1 A High-End Finish (12 page)

Cindy’s eyes widened as the color in her face drained. “I’m sorry, sir, but you were demanding coffee so I gave you the first cup off the burner.”

“You bitch!” Wendell grabbed his water glass and gulped down the entire thing—to cool his mouth, I assumed.

It wasn’t the first time I’d heard him shout that offensive word. Besides the world in general, he seemed to have a particular problem with women.

I could see Cindy’s hand shaking. She backed away and set the pot back on the burner.

“Don’t you walk away from me,” he shouted. “Bring me more water.”

“Right away, sir.”

He pounded his fist on the counter. “The service in this place sucks.”

The kitchen door swung open and Rocky the cook and owner walked out to the front counter. “Is there a problem, sir?”

“You’re damn straight there’s a problem,” Wendell bellowed. “This bitch was trying to burn my mouth with that crappy coffee you serve.”

“You’re welcome to leave,” Rocky said. “Coffee’s on the house.”

Wendell’s shoulders tightened in aggravation. “I’m not leaving until I finish my lunch.”

“That wasn’t a suggestion,” Rocky said, standing directly in front of Wendell. “Lunchtime’s over.”

I could almost see Wendell’s devious mind spinning as he scrutinized the situation. This time the obnoxious jerk wasn’t facing down a woman like me or even a well-mannered police chief at the pub. No, Rocky was a 250-pound ex-Marine with a tattoo of a snake on his neck.

Wendell turned around and slowly panned the room, glowering at every single person in his line of sight. His face turned redder and redder, and when he saw me, I thought his head might explode.

“God, I hate you people,” Wendell said, his voice dripping with malevolence. Without warning, he grabbed his coffee cup and dumped the hot liquid on the floor where Cindy and Rocky were standing. Then he flung the cup against the wall, causing it to shatter, and stormed out of the diner.

“I hate him more,” Cindy said, scowling at his back.

Rocky watched him leave. “Don’t go away mad,” he taunted loudly.

“That guy is a menace to society,” one of Penny’s friends said.

“You should warn the police about him,” another customer suggested.

I’d never seen Cindy so angry. Her lips trembled and I thought she might start to cry.

“What an ass,” Rocky said, glancing out the door to make sure he was gone for good. “I don’t want to see that guy back here again.”

“You and the whole town, Rocky,” one of the guys said.

Rocky’s voice softened. “You okay, Cin?”

She sniffled but nodded briskly. “I’m fine. Thanks, Rocky. I’ll be around to serve y’all in a minute.”

There was a moment of silence and then everyone in the restaurant burst into applause.

“Good riddance,” someone shouted.

Cindy looked ready to cry again, so she grabbed a mop and began to sop up the dark liquid off the floor. The busboy ran over and nudged her aside. “Let me do that.”

Through clenched teeth, she said, “Thanks, Kenny.” She took a few seconds to breathe before going right back into service mode. She picked up the coffeepot and, pasting a bright smile on her face, walked around the restaurant, refilling coffee cups.

When she got to my table, her gaze narrowed in on me. “Do me a favor, will you, Shannon, honey?”

“Anything you want.”

She glared at the doorway where Wendell had exited, then looked back at me. “Next time you’re looking to emasculate someone, you give
that
one a swift kick in the you-know-what for me.”

•   •   •

Later, as I rode my bike home, I couldn’t help but dwell on the irrefutable fact that I wanted to get rid of my hateful tenant. I couldn’t help it. He’d been a complete ass with me, but what he’d done to Cindy and Whitney was a crime. And I didn’t even like Whitney! But nobody had the right to treat another person like that. I thought of him spewing ketchup at Whitney. And then to dump the coffee on the floor of the Cozy Cove and smash the cup? Maybe Wendell hadn’t been potty- trained as a kid, because something was horribly twisted inside his head.

•   •   •

Monday morning, I was halfway through my usual getting-ready routine before I remembered that I didn’t have my truck. It didn’t really matter, since there were no high-powered business meetings scheduled today. But I’d been planning to swing by some of my job sites to check on things and I supposed I could use the bike for those trips. My guys wouldn’t dare make fun of me.

