Last Resort (11 page)

Carrie stiffened and I waited for steam to pour out of her ears. “You wish!”

“You wish,” Mary taunted.

I'd finally had enough. I pushed off the wall and swam away from them and toward the stairs.

“Where are you going?” one of them called.

I didn't turn around to see who was talking to me. Not that I would've been able to tell them apart, anyway. “Goodbye, girls,” I said, swimming toward the toddler in the inflatable duck.

“We were still talking,” one of them complained.

But I was done listening
, I said silently. I swam further, not responding, weaving in between the elderly ladies still twisting and turning as they did their water aerobics.

I lifted myself out of the pool and made a concerted effort to not look their way. I felt their creepy eyes on me but I ignored them.

I needed to find some sanity.

Quick.

NINETEEN

Jake was still passed out in the lounge chair and I really was getting hot. I'd gotten away from the creepy twins and promptly closed my eyes so they wouldn't be tempted to wander over and resume our conversation. Thankfully, they'd either gotten the hint or simply forgotten about me because I didn't hear a word from them. The afternoon sun was unfettered by clouds and beat down on all of us. I liked the sun as much as anyone, but I could only sit around in it for so long. I slipped on my sandals and wandered into the clubhouse, where I knew I'd find a ceiling fan and some ice cream.

Delilah was behind a wooden counter tucked in the corner of the clubhouse. A small freezer sat behind her and there was a metal cash box in front of her. She smiled at me when I walked in. “Tired of the sun or the people?”

I thought that was a curious question. “Right now, the sun.”

She slid the door back on the small freezer, pulled out a drumstick and handed it to me. “This might help.”

I took it from her. “Jake has some cash. I'll go get—”

She waved a hand in the air. “Nonsense. Your trip is all expenses paid.” She smiled. “Ice cream included.”

I felt horrible taking anything from her, especially knowing her financial circumstances. “I couldn't--” 

“I insist,” she said firmly. Before I could object again, she said, “I saw you talking to the twins. Mary and Carrie.”

“Yeah,” I said. I pulled the paper from the ice cream, balled it up and dropped it in the small wastebasket. “That was...interesting.”

She rolled her eyes. “Oh, I'm sure it was. They're both lunatics. Their family has been coming here since they were little girls and I'm pretty sure they've caused some kind of problem every single summer during that time.”

“Like?” I couldn't help but ask. I was curious.

“You name it, they've done it,” she said. “Stolen golf carts. Jumped the fence to the pool after hours.” She gestured at the freezer. “They've broken into this thing twice to take ice cream.” She shook her head. “And they are never apart.”

I took a bite of the ice cream. “They said they dated Harvey.”

She sighed. “Yes. They did, unfortunately. He should've known better, but, you know. They're both very attractive girls and Harvey was still a young man. Couldn't think with the right part of his body, I'm afraid.”

“Did he date them for a long time?”

“Not really,” Delilah explained, leaning her hip against the freezer. “I think he dated Mary first, then Carrie. Both were over the course of last summer. They'd been after him for a couple of years and he'd managed to stay away from them. But they finally broke him down last summer.”

“And it didn't go well?”

She snorted. “That's putting it mildly. No, it did not go well. Mary got so angry at him one night that she tried to set his pants on fire at the campfire ring.” She shook her head. “He had to hide from her and ended up staying at my place for the night so they couldn't find him.”

I'd half-thought they were kidding about setting his pants on fire, but clearly I'd been wrong.

“So then he moved on to Carrie,” Delilah continued. “They managed to make it about a month of sneaking around behind Mary's back, but then the crazy came out of Carrie and he decided he'd had enough of both of them. He told Carrie they were done and she picked up a hammer and threw it at his head. Fortunately, she's a bad aim The handle nicked his ear. But once again he found himself hiding at my place.”

I polished off the ice cream. “Wow. That's...crazy. At least he managed to be done with them.”

“Well, he was done with them, but they weren't finished with him,” she explained. “They kept harassing him, taking turns asking him out, following him around. He made it clear to them that he wasn't interested. Then they cornered him one afternoon down at the bottom of the trail.” She shook her  head. “They wouldn't let him leave and wrestled him to the ground, telling him he had to pick one of them. Some campers came by and called the local police. They were both charged with assault and I let them know that if anything else happened, they would be banned from Windy Vista.” She rolled her eyes. “Harvey refused to press charges but he told them he'd go to the sheriff if they bothered him again. That seemed to finally get through to him. They'd left him alone this summer.”

