Killer Honeymoon Part 24

"Probably pure coincidence."

"Probably, but I thought I should tell you. Are you back on the island yet?"

"Just walked in the door of the cottage." She looked over and saw Dirk waving his hand. "Dirk says 'hi.' "

"Actually, I was asking you to get rid of her," he mumbled under his breath.

Savannah nodded. "How's stuff there?"

"Stuff's great!" Tammy giggled. "That was a great idea you had, 'cause-"

"I gotta go. Thanks for, you know, everything."

"No problem. Glad to do it. All of it."

There were peals of giggles on the other end as Tammy hung up.

Savannah shook her head, laughing. "For just five minutes of my life, I'd like to be as cheerful as she is all the time."

"She's an airhead. It's easy for her to be chipper. She don't know no better."

A knock at the back door made them both jump. As Savannah went to answer it, she steeled herself that it could be Chief La Cross.

"Or the killer," whispered a quiet little voice. "You wouldn't be the first witness who-"

"Oh, shut up," she told it.

But she subconsciously reached under her arm and touched the Beretta in her holster. She glanced over her shoulder and saw Dirk was right behind her; his hand was on his weapon as well.

However, when she opened the door, it was Betty Sue's smiling face that she saw. In her hands, the shopkeeper held a basket spilling over with freshly cut flowers, baked goods, and a bottle of wine.

"What's all this?" Savannah asked, opening the door and ushering her inside.

"Oh, it's nothing much. I heard you two weren't having a very nice honeymoon, and we can't have that!"

Betty Sue set the basket on the kitchen counter and turned to them. "Holy c.r.a.p!" she said. "What happened to you two?"

Savannah put her hand to her swollen, bruised lip. Okay, so much for the merits of cover-up makeup.

"Uh, we sorta fell into a meat grinder," Dirk grumbled.

"No kidding. I'd hate to see what the other guys look like."

Savannah felt no need to set any records straight by informing Betty Sue that it was only one guy, and the last time they'd seen him, he looked a heck of a lot better than they did.

"Thank you for this basket," Savannah said, rummaging through the goodies and finding all sorts of wonderful treats, many of which contained chocolate-Savannah's number one standard of quality. "You're a sweetheart to think of us."

Betty Sue lowered her voice and glanced around, as though expecting some sort of eavesdropping gremlins to appear inside the kitchen. "I heard you're trying to find out what happened to Amelia Northrop. And I remember that friend of yours who rented this place for you, he said you're a cop and a private investigator."

"Guilty as charged," Dirk replied as he pulled out a cellophane-wrapped chocolate chip m.u.f.fin and began to unwrap it.

"Do you know who did it yet?" Betty Sue asked. "Does that have anything to do with the fact that your faces are all beat to h.e.l.l and back?"

How lovely, Savannah thought. Another nice little memory to tuck away in the mental honeymoon alb.u.m. Being told that you look like you've been beaten "to h.e.l.l and back."

"Well, we certainly didn't do it to each other," Savannah said, "and that's all that matters."

Betty Sue glanced at her watch. "I gotta get back to the shop. You two enjoy your basket and, hopefully, the rest of your stay with us."

"Thank you, ma'am," Dirk said. "I'm sure we will."

Savannah walked Betty Sue to the door. Just as she was stepping outside, Savannah asked, "By the way, do you know a woman named Opal Parson?"

"Sure. Opal lives just a block away from me on Schooner Drive. She's got a big, wonderful house, sort of Victorian-ish, not like my little sea shack. But then, Opal can afford it. She's a successful interior decorator you know."

"Yes, so I heard."

Betty Sue paused halfway down the steps and looked around once again, as though checking for snoopers. "Don't tell anybody I told you, but you and Opal have more in common than you might think."

"Oh?" Savannah considered her own modest decorator skills and figured Betty Sue was mistaken.

"Yeah. When she's not decorating, she's got herself another little business on the side. Opal's a private detective."

"Really?" The hamster in Savannah's mental wheel started running like crazy.

"Yes. She's got herself a specialty, you might say."

Savannah could almost taste the sweet answer before Betty delivered it.

Betty Sue waggled one eyebrow and whispered, "Between you and me, she's real good at catching spouses who cheat."

Fortunately, Schooner Drive was short and had only one big Victorian-style house on it. Then there was the other clue that it was Opal's home-the large gilt, hand-carved sign in the yard: OPAL'S INTERIORS.

As Savannah pulled the Jaguar over to the side of the road and parked in front of the house, she told Dirk, "I think you should let me take the lead on this one. You know, it being a woman and all."

He was already sulking from having to give her a turn behind the wheel, so he wasn't thrilled with this new insult added to injury.

"Yeah, that worked out really great with Xenos," he snapped.

"Don't you dare throw that up to me, buddy boy!" she tossed back. "I was doing fine with him until-"

"Until he called you a filthy name and shoved you?"

"Until you felt the need to land on him like a ton of bricks!"

They both sat there forever, glaring at each other, nostrils flaring, breathing hard, until Savannah broke the stalemate. "Maybe in an effort to preserve domestic tranquility, we should never bring up Ian Xenos again."

"Good idea." He opened his door. "Let's get going."

"I do the talking."

"Yeah, yeah. Whatever."

They walked up to the arched door, which was carved mahogany, and knocked with the bra.s.s knocker. Though the sound echoed inside the house, no one answered.

"I think I hear something around back," Savannah said.

