A Deadly Slice of Lime: A Key West Culinary Cozy - Book 6 (5 page)

Marilyn
was never one to sit idle for very long, and unanswered questions always seemed
to fester in the back of her mind, driving her to action, which explained why
she was now pulling her car into a parking space at the marina. Tiara had
described the boat that she had been on with her father and Brad in great
detail when she came home, so Marilyn intended to have a word with the captain
to see if he had witnessed anything out of the ordinary. She wanted to know,
not only what kind of person Brad was, but what kind of person Daniel seemed to
be, from an objective stranger’s point of view. It didn’t take her long to spot
the charter boat with a wooden deck and purple and red detailing, and she made
a beeline for
Island Girl
, hoping to run into the captain.

“Hello?”
she called, standing on the dock and trying to peer into the vessel’s darkened
interior. She moved further down the dock, toward the bow of the boat and
called out again. “Hello? Anybody home?”

“Good
morning, ma’am, can I help you with something?” a grizzled man who looked to be
in his mid-sixties came trotting down the dock toward her with a smile. He was
dressed like a fisherman, so she hoped that he might know who owned and
operated the charter boat.

“I’m
looking for the captain of this boat,” she said, gesturing toward
Island
Girl
with a smile.

“Well,
what a lucky thing,” he chuckled. “You found him. Captain Bob Jensen at your
service,” he stuck out a calloused hand in greeting, but his grip was gentle.

“Nice
to meet you, Captain Bob, I’m Marilyn,” she introduced herself. “Do you have a
few minutes?”

“I
have all the time in the world, pretty lady,” he grinned. “Are you looking to
book a trip?”

“Uh,
no, actually, I just wanted to talk with you for a bit,” she admitted.

“Well
now, I’ve found that some of the best conversations take place over a hot cuppa
joe – would you care for some?” he invited.

“Absolutely,”
Marilyn nodded happily, having left the house this morning without first firing
up the coffee pot.

“Follow
me then,” he commanded, and led the way to the tiny charter office on the
shore.

“So,
what can I do for you?” Bob asked, after placing a steaming mug of strong black
coffee in front of each of them.

“Well,
I don’t know if you remember or not, but last week, you took two men and a
young woman out for a fishing trip. The young woman was tall and blonde, and…”

“And
quite a looker,” the captain nodded, then grimaced. “Yeah, I remember that
trip.” He looked closely at her, eyes narrowed. “You wouldn’t happen to be from
that same outfit, would ya?” he asked suspiciously.

“Outfit?”
Marilyn was puzzled. “I’m afraid I don’t understand…”

“That
blasted company of theirs. The one that’s trying to buy me out for pennies on
the dollar,” he slammed his mug down on the formica table top.

Light
dawned in her mind. “Wait…do you mean to tell me that the reason those two men
were down here was because of some sort of business?” she asked, her heart
pounding.

“What’s
it to you, anyway?” the captain was wary now.

Marilyn
had nothing to lose by being honest. “I’m worried, Captain Bob. That lovely
young woman is my daughter, and now one of the men is dead, and I’m concerned
for her safety,” she confessed, hoping that her story would prompt the man to
open up about what had happened on the fishing trip.

“Dead,
you say?” he leaned forward. She nodded. “Which one? And how?” he asked
gravely.

“Well,
Brad, the one that was killed, had his…throat cut,” she found it difficult to
even say those words. “The other man, the blond one, is my daughter’s father.”

“Your
husband?” Captain Bob seemed surprised.

“Oh
no, not for years now. We divorced when my daughter was small,” she explained
hurriedly. “So you can see why I’m worried.” He nodded slowly. “Did anything
strange happen on the fishing trip? I’m just trying to wrap my mind around this
whole thing.”

