Death in the Aegean (3 page)

Was Lucy killed in the cave or was she murdered somewhere else and then thrown into the sea, finally washing up there? Or perhaps she was brought to the cave in a boat or she could have been carried from the cove? It wasn’t far and she was very light. And who had killed her? Kevin? His brother, Paul? Or somebody else?  This is so interesting. I would love to solve the case before the police.  

Eve was getting excited, the shock of finding Lucy’s dead body subsiding. Eve lived in the moment and was able to put things behind her very quickly, except where David was concerned.

However, as Eve sat there, an awful thought ran through her head. She had touched the body. 

The police will say I shouldn’t have touched it. Damn......... Well, I had to see who it was. I know, I’ll say I had to make sure she was dead. She might not have been and I could have helped her. The light was very dim so I had to make certain and that meant touching her.

Eve’s thoughts were disturbed by sirens and she was relieved. Although she thought the killer was long gone, a small part of her was worried that he or she might suddenly appear and attack her.

Before long, a police car and ambulance drove down to the cove. The road was steep and dusty, and while Eve hadn’t bothered driving down in her expensive Mercedes, they didn’t seem bothered.

Dimitris Kastrinakis and a few other policemen walked towards Eve, followed by a couple of men with a stretcher. Eve started to get excited about the start of a new case, although she knew that this was the last thing she should be feeling.

I must pretend to be upset about Lucy’s death, I really must, she said to herself, trying to look sad.

Eve knew the possibility of Dimitris seeing through her facade was very real, but she had to give it a go. She needed to be as discreet as possible this time, for the sake of her relationship with David. When she discovered who the murderer was without getting hurt or getting into any sort of trouble, then she would tell him. In fact, she probably wouldn’t have to, as it would be reported on T.V. and in the papers. He would most certainly be proud of her achievement and would forgive her for going behind his back.

Within a couple of minutes, Dimitris Kastrinakis came over to talk to Eve, followed by another officer.

“Well, it’s been a while,” Dimitris said, almost smiling. “After you point out where the cave is, I will need to ask you a few questions, Miss Masters, as I’m sure you’d expect.”

Eve nodded. She didn’t feel like getting into another argument with him. She was certain that they would never see eye to eye, but she had no choice but to answer his questions.

Eve waded into the sea with Dimitris, another policeman called Stavros, and the men carrying the stretcher. Once she had shown them where the cave was, she paddled back to the beach and waited for Dimitris to come back. She suddenly felt quite nervous; countless questions filling her mind. What if the body had disappeared? What if Dimitris was angry with her for touching Lucy? What if they suspected her of the murder?  

However, Eve calmed down once Dimitris got back and started questioning her. She was surprised that he seemed less antagonistic than usual and wondered if it was because she had found the body. Perhaps he realized that she must still be in shock.

“So, can you tell us in your own words, what happened this morning, Miss Masters?”

He spoke gently, but Eve still sighed.

He knows exactly what happened, but I suppose I’ve got to repeat it for the other officer so he can write it down.”

“Well,” Eve said in a monotone voice, surprising Dimitris by her lack of enthusiasm. “I got hot sunbathing so I went into the sea for a while. When I’d had enough, I started to come back to the beach, but I saw a cave not far from here. I was curious so decided to go in. It was quite dark and I tripped over something. When I looked, it was the body. I bent down and saw it was Lucy Fowler. Her body anyway.”

“If she were face down, how could you recognize her?”

“Oh, for a start, I recognized her outfit. She was wearing exactly the same thing when I saw her in the village shop yesterday afternoon. Then I pushed her hair away from her face to make sure.”

“So you touched the body?” Dimitris asked, a little more harshly now.

Eve had heard him speak like this to her many times, usually when she had interfered in his cases before.

“I had to be sure,” Eve replied calmly, refusing to be put off by his attitude. “I know; I wasn’t thinking, but I also wasn’t certain that she was dead. I had to check. It could have been a matter of life and death. As it was, she was well and truly dead.”

