Murder in Death's Door County (6 page)

“Believe it! Oh my gosh! Will you let me
finish already? Do you interrupt all of your clients this much? Anyway, after
Ray was stabbed, they blamed me. They roughed me up again, and hauled me down
to the station. But Tina came forward and admitted what she had done. As soon
as they found out Tina had done it, they let her go. They didn’t even charge
her. Nothing. They reasoned that she was an admitted alcoholic, and it was a
crime of passion. Yet they had no problem coming after me with no evidence and
no witness. During the first incident, she never charged me and never told the
police I threatened her in any way. In every incident, it’s always the cops
saying I beat someone up or I threatened someone. It’s all lies. Everything’s a
fabrication.

“Eventually, I made the connection
between the banks and the cops because that bank handles the cops’ main pension
fund. These guys all stick together, thick as thieves. After we won the
lawsuits, not only did we suffer at the hands of the cops, but they would not
allow us, the Landrostassis family, to bank with them. They refused to let us
pay our mortgages. They wanted to intentionally send us into financial ruin.
They would go as far as calling the police to remove me and Diana from the
bank.”

“Wait! Who’s Diana again?” I felt I had
read that name somewhere, but Marcos was throwing so much information at me.

“My wife! Now, stop interrupting. Where
was I? Oh yes, they prevented us from making payments on the rental property
and the bank was allowed to get control of the rentals and two of the other
buildings we had previously bought! And sent me to prison! For crimes I didn’t
even commit!”

Writing furiously, I was determined to
get all of his narrative down on a paper. If what Marcos said was true, it
sounded like he and Diana had gotten a raw deal. He had said “the Landrostassis
family” like I was supposed to know who they are. I knew I had heard the name before
this project. Lizzy had mentioned that the name sounded familiar to her too.

“Hey, would it be okay with you if I
talked to this Tina Delvecchio? I’m wondering if she can give me any insight as
to her thoughts on why you and your family have been so harassed.” It seemed
like a logical step to me. I figured I could have a quick phone conversation
with Tina Delvecchio, and get my impressions. Drunk or not, Tina had to have
some interesting insight into this whole story. I reasoned that Marcos’ problem
wasn’t really with Tina anyway; it was with the police who had roughed him up.

“You don’t need to interview her. Why
would need to interview her? What would she tell you that I’m not already
telling you?” Marcos demanded.

He was getting really agitated. “Tell
me,
WHAT
WOULD SHE TELL YOU THAT I’M NOT ALREADY TELLING YOU
?”

Okay, now he was yelling. I started to
get a stomachache while my stupid client yelled in my ear. Very uncool. I
resolved to talk to Harry about this one. A slap would feel better than this
verbal onslaught. My stomachache grew worse the more he talked.

“Why are you yelling at me? I’m just
trying to help, you big goon.”

Oh my gosh, I realized I had just called
my volatile client a goon. Uh oh.

“Did you just call me a goon?”

“I’m sorry, what? Our connection is bad.
I can’t hear you. Someone is knocking on my door.” I felt like such a wimp.
Now, where had my courage run off to?

“Look, if you don’t want to do this book
the way I’m paying you to do it, just say so. I can call Harry and he can find
someone else.”

My stomachache kicked into high gear.
Which was worse: poverty or dealing with this schlub? Crap… fear of living on
the streets won out.

“No, no… you are exactly right, Marcos.
I do apologize. It’s been a long day, what with the drive up here and getting
situ-,” I said, trying to smooth his ruffled feathers.

Now it was his turn to interrupt me. “I
can’t talk to you anymore today,” he still sounded extremely upset. “Let me
think about how to continue with this. I’ll be in touch with you tomorrow with
my decision.”

“Marcos, seriously. I didn’t mean
anything by it.” He had already hung up.

Crap!

