Her Ocean Grave

by Dana Perry

Genres: Small Town & Rural; Mystery; Police Procedurals; Female Sleuths; Noir; Thrillers; Crime Fiction; Suspense

Synopsis

Over the cliff edge, she sees a broken body on the jutting rocks below, the waves crashing all around. She can’t see the girl’s face, which is covered by her long, brown hair. But she knows her. She met her just yesterday… When Samantha Claymore doesn’t return home after an afternoon bicycle ride on Martha’s Vineyard, Detective Abby Pearce acts immediately. She knows from experience how quickly a lost girl can become a tragedy. Back on the island for the first time since she ran away as a teenager, Abby hopes solving Samantha’s case will make up for her past mistakes… But, as the media swarm and Samantha’s grieving mother joins the search, the police find no trace of the beloved sixteen-year-old—even when a reward is offered for her return. Trawling through old case files, Abby discovers that Samantha is not the only girl to have gone missing in the small community of Martha’s Vineyard. She’s convinced more could follow, but her team insists there’s no link to be found. Until Samantha’s best friend is found dead at the bottom of a cliff the next day … After searching Samantha’s bedroom and trawling through the files on her computer, Abby digs into the death of Samantha’s father five years ago at sea, following the trail to one of the island’s most powerful families. The same people who failed to protect Abby the night she was forced to leave as a young girl. Is there anyone left on this quiet island who Abby can trust? Can she find Samantha before more innocent lives are taken? An absolutely unputdownable and nail-biting crime thriller that will have you racing through the pages. Perfect for fans of Lisa Regan, Kendra Elliot and Gregg Olsen. What readers are saying about Her Ocean Grave : “I really loved it and had to finish it in one day! ” Goodreads reviewer, ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

“ This book I couldn’t put down! I loved Abby’s character. She is fierce and unstoppable!” Goodreads reviewer, ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

“A fast-paced and engrossing read.” Goodreads reviewer “I couldn’t put it down.” Goodreads reviewer “A great start to a new mystery series.” Goodreads reviewer What readers are saying about Dana Perry: “ WOW, WOW, WOW. I absolutely loved this book. It completely blew my mind and I have not been able to stop thinking about it since I finished reading it! I devoured this in one sitting… Magnificent.” Once Upon a Time Book Blog, ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

“ Loved, loved this book. It totally blew my mind. From beginning to end it was a thrill ride. So chilling and tense… Outstanding ! ” Goodreads reviewer, ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

“ Addicted to this book… As soon as I started to read, I just knew that I wouldn’t be able to put the book down… One hell of a rollercoaster ride.” Ginger Book Geek, ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

“ Brilliant… gripping and addictive, it will pull you in from the first page… A must-read.” Goodreads reviewer, ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

‘ Kept me up well past my bedtime, I could not put it down.” Goodreads reviewer “ So many thrilling twists and turns… Just could not put it down… highly recommend.” Goodreads reviewer, ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

“ Phenomenal… I did not want to put it down. I was blown away by this book... brilliant.” Goodreads reviewer, ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

Release date: June 2, 2021

Publisher: Bookouture

Print pages: 350

Sample

The first time I ever went to work in a police station was at the 13th Precinct in New York City.

The 13th Precinct is located on East 21st Street in the heart of Manhattan, right by the Police Academy where I had just graduated as a new recruit. Dressed in my blue police uniform with my name badge on my chest and my recently issued Sig Sauer P226 weapon on my hip, I felt a sense of excitement like I’d never experienced before.

Abby Pearce.

NYPD.

This was where I wanted to be. This was where I belonged.

Things are different now.

And the police station where I work these days is different too.

“The boss is looking for you, Abby,” Meg Jarvis said to me now as I walked into the Cedar Cliffs, Mass. police station on Martha’s Vineyard on a hot August day at the height of the tourist season.

“Chief Wilhelm?”

“He’s the only boss we have. Said I should tell you to come see him right away. He said he had a case he wanted you to work on. Oh, and he also said to tell you that you were late.”

I sighed.

“I had a long night.”

