No Virgin Island (2 page)

“Counsel,” Janquar said, nodding at Neil, who managed to look distinguished in his flip-flops and Ray Bans. He was a tall, tan man wearing cut-offs and a T-shirt with the words “Bar None” written below the scales of justice, which were pictures of inverted martini glasses.

“Neil? How did you—” Sabrina began, but quickly turned to Henry. “Did you?” Henry was the only one who knew Sabrina found Neil attractive enough to tempt her to break her self-inflected ban on men in her life.

“Guilty as charged,” Henry said, moving toward his scooter. “I’d best move on so that the Leonards will have a house tonight. Shall we tuck them in Tide-Away?” Henry asked while mounting his scooter.

“Sure. Maybe I should come help you,” Sabrina said, although she knew Tide-Away was probably in decent shape and would require only minimal efforts after Henry’s sleepover.

“Just say we’re upgrading them at no extra charge when you pick them up at the ferry,” said Henry.

“As long as Detective Janquar’s done with you for the moment,” Neil said, “you need to come to my office as—”

He was interrupted by the sound of a vehicle approaching. A navy-blue jeep came into view.

“Oh no. Do we have curiosity creeps already?” Janquar said, disgust rolling off his tongue. Sabrina knew what he meant by curiosity creeps. They were the people who considered a crime site a scenic view, a shrine to visit even years later. They were the ones who called in to talk shows, night after night, to ask questions about the crime, investigation, and trial, waiting hours on the line to get through. Worse were the authorities, the callers who scrutinized and weighed the forensic evidence, sharing their theories about why the accused was guilty and should go straight to hell.

“No, no,” Sabrina said. “That’s Lyla and Evan. They live over there,” she said pointing at the house. Lyla and Evan Banks were an elderly couple who had recently moved from New York City to retire on St. John at the villa across the way from Villa Mascarpone.

Sabrina watched Lyla, always the one to drive, pull into her driveway. Within seconds, Lyla was out of the jeep staring at the busy officers who were now swarming the driveway and outer yard like navy-blue ants at a picnic. One was winding crime scene tape around the property line, cinching Villa Mascarpone at the waist.

Evan emerged from the passenger door and went to hoist a plastic bag from Starfish Market out of the backseat.
Sabrina heard him telling Lyla, “Why don’t I just bring the frozen stuff in the house while you run over and see what it’s all about, dear? I’ll join you in a minute.” Though the Alzheimer’s was barely noticeable to anyone else, Sabrina knew Lyla felt crushed whenever the slightest sign of Evan’s deterioration showed, and she guessed that before becoming ill, he would never have let Lyla approach a police scene alone. Sabrina was also reminded about the close proximity of the driveways of the three villas sitting at the top of the hill were and how easily you could hear conversations taking place in them.

“What’s going on here? Whatever has happened? Are you all right, dear?” Lyla asked as she approached Neil, Janquar, and Sabrina but looked directly at Sabrina. “I thought we’d left this kind of thing behind us when we left New York.”

Sabrina wanted to reach out and hug Lyla, which surprised her because she was not the hugging kind. Henry was always trying to give her a hug for this or that and she wanted no part of it. But Lyla Banks was her friend and seemed frightened.

When Lyla and Evan first moved to the neighborhood, Henry had introduced himself and let the Banks know that Ten Villas managed their neighbor, Villa Mascarpone. Lyla had invited Henry and her to dinner. Sabrina had insisted to Henry she didn’t want to go, didn’t want to get involved with people, especially not old people. But Henry had been adamant. If they were going to make
their business work, they had to become part of the small island community. “No man is an island,” he said, before she agreed just to shut him up.

Not long after she and Henry had arrived for dinner, Evan, tall, lean, and charming, a retired math professor, had bragged to them how brave Lyla was because she was making a new recipe for them, a seafood casserole, which Sabrina and Henry had inhaled. Later, when Sabrina helped Lyla load the dishwasher in the kitchen, away from the men who were having brandy by the pool, she complimented Lyla on the dinner and for daring to experiment with guests, something Sabrina couldn’t imagine doing.

“Oh, dear, I think I’ve made that seafood casserole about one hundred times in the past forty years. The secret is the Ritz crackers on top with loads of melted butter. Evan just doesn’t remember. It’s part of the Alzheimer’s.”

