrangement?"

Ruby chewed on her crimson-painted lip, pondering that. "No, I'm pretty sure she wouldn't have."

"So Pandora must've called him," Vernon said.

"Or maybe someone else had been watching her, stalking her, waiting for an opportunity," I said, thinking back to her rear garden. "If you were standing on the other side of her fence in the woods, you could probably look into her kitchen window. Maybe the killer saw her slumped at the kitchen table in a drunken sleep. Because I still don't know why Tim would do it now, after all this time, unless she really did call him and say she had some kind of evidence about Jenna."

"Yes, but maybe this evidence might've been something she found out that proved Tim had murdered Jenna all those years ago. He'd definitely want to shut her up then, wouldn't he?"

"That makes sense." Ruby nodded vigorously.

Vernon scrunched up his face, thinking. "But why do it in broad daylight with a chance of being spotted?
If
Pandora called him and said she had such evidence that was going to put him away, why not arrange to go to her house when it was dark? Or meet somewhere secluded? And why didn't he leave through the back door and over the fence, disappearing into the woods, where there was less chance of being spotted? Why go straight out the front door where people could see?"

"Maybe he panicked," Ruby said. "It must be pretty stressful murdering someone. Perhaps he wasn't thinking straight. Don't they always say there's no such thing as a perfect murder?"

"That's possible, but Tim must be a reasonably intelligent guy if he's a pharmacist. I can't believe he wouldn't have gone out the back," Vernon said.

"There are too many questions," I said.

"Exactly. That's why we need to get inside and have a good look around to see if Lester and Co. missed anything." Vernon nodded. "Tonight. We'll go there when it's dark. I can get us inside with no problems."

"Break in, you mean?" Ruby whispered, eyes rounding.

"Er…excuse me. I'm looking for Ruby Fournier?" A male voice interrupted our hushed conversation.

I glanced over at the bar. A tall, skinny guy with strawberry-blond hair and freckles stood there. Even from this distance I could smell disinfectant and that horrible scent that hits your nostrils when you go inside a hospital. I didn't need to be psychic to work out who this was.

"Yes, I'm Ruby." She gave him her hand and a warm smile. "You must be Ian?"

"Yes." He nodded grimly, shaking her hand.

She placed her other hand on top of his. "My condolences. I'm so sorry for your loss."

"Thank you. Is there somewhere we could talk?"

"Of course." Ruby rounded the bar and took hold of his elbow, leading him outside into the garden, which was now quiet. Before she walked out the front door, she glanced over her shoulder and beckoned me to follow.

By the time I got outside, they'd chosen a secluded corner table. "Hi, I'm Hope Foster." I offered my hand, and he shook it with a firm but cold grasp. "I'm really sorry about your mom."

He nodded at me.

"Can I get you something to drink?"

"No, I'm fine, thanks." He turned to Ruby as I sat down next to her. "Thank you for calling me. I don't even know where to begin with the funeral arrangements. I don't know who to invite to her wake. Don't know who her friends were anymore. I was hoping someone who knew her could help me out. I…haven't seen Mother in a long time. I mean,
hadn't
seen her."

Ruby reached out and patted his hand. "I understand. She told me how difficult things were after Jenna."

Ian looked away, out over the cliffs toward the lighthouse.

"It's tragic what happened to your mom and sister," I said.

"Jenna. Yes." Ian gave a small, almost imperceptible shake of his head and avoided our eyes, as if the memories were too painful. Eventually he turned back to us. "I've just been at the police station. They think Tim murdered Mother. They think she'd found some kind of evidence finally that he'd killed Jenna, and confronted him about it."

"That's the way it looks," Ruby said.

"Did they tell you they'd found anything when they searched her house?" I asked Ian.

"No. They said they didn't find anything that might help them. My sister was six years older than me." He placed his neat, manicured fingers on the table and stared at them. "Twenty-three when she just disappeared. I'm sure you know the story?"

"I do," Ruby said.

"Both Mother and I always thought Tim had killed her. Mother almost lost her mind afterward. Had a breakdown. She wanted to get revenge on Tim, so she did everything she could to disrupt his life. Cause problems with his business. Ruin his reputation."

"I heard he threatened her with lawsuits, and she was arrested," I said.

"Yes." Ian sighed. "I told her it had to stop. I loved my sister. We were a close family at one time, but all that just fell apart. I knew Jenna wouldn't have left without saying good-bye. Everyone knew it. We just couldn't prove it. But Mother wouldn't let it go. She became depressed. She didn't have any time for me. She could barely talk to me sometimes, let alone look at me. I think I reminded her of Jenna. Of what she'd lost, you know? I was the one left, and she didn't want me there. She wanted Jenna. I felt guilty, most of the time, that I was still alive."

I felt his grief palpably in the air. What an impossibly awful situation.

"So we drifted apart. I left to go to the university, and I never came back. I got a job in Seattle and stayed there."

"And you're a cardiologist?" I asked, catching Ruby's eye. A cardiologist with access to pentobarbital. Could Ian be the murderer? Could he have framed Tim?

"Yes."

"So you hadn't visited your mom in a long time?" I asked.

He ran a hand through his hair and shifted in his seat as if he was uncomfortable. "No. We were estranged. That's why I don't know who to contact about her funeral. But you knew her." He looked at Ruby. "Can you tell me how she was these last few years?"

"I only met her about ten years ago when she restarted up her healing therapies. She told me about you and Jenna, of course. And how she'd had a breakdown and become a recluse. She was still a recluse when I knew her, only leaving the house for essentials. She didn't have many friends, and only really saw people when they went to her house for treatments. In spite of everything she'd been through, she still wanted to help others, but I guess she just didn't have the strength to help herself."