Family Skeletons (13 page)

She’d asked him to personally pass on his findings
because she doubted her companions would take her word for anything.

“Okay?” Sunny asked her guards. “Can I go now?” Oh,
boy, did she ever want to lay into them. The few parts of her that hadn’t hurt
before all that prodding and pushing were sending out steady streams of hurt
now.

Jonathan and Ryan exchanged glances, looked at
Sunny, then to the doctor, and again at each other. She rolled her eyes.
Oh,
come on, would you really feel better if I’d broken a leg or concussed myself
into a coma?

When she noticed the doctor writing on a
prescription pad, she frowned. He tore off the prescription and handed it to
Jonathan, one man with a medical degree to another. “She’s already stiff and
sore and it’s going to get worse. That’ll help her to sleep.”

“No,” Sunny said. “Give it back to him. I’ll take
Advil.”

“We’ll fill it anyway,” Jonathan said. “It’s a mild
painkiller. About midnight tonight you’ll be glad you have it.”

Ryan took the prescription from Jonathan and gave it
back to the doctor. “She’ll take Advil, like she said.”

The doctor looked at him, then Sunny. He asked
softly, “Do you have a drug problem, Sunny?”

She returned his gaze without flinching. “Not
presently.”

He nodded, his expression now sober and displaying
respect. “I never met you before today, but I feel like I have a personal stake
here. Take Advil, Sunny.”

She had a sudden desire to cry, but fought it off.

Next was Tom’s office. She’d prefer to put off
filing a report, but she couldn’t get her mind around the fact that someone had
deliberately pushed her off the cliff. As much as she wanted to explain it
away, no innocent interpretation occurred.

Tom winced when he saw her. “Sunny, whatever you do,
don’t pose for a portrait today.”

“Thanks, Tom.” Her grin drew a protest from
scratched and bruised cheekbones.

She eased into the visitor’s chair, wondering if she
could manage without having to ask for a pillow. She noted that neither
Jonathan nor Ryan seemed to appreciate the deputy sheriff’s humor, which only
served to amuse her more. She was feeling punchy.

“Maybe you two guys should go check out the deli at
Bev’s,” she suggested. “Sometimes she has roasted chicken and ribs in that hot
case. It’s either that—for lunch and dinner—or get back on the highway until
you run into a fast food franchise.”

The only pillow in sight lay atop the cot inside the
open cell, and she didn’t think she wanted that one. Deciding to rough it
without a cushion, she managed another grin for Tom once her two guardians had
left. “Okay, now it’s time for you to tell me you’ll make this report as
painless as possible.”

He chuckled. “I like you, Sunny. You’re like a
breath of fresh air.”

Then he sat forward, placed his palms on the desk,
and his expression sobered. “But I don’t like what I heard. Who was it that
called me? Mark?”

“Marcus.”

“I have to get this straight from you. Did somebody
push you off that cliff?”

A very cold feeling sprang up very quickly in her
gut. “Yes.”

“Think about this carefully, Sunny. I’m not trying
to feed you, or lead you, but stray dogs are known to roam the beach. Could—”

“It have been a friendly mongrel that jumped up to
say hi?” she finished for him. “I already thought about that. My impression
was, and still is, that it was a person. Not an animal.”

He sat back and stared at her. Clearly he hadn’t
liked hearing that any more than she’d liked saying it. “Then we need to assume
the only thing accidental about that bullet crease in your forehead is that it
didn’t kill you. Who wants you dead, Sunny? And why?”

* * *

“Sunny?” Jonathan’s voice again, calling hesitantly
through the closed bathroom door. He’d been hovering out there off and on since
she’d come in here.

“I’m okay, Jonathan. Just give me a little longer.”
Hot water had never felt so good. This was her second bath today, and she’d
probably be back in here again before bed.

They’d finished off the chicken and ribs and a
second loaf of French bread for dinner, and had listened to traffic sounds
outside their front door. The skeleton had a lot of company down there on the
beach. Tom had popped in and out a couple of times, but she’d been in the tub.
She’d caught a glimpse of him once from the top of the stairs as he’d exited
the front door gnawing on a drumstick.

She hadn’t called to him. Another conversation would
only add to the sick feeling in her gut. Tomorrow was soon enough to meet the
world again.

But some things she had to meet tonight. There had
been tension at the dinner table. Ryan had been both wounded and pissed that
she hadn’t told him about the bullet crease in her forehead, and she felt bad
about that.

