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  Pris said, “Maybe Jack stole the anchor to embarrass his family because he knew Stephen would get the business before he ever would.”

  “And Charlotte killed him cause he tried humiliating her? That would take some profound level of evil.”

  “It wouldn’t be the first time in history,” Pris said as she refilled their cognac glasses.

  * * *

  Twenty minutes later, Vance and Buster Crab came roaring in with so much energy, both she and Pris had to lift their cognac glasses before Buster’s tail sent them flying across the room. She hugged Buster and Vance came in the kitchen tossing his jacket onto the island.

  “Hey, how about this,” he said, talking fast, “it’s Stephen taking the anchor from the Crockett Foundation because he’s going to frame his brother Jack. If Jack takes the fall for the theft of the anchor then the business will go to Stephen.”

  Bette saw it, but cocked her head. “We talked to Stephen at the brewery and he didn’t honestly seem so jazzed about having control of the crabbing business.” She shrugged.

  “What if he did it for his father’s sake? Like this big secret Stephen has will be safe if he runs the crabbing business. Like it’s Charlotte who has the secret over him—we know that—and she wants him in charge because she’s a psycho control freak, so he gets his brother out of the picture and gets the business, then Charlotte will keep her mouth shut. Stephen would think that a simple petty crime like stealing the dumb anchor wouldn’t really damage Jack, just enough he’d get the business. His secret’s safe, his dad is none the wiser, and his mother is content.”

  Pris nodded. “So Stephen steals the anchor to frame Jack but Jack finds out and maybe they fight.”

  Vance said, “And in the fight . . .”

  “Jack ends up dead,” Bette said, leaning forward and considering it, still hugging Buster.

  Vance said, “Stephen was in the café, so he could have hid the knife in Cherry’s freezer.”

  Bette said, “I do think Stephen actually cares about Cherry for some reason. You think he would let her take the fall, hide the murder weapon on her property?”

  Pris said, “Less he thought he’d nip in some other time and take the knife elsewhere, hide it better, but just never got the chance.”

  “Or maybe Cherry witnessed the whole thing and she hid the knife to protect Stephen,” Bette said.

  None of them liked that direction and they all slumped and sighed and Vance dropped onto the couch opposite her again. Ripken padded over and crawled in his lap.

  Vance said, “She is very kind.”

  Pris said, “She might do something like that. Out of kindness.”

  Bette said, “No. I don’t think she would.”

  Vance liked that statement, smiling and stroking Ripken’s back. “No, you know you’re right. She’s kind, but not dumb.”

  Pris nodded, looking sleepy, the firelight dancing on her face.

  “And Cherry wouldn’t steal the anchor either. We know that,” Vance said, trailing off, letting them know he had more ideas.

  Pris said to him, “So what do you think?”

  “Mom, you said you weren’t convinced it was Cherry with the anchor on the video, that your big dumb cop friend might only assume it.”

  “He’s not dumb, Vance, and, yeah, he maybe assumed it was her. We know that he couldn’t see the face of the other person in the alley, so how would he see it was Cherry’s face?”

  “How about this: Stephen has an accomplice. An accomplice that’s his secret, too. A girlfriend Charlotte disapproves of and Stephen and his girlfriend are working together to make sure Charlotte keeps them a secret from Vinnie.”

  Bette didn’t buy it. “A secret girlfriend, Vance?”

  “You don’t think so?”

  “Sounds like wishful thinking on your part.”

  “What does that mean?” He looked surly and then popped a piece of cheese in his mouth, chewing and petting Ripken, staring into the fire.

  Bette said, “What kind of girlfriend would Stephen have that it’d have to be a secret?”

  “I don’t know. A cousin or something maybe.” He still stared at the fire.

  “Charlotte wouldn’t be okay with that, either, Vance.”

  “No,” Vance agreed. “I just think . . . wouldn’t Charlotte dislike any woman who threatened her connection to her beloved Stephen. Cherry was bad but maybe this other one is worse. Maybe . . .”

  “I see what you’re saying, but yet . . . Here’s where I think you’re on to something: Cherry and Stephen are working together to keep a secret Charlotte knows away from Vinnie.”

