5 Highball Exit (2 page)

CHAPTER 3

“The police came,” she said. “They found my telephone number in her wallet. She listed me as next of kin on one of those little
ID
things that come with wallets.”

She leaned forward, the edge of the table cutting into her breasts. “Isn’t that the saddest thing you ever heard? To think I was the closest thing to a relative she had.”

“How?” I asked. “How did she die?”

She pulled back from the table and her eyes dropped. Her left thumb found a hangnail and began worrying it.

“Tell me.”

“It seems she committed suicide, took a highball of drugs.” Tears slid down her cheeks.

I got a box of tissues off the top of the fridge and set it on the table between us.

I wanted to ask if there could be a mistake. “She was so unendingly cheerful. How could someone with that optimistic outlook kill themselves?”

“The policeman who came to tell me about Holly’s death took me to Sarasota to make the official identification.” She sucked in her lips and bit down, struggling for control.

“They showed me her note, on pink paper. She always loved pink.”

“I remember.” When I first took over the Sunset, and was stillfeeling my way into the job, Aunt Kay called and insisted I hire Holly. Aunt Kay had no pride when it came to begging jobs for the people who grew up in her backyard. We all knew if we needed it she’d do the same for us, her love making us part of a small and unique tribe.

“They took me to the morgue. I didn’t know it was her at first. Holly’s hair was stark black. You know how she was, a new color every week. I hadn’t seen this one. I haven’t seen her in months. She looked so small and fragile, like some discarded porcelain doll . . . so thin. Her face . . .” Her hand rose to her own cheeks. “Holly’s face was all bruised. Someone had beaten her.”

“Oh shit.”

“There’s something else worrying me.” Aunt Kay’s eyes were locked on mine. “No one knows what happened to her baby.”

CHAPTER 4

“Baby? Holly didn’t have a baby.” Why was I so sure of this? Maybe because spiked magenta hair and a glittering nose stud were not included in my vision of motherhood.

“Oh, there was a baby all right,” Aunt Kay said, nodding her head.

How long had I known Aunt Kay? Almost all of my thirty-one years—was her mind starting to wobble? Perhaps the shock of Holly’s death had been too much for her.

“I’m not losing my mind.” Her piercing black eyes held mine. “Angel was born about Christmas and Holly borrowed a car and brought her to Jacaranda in January or early February. Holly wanted me to take care of Angel full-time . . . until she worked some things out.”

“She had no right to ask that of you.”

“Holly said it would only be for a few months.” Her mouth worked in and out and her hands worried each other. “I said no. Today I asked the police about the baby. They said there wasn’t any baby, said there was no sign of a baby in the apartment.”

“Perhaps Holly found someone else to care for the child, maybe her parents.”

Aunt Kay shook her head. “A few months ago Marnie Mitchell moved back to Jacaranda and started working behind the beauty counter at my local Walgreen store. I asked her about Holly’s little girl and she stared at me like I’d lost my mind. She said Holly didn’t have any children. Got all sweet and started doing the ‘There, there’ thing we do with people suffering from dementia, and told me I was confused.”

“Maybe Holly gave her baby up for adoption.”

She gave a grimace of annoyance and leaned towards me, trying to make me understand. “Holly only wanted me to take Angel for a couple of months. She said that everything was going to change soon . . . that all her dreams were coming true. She was real excited, so sure things were finally working out for her. She thought her big break had arrived.”

“Sounds like horse feathers to me.”

“Yes, I thought so too. Holly, well, she . . .” Aunt Kay was searching for nice words to say that Holly had nothing but stale air between her ears and operated from hope rather than common sense. “Holly was never practical. She needed me and I let her down.”

“You had a perfect right to say no if you didn’t want to care for another child.”

“It wasn’t that. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to help her. I couldn’t.”

“Couldn’t?”

She sighed. “Life can play strange tricks.”

“And what particular prank did it pull on you, Aunt Kay?”

“Just age and a body that won’t co-operate anymore. Time seems to be having its way with me. I always knew life was a terminal condition, but . . .” She wrinkled her nose and shrugged without finishing her thought. “I’ve been having some problems. It’s my heart you see; seems I was born with something called Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome. The thing is, my heart is just worn out. I can’t be responsible for children anymore, can’t even drive a car.”

“I’m so sorry.”

She reached across the table and took my hand. “I know.” She patted my hand. “I don’t mind so much, it’s just this waiting, no family, no one needing me.” She sat back in her chair. “I loved Holly like my own child. I need to know what happened to her and I want you to help me find out.”

“Aunt Kay, I’m trying to keep my restaurant alive and filling in for staff I can’t afford to replace. I haven’t got time to help you. I’m so sorry.”

She nodded and looked around the kitchen. “So, house on the beach—I suppose that means you have lots of money?”

