Jenn Vakey - Rilynne Evans 07 - Revenge with Murder (3 page)

Ben motioned back out and Rilynne nodded and followed him back through the opening.  After checking her gauges again, they started venturing out into the reef.

She had seen footage taken underwater before, but it was nothing compared to
actually seeing it with her own eyes.  She was watching some small fish weaving in and out of the coral when Ben tapped her shoulder.  She turned around to see a large sea turtle swimming past them, close enough that she reached out and ran her fingers down his shell as he passed.  She watched him swim away, her eyes not leaving him until they landed on something in the distance.  Her first thoughts were that it bore a striking resemblance to a dead body.  As she quickly shrugged that notion off, laughing at herself for it being the first place her mind jumped, she pushed through a school of fish swimming by and started moving toward it. 

She hadn’t made it five feet before Ben reached out and took her arm.  He couldn’t talk, but his eyes said enough.  He wasn’t sure she should be wandering off.  She pointed toward the mysterious object, but it didn’t appear to ease his hesitation.  Rilynne didn’t know how to convey her desire to investigate the curious scene without words.  After a few moments of trying, she just took him by the hand and started slowly swimming closer.

Though there was a high level of visibility, she still couldn’t make out exactly what she was looking at.  Hidden amidst the swaying seaweed, there was a large white object.  Against it was something else.  Rilynne strained her eyes as they inched closer.  Ben’s curiosity finally seemed to take over as he pulled out of her grip and swam ahead.  He was a few feet in front of her, blocking her view, when he suddenly stopped.  She kicked to catch up to him, but the moment she did, he wrapped his fingers firmly around her arm and started to pull her back.

She fought as he did, though, trying to get a better look.  A list of things ran through her mind at once.  First was that it was a shark or something else that was going to harm them.  Her heart was pounding violently in her chest at the thought.  Part of her wanted to just back away with Ben, but her eagerness got the better of her. 

The moment she freed herself from his grip, she saw what had spooked him.

“Oh no,” she said, though only bubbles escaped her.

R
ilynne fought the urge to move even closer.  She was already close enough to see everything she needed, though, and she knew Ben would stop her if she tried.  The white object was a refrigerator, but that wasn’t the startling part.  Her initial thoughts had been correct.  Chained to the front of it was the body of a woman.

Ben tugged at her arm again to grab her attention.  When she turned to face him, he motioned up to the surface.  She nodded but not before taking the camera from his other hand.  Luckily, he didn’t need her to explain what she was planning to do.

Rilynne swam a few feet closer as she began taking pictures of the horrific scene.  The woman, who appeared to be in her fifties or sixties, had several visible wounds.  Her white blouse was discolored in several spots, which she assumed was what was left of any blood stains.  The thing that surprised her was how fresh she looked.  She wasn’t an expert on the decomposition rates of a body submerged in the ocean, but she couldn’t imagine she had been there more than a day.

After taking pictures of everything she could, Rilynne let Ben lead her back up.

Neither she nor Ben seemed to be able to say anything after they surfaced.  Rilynne just pulled her regulator out of her mouth as soon as her BC was inflated and looked quietly around for the boat.  Though it only seemed like they had moved about twenty feet, the boat was closer to three hundred away.  Ben raised his arm to attract the boat as she took a few deep breaths to collect herself.

It took mere moments for Ben to capture the attention of the captain and for the small boat to jump into motion.  Although it sped toward them, it felt to Rilynne that it was moving at no more than a crawl.

“Call the police,” Rilynne said when the boat pulled up minutes later and the captain reached down to help her back on the boat.  When he shot her a confused look, she continued.  “There’s a body down there.”

He looked for a moment like he wanted to laugh, as if she were telling an ill humored joke.  As he helped her out of the water, he turned to Ben.  If he was hoping to get assurances that she was just messing with him, he didn’t get it.  After releasing his hold on Rilynne, he turned without a word and walked into the cabin.  She pulled her
mask off just in time to see him reaching for his radio.

Rilynne pulled her gear off and helped Ben up.  As soon as he was on, she sat down and reached for the camera.  As she did, she felt the boat start moving.

“Where are we going?” she called out as she moved toward the cabin.  “We should wait here for the police to arrive.”

“I was told to head back in,” he said as he slowly shook his head.  Though he didn’t meet her gaze, she could see the shock on his face.  It was clear that he had never encountered anything like this before.

She wanted to argue, but she knew it wasn’t her call to make.  They were far outside of the range of pull she had.  After a few seconds, she turned and walked back over to where Ben had sat down.

