No More Time Page 8

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean, that’s all you know about the death of this Vincent Carcherelli? Partner of your old flame?”

  Bill was a little touchy. “Why should I know more?” I asked, pretending innocence.

  “Dodie, you tend to get yourself involved in the murder investigations of people you’re acquainted with.”

  “That’s back in Etonville. I’m on vacation here.” I slipped my hand in his, attempting to change the subject.

  “I hope so.” Bill put an arm around my shoulder.

  The boardwalk was emptier now that it was edging toward midnight. I pulled Bill’s jacket tighter around my midsection to ward off the gusts blowing in from the ocean and glanced up at the stars. A jet-black sky was dotted with bits of white. There were no skies like this in North Jersey. Only down the shore. Were Bill’s constellations on view tonight?

  “…and Jackson?” he asked.

  “Sorry. Got distracted by the night sky.” I leaned into his body and grasped his right arm. “What did you call that one?” I pointed upward. “Ursa Minor?”

  “Ursa Major.”

  “Last I checked, Jackson’s belongings were still on our front porch. Neatly folded, however,” I said lightly. “He spent last night with someone else, so I’m hoping he’s planning on bunking there tonight.”

  I neglected to mention Jackson’s interviews with the Candle Beach Police Department—in our living room and at the station—as a person of interest because he had a history with his old partner and had seen Vinnie the day before the murder. Making him one of the last people to see Vinnie alive. I also avoided mentioning the fight on the boardwalk and the contents of Jackson’s pocket. Bill wouldn’t approve of me rifling through clothing, but my intentions were pure. For the most part. I wanted Jackson out of our lives, and the most efficient way to do it was to clear up any suspicious behavior on his part that would entangle him further in the murder investigation of Vinnie C. Revealing all of this to Bill would only complicate my life.

  Bill paused on our screened-in porch. No trace of our boarder. “Jackson had been a friend of Vinnie’s. The Candle Beach police will want to interview him.”

  “You think so?” I asked and unlocked the door, flicked on a light, and headed to the kitchen for a glass of water. And to avoid Bill’s scrutiny. He had a way of reading me that could be unnerving.

  “Are you telling me everything about Jackson?” He stepped up behind me, his arms around my waist. I smelled the musky scent of his aftershave and felt his muscled torso pressing against my back.

  Had he guessed that I was holding out? This required a full-frontal attack. “Mmm.” I rotated in his arms and kissed him squarely on the mouth. That ended the Jackson discussion…

  * * * *

  I gazed into the dark of the bedroom with only a thin slice of moonlight that had crept in under the window shade providing illumination. The digital alarm clock read 2 a.m. I’d been awake for an hour, tossing this way and that under the sheet, afraid that I would disturb Bill. No danger there; his breathing was deep and regular. This was ridiculous. I eased to the edge of the bed and executed a rollover that barely jiggled the mattress but landed my feet on the floor. I pulled on a T-shirt and shorts and padded noiselessly to the living room, where I switched on a table lamp.

  A series of notions jostled one another in my mind, each pushing the other out of the way to grab first in line: What specific evidence did the Candle Beach police have that convinced them Vinnie was murdered? Had Vinnie been killed somewhere else and dumped on the beach? And—I gulped—what did Jackson know about the murder? When we talked this morning, he had been a person of interest. What was he now? And for that matter, where was he now?

  Sleep was miles off yet, so I opened my laptop. What did I know about Vinnie Carcherelli besides him being Jackson’s partner in the charter boat business before the hurricane? Neither he nor Jackson was very capable in the bookkeeping department, their venture continually teetering on the brink of disaster. Vinnie was a happy time Charlie and liked to party; he had no steady girlfriend when I knew him. That was it.

