A Crime of a Different Stripe Read online

  Books by Sally Goldenbaum

  The Seaside Knitters mysteries:

  Murder Wears Mittens

  How to Knit a Murder

  A Murderous Tangle

  A Crime of a Different Stripe

  The Queen Bees Quilt Shop mysteries:

  A Patchwork of Clues

  A Thread of Darkness

  A Bias for Murder

  A Crime of a Different Stripe

  Sally Goldenbaum

  KENSINGTON BOOKS

  www.kensingtonbooks.com

  All copyrighted material within is Attributor Protected.

  Table of Contents

  Also by

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  A Crime of a Different Stripe Cast

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Acknowledgments

  LITTLE WAVES BABY HAT PATTERN

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events, and incidents either are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  KENSINGTON BOOKS are published by

  Kensington Publishing Corp.

  119 West 40th Street

  New York, NY 10018

  Copyright © 2020 by Sally Goldenbaum

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means without the prior written consent of the Publisher, excepting brief quotes used in reviews.

  Kensington and the K logo Reg. U.S. Pat. & TM Off.

  Library of Congress Card Catalogue Number: 2020939496

  ISBN: 978-1-4967-2937-8

  First Kensington Hardcover Edition: November 2020

  ISBN-13: 978-1-4967-2939-2 (ebook)

  ISBN-10: 1-4967-2939-0 (ebook)

  A Crime of a Different Stripe Cast

  The Seaside Knitters

  Birdie Favazza (Bernadette): Sea Harbor’s wealthy, wise octogenarian

  Cass Halloran (Catherine Mary Theresa): Co-owner of the Halloran Lobster Company; married to Danny Brandley, mystery writer

  Izzy Perry (Isabel Chambers Perry): Former attorney, owner of the Sea Harbor Yarn Studio; married to Sam Perry, award-winning photographer; toddler daughter, Abby

  Nell Endicott: Retired nonprofit director; married to Ben Endicott, retired lawyer and family business owner

  Family, Friends, and Townsfolk

  Abigail Kathleen Perry: Izzy and Sam’s daughter

  Annabelle Palazola: Owner of the Sweet Petunia Restaurant

  Archie and Harriet Brandley: Owners of the Sea Harbor Bookstore; Danny Brandley’s parents

  Beatrice Scaglia: Mayor of Sea Harbor

  Charlotte Simpson: Harrison Grant’s office assistant

  Deb Carpenter: College student and an Art Haven caretaker

  Don Wooten: Owner of the Ocean’s Edge Restaurant

  Eddie Porter: Student and Art Haven caretaker; Detective Tommy Porter’s brother

  Elena Costa: Marco Costa’s twenty-two-year-old bride

  Ella and Harold Sampson: Birdie’s housekeeper and groundskeeper/driver

  Frank Ames: Businessman

  Gus McGlucken: Owner of McGlucken’s Hardware Store

  Harmony Fairchild: Yoga instructor

  Harrison Grant: New York photographer

  Harry and Margaret Garozzo: Owners of Garozzo’s Deli

  Libby: Waitress at Garozzo’s Deli

  Jake Risso: Owner of the Gull Tavern

  Jane and Ham Brewster: Artists and founders of the Canary Cove Art Colony

  Jerry Thompson: Police chief

  Liz Santos: Manager of the Sea Harbor Yacht Club

  Mae Anderson: Manager of the Sea Harbor Yarn Studio

  Marco Costa: Lobsterman; Elena Costa’s husband

  Martina Silva: Rico Silva’s wife

  Mary Halloran: Cass and Pete’s mother

  Mary Pisano: Newspaper columnist; owner of Ravenswood B and B

  Pete Halloran: Cass’s brother; co-owner of the Halloran

  Lobster Company

  Rico Silva: Sea Harbor resident; dog, Frodo

  Tegan Johnson: Town veterinarian

  Tommy Porter: Police detective

  Prologue

  At first, Izzy Perry was puzzled when her husband, Sam, hesitated to invite the well-known photographer Harrison Grant to deliver the debut lectures for Sea Harbor’s fall art series. He was charming, charismatic, and would draw a crowd.

  But the fact was, Sam did invite him, and that invitation would change all their lives, at least for a period of time.

  Murder could do that.

  Chapter 1

  Harrison Grant stood against the deck railing, watching the waves pummel the shore below, a narrow stretch of beach diminishing with each surge of tide. A gigantic moon played along the curve of the waves, nearly dipping into them. Mesmerizing. Otherworldly, he thought.

  Although the ocean spray wasn’t cold tonight, it was needle sharp, uncomfortable enough to finally drive him back inside, where a fire at one end of the Beauport Hotel bar helped dispel the damp. He found an empty chair at the bar and resumed watching the drama playing out beyond the windows.

  He had nearly forgotten the power of the sea.

  Unrelenting. Frighteningly beautiful and unpredictable. Destructive and majestic.

  Like life.

  “A drink, sir?”