The trip back seemed to take twice as long as it should have.  Although she was flipping through the pictures she had taken, it still seemed so unreal.  While this wasn’t the first body she had found, usually she was out looking for one.  She never even imagined they would find one while on vacation.

“What’s going on, Ray?” a voice called out when they pulled back up to the dock.  Rilynne looked over and saw a man storming toward them.  He was only a few inches taller than herself, though the look of intense frustration on his face made him appear larger.  His head, though she had a feeling it was optional, was cleanly shaven.  His worn navy blue button up fit a little too snugly around his midsection, but the badge could clearly be seen over his heart.  “It’s supposed to be my day off.”

“Sorry, sergeant.
  They’re insisting that they found a body down there,” Ray stated.  Rilynne had a feeling he was forcing the skepticism in his voice, because that wasn’t what was showing on his face.  She wasn’t entirely surprised, though.  With a population as small as the one in Spicer Island, it could cause someone a lot of trouble to get on the wrong side of law enforcement.  Without having seen the body himself, he wasn’t likely to want to be pulled into the middle of it.

The sergeant, looking both annoyed and condescending, turned to Ben and Rilynne.  “We’ve lost several vessels when they’ve been caught in storms over the years,” he stated.  “Not all of the bodies have been found.  While we are always looking to provide the remains to the families, I hardly think the discovery of one warranted me cancelling
my plans and making a trip out here.  I’ll have the divers go out to the location first thing in the morning to collect any bones and personal effects they can.  Now if you don’t mind…”

He turned to make a move toward his car, but Rilynne interrupted him.  “Well unless any of your lost sailors were tied to a refrigerator and dropped in within the last day or two, I don’t think that’s what we found.”

He stopped in his tracks and turned back to face them.  While his expression had shifted to confusion, he didn’t seem to be able to form words.  Rilynne didn’t wait for him to get his composure.

“You have an older woman who is showing obvious signs of an assault chained to a refrigerator sitting on the ocean floor,” she said harshly.  “Surely that qualifies as a good excuse to be called in on your day off.”

Ben grabbed her arm as if to rein her in, but he didn’t say a word.  She knew even as the words left her lips that it was probably the wrong approach to take, but she couldn’t stop herself.  There was just something about the man that she didn’t like.

After a few tense moments the sergeant finally seemed ready to talk, but it wasn’t them he spoke to.  “Do you have your gear on you?” he asked the captain.  Apparently at a loss for words himself, Ray just nodded.  “Good.  Get your boys and go down to collect the body.  Take Taylor’s boat so you can pull everything up all at once.  Try not to remove the body from the refrigerator unless you have to.  I’ll have a truck waiting out here to take it to the doctor.”

Rilynne was outraged by his willingness to have someone else collect the remains without his supervision.  She took a step forward but Ben pulled her back.  When she looked up at him, he just shook his head.  As frustrating as it was, she knew he was right.  Nothing good could come from angering him further.  At least she had the pictures she’d taken so there was evidence of exactly how the scene had looked before being disturbed by the divers he sent down.

“I want to go to the station,” she said as they watched him climb into his car and pull away.

To her surprise, Ben didn’t argue.  She could tell by his hardened expression that he wasn’t happy with the idea, but he kept his thoughts to himself.

“Let’s go back to the house and get cleaned up and changed first.  Then we’ll walk down there,” he said.  “It will do you some good to take the time to calm down a little.  I have a feeling he’s the type who would rather lock you up than listen to your opinions on how he should be handling a case.”

Rilynne didn’t want to wait, but she knew better than to fight him on it.  He was only agreeing to go in the first place to make her happy; she wasn’t going to push him further.

She quickly pulled her wetsuit off and fought as hard as she could to calm herself while Ben collected the rest of their stuff.  She had little success.  There was little that enraged her more than someone not respecting a scene, especially when it was their job to do so.  It was everything she could do to keep from sprinting off when they finally started back toward the house.  Several times she had to make a conscious effort to slow her stride so she could stay with Ben.

Rilynne didn’t say a word from the time they left the marina until they were close to the station over half an hour later.  It wasn’t that she didn’t have anything to say.  On the contrary; she felt like she was going to explode.  She was actually afraid to talk.  While Ben had agreed to go, he wasn’t hiding his frustration about it.  Several times in the few minutes they were at their beach house he put things down or shut a door harder than needed.  The fact that he wasn’t asking her why she was being so quiet was just further proof of that.  If she thought for a second she would be able to push the case out of her mind so they could just enjoy the remainder of their honeymoon, she would have just turned around and walked back to the house.  She knew herself better than that, though.

