A Sunny McCoskey Napa Valley Mystery 3: Murder Alfresco Read online

  “Well, for one thing, there wasn’t a murder investigation going on when she was alive. Her house could have evidence in it. Fingerprints, some indication of what happened to her.”

  “Her father owns the houseboat and he said it was okay to go out there. That’s good enough for me. We can check with the harbormaster on the way in and make sure the cops are done with the place. I’m sure they’ve been all over it by now.”

  Sunny hesitated.

  “I don’t have time for this. Are you coming or not?”

  Sunny studied the contents of the 4-Runner’s cabin. It looked normal enough. “How did you know Heidi?”

  “We used to date, a long time ago. Then we decided we were better off friends. Now, are you coming or not?”

  They agreed to meet in an hour at the park-and-ride by the Sausalito off-ramp. “You can follow me from there,” Joel said. “There are a couple of tricky turns.”

  Joel pulled out of the parking lot and turned up the road throwing gravel. Sunny and Rivka got in the truck.

  “Do we go?” said Sunny.

  “Curiosity killed the cat,” said Rivka.

  “I hope that’s just an expression.”

  They burned the time at the upscale grocery Rivka called Whole Paycheck in Mill Valley. She put an organic tomato on the scale. “Look, it’s a three-, no four-dollar tomato.” They bought a papaya the size of a football, Asian pears, dates, a baguette, mixed olives, a wedge of Romano cheese, salmon jerky, and a bottle of cheap pink wine from Spain.

  “I hope this is a good idea,” said Sunny, back in the truck. “We have no idea who this guy is or what he’s getting us into. And the way he was leering at you made my skin crawl. He could be dangerous.”

  “You’re just freaked out by the tattoos. A little aggressive ink doesn’t have to mean he’s dangerous.”

  “It’s not just that. Don’t forget why we’re here. The more I think about it, the more I think this is not a good idea.”

  “It may not be, but I think we should do it anyway. We came here looking for traces of Heidi and we stumbled onto the jackpot. Like he said, we’ll get an up-close look at who she was, your curiosity will be satisfied, the dream ghost will leave you alone, and we can all get back to business as usual. I can’t say I like the guy, but I don’t think he’s dangerous.”

  “At least there are two of us. We just have to be ready to run, scream, fight. Whatever it takes if things get sketchy.”

  “If you think about it, he’s the one who should be suspicious, not us. He was just minding his own business. We’re the ones who stalked him and lied about who we are.”

  “That’s true. And we have our cell phones in case things get weird. Let’s just keep our wits about us.”

  “Right. The cell phones will save us.”

  Sunny drove back to Sausalito and pulled into the lot, where Joel Hyder was waiting. He flashed them the thumbs up and led the way.

  11

  The harbormaster’s office was little more than a storage shed with windows, set down under an acacia tree in between two parking lots. No one was in when they arrived. A note taped to the door said, “Back in five minutes.” Joel tapped the note. “Starting when?”

  “About five minutes ago,” said a man striding up to them. “I left the dog in the house by accident this morning. She sleeps most of the day, but she can’t stay in there forever. Had to pop home and let the old girl out for a pee.” He was dressed East Coast nautical preppy, in khakis and a V-neck sweater over a button-down shirt and tie. He unlocked the door and they followed him into his outpost, where he hung his car keys on a hook by the door and took a pair of canvas topsiders from their place next to the coatrack. He sat at his desk and changed out of his worn leather topsiders and into the newer canvas ones.

  “You live in town?” asked Joel.

  “Just across Bridgeway, a couple blocks up the hill.”

  Joel jiggled the flimsy aluminum-frame window by the door. “What happened here?” he asked. The frame was bent and sitting crooked in the track, apparently from being jimmied open with a screwdriver or some other prying device.

  “The local riffraff broke in again, looking for cash. We only keep a few bucks for incidentals. As far as I can tell, they got seven dollars. That’s not much, but it’s enough for a bottle of cheap booze, which is what they were after.”

  “You know who it is?” asked Joel.