Dirk listened for a moment, and the sound of some sort of machine became even louder.

"I hear it, too. Let's go."

They walked around the house to the rear and followed the sound to a large garage shaped like a barn. Looking inside the open doors, they could see it had been converted to a workshop.

Inside, wearing stained jeans and a tee-shirt bearing a Victorian house as a logo on the front, was a slender woman with dark brown, short, curly hair. She was wearing an industrial-grade dust mask and was working over the top of an oak table with an electric sander. Dust was flying everywhere.

"Excuse me," Savannah said. Not surprisingly, the woman didn't hear her and continued to sand. "Hey! Excuse me!" she shouted.

This time, the woman heard. She turned off her sander and set it on a nearby workhorse table.

"Hi," she said as she walked over to greet them, wiping her dusty palms on her jeans.

Savannah held out her hand. "I'm Savannah Reid. This is my husband, Detective Sergeant Dirk Coulter."

At the mention of Dirk's rank, an expression of fear flickered across the woman's face, but she smiled nervously and shook their hands. "I'm Opal Parson. Sorry for the mess." She waved an arm, indicating the cluttered workroom, filled with half-done projects. "But contrary to popular opinion, interior decorating isn't always glamorous. In fact, it seldom is."

"I'm sure the end result is worth all the drudgery," Savannah said. "I wish I knew how to do what you do." She pointed to a gorgeous claw-foot armoire, which was half-restored. "Like knowing how to rescue a lovely thing like that. It must be fulfilling."

"It is. It's most satisfying." She looked from Savannah to Dirk. For a long, uncomfortable moment, no one said anything, and slowly the fake, friendly smile disappeared from her face. "But you didn't come here to talk about restoring furniture, did you?"

"No, Ms. Parson, we didn't," Savannah said.

Suddenly she looked tired, defeated. "I was wondering when someone was going to come question me. Figured it was just a matter of time." She tossed her mask down onto the table. "Let's get out of here," she said. "If I'm going to do this, I need some fresh air."

Opal led Savannah and Dirk up a small hill behind her house to a charming gazebo. Inside, she invited them to sit in comfortable wicker chairs. She sat across from them in the same type of chair, but she looked quite uncomfortable.

"Go ahead," Opal said, brushing some stray curls out of her eyes. "Tell me why you're here."

"It's about Amelia Northrop," Savannah told her.

"Like I didn't already know that." Opal sighed.

"You did some work for her."

"Yes. I did."

"I'm a.s.suming you didn't decorate that big gla.s.s box of theirs," Dirk chimed in.

Savannah shot him a be-quiet look.

"No, I did not decorate that monstrosity, I'm happy to say."

Savannah drew a deep breath. "So the work you did for Amelia came under the heading of 'Unfaithful Spouse Investigation'?"

Opal looked down at her hands, which were folded in her lap. They were trembling. "I'm very uneasy about this," she said. Her voice was shaking as badly as her hands. "Normally, I'm very conscientious when it comes to client confidentiality. I pride myself on being highly discreet."

"I understand," Savannah replied. "Being a PI myself, I feel the same way."

"I have always believed that confidentiality extends even after a client's death."

Savannah was starting to get worried about where this might be headed. "Normally, I would agree," she said. "I suppose it would depend upon the circ.u.mstances."

"I'm afraid the circ.u.mstances of this case require me to break that rule." Opal closed her eyes as though feeling some sort of internal stab of pain. "Because I'm afraid that I may have inadvertently done something that led to a tragedy."

"Tell us about it," Dirk coaxed gently. "You'll feel better if you do."

"Oh, I don't know. I think it's going to take a lot more than that to make me feel better, but here goes."

She sat back in her chair and crossed her arms over her chest. Her voice became a flat monotone as she told them her story.

"Amelia Northrop came to me, here at my house. In fact, we sat right here in this gazebo while she poured her heart out to me. She had a strong suspicion that her husband, William, was being unfaithful to her. She had suspected it for some time and wanted to know for sure, once and for all.

"Frequently people come to me because they actually want to catch their cheating mate. They want out of the marriage, and they're looking for a good reason to leave.

"But Amelia wasn't like that. I think she truly wanted to hear me report back to her that she was mistaken, that he was as good a husband as she had hoped he was."

"Let me guess," Dirk said, "he was a rat fink."

She nodded. "He was. No doubt about it. I had the pictures, the video, and the audio recordings. She demanded to see and listen to everything I had. She was devastated."

"I can imagine," Savannah said, thinking of the beautiful woman whose bright smile and bubbly personality lit up the television screen every night at 11:00.

Thousands of men gazed at that beauty every night and wanted her. And yet, for the man who had her, she wasn't enough.

"I've been doing this for years, but I think her grief was the deepest I've ever seen. She felt so terribly betrayed. And she was angry. Horribly angry.

"I couldn't console her. She left here, sobbing hysterically. I remember worrying if she would even be able to drive, considering her state of mind."

"Did you hear anything more from her?" Savannah asked.

"No. The next night, I was delivering a sofa, which I had reupholstered, to a client, and that's when I'd heard that William Northrop was in the hospital. That he'd been shot."

"Do you think she did it?" Savannah asked.

"Well, yes. It certainly occurred to me that she might have. I mean, what are the odds?"

Savannah looked over at Dirk and saw he was as intrigued by this news as she was.

"I suppose it might have been a coincidence," Savannah said, testing her.