Cloudy with a Chance of Ghosts (Destiny Bay Cozy Mysteries Book 4)

  This novel is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locales, or organizations is entirely coincidental. All rights are reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission from the author.

  Copyright © 2015 Helen Conrad

  Cover Copyright © 2015 DoorKnock Publishing

  Cover images from Shutterstock.com

  First Edition June, 2015

  Cloudy With a Chance of Ghosts

  A Destiny Bay Cozy Mystery

  By J.D. Winters

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Epilogue

  My Mailing List!

  Recipe for Hawaiian Chicken Salad

  Also in the Cozy Mystery Series

  Also in the Destiny Bay series

  ABOUT AUTHOR

  Chapter One

  I’d always heard that Carlton Hart was considered one of the good guys—a patron of the arts, a keeper of the flame. A man sure to drop a nice bit of change into a beggar’s cup. Someone who cared.

  So they said. The fact that he also looked a lot like George Clooney with a gorgeous head of carefully coiffed silver-grey hair helped a lot.

  Lots of money—check.

  Swoon-worthy—check.

  Ready to back up his philanthropic words with cold, hard cash-- check.

  But he did go on and on at times.

  “No, no, no, my friends. It’s so easy. Here’s the key to analysis of great modern art.”

  I wasn’t sure if I would have called most of the art we were here in Carlton Hart’s ocean-view mansion—also known as “the Carlton Castle”-- to look at “great”, but I suppose it was modern. At least, that’s what the program I had in my hand claimed.

  “Art Show featuring stunning modern coastal talent and a delicious high tea.”

  My smile felt plastered on as I waited for Mr. Hart to deliver the punch line he was so obviously leading up to.

  “If it’s hanging on a wall,” he said, nodding toward the large landscape to his left, “it’s a painting. If you can walk around it…” He made a gesture toward the contorted blob of concrete that looked like a VW bug that had lost its way, sitting in the middle of the floor, “it’s a sculpture.”

  Everyone in our little group laughed the way you do when someone very rich is making jokes and you want him to like you. I looked at my friend Jill, going for the secret spark that usually worked between us, but she was gazing up into her date’s handsome face and I didn’t get the answering smirk I expected.

  That set me back on my heels. Jill and I had been best friends since the day I walked into our college dorm room in Santa Barbara and she was waiting to meet me and greet me with celebratory hot fudge sundaes in take-out cartons from McConnell’s. Never mind that the ice cream was melted from waiting too long. It was the thought that counted—and the fudge still had its shape. Mmmm, I can remember how good it tasted. I knew from the first that we were destined to be soul mates.

  But falling in love with inappropriate males back in those days had been my forte. Jill was always able to stand back and be objective about the little quirks of the men she dated. I’d never seen her smitten before. But that was what she seemed to be now. Definitely smitten.

  That set my teeth on edge—just a little bit. The guy she was with was as hunky as they come, with his dark curly hair and his perpetual five-o’clock shadow--but there was a wandering gleam in his hungry dark eyes that gave me pause.

  Careful, Jill, I wanted to tell her. But something told me this wasn’t the time.

  Meanwhile, the rich guy seemed to have taken a shine to me. I have to admit, I was looking pretty good. I’d managed to lose five pounds the week before and was finally able to get into my silky sea-blue jump suit that fit with snug perfection. He took two steps in my direction and practically shoved a middle-aged woman with a name tag identifying her as “Celinda Moore, Artist” out of the way to get beside me.

  “Miss Keahi,” he began, his exquisitely whitened teeth gleaming against his expensively tanned skin.

  “Call me Mele,” I said, smiling back. Well, I wasn’t going to give him the cold shoulder. Didn’t I mention he was rich?

  “Mele.” He managed to tuck my hand into the crook of his arm before I realized what he was doing. “Come with me, my dear. I’d like to show you…”

  “If it’s etchings, turn him down, honey.” Celinda cackled at her own joke and took another swig at her glass. From the sound of her husky voice, she’d already had a few refills of something other than tea.

  I glanced back at her. Middle aged, medium sized, medium brown hair, she looked like she could be running a ladies’ book club and seemed to have a sardonic view of the present company, but I didn’t have time to speculate further--Carlton Hart was pulling me along.

  “Isn’t she the one who does those huge paintings with all the vibrant colors?” I asked him, suddenly remembering that I’d seen a few of them displayed in the hallway.

  “You know how she does it, don’t you?” He gave me a sideways grin that was meant to make me feel like I could easily become one of the gang of local artists if I only had something to show. “She slathers paint on her naked body parts, then rolls around on the canvas.”

  I wanted to say, “Ugh!” but I knew that would brand me as an art hater. I wasn’t sure if he was laughing at Celinda or telling me I could do the same thing if I only had a little gumption. So I just said, a bit weakly, “And people pay good money for what she comes up with?”

  “Oh yes. She’s one of the top earners in our little group.”

  “No kidding.”