“I was here the next day, Sunny, the very next day.
But it didn’t make enough of an impression on you to tell me about it? If it
had gone in the middle of your forehead and out the back of your head, would
you have told me then?”

She needed to make amends. But right now, she needed
to sit in the water for as long as she needed to sit in the water.

“Sunny?”

She leaned her head back and stared at the ceiling.
Jonathan couldn’t possibly be a better ophthalmologist than he was a mother
hen. “Okay, come on in.”

He entered and came to kneel next to the tub. As he
looked her up and down, the distress that spread across his face could’ve
matched the hurt throughout her body. “Oh, Sunny.”

“Yeah, I know. Wish I could say it isn’t as bad as
it looks, but the truth is I hurt all over.”

With his gaze meeting hers, he put his fingers
lightly to her cheek. “Tomorrow will be the worst, then you’ll improve a little
each day after that.” He paused, smiled. “And, for what it’s worth, you’re
still beautiful.”

She smiled back. “Thanks anyway, but you’re
prejudiced.” Her expression sobered. “Guess I better get out of here and go
downstairs. Ryan still mad at me?”

“He’s okay. Stress brings out the best and worst in
a person. That man loves you, Sunny.”

“I know. And I love him back.”

“He and Marcus walked down to the beach, or I should
say the bluff. The area is roped off, at the top as well as the whole cove, but
they hoped they could see something of what was going on. They’ve been gone for
a while.”

His head turned as they heard noise at the front
door. “There they are now.” He leaned in, lightly touched his lips to hers,
then rose and left.

She labored her way to her feet and reached for the
towel.

Not wanting to show off her bruises, she dressed in
an old set of gray sweats and then made her way downstairs. Barefoot. It’d take
too much bending to get footwear on. As she descended the stairs, she overheard
Marcus talking about signs of target shooting they’d discovered among the
cypress trees, but he became silent when she came into sight. The parlor’s
soft, overstuffed chair had been left empty for her and carefully she sank into
it.

Ryan stared at her, and she stared back. She said,
“You told me once we can never go back and undo anything. We accept what is and
go on from there. Right?”

“Generally speaking, I feel successful when someone
starts repeating my words back to me. But in your case—”

“Oh, shut up. I’m sorry. Okay? The gunshot wound was
an accident. I still think so, and I saw no need to advertise it. But,
rethinking it, I admit I was wrong not to mention it, and you’re right.”

He said nothing, apparently unable to come up with a
good argument to that.

That’s a good line, Sunny. Worked every
time you’ve used it.

It was difficult finding a comfortable position and
she tried not to squirm. She wanted to cross her legs, wondered how much effort
it would cost, and then remained still. Ryan was easing up, and she didn’t want
to draw attention to her injuries.

“What does it look like down at the beach?” She
directed the question to Marcus. He was in the other corner chair with Cat on
his lap. When he was around, Cat seemed to forget all about Sunny.

“You’re getting a new trail down the cliff as soon as
they can get a bulldozer out there. One guy already took a fall but didn’t hurt
himself. I managed to keep a straight face, but watching those people negotiate
that last run was a riot. They’re working from both the beach floor and the
cliff. I hope you weren’t too attached to your berry bushes because you’re
losing them. I also heard talk about the Coast Guard being called in, just in
case it was a drowning, but I didn’t see them out there.”

“I wish it were a simple drowning,” Sunny murmured.
“But it wasn’t. The tide doesn’t reach inside the cove.”

“Agreed. That’d be one more iffy element, and you’ve
got enough already. There’s a limit, even to coincidence. At any rate, the
skeleton is going to have overnight company. They were setting up a tent to
shelter it and its guard. If I were the guard, I think I’d want to sleep
outside the tent.”

Ryan rested his legs on the coffee table, crossing
one foot over the other. His gaze moved to her bare feet. “You’ve got a perfect
circle around one ankle. How’d that happen?”

She felt the thorny vines again and saw the sand
rushing to meet her. She gave herself a moment to make certain her voice would
be steady. “A vine caught and held me. It was only for an instant.”

But it felt like eternity.

“That’s exactly what it looks like.” With a
no-nonsense look that was vintage Ryan, he raised his gaze and met hers. “I
want you to come home with me. Jonathan can handle things up here, and the
sheriff—deputy sheriff, whoever he is—has no objection to your leaving.”

“Oh? You’ve all been talking, have you?”

“Don’t look at me like that, and don’t try to pick a
fight with me. I’ll damn well give you one. Somebody has got it in for you. It
doesn’t matter who, or even why right now. What matters is that you get
yourself out of harm’s way.”

