Third Degree (24 page)

“Haven’t seen you in a couple of days,” Greg said, giving me a mirthless smile. He wiped his hands repeatedly on the long apron that was tied at his waist.

“I know. I’ve been busy with school. We’re working seven days a week to get ready for the first day of classes,” I explained. I looked around the store and saw that Queen and I were the only customers, an interesting fact given that Beans, Beans was the go-to place in town for the after-school crowd. I knew that Greg was right; business was down and Carter’s death had everything to do with that. I introduced Queen to Greg. “Hey, did you hear the latest?” I asked.

He shrugged. “Depends what ‘latest’ you’re talking about.”

I lowered my voice even though there was nobody else in the coffee shop. “Carter Wilmott. Poisoned.”

He didn’t look surprised. “Yeah, I read that in the paper. What a shame.”

“It was,” I said. “But between that, and the exploding car, and the fight with George Miller, I’m starting to wonder exactly how many ways that guy was supposed to die.”

“Good point.” Greg shifted from one foot to the other. “Sounds like he was going to go that day one way or another.”

“Heard anything new about the explosion or who might have caused it?” I asked.

Greg looked away quickly. “Not a word. You’re right, though. He was destined to die that day.”

I nodded. I kept the information about the ALS to myself. That was for public consumption when Mac and his cohorts decided that it was.

“I should warn you that the other person we’re meeting is Lydia Wilmott,” I said. I held my hands up. “Not my fault. She wanted to meet here.”

Greg walked back to the counter area and prepared our drinks. After he came back and served me my coffee, he turned and gingerly placed Queen’s café au lait in front of her. “Anything else?” he asked.

Queen reached out and grabbed Greg’s arm and turned the wrist toward her. I leaned over and saw what she was looking at: a tattoo that said “USMC” and had a ring of stars surrounding what looked like a bird carrying an anchor. I didn’t know where he had had it done, but I thought that the artist must have been loaded when he took the tattoo needle to the inside of Greg’s wrist. It was possibly the worst tattoo I had ever seen, and working on a college campus, I see a lot of ink. “Are you in the marines, sir?”

Greg smiled. “I was.”

“My dad, too,” Queen said. “He’s doing another eighteen months in the Middle East right now.”

“God bless him,” Greg said. “May he come home safe.” He closed his eyes and offered a silent prayer, presumably to his homeboy, Jesus.

“Thank you.” She blew on her coffee. “My mother ships out from Camp LeJeune in another week, too.”

Greg looked chagrined. “That’s a lot for a young girl like you to handle.”

Queen shrugged. “It’s okay. I grew up in the military so I’m used to it. They’ll be back,” she said brightly.

There was a lot more to Queen’s story than met the eye. I looked toward the front door to see if I could spot Lydia, but the sidewalk in front of the store was empty. Queen and Greg were still talking about the “Corps” and the lives they had led, he as a member and she as a child of marines. Before Greg walked back to the counter, Queen asked him what his favorite thing about the Corps was.

“Blowing things up,” he said, laughing as he sauntered back to the counter to wait on the sole customer who had walked through the doors since we had arrived.

I froze in my chair, staring down into my coffee cup. But I didn’t have time to work through all of the possibilities in my mind, now that I knew Greg was a marine in addition to a guy who liked to blow things up, before Lydia strolled in, the scent of some overpowering perfume announcing her arrival. She threw herself into a chair at our table as if she had lost control of her legs prior to her sitting down; she placed her giant, suitcaselike handbag on top of the table. I pushed the patent leather bag aside to make room for our muffins, which Greg deposited while giving Lydia a polite nod.

Lydia didn’t take off her sunglasses, even after I made the introductions, so I couldn’t tell what she was thinking, if anything. However, if I had to guess, Lydia knew exactly what I wanted and when, and my presence at this conversation wasn’t needed. I had given her just enough information on the phone to make clear what her role in this process was. I decided that I was on a “need to know” basis with Queen so I excused myself and went over to the counter to talk to Greg while the two women made plans to start Queen on a new path of self-sufficiency.

Greg had his head in the muffin case, assessing the freshness of what was in there. “The banana are still good,” I said, taking a piece off the muffin I had bought and tasting it.

“Yeah, they’re moist. They stay for a while.” He pulled out a tray with lemon-poppy-seed muffins on it. “These always go first,” he said, wrapping them in plastic. His day was almost over and it was time to begin closing down the shop. He handed me some plastic-wrapped corn muffins. “These are almost done. Want to take them home? You can toast them for breakfast and they’ll still be good.”

I was feeding two additional people now so I accepted the muffins. “Thanks.”

He handed me a few more muffins in a paper bag. “Here. I hate to see food go to waste.”

