Hiss and Tell (7 page)

He left, and for a moment Sunny seemed to float on her mattress.
Yes, eyes closing, just sink into the darkness . . .

All of a sudden, she felt a weight on her chest. Sunny’s eyes popped open, and she found herself nose to nose with Shadow, who sniffed very determinedly at her.

“If you start talking again,” Sunny murmured, but she didn’t finish the sentence. Her eyes closed again, and she was asleep.

*

From his vantage
point over Sunny, Shadow tried to inhale every nuance of scent off of her. One of the things he liked about living with Sunny and the Old One was how orderly things usually were, with few surprises. Oh, sometime the Old One’s She would come over with that foolish, yellow-colored Biscuit Eater who’d woof and knock things over, but Shadow could deal with him.

But when people started leaving the house in the middle of the night and not coming back even after the sun had been up for a long time, that was not a good thing.

At least he didn’t smell smoke on her breath, or that pungent stuff the two-legs drank to act silly. He got a whiff of meat and some other kinds of food, and rising from her clothes was that salty aroma she’d come home with the other day. There were a couple of other scents Shadow couldn’t identify, but they didn’t smell like trouble to him.
It had taken him a while to remember it, but he’d finally realized that the fragrance he’d noticed on Sunny when she came home yesterday could mean difficulty ahead.

He’d stayed with several sets of two-legs, couples that he’d thought of as mated pairs. Then one of the humans began coming home at odd times, or leaving during the night. And when they came home, Shadow would find traces of made smells on them, sometimes odd, sometimes nice. Then, sooner or later, the humans would end up making loud noises at one another.

Shadow never understood that. Between cats, a hiss, maybe a cuff or a show of claws, would settle the question of who was boss. But the two-legs would go in for loud noises and sad noises, wet faces and throwing things. It could get on a peaceful cat’s nerves.

Then, all too often, one of the humans would leave. And the next thing that happened was that Shadow would find himself back on the street.

He really, really didn’t want that to happen here. Sunny lived with the Old One, but Shadow thought she might end up mating with the He that kept coming around. Shadow had his problems with that one, but he didn’t seem too bad for a human male.

And he didn’t wear made smells.

But Shadow had detected another smell on Sunny. Maybe it was nothing, but it made him nervous, just like Sunny coming home to sleep while the sun was out made him nervous.

He skulked around on her bed, his tail lashing to show his displeasure. Usually he’d at least consider snuggling with Sunny, to enjoy an occasional drowsy pet from her.
But she was fast asleep already, her mouth open and making that odd
skrawwwk
noise that humans sometimes made when they slept.

No, Shadow wouldn’t nap with her.

She’d probably turn over on me right when I got comfortable,
he thought.

*

Sunny woke up
feeling a bit more human, if not fully rested. The shadows were growing long in her room, so it must be almost evening. She must have zonked off for three or four hours. Sighing, she stretched, sitting up in bed. Her blinking eyes caught a flash of movement down at the bottom of her ajar bedroom door. A small, gray striped face peered suspiciously in at her, then disappeared.

“What’s the matter, fella? Did Dad forget to feed you?” Sunny got up and went to the door, but the hall was empty. Shadow had already darted off somewhere after letting his displeasure be known.

Heaving a deeper sigh, Sunny went to get her bathrobe and then headed for the shower. She wasn’t about to give Shadow another show.

After a long session under the rushing warm water, Sunny felt cleaner on the outside but definitely empty on the inside. She put on shorts and a T-shirt and headed downstairs. Mike was already at the table, arranging rolls and cold cuts. “It’s all ‘food police’ approved,” he told her. “Low fat, low sodium, low taste.”

“It’s not that bad,” she protested, and Mike shrugged.