I licked the ice cream off my fingers. “For sure? They'd left him alone.”

“He hadn't mentioned them,” she said. “So I assumed all was fine and they were keeping their distance.”

Given the way they'd approached me in the pool and their interest in Harvey, I wasn't sure she was right. They didn't seem like they'd forgotten Harvey and they were clearly interested in my interaction with him. I wouldn't say they were obsessed with him, but I thought they still had Harvey on the brain and I wondered if they'd had much interaction with him before he died. Worse, I wondered if they were the reason he'd ended up dead on the trail.

Delilah pulled the cash box up onto the counter and popped open the lid. She laid the cash out on the counter as she counted it, frowning when she was done. Then she let out a massive sigh.

“What's wrong?” I asked, alarmed. “Are you missing some?”

She shook her head. “No, it's all here, unfortunately. But it's far less than what we are used to. And at this point every single penny counts. The problem is that I don't have any more pennies to count.” Tears welled up in her eyes. “I don't know what I'm going to do.”

I licked the cone and said nothing. Because I didn't know what to say.

“I'm out of money,” she said, fighting back the tears. “Literally out of money. I'm not even sure we can make it until the end of the summer now. I was hoping for six months and now I feel like I'm hoping for six weeks.” She paused and wiped at her eyes. “I'm going to have to sell this place.”

My stomach knotted and I felt badly for her. “Really?”

She wiped again at her eyes and nodded. “Yes, really. I'm cash poor and there's no equity left in the property because I've borrowed against it. I can get us to the middle of summer, but at that point, I'm screwed. There's nothing in reserve. I'm going to have to sell just to get myself out of debt.” She looked around the clubhouse. “I can't believe I'm going to lose this place.”

I couldn't believe it, either. I often felt like Jake and I were living on the edge financially with the constant repairs needed to our house, but hearing Delilah lay out her situation made me realize our concerns weren't anything compared to hers. I couldn't imagine losing something that you'd poured your entire life into.

She cleared her throat. “I'm sorry. I didn't mean to freak out on you there.”

“It's okay. I'm just sorry I can't help.” I smiled at her. “This really is a lovely place.”

She nodded. “It really is. It always has been.” She shook her head. “I shudder at the thought of what might happen if I sell it. I doubt anyone interested in buying it would keep it the same.”

I had to agree. It was a prime piece of land and the resort was behind the times. I doubted anyone would just want to continue doing what Delilah had been doing, leasing out lots for campers.

She gathered up the cash and set it back in the box. She closed the lid and snapped it close.  “I'll try to figure something out.”

The screen door to the clubhouse squeaked open. Sheriff Larrabee stood in the doorway, his thumbs hitched in the pants pockets of his perfectly pressed uniform. He nodded at both of us, then took a step forward.

“Afternoon, ladies,” he said.

“Morris,” Delilah said, her tone brisk.

“Thought I'd stop by and give you an update.” He took off his hat, then repositioned it on his head. “Ask a few more questions.”

Delilah rested her hands on the box but not before I noticed they were trembling. “Of course.”

“Initial report is in,” the sheriff said. “Blunt force trauma.”

I processed his words, instantly thinking of Olaf. It was like deja vu.

“Did he...did he hit his head on a tree? Or a rock or something?” I asked hopefully. Maybe it had been just an accident.

“Doubtful,” the sheriff said, his eyes on Delilah. “Looks like someone put him there in the woods.”

“How do you know?”

He turned to look at me. “Because there was a medallion around his neck,” he said. “And it had been hidden in that spot, according to Delilah. Is that correct?” He shifted his attention back to Delilah, waiting for confirmation.

She swallowed and nodded, her gray ponytail bouncing.

“Well, maybe he found the medallion,” I said recklessly, trying to come up with something other than a scenario that pointed to murder. Because I could tell who the sheriff thought the prime suspect was. “Maybe he was walking down the trail and saw the medallion. He thought it might be too easy to spot or something. So he decided to move it. Looped it around his neck so he could move through the brush. Tripped and hit his head. And died.”

The sheriff's eyes narrowed and he took a step closer to me. “How did you know it was his head?”

“What?”

“His head,” he repeated. His expression was grim but there was a spark of interest in his eyes. “I never mentioned his head.”

I felt my cheeks color. “Oh, well, I just thought it would be,” I stammered. “I mean, the guy in our coal chute—Olaf—that was what happened to him. I didn't think you could have blunt force trauma to anything else...” I finished lamely.