“Aye,
I gotcha,” the captain sighed. “Well, I don’t know if it means anything, but it
was obvious that Brad had more than a passing interest in your precious girl.
He stuck to her like glue the whole trip. She made it quite clear that she had
no interest, she’s feisty that one,” he smiled grimly, remembering. “But just
the same, he and the father nearly came to blows over it. I stepped in and told
him that it was my boat and my rules and that he wasn’t to even be on the same
side of
Island Girl
as the young lass. If she was starboard, he was to
be on the port side, and so on. He minded his P’s and Q’s after that, but it
seemed to me that there was some bad blood between the two men, just the same,”
he explained.

“Do
you know what happened after they got off of the boat?” Marilyn asked,
wide-eyed.

“They
went their separate ways as far as I could tell. We brought
Island Girl
back in early, because the mood was soured, and that brings bad luck for
fishing anyway,” he shrugged.

“So,
you said something about the two guys being here on business…what’s that all
about?” she asked, wrapping her hands around her mug of coffee and taking a
sip, trying to sound casual.

“That
ex-husband of yours is a broker, and the one who got killed is his client. They
came down here to try to badger me out of my business, but they weren’t willing
to pay me a decent price. Seemed like they were trying to steal it,” the
captain grumbled. “I spent my whole life on boats. I’ve made a decent living,
and soon I’d like to retire, but I’m not gonna give away everything that I
worked so hard for, ya know?”

“I
know exactly how you feel,” Marilyn nodded, and before she could stop herself,
she told him about her current situation with Litigation Lizzie and how she
could potentially lose everything. It felt so good to finally talk to someone
who listened with a sympathetic ear.

Draining
her coffee cup, Marilyn giggled apologetically. “I’m sorry, I guess I just
talked your ear off. Thank you for being such a patient listener, I hope I
didn’t bore you to tears,” she smiled, a little embarrassed about having
prattled on about her troubles to a total stranger.

“Nonsense,
we small business owners have to stick together, now don’t we?” he replied
graciously. “Tell you what…if you and that young lady of yours would like to
take a charter trip sometime, you just bring me one of those lime pies and
we’ll call it even,” he offered.

“That’s
so sweet,” Marilyn exclaimed, touched. “Thank you so much. I really appreciate
you taking the time to talk with me today,” she shook his hand and headed for
the door.

“Anytime,
pretty lady, anytime,” he smiled and waved as she exited.

After
her enlightening chat with Captain Bob, Marilyn was more worried than ever. She
wondered why Daniel hadn’t told Tiara that Brad was his client, and was concerned
that now she had two accounts, one from Tim and one from Bob, of Daniel getting
into arguments with Brad. Was it possible that he had killed his client? And
why had he felt the need to deceive his own daughter? These were the thoughts
that were chasing each other round and round in her head as she drove to
Litigation Lizzie’s neighborhood. Instead of parking on the street in front of
the house, she parked in an easement behind the property, just inside a garage
that belonged to a vacant home nearly half a block away, cringing at the
thought of the creepy crawly critters that the old building must be harboring.

Trying
to keep her wayward thoughts in check and focus on her surveillance, Marilyn
was bored to tears until just after eleven o’clock, when she saw the back door
of Lizzie’s house open, and the old biddy herself wandered out, carrying a full
basket of laundry. She recorded the woman coming down the steps easily, and
bending over again and again to reach into the basket and fasten her whites to
the clothesline with clothespins. When Lizzie went back inside, Marilyn figured
that she’d gained some valuable evidence and could call it quits for the day.
She had no idea that when she pulled stealthily out of the garage and exited
the alleyway, another car pulled in to take her place.

When
she got back to the pie shop, Tiara was in the office on the main computer, and
Kelcie manned the front counter. Greeting her assistant with a smile, Marilyn
headed back to the office to talk to her daughter. She stood, without speaking,
in the doorway for a moment, watching her daughter work.

“Honey,
I don’t want this thing with your dad to come between us. Now, I know that we
both said some things…” she began, trying to smooth Tiara’s ruffled feathers.

“It’s
fine. We’re fine,” the young woman interrupted, without even bothering to
glance up from her computer.

Marilyn
sighed inwardly, knowing that restoring things to their formerly easygoing flow
was going to be a challenge. “Did you know that your dad was in the Keys on
business?” she asked casually.