  It wasn’t until the bartender asked again, this time leaning slightly toward him, one elbow on the bar and a silky tendril of blond hair falling over her cheek, that her words worked their way into his thoughts. She held a bottle of fine Scotch in one hand, a glass in the other, as if she knew he was that kind of man—the kind who drank fine liquor and was referred to as “sir.”

  He looked up at the young woman, into intent, quizzical eyes.

  She was smiling. And even though the hotel bar was crowded, with hands waving, demanding service, the woman stayed still, waiting.

  Harrison returned the smile. A nod. He held the woman’s face in focus for a minute as she filled his glass. Without conscious thought, he framed her image in his mind’s eye—the long line of her nose, the low light falling over the curve of smooth cheekbones. A small dimple in one cheek. He felt the familiar weight of an invisible Canon EOS resting in his hand. As elemental as his own fingers.

  A sudden mix of feelings swept over him. He took a quick breath.

  “Sir, are you okay?”

  He wrapped his fingers around the glass. “I am fine. As fine as this Scotch, my fair lady. Thank you.” He lifted his glass, as if to make a toast.

  The woman behind the polished bar didn’t move away. She pulled her brows together, her eyes focused on the handsome silver-haired man in front of her. Her head tilted to one side, as if seeking another angle, while absently wiping a damp spot on the bar with a rag. “Have I seen you before?” she finally asked. “I have, haven’t I?”

  “I suppose that’s always a possibility in this small world of ours. But no. I don’t think we’ve met. I’ve never been in this hotel before. It looks new. A beautiful place. Gloucester needed one in this area.”

  “I don’t mean seeing you here. Somewhere else. Bigger. Like a TV show? Late night, Jimmy Kimmel maybe? Or in a movie? Lots of movies have been filmed on Cape Ann. Adam Sandler’s here a lot. Served him myself. Maybe I saw you on a set around town. Are you someone I should know?”

  Harrison chuckled. “No, sorry.” A strand of hair fell across his forehead, and he pushed it back. It happened often enough that Harrison took it in stride. He’d never been in a movie, never doubled for George Clooney or Richard Gere or some British actor in an older film that the young woman might have seen her parents watching. And if she’d been around when he was last in the area, she would have been playing with dolls, and certainly wouldn’t remember people like himself.

  But the fact that the young woman could have seen a photo of him wasn’t lost on Harrison, either. Not likely, he suspected, but possible if she read magazines featuring famous people. He’d photographed plenty of them, and sometimes a sidebar of the photographer was attached to the article. His name mentioned. Or maybe the society pages—Vanity Fair, the NYT, “Page Six.” As his professional reputation had grown, so, too, had his personal notoriety, and with that had come coveted invitations. “H. Grant is right up there with Annie Leibovitz,” a generous critic had once penned.
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  “Somewhere,” the bartender persisted. “I know it.”

  A couple sitting nearby called for beers and martinis, forcing the reluctant bartender away. She glanced back once, seemingly unconvinced that the man at the bar with the strong cleft chin, thick hair, and deep-set eyes wasn’t someone she could tell her friends about when she got off her shift. She caught his eye, and her smile grew mischievous. Flirtatious.

  For a brief moment, Harrison considered his response. Not a consideration, really, but a familiar impulse. Possibly there’d be a phone number on his check. But a deep breath put the night, the journey, back in perspective and the old habits at bay.

  He took a drink of Scotch and looked again toward the ocean. Flames from the outdoor firepit were dramatic against the now-dark sky, a huge autumn moon holding it all together.

  He let himself sink into the scene, the din in the crowded room forming a cocoon around him, blocking out, for that moment at least, the past or the future.

  Finally, one drink later, he stood and stretched, trying to release the kinks in his back. A photographer’s plague. He was tired. Perhaps a walk would help everything. The kinks, the mind, the spirit. He’d come to Cape Ann early, and sitting in a safe, comfortable hotel suite wasn’t the reason. What he needed was thinking time, and not for next week’s lecture series at the small art colony. The lectures could write themselves. But his life couldn’t. He needed to write that himself page by page. Finally. Time to deal with mistakes, with life. With death. All those lofty things.

  Harrison walked over to the windows, nursing the last of his drink, the hours ahead playing out against the night.

  The invitation from Sam Perry had come out of the blue. A gift from the gods. Or the devil, maybe. Who knew? Sometimes he found it hard to differentiate. What he did know was that he had planned to come to Cape Ann, anyway. It was on his list. His last stop. But fate, in the person of this former student, had set things in motion, bringing him to the island a few weeks earlier than planned. Fate sometimes took away the need to make decisions. A relief.

  A lecture series for the Canary Cove Art Colony. In the art association’s new magnificent old house on a cliff. He didn’t deserve it, but he’d accepted the invitation almost immediately.

  Although he and Sam Perry hadn’t kept in touch personally, they would run into each other at events occasionally. He’d see the younger man’s name in the press, an award here, a lecture there. A new photography book.

