Page 57 of Secrets Along the Shore (Beach Read Thrillers #1)

CHAPTER

THREE

I walk over the slate tiles of the courtyard in front of The Ink & Ivy, past the outdoor tables, to the heavy iron-studded front door Grace had shipped from across the pond.

More gas lamps burn on either side of it, affixed to walls crawling with English Ivy with dangling tendrils seeking out the window boxes overflowing with pastel impatiens.

I push through into a large room resembling something out of a Dickens novel.

Polished, dark wood is everywhere—the bar, the square tables lined with chairs and benches, the floors.

Exposed beams crisscross the ceiling. The large, multi-paned windows aren’t old, but most definitely look it, given the warbled glass and rough frames.

Two wood-burning fireplaces on opposite sides of the room are going strong, despite that it’s early May and in the low seventies outside.

Poofy couches with plaid blankets face both hearths.

Painted portraits and landscapes in rustic gold frames adorn the walls, but the pièce de résistance is the books.

Books, books, and more books fill an entire wall of shelves made of the same dark wood.

The shelves soar to the ceiling, their heights accessible by the rolling ladder on a brass track, which countless children—and adults—have taken for a spin.

There are two distinct sections of books.

One consists of new books for purchase, ordered and stocked by Grace, of a wide and sometimes odd variety.

The other is a library of free books from a variety of sources, including contributions by pub patrons, as well as the fruits of Grace's perennial estate-sale habit.

As if all that wasn't enough to get you here, Grace Dean is also the best cook in town. Her kitchen is second-to-none, serving a nightly special five days a week in addition to the regular menu. Given that my cooking is awful enough to make Gordon Ramsey swear off food for life, I usually eat here all five days and sometimes take enough home for leftovers on Sunday and Monday, the only days the pub isn’t open.

Grace is standing behind the bar to my right, wiping it down. When she looks up, a grin splits her face. “Come here, you!” she bellows, coming around the bar to wrap me in a hug.

I’m five-three on a good day and Grace is five-eight with at least thirty pounds on me, so when I say “hug” I mean a full-out, arms-trapped, can-hardly-breathe hug. It’s spectacular. Like getting a hug from a mother, something I haven’t experienced in ten years.

She pulls back, beaming, her face framed by her bright blond hair, pulled on top of her head in a billowy mound and secured by a plastic clip.

Wrinkles line her face, though there are far fewer than most would have at sixty-two.

Grace could pass for twenty years younger if she wanted to, though she never would.

She doesn’t care about those sorts of things.

“ Not everybody gets as many birthdays as I have. I’m gonna wear ’em like badges,” she says.

I think she may be the wisest person I’ve ever met.

“I heard the news,” Grace says, moisture welling in her eyes. “It’s over.”

Grace has listened to me vent about the burden and responsibility, frustration and fear regarding these murders and finding the devil behind them for over two years. Like James, she understands what the verdict means for me.

“Finally,” I say, shoving down the pesky swell of emotion threatening to crest again.

She reaches back toward the bar and hands me a glass of iced tea.

It may be an English pub, but we are in Alabama.

If you’ve ever had straight up sweet tea in the South, you know it’s enough to send you into a diabetic coma.

I’m from Boca Raton originally, and though that's southern Florida, it's not the same as “the South.” Despite living here for a decade, my insulin levels still haven't adjusted. I prefer something more like “quarter-and-three-quarters” tea, which is what’s in the glass, because Grace knows that about me.

Along with almost everything else.

“Just poured it. Ice hasn’t even had a chance to melt,” she says as I take a swig and realize for the first time how thirsty I am. “You hungry?”

I nod. “Can I get the special?” I don’t ask what it is because it doesn’t matter. Grace’s food always hits the mark.

She smiles knowingly, her red-lipsticked mouth pulling up at one corner. “’Course. It’ll just be a minute.”

“Is he here?” I ask.

Grace nods, then tilts her head toward a table in the far corner of the room against the windows. “For an hour. Didn’t want to be late.”

“Huh. That serious?”

“Seems so.” She shoos me in his direction. “Go on. I’ll bring your food out soon as it’s ready.”

It’s not quite five o'clock. Only six patrons are scattered between the tables and bookshop area, all of whom I know. It's the standard lull before the pub’s busy dinner hours when half the community dumps inside. I nod at the ones who catch my eye, but don’t stop to say hi because I'm on a mission.

I sidle up to the table Grace pointed out and find my client deeply involved in a game of “Clash of Clans” on his iPad.

“You winning?” I ask, sliding into a chair opposite him.

He doesn’t look up. “Not right now.”

Jake Dean is Grace’s nine-year-old grandson and one of my absolute favorite people in the world. He frowns, taps the screen a few more times, then sets the iPad aside. His long-lashed doe eyes shoot right over the top of his Coke to find me. “Thanks for coming.”

“Of course. It sounded important.”

“It is.”

I’ve known Jake since he was born, and even better since his single dad—Grace’s son—skipped town in search of more drugs and left him with her. He’s my buddy, and I’d do anything for him, including agreeing to a client meeting on the final afternoon of a week-long trial.

