Resort at Castaway Bay: Prove or Perish

Book 5: Resort at Castaway Bay

by Kathi Daley

Genres: Craft & Hobby Cozy Mysteries; Culinary Cozy Mysteries

Synopsis

Sydney Whitmore, a forensic psychologist, moves to Shipwreck Island and renews her relationship with Ezra Reinhold, a reclusive billionaire who enjoys poking around in cold cases and has the means to hire the best people to find the answers no one else has been able to.

In book 5 in the series, Arden Haynsworth has been kidnapped after being sentenced to death for her part in the death of the kidnapper's daughter Daisy. Arden insists she’s innocent of the crime she’s been accused of and is certain she was set up to take the fall. She’s been allotted five days’ worth of food, water, and air to prove it. If she can prove that she really is innocent of the murder, she'll be set free. If she can’t prove her innocence, she’ll die. The biggest problem is that she’s locked in this room and therefore unable to investigate. She’s offered the chance to be linked via live video feed to anyone she chooses. She chooses Ezra. With only five days to prove the woman’s innocence or watch her perish, the team jumps into action.

Meanwhile, it's Christmas on Shipwreck Island and everyone in Syd's life has gone just a bit Christmas Crazy. Aunt Charley is baking up a storm, Emily is knee deep in preparations for the annual Christmas by the Sea event, Estelle and Esther have parts in the school play, and Logan is helping Ryder with the annual boat parade.

 

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Release date: June 14, 2022

Publisher: Kathi Daley Books

Print pages: 166

Sample

Chapter 1

 

 

 

“Now that Sydney’s here, let’s get started,” my boss, Agent Colin Black, announced to the group of FBI agents he’d assembled.

My coworkers, Alex Converse, Veronica Parks, Lee Oberman, Gary Kline, and I gave Colin our full attention as he began to speak.

“At approximately seven o’clock on the morning of November fifth, a local bank president named Riggs Maynard called the emergency number for the San Francisco Police Department to report that his sixteen-year-old daughter, Daisy, had failed to come home after leaving to meet friends at the library for a study session the previous afternoon,” Colin informed the team. “Given the fact Daisy’s father is a wealthy man in his own right, with access to huge amounts of cash as a bank president, it was theorized that Daisy had been kidnapped for monetary reasons and that a ransom call would be forthcoming. The SFPD initially set up their equipment at the Maynard home and waited for the call but decided to take a broader approach when a ransom demand never materialized.”

I’d heard about the case and knew that it hadn’t ended well, so I was curious where Colin was going with this.

He continued. “The area between the missing girl’s home and the library where she was to have met with friends was thoroughly searched, as were businesses along this route. Friends and teachers of the missing girl were interviewed, and the girl’s social media accounts were monitored, but in spite of their best efforts to piece together what had happened, nothing ever came together.” He paused and then picked up where he’d left off. “The first real break came after a friend of Daisy’s named Selina Viscount changed her story. Initially, she had stated that she didn’t know what had happened to Daisy, but after Daisy had been missing for two full days, Selina admitted that Daisy had called her after the rest of the study group had already assembled to inform her that she would be unable to meet with the group as planned. Selina told the police that Daisy hadn’t gone into detail but had simply indicated that she had other plans and they should go ahead without her.”

“Why did she wait to tell what she knew?” Agent Veronica Parks asked.

Colin answered. “Selina told the police that she hadn’t wanted Daisy to get into trouble for lying to her father and sneaking away, which she’d done many times in the past, so when she’d been asked if she knew where Daisy might have gone off to, she lied. But eventually, she realized that telling the police what she knew could save Daisy’s life and changed her statement, admitting to the police officer who interviewed her that Daisy had been hanging out with a new group of friends who liked to party in Golden Gate Park. The park was searched, and as a result of that search, Daisy’s body was found.”

“That’s all very tragic, but why are we being briefed on this?” Alex asked.

Colin answered Alex’s question. “I’m getting to that, but before I share my reason for calling you in, I’d like to complete the history of the case to this point.”

“Of course. I’m sorry. Go on,” Alex said.

Colin continued. “When Daisy’s body was found, she was dressed in a very short dress more appropriate for clubbing than a study session with friends. She also had a band on her wrist from the same bar down by the port where it had previously been determined that Gracie Hill had spent time prior to her death.”

I knew that Gracie Hill had been a sixteen-year-old runaway whose body had been found on Ocean Beach near Golden Gate Park a week or so before Daisy went missing.