“I hope we’re not keeping you,” I said, accepting the bag.

“Nah,” he said, pulling a large piece of Saran Wrap from the roll on the counter and placing it over the muffins he was going to try to sell the following day. “You take all the time you need.”

I leaned on the counter and read the various advertisements and postcards that patrons had placed under the glass. “So you blew up things in the marines, huh?”

Greg stopped wiping the inside of the muffin case and looked at me through the glass. “Sometimes.”

“Huh,” I said, picking off pieces of my muffin.

Greg came out from behind the muffin case and stood up, looking down at me. His round chubby face, usually exhibiting a serene calm, looked just a wee bit tense. “Why do you find that interesting?” he asked.

“Oh, no reason,” I said, the tone of my voice completely unconvincing, if I had to admit it.

Greg rested his forearms on the counter and leaned toward me. “I know what you’re thinking, but you’re way off,” he said, a small smile on his lips.

“What am I thinking?” I asked.

He smiled wider. “Oh, I don’t know. Maybe that Carter’s car blowing up had something to do with me?”

I put my hands up in a gesture of surrender and started laughing. “Okay, you got me,” I said. The exchange between the two of us had a modicum of tension to it so I tried to diffuse it a little with some humor. “That’s
exactly
what I was thinking,” I said, laughing harder.

Greg joined in with some loud guffaws, causing Lydia and Queen to turn our way to find out what was so funny. “That’s rich!” he said.

“I know!” I said, still going along with the idea that this was just a preposterous conclusion to come to, even though everything pointed in the same direction. The nasty blog posts, the animosity between the two men, the vociferous “Coffee Lover” who commented on Carter’s post and who may or may not have been Greg, the exploding car that certainly would have killed Carter had he not met his untimely demise right where I was currently standing. It was alternately completely plausible and completely ridiculous, considering who Greg was and what he stood for: peace, love, and understanding. I grabbed my midsection and laughed harder until I couldn’t breathe. Was this what I had become? A suspicious meddler who saw everyone as a suspect, despite my history with them? I looked up at Greg and he was still chuckling a little bit while he was cleaning out his large coffee urn, muttering to himself about how “you people are crazy.”

I finished my muffin and threw the wrapper in the silver bullet-shaped trash bin and walked back over to the table, where Lydia and Queen were finishing up their conversation. Lydia looked at me, her eyes still hidden behind the big black sunglasses.

“We’re all set here, Alison,” she said and stood. She took Queen’s hand and promised her that the whole thing would be worked out within twenty-four hours.

I walked ahead with Lydia while Queen cleaned up the table. “Thank you, Lydia.”

“You’re welcome,” she said. “I’m glad you called me.”

“You didn’t sound glad when you heard it was me.”

She fingered the diamond necklace around her neck. “That’s water under the bridge. I’m sorry that we misinterpreted your situation. My apologies on behalf of the group.”

“Apology accepted.” I held the door open for her. “I’m just glad that something good has come from this whole mess.”

Although I couldn’t see her eyes, I suspected that Lydia was crying. “Me, too,” she said, and walked down the street toward the river.

Although I had played along with the “aren’t we having fun?” conversation in which I basically accused Greg of trying to get rid of Carter by blowing him up and he denied it, I was still thinking about it. Because who better than someone who liked to blow things up blowing up their archenemy, aka Blogenstein, as Max liked to refer to him? But was it so obvious as to not hold any water? I decided that I wanted to see where this led, and although spending a little time shadowing Greg might not tell me anything, it also wouldn’t make me late for dinner, so I had nothing to lose.

Greg was a townie and lived in the direction of Lydia’s house, that is, away from the river. So I was shocked when he left the shop with a small bag under his arm and started for the river, just as Lydia had a few minutes earlier. I waited until he was almost out of sight before getting up from the bench and starting after him, staying on my side of the street. There was no way I was going to lose him unless he jumped in a cab, but cabs meandering down sleepy village streets on warm summer nights are fortunately in short supply.

Things got a bit more complicated when he started for the bridge that arched over the train tracks. I would have to follow directly behind him rather than from a safe distance across the street and I wondered how this was going to work out. I decided that if he saw me, I would lay blame on the beautiful night and my desire to spend some time at the river. It wasn’t completely outside the realm of possibility, yet in case it hasn’t been established thus far, I am a terrible liar. Which is why I try not to do it with any regularity.

We continued across the bridge, me a safe distance behind Greg. It was a little after six and there was still plenty of sunlight left in the day and dusk was at least two hours off. He finished his journey across the bridge and took a seat on one of the benches on the train station platform. I decided then and there that I wasn’t going to follow him into New York City or up north toward Poughkeepsie, depending on which train he was waiting for. I stole into the ticket office and looked at the schedule, deciding that he was waiting for a New York City–bound train, one of which was on its way into the station in less than a minute. I watched him from the ticket window office, a man deep in reverie on a balmy night with seemingly not a care in the world.

