Catch as Cat Can (8 page)

“You mean, somebody better known than Nicky Suits,” Sunny corrected. “I used to help cover some of the federal trials in New York. The prosecutors knew that nailing big names meant career advancement.”

“That doesn't mean that Jimmy DiCioppa doesn't deserve prison time,” Will argued.

Sunny gave him a disgusted laugh. “Yeah, having a colorful nickname like ‘Jimmy de Chopper' because of what happened to the fingers and toes of people who owed him money—that didn't enter into the equation at all.” She paused for a second. “So what's the deal? Is Val Overton trying to save her witness? I thought that if you broke the witness protection rules, you got kicked out of the program.”

“There's the question of innocent until proven guilty,” Will said. “And Neil keeps swearing that he's innocent.”

Sunny took a moment to digest that, contrasting the Nick Gatto she'd heard about with the Neil Garret she knew. On one side was the guy who'd broken the law and gone to prison. On the other was the boss that Abby Martinson had more than liked, the pleasant store owner that Sunny had come to know . . . the rattled guy who'd opened the freezer and let a body out of the bag.

“So what do you make out of what he's saying?” she finally asked.

“He sounds good,” Will replied. “But then, he made a lot of money scamming people on the stock market.”

“So, has he got some sort of alibi that required the body to be found at nine thirty-seven in the morning in the presence of a witness? If we're thinking he killed this Treibholz guy, why did he drag me into it?”

“The medical examiner has had a lot of fun trying to determine a time of death. Apparently the body hadn't frozen through, so we have a rough window between twelve and fourteen hours before you found the body.”

“Sometime after the store closed and well before morning,” Sunny said. “So was Neil Garret out of town, or surrounded by witnesses at the time in question?”

Will laughed, with precious little humor. “That's the thing. He hasn't got an alibi at all. Not even a favorite TV show he was watching. If we believe him, he was in his lovely rental home out in Sturgeon Springs, reading a book.”

Sunny sat back in her chair. “A literate criminal. That's something we don't see every day. But it kind of clashes with his alibi. That sounds like something he came up with between the fish market and the interrogation room in Levett. You'd expect better workmanship, considering this is a guy who swindles people.”

“So far he's stuck with it, and we haven't been able to challenge his story. You know the area. It's pretty countrified, the houses are spread out, nobody really notices anything.”

“He had to know that he couldn't just talk his way out of having a body turn up in his freezer.” Sunny squinted her eyes, as if that would help her focus on her memories of
Thursday morning. Neil trying to tell her the store wasn't open yet. The chill in the air. Finding the door open. Did he look surprised or scared? What was his expression when he checked the cash register? When he opened the freezer door? It hadn't seemed rehearsed, and Neil hadn't been checking her reactions. Unless . . .

“What if he had an accomplice, someone he expected to clean up the crime scene, and they didn't—or couldn't do it?” Sunny bit her lip as the idea came out of her mouth. Who would be the most likely accomplice, someone who knew all about Neil Garret's former life? Someone who had just turned up from California?

Abby Martinson.

Sunny shook her head. “No, that's a ridiculous idea. What was I thinking?”

It doesn't make sense,
she realized with a feeling of relief. Abby as an accomplice would only work if nobody knew of her connection with Nicky Suits. So why would she blab that to Sunny? But that question still paled beside the biggie. Why would Neil Garret reveal Treibholz's dead body? And of all the people he could have had in front of that door when he threw it open, why choose Sunny?

“So Neil is the obvious choice, but you're not sure he's the right one,” she said slowly.

“Maybe someone here knew about Garret's California connection and didn't want it coming out. A business associate, or competitor.” Will leaned across the desk with their half-eaten sandwiches. “It strikes me that your father has a lot of friends in the local fishing community. Now that you know what's going on, maybe you could work some of those contacts.”

“I should still be furious with you,” Sunny told him.

“I'll say I'm sorry, if that helps,” Will said. “The sheriff really wanted to keep this under wraps. When Lenore revealed the truth about Garret, she said that Frank hadn't even told her.”

