Page 28 of Light of Day (Sea Smoke Island #1)

The Harbortown police couldn’t send anyone out to Sea Smoke until the next day.

“I’m hoping to have it solved by then,” Luke told the police chief, only half joking.

“Your first homicide case. It’s a big lift. Any thoughts so far?”

“Strangulation is an up-close-and-personal crime, which tells me it was someone he knew. Not random. Not accidental.”

“Agreed. Listen, be careful. I’m not going to tell you to stop because I don’t have any jurisdiction over you. Just don’t mess up any crime scenes and don’t scare off any witnesses.”

“Roger that.”

If only he had a witness. But no one to this point had surfaced with any reports of a sighting of Denton on the days leading up to his death. Jimmy was the last to speak to him, but that had been three days beforehand.

No one had seen Denton on his boat for the past week, including Mrs. Butters, who had a perfect view of the Sea Siren from the rocking chair where she spent much of her time.

Just to be thorough, Luke rowed Denton’s dinghy out there to search it.

Everything was in its place, all lines neatly stowed, a pile of freshly painted buoys filling the stern.

If any struggle had taken place here, someone had cleaned up after it.

But Luke would bet his own boat that nothing like that had taken place here.

On the dashboard, he found a tide calendar booklet branded with the logo of a local hardware store, the usual array of depth finders, sonar, radar, and an old-fashioned compass mounted on a brass plate.

With his feet braced apart against the gentle rocking of the Sea Sire n, he flipped the tide calendar to the day of Denton’s death, then turned the pages backwards in time from there. Some fishermen left notes in their tide books—bird sightings, weather conditions, hauls, anomalies of any kind.

Sure enough, Denton had scribbled something in the margins three days before his body had been found. Meet at point. 2 Friday. Proof?

The closest point of land to Seaweed Cove was known as the North Point. Luke pulled up the site that mapped the local currents and confirmed that the North Point lay about a mile up-current from where Denton’s body had washed up.

The coroner had estimated his time of death at between eight and four on Friday. Was two o’clock on Friday afternoon Denton’s last moment of life on this earth?

Luke tucked the tide calendar into an evidence bag and rowed back to shore.

He tied up Denton’s dinghy as he’d found it.

He wondered what Jimmy would do with this property now.

Would he let the Island Trust buy it, as they’d always wanted to do, so it could be part of the swimming cove grounds, and maybe a museum?

Or would he sell it to another wealthy family who’d spend a total of two weeks a year here?

Pretty soon the entire island would be short-term rentals.

Knowing Jimmy, he’d want to support the community. Thinking of the grieving man, he decided to check in on him before he drove out to the North Point, possible scene of the crime.

Jimmy had already shifted from the first shock of the news to anger. “Who would want to murder Denton? He kept to himself, didn’t bother anybody. You have to catch the sumabitch, Luke.”

“I’m working on it, I promise you. How’s it going with settling the estate? Did you call the lawyer I recommended?”

“Ayup. Got a meeting set up in town later today. It’s a funny thing though, Luke. He left the house to some stranger.”

Alarm bells clanged. “What stranger?”

“They aren’t from here, that kind of stranger. I never heard their name before. Mackey, that’s the last name. Sasha Mackey. Know who that is?”

“Nope. What do you know about her?”

“Not a thing, and I don’t know as I care. She can have the house and everything in it if she wants. I can’t even go in there anymore, it breaks my heart. Maybe she’ll take the cat too. You know I can’t have her here. I tried that allergy medicine and it makes me fall asleep on my feet.”

Luke had forgotten about poor Savannah. “Where’s the cat now?”

“At the house.”

“Mind if I take her for now?”

“That’d be good. Appreciate it.”

He didn’t want to adopt a cat either, but he’d seen the way Heather had cuddled up with Savannah. Maybe she’d want to take her down to Boston. Or maybe…maybe he was secretly hoping the cat would make her want to stick around a little while longer.

Silly, he knew. Leaving the island had been an important step for her, and he wouldn’t want to be part of dragging her back to something she didn’t want. All he wanted was more time to get to know her. And maybe finish what they’d started in his bedroom.

With Savannah tucked into a cat carrier in the crew cab of his truck, he drove to the North Point.

With its windswept bluffs, it was a popular spot for blueberry picking.

Trails wound along the cliffs, through wild roses and a profusion of blueberry bushes.

It wasn’t the most obvious meeting place, since it was hard to reach and not especially private.

At two in the afternoon, there would be at least a decent chance that someone else would be there.

In other words, Denton certainly wouldn’t be wary about meeting at the North Point.

He probably had no idea that he was walking to his death.

