Ginny Gold - Early Bird Café 02 - Deadly Surprise (5 page)

Kori rolled her eyes and crossed her fingers that Jay wouldn’t pursue the topic.

“Well, here you go.” Gale nonchalantly handed Jay the gun. “I used it last week at the shooting range so it’s empty.”

“Thanks,” Jay said, sounding stunned.

“Mom, before you go, have you kept in touch with Dad’s sister or Tyler and Janie at all?” Kori asked, making Gale turn back toward them and stop walking to the door.

“Not really. Why do you ask?” The expression on her face didn’t convey complete trust.

“Oh, you know …” Kori stalled for time, trying to come up with an excuse. “We’re not getting any younger and they’re the only extended family we have. I just thought it’d be nice to get to know them maybe.”

“Well isn’t that nice. But no, I haven’t been in touch with any of them for years. I’m not sure where they’re even living now. Ever since your father had that falling out with his sister all those years ago, I hardly heard anything when he was still alive. And once he was gone—I don’t think they even came to his funeral. Trust me, you’re better off without them.”

Gale waved her hand and turned back to the door.

As soon as
she was gone Jay turned to Kori, completely ignoring the comments about their extended family, and said, “This means that my gun was in Scoter Circle this weekend. And with my DNA possibly at the crime scene, this has gone from bad to worse.”

“What time is it?” Kori asked Jay, letting her mind race away from her
while trying to devise a plan.

Jay glanced at his watch. “
Almost one thirty. Why?”

“I think we need to go for a drive. Come on.”
Kori heard Ibis walk toward their table from the kitchen where she had been sleeping. She looked like she was asking if she was invited. “Ibis, let’s go.”

“Where are we going?” Jay got up and followed
Kori who was on a mission and Ibis who was at her heels. She noticed that he grabbed his gun from the table where their mother had placed it. She hoped that he would find a secure place for it when he got home and start keeping tabs on it. Guns weren’t something he should be so careless about.

“We’re going to Scoter Circle.”

“What? What are we going to do there?”

Kori held the door open for Jay
and Ibis, locked it behind her and then led the way to her car. “We’re going to start asking the questions that need to be answered.”

“Don’t you have work to do?” Jay jogged to catc
h up. Kori was walking too fast.

“Yes. But it can wait. Family comes first. And it looks like you need to get some more information before
you get arrested.”

“Shouldn’t you just call Zach and tell him to do this?”

Kori couldn’t figure out why Jay needed so much convincing to solve this murder that he was constantly looking more and more guilty of committing.

“I could. But then he’d have to go through too many hoops to get where he needs to be. Where we need to be. Get in.” Kori had unlocked her car and
was holding the driver’s door open, ready to get in and drive away but Jay was still hesitating. Ibis jumped into the open door and headed to the back seat where she happily lay down. “Are you worried about missing work?” she asked.

Jay nodded slightly.

“Don’t be. Spencer will understand. Call him on the way. Let’s go.”

Jay finally opened the door and sat in the passenger seat, still looking stunned. “Who are we even going to talk to?”

Kori didn’t really have a plan. “Well, there are the three guys you found who we could look into. You said Larry Downing lives in Scoter Circle?” Jay nodded and Kori started the car, glanced at him for his answer and backed out of her parking spot behind the café. She was always thankful she didn’t have to deal with parallel parking on Main Street. There wasn’t much traffic, but there weren’t many parking spots either. “We could start with him. And Brett Carr. He might be easier to approach. We can tell him Mom was at his yoga retreat and she’s having some muscle pain now. Ask him about the weekend. See if there were any gaps in classes or when he could have been gone.”

“Okay.
”

“And while I drive, try to find Tyler. He’s our cousin, we should be able to figure out how to contact him.”

Jay obediently took out his phone and waited for more instructions. “Where should I start?”

“I don’t know. Facebook. Are you friends with him? Or Janie?”

“I don’t think so. Hang on.”

Kori drove and waited for Jay’s answer. How could it be so difficult to locate their cousin? Unless, of course, he didn’t want to be found because he had something to hide.

After some silence, Jay finally said, “Here we go, Tyler Roberts. Wow, he looks nothing like the last time we saw him.”

