The Ghost Who Was Says I Do Page 19

  “Considering what Clint tried to do with Danielle’s portraits, we all know he was not above pulling a scam on someone,” Lily reminded them.

  “If Clint and Claudia were somehow getting an appraiser to overvalue property and Dirk knew that—or if Clint and Claudia were violating their fiduciary duties to their clients, that might all be illegal, yet I doubt it’s what Dirk is trying to blackmail me over,” Walt said.

  “Why do you say that?” Lily asked.

  “Statute of limitations?” Danielle asked.

  Walt nodded. “We would have to look it up, but I suspect if all of this happened over six years ago, the statute of limitations would be up, making it impossible for anyone to charge Claudia or Clint.”

  “I thought it was seven years?” Lily asked.

  “It varies,” Ian said. “And if I’m not mistaken, I think it’s something like three years for real estate fraud.”

  Danielle stood at the window of the attic, looking outside at the near moonless night.

  “Are you coming?” Walt called out to Danielle from the bed, patting the empty spot next to him.

  “No one is back yet, not even Rachel.” She continued to stare out the window.

  “That probably means Claudia got ahold of her,” Walt suggested. “And it’s my guess they’re at a bar somewhere getting blotto.”

  “Blotto?” Danielle chuckled.

  “Would you prefer splifficated?” Walt asked.

  “Oh, I like splifficated better.” Danielle turned from the window and walked to the bed. Walt pulled back the covers so she could crawl in with him. When she did, he pulled her close, the two cuddling under the blankets.

  “Dirk must have called Tanya to pick him up,” Danielle said. “I hope when they come home tonight, they don’t wake us up.”

  “Maybe if we’re lucky, none of them will come back,” Walt said.

  “I just realized who else didn’t come back today like they promised.”

  “Marie and Eva?” Walt said before pulling Danielle closer.

  Twenty-Nine

  Reluctantly, Danielle opened her eyes and rolled over to face the nightstand. She looked at the time on the alarm clock. With a moan, she stumbled out of bed and made her way to the bathroom. A few minutes later she returned to the bedroom and looked out the window, rubbing her eyes.

  “Come back to bed,” Walt called out.

  “I gotta make breakfast,” she groaned.

  “No, you don’t. Joanne is coming this morning, remember?”

  “You’re right,” Danielle said with a relieved sigh, turning from the window.

  “Plus, someone is going to see you standing at my bedroom window early in the morning, and then there will be a scandal,” he teased.

  Crawling back into bed, under the sheets and blankets, she said, “I just wanted to see if our guests made it home last night.”

  “And?” Wrapping his arm around her, Walt pulled her close, spooning Danielle, resting his chin against the top of her head.

  “All the chicks are tucked in—or at least all three cars are parked in front of the house.”

  “I was rather hoping the Dane sisters and the Thorpes had decided to move on.”

  “No such luck. But today we can go talk to the chief, he is supposed to be back, and see if we can get together with Melony and get that marriage of Clint’s taken care of.”

  Walt pulled her tighter. “It isn’t true. I can’t believe Clint had a wife.”

  Turning so she could face him, Danielle placed her hands on his shoulders and looked in his blue eyes. “It is what it is. It’s Clint’s marriage, not yours. I know legally we need to deal with it, but considering everything, you need to stop letting it bother you so much.”

  “But if Clint was married to Claudia, then we’re not legally married.”

  Danielle brushed a kiss across Walt’s mouth and said, “Don’t be silly. You were never married to Claudia, so it really is a nonissue. Hopefully, if Clint was married to her, Melony can get the marriage dissolved before our wedding next month, and then we’ll make it not just official but legal. And if you have to pay Claudia something, so what? In the big scheme of things, you know as well as I do that there are some things money simply cannot buy—and you and I have that.”

  “I love you, Danielle Marlow,” Walt whispered before pulling her closer.

