Promise Not To Tell(26)

Louann was in the process of taking some sheets down from a shelf.

“Mind if I ask you a question, Louann?” Cabot said.

“What?” she said.

“Do you remember any of the people who were staying here the night that Hannah Brewster died?” Cabot asked.

Louann frowned. “Why?”

“Just curious,” Cabot said. “It’s what you might call an occupational hazard.”

“Well, I can’t help you because I didn’t meet any of the guests – didn’t even know there were some staying here. You see, I wasn’t on the island at the time. I was attending a weeklong yoga retreat down in Oregon.”

CHAPTER 15

“I don’t understand, Mr. Sutter.” Octavia Ferguson regarded Cabot with an expression of aloof disapproval. “Why in the world do you want to open up the past? No good can come of it. I assume you’re doing this for the money. How much is my granddaughter paying you?”

In Cabot’s experience, the people who were most afraid to open up the past were usually the ones most shackled to it.

Three minutes after being introduced to Octavia Ferguson, he had concluded that Virginia owed her edge and her streak of determination to her grandmother. Octavia was a formidable woman. He was sitting across from her now, and it was easy to imagine her as a stern professor in front of a room full of students. She wouldn’t have had any patience with those who failed to study for an exam or the ones who turned in their papers late.

Toned and fit, she was in her late sixties or early seventies. Her hair was cut fashionably short and tinted a discreet shade of blond. She was dressed in a pair of dark trousers and a blue-and-white-striped sweater. She wore small gold studs in her ears but no wedding ring.

It was early evening and Cabot realized he was hungry. After catching the last of the two ferries required to get back to the mainland, he and Virginia had driven straight down the interstate to Seattle. Octavia Ferguson’s Victorian house on Queen Anne Hill had been their first stop.

Octavia had clearly been pleased to see Virginia, and she had initially regarded Cabot with a welcoming air. He got the impression that she had been both surprised and possibly even a little relieved to see Virginia in the company of a man. Evidently, Virginia was not in the habit of bringing men by to introduce them to her grandmother. He was pretty sure that Octavia would frown upon the serial dating thing.

The welcome hadn’t lasted long. Octavia’s barely veiled curiosity about him had been transformed first into shock and then deep wariness when she had learned that he was a private investigator.

Virginia spoke from a window that overlooked a magnificent garden. “Octavia, please, just listen to what we have to say before you jump to conclusions.”

Watching the two strong-willed women deal with each other was both fascinating and a little scary, Cabot thought.

“From everything you’ve told me, Hannah Brewster had serious mental health issues,” Octavia said. “The authorities made it clear that she took her own life. Why would you waste time and money looking into her death?”

“I think there is at least a reasonable chance that Hannah was murdered,” Virginia said, “or perhaps driven to take her own life. As far as I’m concerned, it amounts to the same thing.”

“That seems highly unlikely,” Octavia said. “But even if it’s true, it’s a matter for law enforcement. You have no business being involved in a private investigation.”

She shot Cabot another disapproving look. He kept his mouth shut. A smart man did not step between two quarreling lionesses.

Virginia turned away from the view of the gardens and faced her grandmother.

“This is my business,” she said. “And it’s Cabot’s business as well. Here’s the bottom line: if Hannah was murdered, then there is a very real possibility that her death is connected to what happened at Quinton Zane’s California compound. Our biggest concern is that Zane himself may still be alive.”

Octavia flinched as if she had been jolted by an electrical charge. Pain, rage and horror flashed across her face. An instant later the emotions vanished behind a mask of cool control.

“That’s impossible,” she said. “It’s been twenty-two years since that monster murdered your mother and so many others. How could anything that happened so long ago affect the present?”

“We don’t know,” Virginia admitted. “But Cabot has a theory.”

Reluctantly, Cabot decided it was time to speak up.

“I agree that it’s possible Hannah Brewster was a victim of her mental health issues,” he said. “But I think that, under the circumstances, the situation needs to be checked out.”

Octavia eyed him, making no secret of her opinion. She blamed him for encouraging Virginia to stir up the past.

“The authorities assured me that Quinton Zane was dead,” Octavia said. “I was told that he attempted to escape the country on a private yacht that he stole. There was a fire on board. They found the wreckage.”

“They found the wreckage of the burned-out yacht but they never found Zane’s body,” Cabot said.

Octavia clasped her hands very tightly together. “They told me that wasn’t uncommon in disasters at sea.”

Virginia looked at her. “I think Hannah Brewster was convinced that she saw Zane shortly before she died.”