Sunny noticed that her father had put out a bowl of salad. He’d also cored and sliced several McIntosh apples. “Figure
we could do like you see in restaurants, and use them on the sandwiches with a little mayonnaise, or whatever they call that healthy stuff in that jar you bought.” He smiled. “I figured you must be up when the mange-ball came down and got something to eat.” Mike nodded at Shadow, who was crunching away at his dry food, apparently unaware of their presence until Sunny went over to pet him. Somehow he managed to avoid her hands while still keeping his head in the food dish.

Sunny gave up and returned to her father, who laughed. “He’s miffed with you for creating a stir when he’s the only one who’s supposed to be up and patrolling the house.”

“How did you feel about the stir?” Sunny asked.

Mike’s smile slipped a little. “It worried me, not knowing what you were going off to do. After reading the
Courier
, though, I don’t think I’d have felt any better if I
had
known what you were letting yourself in for.” He sighed. “At least Ike Elkins was about the safest guy you could have picked for a midnight boat ride.”

“I’ll give you the whole story while we eat,” Sunny promised. “If you don’t think it’ll ruin your appetite.”

“Just try,” Mike said stoutly, plunking a bottle of seltzer water on the table.

They made healthy inroads into the food, though Mike shook his head in dismay at Sunny’s description of spotting Eliza Stoughton. “She sounds like just a kid.”

“Definitely younger than I am,” Sunny said.

“And you saw her when you were there before?”

“Parading through the compound in her purple bikini and dancing by the pool as if she didn’t have a care in the world.” Sunny frowned, snagging a slice of apple and
chewing on it. If Randall’s story was right, Eliza had had a lot of cares. Enough, maybe, to prove fatal.

Mike rose from the table and began setting up the coffeemaker, something he never did after supper.

“Are we expecting company?” Sunny asked. If it turned out to be Mrs. Martinson, there was a good chance of scoring a piece of her famous coffee cake.

“Will Price said he’d drop by,” Mike replied. “I spoke with him on the phone while you were in the shower.” He seemed very interested in his coffee preparations. “I’m afraid it’s going to be tiresome politics. You may find yourself dropping off again.”

“We’ll see.” After helping her dad with the dishes, Sunny zipped around the living room, piling up the newspapers and collecting some of Shadow’s cat toys from the floor.

Will arrived late and still in uniform, the expression on his face warning of a foul mood. “Well, even though I was short on sleep, I liaised brilliantly with the other crime busters out on Neal’s Neck,” he announced. “Kept traffic moving smoothly in spite of all the news trucks stopping in front of the compound to do remote shots. Not to mention all the idiots rubbernecking to see the crime scene.” He shook his head sourly. “At least all the evening newscasts are done for the time being. I’ll probably have to get back there for the ten and eleven o’clock broadcasts.”

“It’s going no better with the people out there?” Mike said.

“Trehearne considers me
persona non grata
,” Will replied. “He doesn’t even want to let me past the troopers’ roadblock. Says I’ll pass along everything I see to the
Courier
.”

“We kept your name out of the story,” Sunny said
defensively. “Mainly, we discussed things we’d seen while we were there ourselves, either for the press conference . . . or later.”

“You did mention the arguments Eliza got into,” Will pointed out. “I was the one who told you that.”

“We kept it vague, only mentioning that there were reports of arguments, not going into specifics, and not naming a source.” She remembered how heated her discussion with Ken had gotten over how they should treat some of the stuff that Will had mentioned on the ride back to Kittery Harbor. Ken had wanted to go whole hog, but Sunny had wanted to soft-pedal Will’s revelations, arguing that they’d ruin him as a source. Journalistic sugarcoating. She hadn’t wanted the story to blow back on Will, but from the look of him, her attempts at concealment hadn’t worked.

Will shrugged. “Trehearne’s still blaming me.” He looked over to Mike. “So, how much hay has Nesbit been making, while I was away on glorified traffic duty?”

“It’s more of a whispering campaign,” Mike reported. “Frank’s not coming out and actually saying anything, but after the big show of turning the responsibility to you, a lot of his online supporters are suggesting you weren’t up to the job, letting a murder happen on your watch.”