Jake's serious expression almost makes me laugh, but I fight back the urge.

He's an intense kid, curious and super smart, and about six inches shorter than most kids his age. The first two land him in trouble with adults, and the last two, with his classmates. I’m not sure what trouble with which group brings me here today.

“I’ve got a problem,” he says, then sucks down a straw-length of soda.

Again, I have to work to not chuckle at the slurpy sound. “I figured. Your Gigi said I should come.”

The last time Jake insisted on a “client-meeting” he was five and ran home from school after the teacher blamed him for starting a fight which he swore he didn’t.

She didn’t believe him, so he took off. Ran eight blocks to the pub.

That time he wanted me to investigate and prove Callum Barclay was the one who tripped Michael Jones on purpose, not him.

Of course, I took the case. After being paid in Cheez-Its, I proved to the teacher—through information casually obtained from other parents at a local middle school baseball game—that Callum had it in for Michael because Michael lost Callum’s glove.

It was enough for the teacher to renege on the time-outs for Jake, although I’m not sure whether that was because of the evidence, or because she wanted me to leave her alone.

“Lay it on me,” I say.

Jake sighs, then starts in. “There’s this kid in my class. Dale Peyton. A real dummy.”

“Hey, bud. That’s not nice.”

“Maybe not, but it’s true. Anyway, Dale is a bully. He likes to eat his food and everybody else’s. Lately, he’s been snatching my lunches sometime before we go to the lunchroom. The last two days he got my ham and cheese melts.”

“Not cool,” I say, folding my hands on the table in front of me, though I can’t say I blame Dale. Grace’s ham and cheese melts are the stuff of legend .

“No, not cool. And even not cooler is that Ms. Palmer doesn’t believe me.”

“How many times has this happened?”

“Five times in the last two weeks.”

“And your teacher doesn’t believe you?”

“Well”—Jake tips his head—“I mean, I haven’t actually seen him do it. That's why Ms. Palmer says she can't do anything about it. That’s why I need you.”

He slides a snack bag of Cheez-Its across the table and this time I have to cough to cover up the chuckle that leaps from my throat. “Will you do it?”

I lay my hand on the bag, slowly pull it to my side of the table with the most sober expression I can muster. “Absolutely, I will.”

For the next fifteen minutes Jake regales me with tales of the missing ham-and-cheeses and I pepper him with questions about the room setup, the timing of recess and lunch breaks, and how he thinks Dale is spiriting the sandwich away and eating it without being seen.

“Bathroom breaks. I’m sure of it. He takes at least two before lunchtime.”

“Hmm.” I pause, thinking. “Does Dale have any allergies? Food or whatever?”

“If he does, then he’s being pretty stupid eating other people’s food.”

“True. But does he?”

Jake shrugs. “Don’t think so.”

“Well, I’ve already got a few ideas, but I need a little time before I put a plan in motion,” I tell him. “I’m gonna think this over and get back to you. I should be ready for you on Monday. You think you could pack a second lunch, something he won’t want to steal?”

Jake shakes his head, his brow furrowed in consternation. “Like what? I’ve seen Dale eat a worm on the playground on a dare after another kid stomped on it.”

“Fair point. Maybe plan to buy lunch on Monday—I’ll tell your Gigi what’s going on…unless, did you tell her already?”

“Nah. I didn’t want to worry her.”

“She’ll be okay. Let’s bring her in on this, agreed? ”

Jake nods. “If you say so.”

“Good man.”

If only all my clients were so obliging.

By the time Jake shuffles upstairs to do his homework, I’ve got no steam left. I get up to go ask Grace about my takeout order when she walks over with it already bagged up.

I sigh. “You’re a mind reader.”

Grace shrugs. “Figured with everything going on today and”—she tilts her head at the place Jake had been sitting—“his little crisis, you’d be desperate to head home as soon as possible.”

“Right as usual,” I say, taking the bag from her. I don’t bother to tell Grace to put it on my tab. I have a standing one I pay off monthly. “He’s fine, by the way.” I know Grace won’t pry, but I also know she’s likely a smidge worried. “Kid at school’s been stealing his lunch.”

“Hmm,” Grace mumbles, the same fire in her eyes I felt when Jake told me the story. The kind of fire that would send a grandmother—or pseudo-godmother like me—down to an elementary school to address the situation, were it not for her better judgement.

“Don’t worry. I’m going to help him make it clear what’s going on. Just need a few days.”

Grace grins. “I’d like to see that go down.”

“You and me both.” I raise the bag. “Thanks for this.”

“Anything for Riverview’s best private investigator.”

“Riverview’s only private investigator,” I call out on my way to the door.

“One and the same, kiddo. One and the same.”

I’m halfway home before I realize that, as with Cole, I forgot to ask Grace her thoughts about the note left on my windshield.

My brain is apparently pretty scrambled.

You would think I’d spent the last week helping to put a serial killer away or something.