“Big date?”

“Just me and Oscar.”

“Oscar?”

“My dog.”

Meg smiled. She was somewhere in her 60s, and she’d served as the department’s administrative clerk for most of her life. She’d been through more than a half dozen police chiefs during that time, and she was still here. Everyone said Meg Jarvis was the person who kept the department running. It was important to stay on her good side. So far, I had done that. She seemed to like me.

“A pretty young woman like you should be spending her nights with a man, not a dog.”

“I’m not that young. I just turned thirty-three.”

“That’s still plenty of time for you to settle down and get married.”

“I’ve already done that, remember?”

“Right. To the state trooper back in New York. Well, maybe it’s time for you to find someone new. Someone nice.”

“Oh, it’s time all right. But it’s tough to meet nice guys. Especially in a small town like this and on an island. I suppose I could go into Boston and meet some guy at a singles bar, or hook up with someone on Tinder or through one of those other dating services. But I’m not really into that.”

“Oh, no, Abby – that could be dangerous,” Meg said. “You never know who you’re meeting that way. Those are men just looking for someone to bed down for the night. Or worse. Of course, you’re probably safer than most women. I mean no one’s going to get too out of line with a policewoman who has a gun.”

“I guess not,” I said. “Of course, I generally don’t shoot mashers with it on the first date.”

The Cedar Cliffs Police Department where I’m a detective now – actually I’m the only detective – is housed in a small building across from the ferry docks where thousands of vacationers descend on the island of Martha’s Vineyard every day during the summer.

On the other side is a famous carousel for children to ride. The rest of the area is filled with beach stores, ice cream parlors and outdoor cafes. The Cedar Cliffs Marina where all the fancy boats are anchored – some of them so big they could be called yachts – is right across the street.

I’d grown up on Martha’s Vineyard, and now I was back, after ten years working on the New York City police force – first as a patrol officer on the street and then as a homicide detective. Going from being a cop with the NYPD to working here on the tiny Cedar Cliffs force was… well, a helluva adjustment to make.

Most of the police work done on this island has traditionally consisted of lost dogs, stolen mopeds, traffic problems, and maybe a rowdy beach party or two when the drinking and the drugs get out of hand.

In fact, there have only been two major crimes as far as I know in the history of Martha’s Vineyard.

One was the famous Chappaquiddick drowning death of Mary Jo Kopechne in a car with Senator Ted Kennedy during the summer of 1969, which derailed his presidential aspirations.

The other was that of a seventy-two-year-old woman named Clara Smith who was mysteriously found beaten and strangled to death in her bed back in 1940. The murder was never solved, and I didn’t figure there was much chance of me or anyone else solving it eighty years later.

Police Chief Barry Wilhelm was in his 50s, stocky, with close-cropped grey hair, dressed in his crisp blue uniform. He looked like a cop. Or at least what a lot of people thought a cop was supposed to look like. I think he really worked on that look. Probably posed in front of a mirror every morning before he came to work. Getting that tough police chief look just right.

Only problem is he was here running a tiny police force on an idyllic island where crime hardly ever happened. I’d heard that Wilhelm once hoped to move up to a big city police force, but instead he was still here as a small-town cop. Maybe that’s why he didn’t like me very much. I’d been a big city cop once.

“So what’s going on today?” I asked him when I sat down in front of his desk. “What’s the case you want me to check out?”

He picked up a picture from his desk and handed it to me. It was a young girl in her teens. Pretty, with long blonde hair and smiling for the camera.

“That’s Samantha Claymore, Valerie Claymore’s daughter. Sixteen years old. She didn’t come home last night.”

“Valerie Claymore, the cosmetics queen?”

“Right. The Claymores have been staying here for the summer. Samantha went out for a bike ride yesterday, headed for Edgartown. They haven’t heard from her since. She was supposed to be back for some barbecue last night, but she didn’t show.”

‘Maybe she found something better to do than be with her family. There’s a lot of stuff for a teenage girl to do between here and Edgartown. Beach parties, bars… it’s probably something like that. A kid just having some fun.”

