Page 56 of Dead Men Tell No Shells

I took a photograph of my handwritten summary and sent him a message.

I found a connection between Harvey, Chesapeake Shore Community Bank, and the old waterfront redevelopment. Owen’s family business lost its property during that period. I have dates and document references, but nothing that proves wrongdoing. Could be worth checking.

His reply came a few minutes later.

It’s worth checking. Bring your notes by the office when you can. Don’t draw conclusions yet.

I smiled despite myself. The message was entirely professional, exactly what I should have expected from the sheriff, and I appreciated that he hadn’t dismissed the research just because I was the one who’d done it. I also appreciated that he’d reminded me not to leap ahead of the evidence. It was a sensible warning, and one I needed to keep in mind.

I finished my coffee and drove home, where I spread my notes across the kitchen table and arranged them in chronological order. The pattern looked more coherent when I could see all the dates at once, although the gaps remained frustrating. I made a list of the questions I wanted Josiah to consider: who had controlled the intermediary company, whether the bank’s foreclosure procedures had been followed, and whether anyone else had been involved in the waterfront acquisitions. I also marked the missing correspondence, since it might explain what had passed between Harvey and Owen before the business closed.

For a moment, I considered trying to track down former employees of the bank or people who’d worked on the redevelopment. That could wait until Josiah had reviewed what I’d found. I wasn’t a licensed investigator, and I didn’t want to complicate his work by approaching potential witnesses without knowing what he already had on file. If I was going to help, I needed to be useful rather than simply busy.

I gathered the papers into a folder and checked the time. There was still plenty of evening left, but the thought of going to the sheriff’s office made me unexpectedly nervous. It wasn’t the prospect of discussing a murder; I could handle that, particularly when there were records to examine and questions to answer. It was the prospect of spending time with Josiah again, of sitting beside him and working through the details while the rest of the town went about its evening.

I knew how easily the ordinary things could get to me: the sound of his voice, the way he listened when I spoke, the steady attention he gave a problem once he’d decided it mattered. Those qualities had always been part of him, even when we’d been younger and far less certain of ourselves. The years apart hadn’t erased what I remembered, but they had changed the man sitting across from me at Dixie’s. I was still figuring out what that meant, and I didn’t want to mistake the comfort of familiar company for a promise neither of us had made.

Besides, this was about Harvey Sinclair. The old property transactions might reveal a reason for the argument with Owen, or they might lead nowhere. Either way, Josiah needed the information, and I was going to give it to him without dressing it up as anything more conclusive than it was.

I slipped the folder into my bag and checked that I had the document numbers, my timeline, and the notes about the stopped watch. Then I paused with my hand on the strap, aware that I was already looking forward to seeing Josiah.

The investigation gave me a perfectly good reason to go to the sheriff’s office. I intended to stick to it, at least until I got there.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

A DANGEROUS PROPOSITION

Max

The sheriff’s office was quieter than I expected when I arrived with my notes tucked into a folder beneath my arm. I’d half expected to find Josiah buried in paperwork, fielding calls, and trying to keep half of Hartwell Cove from demanding answers about Harvey Sinclair’s death. Instead, I found him at his desk, reading something on his computer with a frown that deepened when he looked up and saw me.

“Let me guess,” he said. “You’ve found something else.”

“Good afternoon to you, too.” I set the folder on the corner of his desk. “I brought the property records I mentioned. I’ve marked the relevant dates and included the references for the documents I found at the courthouse. I thought it might save you some time.”

His expression softened as he drew the folder toward him. “Thank you. That will help.”

I settled into the chair opposite his desk while he opened it. For the next several minutes, he worked his way through my notes, occasionally pausing to examine a date or ask where I’d found a particular reference. I answered as best I could, taking care to distinguish what the documents actually established from what I suspected they might mean. By the time he reached the final page, I’d begun to feel cautiously pleased with myself. Whatever else I might have been, I was good at research, and I’d uncovered enough to give the police somewhere productive to start.

Josiah leaned back and rubbed a hand over his jaw. “You’ve done a thorough job. But I want you to understand something. These records establish a connection between the waterfront redevelopment, Chesapeake Shore Community Bank, and the company that handled some of the transactions. They don’t establish that anyone committed a crime, and they certainly don’t tell us who killed Harvey.”

“I know that.”

“Do you?” His gaze held mine. “Because you have a habit of finding one interesting detail and following it until you’re halfway into trouble.”

“I’m a mystery writer. Following interesting details is practically my job description.”

“Writing mysteries and investigating murders aren’t the same thing.”

“I’m aware of that, Sheriff.”

“Max.”

The warning in his voice wiped the smile from my face. He wasn’t speaking as the man who’d once kissed me beneath the old pier, or the boy who’d shared secrets with me before either of us understood how complicated life could become. He was speaking as the sheriff of Hartwell Cove, responsible for an investigation that had already left one man dead. The distinction shouldn’t have mattered to me, but it did. Some stubborn part of me still wanted to be the person who could make him relax, who could draw that familiar smile from him without having to work for it. Instead, I was sitting across his desk while he looked at me as though I were another problem he had to solve.

I folded my hands in my lap and waited.

“I know telling you to stay out of this would probably be a waste of breath,” he said at last. “You’re stubborn enough to make your father proud, and I suspect you’d find a way to keep digging even if I threatened to arrest you for obstructing an investigation.”