“So now that I know, the old team is back together again?” Sunny gave him a rueful grin.

And that snarky voice in the back of her head chimed in,
Just when you thought you were out . . . they pull you back
in.

The rattle of
the key in the lock quickly brought Shadow to the door. He did his usual circuit around Sunny's ankles, checking for odd smells and marking her with his personal scent. She reached down and gave him a quick pat on the head, then walked into the living room, calling to the Old One. But he wasn't in.

Often when Sunny was alone with Shadow, she'd get down on the floor and play with him. He rolled on his back, hoping that would happen now. Instead, Sunny went to a chair and flopped down with a sigh.

Shadow immediately got to his feet. Was Sunny sad? He'd caught some traces of Sunny's He when he checked her ankles, so Sunny must have seen him today. Shadow knew that when male and female humans got together, sometimes they were very happy—and sometimes not.

He scaled the chair, not going for Sunny's lap but instead climbing up onto the arm, stretching so that he could press his forehead to hers and let her know that he thought she was special, even if that stupid He didn't.

But as he brought his face close to hers, he caught a scent that made his nose twist and his eyes blink. Shadow drew back in disgust. This was another of those crazy two-leggity things he'd never understand. With all the foods humans enjoyed, why would Sunny eat something that smelled like that?

Sometimes, in his wandering days, hunger forced Shadow to eat food that was old or tasted odd. Even so, he wouldn't put something that smelled so bad into his mouth. Shouldn't Sunny know enough not to do that?

Annoyed, he jumped back to the floor, stalking away with his tail lashing the air.
She always yells at me when something I eat comes back up,
he thought.
I'm going to stay away from her. She's a lot bigger than I am, and I don't want to be around if she gets sick. That will be a real mes
s.

He headed for the room of food and a quick bite from his bowl. The box that kept things cold loomed over him. That would be a good place to go, somewhere that would let him look down on everything.

It's even taller than Sunny,
he thought.
So if that bad-smelling food comes back up, I'll be well out of reach. Safe.

*

Mike came into
the living room, rubbing his hands together after being outside in the cold. “I'm surprised to see you sitting,” he told Sunny. “Usually when you're here alone, you're romping around on the floor with the furball.”

She smiled. “Yeah, well, he went to do that Vulcan mind-meld thing he likes to do, bopping his forehead against mine. It's called bunting. But I'm afraid the ghost of the garlic bread I had for lunch put him off. What's the matter?” she asked as an inquisitive gray-furred face poked around the entrance to the room. “Are you a vampire?”

“Well, he's got the fangs for the job,” Mike said as Shadow yawned, revealing an impressive set of chompers.

Sunny glanced at the wall clock and got up. “Guess it's time to start supper—which I'll do after I brush away the offensive garlic breath.” She headed upstairs, brushed, and then went to the kitchen. Dinner was simple—and bland. Boiled potatoes, frozen veggies, and baked pork chops. She put a pot on to boil, preheated the oven, and got out the jar of unsweetened applesauce. Spooning out a few ounces into a bowl, she sprinkled some powdered ginger on top and set to mixing.
That should give it a little taste without setting off Shadow's finicky nose.

He sat by his bowls, watching Sunny but still not coming close.

Arranging the chops in a pan, she topped them with the spiced applesauce and put them in the oven, setting the timer. Then came the potatoes. After a half hour, she checked the meat and stepped into the living room, where Mike was watching the news. “About five minutes,” she reported. She went back in to microwave the vegetables.

Mike came into the kitchen and helped set the table. Sunny stepped over to the pot and stuck a knife in one of the potatoes, testing for doneness. “Should be ready any time now.”

The timer bleeped, and a moment later the microwave
joined in, not exactly in harmony. Sunny took one more look at the chops and then began moving things onto plates.

Mike immediately attacked his chop with knife and fork, putting a bite into his mouth. “Nice,” he declared after he'd chewed and swallowed. “Do you think His Nibs over there will approve of your breath after this?”

Sunny shrugged, mashing some potato under her fork. “Jane Rigsdale tells me some folks use ginger when a cat or dog has an upset stomach.”