  I typed his name in the search bar of my computer. Up popped a handful of links for four different Vincent Carcherellis—an account manager in Florida, a photographer in the Bronx, and two in Italy. A father and a son. Vinnie C’s links consisted of newspaper articles on his death, and further back, one from a year ago, about the opening of his new charter enterprise with a shot of a beaming Vinnie standing in the hull of The Bounty. The article described how Vinnie had lost his previous boat due to the ravages of Hurricane Sandy—and bad management, if you asked me—and that he and his partner would soon be serving visitors to the Jersey Shore. The writer ended the story wishing the twosome smooth sailing. A puff piece with few details and no mention that the new boat business had a particular wealthy clientele in mind. Who was the other unnamed partner and what was his or her status, and that of the business, now that Vinnie was dead? Did Jackson have any idea?

  I was wide awake and had no intention of spending the rest of the night flip-flopping in bed, preventing Bill from getting a decent night’s sleep. So I cleared Vinnie’s name, typed in “dry drowning,” and clicked on the first link, a definition and discussion. Though Grody was correct in his description of the condition—no water in the victim’s lungs—curiously it was a medically discredited term. In 2002, a World Congress on Drowning established a consensus definition: Drowning was the process of experiencing respiratory impairment from submersion or immersion in liquid and that the end result of hypoxemia (low oxygen in the blood), acidemia (abnormal acidity of the blood), and death was the same regardless of whether water entered the lungs. Experts discouraged the use of the terms “wet drowning” and “dry drowning” to avoid significant confusion and because the terms were not relevant to drowning care. Huh.

  However, the term was significant if it indicated that someone had murdered Vinnie on a dry dock and dumped him on the beach to give the impression of a drowning. What about Vinnie’s blood alcohol level? According to both Jackson and Grody, Vinnie was famous for tippling a bit too much. Drinking could have contributed to his death. No doubt the toxicology report from the autopsy would confirm if that was the case.

  I leaned into the sofa cushions and closed my eyes. I waited a moment. Nope, I wasn’t ready yet to head to bed. My fingers played over the keyboard of my laptop. I looked at my email, the shore weather for the next five days, and researched new casserole recipes. I’d been encouraging Henry to experiment with some one-dish specials at the Windjammer. Like chili rellenos, cheesy broccoli and quinoa with sausage, a variation on a creamy tuna noodle casserole…

  I yawned. On a whim I typed “Sam Baldwin Jersey Shore” into the search bar. The results were surprising. The link describing his Baldwin General Contractors was straightforward, and a website provided an overview of the company. Services included additions, renovations, bathrooms, and kitchens, with a mention of carpentry, masonry, roofing, and siding. A portfolio page boasted photos of completed remodeling projects, and the “About Us” page described the founding of the company in 1990, listed reviews from satisfied customers, and included a picture of Sam and his wife, Arlene, sitting on an outside deck. Presumably one he’d built. Sam’s business appeared to be a very successful enterprise. I studied the photo. Both Sam and his wife looked as if they were in their early forties. It had to have been taken a while ago.

  I went back to the Internet links. Though I knew he was a benefactor of the New Jersey Community Theater Festival, his philanthropy extended far beyond the arts. Article after article described his donations to various institutions in the area: a hospital wing, a school athletic field, the Candle Beach library, an aquarium… If the articles were to be believed, Sam was a sugar daddy of the Jersey Shore. Not exactly the impression I got from interacting with him.

  What startled me were t
he links illustrating Sam’s activities since the destruction of Hurricane Sandy. I’d read newspaper stories and seen a 60 Minutes segment on construction and insurance fraud after the brutal storm. But in recent years I hadn’t paid a ton of attention to the ongoing reconstruction crises. Skimming stories on the storm revealed examples of price gouging, swindling, and theft by shady contractors and scam artists to the tune of millions of dollars. Some residents of the shore area were assaulted twice: first by the hurricane and then by greedy predators. Without much effort, I am back in 2012. I can hear the roaring of the wind, see branches from the elm tree in my front yard crashing through the roof of my home at the height of Sandy’s wrath. I shuddered. It was this devastation that had driven me to North Jersey.