  Vance nodded happily. He liked that.

  Bette said, “It’s not much to go on, but I’m calling Marcus to let him know.”

  “Pfft,” Vance exhaled. “Guy that put the cuffs on Cherry?”

  “He’s on our side, Vance.”

  Vance grumbled, hugged Ripken to his chest and stared at the flames. Bette looked to Pris to see what her aunt thought. Pris’s eyes had closed and she slept, her head beginning to dip forward. Bette removed the cognac glass from Pris’s hand and put a blanket on her lap. She checked her watch.

  When she began to collect the dishes, Vance said, “I thought you were going to call that cop friend?”

  “Little late,” she said. “I’ll talk to Marcus tomorrow morning.” Wouldn’t want him getting the wrong idea.

  THE NEXT MORNING

  In the morning, Bette cooked them breakfast. Pris stayed the night at Fortune, took a guest room, and woke with a headache she refused to admit was from drinking too much port. Orange juice, a pot of strong coffee, bacon, hash browns, fried tomatoes, and cornbread biscuits got her on her feet again. Got Vance footed as well, her son lapping up the home cooking and care he was used to going to high school in Bethesda when he was a teen.

  Once Pris was fed, she became a motivated demon again, clapping her hands and acting like everyone else was a slacker, saying, “I’m gone on to The Promise and when I get back, it’ll be in my truck and I hope to see you two lazy bones in comfortable walking wear.”

  Vance asked for what, and Bette’d said, “Pris wants us to go out with the walking group this morning.”

  Vance asked what that was and Pris said, “Come on with us and find out.” Then she left the Fortune and headed along the beach back to her place.

  Vance said, “That was ominous,” and Bette didn’t argue.

  On her word, Pris returned a half hour later, honking her pickup truck’s horn out front of the Fortune, and when she and Vance’d clambered in finding Pris with sunglasses and an all-white track suit, Vance said he felt underdressed.

  Pris said, “Long as you got your sneakers on, you’re gone be just fine,” and tore off from the loop around out front of the Fortune.

  * * *

  Vance transfixed Margaret Whalen, Margaret walking at his side and blinking at him from behind her big, black-framed glasses. She said to him, “Don’t you fret on that girlfriend of yours.”

  Vance grimaced. “What girlfriend?”

  Margaret scoffed and said, “One that’s in jail.”

  Vance looked perplexed. “I don’t have a girlfriend in jail.”

  Margaret gave a knowing chuckle. “I’m sure you don’t. Don’t you mind it none, that Cherry’s a good girl. No way she could have done what that Marcus picked her up for.”

  Vance said, “Cherry’s not my girlfriend, I don’t know why you’d think that, but I agree with you, there’s no way she could’ve hurt Jack Dawson.” He nodded his chin Bette’s way, saying, “Pris, Mom, and I were up late last night talking about it. I’m sure my mom’s going to figure this out.”

  Margaret scoffed again, laughed with her eyes closed, a hand on her stomach. She said, “If your Cherry’s waiting on Bette’s help, might as well be death row, less your mama can find somebody who’ll confess to her.”

  Bette slowed down and looked over her shoulder at them. She said, “Marcus said Troy M
urdoch thanks me.”

  “Don’t listen to Troy, that man’s a murderer,” Margaret said, then to Vance: “I’ll tell you what . . .”

  Bette rolled her eyes, continued forward, trying to catch up with Pris who was out front of the walking group leading the way as they passed through Hazeldean Park and made their path back toward the water.

  Behind her, Margaret continued. “Some great loves have been born when one of them’s separated by prison.”

  Bette said over her shoulder, “Cherry’s not in prison.”

  Vance said, “And we’re not in love either.”

  Her son wore a sheen of sweat and she didn’t know if it was from the walking group’s pace or Miss Margaret’s line of questioning.

  “In fact,” Margaret said, “I don’t mind saying, it was me in jail brought my Irving to me for good.”

  Now Bette slowed right down so Margaret and Vance could catch up. “What’s this about?”

  “Your mama loves her gossip,” Margaret said. “It was nothing. Just a good old-fashioned fistfight.”