C
AUGHT UP IN THE RECENT
EVENTS
, I daydreamed about
how quickly life can change as I drove down the highway to a grocery store in
Sturgeon Bay. I figured since Harry was paying for it, I should get some good
snacks for my room at the inn while I could. Plus, I needed some aspirin for
the headache Marcos gave me. Between my throbbing head and being super
distracted, I totally missed the car braking in front of me. Until I was about
one foot away from it. As my heart flew to my throat, I simultaneously prayed
and slammed on the brakes. I only started breathing again when I didn’t hear
the “crunch” of metal. I heard what sounded more like an aggressive scraping. I
slapped my forehead. Darn it all! Not another accident! Granted, this seemed
like just a fender-bender, but still...

I resigned myself to the inevitable as I
opened the car door to exchange insurance information. As I pushed open the door,
I encountered resistance and felt a thud. Then, I heard a howl of pain and a
muffled, “Ah you tayin to kiw me?”

Startled, I leapt out of the car and
looked down to see a man. In great pain. Writhing on the ground and holding his
nose.

Immediately, I bent down over him, “Are
you okay?” Oh dear! Oh dear! This isn’t good! That makes two accidents in as
many months. Just last month, I had t-boned a deputy sheriff’s car. I still got
teased about that.

“Wha ah you doig? Why did you opah ya
dooh? I thing you brog mah noze! Aargh!”

I decided that the best defense is a
strong offense. “Well, what do you think you were doing, sneaking up to my
door! I was just about to get out of the car and assess the damage! Obviously,
I didn’t see you there! Do you think if I had seen you there I would have
opened the door like that? Do you? Do you?”

By the time I had finished my tirade, he
was vertical and staring at me as though I’d grown a second head.

The first thing I noticed about him was
the gash across his nose and the profuse bleeding. The next thing I noticed was
the scowl his mouth made. The last thing I noticed was that his piercing green
eyes made me feel flush. Mentally, I admonished myself. A cute guy finally
crosses my path and what do I do? Crash into his car and break his nose. Well,
possibly break his nose. I wasn’t a doctor and couldn’t make a diagnosis.
However, his nose was really bleeding a lot.

He kept glaring at me as he held his
nose together. Silently, he handed me a business card and turned on his heel. Speechless,
I stared after him.

In stunned silence, I
watched him drive away. I looked down at the card in my hand, which read:

D
ONOVAN
A
RCHER

Insurance Agent

920-555-0301

“Great! What do I do now?” I thought. I
never got to give him my insurance information. I shrugged and pocketed his
card. The mysterious exchange suited me just fine actually. I didn’t relish having
this added to my already-abysmal traffic record.

—
–

That night and next morning went so
slowly, I thought I would go barking mad. I hated waiting for anything. This
time, I felt like I was waiting for my future to be decided by a nut job. Harry
called in the morning to give his estimated time of arrival for that night and
asked me to make his reservations at the Lighthouse Inn. While waiting to meet
Lizzy for lunch, I decided to put my time to good purpose and wrote the outline
and the first 2,000 words for the book. I figured if I had work to show for it,
I could use that as an argument to keep the project. In addition, I went online
and researched some information about the InterGlobal bank and additional
mortgage terminology. The weird thing is, the more I learned about the way
mortgages work, the more confused I became about Marcos’ situation. What
confused me even more was why he had yelled at me. My questions hadn’t really
been that probing. Clearly, I had struck a nerve with him and I wasn’t even
sure how it had happened.

Fortunately, I had a lunch date with my
new friend, Lizzy, to take my mind off things. Since Lizzy lived in Fish Creek
with her sister’s family, we had arranged to meet up there Fish Creek at Janie’s
shop, then go to lunch.

—
–

Feeling somewhat better, I found Janie’s
boutique fairly easily and parked a few doors down from it. Usually notoriously
late, I managed to get there before Lizzy to look around.