Colin continued. “As you all know, the bar where Daisy and Gracie spent time during the final hours of their lives had also been the place of employment for Barbie Smith, the cocktail waitress who was found dead in the dumpster behind The California Academy of Sciences back in October.”

“So you think that we might be dealing with a serial situation,” I stated, realizing that three deaths within a month of one another, all with links to the same bar, seemed like more than a coincidence.

“That’s exactly what the SFPD thought, which is why they focused their investigation on employees as well as regular customers of the watering hole. At the time this was all going on, I wasn’t sure the team looking into things was on the right track, but it wasn’t my case, and there did seem to be some internal logic behind the idea that there might be a link between the three women who were murdered after spending time in the bar.”

“But nothing came from that line of investigation,” I said. I’d been busy with the Conrad Baker case while this had been going on and hadn’t been involved in the investigation on any level, but the kidnapping and murder had been in the news, so I’d been following it from afar.

“That’s correct,” Colin said. “At this point, the team investigating the murder decided to go back and look at individuals with a specific motive to kill Daisy. I think they realized that they’d been waylaid by chasing individuals with a link to the bar. I’m afraid that the investigation had grown stale, and those in charge hadn’t been able to identify a single viable suspect. Eventually, the lead detective on the case sought me out and asked for my feedback. I certainly didn’t have an answer, but I did have some ideas, which I shared. Even with my ideas, the case looked as if it might go cold until Liza Stallworth, a woman who worked at the bank where Riggs Maynard was president, came forward. Ms. Stallworth told the police that she had seen another bank employee, a woman named Arden Haynsworth, with Daisy on the day she died. After Ms. Stallworth shared her story, Ms. Haynsworth was called in and questioned. While she initially denied spending time with the girl on the day in question, she eventually admitted that Daisy had called and asked her to transfer ten thousand dollars from her trust account into her checking account.”

“Do we know why Daisy wanted to do this?” Lee asked.

Colin nodded. “According to Ms. Haynsworth, Daisy was able to access the cash in her checking account with her bank card, but she needed her father’s signature to access the cash in her trust account. I imagine that her father set things up this way so he’d be able to monitor her spending. Anyway, Ms. Haynsworth eventually admitted that she’d done as Daisy had requested and made the transfer. Ms. Haynsworth also admitted that she’d not only transferred the money from one account to the other, but she had also withdrawn it and then arranged to meet Daisy at the bar later that evening to give her the cash she’d requested.”

“And did they meet up?” Gary asked.

“They did,” Colin answered. “In fact, it was in a diner down the street from the bar where Liza Stallworth had seen Daisy with Arden Haynsworth. Daisy was dressed in the same short dress her body was eventually found in, and, according to Ms. Stallworth, she was made up to look like a hooker. Liza stopped by the table and suggested to Daisy that she might want to go home, but Daisy told her to mind her own business and then got up and left.”

“Okay, wait,” Veronica asked. “If this woman saw Daisy with her coworker, why didn’t she come forward right away?”

“Honestly, I’m not sure,” Colin said. “Liza shared with the police that after her mother’s death, Daisy began hanging out with a rough crowd. Liza admitted that she was afraid to rat Daisy out on the chance that she’d simply taken off with friends and had waited for a couple days to tell what she knew. Of course, by the time she admitted that she’d seen Daisy dressed like a hooker and hanging out with one of the other bank employees, the girl was already dead. Personally, I had the feeling all along that Liza Stallworth may have had a very different reason for not coming forward sooner, but she was the witness and not the suspect, so digging too deeply into her reason for waiting to tell what she knew didn’t seem to be a task that would move the investigation forward.”

“So, what happened next?” Alex asked. “Was this Arden Haynsworth arrested?”

“She was brought in for questioning,” Colin confirmed. “She eventually admitted to transferring the money Daisy had requested be transferred and then meeting the girl at the bar. Once they made contact they walked to a nearby diner where she’d passed the cash she’d withdrawn off to the teen. Ms. Haynsworth claimed to have no idea why Daisy wanted the money, where Daisy went, or what happened to her after she left the diner. The police didn’t have enough to arrest Ms. Haynsworth for Daisy’s murder, but she did happen to have a bunch of unpaid parking tickets, which allowed the SFPD to hold her while they looked into things. During the investigation, it came out that this wasn’t the first time Ms. Haynsworth had helped Daisy move cash from her trust account into her checking without her father’s signature. In my mind, the fact that Ms. Haynsworth helped Daisy with the money transfer didn’t mean that she’d killed her, but Mr. Maynard was certain that Arden had killed Daisy and began demanding that she be officially charged with murder.”

