Beach Thriller(66)
Holly nodded gravely. She could peer into the past, but she couldn’t look at those pictures. That was where she drew the line.
She paused for a moment, gathering her resolve before commencing the worst trip down memory lane. She reviewed the 911 call logs, imagining the panicked voices summoning help. Beauport had a volunteer fire department, but the blaze was so fierce that police and fire crews from several nearby towns arrived to assist.
“Do you need some water?” Finn asked.
Sure enough, her throat was parched. He retrieved a bottle from the refrigerator.
Holly drank deeply as she skimmed a brief interview with Maeve Carmichael—a woman so desperate to maintain her financial status that she married her son’s father-in-law, Baxter Ward. Or maybe it was love. Holly knew only that if humans didn’t make questionable choices, she’d be out of her job as a writer.
The interview was dry and factual. Maeve had been at home when the explosion occurred. Nobody was living in the guesthouse at the time. She had no idea whose body the firefighters had wheeled out on a stretcher.
She read a later police report about Maeve, equally brief, this one dated after Anna’s body had been identified.
The property owner, Maeve Carmichael, admitted to firing the victim, Anna Sinclair, a week before the explosion. She had filed a complaint accusing the victim of theft. Officer Tom Walker investigated. No arrest was made. Mrs. Carmichael speculates that the victim might have attempted to destroy the guesthouse as retribution for her firing and was accidentally caught in the ensuing explosion.
Holly resisted the urge to crumple that report and toss it away. What a gross insinuation. She had her own theory. Anna had gone to end things with Conrad. What if it turned violent? What if Conrad had killed Anna? Strangled her? Stabbed her? What better way to cover up your crime than to incinerate the evidence?
And what about his jealous fiancée, Elizabeth? Maybe she discovered the love affair and committed a crime of passion. As a Carmichael-to-be, she had been protected as well. Holly made a mental note to learn more about Elizabeth Ward.
The interview with Conrad Carmichael, which Tom Walker also conducted, was cursory at best. And there was one glaring hole in Conrad’s story.
I haven’t seen Anna since she was fired from her job, he reported.
Holly’s blood boiled. That was a blatant lie. Anna had gone to see him that night—at his invitation. He had left Anna a note, asking her to meet him. Those two were together every moment they could sneak away.
The note was never recovered. It was probably in Anna’s pocket at the time and burned in the fire. Holly told the police about it, but without physical evidence, they didn’t seem to care. If they had, Conrad might be behind bars instead of walking free and offering jobs to impressionable young women.
Holly pushed through her mounting anxiety to examine the remaining items in the box—everything except the crime scene photos.
Next was the medical examiner’s report. She read it carefully, grimacing at the gory description of the body. In the Cause and Manner of Death section, the box for Undetermined was checked.
Holly continued searching through the contents. Her sister’s claddagh ring was bagged and tagged. She held it up to her eyes. The gold appeared dull, especially when compared to the color of the matching ring she wore in her sister’s honor.
“Could I have this back?”
Finn didn’t think long before he shrugged. “Don’t see why not. Nobody is asking for it. I’ll fill out the forms. Go ahead and take it.”
She placed the bag holding the ring into her purse as unbidden tears leaked from her eyes.
Reaching into the box, Holly pulled out a clipping of a newspaper article she remembered reading when it was first published. It was a follow-up article, written several weeks after the fire, but held no new information, and was cursory at best. For most people, that might have been enough—short and sweet. But for Holly and her family, the quick overview had felt more like an insult.
She turned the clipping over as she returned it to the file, but something else caught her eye—a familiar face, staring at her from a black-and-white photo on the back of the article. The shock made Holly gasp.
Ethan.
There he was, standing beside an older woman whom Holly didn’t recognize. But there were two other figures in the frame she identified immediately: Maeve and Conrad Carmichael. Under the photo was a title and a short blurb:
Carmichael Family Continues Its Philanthropic Tradition
Despite the recent tragedy at the family’s estate, the Carmichaels made their annual donation to the Beauport Literary Society this past weekend, though without the usual gala they would have hosted in the past. The Literary Society expresses its deepest thanks to the Carmichael family for the donation that all but sustains them throughout the year.
From left to right: Maeve and Conrad Carmichael, Barbara and Ethan Greene.
Holly was confused. She assumed Barbara was Ethan’s mother—they looked enough alike—but Ethan had never mentioned a connection to Conrad, besides doing carpentry work at the estate. Was it just an innocent oversight, or had he purposely withheld that detail when they’d talked about the family? Alarm bells rang in her head—or was it just another headache coming on?
Those questions would have to wait. She had more to examine.
She’d never seen the report from East Coast Gas and Propane, the company that helped the fire department inspect the gas lines after the explosion. The report stated there was no indication of foul play, but Holly noticed something else. She credited her fledgling writing career for catching this detail. When she typed short stories on her grandfather’s old Olivetti typewriter, she often used Wite-Out for corrections. That might explain why the bright white patch in the report’s conclusion section stood out so sharply.