“But it’s red meat! Red meat is good for me!”
“It’s fattening. The last thing you need right now is to fatten up even more.”
“I won’t fatten up,” I told him. “I promise!”
“Eat this and I won’t be your friend anymore,” Dooley said with uncharacteristic severity.
“Huh?”
“I’m not going to stand idly by and watch you eat yourself to death, Max.”
“Well, you don’t have to. You just have to watch me eat that tasty bit of steak.” And I made a move to snap it up, only to be forestalled by Dooley once again.
“Choose, Max. Me or that steak.”
Phew. Tough choice. Still, instinct is instinct, and red meat is red meat, and I would have gobbled the bit of steak if I suddenly hadn’t caught sight of a familiar figure.
“Hey, isn’t that Donna’s CEO Hillary Davies?”
“I’m not going to fall for that, Max. You’re just trying to distract me.”
“No, but it really is. Look, she just ran into Donna’s ex-husband.”
“You’ll have to do better than that. You know me, Max. Nothing gets past me.”
“Oh, and those must be Donna’s kids. Sweetums and Honeychild. Look how Hillary is smiling so sweetly at those kids. It’s obvious she’s crazy about them.”
“Oh, for crying out loud,” Dooley said, and grabbed the bit of steak between his teeth and devoured it in one go. He swallowed, then turned to where I was looking.
I stared at him, aghast.“Did you just eat my piece of steak?”
“It wasn’t your piece of steak.”
“But you just told me it was fattening.”
He lifted his chin.“I’m your friend, Max. If I have to sacrifice myself for your sake, I will gladly do so.”
I narrowed my eyes at him.“Eating a perfectly delicious and juicy bit of steak doesn’t sound like much of a sacrifice to me.”
“A friend’s gotta do what a friend’s gotta do.”
And then we both watched as Hillary Davies picked up Sweetums and Honeychild, who turned out to be two adorable apple-cheeked little boys, and hugged them close. Tad Rip watched on with a smile on his face. It was the scene of perfect familial bliss, if not for the fact that it should have been Donna and not her CEO hugging those kids.
“We have to find the killer, Max,” said Dooley, obviously sharing my sentiments.
“Yes, we do,” I said, and never had I been more resolved to put my best paw forward. Watching Dooley swallow down that tasty sliver of steak I had marked for my own might have had something to do with it as well. I was pretty sure that if we caught the killer, Odelia would be more than happy tobuy me not just a tiny piece of steak but a complete slice!
Chapter 28
Odelia was feeling restless. She’d written her article—what little she knew about the case at this point—and now there was nothing else to do but go over all the elements again until something jumped out at her that would provide the final clue. That moment when everything clicked into place. And she’d revisited the crimescene in her head and had gone over all the interviews she and Chase had done but still nothing took her to that aha moment she was looking for. Nothing.
Even Max and Dooley were coming up empty, and if Harriet and Brutus had found something online they weren’t telling, which meant Harriet was probably just surfing to all the gossip sites as usual.
She looked up when a deferential cough sounded. Her editor Dan was watching her from the doorway, thoughtfully rubbing his long white beard.“Stuck, kid?” he asked in his smoky voice.
“Yeah, pretty much,” she admitted.
“You know what I do when I get stuck?”
“Have a smoke?”
“How do you know?”
“I don’t smoke, Dan. And I’m not going to start simply because this case doesn’t make sense.”
“I’m not telling you to smoke, honey. I’m telling you to take a break.”
“Take a break?”
“Don’t look at me as if I just suggested you to go and harpoon some whales. Taking a break is a perfectly legitimate solution to getting your brain unstuck.”
“But I still have a ton of work. There’s the county fair, the new addition to the marina, the paddleboard competition—”
“Those can all wait. As your editor what I want you to do right now is to take a break. Get away from your computer for a couple hours and take your mind off things for a while.”
“You’re a weird editor, Dan,” she said. “Most editors prefer to work their reporters to death.”
He pointed a stubby, crooked finger at her.“And that’s exactly what I don’t want you to do. I like you too much to see you work yourself to death, Odelia. And I know from experience that sometimes all you need is some perspective.”
“And a break.”
“And a break. So shut down that computer of yours, get out of here, and don’t let me see you for at least the next couple of hours.”
“So what do you suggest I do?”
He threw up his hands.“Go for a walk! Take a swim. Sit on the beach and look at the damned tourists for all I care. But most importantly, don’t think about the case!”
Which, as she soon discovered, was easier said than done. She’d gone for a walk, and had walked as far as the boardwalk, taken a seat on one of the benches the town council had been so kind to install, and had stared out across the ocean for a bit. The water was pretty choppy, and kids were squealing happily as they jumped into the cresting waves. And she’d been sitting there for twenty minutes, doing her absolute darndest to empty her mind and NOT think about the case and NOT check her phone, when a deep voice sounded beside her.
“Mind if I join you?”
“Oh, God,” she said. “Am I happy to see you.”
Chase took a seat next to her on the bench.“Not that I’m not flattered, but any special reason?”
“I’ve been trying hard NOT to think about the case.”
He grinned.“Which is just about the best way to think about the case.”
“It is?”
“Of course. What if I tell you NOT to think about pink elephants?”
Suddenly, all she could think about were pink elephants.“I see what you mean.”
“Who gave you this sterling piece of advice?”
“Dan. Said if I didn’t get out and take a break I was never going to get anywhere.”
“Same here,” Chase said with a deep sigh. “Only it was your uncle who kicked me out.”
“So here we are. Marooned on the beach.”
“Yep. You can say that again. So why don’t we try NOT talking about the case, huh?”
She laughed.“You’re funny, do you know that, Detective Kingsley?”
“You take that back right now,” he said with a grin. “Police detectives are not supposed to be funny. It is not in the job description.”
“But you’re not a detective now, are you? You’re on a break, and so am I.”
So they sat there for a bit, a convivial silence descending upon them, when suddenly a woman started screaming nearby for help. Immediately, both she and Chase were on their feet.
They reached the woman, who was cradling a little girl in her arms. The girl’s breathing was labored and her face deathly pale.
“What happened?” Chase asked urgently.
“She was stung by a bee,” the woman wailed.
“She’s in shock,” Odelia determined. “Did you call 911?”
“I did,” said the woman, tears streaming down her face.
Chase checked the girl.“She’s not breathing,” he said, and immediately started CPR. Odelia took out her phone and called her dad. He just might beat the ambulance. She watched Chase perform the lifesaving procedure and when he announced that she was going to be fine, she breathed a sigh of relief and so did the girl’s mother. Just then, her dad’s car pulled up, and he came hurtling down the stone steps and plowed through the powdery sand until he’d reached them. He was carrying his black doctor’s bag and sank down onto his knees next to the girl.