Sleeping with the Fishes (A Paranormal Cozy Mystery) (Willow Bay Witches Book 6) Read online

  “Great. With that cat, it’s never anything good,” I said. I loved Bee, but she was an absolute drama queen. “I bet she’s realized the kittens are getting old enough that I’ll be looking for adopters for them soon.”

  Sophie nodded. “That could be it. Maybe she’s hoping if they hide you’ll forget they exist.”

  “But then who will complain that I let a dog live in her house?” I replied with a smile. Bee still hadn’t forgiven me for allowing Sophie to adopt Sprinkles, who was the absolute nicest dog alive and the complete opposite of Bee in every way.

  “Ooooh, look, Betty got a new sign,” I noted, pointing out the chalk A-frame at the front of the store. The writing was extremely pretty, advertising half price slices of pie with a nice picture of a slice done in chak as well.

  “Well, I know what I’m going to order to take-away and have for desert tonight,” Sophie joked.

  “As long as she still has peach-blueberry, I’m in,” I replied, my mouth already watering.

  Sophie opened the door to Betty’s Café and walked in, with me following behind her. All of a sudden, every head in the café turned to stare at us. The murmurs of conversation–mostly gossip from around town–that the dozen or so people in the café had been partaking in suddenly stopped. Betty’s new employee, a teenager named Carson, was standing behind the counter. As soon as he saw us, his eyes widened and he zipped back into the kitchen.

  “Was it something I said?” Sophie mumbled to me. We quickly made our way to the counter.

  “I know I walked a giraffe through downtown but I didn’t think it would warrant this kind of reaction,” I said to Sophie in reply. The slow murmurs began once more, and I overheard snippets.

  “They don’t know, it’s obvious they don’t know.”

  “Maybe that’s just what they want us to think.”

  “Or she just doesn’t have anything to do with it. It could be that boy of hers, the one from New York City. That’s how they solve their problems over there, right?”

  I had a feeling whatever had happened, it wasn’t good. Just then Betty, the café owner, came out from the kitchen. As soon as she saw Sophie and I she rushed over.

  “You’ve obviously not heard the news if you’re here,” she said in a whisper.

  “What news?” Sophie asked.

  “Someone found Matt Smith’s body washed up on the beach this morning,” she said. “He’d been shot.”

  “Oh my God,” I whispered. “We had no idea.”

  “And of course, the whole town heard that you chased him down after he set your vet clinic on fire last night,” Betty said.

  “Ohhhh,” I said with a groan, realizing why everyone was staring at us. They weren’t staring at Sophie and me, they were just staring at me. I was definitely the prime suspect in this murder.

  “I think we’re going to get two BLTs to go, one with real bacon please,” Sophie said. “And two hazelnut lattes.”

  “Coming right up,” Betty said. “If you’d rather sit in the back room to avoid everyone while you wait, I have a nice little seating area there for when I eat my lunch.”

  “Thanks, Betty,” I told her with a smile. “But I think we’ll hang out here. After all, I didn’t do it. I have nothing to hide.”

  “Of course you didn’t, dear,” Betty told me. “And shame on anyone who thinks you did.”

  Sophie and I took a small two-seater table by the wall while we waited for our food and drinks.

  “I can’t believe he’s dead!” Sophie whispered to me when we sat down.

  “I know! And of course with the timing, everyone thinks I did it, or Jason,” I replied, remembering the conversation. I glared at the woman who had made the comment about Jason; she was facing away from me so it wasn’t exactly threatening, but it made me feel better.

  “Everyone who actually knows you will immediately know that’s bull,” Sophie said.

  “I know, but still. Chief Gary’s going to have to investigate me. He wouldn’t be doing his job, otherwise. Same with Jason. And people here don’t know him as well as they know me.”

  “That’s true,” Sophie conceded. “I’m pretty sure there’s people here who think New York is like that movie The Purge every single day.”

  I shook my head. “I mean, I’m not sad he’s dead. He basically threatened me last night. If anyone deserved to be murdered it was him. But I also don’t want me or Jason caught up in the aftermath.”

