Deadly Homecoming. Barbara Phinney
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partying?
Oh, Lord, take that image away. Why have You imprinted it in my mind?
She’d been living in Toronto, working at an indoor construction company. She’d seen injuries, even fatal ones.
Again, as she rattled off her address in Toronto, Peta wondered why Danny had invited her. Was it really to help him celebrate his big 3-0? Because he had so few friends here? Because he knew he might die?
With another warning not to leave the island, and a receipt for her knapsack, which she’d left in the house, Peta was ordered off the property. And the officer returned to his phone.
“No place to go?” Lawson asked as she found herself dismissed at the end of the short driveway.
Feeling foolish, she shrugged. “I guess I could go down to the B & B, but I don’t even have my wallet. I’ll have to pay later, if I’m allowed to.” With that, she started walking toward the village center.
Lawson fell in step beside her. Having lifted the fog, the wind now blew hard in their faces. She could hear it hum the power lines above. “You said you’re here to celebrate Danny Culmore’s thirtieth birthday.”
They passed the café before she answered, “We’re old school friends, and he asked me to come back this one time, so I did.”
He shook his head, his eyes unreadable in the bright, cool day. “You must have been special to him.”
Was she? He hadn’t spoken much to her these past few years. Peta stole a glance at the man beside her. She wanted to ask him what he was doing on the island, but held back. Ten years in Toronto had taught her not to even look people in the eye anymore. She lived in a community of strangers, all as foreign to her as she was to them. It was better to mind her own business. That way, everyone else did the same.
They’d reached the B & B. It was still the image of what it had been years ago, with huge, unruly wild rosebushes guarding its perimeter, and wind-bent trees shading one side of the large house. The wooden sign out front still rattled in the constant breeze, and, as in years before, Kathleen McPherson still sat in the front-room window, glaring out at the world from below her VACANCY sign.
Peta shook her head. It was sad to see Auntie Kay hadn’t changed her bitter outlook on life.
A car growled behind them, and Peta turned. Constable Long brought his patrol car to a halt, then got out.
“Miss Donald? Can I have a word with you?”
She shot a glance at Lawson, then walked to the front of the car. “What’s wrong?”
He peeled off his sunglasses and squinted against the sun and wind. “I’d like to take you to the station to ask you a few questions.”
She shook her head. “I’ve got nothing to hide. Ask me here.”
Lifting his eyebrows, he shrugged. “How long did you say you’d been here on the island?”
“I just got here around lunch, about fifteen minutes before I called 911. Why?”
“It looks like you’ve been here for longer. Your belongings are scattered all over the spare room. Where did you say you stayed on the mainland?”
“An inn called the Lilac Cottage. I got there yesterday morning and left around eleven this morning. I’d decided to stay there because I was tired from driving. I have the receipt in my knapsack.”
He pulled out a zippered plastic bag. In it lay a handwritten receipt. “The date on this says you left yesterday. I called the inn and the woman confirmed that you’d spent one night, but had checked out yesterday, not this morning.”
Peta hadn’t read the receipt. She’d simply shoved it into her bag. Frowning, she shook her head. “That’s not possible. I just arrived here. Ask the guy who owns the blue boat called the Island Fairy. He brought me here today.”
The officer flipped open his notepad and scribbled down the names. “I’ve been told that none of the ferry boats have come in today. And I’m told that you used to live here. You dated the deceased, didn’t you?”
“Yes, in high school. What difference does that make?”
“You split up with him under angry circumstances, I’m told.”
The locals did have long memories. “True, but we settled that dispute a few months later. We were kids.”
“You left here ten years ago and swore you’d never return.”
“I was young and angry. But I did come back, because Danny asked me to come to his birthday.”
“Anyone else see you?”
She paused. “Doc Garvey and Jane Wood saw me. Ask them.” Though with their obvious disapproval of her appearance, would they help her out, or want to see her off the island, as soon as possible?
“Anyone else invited?”
Peta wasn’t sure. She hadn’t received a formal invitation, just the phone call. That had always been Danny’s style. With a frustrated shrug, she felt the blood surge into her face. This was stupid and confusing, and not making an ounce of sense. “I don’t have all the answers. All I know is that I arrived here today because Danny asked me to come.”
“Don’t you find it odd that a man would ask his old girlfriend back?” the officer asked.
“This is a small community, and I was also his friend.” She frowned at the officer. “What are you saying, Constable?”
The constable walked to his patrol car, then returned carrying a paper bag. “Miss Donald, is this your medication?”
He pulled out a prescription bottle. Peta took it, and peered through the clear plastic at a few round tablets. She frowned. “This is my prescription bottle, but these aren’t my pills. Mine are small yellow ones. These are white.”
“These were the ones found in this bottle, Miss Donald. In Danny’s house.”
She handed him back the bottle. “I sometimes get migraines so I carry pills to ease the pain. But these aren’t my pills.”
“Do you know what kind of pills these are?”
“I’m an accounting officer, not a pharmacist. They look like small aspirins.”
“These are a type of hypnotic drug commonly known as the date rape drug, or ‘roofies.’ Several were found in Danny’s mouth. The autopsy will show if he ingested any, but he appears to have exhibited the outward symptoms that this medication, when mixed with liquor, causes. And when mixed with alcohol, this drug can kill a person. Did you know that this drug is illegal in this country?”
“I can imagine! But you can see on the bottle that the medication I take is for migraines!”
The officer said nothing, but she knew what he was thinking. She could have replaced the medication with something more dangerous and offered it to Danny if he complained of a headache.
She slumped against the patrol car, battling fear and nausea. There seemed to be proof she’d been here for a least a night, and there seemed to be proof that she had given Danny a drug that would have at least rendered him unconscious, maybe even killed him.
Constable Long’s expression turned dark. “I’d like to take you into custody, Miss Donald, to hold you for questioning in the murder of Daniel Culmore, but I have only one cell and it’s got a drunk in it right now. So I’m forced to wait until backup from the mainland arrives before we can make a decision on formally charging you.”
“You want to charge me? I didn’t kill Danny!”
“I’ve also instructed all boat owners to lock their watercraft so you can’t leave,” Long continued, as if she hadn’t interrupted him. “And wherever you find lodging, I’ll need the address immediately.”
He