Sabrina worried when Detective Janquar took a step toward Lyla, but his voice was surprisingly gentle. “Ma’am, I am Detective Leon Janquar—”

Janquar was interrupted by Rory Eagan, who had stormed up the driveway from his house below, indignation written all over the scowl on his otherwise handsome, smooth-featured face.

“What the hell is going on?” Rory asked.

Sabrina knew Rory was more inclined to bellow than speak. His flair for the dramatic annoyed her. She was glad his house sat down on a slope below Villa Mascarpone. She could go weeks without seeing him, though she
saw his wife frequently. Sabrina had become friends with Mara, meeting her first through Henry and later through Lyla’s newly formed reading group.

Janquar looked at Rory and then over to Lyla.

“A crime was committed here, ma’am,” the officer told Lyla, ignoring Rory. “I can’t tell you much more right now, but an officer will be over to your house within the next several hours to interview you, and we may be able to provide more information then. I’d ask you to please go to your home and remain there for now.”

“What, and not know what’s going on in our own neighborhood? Officer, I have a wife and two children who live next door. I demand to know if they are at risk,” Rory said, pointing a finger at Janquar. Sabrina caught a faint whiff of rum from Rory and noticed a redness to his tanned checks.

“Listen, Mr. Eagan, everything is under control here. No one is at risk, but this is an official crime scene, and I must insist you return to your home and let my men do their job.” Janquar stepped in front of Rory.

Sabrina saw Evan come up behind Lyla, placing his hand on her right shoulder.

“Come on, dear, let’s wait at home to find out what’s happening,” Evan said, pulling Lyla gently toward him.

“Thanks, folks,” Janquar said.

“Well, do you think you could at least move your vehicle so I can get out of my driveway? I have an important appointment I can’t miss,” Rory told Janquar, grabbing his keys from his pocket.

“Sure thing, after you give a brief statement about whether you might have seen anything unusual, and as long as you understand we’ll need to interview you in more detail first thing tomorrow,” Janquar said, motioning to one of the officers to move the cruiser.

They watched Rory gesture as he talked to a different cop before trotting down the driveway to get his Suburban.

Janquar winked at Lyla and then looked over toward Neil.

“We don’t want to be responsible for an empty stool down at Bar None, now do we?”

Thinking she should take advantage of the lightness of the moment, Sabrina asked Janquar if she could leave, reminding him that there were new guests arriving at the dock who had reservations for Villa Mascarpone she needed to divert.

“There’s no reason to detain my client, is there, Detective?” Neil said, making it sound more like a statement than a question.

“Just as long as she doesn’t go off-island. I’ll want her to come to the station for questioning first thing in the morning, and I’ll want the information about where the victim lives phoned in right away,” Janquar told Neil Perry.

“What do I have to be questioned about? I’ve told you everything I know.”

“You were the last person to see this guy alive, as far as I know, and the first to find him dead. That’s reason enough, Ms. Salter.”

Henry arrived at Tide-Away to find Scott lying naked on a lounge chair, save for the tiny towel he had draped over his twinkie. He had slicked enough sun tan oil on him that if you threw him in a frying pan, he’d sauté.

The thoughts Henry harbored the night before about devouring Scott for twenty-four hours straight were no longer appetizing. He could distract himself with an occasional fling, but Henry craved routine, the predictability that came with the monotony of monogamy. Normal. Could he just have an ordinary life? Now with a murder at Villa Mascarpone, the tectonic plates of the new world he’d created had shifted. He was back in turbulent skies and needed to fasten his seatbelt.

“Hey, where’d you go?” Scott asked, lifting his Dolce & Gabbana sunglasses so he could look Henry directly in the eye.

“Sorry, but you’re going to have to leave,” Henry said, ignoring Scott’s question. He had more important things
to think about, like how he was going to get Tide-Away ready in record time. He figured the first thing he’d do was strip the bed they’d slept on and get the sheets in the washer. They hadn’t made much of a mess of the house where they’d crashed after a romantic dinner on the patio at Asolare the evening before. But Henry needed to make sure the house was perfect for the couple who were not going to stay in the villa they had reserved and whom he didn’t want disappointed with the substitute.

One of the fringe benefits from Ten Villas was use of any villa that was unoccupied, as long as he restored it to a guest-worthy state when he was done. The lure of a luxury villa with hot tub and pool was hard to say no to, Henry had learned. But it was not the white picket fence life he longed for.

Straight people didn’t get it. They equated a gay life with South Beach and a flamboyant lifestyle. What Henry had hoped he would have with David was a couple of kids and a golden retriever to go with a weathered, gray-shingled cottage surrounded by a picket fence. But that had been before David betrayed him.

