Tarek drove them back to Edgartown. Kyra went over the conversations she’d had with Chase, Sara, Beth, and Grover.
“So how did you do it?” Tarek asked, interrupting her thoughts.
“Excuse me? Do what?” she asked, turning to look at the detective. He glanced at her, his expression amused.
“Get invited into the senator’s office.”
“I carried the coffee. It worked in Dirty Dancing.” Kyra shrugged.
“Operation Watermelon?” He huffed a laugh.
“I’m surprised you didn’t kick me out.”
“It wasn’t an official interrogation. I didn’t Miranda them, and I wanted your opinion.” She blinked back her surprise. “What do you think of Margot Hawthorn?”
“Other than being a right bitch?” Kyra pressed her lips together in distaste.
Tarek grinned.
“I think she’s lying for Chase, but I don’t understand why. I don’t think Chase knows either.” Is Margot that fiercely protective of her son? Or the senator’s reputation? “But I don’t think he could have hurt Brendan.”
“You talked to him?”
Kyra couldn’t read Tarek’s expression, but he didn’t look angry. Actually, he looks … pleased.
“I ran into him down by the fields. He helped deliver a foal.”
“What did he say?”
“Nothing really.” Kyra pressed her lips together.
She didn’t feel entirely comfortable sharing Chase’s story. He hadn’t confided in her, not really, but sharing his grief still felt a bit like a betrayal.
“He told me he was drinking at a bar in Edgartown on January third. He has no memory of what happened after the bar. He said Brendan and Dr. Alonda had a falling out last fall, but he didn’t know what they were arguing about.” Kyra tapped her fingers on the armrest. “I knew Alonda was lying when she pretended she’d never heard of Brendan.” Kyra chanced a glance at Tarek, but his eyes were on the road. “I just can’t think of a reason Chase would kill my dad. Even if it was an accident, and Chase was involved somehow, I still don’t understand why Ed was on that boat.”
Maybe Chase was in trouble and Ed tried to help him? No, Ed never did anything that didn’t benefit him.
“The motive I’ve come up with is that Chase knew about your dad’s article and wanted to protect his family.”
“I’m pretty sure Chase knew my dad, but I doubt Ed would have confided in him. If Chase found out about the article, I bet the rest of the family knew about it, too. And if Chase did know, if he wanted to protect his family or Brendan, wouldn’t he just tell his father? The senator would have resources to bury it. You said people don’t quickly resort to murder.”
No, we’re missing something. Ed was on that boat for a reason.
Tarek parked the car at the bottom of Main Street and turned to her. “Are you sure you don’t want me to drop you off at the house?”
“No, I’ll wander around, maybe go shopping.” She gave him a timid smile.
Actually, there’s something I want to see.
“Okay.” Tarek gave her a long look. “I doubt this will take long. If you need anything, call me.”
Kyra grabbed her bag and walked down to the marina. She pretended to window-shop while watching Tarek continue up the street and enter the yacht club. As soon as he was out of sight, she turned her back on the town and scanned the boats. There, she spotted what she was looking for. It was still tied up in the third slip where it’d been the other night when they’d talked with Brody. The yacht was even more luxurious in the daylight. She glanced around. The few nearby people were busy, and no one noticed when she hopped off the pier and onto the stern of The Island Pearl.
From the back of the boat, Kyra climbed up to an open-air deck, which contained a lux seating area. There was another set of stairs leading to an upper deck and a glass doorway into the interior cabins. She ascended the stairs and popped her head above the floor of the upper deck. Empty. Ed wouldn’t have come up here during a storm. She returned to the main deck and tried the glass door to the cabins. It slid open.
She slipped through, careful to shut the door quietly behind her, and crept down a short hallway to a gourmet kitchen. There were empty glasses and bottles of champagne discarded in the sink. Kyra’s heartbeat ticked up. Adele should be at the yacht club with Tarek. There shouldn’t be anyone here.
Even still, Kyra strained her ears, but the only sound was the creaks of the spring lines. She moved beyond the kitchen, nay the galley, into a formal dining and living space complete with an electric fireplace and a television above the mantle.
Kyra wasn’t sure what she was looking for, but this was where Ed had died. She owed it to him. She slunk through the communal space, hugging the walls. The back of her neck was slick with sweat.
Toward the front of the cabin, she came upon a spiral staircase.
She descended to the lower level, nested in the hull. At the base of the staircase, she faced a hall with three doorways leading in different directions. She peeked through the open one to her left. The room was a multilevel sleeping area. It was tidy and undisturbed. Kyra caught the faint musty smell of disuse from the linens. She opened a closet door. Empty. The Hawthorns didn’t keep many personal items on their yacht.
She retraced her steps back toward the spiral staircase and tested the closed door. It opened to reveal a luxurious suite. This room was not tidy. It had been inhabited. Recently. The bed was unmade, the coverlet and sheets askew. Discarded clothes and more empty champagne bottles lay on the plush carpeted floor, moving slightly with the rocking of the waves. A built-in desk was littered with glasses and the remnants of a meal. Someone’s living here? Adele? Brody? Kyra crossed the floor to another doorway, careful not to disturb the clutter on the floor. It was another room—an en suite bathroom and a generous walk-in closet.
Kyra stepped into the bathroom. She absorbed the decadence of the space, her eyes resting on the soaking tub nestled under an oval window. Is that necessary? The door to the walk-in closet was slightly ajar. She pushed it open and stepped inside. It was full of clothes; however, despite the glossy wooden shelving and hanging racks, the clothes were scattered around the room on the floor, mostly in piles, and one of those large, waterproof duffle bags lay in a corner. Kyra noticed the coastguard emblem on the side. Definitely Brody. Shoes—men’s—were strewn about as well, resting where they’d fallen from being kicked off. A strange, earthy moldy scent lingered in the closet reminding her of stale, unwashed towels and she pressed a hand to her nose. She turned to leave. She stepped over a pile of laundry, and her foot hit something hard. Kyra paused and toed the dirty clothes. Her eye caught something, a matte, gray metal casing. With a grimace and a snort of disgust, she pushed aside the laundry to uncover a laptop.
She yanked it out from under the clothes and opened it. The screen was cracked, but there it was. Taped down next to the touchpad was a Post-It. “USERNAME: E.K.Gibson / PASSWORD: KuddleBug.”
“Holy shit!”