  “You won’t be. Look on the bright side, now no one cares about the fact that you spent the morning walking a giraffe through town.”

  I smiled at Sophie. “That’s true. I’m going to text Jason.”

  I sent him a quick text telling him Matt’s body had been found in the ocean. He replied a minute later telling me he was aware, that everyone was on Willow Bay Beach, the main beach in town–whoever founded this place wasn’t exactly bursting with creativity when it came to names–and he confirmed that Matt had been shot.

  “We should go down there, have a look,” Sophie said as Betty motioned to us that our sandwiches were ready. I nodded.

  “Yeah, good plan, I replied. Sophie and I took our sandwiches and coffee and ate while walking down the street toward the beach. We walked silently, each one of us preoccupied with our own thoughts.

  Was it bad that a part of me was a little bit happy Matt Smith was dead? After all, he had proven himself dangerous. He had set my vet clinic on fire, and threatened me less than twenty-four hours ago. I definitely felt safer without him around.

  Unfortunately, I also knew those thoughts were what was going to make me an automatic suspect in his murder.

  When we arrived at the beach, it could have been mistaken for a warm summer day. A gentle breeze floated in from the ocean, and the sun shone down on the sand, sending a small wave of heat up from the ground as Sophie and I walked along. The crowd—made up of at least a few dozen onlookers—and police tape strung between some trees, flowing in the breeze, was the only indication anything was wrong.

  I saw Jason over to the side of the onlookers, with his camera with the telephoto lens–a necessity for a journalist–taking photos of the police officers. Making my way toward him and away from the crowd, I got a better look at what was happening behind the police tape.

  There was a body in a black bag lying on the sand. Huddled around it was Chief Gary, with a somber expression on his face. He was speaking with Taylor, Sophie’s boyfriend, and two other police officers who I recognized but didn’t really know very well. One of them nodded at something Chief Gary said and made his way back toward the street. A minute later I saw a van with ‘Wawnee County Medical Examiner’ stencilled in white letters on the side, and I imagined it wouldn’t be long before the black bag was loaded up into the van.

  “Hey, what’s happening here?” I asked Jason as I made my way toward him. He turned to me, his face grim.

  “The rumor mill is right, it was Matt Smith. I considered texting you, but didn’t want to worry you at work.”

  “It’s ok. I found out about it at lunch, we went to Betty’s and found out there. Are you sure it’s him?”

  Jason nodded. “One hundred percent. I was walking to the office when I saw someone running away from the beach, saying to call 9-1-1, that her phone had died. So I gave her my phone and went to see. It was absolutely him, and he had a bullet wound in the middle of his forehead. He didn’t drown accidentally; Matt Smith was murdered.”

  I shook my head slowly. “So we’re essentially the biggest suspects, aren’t we?”

  “As of right now, as far as I can tell, yes.”

  “I’m guessing you can’t tell when he was shot?”

  Jason grinned. “Sadly, despite how much of my youth was spent watching Law and Order, I can’t tell time of death myself yet. I don’t know, although I think it’s safe to assume it was in the last 18 hours or so.”

  “Definitely,” I nodded. “So we know it was sometime after he set the clinic on fire and then claim
ed he didn’t to Chief Gary, but before…”

  “Eleven-fourteen,” Jason replied. “I had my phone out and was texting someone about an interview when the lady came running toward me.”

  “Ok, so there’s about a fifteen hour time span when he could have theoretically been killed. Probably more like 14 hours because the body was probably in the water for longer than five minutes.”

  “I would say so,” Jason agreed. “Now we just have to find out who wanted Matt Smith dead.”

  “Apart from us,” I deadpanned.

  “Apart from us,” Jason agreed, nodding. “I’m going to interview some people here. After all, I have the perfect reason to find out as much information as I can.”

  “Sounds good. I need to go back to work, but since today is Saturday I can help out tomorrow.”

  “Sure thing. Talk to you soon, sweetie,” Jason said, leaning over and kissing me softly on the lips. My face flushed with excitement as I found Sophie and we made our way back to the vet clinic. Comparing notes, it seemed she hadn’t learned anything other than what Jason already knew. I hoped his interview skills would get us a little bit more information before the night was out.