Who was I kidding? They
lived
to make fun of me. Out of love and respect, of course.

As I poured my second cup of coffee, the phone rang.

“Morning, Shannon.” I recognized Tommy’s friendly voice.

“Hey, Tommy, what’s up?”

“I’m calling to give you the go-ahead on the Boyers’ house. It’s no longer a crime scene, so you and the guys can go back to work.”

“That’s great, Tommy. I appreciate it.”

I hung up and immediately phoned Wade to tell him the good news. We had planned for this eventuality at our Sunday meeting, so he was prepared to call his crew members to alert them to the change of assignment.

I pulled out my computer tablet and made some minor adjustments to the crew list and the Boyers’ estimated completion date. Then I contacted Carla and gave her the same information.

I let both of my foremen know that I was without a car today, but I would be willing to stop by a few of the nearby places on my bike. The one exception was the Boyers’ house. I could make the trip, but I didn’t want to take the chance of running into the Boyers on my bike. For reasons I couldn’t quite explain, I wanted to present the most professional image I could to them, at least until the murder of Jerry Saxton was solved.

Both Wade and Carla insisted that they had everything under control on all the jobs. I knew it was true, but that didn’t mean I could shirk all the other duties I had to take care of today. Like payroll, for instance. I could always stay home and write checks and clean up some paperwork.

And I would. Maybe this afternoon. But what I really wanted to do this morning was check out the lighthouse mansion. It was less than three miles up the coast, so I could make the trip there and back, along with an hour of wandering around the house itself, in a few hours. The road twisted and turned in a few sections, but the surface was smooth most of the way and the ride was partly downhill on the trip back.

I worried for a minute that I might run into the new owner, but decided it wouldn’t happen. The house wasn’t livable yet, especially for a pampered celebrity author like MacKintyre Sullivan. No, he was most likely staying at Glencannon Green or the Royal Coast Hotel up near Mendocino, both of which were world-class establishments.

Since I would be gone most of the morning, I packed some munchies and a bottle of water in a small backpack and tucked it securely in the bicycle basket.

I wore jeans and a sweater topped by a down vest that I could take off once the cool marine layer dissipated.

I paced myself for the ride north, coasting leisurely along the bike path until it ended and I crossed onto the Old Cove Highway. Traffic was light this early in the morning and I felt safe as long as I kept within the narrow lines of the bike lane painted along the edge of the smooth blacktop surface. Going around some of the curves freaked me out a little, so my brakes got a good workout, especially when the occasional truck rumbled by.

For the next mile and a half, the highway twisted and inclined gradually so that by the time I reached the turnoff, I’d gotten a good workout. I waited for a milk truck to pass and then crossed the highway and turned onto Old Lighthouse Road and headed toward the ocean.

The condition of the old road had not been improved since the first time I remembered coming out here with my family when I was five years old. Dad would park the station wagon along the dunes and we would trudge over the hills of sand to watch the waves crash against the craggy breakwater. It never got old.

The road was still crusty, pockmarked and pitted with bumps and cracks and gaps along the edges. Sand had blown across the surface recently, so I took it nice and slow in case my tires lost their grip. The flaws in the road made me wonder about our famous new resident. How much time would pass before Mac Sullivan demanded that the county repave this road? Maybe he had already done so.

I followed the narrow lane as it curved along the dunes for another quarter of a mile. Finally there was a break in the line of tall cypress and redwood trees and I stopped in the middle of the road to breathe in the cool, sea-scented air and take in the overwhelming, up-close sight of the lighthouse tower.

Even though the tip of the lighthouse could be seen from the highway, this first up-close, full-length view was always spectacular.

The tower rose one hundred feet into the sky and stood as straight as an arrow, thanks to a series of steel reinforcement rods encased in concrete. Inside the walls of the tower was a solid stone-and-iron spiral staircase, which I had climbed twice in my life. Gazing up at the top of the structure, I could see that the narrow balcony surrounding the glass-walled lantern room appeared to be in good condition. I itched to inspect it more closely, but that moment would have to wait. Not long, hopefully—assuming Sullivan allowed for open bidding on his rehab job.