Dimitris wasn’t sure if he believed her. She was probably just being nosey, but then not many women, even someone as brave as Eve, would particularly want to touch a dead body.

“I mean if she had still been alive, I could have helped her, don’t you agree?” Eve smiled sweetly.

Dimitris wondered what Eve was playing at. She wasn’t behaving in her normal manner. She was being co-operative and that was nothing like the Eve Masters who Dimitris Kastrinakis knew.

She’s up to something. I don’t know what, but I’ll have to keep a close eye on her.

“Yes, you could have helped her and she could have told us who had attacked her. Very well, I agree you had to find out if she was alive or not. Now, I just have a few more questions for you. What time yesterday afternoon did you see Lucy Fowler?”

“It was just after three. I can tell you that because I’d watched Masterchef Australia on TV which finishes at three and I went to the shop directly after.”

“Did you speak to Lucy?”

“We said hello and that was it. We don’t get on particularly well.”

“During the last case, she and her husband weren’t getting on. Have they reconciled?”

“I don’t think they are getting on any better, though they still live together,” Eve replied, wondering if he suspected Kevin.

“And you, Miss Masters, have you seen her socially recently?”
“No, I try to avoid socializing with people I don’t get on with, though sometimes it can’t be helped. However I did notice her out with other people on Saturday. David and I were in
The Black
Cat
with Paul and Jane having a drink while Lucy was there with her husband and Betty and Don Jones.”

“Isn’t Paul her brother-in-law?” Dimitris asked.

“Yes, well by adoption as you know, why?”

“I’m surprised you weren’t all having a drink together. That would seem like a case for burying the hatchet, as you British say.”

“I’m very impressed by your knowledge of common English sayings,” Eve said, sounding surprised.

Dimitris gave a nod of the head, but Eve didn’t give him time to elaborate, certain he would say it was because he had been spending too much time solving English ex-pat murder cases.

“I think you know that Betty and I don’t much care for each other, so it would hardly have been a pleasant evening.”

In fact Eve and Betty hadn’t been able to stand the sight of each other from the moment they had first met and there had been a feud going on between them since that time. Betty had tried her hardest to keep her apart from David, but she hadn’t succeeded and instead had now alienated David as well as Eve, much to Betty’s disappointment. She admired David enormously.

“How did Lucy seem on Saturday?” Dimitris continued.

“It’s funny you should ask because she was a bit tipsy. It’s quite unusual for her and she gets argumentative when she’s drunk. We all heard Kevin trying to quieten her down, but that’s nothing new since their marriage hit rock bottom. Then a little while later they left, followed shortly by Betty and Don.”

“Well, I think that will be all for now, thank you. I hope you haven’t any plans to leave the country at the moment?”

“What, do you think I killed her?” Eve asked in disgust.

“You are an important witness, Miss Masters.”

 Eve looked at him crossly. How dare he tell her what to do? Luckily, she hadn’t any plans to leave Crete, but she would have been very annoyed if she had.

“Oh, and by the way, don’t go looking for the murderer again, Miss Masters. Remember last time and the time before. You weren’t too keen on staying in the hospital, if I remember rightly. Of course, this time you might not be so lucky.”

With that Dimitris Kastrinakis turned and walked away quickly, leaving Eve open-mouthed with no time to respond. 

* * * *

While all this was going on, David was crouched over his laptop at Eve’s house. After she had stormed out, he had barely typed a word, not being able to get her out of his mind.

He was aware that Eve had recently become restless and he thought that she had probably said these things out of frustration. He knew she’d come back home eventually and would act all contrite, so why couldn’t he concentrate on his book?

Deep down, David was scared that Eve would become completely fed up with life on Crete and would move back to England. It would break his heart if she did, knowing how difficult it would be for him to leave the peace and tranquility of Crete to go back to London. He didn’t think he would be able to settle in such a busy city again. Would that be the end of their relationship? 