  Chapter 5

  A few hours later I was back home, an afternoon of clinic work over. Nothing especially exciting had happened–after a smuggled giraffe had ended up in the clinic, that was always going to be the peak excitement for the day anyway–and when I got home after a quick trip to the grocery store I got straight to work taking care of said giraffe.

  Lucy seemed happy in the stable. As happy as a young giraffe taken from her mother as a calf and sold, presumably as a pet, on the other side of the world from her home could be, anyway. She was having a chat with a little Stellar’s Jay that had come by, but her new friend flew away as soon as I appeared.

  “Hi Lucy,” I greeted her. “How are you doing?”

  “I’m ok. I’m a little bit hungry though. I really liked the orange thing you gave me.”

  I grinned, and pulled the bag of lettuce and a few carrots that I’d grabbed at the grocery store out of my bag. “You’re in luck,” I told Lucy. “These are treats, I was thinking if I let you out into the yard, you could try eating from the trees here and see if you like them?” I asked.

  “All right, I will try that. But first, the orange treats!”

  I laughed and handed her a carrot before putting the lettuce and other carrots where I had left the rest of her food. I then opened the door to the stable and let Lucy out into the backyard.

  “So Lucy, I want to do my best to help find your mom. Do you remember what the place you came from was called? Do you know what country you were from?”

  “I don’t know,” Lucy said. “I remember my mother calling our home something, but it was long ago now. I think it was called ‘Tara’-something.”

  “Tanzania?” I asked hopefully, but Lucy shook her large head.

  “No, it was not that. It definitely started with ‘Tara’, but beyond that, I cannot remember.”

  “Ok,” I told Lucy. “I’m going to go inside and look up where it could be. Do you think you would remember the name if I told it to you?”

  “I think so, but I am not completely certain, I’m sorry,” Lucy said.

  “It’s ok, you don’t need to be sorry,” I told her, stroking her. She was so much softer than I had expected a giraffe to be. “I’ll be back soon, ok?”

  “Ok,” Lucy replied. I left the stable door open.

  “Feel free to go out and eat some of the trees in the yard,” I told her. “There are no predators here.”

  “I will.” I turned around to go back to the house when suddenly I heard Lucy’s voice again. “Do you think you’re going to be able to find my mom?”

  My heart broke at the sentiment. I knew what it was like to lose my parents, although I barely remembered mine. I hoped Lucy would have better luck. “I hope so, Lucy. I hope so.”

  As soon as I walked back into the house I unlocked my iPad and started to search through Google Maps. A few minutes into it, my phone rang. It was an unknown number; normally I’d just let it go to voicemail, but now that I’d sent an email to my old vet school friend to call me, I picked up.

  “Hello?” I answered.

  “Hi, Angela, it’s Kirsten,” the voice on the other end of the line said. The connection was a little bit on the scratchy side, but I didn’t care; my heart leapt with joy at hearing her voice.

  “Kirsten, hi! Thank you so much for returning my call.” Kirsten had gone to veterinary school with me, but after graduating, rather than becoming a run-of-the-mill vet she moved to Africa, where she worked at an elephant rescue sanctuary in Kenya. We weren’t especially close, but had kept in touch on Facebook, where she’d posted her phone number. I’d left her a voicemail a few hours earlier asking her to call me when she got a chance.

  “No problem, it’s great to hear from you. What’s up?”

  “Well, it’s kind of a weird problem. I have a juvenile giraffe here in Oregon that’s been smuggled from somewhere in your part of the world, and I’m hoping to be able to reunite her with her mother. I know, I know, the odds are pretty slim.”

  Kirsten laughed on the other end of the line. “No kidding, right? Well I’ll do what I can. Do you know anything at all about where the giraffe came from?”

  “The, uh, girl who dropped her off said that she came from a place whose name started with “Tara”,” I replied, obviously unable to tell Kirsten the true source of my information.

  “Hmm,” Kirsten replied. “There’s always Tarangire National Park in Tanzania, I imagine that would be the most likely place your giraffe came from.”