“Well, she ought to know, being a vet.” He glanced over at Shadow, who still sat regarding them. “Should we have given him that when he tried to eat that frog?”

Sunny shuddered at the memory of that epic disaster. “Only if he ate the ginger
instead
of the frog,” she said. Slicing off a bit of pork, she asked, “How was your day?”

Mike shrugged. “Pretty quiet. Went up to outlet-land and got in my walk, ran a few errands, and stopped in to say hello to Helena. That was a pretty weird visit. She and Abby seemed so distracted, I wondered if they'd had a few drinks with lunch.”

Probably no lunch,
Sunny thought,
although they had a lot to chew over mentally.

But that was nothing to talk about. She'd promised both of the Martinsons she'd keep quiet about Abby's little secret and asked them to do the same. Remembering her own lunchtime conversation with Will, she decided to try and steer the conversation in a new direction. “You know a lot of the fishermen around here, Dad. Did any of them get particularly friendly with Neil Garret?”

“Friendly?” Mike frowned in thought. “I wouldn't go that
far. A lot of guys were glad he opened that shop, though. Neil offered a better price than they'd been getting, and if a guy had a small catch, he could sell it all here and not have to hump it over to Portsmouth or one of the other big wholesale markets. Guys who managed to get a prime item would do deals with Neil before taking the rest of their catch elsewhere.”

“You make Neil sound like a big deal.”

“He was, to the guys still shipping out from here.” Mike's frown deepened as he tried to explain. “Remember that movie,
The Perfect Storm
?”

“Sure,” Sunny replied. “George Clooney going down with his ship.”

Mike nodded, his face grim. “The only thing worse for our local fishermen is that they
didn't
drown. The story they based the movie on happened in 1997, and catches were falling even then. Foreign trawlers were coming into our fishing grounds, huge factory ships, and a lot of locals jumped in, upgrading their ships to compete. A lot of areas got overfished. And when there are no fish, that kills jobs for a lot of fishermen.”

He sat for a moment. “You know, years ago, before your mother and I talked about getting married, I thought I might go out on the fishing boats. It seemed a pretty manly way to make a living. Shows how much I knew.” Mike laughed, but there was a lot of bitterness in his voice.

“Instead, I went to work hauling salt—which turned out to be the better call. Every winter, it snows somewhere, and the folks need road salt.”

They both sat in silence for a moment. That might be true, but it meant that Mike was out of town when the ice
storm of the century hit Kittery Harbor . . . and a fatal car accident took Sunny's mom.

Mike cleared his throat. “Funny thing. The company started out providing salt to preserve all the fish coming out of the waters around here.”

“I know a lot of your buddies only do sportfishing now, or they find other ways to make money, like Ike Elkins and his floating tours,” Sunny said.

“A lot of fellas pay for their boats by acting as fishing guides,” Mike told her. “That's okay during the tourist season, but nobody in their right mind pays to go out in the Gulf of Maine during wintertime. So the boat owners head down where the water is warm—Carolina, Florida—and take people fishing for bass. Pretty much everybody does that now.”

He frowned for a moment, going over a mental list. “The only guy who goes out regularly from these parts is Charlie Vane.”

“I don't think you ever mentioned him among your fishing buddies,” Sunny said.

“He's not a buddy. And for him, fishing is business, not pleasure. He's the only fisherman who works the winter months around here. Of course, he's a bit of a nut.” Mike shook his head. “Charlie claims to be a direct descendant of another Charles Vane, a pirate who got hanged about three hundred years ago. Maybe there is something to his claim, if stubbornness is something that sticks in people's DNA.” Mike leaned forward, in storyteller's mode. “Here's something they don't usually mention in those pirate movies. There was a point when the British government offered pardons for past bad behavior to the pirates operating out
of their colonies, provided they knocked it off. The 1700s Charles Vane rejected the deal—and ended up at the end of a rope. Our Charlie Vane refuses to stop fishing, although from what I hear, he's at the end of his rope, too—financially speaking.”

Sunny looked at her dad. “You don't sound as though you've got much sympathy for him.”