The train screeched into the station and several rush-hour passengers disembarked, while a few got on to head south into New York City. Greg was not one of them. When the train had left the station, he was still sitting on the park bench, enjoying the view, the plastic bag in his hand.

I observed this curious behavior for another hour, while trains came and went, and when the sun had finally set completely over the mountains on the other side of the river, he got up. I left the ticket office and followed behind him, glad that it was dark and that he probably wouldn’t be able to tell that I had been tailing him for the better part of two hours. He made his way down toward the river and the boat slips; I was close enough now to hear him whistling what sounded like “Bridge Over Troubled Water,” by Simon and Garfunkel. He walked along the dock and finally arrived at his destination, which was surprising, to say the least.

He boarded
The Lydia.

Not at all what I was expecting, but then again, not sure what I was expecting. I stood on the dock, watching the boat list to and fro, and waited for him to come out.

While the darkness had brought a drop in temperature, it also brought mosquitoes. Big, giant, nasty, bloodsucking mosquitoes. And I don’t know what it is, but I’m one of those people to whom mosquitoes gravitate. Crawford could be sitting outside wearing a fructose bodysuit and he wouldn’t get one bite. I, on the other hand, am descended upon like an open container of raspberry jelly at a picnic. As soon as I felt the first sting, I knew I was in trouble, but I had invested too much time in this surveillance operation to give up. I was going to see what was happening on board
The Lydia
if it was the last thing I did. Which, I was afraid to admit, it might have been, if my internal radar was any indication.

I couldn’t not find out, though. It was too tempting, and too bizarre. The Greg that I had known all of these years as the affable coffee shop owner was different today. And that made me curious.

I had almost reached the boat when the door to the sleeping quarters opened and Lydia emerged. She took off her sunglasses when she reached the deck, realizing that she no longer needed them. It was pitch-black on the water, with only the lights from town and the small dock lights illuminating her way as she stepped off the boat. I jumped onto a boat closer to the end of the dock, praying that no one else was on board, and got on my stomach so she wouldn’t see me, listening to her high-heeled sandals making a clicking sound on the wood as she got closer and then hit the pavement, making her way back up toward town. When I no longer heard the sound of her footsteps, I got up and returned to the dock, making my way toward
The Lydia.

The boat was running, its engine making a loud clicking sound in idle mode. Greg appeared on the deck just as I stepped onto the boat, scaring both of us. He grabbed his chest. “Dude!”

“Oh, Greg, you scared me,” I said, acting a little bit. Obviously I knew he was on the boat, but I had no idea that he would appear at that exact moment and scare the bejesus out of me. Surprised? Yes. Scared? No.

He looked around as if searching for someone else. “What are you doing here?” He crossed his arms over his chest. “I don’t see you for over a week and then I see you two times in the same day. What are the chances of that happening?” His demeanor was old Greg: friendly, a little loopy, and nonthreatening. Maybe I had exaggerated the whole exchange in the coffee shop to be more sinister and loaded with innuendo?

He had a large screwdriver in his hand and I kept my eyes on it. “What are you doing on Lydia’s boat?” I asked.

He held the screwdriver up and waved it in my direction. “Repairs.”

“What kind of repairs?”

“What do you know about boats?”

“Why?”

“Because you’d have to have some knowledge of boats to understand exactly what I’m doing,” he said. Although he was wearing a tool belt and could have stored the screwdriver in one of its handy pockets, he kept it in his hand.

“Why did you wait until dark to come on the boat?”

“Because Lydia asked me to wait. She wanted to spend some time here. It’s the only place she can go to get away from everything. But the engine needs work and I came to fix it.” He held up the screwdriver again. “What are you doing here, by the way?”

“Me?” I asked.

He pointed the screwdriver at me again. “Yeah. You.” Although the screwdriver gave me pause, he was the same old goofy Greg right down to his old Birkenstock sandals, which he wore with white socks.

I decided not to go with my first choice: I think you wanted to blow Carter Wilmott up and that you had means, motive, and opportunity. I thought that might sound a tad impolite. So I went with my second choice. “Just out for a stroll.”

“On the dock?”

“Uh, yeah,” I said, backing up toward the edge of the boat, taking in the appointments of each boat tethered to a slip. None of them, as far as I could see, had a deep gash in their seats, like
The Lydia
did. I felt vaguely remorseful for bringing Trixie on the boat the week before.

Greg smiled. “Were you always playing Nancy Drew? Even as a kid?”