  This was a whole new world to me. I’d always wished I had a gift for art. I even took a few drawing classes. But nothing remotely resembling talent ever surfaced, and I went on to other things. Still, when Jill asked me if I wanted to come to this art show I jumped at the chance. I told myself it was in order to check out how these things were run in case we wanted to put on a show of our own in our little beach town of North Destiny Bay, where I was Activities Director, but I knew the truth.

  I was after the romance of it all. I liked to think that—if I could just draw, I would be right at home slaving away in a little garret off a quaint Parisian street, sacrificing everything for my art. Dying of consumption because …

  No wait, that was Mimi in La Boheme, wasn’t it? And she wasn’t exactly an artist. But you get what I mean. The things that dreams are made of.

  The truth was, Jill had fallen for a painter, and she was, as I’d said, smitten. Gob smacked. Loopily-in-love.

  Some of his work was included in this show and I had to admit, it was pretty good—sort of dark and brooding, with elongated figures that reminded me a bit of Modigliani. And that name he called himself--cleverly chosen for stardom, should it venture his way: Jagger. Just the one name--like Pele or Madonna or Cher. Or Bozo.

  Here is where I would roll my eyes, except that I hate it when people do that.

  At any rate, Carlton Hart, being a big patron of the arts, had gathered a group of artists around him, called, appropr
iately, The Carlton Group. This weekend he’d volunteered his beautiful, cliff-side home for the group’s art show and it was worth enduring the choking air of pretension just to get a tour of the place.

  We turned into a room that had probably once been a dining area, but was now turned into a virtual museum of its own with display walls set up everywhere. I wanted to wander and enjoy the art, but Carlton seemed to have developed a need to clutch my elbow in order to keep track of me. I began to wish I’d worn one of those skimpy little cardigans so that I could slip out of it and leave him standing there with nothing but my empty sweater in his hands.

  He did know everyone and he introduced me to a few of the most memorable—such as a slinky Asian lady known as Quill who did exquisite ink drawings of children looking winsome, and bluff, gone-to-seed-looking George Marker whose paintings of trash cans in various states of overflow were winning awards.

  “Not many sales, though,” Jill confided softly as we stared at them, somewhat appalled. “Jagger says he’s a hit with critics, but the public just says ‘no’.”

  “Oh,” I said. “Poor guy. How does he make a living?”

  “Good question. I guess that’s why Carlton lets him live in the casita down by the entryway.”

  “Oh. Nice of him.”

  “Um hmm.”

  I sighed to myself. Here I wanted to look askance at Carlton, and then I found out he gave generously to the arts, donating his time and money, setting up awards for excellence and helping people down on their luck. So I decided I was going to have to like him after all. At least a little bit.

  Next there was a sweet little blue-haired lady who called herself Shady Tree. Her specialty was huge canvases of cows reading books, some grazing in meadows, others lounging on lawn chairs. Sort of like a Fine Arts version of a Far Side cartoon. Very odd, but popular, or so Carlton told me.

  He took my hand and led me out onto the terrace which had been set up for high tea with tables and chairs strewn about in artistic abandon. But we walked right past them and went to the heavy stone wall with a railing along the edge.

  “Look at this view,” he said, putting his arm around my shoulders. “To die for, no?”

  “It’s stunning,” I agreed, carefully pulling away from his arm and leaning out so that I could pretend I hadn’t just blatantly rejected his latest effort at familiarity. I hardly knew the man!

  But he was right about the view. It was a gorgeous day. The sky was blue and the ocean was almost turquoise. Sailboats skimmed along below, and the beach was golden.

  “We’ll have to go sailing, you and I,” he said.

  “Will we?” I doubted that it was going to become a real priority in my life, but you never did know. Looking down, I could see an orchard planted on a leveled area below, and lots of small, flowering bushes planted closer to the terrace. Wandering paths wound attractively through the area. Here and there, a colorful ceramic yard piece was tucked in between plants. It looked like a fun place to explore.

  And then my eyes zeroed in on a little Siamese cat face peering up at me from under a rockrose covered with white blooms. I smiled. The little cat switched its tail, then turned and slinked away, going for low and under the radar beneath the plant life.

  I straightened and turned around, hoping to make a clean break for it myself and go back to looking at the art works, but before I could get my excuses lined up, our attention was grabbed by an argument further down on a walkway below and we both bent over the rail to see what was going on.

  There were two women on the path—a tall, pretty, redheaded girl about my age, wearing a mint green shirt dress, and an older, shorter dark-haired woman in glasses and a classic pants suit, looking very professional and serious. There was definitely a disagreement between them but we couldn’t understand the words from where we stood. The ocean breezes were too stiff for that. So it surprised me when Carlton called down to them.

  “Debbie, baby, what’s going on?”

  The red head looked up and said, “Oh!”

  The serious one looked up too, tucked her purse under her arm and headed out, wings on her feet.

  “Debbie?”

  “Sorry, Daddy. I’ll be right up.”

  Carlton turned to me. “My daughter Debbie,” he said. “She’s been staying with me for a week or so. I’m trying to get her to go back to Seattle where she belongs.”