“Oh, I have a little sympathy,” Mike protested. “Charlie's family has fished these waters for generations. It's not his fault, what's happened to the business. But I don't like what Charlie does to keep his head above water.”

“You're not telling me he's a pirate—are you?” Sunny asked in disbelief.

“No, that would be more honest. Charlie cuts any corners he can. Some areas have been declared off-limits to fishermen to let the fish population grow back again. But Charlie will sneak in to get a catch. Or he'll finagle when he's caught more than the allowable quota.” Mike scowled. “You're supposed to dump any overcatch back into the water. But it's not as though those fish are going to go swimming off, thinking, ‘Whew, that was a lucky break.' They're dead, and dumping them back isn't going to make them alive again. It's the law, though, and that's what fishermen are supposed to do.”

“Sounds like a stupid kind of law, with so many people around here struggling to put something on the table,” Sunny argued.

Mike nodded. “I'm not saying you're wrong. But that doesn't make it right for someone to slide around the law because he's supposed to be protecting his birthright as a fisherman.”

“So is that why you never mentioned Charlie Vane to me?” Sunny asked. “Because he's a crook?”

“Not a crook.” Mike hesitated. “But he is crooked.”

“What's the difference?” Sunny wanted to know.

Mike gave her a shrug and a grin. “I guess he hasn't been caught yet.” He got a little more serious. “I have heard, though, that Charlie's been thick as thieves with your friend Neil Garret.”

Sunny sat a little straighter. “You make it sound as if they've been up to something together.”

“Well, they've gotten in trouble together,” Mike said. “When Garret began cherry-picking local catches, he disrupted the usual way of doing business.”

“What was that?”

“Boats brought their catches to the wholesale fish market in Portsmouth, which is just a long-winded way of saying they dealt with Deke Sweeney.”

Sunny frowned. “So this Sweeney guy owns the operation?”

“No, but he might as well. Anyone who buys or sells fish in Portsmouth knows Sweeney. They call him the Shark of the Fish Market.”

Sunny laughed. “Nice nickname.” Then she got thoughtful. “You think this shark might have tried to take a bite out of Neil Garret?”

“No need,” Mike replied. “Sweeney already cut him—as in cut him off. I hear he put out the word. Several of the guys who did deals with Garret couldn't sell their fish in the Portsmouth market. And Garret can't even buy a sardine there.”

Maybe that explains the lack of variety in Neil's store
lately,
Sunny thought.
It sure didn't help the drop-off in business.
“Do you think that really hurt the fishermen?”

“It's more than half an hour, driving to Kennebunkport, and an hour, hour and a half getting to Boston or Gloucester,” Mike said. “Going by boat makes the trip even longer. When you're racing the clock to bring in your catch as fresh as possible, that can become a factor. And if you land in a market where no one will buy from you, the wasted time may make for a spoiled catch.”

Sunny frowned. “So that's it—all those fishermen are ruined?”

“Oh, when they come back around the beginning of tourist season, Sweeney will probably let them off the hook. He's a businessman.”

And the way things are going, by then Neil's store should be bankrupt and safely out of Sweeney's way,
Sunny added silently. “But what about Charlie Vane?” she asked. “You told me that he's still up here fishing, out in the cold—in more ways than one.”

Mike only shrugged. “He's played it cute with Sweeney and the other guys in the fish market for years, hornswoggling them whenever he can. Sooner or later, that was going to catch up with him. If it hadn't been his side deals with Garret, it would have been something else.”

“You think maybe he's angry with Neil Garret for dumping him in it?” Sunny didn't quite bring off the nonchalant tone, because Mike shot her a sharp look.

“If you're going to ask him that, I'll have to come along,” he told her. “Frankly, I'd prefer if Will went with you, but I don't think Charlie will say anything if there's a cop around.”

“I don't—” Sunny began, but Mike cut her off.

“Of course you're pumping me about the local fishing scene—probably because Will asked you to do it.”

“He may have suggested that I talk to you, but I thought of that in terms of getting background, not expecting you to come up with a possible suspect.” She gave her dad a look.