  “Ok, I might be able to find out for sure. If that’s the place, do you think it would be easy to find the mother?”

  “Not really,” Kirsten replied slowly. “It’s a big park, about two thousand square miles if I remember right. It would be infinitely more helpful to know where the giraffe was taken from. If you could find the smugglers, that would make it a lot easier, but of course, I know that’s probably impossible.”

  “That’s not what I wanted to hear, but I definitely get it,” I replied. “Is there nothing else that can be done to find the mother?”

  “I’ll put some feelers out. I know a group that rescues elephants in Tanzania, and Tarangire is very elephant-heavy. They might know something. I’ll let you know.”

  “Thanks so much, Kirsten.”

  “No problem. I gotta run, but one day you’re going to have to tell me how you ended up with a smuggled giraffe in your care.”

  I laughed. “Sure thing. Talk to you soon!”

  As soon as I hung up the phone I entered Tarangire National Park into Google Maps. Sure enough, it was a national park in northern Tanzania. To my surprise, despite the fact that Kirsten said it was two thousand square miles large, it was actually nowhere near the largest national park in Tanzania. Thank goodness for small blessings.

  I made my way outside and asked Lucy, who was happily munching on the leaves and twigs of one of the apple trees in my backyard, if the name was familiar.

  “Yes! Tarangire! That is what my mom used to call where we lived. Tarangire! Does that mean I can go home now?”

  “You could, but the thing is, Tarangire is really big. We don’t know exactly where in the park your mother came from. We can’t just leave you out there without her. You wouldn’t be safe. I have a friend who lives near there, she’s looking into whether or not one of her contacts can find out anything, and I’m going to look into it from this side. If I can find the people that brought you here, maybe I can convince them to tell me where in the park they took you from.”

  To be totally honest, I had no idea how old Lucy was. I knew she was older than a newborn, and if I had to guess I’d say eight months or so, but telling a giraffe’s age based on size wasn’t exactly relevant to our studies in veterinary school, seeing as most of us weren’t going to be seeing anything more exotic than a hamst
er during our careers. And on top of that, having been taken from her mother, I didn’t know if she’d been artificially weaned and what an impact that may have had on her development. I only hoped that when we did find her mother–I was going to do everything I could to make sure that happened–that Lucy would be accepted by her once more. I really, really hoped so.

  “Ok,” Lucy said. “Angela?”

  “Yes?”

  “Is it all right if I go back into the stable now? It feels safe in there.”

  “Of course,” I told her. “Please, do. I’ll close the door for you tonight, so nothing will be able to get in until morning. How does that sound?”

  “That would be nice.”

  I put the poor, scared giraffe to bed, then gave her a quick pat before heading back into the house. I was going to have to figure out just how to find the smugglers.

  As I made my way back into the house I found Sophie and Charlotte in the kitchen, Charlotte with a medical textbook that made War and Peace look like a children’s book open in front of her, and Sophie chopping up vegetables for enchiladas at the counter.

  “So how’s our new roommate?” Sophie asked.

  “You know, I’m pretty sure you’re supposed to report smuggled animals to some authority somewhere,” Charlotte scolded before I got the chance. I looked at Sophie, who shrugged.

  “I was going to not tell her, so I could see the look on her face the next time she went out into the stable and saw a giraffe there, but then I realized I might not be around to see it. So I figured seeing the look on her face when I told her about our new arrival was the next best thing.”

  Great. Charlotte was smart as hell, but also a huge stickler for rules.

  “I want to try and find her mother, first. Don’t worry, I’m not going to keep her,” I said, rolling my eyes. “I already know she comes from Tarangire National Park in Tanzania. But I spoke to Kirsten and she said that’s a big park, and that it would be best if I narrowed down where she came from.”

  Charlotte closed her book with a thud. “And let me guess, that means you’re going to try and find the smugglers who brought her here in the first place.” I didn’t even need to look at my sister to know she was giving me that look. The look that screamed, even though I’m the younger sister, I’m the responsible one and I think this is a bad idea.