“What a crock!” Will burst out, following up with some choice epithets about the Internet, then apologized to Sunny.

“You won’t get an argument from me,” she said. “I probably say the same thing about ten times a day.”

“Considering the scope of my authority there, the only way anyone could hold me responsible for someone getting killed would be if they got run over by an out-of-control dump truck.” He finally sat down, and Sunny gave him a
cup of coffee. “So what does the rest of the kitchen cabinet say?” he asked Mike.

“That it hits at what should be your strongest point, your experience and competence.” Mike frowned. “Now, we can’t afford to run any sort of a poll. But Zach Judson’s been sounding out people in his market, and some of the fellows with connections up near Levett have been asking around, and I won’t sugarcoat it, it looks as if this has hurt you.”

“So what should I say?” Will asked.

Mike dithered for a moment. “The boys think it’s not so much what you should say as what you’ll have to do. They think you’ll have to find whoever killed that girl.”

Sunny kept her hand firmly on her cup. At least she hadn’t had a mouthful of coffee for this latest news flash from crazy-town.

Will sat in silence for a moment. Then he turned to Sunny with an inquiring expression.

“Don’t look at me,” she told him. “I was asleep while Dad and his cronies hatched this nutty idea.”

“What’s so nutty about it?” Mike argued. “You and Will have investigated mysterious deaths before.”

“But in those cases, someone we knew was involved first,” Sunny said. “We never butted into a case.”

“That goes double for me. I’m a cop. I can’t just go off investigating cases I haven’t been assigned to,” Will said. “Besides, I wouldn’t say that Kingsbury compound is impregnable, but it’s darn close. It’s almost impossible to get into Neal’s Neck right now. And Lee Trehearne, the head of security out there, doesn’t even want me inside his perimeter,” Will added. “So how could I even talk to any of the witnesses?”

The doorbell rang, and Sunny excused herself to go and answer it.
Probably another of Dad’s political buddies, come to offer Will more useless advice,
she thought.

But when she opened the door, she didn’t find one of Kittery Harbor’s geezer politicians. Sunny didn’t even find a man.

It was Priscilla Kingsbury. The bride-to-be wasn’t wearing as much makeup as she had when visiting the 99 Elmet Ladies, and her outfit was less formal—though not swimsuit casual. “Hello, Sunny,” she said with a nervous smile. “We didn’t get a chance to talk much the other evening, which is really a shame. Wilawiport isn’t next door, but I’ve read some of your articles in the
Courier
—and some of the articles about you and Constable Price. I’ve spent more time up at the compound than anyone else in the family, so I’m a little more tuned in to local news. Oh, I’m doing this all wrong.” Priscilla seized Sunny’s hand. “I think you’re the only person I can trust, and I hope you can help me.”

“Wha-wha-why?” Sunny asked,
staring at the youngest member of the Kingsbury dynasty. “Why do you think I’m the only one who can help you?”

Now Priscilla looked embarrassed. “Sounds a little over the top, doesn’t it? But I’ve heard good things about you from Helena Martinson and other women in the 99 Elmet Ladies. And I have read your stuff.” She bit her lip. “All the other people writing and talking about Eliza make her sound so horrible. They slant things to make it seem as though she brought trouble on herself. Yours was the only story that didn’t pile a lot of innuendo on top of the facts.”

The girl still clung to Sunny’s hand as if she were afraid to let her go. “Eliza was a mess yesterday, and I tried to find out why, but she wouldn’t tell me. She’d always been on the fringes of our crowd, only here because she was Beau’s date.
Frankly, I didn’t know her well enough.” Priscilla blinked away tears. “Maybe if I had gotten her to talk—”

She broke off, clamping her lips together for a moment. “I wasn’t a good friend. But I’m hoping you and Constable Price can get to the bottom of this, the way you did that time when everyone else was busy pretending that nothing had happened.”