“I think this is it right up here,” Ben said, finally breaking the tense silence.  Rilynne studied the front of the small, white stone building before she finally saw the police department sign.  Without waiting, she hurried up the stairs and pushed the door open.

“I don’t think I’ll be needing your statement at this moment in time,” the sergeant said when he looked up and saw them walk in.  He looked less than pleased by the intrusion from where he sat, feet propped up on his desk.  Without waiting for them to respond, he turned his attention back to the newspaper in his hands.

“I’d actually like to help with your investigation, Sergeant Perez,” she said, looking
at the name plate on his desk.  “Starting with the photos we took of the scene before you had the body removed.”  He looked up at her with an almost amused sort of grin.

“Why don’t you head back to your room and leave the police work to me,” he stated.  The continuous note of condescension in his voice was growing old.

Ben reached for Rilynne’s arm and pulled her toward the door, but she pulled it free and crossed the room toward him.  “Have you ever handled a murder?” she asked, dropping her hands down on his desk.  Perez’s grin faltered, but he didn’t rise from his seat.  “I’m a homicide detective, and my husband is the top forensic analyst in the United States.  Looking into things like this is what we do.”

“Well, last I checked,” he said, finally pushing himself up from his seat, “this isn’t the United States.  Now, you can either head back to your house, or I can arrest you.  The choice is yours.”

She stared at him for several tense seconds before pushing off of the desk.  Before walking out the door, she turned to the young boy sitting behind the desk just to the right of it.  “Tell your boss to look us up.  If he wants our help, you know where to find us.”

He looked stunned, but nodded.  Rilynne shot a menacing glare back at Perez before stepping through the door Ben was holding open for her.

“Can you believe how rude he is?” she asked.  Rage was coursing through her as she started down the dirt road.  She didn’t realize how fast she was moving until she noticed that Ben had to run to catch up.

“What do you expect?” he asked.  Surprisingly, he didn’t try to slow her.  “No one wants a stranger to come in and take over a case, especially one as big as this one.  This isn’t like cities back home.  We can’t just call in favors to get them to cooperate.  Neither of us have connections that reach this far.  He’s already told you what would happen if you push.  I don’t know about you, but I don’t really want to spend the rest of our honeymoon behind bars.  I know it’s hard, but you need to just let it go.”

With his words, Rilynne felt the anger slip away.  He was right; this was their honeymoon.  She should be enjoying it instead of obsessing about something she couldn’t control.

As her pace slowed, she just nodded and took him by the arm.  “Sorry,” she mumbled.  She could see him grin from the corner of her eye, but he didn’t respond.  She
felt herself wanting to rant again, but refrained.  It was enough for one of them to be frustrated.  If she dragged this out any further, the only thing it would accomplish would be angering her husband.

“Tell me you didn’t see this coming,” he said.

Rilynne quickly shook her head.  “I promise I didn’t,” she said, trying to reassure him.  The fact she hadn’t actually surprised her.  Even if she had, though, she wasn’t sure she would have told him.  As much as she would have hated to lie to him, the only thing telling him would accomplish would be frustrating him further.  That’s the last thing she wanted to do.

The tension that had surrounded them on the trek to the station had completely disappeared by the time they made it back to their island house.  While Rilynne was still furious by the sergeant’s decision, as well as his apparent disinterest for the case, she knew Ben was right.  There wasn’t anything she could do about it.

“We could just buy the island,” she joked as she stepped up behind Ben.  He unlocked their front door before turning and looking down at her.  To her relief, he seemed almost amused by the suggestion.  “Then he would be forced to be a more accommodating individual.”

He shook his head slowly as he held it open for her to enter.  She quickly kicked off her shoes before dropping down on the couch in the small sitting area.  Ben glanced back outside before shutting the door and joining her.  With as often as they had been sneaked up on over the last year, it was a habit she wasn’t surprised he had picked up.

“So you want us to buy an island, well, actually an entire country, just so you can work on a murder case?” he asked.  He sat down in the armchair across from her and pulled her feet up onto his lap.  “And you wanted me to actually believe that you would be able to up and move to a place like this without going completely crazy due to a lack of crimes to solve?”

He pulled off her socks before pushing his thumbs into the bottom of her feet.  She closed her eyes and let her head drop back against the back of the couch.  “I…” she started, but the comfort radiating up her body left her unable to complete her sentence.  After a few blissful moments, she picked her head back up and looked at him.  “Consider it an investment.  We buy the island and lock up the only killer it’s apparently ever had. 
It would be the responsible thing to do.”