  Sam Baldwin was actually one of the good guys. Not only was he an honest contractor—according to testimonials—but he’d made it a point to combat the dishonest members of his profession by holding town hall meetings on how to avoid being a victim of unscrupulous companies and how to navigate the tangle of state and federal red tape that was wrapped around relief programs. There were photos of Sam shaking hands with shore residents, municipal government officials, and the governor. Another link went to an article on Sam hosting a party for children of homeowners victimized by the storm at the Candle Beach amusement park. Kids played in the arcade and enjoyed the rides. I was impressed…my outlook on Sam shifted about three hundred and sixty degrees.

  I jumped, startled by a light thunk from outside my bungalow. Possibly Jackson returning. Late, or early, depending on one’s point of view.

  I set my laptop aside, opened the front door, and muttered, “Jackson, where have you been? We need to…” I paused and glanced around. No sign of my errant former boyfriend. His pile of belongings was undisturbed. A creepy sensation freaked me out. Was the noise my imagination? Did it originate from one of the properties next door? The houses on both sides were dark. All on the street was quiet.

  I could rouse Bill, but why disrupt his sleep if it was only a nighttime house noise or some non-human critter nosing around the perimeter of the place? Such as a raccoon investigating the trash. I stepped inside and shut the door quickly. I needed to get back into bed, where any wayward noises were drowned out by Bill’s—

  “Yo.”

  A tap on my back. “Arrgh!” My heart shot into my mouth.

  “Shh! You’ll wake the house,” Jackson admonished me.

  I whacked his arm.

  “Ouch. Cut that out.” He ducked away from me.

  “Why are you sneaking up on me? And how did you get in here?” I pushed him onto the screened-in porch. He collapsed into the comfy rocking chair. An outdoor lamp provided enough illumination to see how guarded and stricken Jackson looked.

  “First of all, I wasn’t sneaking in the house. The porch door was locked, and then I remembered how you used to leave back doors open in case you forgot a key,” he said wearily.

  Had I left the back door unlocked subconsciously? “You look worse than you did this morning. What’s going on?” I asked, a trifle kinder.

  Jackson blew out air from between pursed lips and tugged on his earlobe. Oh no…I could not take another round of lies and evasions from him. “I recognize that sign.”

  He self-consciously put his hands in his lap. “You always could read me, Dod.”

  “Jackson, have you heard what’s happening?” I asked quietly.

  “About Vinnie? Yeah. I been thinking about blowing town. Head back to Iowa. Selling farm equipment’s not so bad…”

  My jaw dropped. “Blowing town? You are a person of interest in a murder investigation. Leaving town is the equivalent of confessing. Are you out of your mind?” I struggled to keep my voice and irritation under control. “Jackson, I want the truth about what went down with you and Vinnie.”

  He rubbed his eyes. “Not that again. Gimme a break—”

  I poked him. “You’re not going to sleep until I get the truth out of you.”

  The creaking of the rocking chair cut into the silence. The planes of Jackson’s weary face created scary shadows. This was not the man I split up with years ago. His shoulders sagged, his cocky confidence melted away.

  “Vinnie was, like, my man…” Jackson was about to cry. “When the JV was running we were, like, best bros. Did everything together.” He smirked. “Well…almost everything.”

  “Right. Got it.”

  “Anyway, when Sandy hit and the JV was destroyed and you and I…well…things were rocky there.”

  “They were.”

  “It was time to move on. And my blood bro needed help.” Jackson shrugged. “So, Iowa.”

  “Were you in touch with Vinnie while you were away?” I asked kindly, assuming an ounce of honey would get me more answers than a whole bottle of vinegar.

  “Nah. Not for three years. Then he began emailing and texting last year. All about his new boat The Bounty and some job opportunities and did I want in. Truth is, I’m a class A salesman.”

  Didn’t I know it. Jackson had sold me a bill of goods on many occasions.

  “I can sell anything. Almost anything. But tractors, harvesters, cultivators? Not my thing,” Jackson said.

  “So when Vinnie proposed bringing you onboard, so to speak…”

  Jackson grinned innocently. “I hit the road and showed up here.”

  “With no funds and no place to stay?” I asked.

  “I planned to bunk with Vinnie, but that was a no go. Then I heard from Grody about you being here and I thought, what the hell, maybe for old times’ sake,” he said.