Sunny matched his stare for a long moment, and then
blew her breath out in a loud whoosh and looked at the empty doorway. He was
the only person she’d never been able to win an argument with. But she wasn’t
about to tell him that, and she hadn’t yet given up on winning this one anyway.

She looked back. “Okay, listen. Really listen. That
bullet may have been exactly what we thought, a stray, and had nothing to do
with what happened today. Even if it was deliberate, it could’ve been meant for
Jonathan instead of me.”

She held up her hand to shush her audience. Marcus
was the only one who didn’t have his mouth open. “It’s difficult sorting
impressions after a fall like that and I could be way off. Maybe it was a dog,
as Tom suggested. If it’d been one of the boys who pushed me, he might have
hidden in the reeds when he saw me coming, panicked and then shoved me so he
could get away undetected. All kinds of scenarios here. The mere thought that
someone might be trying to kill me boggles my mind. There’s no reason. Jonathan
is the only person who would gain by my death, and that bullet could’ve hit him
as easily as me.”

She lowered her hand. “Okay. Your turn.”

No one appeared convinced, but neither did anyone
jump in with a ready argument.

Taking advantage of the silence, she added, “And I
can’t go home yet anyway. Not without knowing who that skeleton is—was. If it
was my father or not. I have to know, Ryan. You should understand that. And
once it’s identified, one way or the other, I’ll tell my mother. I refuse to
let anyone else do it.”

Chapter Fourteen

The phone rang. Since Ryan was closest to it, he
gave Sunny and Jonathan a questioning look, and when he got two shrugs in
response he answered it. Quickly, his gaze darted back to Sunny. “Hi, Roberta.
Yes, she’s right here.”

Sunny steeled herself; it was doubtful the call from
her mother was a coincidence. Because of the short phone cord, she and Ryan had
to trade places. She moved slowly and tried not to wince.

“Hi, Mom.”

“And hello to you, too. Would you mind telling me
what’s going on up there? A reporter called to get my reaction to the lurid
discovery at Corday Cove.
And
the attempted murder of my daughter. It
was that last one that got me.”

Sunny swore under her breath then glanced guiltily
at Jonathan. “I’d hoped we’d have some time before the news got out.”

“Well, the news is out. I was told a skeleton had
been found in the cove, and that you’d been admitted into the hospital with
extensive injuries.”

“That second one is an exaggeration. I fell off the
cliff.” She turned away from Ryan’s look of disapproval. Telephone privacy was
in pretty short supply around here. Why hadn’t her mother called Sunny’s cell?
Well, she probably had. The cell was upstairs in her purse and she wouldn’t
have heard it ring from down here. In her mildest, blandest voice, she went on.
“I’ve got bruises to show for it, but that’s about it.”

“Bruises, huh.”

“Yeah.”

Sunny let the silence ride. No sense volunteering
information that might have her mother hopping into her car and adding to the
confusion up here. Wait until she knew something, then she’d lay it all out for
her.

“I’m working on it,” Roberta said slowly, “but I
can’t quite figure out how you managed to take a fall like that.”

“Well...”

“All right,” Roberta said. Sunny heard the weary
sigh and could almost see her mother’s long look at the ceiling. “If you’re
okay, I’m okay.” Then she went on. “They’ll try to identify the skeleton
through dental records, and it may be your father’s. This is a high profile
case and it might become difficult for you up there. Perhaps you should come
back home.”

“No. I can handle it. I want to stick it out until
we get answers. And I’ve got a lot done. We’re almost through with the attic.”
That reminded her of the bloody baseball bat, and she tried to turn her face
even further away from Ryan. “And we found a Victrola. It’s a beauty, Mom, a
real antique. Ryan and Marcus will be helping Jonathan to get it down from up
there.”

“Jonathan?”

“Uh, yeah.” She glanced quickly at him. “I met the
other owner of Corday Cove. We, er, surprised each other.”
Now that’s an
understatement if I ever heard one
.

“Good. I’d like to meet him, too. You haven’t been
bothered by the press yet?”

“This is a newly connected phone line, and I guess
they haven’t discovered it. For now it’s just police presence, but I’m sure
we’ll be getting other visitors. Hope they take their time getting out here.”

“The reporter who called isn’t one of the ghouls.
I’ve dealt with him before. And that rock star who shot himself last month will
be the focus of the tabloids for a while. I dislike being callous, but that
might give us a reprieve. Call me, Sunny, as soon as you know anything. I’d
rather hear it from you first.”