Janie Nicholson, Kitty Breckenridge’s
sister and silent co-proprietor of the Lighthouse Inn, had bought space
in a renovated old mill for her pet project, this boutique. Lizzy had given me
a little of Janie’s backstory when we arranged to meet in Fish Creek. After
Janie’s divorce, she had moved back home to Door County. Right about the same
time, Kitty was looking for a partner for her inn and Janie was looking for way
to invest her recent divorce settlement. Since the sisters were close enough to
enjoy each other’s company, and mature enough to respect each other’s
boundaries, the partnership worked really well.

The exposed Cream City brick allowed the
beautiful clothes to “pop” perfectly. For decoration, Janie had hung up select
pieces from that season’s collection to entice shoppers. I eyed a gorgeous
ruffled sweater... then remembered that at five feet nothing and 100 pounds
even, ruffles made me look like a 10 year-old.

As I made my way to the back of the shop,
Janie peeked out from behind a mannequin she was dressing. “Hey Annie! Good to
see you up here. Are you meeting Lizzy? Take a look around,” she said as she
draped a gorgeous blue knit over her arm. “Try out some cookies and cider.” She
pointed to a small table laden with treats and placed next to two overstuffed,
yellow chairs next to the big front window.

“Hi Janie! Cookies and cider? As if this
place could get more charming! Yeah, we’re supposed to have lunch at that Irish
pub down the street.”

“Dublin’s?”

“Yup.”

“Be sure to try their salmon sandwich.
It is to die for.”

“I really love your shop! How’s business
after the tourist season ends?”

“Not too bad. I’m really hoping that
things pick up after Halloween. But it isn’t bad at all!” Janie smiled as she
spoke.

“Hey guys!”

Janie and I turned towards the door as Lizzy
came in.

Before I could say a word, Lizzy saw
Janie’s plate of cookies. “Cookies! Oh great! I’m famished. Do you care if I
have one or two or ten?”

Janie smiled. “Sure, no problem. I have
more in the back. Well, I’ll let you two look around. I need to get back to
dressing her.” Janie gestured towards the half-dressed mannequin.

Lizzy dragged me over to the sweaters
and pulled one from the pile.

“What do you think of this one?”

I gasped, “Oh my gosh! That’s my color!
Where did you find this?”

Lizzy gestured around the shop.

Nudging Lizzy, I laughed and said, “you
know what I mean!”

“Yeah, I thought you might like it. I
came here the other day and saw this. When we met, I immediately remembered
this sweater, which is one of the reasons I suggested we meet here.” Next, Lizzy
held up a lime green sweater with bright orange piping. We both shuddered at
the color combination.

“And you have to get it!” insisted Lizzy.

“The green and orange sweater?” I said
in mock horror.

Lizzy laughed, “Yeah, not the blue one
that’s clearly perfect for you.”

I held up the peacock blue sweater and pirouetted
in front of the mirror. “I do think you’re right—it’s meant to be! I think half
of my wardrobe is this color—I love it!”

Lizzy added, “Seriously, if you don’t
get it, it will be a sin and you will have to go to confession.”

“I think you should get it. The blue complements
your coloring,” said a surprisingly male voice behind me. I whirled around and
gasped.

My jaw dropped as I recognized the face
belonging to that voice. Feeling a blush coming on, I sputtered, “Hey! You’re
the-.” His smile stunned me into silence. I promptly stopped talking and
turned bright red. Flustered, I turned out to grab Lizzy, only to see Lizzy and
Janie giggling by the cash register.

“Yeah, and you’re the chick who hit me,”
Donovan said, smiling even bigger. “Your dimples are cute when I’m not writhing
in pain.”

“Of all the arrogant…”

“Arrogant what?”

“Arrogant you’s!” I stomped my foot in
frustration.

“You walked away without even saying a
word yesterday. I had no idea if you were okay!”

“Well, as you can see,” he grinned
broadly and made a sweeping gesture from his head to his shoes.

Now that he stood before me without
blood squirting out of his nose, I got a good look at him. He wore a black
leather jacket and perfectly fitted blue jeans. I realized that his dark hair
and piercing green eyes offset his bandaged nose, and he looked hot.