  “So far I can’t prove it, but there’s a crew of anchor outs who will do just about anything for a snootful. My money is on one of those characters. Now, what can I do for you?”

  Joel introduced Sunny and Rivka. The harbormaster stood up and shook their hands with a stern grip. He scrutinized each of them carefully from behind thick bifocals, holding onto their hands longer than necessary. “Dean Blodger,” he said. “You’re friends of Heidi’s, are you? How come I’ve never seen you around here before?”

  He asked it in a folksy, friendly voice, as though making conversation, but Sunny was sure he was dead serious, based on the way he studied her face when she answered.

  “We were in the same yoga class,” she said. “We never socialized much otherwise. Just yoga and sometimes coffee afterward.”

  “Yoga class and coffee,” said Dean Blodger. “I see.” It was impossible to discern if his tone was sarcastic or fatherly.

  “We’re headed out to Heidi’s place now,” said Joel. “Are the police finished going over it?”

  “The coroner’s seal is still on the door, but they’re done as far as I know. They certainly ought to be. There were at least a dozen officers here most of the day Friday and all day yesterday, turning the place inside out. Interviewed everybody, even me. Walked their tracking dogs up and down the docks and all over the parking lot. Those dogs make a mess. One of them got into the mud and tracked it all up and down the dock. The other relieved himself in the parking lot, right where anybody could step in it. You’d think police officers would know that we have laws about curbing your dog at the marina. It was still there when the last one of them left. You can guess who finally had to clean it up.”

  “That’s rough,” said Joel.

  Dean Blodger scowled. “I just hope they find who they’re looking for.” He went back to his desk and sat down. “You’re sure you want to go out there today? You can’t break that seal without permission. They’ll haul you off to jail.”

  “I’ve already spoken to the police. It’s okay if you have permission from the family, which we do.”

  “Please yourself,” said the harbormaster, turning to his paperwork.

  “That guy makes me wish I had a dog,” said Joel, walking fast. Sunny and Rivka hurried after him.

  They passed an outbuilding for trash and recycling, then came to a weathered wooden portal announcing the entrance to Liberty Dock. The dock consisted of a wide plank gangway extending into the protected inlet between Sausalito and Tiburon. Floating houses sat close together on either side. Potted gardens of bright flowers, grasses, palms, succulents, and shrubs lined the way. The noise of cars dissipated quickly behind them, and soon the only sounds were the lap of water, a distant wind chime, and the thump of their footsteps on the planks. Each house was different from the next. There were sagging bohemian relics from the sixties, generic suburban tract homes, a pasha palace, and several twenty-first-century behemoths with all the posh trimmings.

  Why was this place so inviting? And why was the light so marvelous? Sunny had rarely been anywhere so appealing. The tide was high and murky green water filled the narrow spaces between houses. That was it. The water made all the difference. Not the water itself, but the changes its presence produced. There were no garages, driveways, or front yards to these houses. There was no street. The lack of cars and pathways wide enough to accommodate them had reduced the setting to human scale. This was a human place, designed for the circumambulation of people, not cars.

  As for the light, that was simple enough. It was the water again. Being on the water
, there were no shadows from hillsides, trees, or tall buildings. A ubiquitous golden sunlight enveloped everything, the way it did on a sailboat, making even ordinary objects crisp and radiant. A blue glazed pot holding a succulent with spade-shaped leaves seemed to glow, and even the dock’s weathered gray planks had a silvery sheen. Shoved out on Richardson’s Bay, the houseboats bathed in sunlight. Most of them enjoyed a straight-on, unimpeded view of Mount Tamalpais, a massive wedge of green from this point of view.

  “What’s an anchor out?” asked Rivka.

  “The people who live beyond the docks,” explained Joel. “There’s a certain band of water where it’s legal to drop anchor and stay there, indefinitely. Some of the houses aren’t much more than rafts with shacks hammered onto them, but a couple of them aren’t too bad, and some of the people are pretty interesting. There’s also a bunch that don’t bring much to the table, unfortunately.”

  They passed a house where a trim woman who looked to be in her early fifties was watering the potted plants around the gangway to her houseboat.