  “Belongs?” I repeated, thinking it an odd way to say it.

  “Yes. She’s going to college up there and she needs to get back and get on with her life. For some reason, she seems to think I need protecting or something.” He laughed. “Don’t get me wrong, I love her. But she doesn’t belong here. She sort of cramps my style.” His grin was somewhat lascivious. “If you get what I mean.”

  “Oh, I get it alright.” I gave him a phony little finger wave and turned on my heel and left him there.

  I’d given up on trying to spare the man’s feelings. He was old enough to be my father, for Pete’s sake. Okay, so he was rich, but money wasn’t everything. Mansions and yachts and dinners at five star restaurants…. Well, it did seem to be a shame to give up on all that before it had even begun, but like I said—money isn’t everything.

  I got half way across the terrace before I got stopped by a rather callow-looking young man with a gleam in his eye.

  “Hey,” he said, making it obvious he liked me in my jump suit, too.

  I stopped and waited for the rest, but there didn’t seem to be any.

  “Hey what?” I asked, feeling prickly.

  He shrugged and looked a little too friendly, as though he knew me well and was ready to tease about it. To tell you the truth, I was getting a little tired of this informal presumption from artist and rich guy alike. And then he spoke.

  “Uh…, are you Carlton Hart’s current girl friend?”

  “No,” I said sharply. “Are you?”

  He looked startled, then laughed. “No, that’s nuts.”

  “Is it?” I started to go, but he touched my arm.

  “Wait. I’ve got a million questions.”

  I frowned. Something in his attitude was sure rubbing me the wrong way. “What about?”

  “Uh…where do you know the guy from? Any interesting insights into his business dealings? I mean, what do you know about him, really?”

  My gaze zeroed in on the notebook in his shirt pocket. It certainly wasn’t an artist’s sketchbook at all.

  “What’s your name?” I asked.

  “Vince. Vince Bianchi.”

  “Let me guess,” I said. “You’re some sort of cub reporter. Right? A Jimmy Olsen for the modern world. Out to fight injustice and bring the rich to their knees. Am I warm?”

  He was beginning to realize he might not like me so much after all. A frown was crossing his face. “No. I mean, not quite.”

  I caught myself and sighed, knowing I ought to back off a little. He was just a young guy, trying to make his way in the world. I don’t know why his first silly question had annoyed me so much.

  But I did know his type. In fact, I’d dated a slightly older version of him about two years before and I knew what the burning zeal of a journalistic reformer looked like.

  “But you are a reporter, aren’t you?”

  “Sure.”

  I shook my head with a half laugh. “You don’t look old enough to get hired at a newspaper. Is it something online?”

  He tried to stand a little taller. “No. I’m plenty old enough. And it’s not online. I work for the Daily Delivery.”

  “Sure. And I’ll bet you were very recently on the staff of the UCSB student newspaper. Am I right?”

  “So what’s wrong with that?”

  I shook my head. He couldn’t be more than nineteen. “Have you graduated?”

  He puffed his chest out, or at least he tried to. “No. I’m taking some time off. I think actual experience is better than academic credit anyway.”

  “Uh huh. So you failed chemistry. Right?”


  He turned a little red.

  “Oh, don’t worry. I almost did that too. I understand. Only—a bit of advice. Don’t try to get me to give you the inside scoop on my host’s activities. My ties to him are so much stronger than any responsibility I could feel toward you.”

  It was only the truth and he’d do better if he faced it. But I winced at the tone I’d taken and smiled at him, hoping to soften it that way. “Come on, Vince Bianchi. Just enjoy the art show. And describe to people what beautiful paintings you saw and who won what award. That’s what they really want to hear about.”

  “But that’s….boring,” he said, looking lost.

  I sighed. He was probably a good kid. He just needed to grow up a little. I gave him my newly acquired signature wave and headed back inside where I found Jill wandering through the Impressionists.

  “Where’s the new man in your life?” I asked her.

  “Jagger?” She grinned at me. “He had to go see about some of his paintings. Isn’t he a dream come true?”

  “Maybe.” I wrinkled my nose. “Isn’t he a little nervous that Mick might show up and ask for his name back?”

  She stared at me blankly for a moment, then got the joke and made a raucous sound of derision for my sense of humor. “Ha ha. Very funny. Don’t you think he’s gorgeous?”

  I nodded. “Yes. There’s no denying that.” I hesitated. Did I really want to do this now? “But doesn’t that make you uneasy? I mean—a lot of female types are going to be chasing him every moment of the day. Don’t you think?”

  “Who cares?” said my adorable ex-roomie who cared about everything, always. She was radiant. “Mele, I really think I’m in love.”

  “Oh.”

  Okay. I could hear the emotion in her voice and I knew what this meant. No more criticism of Jagger. No more anything. She’d gone beyond the stage where she might make a rational decision, where she could weigh the pros and cons. She really was on the edge of love. It was over.

  “That’s wonderful.” I told her with all the candor I could pretend to possess. “You’re a lucky girl.”