Tiara’s
fingers stopped their perpetual clickety-clicking on the keyboard, and she
actually raised her eyes to meet her mother’s. “What?” she said quietly,
grinding her teeth a bit.

“I
did some checking, an apparently your dad brokers luxury items and businesses
for some very wealthy people. Brad was a client of his,” she explained, her
daughter taking it all in.

“Brad
was his client?” she repeated.

“Yeah.
The reason that they went charter fishing was because Brad wanted to buy the
charter business,” Marilyn nodded, hating to hurt her daughter.

“You
just couldn’t leave it alone, could you?” Tiara said, shaking her head slowly.
“You couldn’t let me believe for even a little while that my dad had actually
come to the Keys because he wanted to see me, could you?” she blurted, tears
welling in her eyes.

“Honey,
I’m sorry. I thought you would want to know,” Marilyn hung her head. “I never
meant to hurt you. Looks like I can’t do anything right these days,” she
muttered, turning to leave.

“Mom,
wait,” Tiara called out, tears rolling down her cheeks. “I know you meant well,
I’m just sad and confused, and I did some checking of my own that makes me
think that things are even worse than we may have thought,” she admitted,
wiping her face with the back of her hand.

“Really?”
her mother asked. “What did you find?”

“Come
look,” was the response. Marilyn came around behind her daughter and saw that
she was looking at a series of photographs simultaneously.

“What’s
this?” she asked, befuddled.

“See
that guy, right there?” Tiara asked. “That’s Brad.” She indicated a middle-aged
man in a bar with a drink in his hand, who appeared to be singing or something.

“Okay,
so what’s the issue?” she was still confused.

“There’s
Dad, right there,” her daughter pointed out Daniel, standing behind Brad, with
a hand on his shoulder, and in a couple of other pictures, where they appeared
to be dancing in a group.

“Well…it’s
not unusual to take your client out and schmooze them until the deal goes
through,” Marilyn pointed out, wondering what Tiara saw that she didn’t.

“Yeah,
I know,” the young woman nodded. “But do you see this neon sign? That’s the
name of the bar. I searched it on the internet, and…” she shook her head, her
cheeks reddening.

“And?”
her mother prompted.

“And…not
that there’s anything wrong with this at all, but…it’s a bar for…for people
with alternative lifestyles.”

“Okay…”
Marilyn said, not understanding what any of this had to do with their current
situation.

“So…if
Brad and Dad are…or were, in a relationship, Dad might’ve been really mad at
his client or partner or whatever he was to him, because he flirted with me on
the fishing trip. The bad part about that is that, even though I know that Dad
would never hurt anyone, this might make him look more guilty,” her tears
started anew.

It
was on the tip of Marilyn’s tongue to reply tartly that Daniel had indeed hurt
his share of people, two of whom were in this very room, but she refrained, not
wanting to cause her daughter anymore pain. Instead, she murmured words of
comfort to the scared and sad young woman.

“Sweetie,
one thing you have to realize right now is that what happened was not in any
way your fault. We don’t know whose fault it was, but the police will figure
that out. As for your dad looking guilty, he either did this or he didn’t, and
his lifestyle choices can’t condemn him if there’s no evidence of his guilt. So
let’s just let the police do their job and hope for the best, okay?” she said,
wrapping her daughter in a warm hug.

“I’m
sorry I was rude to you,” Tiara sobbed on her mother’s shoulder.

“I
know you didn’t mean it, honey. Don’t worry about it,” Marilyn soothed. She
held her daughter, glad that things were right between them once again, and
smoothed her hair while her sniffles became less frequent. She looked up when
she heard a soft knock on the doorframe.

“Ms.
Hayes,” Kelcie said tentatively, hovering in the doorway. “I’m so sorry, I
didn’t want to interrupt, but Detective Cortland is here to see you.” Marilyn
and Tiara gazed at each other with apprehension.

“Here
we go,” her daughter exhaled.

“Maybe
it’s good news,” her mother replied, trying to be optimistic, but the look on
Kelcie’s face didn’t bode well.