Charlotte Douglas - Holidays Are Murder

She crossed her arms over her skinny chest and tapped her foot impatiently. “It’s a different guy altogether. He’s almost a foot taller than the one who robbed me.”

Those were words I didn’t want to hear. “You’re sure? After all, you were sitting down.”

“And the guy in the Clinton mask was almost eye-to-eye with me. Nope, that’s definitely not the one who robbed me.” Her scathing look spoke volumes. “Looks like you’ve got two robbers to catch now.”

The next morning the insistent ringing of the telephone awakened me. A glance at my bedside clock indicated the time was a few minutes past seven. I’d had less than four hours’ sleep in the past two days, and I wanted nothing more than to let the answering machine pick up while I dived under the covers until the alarm sounded at seven-thirty. But, recalling the dynamic duo of thieves still at large, I fumbled for the phone beside my bed and braced to hear Darcy announcing another break-in.

“Good morning, dear.” My mother’s refined voice, buoyant with irritating cheerfulness, resonated in my ear. “I was hoping I’d find you at home.”

That one simple statement carried a truckload of disapproval, her indirect snipe at the unpredictable hours of my job.

“What’s up?” I asked. Mother never called simply to chat or pass the time of day. She communicated only to issue a summons or an edict. This morning was no exception.

“I’m calling about Thanksgiving dinner. You are coming, aren’t you?”

“I certainly intend to.” I didn’t want to get into the possibility, of which Mother was well aware but chose to ignore, that work might intervene.

“We’ll gather at five for cocktails. Dinner at six.”

With partial consciousness came the memory of my conversation with Bill at the restaurant the previous night. “If it’s all right, I’d like to bring a guest.”

“A guest?” Her voice crackled with surprise.

“Bill Malcolm.”

“Oh.”

“Is that a problem?”

“Of course not.” Her tone contradicted her words. “But, really, Margaret, what do you know about this man?”

“This man was my partner for seven years and he’s been my friend for over twenty.” The fact that in all that time he’d never met my family said a lot about my shaky relationship with them.

“I’m aware of that, dear,” she said with a hint of exasperation, “but what do you know about him?”

“I know that he’s good and decent, but if you’d rather I came alone—”

“I’m sure Mr. Malcolm is a very nice man, but what do you know about his family?” For Mother, with people, as with art and antiques, provenance was all.

“Most of them are dead,” I said.

“Don’t be obtuse, Margaret. You know exactly what I’m asking. Who were they?”

Decent, unpretentious, hardworking people, with whom my elitist mother had absolutely nothing in common. “His father was a citrus grower in Plant City. He’s eighty-five, suffers from Alzheimer’s, and is in an assisted-living facility in Tampa.”

“He was a farmer?”

“You could say that.” Contrariness kept me silent on the fact that Bill’s father’s orange groves were several thousand acres of prime real estate, worth millions if sold for development. A sufficient amount of wealth covered a multitude of sins in Mother’s book, but I wasn’t about to pander to her prejudices.

“And his son lives in Pelican Bay?” She was sounding more dubious by the minute.

“At the marina. On his boat.”

“Mr. Malcolm lives on a boat?” Horror laced her voice. “Like a transient?”

Even in my sleep-deprived state, I experienced a guilty thrill at Mother’s disapproval. I’d learned long ago I could never please her, so sometimes I took perverse pleasure in pushing her buttons instead. Especially since I was still smarting from her dismissive attitude a few weeks ago at the yacht club when I’d saved her from an armed teenager intent on robbery. Instead of thanking me, she’d criticized my language. Why I, at forty-eight, still longed for my mother’s approval, was one of the mysteries of the universe.

“Because he does live on a boat, I’m sure he’d enjoy having Thanksgiving dinner in a real home,” I lied, knowing Bill could whip up an elegant holiday meal in his small galley kitchen that would put Mother’s expensive caterers to shame.

“Your friends are always welcome at my house, Margaret,” Mother insisted, but her tone lacked conviction. “I’ll be happy to have Mr. Malcolm join us for Thanksgiving. But please, remind him that we dress for dinner.”

I stifled the irrational image of Mother, my perfect older sister Caroline and her stuffy husband, Hunt, sitting naked around Mother’s antique dining table, and I couldn’t resist baiting her. “Clothes are always helpful, especially when the weather’s chilly.”

Mother’s sigh of exasperation vibrated loudly through the handset. “You know what I mean, Margaret. At least, I hope you haven’t forgotten all the social niceties.”

Not as long as I had Mother as a constant reminder. “Thanks, Mother. I’ll see you Thursday.”

I climbed out of bed and gazed through the sliding-glass doors of my second-floor bedroom at St. Joseph Sound and the Intracoastal Waterway that separated the city from Pelican Beach. The waters, smooth as glass, reflected a towering bank of cumulus clouds, rose-tipped by the sunrise, and mirrored the shimmering lavender-and-pink striations cast by the early-morning sky.

For a moment I considered what life might be like without my job. With the tidy sum vested in my pension and a small income from the trust Daddy had left me, I wouldn’t have to work. If I retired, I could enjoy a cup of coffee and the morning paper on my balcony while I watched the charter boats heading into the Gulf with their boatloads of tourists.

And then what would I do the rest of the day?

With a month’s worth of Bloomberg’s surveillance video waiting at the station, I headed for the shower.

Adler was already at the station when I arrived.

“Did you go home last night?” I asked.

Adler had a pretty young wife, Sharon, and an adorable year-old daughter, Jessica, and I worried that the extra hours he logged were negatively affecting his family. I didn’t want him to end up as Bill had, divorced and unable to watch his daughter growing up.

“Yeah, I left right after you.” Adler flushed to the tips of his ears. “I’m logging some personal time today. Came in early to let you know before I take off.”

He was having trouble looking me in the eye. I shut the door to the CID cubicle that some called an office and faced him. “What’s up?”

He lowered his voice. “An interview with the Clearwater P.D. I can’t wait for the council to make up its mind about whether to keep our department. For my family’s sake, I have to make sure I have a job.”

Although he was still green, I respected Adler more than any of my partners since Bill Malcolm. With his sharp mind and humble demeanor, he had the makings of a great detective. He also had the rare gift of bringing out my maternal instincts, and I would sorely miss him if he left.

I spent the rest of the day watching surveillance tapes until my eyes crossed. During the past few weeks, several people had done some serious browsing in Bloomberg’s without making any purchases, but no one fit the description of either of the perps. In desperation, I punched the number of Mick Rafferty, head of the sheriff’s crime lab, into my phone.

“Mick,” I said when he answered. “Do you have the latest face recognition software?”

“You know I do, Maggie, me darlin’.” Mick was quintessential Boston Irish, young and cocky with devilish blue eyes, wall-to-wall freckles and an encyclopedic mind like a steel trap. “Haven’t you seen the ACLU goon squad screaming invasion of privacy for the past few months on the evening news?”