Killer Colada: a Danger Cove Cocktail Mystery (18 page)

It took ten minutes for the fire service to hoist Carmen out of the cave and load her onto a gurney. After what she'd done, I didn't really want to go with her to the hospital, but who else could I call to make sure she was okay? Harvey was tied up with the police, and she didn't really know anyone else in town. And I was hoping to win back some good brownie points after all the lying I'd done recently trying to solve Pandora's murder.

While Carmen was being moved into the back of the ambulance, I took a traumatized Karma back to the house. As soon as he saw Zen, he rushed toward him, and Zen gave him some reassuring licks. I locked the kitty door so neither of them could get back out, then hotfooted it back to the ambulance in time to hear Carmen screaming at them to give her some pain meds. "Morphine! I want morphine, you idiots!"

I climbed in and sat on a foldaway seat by the door, watching the paramedic open a plastic syringe packet, discarding the wrapper hurriedly on the floor. He filled it from a vial of some kind of liquid and gave her a shot. After that, Carmen was quiet, eyes closed as we sped to the Seattle General Hospital.

She was wheeled down a corridor, and I was directed to a packed waiting room. I picked up a magazine, flicking through but unable to register anything. I was seething at her, but I did some deep breathing to try to keep calm, and opened and closed my jaw to get rid of the knot of muscles tightening up. How could any sane person want to harm a defenseless animal like that just to get back at someone? I fantasized about doing some martial arts moves on her but couldn't decide what I wanted to do first. A flying knee? An uppercut elbow? Oooh, a double chop elbow would be good.

I slammed the magazine down on top of a pile on a table and tried to project something positive into my head to dispel the angry energy, like Harvey telling me he loved me. Ruby had suggested to me that inner anger was a destructive emotion. The person you were angry with probably didn't know or didn't even care if you felt like that, so why store it up? The only person anger hurt was you, which was why I meditated a lot and tried to practice the art of forgiveness. Okay, so obviously I sometimes needed a bit of help to maintain that, but at least I was trying.

I attempted to clear my mind of Carmen, but instead, I kept seeing her in the ambulance, screaming for pain meds, and the paramedic's syringe wrapper on the floor, hastily discarded. There was something about it that triggered an idea, but it was just out of reach. What was it?

Before I could think anymore, I saw Ian striding down the ER corridor, dressed in a white doctor's coat, heading toward the front doors.

He spotted me and walked over. "Hi. I didn't expect to see you here. Are you okay?"

"Oh, I'm fine. I just came with…" I searched for the right word to call Carmen. A psycho? A jealous freak?
No, be kind, Hope.
"I came with someone who needed treatment. I'm just waiting to make sure they're okay."

"Well, you can't have cycled all the way here. Do you need a ride back to Danger Cove? I'd be happy to give you a lift. After everything you've done for me lately, it would be my pleasure."

"Um…I need to check on Carmen first. Find out if she needs any help getting back."

He nodded. "I can get an update on your friend and find out what's happening." He disappeared behind the triage desk, chatting with one of the nurses. Then he walked back up the corridor.

A few minutes later, he returned. "She's still waiting for her leg to be set in a cast. Then they're going to keep her in overnight, just for observation. It seems she also hit her head, so they want to monitor her for any concussion."

Hopefully the bang to her noggin finally knocked some sense into her.

"Oh, okay," I said, tucking a wayward wave behind my ear. "In that case, I'd love a ride back, thanks."

I followed him out to his Range Rover in the car park and buckled up. "So how're you doing?"

"I don't know. My head's still a mess, but at least Tim's been arrested for both Jenna's and Mother's murders now." He paused before starting the ignition and driving off. "You know, I never really got say good-bye to either of them. When Jenna went to meet Tim that day, I was out with my friends. I can't even remember what I was doing now. And when I left town after everything went wrong between Mother and me, I didn't have the courage to tell her I was going. I waited till she was asleep and left a note. By that time it wasn't like we had much of a relationship. We never really did. It was always mother and Jenna. Deep down, I don't think she ever wanted me. Of course, things were okay when Father was alive. But when he died…well, I was the odd one out."

I reached out and put my hand on his arm. "I'm sorry. I know it's difficult when relationships go wrong. Just because people are your family doesn't mean you're always bound by unconditional love. Some things just aren't meant to be. But I bet it's made you a stronger person. The person you are today. Everything is a lesson, designed to make us learn something valuable. Sometimes you don't know what that lesson is until later in life, but it's necessary nevertheless. And you can't change the past. It's not healthy to let it eat you up. You can say good-bye now, to both of them. Then you can let it go. All the guilt and the anger and the feelings of inadequacy and hurt."

He picked up a water bottle from the drink holder in the center console, and I let my hand fall away. He took a long swig and swallowed. "Sounds like you've been through something similar."