“Is something wrong?” Scott said, sitting up straight in the deck chair with exaggerated concern.

“Honey, this has nothing to do with you. I just have to get this house ready for guests, pronto. They were supposed to stay somewhere else, but it’s still occupied,” Henry said. The inevitable boredom that ultimately fizzled his infatuations had been accelerated by the death of Carter Johnson
at Villa Mascarpone. Henry wondered what it would be like to have a steady significant other in his life when faced with a crisis. He just wasn’t into this boy-toy scene.

“Okay, I’ll just slip into the shower,” Scott said.

“No time for that,” Henry said, thinking about how long it would take to scrub all that suntan oil out of the tile shower stall.

“Well, I’ll just take a quick dip then,” Scott said, starting to walk toward the hexagonal shaped pool.

“Are you kidding? I’d have to call the company that cleaned up after BP in the Panhandle,” Henry said, beginning to straighten the six teak deck chairs so they were in a perfect chorus line.

Scott stood and watched while Henry moved over to the round patio table where they had sipped champagne under the stars. Henry was all business, pushing in each chair and picking up the acrylic flutes reserved for outdoor use, which had toppled over. Scott’s pout rivaled that of a two-year-old who’d had his binky stolen.

“I can’t leave like this,” he said, sweeping his hands from his arms down to his legs over his shiny body.

Henry strode over to the side of the house and turned on the outdoor shower. Getting rid of Scott was more work than cleaning the house.

“Here, rinse off and hurry,” he said. “I’ll bring a towel out after I load the dishwasher.”

Henry placed the flutes and a few other dishes in the dishwasher and wondered how Sabrina was faring. He
hated the way the cops were all over her. He remembered how they had treated her when they had a burglary at one of the villas, letting her know they didn’t approve of her and what had happened in Nantucket. He couldn’t imagine being the subject of their scrutiny.

He grabbed a clean fluffy towel and rushed out to the patio to find Scott. Henry wrapped the towel around Scott, gently dabbing him dry.

“There you go, handsome. That’s better, isn’t it?” Henry asked.

“That’s more like it,” Scott said, stepping into the clothes Henry handed him.

“Look, sweetie, I’m really sorry I’ve got to give you the bum’s rush here, but I’ve got kind of a work emergency,” Henry said. “I’ll call you later and make it up to you.” He patted Scott on the tush and dashed back into the house, knowing he would never lay eyes on him again.

Sabrina raced down the dirt road, which clung to the edge of the cliff where Villa Mascarpone and the other two villas were perched. Tourists were horrified when they first encountered the loose gravel surface without a guardrail to protect them from falling three hundred feet down onto jagged rocks and coral. Sabrina could drive it with her eyes closed with no fear. It wasn’t natural danger that scared her. No, what kept her awake at night was all man-made.

She made it up the next hillside where her own small house sat tucked in a pocket surrounded by thick vegetation on three sides, facing the Caribbean on the fourth. Normally, it took her eight minutes to drive back from Villa Mascarpone. This afternoon she made it in five. Neil’s final words, whispered as he walked her away from the cops and over to her jeep, propelled her to rush home. Besides, there were no cops to give her a speeding ticket. They were all back at Villa Mascarpone.

“And Salty, one last little bit of advice. If you have anything in your house you don’t want the cops to see, maybe some homegrown weed, maybe something more exciting, get rid of it. I’d bet you a month of free mojitos they’ll have a search warrant by tomorrow morning,” he’d said.

Weed wasn’t her thing, and for the most part, except when people around her were getting killed, her life was beautifully boring. But there were a few things Sabrina didn’t want the cops to see, and the first was the Villa Mascarpone file.

She pulled into her driveway behind an ancient red Wrangler, which belonged to Tanya from Texas. Tanya was one of the many minions who passed through Ten Villas in an effort to live in St. John. Like most, Tanya had arrived for a vacation, fallen in love with the island, and on a drunken last evening, called home and instructed whomever she was leaving behind to sell everything and send her a check. She wasn’t coming back. Until island living got too tough, which it almost always did. Jubilation turned to depression when island refugees realized you had to go to St. Thomas to get to a Kmart and San Juan to gamble. Boredom and isolation drove them home, making room for a new crop of dropouts. So far, Tanya had stuck it out.