“That’s what I tried to tell Mrs. Claymore. But she is still worried. And she’ll continue to be until the girl comes home again.”

“You don’t figure this is anything serious?”

“No. That’s why I want you to go out and talk to Mrs. Claymore. Tell her we’re taking all the necessary steps to look for her daughter, but mostly convince her not to worry.”

“Sure, Chief. I’ll head out there now.”

Wilhelm fiddled nervously with some paperwork on his desk. I could tell he had something else he wanted to say.

“How is everything in your life these days, Pearce?” he finally asked me.

“Such as?”

“Well, that problem…”

I sighed.

“If you want to know about my drinking, I’m fine. I haven’t had a drink since my trouble that night in East Chop.”

“And that’s the truth?”

“It’s the truth.”

“How can I be sure about that?”

“I understand, Chief. And you’re right. Because even if I was drinking again, I’d probably lie to you about it. So, I can see why you might be concerned.”

“But you’re not drinking?”

“No, I’m not drinking.”

The house where Samantha Claymore’s mother was staying on Martha’s Vineyard turned out to be a little bigger than my apartment in New York City. Not just my apartment, but the entire building. It had more bedrooms than I could count; a living room the size of a football field; a spacious workout room with gym equipment; an outside swimming pool; and private decks wrapped around the whole house with ocean views of Nantucket Sound from the front and Sengekontacket Pond from the back.

The place was about a five-minute drive south of the center of Cedar Cliffs, not far from Beach Road, which ran all the way down to Edgartown on the south side of the island. There was a bike path along the entire six-mile route, which was probably the way Samantha had pedaled her bike away from the house the previous day.

I stood there now, watching other bikers and cars and Jeeps passing by, hoping Samantha might possibly be one of them and that she’d soon show up at the house with an explanation of where she’d been. But she didn’t do that, of course. So, I went up to the house and rang the bell.

“Are you the detective?” Valerie Claymore asked when she opened the door.

“Yes, I’m Detective Abby Pearce.”

“You don’t look like a detective.”

People have always said that about me. I have long black hair, which I usually wear in a ponytail or a bun held in place by a plastic hair clip. I’m pretty much average size – 5 foot 5, 105 pounds or so. I know men find me attractive because a lot of them have told me so. Which is all good. It’s just that when people meet me for the first time – especially since I don’t wear a uniform – they sometimes figure me for a businesswoman or a real estate broker, maybe even a media person or soccer mom. Not a cop. Which I’ve sometimes been able to use to my advantage by catching people off guard. But that wasn’t the situation here.

I took out my badge and showed it to Valerie Claymore. It wasn’t as impressive as the NYPD shield that I used to carry, but it did the job. She nodded and motioned for me to come inside the house.

“I hope you can help me find my daughter, Detective Pearce,” she said as I followed her down a long hall.

“That’s what I’m here for, Mrs. Claymore.”

Valerie Claymore had to be at least fifty, according to the math I had done on her before coming here. But she looked more like someone my age. Perfectly coiffured blonde hair, flawless facial features, dressed in a fashionable, expensive-looking sundress and sandals – and a body so tight it must have been the result of daily workouts in the gym and pool.

I guess when you run a cosmetics empire like Valerie Claymore, it’s important to look good. And it’s a lot easier to do that if you are worth the kind of money she was.

“The most important thing to remember is that your daughter is very likely safe and in no danger,” I said as we sat on a plush white couch in the living room. “If she was in an accident, we would have found her bike or her belongings by now. There’s no sign of any of that. And there’s no record of Samantha – or anyone fitting her description – at the hospitals nearby and seeking medical care. So, it looks as if she simply chose to go someplace without telling you.”

I asked her to tell me everything about the last time she saw the girl – and anything else she remembered leading up to that point.