Whoopee,
Sunny thought,
we’re a famous crime-fighting duo—sort of.

Priscilla was already rushing on. “I’m beginning to find out what that feels like—the everyone pretending everything is fine part. Mr. Trehearne is trying to keep the whole compound nailed down, and Uncle Cale thinks that’s because he’s afraid that one of the reinforcements he brought in for wedding security may have killed Eliza.”

The girl paused for a moment, looking at Sunny. “Uncle Cale says hello, by the way. He thought you were pretty smart.”

I guess the question is whether he stressed the pretty or the smart part
. Sunny took advantage of the brief interruption in Priscilla’s flow of words to get her own thoughts in order. The girl might be petite, but she was like a force of nature once she got going. Sunny led Priscilla into the house. “As it happens, Will Price is visiting right now,” she told the girl. “Why don’t you come in, and we’ll all talk?”

Mike was surprised to see their visitor, but he immediately offered her a cup of coffee. Hospitality was part of the Kittery Harbor Way, the ethos that Sunny had grown up in. So had Will, although he kept a cop’s wariness behind his good manners as Priscilla accepted and joined
them at the kitchen table. Even sitting down, she seemed to give off an aura of “full speed ahead.”

“I’m glad to catch you both,” she said to Will and Sunny. “You have to understand that our family is all over the country these days. My big brothers Lem and Tom are responsible for their states, and although I grew up with my grandparents after my folks died, they live mostly at their place on the Connecticut shore. The winters are usually milder there. I’m the one who stays here in Maine, working with Uncle Cale—or rather, for the Act Two Foundation. He travels thousands of miles a year, visiting our local offices and fund-raising. We help programs all over the country, from food insecurity to prisoner rehabilitation. I work closer to home, in Boston, Providence, and of course here in Elmet.”

Mike nodded. “Helena mentioned you helping out the food pantry.”

“Since I’m more local, I’m aware of your . . . reputation,” Priscilla said to Will.

He frowned, considering something. “I wonder if Trehearne is, too. Maybe that’s why he’s trying to keep me out of the compound. I’m supposed to be the local law enforcement liaison for your wedding,” he explained to Priscilla. “But your security guy only wants me outside directing traffic.”

“Mr. Trehearne doesn’t like
any
outsiders getting past his perimeter,” Priscilla said. “That even includes the state police.” She made a face. “I can understand his attitude a little better now. It feels like our place is under siege. The security people have caught photographers creeping around in the neighbors’ yards, trying to get pictures of us. I had to sneak out with the cleaning staff to come here.”

“That’s our problem, Ms. Kingsbury,” Will said. “Your home is pretty much sealed off. Makes it difficult to talk with witnesses and so on.”

“Oh, call me Cillie,” Priscilla told him. “That’s the nickname I grew up with, and the one my friends use.” She took a sip of the coffee Mike had handed her. “I think Uncle Cale and I may have a way around the locked-in problem. We’re going to suggest embedding a reporter in the wedding party get-together. A local reporter. You, Sunny.”

Sunny stared at Priscilla, speechless. But her inside reporter was jubilant . . . and a little impressed.
Quite the bold move, there. I guess Uncle Cale is more than just a pretty face.
“You do realize that I’m not a full-time reporter,” she finally said. “I do have a day job. And I’ll have to talk to the publisher of the
Courier
.” Although she suspected that Ken Howell would jump at the opportunity.

“Well, we haven’t sprung our idea on the rest of the family yet,” Cillie told her. “But if you could get things ready on your side, I think we can push this through on ours.”

Family politics,
Sunny thought.
And this is a political family.

The bride-to-be sipped her coffee. “I thought we should postpone the marriage,” she said abruptly. “Even though the wedding is a couple of months away, it still seems too soon, you know? I didn’t feel right talking about wedding plans while people were discussing when to release Eliza’s body.” She had trouble saying the last word. “I called her family to ask about memorial services, and they asked us—no,
told
us—not to come. They want to keep things private, and they figure we’ll draw reporters like you-know-what draws flies. We’d turn it into a circus, and they d-don’t want
that.” Tears appeared at the corners of her eyes, and she blinked furiously to get them under control.