Sabrina’s heart leapt at the sight of a shiny-coated chocolate lab bolting through the pet flap in her front door. This was the only creature she had ever been able to live with in total harmony.

“Hey, Girlfriend,” Sabrina said, dropping to her knees, letting the dog nuzzle her neck. If only people could be like dogs, she thought, not for the first time. Girlfriend was Sabrina’s first dog. She had vowed never to be tied down to one, until one day when Henry surprised her with a small ball of fur.

“You said you never have girlfriends,” Henry had told her. He’d been horrified when she claimed not to have had a single female friend in the past two decades, only male pals—and most of them had hung her out to dry.

“Her name’s Girlfriend, so now you’ve got one,” Henry had said, turning to leave before Sabrina had a chance to protest.

Since then, Sabrina had started to warm to the idea of having girlfriends. She liked Mara Bennett, whom she sensed was an independent woman living under difficult circumstances. Lyla Banks was becoming her friend. The tall, graceful, and brave woman was inspirational, a role model for aging for a motherless woman like Sabrina.

Girlfriend followed her into the house where Tanya stood before a commercial-size stove, removing an assortment of appetizers from the oven to deliver to guests. She looked ready to pack up and leave, Sabrina noted with relief.

“Hey, Tanya, everything okay here?” Sabrina asked, not expecting anything else could go wrong.

“Everything is okay, except a woman called. What a witch with a
b
, if you’ll excuse me for saying,” Tanya said.

“Who was she?”

“She said she owns Villa Mascarpone and wants to talk to you, pronto.” Tanya piled the hors d’oeuvres she had removed from the oven into Pyrex containers, ready for her to deliver to the guests at Lime Cay villa.

“Oh sh—,” Sabrina said, almost forgetting to respect that born-again Tanya didn’t allow cussing.

Sabrina knew she’d have to disregard her lawyer’s advice and the police’s order to not discuss the case with anyone. She needed to talk to Angela Martino about the murder that had occurred in the villa she owned. Maybe Angela had already heard. Was word out? Sabrina reigned herself in, concentrating on the first step she had to take to protect herself.

As soon as Tanya had left with the trays and containers placed in her vehicle, Sabrina walked over to the side of the main room of her tiny three-room cottage. Houses on St. John ranged from $800,000 to $8,000,000. Sabrina had nothing left after she had fed the bloodthirsty lawyers in Nantucket. Even after she sold the Beacon Hill townhouse and the infamous scene of the crime in Nantucket, she was broke. She declined the book offers and the paid television appearances because she’d rather be accused of murdering her husband than pander as a media whore. When she learned her husband had named her as a beneficiary on one of his life insurance policies, which she hadn’t known existed and was the only policy not bound by the terms of his divorce to be for the benefit of his kids, Sabrina took it as a heavenly sign that she should take the money and run.

While Henry had chosen to purchase a condo more luxurious than the cottage she had purchased for about the same money, Sabrina was thrilled with the tiny house where she had no neighbors and where no one could tell her what color to paint her front door.

She opened a file cabinet drawer where she kept her business records and reached for the folder labeled “Villa Mascarpone.” She found the printed-out e-mails she had received from Carter Johnson when he’d rented the villa, copies of the lease agreement, and a bank check he had used to pay for the house. Unlike most people, Carter Johnson had paid in full in advance rather than just sending the required deposit. He’d done this because he’d only booked the rental four weeks in advance when Sabrina had an unexpected cancellation.

She looked for a mailing address on the e-mails but there was none. The only phone number was for a mobile phone. The bank check was from American Express. There was nothing here that would help her or the police notify Johnson’s relatives about his murder.

Sabrina grabbed the sparse information she had about Carter Johnson, taking note of the receipt for the propane refill for the gas grill with a post-it stuck to it with a note in her handwriting. She was owed twenty-seven dollars for the refill she had purchased at St. John Hardware during Carter’s visit, when he’d forgotten to turn the tank off and had run out mid-vacation. She knew that tank of propane could cost her a lot more than twenty-seven bucks if
the cops learned she had been to Villa Mascarpone while Carter Johnson stayed there, especially after she’d lied to them and told them she’d met him only once.

No one knew except Carter, and he was dead, so it had really been smarter to not mention it. It wasn’t a big deal. All she had done was deliver the filled tank to him. They’d barely talked. She ripped the receipt into tiny pieces and then set fire to them in her sink. Then she ran the faucet full blast, washing away any remains of what could tie her to Carter Johnson.