  Vance said, “Over what?”

  “Another girl. One had her hooks in my Irving. Back then, let me tell you, your Miss Margaret here was a lean machine,” Margaret said, rolling up the sleeves of her pale pink tracksuit. “Used to carry a straight razor in my zip-up boots.”

  Bette said, “Hey now, this story here, you didn’t cut anybody, did you?”

  Margaret nudged Vance with her elbow and said, “Look at your mama trying to get a confession out of me.”

  “I’m just worried what you’re about to tell my son.”

  “There were no razors that night. Didn’t need it, just this old woman—she was a young woman then, though—trying to put the moves on my Irving. You met my Irving, Bette?”

  “No. Always sounds like you’re trying to get out of the house so you can get away from him.”

  “That’s now. This story’s almost fifty years ago. No, when Irving was twenty, Irving was a man a woman like me put up her fists for.”

  “Make sure you keep this PG,” Bette said, enthralled with this revelation about Chunky Glasses Margaret, but worried where it might go. “And remind me not to get in any more races with you.”

  Margaret said, “Races? When was we racing? You and me racing, you going to know about it as you crossing the finish line, see me in my lawn chair sipping an iced tea wondering what took you so long.”

  “I just want to know if you carry a razor in those fancy new shoes of yours.”

  Margaret said to Vance: “Your mama’s been eyeballing my new sneakers since I got them. Might be a good idea with Christmas coming up—but don’t get the exact same ones or I’m a throw mine in the trash.”

  Vance said, “At least if you and mom were in the same shoes, she won’t say you had an unfair advantage,” and then they both laughed.

  Bette said, “Whose side are you on?”

  “Your side, Mom,” he said.

  “You just remember who makes your scrambled eggs in the morning.”

  Margaret said, “So anyway, where was I? Oh yeah, Rhonda. That was her name. Good-looking woman. You might know her, Bette, she worked the lunch room at your school.”

  “That Rhonda? Mrs. Carlisle?”

  “Red hair back then. Rhonda Van Heusen. Beautiful. Terrible fighter, though. See, Vance, I got word she tried to put her lips on my Irving—Irving swore to me he did nothing to provoke it—so I go down to the—”

  There was a sound now of a nearby argument.

  The walking group was on the beach trail, cutting through Crockett Park but heading back toward the boardwalk right by the main marina. It was a great day but not very warm; there were two figures close together on the pier leading out between two rows of sailboats and power cruisers bobbing up and down on the wharf’s salty water.

  Pris said, “Some kind of argument. I might need my glasses, but looks like Charlotte and a tall cop who’s got to be your man, Bette.”

  Bette grimaced, hoping Vance wouldn’t have heard that and misinterpreted. She quickened her pace, catching up with Pris to walk beside her. The two figures were engaged in some sort of heated conversation. It had to be Charlotte—who else would wear a chartreuse pantsuit in Chesapeake Cove?—and the man was Marcus. She knew his posture.

  Margaret said to Vance, “And that was how I ended up in jail.”

  Bette dipped back again, eyes forward on the angry interaction between Charlotte and Marcus that looked to be growing more heated, and said, “What are you telling my son?”

  “How I ended up with my Irving.”

  “After you went to jail?”

  “Don’t worry, Vance will tell you, wasn’t nothing but a fistfight. No harm done, just Miss Rhonda’s pride,” Margaret said. “I only spent the one night in jail—but guess who come to visit me?”

  “Irving,” Bette said, then trotted forward again, leaving Margaret with her son and hoping there wasn’t much more to that story to have her worried.

  The argument carried on the cold air to their ears now. Not the words, only the tone. Charlotte’s voice was raised, and her shoveled hands stabbed in the air with contempt. Marcus’s voice was raised now too, and she couldn’t recall Marcus ever having been riled like that before.

  All of them quickened their pace, putting good use to their cardiovascular abilities, setting foot now on the pier and headed right for the arguing couple. Charlotte was saying, “Here comes your cavalry,” and folding her arms, scowling at Marcus.