  “You and Vinnie met up and…what…talked about his new charter boat business?”

  “Something like that,” he said evasively.

  “Did he give you any details? Like who his clients were?”

  “Nope. Hey, where’s Bill?” he asked suddenly.

  “In bed. Where I should be—”

  “Me too. Let’s talk in the morning.” Jackson headed to his stockpile of clothing. “Did you…fold my stuff?” He was suddenly wary.

  “You left things in a mess.” Instinct told me to keep my discovery of his money to myself.

  “Sorry about that.”

  I felt vulnerable. “Jackson, you want to sleep in the guest bedroom?”

  “Thanks but, like, I’m having fun out here. Kind of like sleeping under the stars.” He snickered. “Anyway, need to give you and Bill some privacy.”

  That particular horse was out of the barn.

  * * * *

  I lay awake. But this time I mulled over my past with Jackson. What had drawn me to him? I was younger then—nearly ten years younger when we embarked on our relationship. He was cute, funny, always a great time. We laughed a lot and liked the same things: sunbathing, sailing, and seafood. We both spent a lot of hours on our jobs and were fairly loose about demands on each other’s time. We took things easy. What had changed? Hurricane Sandy sobered us up. Forced us to confront reality—we weren’t meant for each other, and life offered more interesting prospects. I wasn’t sure Iowa had been all that productive for Jackson; however, Etonville had brought me Bill, friends, and work that I enjoyed. I loved my life. I didn’t think Jackson could say the same.

  7

  “Dodie!” Bill’s strangled cry yanked me from a pleasant dream. I was serving seafood hors d’oeuvres to a large, appreciative theater audience who chewed and smacked their lips.

  “Wha—? What?” I sat upright in bed, my pulse racing. Bill held on to the doorjamb for support. Clearly distraught. He must have seen Jackson on the front porch. “I can explain. I was up late and Jackson showed up and he needed a place to sleep and I even offered him the bedroom but he said the porch was fine and—”

  “Dodie! Stop!” He raised his hand like a patrol cop. “I don’t care about Jackson.”

  He was upset. “What
’s the matter?” I hopped out of bed and grabbed my robe. It was only seven thirty.

  “My car. It’s gone.” Bill tore at his hair, then opened and closed drawers as he jerked on jeans and a clean T-shirt. “I’ll need your car.”

  My mind was fuzzy, craving caffeine to get it functioning. “What do you mean ‘gone’?”

  “Gone. As in, I left it parked on the street and now it isn’t there.”

  He did? I couldn’t remember. “Bill…what the…are you sure? Maybe you left it by the boardwalk and forgot. I’ve done that.”

  We both knew that wasn’t Bill’s MO; he was a police chief, after all. He had to keep track of where he left things. Like his automobile.

  “I need to get to the Candle Beach police and make a report.”

  “Wait. I’m coming with you.” Now it was my turn to tug on a T-shirt and jeans. “What were you doing up so early?”

  “I was going to bring you breakfast in bed with donuts from the bakery. I went to the kitchen to put on the coffee and looked out the window. No BMW.”

  “I’m so sorry.”

  “Me too. Let’s go.”

  I crossed my fingers that Jackson was asleep and that we didn’t need to confront his presence. Too late. As we stepped onto the porch, his head poked out of the sleeping bag, his face covered in stubble, his long mane tousled. “Wassup, bro?”

  “Never mind. Go back to sleep.” I nudged Bill forward, but he paused in his tracks.

  “Did you hear anything early this morning? Like an engine starting or somebody creeping around? My car’s missing,” Bill said.

  “Dude, I am soooo sorry. But nada on the sound thing. ’Course, I sleep like a baby. So something like a car engine might’ve got by me.”

  Jackson was going to be no help. “Don’t leave the house until I get back if you want to spend another night here,” I said more sharply than I intended.

  Bill scrutinized me and Jackson saluted. “I’ll drive.” I brushed past Bill, unlocked my MINI Cooper, and slid behind the wheel.