I shrugged. "Yeah, my parents…well, let's just say they weren't there for me either. I pretty much raised myself. And like you, as soon as I was old enough, I left. But what I learned eventually was to not have any regrets about the way things turned out. Regrets waste too much negative time and energy. And happiness is an inside job. You can spend all your time searching for something, wanting things to have been different, thinking if you do this or that, or get this or that, it will make you happy, but it won't. You have to take control of yourself, and that starts with self-love." I fiddled with my tiger's-eye bracelet, wondering how I'd ever let Carmen make me doubt myself and raise old anxieties and fears that I wasn't good enough to the surface. I wasn't in competition with anyone. I was just me. And I was happy with who I was. Carmen, on the other hand, was superficial and nasty. She may have been beautiful on the outside, but inside she was total ugliness. Why would I want to be like her?

"You know, I think you're right." He raised his bottle to me in a
cheers
gesture. Took another sip. "The day before Mother died, I was coming to see her. I'd spent too much time searching for…I don't know…
something
. Something missing in my life. I thought
things
could make me happy. Make me feel worthy. Material things. So I worked hard, built up my practice, bought stuff. Enjoyed the fancy holidays and the fast cars and splashed money around like it was going out of fashion. Because it got the girls, you know. Until I realized they weren't with me because of me. They were only hanging around because they thought I was rich. And then things started to go wrong at work. I lost interest in it all. Couldn't even see why I'd become a doctor in the first place. Started to question everything. Turned to gambling and became addicted to that. Overran my credit and started building up debts that I couldn't control. Maybe I was having a midlife crisis. I don't know. And then I decided I needed help, so I checked myself into an inpatient gambling addiction program a few weeks ago. I had a lot of time in there in between group and one-to-one therapy to think, and I started dealing with the past. Mother, Father, Jenna. We all suffered tragedies, but mother and I were the only ones left. I realized I had to try to finally patch things up between us before it was too late."

"So what happened?"

"I got out of the program on Labor Day, and the next morning I drove to Danger Cove. I parked outside Mother's house. Walked up the path and stood on her doorstep. I was about to knock, but then I thought about everything that had happened. About all the time that had gone by. And…I lost my nerve. I couldn't do it. I was scared. Still not ready to confront everything that had happened in the past. I didn't want to be rejected by her again like I'd felt all those years growing up. So I got into my car and drove back to Seattle. I was so mixed up and emotional that I ran into a stop sign on the way out of town."

"I heard about that."

"I got a phone call from an Officer Faria a few days later, who said there were some witnesses. I could either pay for it to be repaired or be charged with damaging it. He's the same guy who caught me speeding the day mother was killed."

"Yeah, about that…so you came back a second time to see Pandora?"

He nodded. "I drove around town for a while, trying to work up the courage, but again, I just couldn't bring myself to speak to her. There was still too much pent-up anger and hurt. I wanted to get it out, but at the same time, I didn't. Does that sound crazy?"

My heart ached for him. "No. It doesn't sound crazy at all. It sounds pretty normal under the circumstances."

Ian sank into a silence. I opened my mouth to say more but didn't really know what to say. Ian had to grieve in his own way. Get past his own guilt about the past and hopefully move forward and make peace with himself. I looked out of the window and watched the world speed by.

Finally, we pulled up in the tavern's parking lot. He got out and walked to the passenger side, opening the door for me. "Will you be coming to the funeral? Jenna's remains have been released now, so I can arrange for a double service. I've changed my mind about having the wake here. I hope you don't mind. But what with Jenna being found out there…" He trailed off, eyes glistening. He cleared his throat and coughed.

"Of course I don't mind. But I'm happy to do anything I can to help." I gave him a hug. "Just let me know the date, okay?"

"I'll see you soon, then."

I stood and watched him walk back around the car, his shoulders hunched, head down, then I took a deep breath and headed inside.

Karma didn't seem to have any long-lasting effects from his earlier brush with Carmen and, along with Zen, was ecstatic to see me when I opened the door, winding himself around my legs and purring loudly before I could even get up the stairs. I refilled their bowls of food and poured myself a much-needed glass of red wine, staring out the window at the full moon illuminating the water, watching the swell and fall of the waves crashing onto the rocks below the lighthouse as everything turned over in my head.

I thought about Pandora's murder. How the killer had left the same kind of wrapper on the floor as the paramedic had in the ambulance. How the syringe was still left in Pandora's vein when we'd found her. The vial of pentobarbital on her kitchen table.

And I wondered again why the killer didn't take the evidence with him when he left the house. 

Donna's words filtered into my head:
It was probably some kind of trap
.