David understood that Eve needed more than romance in her life. After all, she’d had a successful and powerful career back in England. She’d given up her job, saying she’d had enough, but had she? She definitely needed something to replace it, but as for her saying she’d had no excitement since the last murder; well David thought that was nonsense. He believed that she’d been kept busy during the past six months and couldn’t understand how she had got so bored.  

While there hadn’t been any more murders, Eve had managed to get back to England three times since the New Year, one time stopping in Paris to do some shopping and another, continuing on to New York for a few days. She had also been to the Cotswolds with David for his sister’s wedding.

As well as her trips, Eve had been fully occupied with running her amateur dramatics group which had turned out to be very popular with the ex-pats. Even Greeks came to see her productions and she became very much the centre of attention. Congratulations poured in from all sides.

However, she was already fed up with the drama group. She had been excited about it when she started in January, thinking it would keep her busy, but that soon wore off when she realized how amateur most of her actors were. Only David was any good and that was because he had previously been a professional actor. However, people had crowded in to see the two shows she had produced and they were both well received. The members of the group were now all looking forward to the third production. The group was taking a break during the hot weather and intended to resume in the autumn. However, Eve wanted to close down the group, but surprisingly for such a self-centered person, she was feeling guilty about letting everyone down. 

In addition, if she did close the group, her arch enemy, Betty Jones, would probably re-open it with her in charge and that was the last thing Eve wanted.

From the moment they met, Betty and Eve had taken a dislike to each other and Betty had refused to take part in the drama group, either on stage or in stage-management, even though her husband, Don, had eagerly joined. 

Betty and Don were in their mid-sixties and had lived on Crete for many years. Betty liked to think she was in charge of the English community and was extremely bossy. She imagined that Eve was trying to usurp her position although nothing was further from Eve’s mind. After being a successful showbiz agent and mixing with the rich and famous, Eve had no wish to organize the lives of a group of ex-pats, not understanding why they needed to have their lives controlled anyway.

David looked at his blank screen and closed the lid of his laptop. He decided to go for a short walk, hoping this might clear his head. Maybe he would be able to write when he got home.

Oh Eve, I do love you, he thought as he shut the front door, but you are such a distraction.

 “I’m back, darling,” Eve shouted as soon as she got home.

There was no reply and Eve guessed that David was still upstairs engrossed in writing his novel and hadn’t heard her. It wasn’t unusual for him to become so absorbed in his work that he shut out the rest of the world. Sometimes it infuriated Eve. She thought that she should be the centre of his universe, not his writing.

Today however, she was relieved that David hadn’t rushed down the stairs to greet her. Eve was having problems deciding on what was the best way to tell him the news of Lucy’s death. Should she come straight out with it and say that she had tripped over the body, or should she gradually bring Lucy into the conversation? And would it be best to try and convince him that it probably wasn’t murder and that Lucy could easily have fallen and hit her head? Wouldn’t it be better if he had time to get used to the idea of Lucy being dead rather than thinking straight away that she had been murdered?

A gin and tonic; that’s what I need, Eve thought. It’ll help me decide how to approach this awkward situation. If he thinks I’m going to get involved in another murder investigation, he won’t be too happy. 

Eve went to prepare her drink, still thinking of what to do. In fact, as she had driven home from the cove, all she had been doing was mulling over how she was going to recount the events of the morning. She always liked to appear brave, so she didn’t want to sound as if this had upset her as much as it had. On the other hand, she didn’t want to seem heartless and cold. She had to find a happy medium. One thing Eve knew was that she couldn’t show any interest in solving Lucy Fowler’s murder, if that’s what it turned out to be. In fact, the more she thought about it, the more she realized that the best thing to do was to stress that the police hadn’t even decided that it was murder.

Once Eve had made her drink, she took it outside and sat down, her mind drifting away from her main problem. She started to wonder about Lucy’s husband, Kevin. Had he reported his wife as missing? Eve had been certain rigor mortis had set in, so Lucy must have been there for some time. The police hadn’t mentioned anything, but would they tell her? She doubted if Dimitris Kastrinakis would give her any information. He didn’t want her to be involved in the inquiries at all.