Delilah had a frown on her face and I realized that she knew nothing about the dead Olaf story.

“That's a nice story you've concocted,” Larrabee said. I waited for him to produce handcuffs and fasten them around my wrists. “But there's just one problem with it.”

Relief flooded me. “Oh? What's that?”

“The brush surrounding the body had been disturbed. Like someone had dragged something heavy through the woods. Something like a body...”

Delilah's fingers drummed the top of the cash box and she stilled them.

“So it was dumped there?” I asked.

“I'm not at liberty to say,” the sheriff responded. “Right now, we're exploring a multitude of possibilities.” He shoved his entire hand into his pocket. “However, we did find something else in the woods.”

It was obvious to me that he had something to show us. He looked at me, then Delilah before  pulling a folded up slip of paper from his pocket. With painful slowness, he unfolded it. Wordlessly, he walked over to the counter and dropped it on the surface.

“Recognize this?” he said to Delilah.

Her face drained of color.

I couldn't help it. I leaned forward to study the paper.

It was a printed deposit ticket, the kind found in the back of a checkbook.

And it had Delilah's name on it.

TWENTY

“They really thought I was hot?” Jake asked.

I'd walked back out to the pool and he was finally waking up from his nap. I'd explained my confrontation with the twins and my conversation with Delilah and the sheriff as we walked slowly back up the hill toward our cabin. I'd made the mistake of including the part about what Mary and Carrie thought of him.

I stopped in the middle of the road and stared at him. “Seriously?”

“What?” he asked innocently.

“I just tell you that the sheriff knows how Harvey died, that he considered me briefly as a suspect and that he pulled out evidence linking Delilah—whose camper
we are staying in
—to the crime, and all you pull from that conversation is that two crazy girls think you're good looking?”

He shrugged. “I told you. I want a vacation, not a murder investigation. One a year is enough for me. Hell, one a lifetime is pretty much my limit.”

“Fine,” I said, throwing my towel over my shoulder. “I won't discuss it with you. Any of it.”

And I wouldn't. I wouldn't tell him that Delilah had gone silent after the sheriff had shown her the deposit slip and that the sheriff had politely asked me to leave so he could have a private word with her and that my mind was now spinning with all of the possibilities.

“Look,” he said. “I'm a middle-aged man who has been found attractive by younger, nubile women.”

“Nubile?”

“Seems like a good word.”

“It's not. And if I catch you looking at them in any way—”

He grabbed me and kissed me, right in the middle of the road. His body was warm from baking in the sun and he smelled like sunscreen and sweat.

He pulled back from me and looked down at me. “Jealous wives are hot wives.”

My heart pounded against my chest, my breath still missing after the kiss. “I will rip their mouths off if they call you hot again. I will rip their eyes out if they look at you.”

“Hmm.” He smiled. “You're so hot when you're possessive of me. But I told you. No more murders.”

I plucked my towel off my shoulder and snapped it at him.

“Hot and feisty,” he said, laughing. “We need to get back to the cabin so you can work some of that aggression out...”

“Oh, you think you're going to get lucky now? After taunting me?”

“Yes,” he said, nodding. “I think so.”

He was probably right.

I gripped his hand and pulled him up the hill, both amused and irritated. I wanted him to care about the mystery of the campground. But his kiss had smothered my frustration and lit something else. Arousal. He was right. I was jealous. And I wanted to show him how jealous I was.

We were nearly back to the cabin when a golf cart screeched to a halt in front of us, blocking our path.

“Good afternoon,” Copper Marchand said from beneath a floppy brimmed hat. She wore gray sweat pants and a different Minnesota sweatshirt, this one black, and I wondered how on earth she didn't die of heat stroke tooling around in attire better suited for winter. “How are we this afternoon?”

“We are fine,” I said. I glanced down at her feet. She had on different sneakers this time, red ones that looked brand-new, too. “You?”

“Oh, fine, fine,” she said. She peered at both of us. “You look like you both got a little sun?”

“We did,” Jake said. “So we're headed back to the cabin to cool off.”

She smiled at him. “Of course you are. You two do seem to like to cool off quite a bit.”

I wondered if we'd already gotten a reputation as being sex fiends in the couple days we'd been there. Back in Moose River, I had no doubt that we had a reputation because we were always affectionate. And I didn't mind. If the worse thing that people said about me was that I was attracted to my husband, I was more than okay with that. But I thought we'd been discreet so far at Windy Vista.

