Page 26 of Light of Day (Sea Smoke Island #1)

Since Luke had to coordinate with the Harbortown police about the next steps in the homicide investigation, they made a plan to meet at Sea Scoops that evening. They carefully put everything back in place and locked up the cases.

Before leaving the Lightkeeper Inn, she took a detour to the room where Gabby had been staying. With dismay, she saw that it was empty except for a uniformed woman who was busy making the bed.

“Hi! I’m looking for my friend. Did the woman staying here check out already?” she asked her.

The woman shrugged. She had luminous dark skin and wore a head scarf, and when she spoke, Heather detected a strong Somali accent. “No bags. All gone.”

There was no chance Gabby had made her way back here, packed up her things, and waltzed off the island. Besides, if she was going to do that, why would she ask Heather to find her flash drives?

She swung by the front desk to see if Heidi Ochoa was on duty. Sure enough, Heather spotted her slim form barely visible behind an enormous glass vase of island roses and asters.

“Did you hear?” Heidi asked by way of greeting. “Your friend is fine. She checked out last night.”

Heather hid her disbelief. Gabby couldn’t possibly have checked out last night; she’d been hiding in the woods on the western side of the island. “Did you see her?”

“Me? No. But she left a big cash tip for all of us.”

“Did she leave on a private boat? The nighttime ferry doesn’t start running until peak summer.”

Heidi’s bright smile faltered as that gaping hole in the story became obvious. “I suppose she must have. I wasn’t here, I told you.”

“Mmm-hmm.”

Someone must have cleared out Gabby’s things and packed them up somewhere. And added a “big cash tip” to quiet any doubts.

“I’m sure it doesn’t matter now, but I did find out who paid for her room,” Heidi said. “Do you still want to know?”

“Yes! Of course. Who was it?”

“Well, Denton Simms, of all people. It almost makes you wonder. He paid for her room and then he winds up dead?” She shivered dramatically.

“How about we let Luke Carmichael solve that case and not spread rumors?”

Heidi made a face at her, looking so much like the little girl she used to babysit that she almost laughed. “Fine. Also, I think Mr. Carmichael himself freed up a room for her.”

So Gabby had come here with the knowledge and support of both Denton Simms and John Carmichael III. Why hadn’t John mentioned that? He’d talked as if he’d just happened to run into her.

Alarm bells and red flags, check.

She had to find Gabby’s suitcase. If she was lucky, the staff had simply stored it somewhere for the time being.

“Heidi, there’s a box of old linens that the housekeeping staff wants to donate. I offered to run them to the thrift store when I’m done here. Can I store them somewhere safe until then?”

“Sure thing, we have a storage room out back next to the service entrance. Want me to?—”

“No no, don’t worry about it. I got it. I’ll snag one of your bellhops to help me. Maybe that cute one with the shoulders.” She nodded toward the bellhop who kept exchanging secret glances with Heidi. The girl giggled and winked.

Sure enough, in the storage room, she found Gabby’s suitcase, tucked into a corner behind some cases of toilet paper.

Had they believed that they’d gotten rid of Gabby, and all they had to do was put out a story that she’d checked out?

And who exactly was “they,” exactly? John Carmichael?

He was the owner slash emperor of the Lightkeeper Inn, which put him at the top of the list.

She thought about Andy’s phrasing, how he kept referring to “they,” but never named any names. Would Andy be willing to talk to her now that he’d gotten a good night’s sleep? She could bring him the news that Gabby was safe and see how he reacted.

As she crouched next to Gabby’s suitcase, it struck her that she didn’t need to be on the island any longer.

Her only goal had been to find Gabby. Mission accomplished.

She could hop on the next ferry boat and return to her life.

She could take a trip down to New York and try to meet with Mindy’s friend.

That job was within her grasp, she could feel it.

But Gabby had passed the baton to her, and she couldn’t just drop it. She had to pick up where Gabby had left off, and besides…this mystery had its hooks in her now. She wanted to see this through, find out what was behind Denton’s murder, and what “conspiracy” her ancestors had been part of.

The part of her that had been drawn to journalism was wide awake now. She couldn’t walk away with the story unfinished. It was demanding to be revealed. That was why she’d chosen this field, with all its flaws. She wanted the truth. No matter how upsetting it might be.