“It was a normal day,” she said. “We’ve been up here since July. There was nothing different about yesterday. Samantha got up early – she always gets up earlier than me – and sat out on the deck getting some morning sun. That’s where I found her when I woke up. Then she was on her computer and her iPad and her phone and all the rest of it for a few hours. You know how teenagers are addicted to their electronics. She ate breakfast at some point, but a very light one, because she said she wanted to stop for lunch later during her bike ride. Said she was going to eat at a place in Edgartown called the Chicken Shack. She loves the chicken wings there.”

“Tell me what else she said about the bike ride.”

“Not much else to tell. She likes to ride her bike, and it is so much easier to do here than back in New York City where we normally are. She wanted to buy a blouse at a store in Edgartown. She’d seen it there one day, and decided to go back and buy it.”

“Do you know the name of the store?”

“Yes. It was called Sunflowers.”

“And, as far as you know, she never got there?”

“That’s right. I called the store. No one there had seen her or had any record of her buying anything yesterday.”

“And you checked others places too?”

“Yes, I called the Chicken Shack and some other places I know she’d gone to in the past. Not only in Edgartown but all around the island. No one had seen or heard from her. I’m sure she was going to Edgartown though, and not anywhere else. That’s what she told me. And I saw her from the deck pedaling away from the house. It was south on Beach Road, taking the bike path that leads to Edgartown. Maybe she stopped somewhere along the way. But I don’t know where that might be.”

I thought about one possible spot Samantha Claymore might have stopped. I raised it as delicately as I could.

“It was nice weather yesterday,” I said, “and there are open beaches all along that bike path your daughter was on. Do you think she might have gotten off her bike at some point? Maybe she wanted to go for a dip in the ocean and…”

I didn’t finish the thought. It was an ominous one.

If she’d gone in the water without people around – and somehow got pulled out to sea by a rip tide or something else – no one would have seen what happened. Of course, that didn’t explain the missing bike or the belongings she presumably would have left behind on the beach. But, even though I didn’t want to say it out loud to Mrs. Claymore, it was the most logical theory I could come up with about how or why she’d disappeared.

Except her mother quickly dismissed that idea.

“Are you saying she might have drowned? That’s ridiculous. Samantha would have never gotten off her bike to go into the water.”

“How can you be sure of that?”

“Because Samantha hated the water. She was terrified of it.”

“She never went swimming?”

“Never. Wouldn’t go into the ocean. Not even into our pool here. She sunbathed and nothing else. Samantha had a tremendous fear of the water. I know my daughter. And one thing she would never do is put herself in a situation where she might drown.”

I thought about how strange it was that she brought her daughter to an ocean island for the summer if the girl hated being around water. But I wasn’t here to grade this woman on her parental choices.

“What about Samantha’s father? Would he have any more insight into what her plans were when she set out on that bike trip yesterday?”

“Samantha’s father is dead.”

“Oh, I’m sorry. When did he die?”

“Several years ago. I’m remarried now.”

“Maybe your current husband would know something.”

“Bruce is in New York City. He rarely comes out to the Vineyard.”

I nodded like I understood. I didn’t really. I figured it wasn’t a good sign that they were spending most of the summer in different places. But, if he wasn’t here, he couldn’t tell me anything more about Samantha. I moved on with my questions.

“How would you describe your relationship with your daughter, Mrs. Claymore?”

“Close. Extremely close.”

“I see. Well, that’s good.”

I waited for her to say something more, but she didn’t. So, I looked down at the checklist of questions I’d made in my notebook to see where to go next.

“Tell me about some of her friends?”

“What do you mean?”

“I thought I’d talk to some of her friends on the island. See what they might know. She might have confided in them. Can you give me a list of the young people here she spent time with?”

She looked baffled.

“I don’t know anyone like that.”

“You don’t know anyone she was friends with here?”

“No, I’m sorry.”

“What about back in New York City? She might have called a friend back home to tell them what she was planning to do. If you could give me any names at all…”

Another shake of her head.

“I don’t know any of her friends in New York.”

“Any romantic interests?”

“You mean boys?”

“Yes, did she have a boyfriend?”

“She was only sixteen.”

“Lots of sixteen-year-old girls have boyfriends.”