I laughed. “No. This is a recent development.”

“I can’t believe you thought that I would blow Carter up.”

I wasn’t sure where this was heading, so I played it casual. I waved my hand dismissively. “Oh, sorry, Greg. I don’t know which end is up anymore.”

He sank into one of the tufted benches, and put the screwdriver on the floor of the boat. “Me, neither,” he said, and put his head into his hands. “Having a guy die in your store is not the best thing for business, in case you couldn’t guess.” His voice was muffled. “I don’t know what I’ll do if I lose the store.”

“You won’t lose the store!” I said, now feeling guilty for having suspected him of murder. I rushed over and sat beside him, my arm on his back. The plastic bag was next to me and I put a hand on it to ascertain its contents. Not too mysterious—they were more of the almost-stale muffins that he had offered me from the case in the store. “It will take a couple of weeks to come back but—”

At this, he moaned.

“Or maybe not! Maybe people will start coming back sooner.” I didn’t think so, but it was worth a try, if just to get this hulking bear of a man to stop sobbing. “Maybe you should have some kind of event or something.”

He wiped his hands across his face. “Maybe. What were you thinking?”

I wasn’t really thinking anything so I came up with a couple of weak suggestions. “Maybe you could have Mrs. Brown’s tap class come in and do a show?”

He looked at me as if this were the worst suggestion I could possibly have made. Mrs. Brown’s tap class consisted of three octogenarians who insisted on wearing spandex, despite their advanced age and less-than-supple skin.

“Or have an art show,” I said. “We’ve got tons of artists in the village just looking for a place to exhibit their art.”

He looked like he was considering that. “I’ll think about it.” He sighed heavily. “First, I had Carter’s horrible blog saying things about me and the store and then the bastard goes and dies there.” He picked at a hole in his jeans. “The guy really wanted to see me fail.”

“He was just a mean, angry guy, Greg,” I said. “Everyone knows you have the best coffee in town.” Except for Dunkin’ Donuts, I thought, but I kept that to myself. Now I really had to go to Beans, Beans on a regular basis if only to single-handedly keep the guy in business and atone for my lies about his not-very-delicious coffee.

Greg looked up at the starlit sky and took a deep breath, changing the subject from failing coffee shops to the splendor of our environment. “I love being out here. I’m glad you take advantage of it, too.” He looked back at me, his face calm and serene. “Not too many people stop to smell the roses. Know what I mean?”

I relaxed a little. We were on the same conversational path that we had been down a thousand times at Beans, Beans and it felt like old times before the two of us had seen a man die, and a car blow up, and a woman jump off a bridge. “I know what you mean. Life gets a little hairy.” I swept my arm out, taking in the view. “And look at this view. How could you not walk around down here?”

Greg walked up a few steps to the steering wheel and fiddled with something on the control panel. The clicking of the engine morphed into a smooth rumble. “Isn’t this a gorgeous boat?”

I moved back over to the bench that Trixie had ruined with her sharp nails, covering the wound in the seat with my butt. “It certainly is.”

“I’ve got an idea,” Greg said, and powered up the boat. The roar of the engine startled me and I jumped up from the torn seat.

“What are you doing?”

“Taking you,” he said, pointing at me, “for a ride.”

“No, thank you,” I said, trying not to sound panicked, while opening up all of the bench seats to look for a life preserver. I found some twine, a deflated beach ball, and a few empty beer cans, but no flotation devices. I lurched forward a little bit as Greg eased the boat out of its slip and headed toward the middle of the river.

He turned around. “What’s the matter? It’s a gorgeous night.”

“I’m sure Lydia doesn’t want you sailing this thing, does she?”

“Of course she does!” he bellowed. “That’s another reason she hired me. Nobody would ever take this baby out if it wasn’t for me.”

I headed down into the sleeping quarters, continuing my quest for a life preserver. In the room were two twin-sized beds with beautiful quilts, nautically themed, on top of them. In between the beds was a deep chest on top of which sat an alarm clock and some sailing magazines. I pulled open the drawer on the front of the chest and riffled around in it for something to keep me afloat in the unlikely event that we capsized. My terror at being on the water was unmatched by anything else; not being able to swim had put me in many a precarious position, not limited to an almost drowning at the Jersey Shore when I was sixteen. Although I had managed to get myself out of the river when Ginny had pushed me in, I wasn’t sure that I’d be able to save myself if I happened to fall in the middle of the river, where the depths were far greater. I dug around in the cabinet, coming up with a few packages of M&M’s—which I promptly stuck in my pocket for later—and an envelope out of which fell the most disturbing pictures of the relationship between Ginny Miller and Carter Wilmott that I could possibly see.