My laugh was a bitter sound. “You know better. This place is on loan until December when the real owners show up.”

“And that rich man you’ve been dating . . . Is he going to help you save the Sunset?”

I kept my mouth shut. Clay had lost nearly everything in the housing collapse. The penthouse was gone, as was his real estate company, and all he had left was his failing development in Cedar Key and the ranch, which wasn’t worth what he paid for it.

“Everything’s going good for Sherri Travis, is it?”

There was no turning away from her piercing gaze and no lying. “This isn’t the best time for us. I’m behind on the mortgage on the Sunset and I’m working from when the Sunset opens until we close. I already told you I can’t help you.”

Her face grew sunny. “Now perhaps we can help each other.” Planting her hands on the table, Aunt Kay pushed herself to her feet. “Where’s the bathroom, dear?”

She’d baited her hook and now she was going to let me swim around looking at the lure, getting hungry and ready to bite at anything. But I knew her well enough to look for the barb in the delicacy she dangled in front of me before I nibbled.

I pointed. “Down the hall, second door on the right.”

She walked slowly and carefully away from me. Time had been unkind to Aunt Kay. The edges of her shoes cut cruelly into her flesh and her movements were old and cautious. When had she aged? I suppose it was when I stopped watching. Did she notice the same changes in me?

My cell phone rang and I warily checked the number. My chicken supplier, as desperate as I was, had taken to calling at odd times of the day and night in his pursuit of payment.

The call display said it was from Isaak, the Sunset’s chef. “Why are you calling? You’re on holiday. What’s wrong?”

“No ‘hello’? No ‘I missed you’?”

“Somehow, Isaak, I don’t think you called to say you’re missing me and I don’t think you’ve spent your time in Washington thinking about the Sunset.”

He sighed. “
Chérie
, I’ve been offered a job here.”

There it was, the final black line under “the end” for me and my dreams. Looking out the window, the sea grapes grew bleary.

I was still standing at the window, staring out with unseeing eyes, when Aunt Kay said, “Sherri.”

I jumped.

“Sorry, sorry.” She reached out a hand. “Are you all right? You look . . . well, sort of funny.” She canted her head to the right and considered me. “Things really aren’t going well for you, are they?”

I crossed my arms and leaned back against the counter. “What were you saying about us helping each other?”

She turned away and went to the table and eased her backside down on a chair. “It’s Angel.”

She smiled up at me and gave a little nod of confirmation, knowing she’d hooked me. “I want to know Holly’s baby is safe.”

“Maybe the baby was another of Holly’s fantasies.” The betrayal and resentment I felt after Isaak’s phone call was now directed at Holly. “She was always making up stories about famous people she’d met, always exaggerating the truth.”

Aunt Kay shook her head. “That baby was no fantasy. I saw her . . . lovely red curls.”

“Maybe it was someone else’s baby.” She glared up at me. “You think she could fool me?”

“Nope, none of us ever could.” I pushed away from the counter. “Who’s the father then?”

“That’s the second problem.”

The worry in her voice galvanized my attention. “Problem? How?”

“At the morgue, I asked who found Holly.”

We stared into each other’s eyes and I waited for the next piece of bad news.

“I was told that it was a policeman, an Officer Raines.” I sighed with regret and slumped down at the table to listen.

CHAPTER 5

Dan Raines lived next door to Aunt Kay and found his playmates among the clutter of toys and kids in her yard.

“Holly lived two doors down from Dan,” Aunt Kay said. “She worshiped him and told everyone she was going to marry him someday.”

“If he found the body, why wouldn’t he identify Holly?”

“Exactly.”

“Did you tell the other policeman, the one who picked you up, about Dan?”

She looked uncomfortable. “I thought it would be best not to until I knew why Dan hadn’t told them. He must have had a reason not to admit he knew Holly.”

“Maybe it was another Officer Raines; maybe there are two cops with the same name.”

She gave me the dimwitted-child look I often got from my teachers.

“How likely is that? In any case, if it was a different police officer, Dan will have to be told about Holly.”

Dim but not stupid—I knew when I was being set up. “You can just call and talk to him. You don’t need me for that.”

“This isn’t something you can do over the phone,” she protested. “I want you to go up to Sarasota and talk to him face to face.” She frowned. “I’d go with you but you’ll do better on your own. He’ll be more honest with you.”

“Look, Aunt Kay, I know you’re upset about this, even feel some kind of responsibility, but you shouldn’t. Let the police sort it out.”

“Won’t you amuse an old woman, an old friend?” She looked at me with such great sincerity that I almost expected her to put her hand on her heart. I already assumed her talk of being ill was a lie to get me to go along with what she wanted.