  “Joel!” she cried happily when she saw them. “I worried we’d never see you again after all this terrible business.”

  “No such luck,” said Joel. He made introductions. “Frank asked me to keep an eye on the place.”

  “How is he doing?” said the woman, a look of intense concern on her face. “He must be devastated.”

  “Like you’d imagine. The whole family is pretty shook up.”

  She nodded soberly. “Well, it’s nice to see you in any case. I miss her already. She was a very positive addition to the scene around here. I liked hearing her voice, knowing she was there. Some mornings, if I happened to be outside, I could hear her singing in the shower. No secrets around here,” she said, winking at Sunny and Rivka. “I don’t know why these things have to happen. Tom down at the elbow—he has the place with the neon peace sign where the dock makes a hard left—he’s having drinks Tuesday night in her honor. You should stop by if you’re around.”

  While they were talking, another neighbor came out of a house on the other side of the dock. He was wearing a pink polo shirt tucked into his jeans and a cream-colored sweater tied around his shoulders, and had a silver iPod clipped to his jeans pocket. He was humming to himself as he put on a pair of gardening gloves and hefted a large, plastic garbage bin from his deck onto the dock, then dragged it behind him in their direction. When he reached them, he waved and took off his headphones. “Irene, any trash you want to get rid of?”

  “Nothing today, Ronald, thank you.” He resettled his headphones and left with a wave, dragging the trash can behind him down the dock.

  “I’ve never known a man more diligent about taking out the trash,” said Irene.

  “I saw him messing around with the trash at about one in the morning one night,” said Joel. “I was dropping off Heidi and there he was, doing something with the trash. Sorting out the recycling, it looked like.”

  “It’s somewhat sad,” said Irene. “He doesn’t work as far as I can tell, and I’ve never seen him have a visitor. But he’s always friendly, and I do appreciate his help. He takes out everyone’s trash, if they’ll let him. He’s house-sitting for the Mendels until they get back from Prague.” She took up her watering hose and turned to Sunny and Rivka. “Nice meeting you, and good to see you again, Joel. Enjoy the day, all of you. That’s what Heidi would have wanted.”

  Heidi Romero’s houseboat was by far the most unique and handsome of the lot. It had been a tugboat and still looked like one, at least from the outside. The hull and deck were painted shiny black. In the center of the deck, a tall cabin of wood slats rose up, topped by a cheerful window trimmed in cherry red. On the whole, the effect was decidedly maritime and vaguely Mediterranean, a souvenir conjured from a Grecian fishing village.

  “Frank Romero, Heidi’s father, converted this place,” said Joel, lifting the edge of a potted aloe vera plant on the deck and removing a key from underneath. “He bought an old tug at salvage and remodeled it himself in the seventies. Heidi’s lived here since she graduated from college.”

  “Where does her father live now?” asked Rivka.

  “Up in Washington. He came down when he heard what happened, but he hasn’t had the heart to come out to the houseboat yet. Says he can’t stand to see it.”

  “Did she leave a key there when she was alive?” asked Sunny.

  “Always. She was bad about losing things, especially keys.”

  Sunny frowned. “People must have seen her getting it.”

  “Maybe. Not much happens around here that everybody doesn’t know about.”

  “And she never worried about someone using it to break in?” said Sunny.

  “There’s nothing inside worth stealing, and you take the key with you when you go in. Heidi was a very trusting person.”

  Joel examined the piece of paper stamped with the coroner’s seal taped across the tugboat’s red door. “Well, here goes.” He lifted one corner of the tape and peeled it away far enough to open the door.