Her first search of Gabby’s suitcase found nothing but clothes and audio gear, same as before.

Had “they” searched it and found the drive already?

She sat back on her heels, discouraged. Then she remembered Gabby’s stories about traveling in and out of China when she worked for NPR.

She’d developed a trick for slipping things through customs. There was an inner pocket tucked within a bigger one.

Once agents had searched the big one, they thought they’d found everything.

That was where she put her thumb drives of photos the government might object to.

Heather unzipped the suitcase and felt for the pocket. Sure enough, Gabby had left a flash drive in there. Was it current, or leftover from one of her international trips?

A shiver of excitement went through her as she saw DRB written on the case of the drive. Dirty Rotten Bastards.

One down, Gabby , she thought.

She ran back upstairs, hoping the cleaner would be gone by now. The door stood ajar, with one suitcase holding it open, and the sound of running water coming from the bathroom. Did she have time for the quickest search ever?

She did her best—peeked under the bed, in the nightstand drawers, in the closet—then faked an “oops, wrong room” when the guest emerged from the bathroom with her wallet ready to tip the person she’d assumed was the bellhop.

When she’d recovered from that scare, she decided to go back to her mother’s house and look through the flash drive from the suitcase. She could no doubt learn a lot from it, even if it didn’t contain everything Gabby had found.

Luke had left her bike propped near the service entrance. Amazingly, he’d apparently found a moment to fix the kickstand, among all his other duties. He probably knew where the inn kept their WD-40.

“Best constable ever,” she murmured as she hopped onto it.

A few moments later, she was coasting down the paved road that curved through the Lightkeeper grounds.

The ocean was an especially sparkling blue today, reflecting a cloudless sky, with barely a breeze ruffling the surface.

She thought about the laborers who had camped out here for months to build that hotel.

And the coffins.

Who was inside those coffins? Workers? Abenaki? Smugglers? Buried treasure?

After an invigorating four-mile bike ride across the island, she found her mother’s house empty. Of course—her mom was at work right now. She took a quick shower, put on some coffee, then settled in at the kitchen table with her iPad and the flash drive.

She opened the drive to find a list of image files. She clicked on a random JPEG and flinched. Islanders’ Deviant Behavior Alarms Authorities , read the screaming headline.

She expanded the image so she could read the text.

Suspicions of lawlessness and incest could threaten Maine’s future.

Just as authorities hope to lure summer visitors to the northern climes, new reports are emerging of illicit behavior that would shock any right-living man’s sensibilities.

While some island inhabitants are God-fearing fishermen attempting to scratch out a living in difficult conditions, others spend their time drunk on liquor and abusing the children they so prolifically produce.

“It’s no wonder, seeing as how some of them islands got settled,” explains one local sea captain.

“Bloody pirates used to leave their mistresses out there. It attracts a bad element. You try to talk to those folks and they don’t barely speak the language.

There’s crossbreeding, even incest. The children coming out of there hardly even act human, that’s how wild they are.

What kind of society is this, if we’re just going to let those folks do whatever they want?

We’re God-fearing folks here, and I get a shiver up my spine if I even sail past some of those islands. ”

Now discussions are being had in the highest seats of government about the best way to clean out those dens of iniquity.

“This cannot be allowed to stand,” proclaimed State Assemblyman John J.

Carmichael. “Those who cannot successfully function in our society must be separated from it. Just like a diseased limb, it needs to be severed. Let them have their own place, but let it be under tight control so the bad element doesn’t infect the bloodstream of regular society. ”

Wow. From her time working in media, she recognized emotionally manipulative writing when she saw it. Fear-mongering, check. Evidence-free accusations, check. It seemed the opinion writers were trying to get people riled up over something.

It was working, too.

Another file on the thumb drive held dozens of letters to the editor.

They said horrible nasty things like, “Something must be done. If you have a nest of roaches, you don’t let them settle in.

You call the exterminator.” Or, “It’s getting so bad out there that some of us fishermen would rather face the currents than let our boats anywhere near those outer islands. ”

Those outer islands…were they talking about Sea Smoke Island? It was one of the most prominent of the outer ring of islands in Lightkeeper Bay.