“How can I go ahead as though nothing happened?” Priscilla took a deep breath. “But it’s like politics. I got outvoted. Carson’s dad, Mr. de Kruk, was insistent about staying the course.” Her voice sounded a little empty now. “Something to do with his schedule. He’d cleared the week around the wedding date and didn’t want to rearrange things.”

Sunny didn’t think that sounded like a good beginning for a marriage, but she didn’t reply. What, really, could she say?

Cillie changed the subject slightly, showing a little more spirit. “We’ve had enough trouble with the Emperor Augustus. At first he wanted the wedding to be some sort of reality TV spectacular, broadcast from the top of one of his construction projects with a congregation of thousands, the New York Philharmonic playing the wedding march, and Cirque de Soleil doing aerial acts while we came down the aisle.”

Sunny had to laugh. “Who would he get to officiate? The Pope?”

Priscilla laughed, too. “Probably someone more fundamentalist, with his own TV church and lots of audience appeal.” Then she got serious again. “But Carson put his foot down, thank goodness. He said it was bad enough being an extra when his dad did the TV thing. And he ought to know—he’d done it since he was a kid.” She sighed. “It was a struggle, but Carson got Augustus to go along with a small wedding, with our local pastor, just the family, and a few close friends.”

She went silent, but Sunny could finish it up.
And now one of those friends is dead.

Priscilla tried to change the tone again, this time going cynical. “So we don’t think Old Augustus will mind you covering things, except he’ll probably crab that you’re too local. But he’s already gotten enough mileage—and footage—out of the preliminaries. The engagement bash he threw was quite a show. Plenty of friends and acquaintances got lots of free champagne, and of course all the celebrity reporters were there.”

Sunny looked over at Will, trying to get a cue from him. “I’ll be honest,” he said. “We’ve been talking over the . . . circumstances of Ms. Stoughton’s death. I’ve got certain reasons to be interested in how the case is handled.”

“Because of the primary campaign against Sheriff Nesbit,” Priscilla said promptly. When Will looked surprised, she reminded him, “I was at your last campaign stop with the 99 Ladies.”

Will nodded, then turned to Sunny. “What do you think of this proposition?”

“I’ll have to clear things at work,” she said. But there was nothing crucial going on in the next week. Besides, Ollie wanted Will to win the primary—and he wouldn’t be averse to hearing a little insider gossip, either. “And get Ken Howell on board.” Though that shouldn’t be too difficult either.

“Then we’ve got a plan,” Cillie Kingsbury said briskly. “Here’s a number where you can get in touch with me. It’s a no-name cell phone.”

A burner phone,
Sunny thought as she jotted the number down.
I suppose you need one—or maybe a dozen—if you’re in the public eye.

Cillie’s manners were as good as Mike’s. She thanked him for the coffee, then said, “I’ve got to go. There are a
couple of other errands I need to take care of while I’m out of jail.”

They saw her to the door. That’s when Sunny noticed the car and driver pulled up in the driveway behind Will’s pickup. It wasn’t a local cab. Cillie must have some friends in the vicinity willing to help out. Patient friends, to sit and wait while she had coffee. Sunny squinted and made out a head of blond hair . . . and a set of fingers restlessly tapping at the wheel. It was Fiona Ormond, Priscilla’s wedding planner.

Guess she’s got to be professionally patient,
Sunny thought.

“Let me know if you can make things work on your end.” Cillie shook hands all around. “And thank you again.”

“Well, that was interesting,” Mike said after they closed the door.

“Kind of like having a whirlwind invade your life,” Will said. “I mean, she was pleasant and polite, but she seemed awfully damn confident that we’d just line up and go along with her plan.”

