The Inn at Holiday Bay: Clue in the Clam

that Oliver had been wrapped up in the proposed development wasn’t surprising. If there was a hot new investment to be made, he had been the sort to want to make it. The fact that he’d taken things one step further and actually run for town council in an attempt to defeat Dennis Painter and take over his seat really wasn’t surprising either. A little research revealed that Dennis seemed to have planned to vote no on the project, so along with Evelyn Child and Sonya Greenly, they should have been able to send Blaine Holleran and his planned development packing. If Oliver had invested not only his money but the money of his clients as well, it made sense that he would have wanted to do whatever was necessary to push the project through. Of course, in my opinion, if Oliver had chosen to vote on the project rather than abstaining, it would have been a huge conflict of interest. I supposed Oliver just figured he’d find a way to steal the election and then worry about the conflict later.

When we arrived at the estate, Colt knocked on the door, and I stood quietly to his left as we waited for the maid to answer. She was a tall woman with dark hair and a friendly smile.

“Police Chief Wilder. Please come in.” She stepped aside.

“Thank you, Collette. This is Abby Sullivan. She’s going to walk through with me if that’s okay.”

“If you want her with you, that’s fine with me. Has there been any news? I keep hoping I’ll hear that they found the terrible person who did this.”

“We don’t have a suspect yet, but we’re working on it. The reason we wanted to take a second look around was to see if something might pop now that we have additional information.”

“Well, look as long as you need to. I’ll be in the kitchen, so if you need something, just holler.”

“Thank you,” Colt said. “I think we’ll start in the home office and then take a quick look around the master bedroom. We shouldn’t be too long.”

Colt had obviously been to the house before since he knew right where to go to find the office.

“Do you have any idea what we’re looking for?” I asked.

“I’m not sure. I just hope that if there is something to find, it will jump out at us. Unfortunately, the computer is password protected, and the file cabinet is locked. The guys from the county took the computer but decided not to break into the file cabinet.”

I wandered over to the desk. “It looks like Oliver had an old fashion desk calendar.” I flipped through the pages. “I didn’t know they even made these any longer. It seems that everyone I know uses the calendar on their cell phone.”

“There are those who feel they remember things better if they write them down.”

“It looks like the page corresponding to the date Oliver’s body was found has been left blank, but if you thumb back through a week, there’s a notation in the margin of that date that says SF-6/22. June twenty-second was Tuesday. Tuesday was the day we found Oliver’s body on the island.”

Colt narrowed his gaze. “I do remember that Oliver was heading out to meet with someone when he was last seen. I suppose the person he was meeting was SF.”

“Might SF be Stan Fairfield?”

“I guess it could be, but if Oliver was heading out to meet with Stan Fairfield and we assume the person he was meeting with is the person who killed him, then who killed Stan? It seems unlikely SF stands for Stan Fairfield. Of course, without more information, we’ll never be able to figure it out.”

Colt headed toward the closet. He opened it and began sifting through the items contained within. The desk drawers simply held supplies such as pens and notepads as well as file folders and paperclips. The file cabinets were still locked up tight. I supposed someone might need to take the initiative to break into them at some point. Doing so might require a warrant, but I wasn’t sure of that in this situation.

“Check this out,” I said after I’d moved from the desk to an unlocked cabinet on the far wall where I’d found blueprints for the proposed resort. The thing really was a monstrosity. Much too large for our isolated stretch of coastline. I had to wonder where the developer thought he was going to find enough employees to fill all the positions he was likely to have. I also wondered how the seven restaurants planned for the property would affect the local eateries, and for the first time, I stopped to wonder how the two hundred rooms and cottages would affect my business.

“Halifax must have been part of the inner circle to have these plans before anyone else,” Colt said, studying the large sheet of paper I’d unrolled after taking it from the cabinet. “I know there’s a link between the three victims and Evagrius Industries, and given the nature of the crime scenes, that seems to be a good clue, but in the end, I sort of feel like it’s going to come back to the resort, which, if you remember, is exactly where we started.”

“I agree. If the men were being blackmailed, it seems they were paying up since money is flowing from their accounts into Evagrius Industries’ account. I don’t see why anyone would have reason to kill them. It seems more likely that the three of them would have gotten together and killed whoever was behind the blackmails.”

“Unless that isn’t what’s going on at all,” Colt pointed out. “The blackmail theory is a good one given the entire situation, but the men might have been sending money to Evagrius Industries for another reason. Maybe they were investors. Or perhaps they were paying for a service of some