“I know. Take care, okay? Love you, Mom.”

Slowly, Sunny placed the phone receiver in its
cradle, and then stared at it instead of looking up at anyone. She wasn’t above
omitting details when it suited her, or even stretching the truth if it came to
that, but she didn’t like doing either with an audience.

“So you fell,” Ryan said mildly, after the count of
perhaps five long seconds. “You weren’t pushed. And I noticed you didn’t
mention that new crease in your forehead or a certain baseball bat that was
used as a weapon on somebody. Possibly on the very same skeleton that had
rested peacefully in the berry bushes until you fell on top of it.” His tone
carried a deceptively casual note. “You and Roberta try so hard to protect the
other, yet each of you know the other so well that neither of you is getting
away with anything. I wonder if either of you knows that?”

Sunny allowed a smile but still didn’t look up.
“Games people play.” As usual, Ryan had found a neat little nutshell that the
situation fitted perfectly into. She studied her hand that rested on the phone
receiver. Angry, red scratches marred it.

Then, as she recalled a comment Jonathan had made on
the beach earlier, she looked over at him. “You said someone called this
morning and that’s why you went looking for me. Who was it?”

“I don’t know. I didn’t ask.” He stared into space
as he jogged his memory. “It was a male voice. I left the phone off the hook,
if I remember right.”

“You did,” Marcus said. “But the person had hung up
before I got back.”

“Whoever it was, I’m grateful,” Sunny said. “Whoever
pushed me came down the trail after me, but then kept on going when he heard
your voices.”

She gave Marcus a questioning look. “When I came
down the stairs you were talking about checking out the cypress grove?”

He nodded. “Are you aware there’s a road leading
into there?” Cat was purring so loudly on his lap that she sounded like a small
motor. Absently he stroked her back.

“I never go in there,” Sunny said, and then she
glanced at Jonathan, who shook his head, conveying that he hadn’t come across a
road during his explorations either. “It must branch off from the main
highway,” she added. “I don’t think there are any spurs off the road that lead
to the house and the cove.”

“Then there’s another way in,” Jonathan mused.
“Other than the beach. We’re not as isolated as I’d thought. We wouldn’t see a
vehicle in there, might not even hear it, and it’s a short walk from the trees
to here.”

“That explains how easily the boys get in for their
target shooting, and possibly why they chose that place,” Marcus said. “I
wonder if we’d be stepping on the sheriff’s toes if we went to visit those kids
tomorrow.”

“We would,” Jonathan said. “For the time being, we
need to leave this investigation to the powers that be. We’d only end up
muddying the waters more than they already are.”

* * *

Sunny spent a bad night and was up at dawn for more
Advil. She wanted another hot bath but didn’t want to start it this early; the
noisy pipes would wake everybody up. She started coffee instead and made
muffins. The activity was good therapy and helped work out kinks in muscles and
joints. She was taking the cupcake tin out of the oven when the hall floor
creaked.

“Well, good morning, Jonathan. I’ve never seen you
up this early.”

“I missed you. What is that? If it tastes as good as
it smells you could probably talk me into trying one.”

“Get a plate. Coffee’s ready, too.”

As he poured a cup he eyed the ancient, scratched-up
thermos next to the coffee pot. “What’s that for?”

“Making friends. It’s a kitchen holdover I hadn’t
thrown away, just in case. I scrubbed it, scalded the inside, and I’m gonna
take coffee and muffins down to the beach. If I’m armed with food maybe I won’t
get chased away as soon as I get there.”

“Good idea.” He shoved the rest of his muffin into
his mouth. “Let’s go. And pack a couple extra of those cupcakes, or whatever
they are. I’m not through.”

Even though they each wore sweats, they shivered.
Though it was light outside, the sun hadn’t yet overpowered the morning clouds.
Halfway to the cliff, Jonathan stopped and jogged in place. Sunny evidently wasn’t
walking fast enough for him so she broke into a run and sprinted past him. She
wasn’t the fastest she’d ever been, but at least her muscles cooperated. She
heard his laugh. Then he caught up and matched his pace to hers until they
reached the barrier of orange tape.

Two pup tents rested inside the cove, one at the top
of the small hill where the skeleton lay, and another in front of it at the
base of the incline to guard it. A man in a heavy jacket, police issue, sat on
the sand outside the foremost one, on the trail’s side. He looked curiously up
at them. He didn’t appear unfriendly.

“Hi,” Sunny said, holding up the thermos and bag of
muffins. “I’m Laurel Corday, but call me Sunny. And this is my cousin—very
distant, family wise—Jonathan Corday. We’ll exchange food for conversation.”

