“The hell they’re not!” Sean exploded. He wasn’t a redhead of Irish lineage for nothing, David decided. “Katie is-my sister!”
“Sean, this is my choice,” Katie pleaded. “And David was one of your friends-a good friend, until you more or less deserted him and turned against him like everyone else.”
“Katie,” David said, grating his teeth, “thanks, but don’t defend me. Look, Sean, I care about your sister a great deal. I believe she feels the same way about me.”
Sean didn’t answer him. He turned on Katie. “I did not turn my back on David,” he protested. “I never deserted anyone.” He looked at David. “We’ve been in contact through the years, off and on. I have never turned on a friend.”
“Sean, I never suggested that you turned on me,” David said. “Look, Sean, honest to God, I mean no offense, and certainly no disrespect here. I care about your sister, a great deal.”
“And there’s a murderer loose in the city again,” Katie said quietly.
“You’re sleeping with him for protection?” Sean said.
“No!” Katie said, horrified. “No, oh, Lord, Sean, will you please…chill! Let’s get your stuff. Have some coffee-give me a minute to take a shower and get dressed. You and David talk-you haven’t actually seen each other in a decade. Talk. Don’t either of you go defending me or my honor in any way, do you understand?” she demanded.
“He’s wearing a towel!” Sean said. “And we’re not in the high-school gym anymore.”
“I have clothing,” David assured him. With dignity, he swept up his shirt and jeans-desperately glad that he had needed his phone and so taken his clothing from Katie’s room-and headed into the downstairs half bath. When he emerged, Sean had brought his bags in. They were dumped in the hall. Sean was sitting on one of the bar stools, a cup of coffee gripped in his hand.
Sean glowered at David. “So. Now a prostitute named Stella Martin has been found dead at a different museum in a similar pose. Fill me in,” Sean said.
David told him what he could. There wasn’t much.
“Danny Zigler?” Sean said. “He’s weird enough-but he’s a runt. And not the sharpest knife in the drawer.”
“Danny didn’t do it,” David said.
“And you know that because?”
“I don’t think that Danny had the strength to kill with his bare hands.”
“Even if he suffocated his victims first?”
“Suffocating, you still fight. I think the killer had to be big.”
“Our size,” Sean said dryly.
“Yeah. Our size.”
Sean shook his head. “And…Katie is the one who showed you the area where she thought that Stella had been killed.”
“Yes.”
“She didn’t say…or do…anything weird, did she?” Sean asked.
“What do you mean by that?” David asked.
“Nothing, nothing.” Sean stared at David. He was still frowning.
“Sean, I have never felt about anyone the way that I feel about Katie,” he said flatly.
“That was fast,” Sean said, his tone dubious.
“You’re her brother.”
“Remember that fact.”
“Fast, slow, whatever, it’s the truth.”
“So, you suddenly love her and you’re going to give up a life of fame and fortune to come home and live the easy life of an islander and raise a passel of little conchs?” Sean mocked.
“I don’t know what will happen in the future,” David said. “I’m telling you that I take nothing about your sister lightly, and that we are emotionally entangled and not just opting for something like a best-friends-with-benefits deal.”
Sean looked away and nodded. “Sorry. She is my sister. And I did walk in to find a man who had been a good friend-and a suspect in a murder-in a towel in my house.”
“I know. I’m sorry.”
Katie came hurrying down the stairs. “So, do you know everything that’s happened on the island since you’ve been gone?” she asked him.
Sean glanced over at David. “I haven’t been gone for a decade-I was here at Christmas,” he reminded her.
“I’m talking about-well, I guess I’m talking about Stella Martin,” Katie said lamely. “And the past,” she admitted.
Sean let out a sigh of aggravation. “Katie, I told you to stay out of it all.”
“Sean, you’re not my keeper. And thank God-you’re never here. So don’t go all protective on me now!”
“Why are you letting her get into danger?” Sean asked David.
“I’m not letting her into danger-I’m trying to stay with her as much as I can to make sure that she’s not alone,” David said.
“Well, I’m home now,” Sean said.
“Hey!” Katie protested. “Hey, I did fine on my own without either of you, so don’t you two go getting the testosterone thing going and try to manage me, either of you!”
She stared at the two of them.
Sean looked at David.
“I’ll make sure I’m with her when you’re not,” he said.
“She shouldn’t be alone. And there will be times…when I might be worried about her,” David admitted.
“Hey!” Katie protested.
David’s phone started to ring again. He snapped it open. “David?”
The voice was sweet and feminine. And old.
“Aunt Alice!” he said, his heart sinking.
“David, you are here. And you haven’t been by.”
Alice and Esther were actually his great-aunts. They had never been anything but patient and kind, and he knew that they loved him, that his leaving had hurt them and that he had been a selfish ass not to have taken the time yet to see them. They were both octogenarians now, with Esther closing in on ninety.
He loved them both.
They were incredible storytellers; they knew the island far better than any teacher he had ever had in high school.
“David?”
“I know. I know. I’m so sorry,” he said.
“Well,” Alice told him, “we’ve heard all about that dreadful business with another poor woman murdered. Your cousin Liam has been terribly busy, and he’s said you’ve helped out with talking to folks, but…we were hoping you could stop by for some lunch.”
Katie and Sean were staring at him, curious. As he looked at them, they looked away, embarrassed at inadvertently eavesdropping.
“May I bring a few old friends?” he asked.
“Well, of course, David! When haven’t we welcomed your friends?” Alice asked.
Katie had thought that Sean was going to refuse the invitation to David’s aunts’ house, but he was determined at the moment to stay close to her, she realized. It was good that her brother cared, she thought.
And irritating.
He had rented a two-seater convertible in Miami.
“I didn’t know I could possibly need more than two seats,” he said.
“My car is in the drive-just move your rental, mine is the obvious choice,” Katie told him.
“We can walk,” David said.
“They’re past the cemetery-it’s almost a mile. Let’s just drive,” Sean said. He was coming with them, but it was obvious that he was tired.
So they drove, Katie at the wheel. She slowed down as they passed the cemetery, trying to drive and see what spirits might be about in the bright light.
As ever, the beautiful, spectral figure of Elena de Hoyos moved among the graves.
She saw no one else.
“What are you doing?” Sean asked her sharply.
“Driving,” she replied.
She pressed harder on the gas pedal. Past the cemetery two blocks, she turned the corner and came to the beautiful old Victorian where Alice and Esther Beckett, spinster sisters, had lived most of their lives. As she pulled into the drive, the two came hurrying out the door and down the porch steps.
She recognized them; they were known throughout Key West and the islands. They had been born rich, and they had used their money wisely and well all their lives, helping with every cause in the world. They gave money to several churches-Alice was quite certain that God didn’t discriminate between minor differences in worship-as well as animal-rescue leagues and all the medical charities for every organ in the human body. They were truly loved.