“Well it has to be at least fifteen years. No, less. Dad’s funeral? No, Mom said they didn’t come. Wow, maybe it has been that long. You’re sure it’s him? What can you see about him?” Kori was desperate for information.

“Almost nothing.”

“Friend him,” Kori instructed and she saw Jay fiddle with his phone out of the corner of her eye.
“Let’s hope he uses Facebook often enough to see it and accept it right away.”

They drove on in silence.
Kori was planning her next move to clear Jay’s name, and her next move with Zach. She wanted to go out with him again but she didn’t want to seem too eager either. Oh, who was she kidding? They’d been playing this game since high school. And being eager was probably important with Lani working next to him all day. She’d call him tonight and invite him hiking next weekend. Or, better yet, she’d invite him to Nora’s farm stand opening on Wednesday. It was always a potluck dinner that kicked off the town’s gardening season. Really, just Nora’s public gardening season. Kori bought plenty of vegetables from her but there were always extra. Kori had done every year since she’d moved back to Hermit Cove and had even come up a couple times for it when she was living in New York City. All of their friends from childhood went and the food was always better than expected. Kori would even offer to do the cooking for both of them so Zach wouldn’t have to bring anything. He wouldn’t have an excuse then.

“He accepted,” Jay suddenly said, breaking through Kori’s daydreaming of officially dating Zach and becoming his girlfriend.

“Oh good,” Kori said excitedly. “Check out his photos. Where does he live? Has he been to Scoter Circle recently? Does he know Heidi?” The questions poured out of her mouth before Jay had a chance to answer even the first one.

“Umm … give me a few seconds … Here it is. According to Facebook he lives on the west coast. About as far from Scoter Circle as he could get and still be in the United States. What else did you want to know?”

“Mutual friends. Do you two have any mutual friends?”

She saw Jay flipping through Facebook as she continued driving. “No. Not even you.”

“If I’d already been friends with him do you think it would have been so hard to find him?”

“Right. But anyway,” Jay said sarcastically, “he’s not friends with Heidi. What if he didn’t even know her? What if it’s not his DNA there and it really is mine? Who would set me up?”

“That’s what we’re here to find out,” Kori said with false confidence.

“
Here where? Where are you going?” Jay asked as she sped past the turn she wanted into Scoter Circle.

“Oops
.” She pulled over and turned around.

“Where are we going to go when we get there?”

“Let’s start with the yoga retreat location. Mom said it was at the conference center. Have you ever been there?”

“No.” Jay pulled out his phone to get directions.

On Kori’s second try she didn’t miss the turn and they were only minutes from Scoter Circle’s center. “Where to now?”

“Umm. Turn right onto Willow Lane. It looks like the conference center is down there.”

Kori did as instructed and they found their location with no trouble. Kori parked in the buzzing parking lot and got out of the car, knowing she’d figure out what she was going to say once she reached the front desk. Jay hesitated but eventually got out too.

“Just follow my lead,” she told him with
more false confidence. Turning back to Ibis, she said, “Don’t bark. We’ll be quick.” Then she felt ridiculous.

Kori opened the front door
to the conference center and was immediately struck by a swarm of police walking up and down the main hallway. She stopped in her tracks and she felt Jay bump into her.

“What’s going on, you think?” she asked him.

He shook his head and didn’t say anything so she led the way up to the front desk.

“Good afternoon. How may I help you?” a short woman wearing a nametag that identified her as
Meri asked, a cheerful smile on her face.

“Um. Hi. What’s going on?” Kori asked, still looking around.

“All I know is that this has been turned into a crime scene and police are working on getting everything worked through as quickly as possible. Are you here for the travel symposium? There’s only a short delay for it to begin.”

“No. No. We’re actually looking for Brett Carr. He led a yoga retreat here this weekend and we were hoping he was still around.”

“I’m sorry. He was here this weekend but doesn’t work here regularly.” Meri’s smile turned into a look of concern for being unable to help Kori and Jay.

“Would it be possible to get us in touch with him? Does he live in town? Our mother attended his retreat and is now having some difficulty with her shoulder. We were just hoping to ask him a few questions about how she could fix that.”