“And was she ever charged with the murder?” Veronica asked.

“No. Ms. Haynsworth was required to appear before the judge for the parking tickets, but after she paid what was owed, Ms. Haynsworth was allowed to leave. Which brings us up to today.”

“And what’s going on now?” Lee asked.

“It seems that Arden Haynsworth has gone missing. She was fired from her job at the bank after she was released from jail, but she was able to get an on-call gig at a bar in the area. When she didn’t show up for work, no one initially thought anything of it, but it’s been three days, and no one has seen her, including the man she seems to have been dating on a fairly regular basis. The SFPD checked her apartment, and there was no sign of anyone having been there recently. They also checked her phone records, and while there have been incoming calls, none have been answered in the past three days, and there’s no record of any outgoing calls.”

“So maybe she just decided to take off,” Gary said.

“That was my first thought when I heard that she was missing, but it appears that Riggs Maynard has likewise been MIA for the past three days. While I have been engaged in conversations with the SFPD, the FBI hasn’t officially been asked to intervene. I called you all in today to catch you up since my gut is telling me that it’s only a matter of time until my role as a consultant turns into the role of lead investigator.”

“So, what do you think is going on?” I asked.

Colin blew out a breath. “I honestly don’t know, and while I’m not one of those people who doesn’t believe in coincidences, I do think that it is highly unlikely that it’s a coincidence that both Arden Haynsworth and Riggs Maynard are missing.”

“Has Riggs Maynard remarried?” I asked, wondering if there was anyone in his life who might have an idea about where he could have gone.

“No,” Colin answered. “As I mentioned, Daisy’s mother passed away three years ago. Mr. Maynard hasn’t remarried, so it had been just Daisy and her father since Daisy’s mother died. I understand why Daisy’s death has hit her father so hard, and I feel genuine sympathy for the man, but something about him has me feeling uneasy.”

“Uneasy?” I asked.

“Let’s just say that if it turns out that Riggs Maynard has decided to take justice into his own hands, I won’t be surprised.”

I raised a brow. “Do you think Maynard killed Arden when he realized the police were going to be unable to make a murder charge stick?”

Colin shrugged. “I don’t know. I hope not. But the last time I spoke to the man, I couldn’t help but feel the rage that seemed to exist just below the surface. In my opinion, Riggs Maynard needs someone to focus his anger on. I think he believes Arden to be guilty of killing his daughter, and any argument that has been made relating to other suspects or the lack of evidence has simply fallen on deaf ears.”

“So if he felt the police had dropped the ball, you think it seems reasonable to suspect that this well-respected bank president would kill his former employee and then flee,” Alex commented, doubt evident in his voice.

Colin shrugged once again. “Like I said, I don’t know anything at this point, but I do have a gut feeling. My gut feelings tend to be dead on, so I decided to open a dialogue. It may be premature, but everyone was in town today, including Syd, so I decided to call the meeting. At this point, I’m not asking you to do anything. Just keep your eyes and ears open, and we’ll see how this all ends up.”

Everyone agreed to do so, and then the meeting began to break up. I stayed behind to chat with Colin for a minute. Since I had given up my full-time position and was currently considered to be an on-call employee, I wasn’t asked to be part of routine tasks such as this meeting often. I’d been in town today helping my sister, Emily, arrange for the transfer of her mother-in-law from the local hospital where she’d been a patient since suffering a major stroke back in October to the rehabilitation center in San Diego she’d decided to transfer to in order to be close to her niece, so when Colin called to inform me about the case, I agreed to join the team for the briefing.

“Thanks again for coming by, Syd,” Colin said.

“I was happy to. I will admit that the past few months have been crazy, but I really do like to be kept in the loop even though I’m only occasionally in the city.”

“Are you still happy with your on-call status?”

I nodded. “I am. It seems to be working out well for me.”

“I’m happy that you didn’t quit, but I keep hoping that you’ll tire of tiny Shipwreck Island and come back full-time. We could really use you.”

“I know, and I appreciate your willingness to let me continue on a limited basis, but I am happy. I honestly doubt I’ll want to come back full-time and will understand if you feel at some point that you need to recruit a full-time psychologist.”