  Morning runs along the beach were typically brisk, but during winter months, they could be brutal. With the drop in temperature, Heather had started wearing long underwear under her jogging clothes. Considering the damp cold January weather, if she didn’t add layers, she would be freezing to death about now. As it was, she was cold in spite of the fact she had been running for a good thirty minutes. She had left the headphones at home and wasn’t listening to music. This morning she had a running partner—Hunny—Chris’s pit bull.

  The pair ran down the beach, Hunny staying close at Heather’s side without a leash. Heather had a leash; it was rolled up and in her jacket pocket along with her cellphone. Every so often Hunny would get a little ahead of Heather, but a simple whistle brought the dog back to her side.

  Anyone who met the pit bull was instantly impressed with how well trained she was. More than one person had asked Chris if he had a private trainer—or perhaps he had sent Hunny to puppy boot camp. Chris had done none of that, and if they had told any of those people the real reason the dog was so well trained, they would never believe it. Chris had a pet whisperer—Walt.

  It was fairly easy to train an intelligent dog if one had an interpreter. No reason to ply a dog with treats to make him or her understand what you want. Walt simply explained to Hunny the meaning of basic commands. This didn’t mean Hunny understood the meaning of every word. After all, she was a dog. Learning by Walt’s method of training didn’t deny Hunny her treats. In fact, Chris tended to overindulge her. It was one reason Heather took Hunny with her on the run—the dog could afford to lose a pound or two.

  Jogging south on the beach, Heather spied Chris’s house ahead. Chris was still in California, but he was supposed to be back today. She and Hunny had already passed the house once, but now she was on the way back home, which was just beyond Chris’s house, on the other side of the street. They were about three hundred feet from Chris’s house when Hunny took off running. Heather whistled. The sound of the waves washing up on shore along with the growing morning breeze drowned out the whistle. Heather wasn’t overly concerned; she figured Hunny would simply stop at Chris’s back porch and wait for her there. However, Hunny ran past the porch and veered away from the house and headed to the ocean.

  “No! It’s too cold to go swimming!” Heather cried out, breaking into a full run in hopes of getting to the dog before she jumped into the icy water.

  Instead of taking a dip, Hunny stopped just at the edge of the sand as it met the incoming waves. The dog began to bark at what appeared to be a tangle of seaweed. Hunny continued to bark, and when Heather got closer, within hearing distance for the dog, Heather’s stern command to come did little to dissuade Hunny. Holding her ground, the pit bull stood guard over the ocean debris and continued to bark.

  “Walt’s going to have a stern talk with you!” Nearing the dog, Heather was now out of breath. She looked at the seaweed that had so captured the dog’s attention, and her heart sank.

  “No…” Heather groaned. Stomping her right foot repeatedly in the sand, she shouted, “No! No! No! This always happens to me!”

  Tangled in the seaweed that so had the dog’s attention was a human foot—and attached to the foot was a body. An obviously dead body.

  When Danielle stepped out of her bedroom on the second floor Tuesday morning, she found Rachel standing by her door.

  “Good morning,” Danielle said brightly. She took a deep breath and could smell bacon cooking.

  “I knocked on your door several times, but you must be a deep sleeper,” Rachel said.

  It was then Danielle noticed Rachel’s serious express
ion. The fact was, Danielle had forgotten to turn on the baby monitor in her room when she went to bed the night before. It was something she normally did if guests were staying in the house. That way, if they came looking for her in the middle of the night because of an emergency, she would hear them. Everyone assumed she slept in a bedroom on the second floor. What they didn’t know, Danielle slept in the attic room with her secret husband—and she got up to the attic by way of the hidden staircase in her closet.

  “I’m sorry, is there a problem?” Danielle asked.

  “It’s Claudia, she never came back last night! I’m so worried.” Rachel started to cry.

  Danielle was still comforting Rachel in the hallway when Walt started coming down the stairs from the attic bedroom a few minutes later.