  Marcus said, “They’re not my cavalry. This is a public place and they can do what they want. But I’m telling you right now if you don’t get yourself under control—”

  “You’ll what? Throw me in jail with my son? That would be just like you. Throw me in jail for no good reason. How on earth do you think you can have my Stephen locked up the way you do? This is the most outrageous I’ve ever been treated—”

  “It’s not you being treated.”

  “I’m his mother!”

  “Mother or not,” Marcus said, “Stephen’s his own man now. He’s not a boy, he’s a grown up, and his words have meaning. What he says is his right, and if he says he did it—”

  Charlotte hollered: “You’re lying!”

  “I’m not lying. Talk to your son.”

  “You coerced him,” Charlotte said and stabbed a finger at Marcus’s chest.

  “There was no coercion, and I’m warning you again—”

  “Oh, that’s it, put all the Dawson’s up in jail. All because of Jack.”

  “He was murdered.”

  “Before Jack was murdered, you put him in jail. You’re trying to define the Dawsons now, trying to say we’re all like Jack.”

  “I’m not trying to define anyone,” Marcus said, “the law’s of the law. A man tells me he committed a crime, I’m going to put him in jail.”

  “My son did nothing like that. It’s that Cherry, she’s poison. Poison in my blood!”

  “Cherry’s in jail too,” Marcus said.

  “She’s the one that killed Jack! My fool son has a heart of gold. Your girlfriend’s stray dog got her hooks in my boy.”

  Bette said aside to Margaret, “You pass me that razor a yours?”

  Margaret said, “You and me don’t need a razor to set this one straight, them skinny stick legs of hers.”

  “Stick legs,” Bette repeated, and her hands went to fists. Skinny stick legs.

  Marcus said, “Be civil, Charlotte. You’re the mayor’s wife.”

  “And don’t you forget that,” Charlotte said, stabbing that manicured nail at him again.

  “Is that a threat? And Vinnie has integrity—”

  “Is that an insult? You’re saying I don’t have integrity? Moi?” She lay her spread hand on her chest, offended.

  “You called me down here,” Marcus said, “to scream at me, spit in my face, all I did was obey what your son wanted, I did—”

  “You want to interrogate somebody,” Charlot
te said, “you interrogate your girlfriend’s stray dog!”

  Vance said, “Is Buster in some kind of trouble?” Pretending he didn’t understand.

  Bette said, “Charlotte’s referring to your girlfriend.”

  Vance poked the back of her knee with the toe of his sneaker and she dipped. But this wasn’t a time for fooling.

  “They’re both in custody,” Marcus said. “You want to yell at someone, yell at Stephen.”

  “For what? Taking the fall for someone else, someone who worked her hooks in him, sweet-talked him into saying he did something he didn’t just to save her own hide? Cherry murdered Jack!”

  Marcus stepped back and put up his hands. “We’re done, Charlotte. Go, file your complaints, lodge your grievances, I’m sure you’ll do it, but nothing’s going to change the fact your son confessed to the murder of his brother.”

  To the sky, hands clenched in fists, Charlotte shouted, “Ludicrous!” The tendons stood on out her reddened neck, and her eyes blazed with rage. But she was done with Marcus. She pivoted and stormed to the opposite end of the pier, high heels clacking on the wood.

  The walking group all exchanged looks. Stephen confessed to the murder? Vance looked pleased, Pris looked like she was skeptical. Bette looked back to Marcus, who wasn’t coming their way and seemed to take a moment to gather himself after that angry exchange.

  Margaret whispered, “Go see him, Bette,” and nudged her forward.

  Bette stumbled forward of the group, flicked her hair, feeling nervous, then sauntered the distance between them on the pier with her hands in her pockets.

  “Hey, Marcus,” she said.

  “You’ve got great timing,” he said, taking off his hat and running a hand through his hair.

  “We’ll vouch for you that Charlotte was out of control.”

  He looked her way. “I meant, I hate you saw me lose my cool.”

  “That was hardly losing your cool, Marcus. It was Charlotte losing it. So, what? Stephen confessed to Jack’s murder?”

  “Yup,” he sighed and plopped the hat back on.

  “I was going to call you later this morning. Glad we ran into you.”