“I never knew of anyone. I mean, she never talked to me about a boyfriend. She never talked to me about boys at all. Sorry. I’m doing the best that I can. But I can’t help you with this.”

“I understand.”

Yep, sounded like a real tight mother-daughter relationship.

“Can you tell me what she was wearing when you last saw her?”

“I think it was some kind of T-shirt with shorts or maybe jeans. That’s what she usually wore.”

“Do you remember what color they were?”

She shook her head.

“Any significant jewelry? Earrings? Necklaces?”

“Why does that matter?”

“Someone might remember a girl wearing a specific type of jewelry. It could help us in our search.”

She thought about it.

“She would have been wearing her ring, that’s all I can tell you.”

“What kind of ring?”

“A big, black onyx ring. She wears it on her left index finger. Never takes it off. Her father gave it to her before he died. It’s very important to her. She always wears it in his memory. That’s all I can think of, Detective. Is there anything else?”

I had a few more questions for her, but I didn’t learn anything useful. Then I reassured her that the Cedar Cliffs police force was doing everything possible to find her daughter, and that I would be in touch as soon as I had more information.

I tried to sound as optimistic as possible about the outcome.

But I already had a bad feeling. About Valerie Claymore’s marriage. About her seemingly dysfunctional relationship with her daughter. And, most of all, about the fate of Samantha Claymore.

Ask any cop – the first forty-eight hours of a case are the most critical.

When I was a homicide detective in New York, everyone knew about this rule for murder cases. If we didn’t come up with a lead, a suspect or an arrest within those first forty-eight hours after the murder was committed, then the chances of solving the crime dropped by fifty percent.

It’s been proved time and time again in countless murder investigations over the years.

And the “first forty-eight hours” rule is even more important in a missing person case, where the chances of a successful solution plunge dramatically the longer that someone is out there missing.

Maybe the most glaring example of this was the murder of JonBenét Ramsey, the six-year-old pageant beauty queen who went missing – and was then found murdered – in her Boulder, Colorado home on Christmas Day, 1996.

We all remember that haunting picture of little JonBenét Ramsey dressed up and dancing on stage before she died. Who would want to kill such a lovely little girl?

But crucial mistakes made during the first forty-eight hours after she went missing made it impossible for investigators to crack the case. The initial crime scene was compromised; evidence was mishandled; full statements weren’t taken immediately from key people. As a result, JonBenét’s murderer was never apprehended – and most people believe they will never be found after all these years.

I picked up the picture of Samantha Claymore that her mother had given me. The photo had been taken on the docks near the Cedar Cliffs Marina. Samantha was wearing cut-off jeans and a tank top, and was smiling for the camera. It was a haunting look. A young woman filled with so much life when this picture was taken – and with so much to live for. What happened to her on that bike ride? And where was she now?

I put the picture down and went to work.

It had already been nearly twenty-four hours since Samantha Claymore was last seen.

The clock was ticking.

I had gained access to Samantha’s computer and iPad, which were in her bedroom at the house. She had seemingly taken her phone with her on her bike ride. Neither the computer or the iPad was password protected, so I was able to look at her files, emails and social media posts. That was the good news. The bad news was they didn’t tell me much.

She had accounts on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. But she didn’t seem to be a particularly prolific poster on any of them. Just stuff here and there about sights she’d seen or a TV show she was watching. I found out she was a fan of Game of Thrones, Ozark and Bosch. Which showed she had good taste in her TV choices, but was of no help to me in any other way.

There were lots of files she’d downloaded and saved. Most of them seemed to be pretty mundane, like her social media posts.

I scrolled through as many of them as I could. But there was one folder I couldn’t get into. It was simply labeled “Mandell” and it required a password. I thought it might auto fill the password saved on the site, but that didn’t work. I couldn’t access it. So, I wrote down “Mandell” in my notebook for later.

From Samantha’s emails and friends list on Facebook, I was able to put together a list of people she communicated with regularly. I wrote down their names and contact info. Then I reached out to some of them over email, asking them to get back to me or the Cedar Cliffs police force as soon as possible. I stressed that Samantha wasn’t in any troub. . .