  “Let’s go downstairs, get you a cup of coffee,” Walt suggested, “and Danielle can call the police.”

  “The police?” Rachel started crying harder.

  Patting Rachel’s back and guiding her down the hallway, Danielle said, “I’m a good friend with the police chief. Let me call him.”

  Once they were downstairs, Walt went to the kitchen to get some coffee while Danielle tried to calm Rachel. While calling the police, she didn’t need a sobbing woman in the background. In the kitchen Walt found Joanne preparing breakfast.

  “Morning, Joanne, I just came to get some coffee,” Walt told her as he grabbed three mugs from the overhead cabinet.

  “Did I hear someone crying?” Joanne asked.

  “Yes. One of our guests is upset because her sister never came home last night,” Walt told her as he filled one of the cups with coffee.

  “Oh dear. I hope she’s okay.” Joanne stood at the counter, cutting up a melon.

  “Has anyone else been down this morning yet?” Walt asked.

  “I met the Russoms. They seem like a nice couple. They said they’re having breakfast at his cousin’s house, but they did take a couple of cinnamon rolls with them.”

  “What about the Thorpes?” Walt asked.

  “The Russoms were the only ones who have been down this morning—except for you.”

  When Police Chief MacDonald arrived at Chris’s house, he found Heather sitting on the back patio with Hunny by her side. On the beach nearby, several officers stood by what he assumed was the body.

  “Morning, Heather, I see it happened again?” MacDonald greeted her.

  “I am cursed,” Heather groaned.

  “Do you recognize the person?” he asked, glancing from Heather to his officers down by the water.

  Heather shook her head. “Fortunately, no. Tripping over dead bodies is bad enough, but I’d rather not know them.”

  “Have you seen…umm—”

  “Any ghosts?” Heather finished for him.

  “Have you?”

  Heather shook her head. “Not yet. It’s possible the spirit has already moved on—or is lingering near the actual place of death.”

  With a nod, MacDonald left Heather and walked down to his officers and the body.

  The first thing he noticed, the eyes were closed. He always felt a corpse looked more peaceful with the eyes closed; while open—they looked more dead.

  “Do we have any idea who it is?” MacDonald asked.

  Brian Henderson, who had been kneeling by the body, stood up and handed the chief a wallet. “This was in the coat pocket.”

  “Does it look like a drowning?” the chief asked, flipping through the soaked wallet.

  “Considering the bullet hole in the chest, I don’t think so,” said one of the responders from the coroner’s office, who was inspecting the body.

  MacDonald pulled a California driver’s license from the wallet just as his phone began to ring—it was Danielle. Believing she might be of some help if this was murder, and because she only lived a few doors down, he took the call.

  “Morning, Danielle,” he answered.

  “Chief, I hate to bother you so early in the morning, but we have a situation…”

  MacDonald studied the license as he listened to Danielle, comparing its photograph to the face of the corpse. “Yes?”

  “One of our guests is missing. She didn’t come home last night. Her name is Claudia Dane, and she’s thirty—”

  “Danielle,” he interrupted.

  “Yes?”

  “I’m afraid I may have found your missing guest.”

  “What do you mean?” Danielle asked.

  “A body washed up on the beach last night, in front of Chris’s house. If you look out your front window, you’ll see all the police cars. It’s a woman, and according to the driver’s license we found in her wallet, her name is Claudia Dane.”

  There was silence on the other end of the line. Finally, the chief asked, “Are you still there?”

  “I’m sitting here with Claudia’s sister, Rachel. She’s pretty worried about her sister, and I told her I would call you.”

  “And you don’t want to just blurt out her sister is dead—I get it. This wasn’t a drowning, Danielle. She has been shot. I’ll need to talk to the sister. How about if I come over there?”

  “That might be a good idea.”

  Thirty

  Danielle continued to hold the phone by her ear, even though MacDonald had already hung up. She needed to collect her thoughts, dreading what she was going to have to tell Rachel. After a moment, she let out a sigh and lowered the cellphone.