I knew then what it was that had been bugging me about it all. Pandora had called Tim at 12:02 p.m., asking him to visit her at 3:30 p.m., but she knew by then that she already had a prearranged appointment with Ruby and me at 4:00 p.m. She must've known the conversation would get heated. That it would turn into an argument. Pandora still adamantly believed Tim had killed Jenna. Her intention was to plead with Tim to get a confession out of him so she could finally lay her daughter to rest before she died from the inoperable brain tumor. But Pandora wouldn't have known how long it would take to get such a confession, if at all, so why did she only allow half an hour's meeting before we turned up? Surely she would've kept the whole afternoon free.

And that's when it hit me. Pandora's death really was tied to Jenna's, just not in the way I'd thought.

Pandora knew she was dying. And she was sure Tim had killed Jenna. She wasn't trying to get a confession from Tim at all that day, because she didn't think he'd ever admit it after all these years. What she'd intended all along was to frame him for her murder. If she couldn't get him convicted of Jenna's death, she'd choose the next best thing. She'd
planned
it so we would arrive in time to see Tim leaving. A lot of people in town thought Tim had got away with murder and had a huge motive to kill Pandora. He had access to the pentobarbital. And if he was seen leaving the house around the time of her death, it would seem like an open-and-shut case. And it did to Lester Marshall.

That's why the wrapper was still on the floor, discarded in a hurry. She couldn't remove the needle from her arm because the drug had worked so quickly she was dead before she'd even finished shooting the whole amount into her vein.

Pandora had taken her own life. And Tim really had been framed.

I sat in the interview room at the police station with Vernon, going over my theory with Lester. When I'd finished, I said, "That's why the only prints you found on the syringe and vial were Pandora's."

He stared at me incredulously. Then he snorted. "That's the craziest thing I've ever heard."

"It's not crazy when you think about it. It all fits into place," Vernon said.

Lester narrowed his eyes. It looked like he was thinking it over, but you could never tell with him. He could equally have been thinking about which flavor pizza he was going to order for lunch.

"Pandora was dying anyway and knew this was her last chance, her only chance, to get her revenge on Tim. She trained as a nurse years ago, so she knew how to inject herself with the pentobarbital," I said.

"What about the cell phone she used to call Tim? How do you explain that? If she was going to kill herself and wasn't worried about him suing her or getting her arrested for harassment, why throw it over her fence after she made the call?"

"I don't know," I said.

"Maybe to create more confusion and suspicion and point it toward Tim calling her," Vernon suggested. "She must've been under a terrible amount of stress at the end. It's hard to know what she would've been thinking. There are some things we'll probably never know."

I tucked a wayward wave behind my ear. "Obviously, Pandora didn't have a clue Donna had really murdered Jenna. She lured Tim to her house, lying to him that she'd found evidence about what had happened to Jenna. That way, she could guarantee he'd turn up, and she could carry out her plan."

"We can't prove Pandora did it herself," Lester said skeptically.

"And can you prove that she didn't?' Vernon asked. "Tim Baxtor isn't a killer. If this goes to a trial, Tim's lawyer will be using our scenario to give the jurors reasonable doubt."

"And if you compare Pandora's fingerprints with ones found at the Danger Cove Vet Clinic, where the pentobarbital was stolen from, I bet you'll find a match. You were probably right about Donna sending me those threatening notes, because she knew we were digging into Jenna's disappearance too, and she wanted it to point toward Ian or someone else being involved to cover her tracks."

Lester stared into space for a while, hand resting in his chin. Then he stamped his foot under the table. "I'll need to compare those prints and then confer with the prosecutor and see what he has to say on the matter." He shook his head. "Damn. I was hoping for two arrests on my record. A Bonnie and Clyde special! Now I might have to make do with one?"

Vernon shook his head at him and stood up.

I slid my chair back and walked toward the door behind Vernon.

"Hey, Miss Marple and Columbo," Lester called out.

We turned back to him.

"Stay out of police business in the future." He wagged a chunky finger at us.

I opened the door and strolled out, muttering, "A thank-you would be nice."

Vernon grunted something under his breath.

We'd just reached the steps outside when we spotted Detective Bud Ohlsen coming toward us.

"Morning, Hope. Vernon."

"Morning."

"Sounds like you've had quite a busy week."

"You could say that."

He rocked back on his heels and looked at me. "I wanted to thank you for finding Jenna. It wasn't the ending I was hoping for, but it was an ending nevertheless."

I nodded up at him, then let him know what we thought about Pandora's death.

He stared up at the clouds, watching the wind drift them slowly over our heads, silent for a few moments as he took it all in. Then he looked back at me and sighed. "I think you're right. None of it really made sense to me. But now it clicks into place. If we find Pandora's prints at the vet's, then that'll pretty much prove your theory." He patted my arm. "Take care, both of you."

"You too."