Maybe his murderer hadn’t either. Maybe something had changed during their encounter that had led to Denton getting strangled in a moment of hot emotion.

Weren’t strangulations usually crimes of passion?

He found the trail that clung closest to the edge of the bluff and slowly walked it, looking for footprints, scuff marks, any signs of a struggle.

A low scrum of clouds was gathering on the horizon, like a flock of sheep stampeding across the ocean.

But for now, a pristine blue sky arched overhead and a whisper of a breeze sang through the bushes.

Damn, Sea Smoke Island sure was beautiful.

It was worth defending. Worth preserving.

He was proud to be part of keeping the island safe.

Gabby’s words about “legacy” kept haunting him. He loved Sea Smoke for its charm, for its magical interplay of light and ocean and wind, and its tight, down-to-earth community. But his family had come here for something completely different—profit. That was the Carmichael legacy, like it or not.

Finally he found what he was looking for. The clear mark of a boot heel in bare dirt where the grass had been scraped away. He peered over the edge of the bluff. This was one of the few spots where the cliff-face was steep enough that someone rolling downhill might reach the water. Especially…

He pulled out Denton’s tide calendar. Yup.

The tide had just turned past its peak at two in the afternoon.

Instead of snagging on the rocks, Denton had likely splashed into the water, and then floated out to sea with the tide.

The currents had picked him up and swirled him around to the west and carried him all the way to Seaweed Cove.

At some point, kelp had gotten wrapped around his body, so when the incoming tide landed him on the rocks there, he’d stayed put.

Any local fisherman would probably know that the tides and currents would keep him from floating out to sea. But would other people? From this lonely, windblown spot, if you didn’t know any better, you might think that anyone falling off this cliff into the ocean would never be seen again.

That might be a lead, if it meant they were looking for someone who didn’t know the currents.

That would rule out every single fisherperson, and possibly their spouses, and their deckhands.

It probably ruled out most of the islanders in general, at least those on the western end, as everyone who grew up here tended to be aware of things like currents and weather patterns.

Gabby had said she was supposed to meet Denton, but had gotten kidnapped before it could happen. Was that the same meeting Denton noted in the tide book? Gabby hadn’t killed Denton, that much was clear. On Friday at two, she was in that yacht, thanks to Andy. But the timing sure was interesting.

Was a third party supposed to join the meeting? Or had a third party learned about the meeting and shown up to keep Denton from delivering this “proof”? Was Denton supposed to receive or deliver the proof? From the note, it was hard to tell.

At any rate, whatever Denton had delivered or received—or not—it was gone now. Nothing had been found on his person that could be considered “proof” of anything. Maybe his phone logs would offer some clues.

He sent a text to the Harbortown police officer assigned to the case, Officer Tina Chen, asking if she could forward Denton’s phone records to him as soon as she had them.

He took some photos of the footprint and sent them to Officer Chen as well. I believe this is where it happened , he added. Can you get this print analyzed? It’s not Denton’s. Denton had been found wearing waterlogged Keens, and that print was from a boot heel.

He got a thumb’s up from Tina Chen, and decided he’d learned all he could from this spot on the rocks. He took one last look around, saying a little mental prayer for Denton Simms, for whom this had been his last view of this mortal world. At least it was a magnificent one.

As he climbed back down the twisting trail from the North Point, he sorted through what he knew so far.

According to Gabby, Denton had uncovered some bombshell he wanted to share with her.

Based on what Heather had found in that thumb drive, it was related to the time period when the Lightkeeper Inn had been built.

Maybe someone at the Lightkeeper had figured out that Denton was her source and wanted to get rid of him. Hadn’t Judy said that Gabby used the fast Wi-Fi in the conservatory? Someone there could have seen her laptop screen. Her research might have triggered alarm bells and they acted.

He needed to press Andy harder about who he’d overheard saying that Gabby was in danger. It was a delicate task, getting information from the kid, but maybe he’d have better luck today.

Or not.

When he called Lily Highgrove, she told him that Andy had shut down so completely that they’d called his therapist. He was currently on his way to the Harbortown Hospital for an overnight hold.

“I’ve never seen him like that, Luke,” she sobbed. “He was in a complete catatonic state, he looked terrified. It was so scary.”

“Would you be willing to talk to me about what’s been going on with him lately?”

“I don’t know…maybe later…” He heard the sound of a lighter.

Later it would have to be. “I’m taking Izzy out for ice cream, I’ll swing by after that.”

From the cat carrier next to him, Denton’s cat gave a loud, mournful meow.

“You want Heather, don’t you?” he murmured, scratching the cat’s head. “I get it. How about hanging out with my kid for a while instead? If you hang around Izzy for a while, you might forget you were ever sad. It always works for me.”