  “What did he say?” Rachel asked anxiously.

  Setting the phone on the nearby table, Danielle turned to Rachel and took her hand. “I am so sorry to have to tell you this…”

  Rachel began shaking her head in denial, and before Danielle could finish her sentence, she sobbed, “No!”

  “I am so, so sorry, Rachel.” Danielle squeezed her hand gently, helping the crying woman to a nearby chair.

  “What happened?” Walt asked as he walked into the library with a serving tray carrying three cups of coffee and three cinnamon rolls.

  Standing by Rachel’s side, her hand on the crying woman’s shoulder, Danielle looked at Walt. “The chief is on his way over to talk to Rachel. They found Claudia—her body washed up on the beach near Chris’s house.”

  “What happened?” Rachel asked between sobs. “This morning I woke up and she still wasn’t back, and I just knew something was wrong. Twins know. What happened?”

  “Police Chief MacDonald should be here any minute,” Danielle told her. “And he can tell you what he knows.”

  Stifling her sobs, Rachel wiped the tears away with the back of her sleeve. Her red-rimmed eyes looked up at Walt. “Did you do this?”

  Startled by the question, Walt said, “Good God, no. I barely knew the woman. Why would I hurt her?”

  “Because she was blackmailing you. That’s what it was. I told her it was dangerous, but she insisted you would never hurt her.”

  Kneeling by Rachel’s side, Danielle took hold of her hand and looked into the grieving woman’s face. “Walt didn’t hurt Claudia.”

  “But did Clint?” Rachel choked out, flashing an angry glare to Walt.

  “Why would he? The marriage was no secret from me, and considering his amnesia, no one is going to hold it against him for having a wife he didn’t remember. We told you he intended to let his lawyer handle it. Hurting your sister makes no sense.”

  “But she’s dead. And he was the last one who saw her!” Rachel sobbed.

  The doorbell rang. Danielle looked up at Walt. “That’s probably the chief now.”

  “I’ll let him in,” Walt said, turning to the door.

  Police Chief MacDonald sat alone with Rachel in the library of Marlow House.

  “Can you tell me when the last time you saw your sister was?” he asked.

  “Right before I left for the show yesterday. I asked her to go with me.”

  “And she didn’t call you anytime after that?” he asked.

  Drying the corners of her eyes with a tissue, she sniffled. “No. She left her pho
ne here.”

  “Was that common for your sister to leave her phone behind?”

  Rachel shrugged. “Sometimes. Especially when she wanted to disconnect from work. She is—was a real estate agent.”

  “Her wallet was in her pocket. Do you know if she took a purse with her?”

  Rachel shook her head. “Her purse is upstairs, with her phone. She didn’t like carrying things. If we walked somewhere instead of taking the car, it was pretty common for her to put her wallet in her pocket.

  “Last night when she didn’t return, were you concerned?”

  Holding the damp tissue in her hands, she looked down and absently twisted it. “I feel a little guilty. I accused Clint of hurting her. But I think I know what happened.”

  The chief arched his brows. “You do?”

  Still twisting the tissue, she nodded. “When I came home from the movies, Clint—I mean Walt told me he had taken a walk with Claudia so they could talk. They, umm…well, used to know each other…before his accident. He can’t remember.”

  “So what do you think happened?”

  “I don’t think the conversation went as Claudia expected. I loved my sister, but she could act impulsively. Knowing her, she got angry, found a local bar, had too much to drink, and since she didn’t have her phone on her, tried to walk home and somehow fell in the ocean.”

  “Rachel, your sister did not just fall into the ocean.”

  Rachel looked up, her eyes wide. No longer twisting the tissue, she asked, “What do you mean?”

  “Your sister was shot. We won’t know for sure until after the autopsy, but it looks as if she was shot and then thrown into the ocean.”