“You’ve got a deal.” The policeman got to his feet
in a smooth, unbroken motion. “But I’ll come up there. I could get in big
trouble if I let you come down here.” Tall and bony, but not awkward, he
climbed the trail faster than Sunny could have.

“Thanks,” he said, accepting the coffee. “My name’s
Joyce.”

Jonathan squinted. “Uh...”

“Gotcha.” He grinned. “Deputy Timothy Joyce. Call me
Tim.” He opened the bag of muffins. “Still warm.” He bit into one then held it
away and gave it an approving look. “That’s real jam in there.”

“No big feat. A combination of Bisquick and Mary
Ellen.” Sunny looked down the slope. “What were you able to get accomplished
yesterday?”

“We got it partially uncovered, but still a lot of
work left before it can be hauled away. Forensic people are fussy. Cameras were
snapping shots from every angle. I was never so glad when everybody left last
night and I could finally just sit and enjoy the ocean. It’s pretty out here.”

Joyce chose another muffin, then offered the bag
back to them. “Too many in here for me. I’ll share.”

Sunny shook her head, but Jonathan took one.
“Thanks,” he said. “Is the Coast Guard coming in? We heard that—”

“That’s no drowning victim. I’m no forensics expert,
but it’s lying on its front and there’s a big dent in the back of the skull.”

His audience said nothing. He paused in the act of
lifting the thermos to his lips. “Hey, I’m sorry. Me and my big mouth.”

“No,” Sunny said. “That’s why I came down here. I
want to know.”

He gave her a long look. “Those scratches on your
face tell me you’re the one who took that header from up here. But you didn’t
land on the skeleton, did you? It doesn’t appear to have been disturbed for a
long time.”

“No. But it...its hiding place was uncovered as a
result of my fall.”

He drained the thermos and started on the last
muffin. “You better not take another tumble. Those berry bushes are gone and
won’t save you again.” He looked down the incline as he chewed. “When you fell,
where did you settle? Farther down the slope, I’ll bet.”

She nodded.

“Good hiding place down there. Made to order. Pull
that body back a little ways, throw some driftwood or anything else on top of
it, make the spot look really natural, cover it up with sand and spread the
vines over it. Not too much work. And it remained hidden for what looks like a
mighty long time.”

“Could a woman have managed to do all that?” Sunny
asked. She frowned against the sick feeling building in her stomach.

“He’d been hit from behind, most likely was
surprised, so he wasn’t fighting back. Doesn’t preclude a female perp.” Joyce
shrugged. “As for the rest of it, it depends on how much time she had, how much
the body weighed. My guess is a woman could’ve done it with enough time. Pretty
much isolated out here. She, he, anyone, would’ve had plenty of time.”

Joyce dusted his hands free of crumbs. “Excellent
muffins. By the way, I don’t know if it’s going to be good news or not, but
you’re going to get a new pathway down to there. Hendricks took a fall
yesterday and ordered it ASAP.”

“Who’s Hendricks?” Jonathan asked. “He must be high
up on the authority list if he can make that kind of order.”

“Yeah, he’s one of the big guns. I don’t know which
we had more of yesterday, generals or soldiers. Tom Fairly, you know him?”

His listeners nodded.

“He’s a good guy. But Hendricks is just full of
himself and when he took that fall, I thought Tom was gonna bust a gullet
holding in the guffaws. And he wasn’t the only one. You never saw so many
strained faces around here. Hendricks ended up with his head stuck in the sand
and his butt in the air. Made a memorable picture.”

His gaze moved beyond them. “Well, here we go. My
last chance to negotiate that cool trail you’ve got there.”

They turned and saw a bulldozer approaching, led by
one official four-wheel drive vehicle and followed by another.

“They’re getting an early start,” Jonathan said.

“Yeah, and I better get back down there,” the lawman
said. “I was told not to talk to or even look at anybody who came from around
here, even if their name was Corday.” He tipped an imaginary hat to Sunny.
“Thanks for the treat. Worth the lecture I’ll get.”

She accepted the empty thermos and bag, and Deputy
Tim Joyce negotiated the trail on his way down as if he were part mountain
goat.

The sun finally made its appearance while she and
Jonathan walked toward the oncoming vehicles. Trying to get her mind away from
the skeleton, Sunny wondered which she enjoyed most at the beach, sunrise or
sunset. And how long it would be before she’d truly be able to enjoy either one
again.