Maybe not.

“Any more run-ins with Mr. Hackerman?” Copper asked, looking at Jake.

“No, ma'am,” he answered. “And I don't think there will be another one. A one-time thing where my temper got the better of me.”

She chuckled. “Ol' Wayne is pretty good at getting under people's skin, so never say never.”

Jake smiled at her and nodded.

“He was even able to get to Harvey and he wasn't an easy young man to rattle,” she said, leaning back in her seat.

I ignored Jake's frown and looked at the old woman. “Oh? How is that?”

“Harvey was very even-keeled,” she said. The breeze tugged at her hat and she reached her hand up to plant it more firmly on her head. “I don't believe I ever heard him raise his voice to anyone and it was rare to see him get angry over anything.”

She misunderstood my question. “So how was Wayne able to rattle him then?”

She tapped her long fingers on the small black steering wheel. “Well, I'm not quite sure. But about a week ago, I saw them having a pretty good go at it.”

“What do you mean?”

“They were over near the laundry room,” she explained. “And I was just driving down to the clubhouse, minding my own business.”

I wasn't sure Copper had ever minded her own business.

“It was in the morning,” she continued. “Before most folks were up and moving. They were quiet at first, but then it seemed to get a little more heated.” She paused, making sure she had our attention. “And I couldn't make out the entire conversation, but I'm fairly certain Wayne was trying to bribe Harvey.”

“Bribe him?” I said.

She nodded. “There was some discussion of money, mostly on Wayne's part. Harvey kept shaking his head and it looked to me like he was telling him no. Then Wayne pulled out his wallet. Harvey put up his hand, like he didn't want to see it.” She raised her eyebrows beneath the floppy hat. “Wayne was not happy about that and that was when he raised his voice and said, 'Then tell me what it's going to take.'” Her eyebrows dropped. “Harvey leaned toward him, so he was right up in his face.” She glanced at Jake. “Sort of how you and Wayne were at karaoke.”

Jake forced a smile onto his face.

She looked back to me. “But Harvey was mad. And his voice was louder than normal, but I still couldn't tell what he was saying. Harvey turned to leave and Wayne grabbed his arm. Harvey turned around. Wayne said, 'Just name your price.' Harvey then shook his arm free and stomped away.” She clucked like an old hen. “I don't think I've ever seen him angrier.”

I was trying to take Copper's words with a grain of salt. She clearly enjoyed reporting on all the resort drama and I couldn't help but wonder if she didn't embellish the stories to make them more exciting. Still, even if the gist of what she was saying was true, it was very interesting.

“Why would Hackerman have been offering Harvey money?” Jake asked.

I wanted to ask him why he cared, since he'd made it perfectly clear he was not interested in solving any of the campground mysteries. But I kept my mouth shut.

Copper's gnarled fingers wrapped around the steering wheel to her golf cart. “I have no idea. But that is certainly what seemed to be going on.” She smiled at both of us. “Anyway, I've held you up long enough. Enjoy your...cooling off.”

She stepped on the gas, sped around us and disappeared down the hill.

“She seems a bit...odd,” Jake said as we watched her go.

“You think?”

“I do.”

“Me, too.” I squeezed his hand. “You think she's right? I mean, about what she saw?”

He shrugged. “I don't know. It sounds like Hackerman. But who knows if she's getting it all right or all wrong? I think she just likes being in the middle of it all.”

“Me, too.” I hesitated for a moment. “Maybe there's something there, though. Maybe we should let the sheriff know. It seems like an important piece of information to share.”

“You are not on the police force, Daisy,” Jake reminded me. “It's his job to investigate. Not yours.”

“I know, but now I think he thinks Delilah—”

“Delilah's a big girl,” he told me. “She can take care of herself. If she didn't have anything to do with his death, she'll be able to prove that.”

“She's just so down,” I said. “With Harvey's death and the whole financial situation. I think it might ruin her if the sheriff really thinks she was involved with whatever happened to Harvey.”

He stopped walking and turned to look at me. “Maybe she was, Daisy.”

“What?” I shook my head vehemently. “No. There's no way she would have done something to him. He was like a son to her. She loved him.”

“Love can make people do strange things.”

“She didn't kill him,” I said firmly.

He chewed on his lower lip. “Remember what the sheriff said?”

I waited.

“Everyone's a suspect, Daisy.” Jake's eyes were hard. “Everyone.”