She spread her hands wide, palms up. “I was looking at Holly, lying there all bruised and battered, and I could only think of one thing: where’s her baby?” She leaned towards me. “There are so many questions I need answers to. Does Holly being beaten have anything to do with Angel being gone? Who’s looking after Angel and is she waiting for her mother to come for her?”

“Speak to the police.”

“I did. The police didn’t pay any attention to me. I told them about the baby, tried to get them interested, but they aren’t going any further because Holly left a suicide note. It’s closed. They’re going to do an autopsy but they’re sure she took her own life. That ends it for them.”

“So what do you want from me exactly?”

“I want you to help me find Angel.”

“You might just as well ask me to find a cure for cancer. I wouldn’t know where to start.”

“But you’re smart and you understand people. They trust you, always have. They open up to you and they tell you things. I can’t drive anymore, because of my condition, but I’ll go with you.” Her face lit up at the prospect. “People ignore old ladies. And they don’t care if we ask stupid questions. We’ll find Angel.”

“I have to warn you, I haven’t a lot of time for this.”

She picked up a spoon, turning it over between her fingers. “Oh, yes . . . time . . . well, I haven’t got a lot of it myself.”

“And what makes you think I’ll give in to blackmail?”

She smiled. “Because you were always compassionate and because I’ll pay you . . .” she stopped and considered the amount, watching me and assessing what would tempt me, “. . . three months’ mortgage for one week of your time.”

She had my attention now. “Really?”

“Really. I go in next week for a little procedure, so you see both of us are running out of time.”

Maybe it was even true or maybe she just wanted to convince me, but either way she needn’t have bothered. She had me with three months’ mortgage.

CHAPTER 6

“One week of my time for three months of mortgage?”

“Exactly.”

“That’s crazy.”

“Remember when I was saying I didn’t know what to do with myself? Well, this is what I want to do. I don’t want to go on a cruise, don’t even want to go to a resort, but you wouldn’t think it was wrong for me to spend money on that kind of thing, would you? I want to find Angel and I want to know what happened to Holly to make her take her own life.”

“Why don’t you hire a private investigator?”

“And sit at home waiting for news? I want to be there.” I started to speak but she held up a hand to stop me. “I have another reason. My sister committed suicide. It’s a terrible thing.” Her voice was soft. “For those who are left behind it’s never-ending pain.” She looked down at the table and watched her forefinger go round and round in tiny circles while she took deep breaths. “The anger and the guilt never go away and you never understand. Please, Sherri, help me.”

“You’re paying me a lot of money.”

“Money isn’t my main concern at the moment but . . .” She raised a finger to stop me from speaking. “I want to make sure you’re committed to this. If you think you can go into this half-hearted, making calming noises while you go on worrying about your restaurant, think again. I’m going to give you a postdated check and if I think you aren’t paying attention, not putting your brain into this, I’ll cancel it.”

I bit back angry words and took a deep breath. “It hurts me that you don’t trust me.”

For the first time she laughed. “I’ve known you since you were five. You’re never more sincere than when you’re lying or when you have no intention of doing what you’ve been told to do. I’ve watched you say, ‘Yes, Auntie,’ and then go right on doing what you wanted to, the very thing I just told you not to do.”

She leaned towards me and pointed her finger at me. “I want you paying attention and concentrating on this.”

“What exactly do you want me to do?”

She started counting off the steps on her fingers. “First, go see Dan and find out if he was the one who found Holly and if so, why did he find her? Seems like a big coincidence if he was the one who discovered her. See if he knows anything about what happened to Holly over these last few months. If he doesn’t know, maybe he can find out.”

“Clay is coming home today, the first time he’s been back in two weeks. Can it wait until tomorrow? I’m all yours then.”

Her lips pursed. “See, that’s what I mean.” For a moment I thought I’d already blown it. At last she gave me a little nod. “Tomorrow I think we should go see the apartment where Holly died. It’s up in Sarasota. The nice policeman gave me her address. It’s in a section of town where the streets are all named after tropical fruit.” She opened her handbag and pulled out a slip of paper and read off the address.

“Wow, that’s an upscale place. How could Holly afford to live there? I thought she was an esthetician at a downtown spa.”

“Yes, that is a problem, isn’t it?”

“Ah, so you already knew she was living beyond her means.”

“Perhaps she was looking after the apartment for someone.”

“You might not like what you find. You better be prepared forthat, Aunt Kay.”

She folded the paper and put it in her purse. “Not knowing is always worse than finding out the truth. After we go to the apartment we have to locate the people who worked with Holly. Those are the ones who’ll know what happened to her after she left Jacaranda.”

“You’ve really thought this through, haven’t you?”

“It was a long drive back from Sarasota.”

“And do you think Holly’s death has something to do with Angel disappearing?”

“I don’t know.” It was the shift in her eyes that told me she was lying.