  Inside was a Heyerdahlian paradise, complete with Polynesian straw hats, ukuleles, and tiki treasures mounted on the walls. The furniture was worn but comfortable, and there was evidence of various efforts at painting and drawing. Being a boat, the interior was entirely wood. The floor, ceiling, and walls were all covered in teak or redwood slats. It would have been morbidly dark if it weren’t for two enormous half-circle side windows in the kitchen and dining area, and French doors off the living room that framed the view of Mount Tam and opened onto the rear sun deck. The corner next to the French doors held a cache of grubby, well-used surfboards and wetsuits, along with a mountain bike, beach cruiser, and an assortment of paddles, all shoved in a jumble against the wall. An open staircase led to a loft sleeping area and a bathroom with a window facing the dock. That would be where Heidi showered, and the open window explained why her neighbor could hear her singing. Joel touched a finger to the soot on the bedroom windowsill. “I didn’t know they still used this stuff,” he said, holding up a blackened finger.

  Other than fingerprint dust, the house looked more or less in order. If the police had scrutinized the premises as thoroughly as the harbormaster said, they’d done an excellent job of putting everything back in place. Sunny made a mental note not to leave any fingerprints behind, if possible, just in case.

  12

  Joel Hyder opened the French doors. “The first order of business is a toast.”

  He went back to the kitchen for glasses. Sunny and Rivka stood on the deck taking in the view in the warmth of the midday sun, grateful to be away from the cold wind at the beach.

  “My mom used to listen to Alan Watts on the radio,” said Sunny. “A long time ago, when I was little. He was a Zen Buddhist. I think he lived here. Sometimes he would mention his houseboat in Sausalito and how they had swinging parties all the time. It was all very groovy.”

  Joel came back and opened the bottle of Champagne. He poured three glasses. “To Heidi. May she journey in peace, free from the menace.” His face flushed red and clinched up with the effort to control his emotions. “From the menace that ended her adventures in this world.” He set his jaw bitterly with the final words.

  They drank and Joel went and sat down on the edge of the deck, facing away from them. He shook his head at some thought and wiped his eyes hard with the back of his hand. Finally he got up and refilled their glasses, then took a seat in a low canvas deck chair and sighed, smiling, his determination to enjoy himself renewed. Rivka sat down against the wall and Sunny took the other canvas chair.

  They watched the water and the houseboats on the next dock over, and beyond them, Mount Tam. A woman in a canoe glided past, paddling the calm water with smooth, silent strokes. Overhead, a quintet of pelicans cruised west toward the open sea. There was the sound of water lapping against wood, the creaking of hulls against their concrete moorings, the occasional cry of a seagull, the distant ringing of a telephone. Sunny an
d Rivka took off their shoes and rolled up their jeans.

  “This is heaven,” said Rivka.

  “The perfect Sunday afternoon,” said Sunny.

  “Glad you like it,” said Joel.

  They made another toast to Heidi’s memory, drank, and finished the bottle. Joel got up and came back with a guitar, which he began to strum. It was all exceedingly pleasant. Sunny’s mind drifted to slow, easy thoughts, few of which involved Heidi Romero. They slumped lower and let the sound of the guitar stand for all activity.

  “I can’t move,” said Rivka. “I think maybe I should go look for some sunscreen, but I don’t think I have the strength.”

  “Me too. It’s the Champagne,” said Sunny.

  “And the heat.”

  “We should eat something before we lose the will to survive.”

  They went into the kitchen. Sunny examined the photographs stuck to the refrigerator. Snapshots of Heidi with friends and family offered the typical evidence of a brief, happy existence. Photographs taken with friends on road trips, at the beach, with her arms around family at her graduation.

  “I hope she didn’t drink this stuff,” said Rivka, holding up a bottle with a snake coiled inside it, its white belly pressed against the glass. Other bottles contained a frog, a worm, and a cricket. “Where did she get them?”

  “Vietnam?” said Sunny, pointing to a photograph of Heidi on the back of a moped being driven through a Southeast Asian village by a local boy in a white button-down shirt. Sunny took a dishtowel and opened the refrigerator. The inventory included soy milk, flaxseed, tempeh, lecithin, plain yogurt, soy sauce, oranges, and an assortment of wilted vegetables. She wondered what happened to the food in the refrigerator of a woman who is killed. Probably it would fall to Joel Hyder to clean it out eventually. She opened a cabinet. Green tea, honey, brown rice, oatmeal, a head of garlic. A wooden bowl on the counter held three apples and a lemon.