“Oh, my God! You are such a liar. You suspected him, too!”
“No. I never did. All right, that’s a lie. I don’t want to believe that David could have been guilty. I mean, I don’t think he could have been guilty. But the thing is, no matter how mature a man he might have been trying to be, Tanya did hurt him. I understand that people think that she might have found him that night, that he might have been angry. I don’t believe it, it’s just…she is dead. David was a big strong kid from the time he was ten. But he was always-sane. Craig taught him to be respectful at all times. He didn’t have a maniacal or crazy temper. So, I really believe he was innocent. Except, inside me somewhere, I suppose, I couldn’t help but let some of the theories and rumors get to me.”
“But now-you don’t believe it was David? Or you don’t want to believe it was David?”
Sean was quiet a moment. “Yes.”
“To which?”
“To both.”
“Okay, I’m saying that it wasn’t David. Then who?”
“I don’t know, Katie.”
“The police questioned you. I read it in a book.”
“They questioned everyone. I had been hanging at Uncle Jamie’s place that night-O’Hara’s. I saw Tanya there. I told them the truth.”
“Do you remember who left the bar?” Katie asked.
“If I do, kid, I’m not telling you.”
“What?”
“Stay out of it, do you hear me?”
“Love you, big bro. Losing the connection,” Katie said. “See you when you get here.”
She cut off the conversation before her brother could give her more instructions.
She looked back to her paper. Her brother’s name was the last thing she had written down. She scratched through his name. Sean certainly never hurt anyone. And neither did her uncle. She scratched through his name, as well. She looked at the list, shaking her head. It couldn’t have been Liam, or Pete Dryer, or…
Lord! No wonder the police had never discovered the truth. No matter what they thought, the murderer had to have been a passerby in the Keys. Had to have been!
She heard a soft sound at the door and looked up. Bartholomew was back; he hadn’t opened and closed the door, but he did make a strange noise as he came through it.
“Where have you been?” she asked him.
“Eavesdropping,” he said.
“On who?”
He pulled out his pocket watch, which couldn’t possibly work, but it seemed to, at least for Bartholomew. “You’d better get going. You’re going to be late for work. Not to mention that your uncle owns the place and you should be keeping an eye on it.”
She frowned and jumped up, realizing the time. She swore softly, gathered her purse and her keys and headed out. She closed the door; Bartholomew stepped through.
“Where were you eavesdropping?” she demanded.
“The police station,” Bartholomew informed her.
“Oh?”
“Maybe I shouldn’t tell you,” Bartholomew said slowly.
“You wretched pirate-”
“Privateer!”
“I’m going to call for an exorcist and send you downward with your scalawag friends!” she threatened.
He laughed, but then saw her eyes. “All right, all right. I was at the police station, and the officers have been warned to keep an eye on David Beckett,” he told her. “See, I shouldn’t have said anything. They weren’t sure what had happened because there was no evidence. There’s some discussion about the fact that David is still obsessed with Tanya and her murder. Evidence! Like that mattered in my day. They just hanged us right and left, right and left!”
She paused, looking at him. “So you were hanged? You never told me that you were hanged!”
In his astral form, he puffed up, shoulders back, head high. “I was a victim of false arrest, Miss O’Hara. And my end was untimely and unjust!” He appeared to let out his breath. “But that doesn’t matter now, Katie. What does matter is that you seem to be getting chummy with a murderer.”
She shook her head, thinking she might be crazy. “He’s not a murderer, Bartholomew. He’s not.”
“How do you know?”
“I just know. I just-know.”
“You must keep your distance,” Bartholomew said.
“Don’t worry-my brother’s on his way here. And, supposedly, Liam Beckett has the files now and they’re working the murder as a cold case.”
“I don’t like it, not one bit,” Bartholomew said.
“Well, I’m sorry. And please hush up and mind yourself. My uncle may own O’Hara’s, but I’d just as soon his customers don’t all insist to him that I’m crazy and talk to myself!”