The tower was separated from the house by only a few feet, a convenient commute for the lighthouse keepers of times gone by. As I leaned my bike against the aging latticework frames that camouflaged the subfloor area under the front porch, my only thought was that those frames would have to be replaced.

After carefully testing the stairs, I walked up to the front door. The veranda was just as spacious and potentially fabulous as I remembered it. Its wood-plank floor was basically solid. To augment my notes, I took out my phone and snapped photos of everything I saw, from the worst problem areas to the unexpected delights.

Crossing to the opposite side of the house from the tower, I peeked through the glass walls of the small solarium. It was empty except for its old brick floor, but I could already imagine it filled with lush greenery and a wonderful chaise longue or two for reading and napping.

Wandering around to the back, I noticed several shutters leaning drunkenly from their window frames and suspected they were rotting from years of rough winds, salt air, and neglect. One of the three chimneys had bricks missing and I worried that they’d fallen through the roof. Everywhere, the serviceable white paint was faded and peeling off the wood siding. Adjacent to what I thought might be the kitchen, a thick wooden door leading to a root cellar had been broken off and left to deteriorate, leaving the old concrete stairs within accessible to the elements.

I rubbed my arms briskly to banish the cold shivers I got from staring down those steps, which led to darkness. God only knew what was down there. Dead animal carcasses? Spiders? Rats? Humans?

I backed away fast. Who needed a real body in a basement when I could use my own imagination to scare myself to death?

“I’m done here,” I muttered, and scurried around to the front of the house. I checked my notes to make sure I’d written down everything that I wanted to remember. Reaching again for my phone, I scanned the photos I’d taken, then took a bunch more of the house from every angle.

Turning away from the house, I took shots of the spectacular views: the ocean waves spewing white foam against the rough rock barrier to the west; the weathered cypress, pine, and redwood trees bordering the property to the east; the soft curve of the coastline to the south.

Without access to the house’s interior, I’d done as much as I could do here today. Standing my bike up, I packed my notebook and phone securely in the basket and walked the bike to the end of the driveway. At Old Lighthouse Road, I put my foot on the pedal, eased onto the seat, and began to ride back home.

I was going downhill now, but I rode the hand brakes, trying to hold back from gathering too much speed because of the difficult twists and turns of the highway.

About a mile into the trip, I approached one of the more treacherous curves and gripped the brakes tightly to slow down.

Nothing happened.

I continued to gain speed and pumped the brakes as hard as I could, but I felt no connection reaching the tire walls. I downshifted to second gear and then to first. That helped slightly, but then the road declined more steeply around another curve and my pace accelerated again. I tried to press my foot down against the road’s surface, but my foot kept bouncing up. I couldn’t get any traction. I was going too damn fast. This was going to end badly if I didn’t come up with a plan quickly.

A car passed me and honked.

“Not helpful,” I shouted. Careening downhill, trying to stay within the narrow bike lane, I had to think fast. Coming up in less than half a mile was Travers Meadow, a pastoral field that belonged to one of the local dairy farmers. The meadow was relatively flat and if I could find a break in the short steel posts that lined the curving road, I would be able to coast to a stop.

My front tire wobbled over a patch of pebbles in the road and I had to strengthen my grip on the handlebars to keep control of the bike. I rounded another curve and now I could see the meadow a few hundred yards away. I steadied my nerves, knowing I would have to swerve quickly to angle the bike through one of the breaks in the row of barriers.

I counted the posts, held my breath, and veered sharply right. My thigh slammed against one of the steel barriers and I felt my jeans rip, but I didn’t care. I’d made it through the break and hit the open field with a jarring bump. The bike and I continued to bounce across the wet, uneven ground until my front wheel hit a gopher hole and abruptly ejected me.

As I flew through the air, my only thought was
Don’t land on your head. Don’t land on your head
. I was wearing a helmet, but that wouldn’t be enough to protect me at this velocity.

For a few seconds it felt like I was moving in slow motion. But then I hit the ground fast, breaking the fall with my hands and left shoulder. I tumbled another few yards in an awkward somersault before skidding for a few feet on my hands, arms and stomach and finally collapsing in the muddy grass, facedown.