“You know, normally I can’t do that. But let me call him and see if he’s available to come in.”

“That’d be really great. Thanks.” Kori was relieved. With the added
chaos of a police investigation she thought they might have made the drive for nothing.

“Just take a seat,”
Meri indicated chairs across the hall from the desk, “and I’ll let you know when I reach him.”

Meri
picked up the phone while Jay and Kori walked to the offered chairs and took in the scene.

Police were whispering in the halls, some running back and forth from one end to the other.
Kori was surprised they were even allowed inside.

“I’m going to go check on Ibis. Text me if
Meri tells you anything,” Kori told Jay who nodded his acceptance and she walked outside to her car.

Ibis was still
calmly sleeping in the back seat, seemingly unaware of the panic that Kori felt growing inside of her. Why would Jay have been setup? And what had Gale done this weekend? Was she somehow involved? What was this current crime scene in the conference center? Kori suspected it was unrelated to Heidi’s murder but she couldn’t be too sure about anything anymore.

When Kori opened the back door to let Ibis out, she quickly hooked the leash on her and started walking toward the road. She planned to just bring her around the block on the sidewalk to get her moving. She checked her pocket for a plastic bag in case she had any business to take care of but she
came up empty. She’d have to make that become part of her normal routine now—always have something to clean up after Ibis.

Kori and Ibis barely made it a hundred yards from the conference center’s parking lot when Kori’s phone buzzed in her pocket. She figured it was Jay telling her to come back inside because Brett was on his way.

“Hello?” she answered without bothering to look at the name on the screen.

“Kori? It’s Zach. Where are you? I’m outside The Early Bird and you’re not there.”

She didn’t want to tell him the truth because he wouldn’t like what she was up to but she couldn’t imagine lying to him. She decided on being vague. “I had to help Jay with something. What’s up?”

“I was just stopping by for a cup of coffee with the most beautiful chef in town.”

Kori’s heart fluttered and she wondered if she was having a heart attack. She couldn’t help but smile. “I can stop by your place later if you want.” So much for waiting to see him at Nora’s opening.

“I’m not sure when I’ll be home. This case that Scoter Circle has us working on is getting the best of my time. I really only had a few minutes and hoped I’d be able to fill them with your face.”

Kori blushed. “Have you gotten any more information about the DNA?”

“Nope. Sorry. I’ll keep you posted.”

“Great. Thanks. Hey, do you have plans on Wednesday night? Nora’s farm stand is opening for the season and I was hoping you’d come with me. She has a potluck dinner every year to kick off the season. I can cook for both of us if—”

“Sounds great,” Zach said, cutting her off before she could make any excuses for him. She could hear the smile in his voice at the other end of the line.

“Great. I’ll see you Wednesday then.”

“
Wednesday.”

Kori waited to see if he was going to say anything else but heard the phone click off instead. She smiled.

But she didn’t have time to revel in her next date because her phone started buzzing again. This time she looked at the caller—Jay.

She picked up and he was already talking. “Come back. He’s on his way. He’ll be here any minute.”

“Okay. On my way.” Kori hung up and turned to bring Ibis back to the car. As they walked into the parking lot a car tore past them and parked in a hurry. She wondered if that was Brett, so instead of making him wait she decided to bring Ibis with her.

As soon as Kori opened the front door, Jay got up to meet her and
Meri rushed out from behind the desk. In an overly friendly voice Meri said, “I’m sorry, ma’am, but you can’t bring your dog in here.”

“Oh, sorry. She’s actually a retired therapy dog so she won’t bother anyone,” Kori protested. She really didn’t want to miss talking to Brett.

“Even so, it’s our policy that dogs aren’t allowed inside unless they’re assistance animals.”

Kori turned and looked behind her. The driver of the in-a-hurry car was now speed walking toward the front door. It was a man and she could only assume it was Brett.

“I promise she won’t bother anyone,” Kori insisted again, not having a clue if that was true or not. She’d barely had her for a full day. “I’ll just stay in the lobby.”

Meri
looked past Kori at the man approaching. “Mr. Carr, thank you for coming in. This is Kori—I’m not sure I got your last name?”