“The rich really are different,” Sunny said. “And despite the nicknames, not silly at all.”

She headed to the kitchen and called Ken, who nearly jumped through the phone in his eagerness to agree. “We can do a special section in our weekly edition, and you’ll write a daily blog on our website.” Ken’s laugh came out suspiciously close to the “MMMwahahaha!” of mad scientists in the movies. “Let the other outlets scavenge off us for a change.”

Having gotten Ken’s okay, Sunny dialed the number for
Ollie’s room at the rehab center. It was getting late, and she knew they turned the phones off there in the evenings.

Ollie picked up on the second ring, sounding reasonably mellow. “What’s up, Sunny?” he asked after she said hello.

Sunny reported Priscilla’s visit, explaining the embedding idea and why they thought it was necessary to go along. “It’s beginning to look as though Will won’t win unless he can do something about this case,” she told him. “And that means we have to get someone into that compound. This seems the best way to accomplish both things.”

Ollie was silent for a moment. “If you think Nancy can handle things at the office, I’ll say okay. Just remember, you’ll have to wrap this up pretty quickly. You won’t have Nancy forever. Labor Day is coming, and she’ll be heading back to school.”

“I know.” Sunny sighed. “And thanks, Ollie.”

She hung up. “Well, that’s all set. He’s giving me the time.”

“The least he can do,” Mike harrumphed. “How long have you been working there without a vacation?”

“Some vacation this is,” Sunny scoffed. “Snooping among the rich and famous.” Then she got more serious. “I suppose I’ll have to do some homework on who’s who in the compound. The only ones I’ve met are Trehearne and Caleb.”

“And Cillie,” Will pointed out.

“But there are a whole lot of other people out there. The other Kingsburys, the de Kruks, not to mention the wedding party.” Sunny had seen them all on her tour, but not up close and personal.

“I know someone who might be able to help.” Will
grinned as he reached for the phone. Half an hour later, they were drinking more coffee with Ben Semple and his girlfriend Robin Lory—the secret resource Will had thought of, a walking who’s who of local celebrities.

“Oh, wow,” Robin said when they told her that Sunny might actually be going out to Neal’s Neck. She happily offered up her full store of gossip to help Sunny prepare.

“So, there’s the Senator and his wife. They’re getting kinda old, but he’s definitely the head of the family, the whatchamacallit.”

“Patriarch?” Ben suggested.

“Right. That,” Robin agreed. “Then there’s his grandsons, Governor Lem and Governor Tom, and their wives. You don’t hear much about the ladies, and as for the guys, that’s all political stuff.” Obviously Robin found the “political stuff” less gripping than the news of who was sleeping with whom.

“Who else?” She thought for a moment and then answered herself. “Caleb Kingsbury, the Senator’s son, of course.”

“I met him,” Sunny said.

For the first time, Robin looked impressed with Sunny. “Really? Is he as nice as he looks on TV? He’s always joking with the reporters and the photographers. You know, he’s kinda old but he’s single—divorced since the scandal.”

“The scandal nearly crucified him,” Will pointed out. “I guess Caleb decided it was better to befriend the media than to fight them.”

Maybe that explains why he was nice to me,
Sunny thought. “How about the wedding party?” she asked aloud.

“I don’t know for sure,” Robin replied. “But I read a
whole thing in the
National Inquisitor
the other day about who’s supposed to be coming up. Beau Bellingham is the best man. He’s really good-looking, like a model, and he’s in med school. He was Carson’s best friend in college. Eliza Stoughton came along as Beau’s date—I don’t know if she was hoping to make it as a bridesmaid. She worked for an advertising agency in New York City.” Robin went on, “She’d been engaged to someone else but broke it off. Oh, and Priscilla’s matron of honor, Yardley Neal, who has been her best friend since they were kids. Her husband is Thomas Something Neal.”

“Langford.” Will supplied the name.