Colin didn’t respond to this, which made me a bit uncomfortable. I supposed a time would come when he would give up on my return and look for a full-time replacement. “How is your sister doing with the mother-in-law situation?” he asked, changing the subject.

“She’s hanging in there. Initially, Emily was looking for a rehabilitation facility for Beverly here in San Francisco, but then her niece, Phoebe, came to town for a business meeting and decided to go by and visit Beverly while she was here, and the next thing we know, Beverly has decided to do her rehab in San Diego.”

“And is the family against this idea?”

I shrugged. “Not necessarily. On the one hand, Beverly has been estranged from her sister for quite some time, so renewing her relationship with her niece is a good thing that may lead to reconciliation between the sisters. On the other hand, after everything Emily has done for Beverly since the stroke, I think she felt slighted that the woman didn’t even talk to her about her decision before making it.”

Colin sat back in his black leather swivel chair. “I can see that, but in the long run, I suspect that Emily will be happy not having to run back and forth between the city and the island all the time.”

“I agree,” I said. “Emily’s been trying to be all things to all people, and I sense that she’s running herself ragged. With Christmas just around the corner, she’s involved with community events in town and activities at the resort.”

“So, will you be giving up your apartment now that your sister won’t need to use it?” he asked.

“I’m not sure. Eventually, I guess I will. It’s pretty expensive to keep for those instances when I’m in town. Just checking in to a hotel when I need to be here will be more economical, but I don’t want to mess with it this month. I guess I’ll take another look at things after the first of the year.”

“I guess it makes sense to be a hundred percent certain that you’ll no longer need your apartment before giving it up. Finding any type of housing is almost impossible these days.”

“The rents are crazy high right now too.” I knew that if I decided to give up my apartment, there was little chance I’d be able to find another one in my price range should I change my mind. “I know I’m changing the subject, and I know I shouldn’t even ask about the Conrad Baker case, but I’m going to. Have you heard anything new?” Conrad Baker was a serial killer I’d been chasing for over a year before he was eventually captured. Unfortunately, he wasn’t captured until after my friend and fellow agent, Faith Meadows, had been killed while trying to find the proof we needed to arrest him.

Colin hesitated, and I wasn’t sure if he’d answer my question. I knew that he knew that I’d really bungled things during my deposition, but I had managed to figure out what had happened and had partially closed the case, so I hoped that in his eyes, I’d redeemed myself and that he’d be willing to share what he knew.

“As a result of his cancer, Baker died two days ago,” Colin answered. “I was going to tell you but had decided to wait until I could see you in person.”

“And did he give up the name of his accomplice?”

Colin shook his head. “He went to his maker without ever admitting that he had a partner. Baker stated for the record that he had been the one who killed all the women we initially believed he’d murdered, and despite the best efforts of a whole lot of folks to get him to name an accomplice, he never would alter his statement. We suspect that the final victim, Davina Hollinger, had been held by Baker’s biological sister, Jasmine. Actually, based on the description Davina was able to supply, I think we can say that at this point, we know this for a fact. And while the fact that Jasmine was the one who took care of Davina after Baker’s arrest doesn’t prove anything, I suppose we can assume that she’d been the one assisting him with all the murders, or at least all the murders where we suspected that a copycat or apprentice may have been involved.”

I’d really hoped that we’d get more out of Baker before he passed, but unfortunately, that hadn’t happened. “Is there a plan to track Jasmine down?”

He shook his head again. “The case has gone cold. With Baker’s death, the case is really cold. We honestly have no idea where to even begin looking for Jasmine.”

“I guess at this point, I’ll just focus on the fact that Davina Hollinger was found alive. That in and of itself was a victory. I do hope we eventually catch up with Jasmine. If she really had assisted in the killings, she may kill again.”

“If she does, we’ll find her. If not, if she had never been involved or decided to retire after this, I guess I’ll just need to learn to live with the fact that she got away. I know things ended up messy, and at the time, I may have been hard on you, but you actually did really good work.”

“Thank you. I appreciate that.” I grabbed my bag and stood up. “I really should go if I don’t want to miss my ferry. The tree lighting on the island is tonight. If something comes up, call. If not, have a wonderful holiday, and I’ll see you next year.”

“I really do hope I’ll be able to honor your request for time off, but we both know it probably won’t work out that way.”

I smiled. “I know. If you need me, call. I do cherish time spent with my family, but I guess I’ll always be an agent first when a life is on the line.”