  He remembered Sam clearly from that long-ago workshop, back when Harrison himself was inflating his worth to anyone who would listen. Teaching workshops at prestigious locations brought him attention and contacts and something else he needed way back then—money to live on. An additional bonus was that now and then he’d have a student like Sam Perry. Harrison recognized the young man’s talent immediately. A fledgling photographer who had that innate gift—the eye, the ability to see things through a camera lens that were invisible to ordinary people. Perry had that talent in spades. Harrison knew it. And used it. And, as he suspected would happen, Perry had done just fine in spite of his instructor’s interference. And somehow, that made whatever he did okay, although the old Harrison Grant wouldn’t have cared either way.

  He looked down at his watch, a despicable habit he couldn’t shake.

  No messages. He shrugged. No one was expecting him for a couple of days. There was no reason to let the lecture organizers know he had arrived in Cape Ann early. Or anyone else. He had no obligations before Friday. It gave him time.

  He put some bills on the bar and anchored them with his glass. He’d be back home soon, wherever that might be. New York for starters, Paris maybe. He liked this new sense of freedom, for however long it lasted. Cleansing the soul had done even more for him than he’d anticipated. A feeling that he could fly.

  Harrison took off his jacket and swung it over one shoulder. He made his way through the bar toward the crowded lobby. It was still early. Maybe he’d take a walk along the water, revisit the beauty of the harbor. See if his memory was triggered by the streets. Think it all through.

  He glanced back at the bar. The bartender looked over the top of a customer’s head and nodded her thanks for the oversized tip he’d left. He nodded back, then turned his thoughts to the rest of his evening. The old address, which certainly would be useless after all these years. He’d given up rights to the place.

  The bar and the hotel lobby melted into one another, a sea of activity. Harrison stood between the two, looking over a maze of faces. At one end of the lobby was another fireplace, where cheery flames cast light and shadows across a wide circle of chatting groups, their faces blending together like in an impressionistic painting. People sat or stood, laughing, greeting, hugging farewell. Harrison stood quietly, enveloped in the lives of others.

  Finally, he looked once more through the bar’s wall of glass, toward the dark night. An unexpected chill ran through him, causing his shoulders to twitch.

  Nerves?

  No. He was known for many things, but nerves weren’t one of them.

  Yet the chill lingered. Harrison Grant was an intuitive man. Perceptive. Important traits for a photographer, he would tell his students. It’s what’s behind the face, the eyes, that your lens needs to capture. It’s what your eye and your camera can see, and what others miss.

  But this night, as a giant moon hovered over the ocean and the town, the photographer chose to ignore the sensation that all wasn’t right. He chose not to look into the crowd. But if he had, the source of the strange slither up his back might have been made clear. His keen eye would surely have spotted the lone figure near the fireplace, would have framed it in his mind’s eye.

  A heart-stopping portrait of a shadowy face. Piercing eyes staring into his imaginary camera lens.

  Staring at Harrison Grant.

  Chapter 2

  The hostess showed Izzy and Cass to the window table in the Franklin Cape Ann, leaving Danny behind, chatting with a friend on the other side of the cozy restaurant.

  Cass sighed, shrugging free of a large, worn military-style jacket.

  “You can double that sigh,” Izzy said. “But the reception’s almost ready.”

  Cass nodded. “But for the record, I’m not much of a party planner. This was it.”

  “I never wanted you helping with this. You know that. The last thing you need to be doing right now is carrying things, moving chairs around, standing on ladders. Jeez, Cass.” The irritation in Izzy’s voice was masking what she really felt. Concern. Cass looked tired and uncomfortable. She seemed to deny the fact that pregnancy could affect one’s life in a multitude of ways. But when Izzy and Nell had offered to plan the lecture series opening reception, there had been no keeping Cass out.

  Cass lifted one hand to stop Izzy’s words. “You’re right. No more ladders. But I’m not an invalid, Iz. And I’m not about to let people make me feel that way.”

  Izzy’s voice softened. “I know.” What she also knew was that Cass was stubborn and refused to let up on anything. Including the stress and work involved in running a lobster business.

  “But, hey, wipe away the concern, Iz. I’m relaxing. I’m even getting into that yoga, which you tell me cures all ills. It’s good.” She looped the heavy jacket across her arm.

  “Harmony Fairchild’s class, right? Yes, she’s great. One of my customers says taking her class is like going to church. Does your little fisherman’s wife like it?”

  “The fisherman is big and bulky. It’s the wife who’s little. Her name, as you well know, is Elena.”

  Before Cass could expand on her yoga partner, Danny Brandley walked over to the table, carrying a basket of warm bread and the restaurant’s lemony hummus.

  “Stole this from the waitress. I told her my pregnant wife might start eating silverware soon if she didn’t have sustenance.”

  He noticed the trace of a frown on Cass’s face and attempted a tease to lessen it, pointing to the jacket she was holding. “Hey, isn’t that mine?” He set the bread on the table and took the jacket from Cass’s hands, then shook it out dramatically in front of Izzy. “Mine, Iz. The woman has taken everything I own. My jacket. My sweats. My pj’s. The last straw was my Wicked Tuna shirt.”