Murder Hooks a Mermaid by Christy Fifield Page A

conversation, although I knew I would be.
    I served dessert and poured Felipe’s coffee. I paused a moment, then poured a cup for myself.
    It was going to be a long night.

Chapter 8
    WE PICKED AT OUR CAKE, TRYING NOT TO LISTEN TO Karen’s end of what was clearly a distressing conversation. I knew what Riley was telling her, but I couldn’t share it with Felipe and Ernie. That was Karen’s choice, although the news would be all over town by morning.
    When she finally came back to the table, her scowl had deepened, twisting her face into a mask of anger. And fear.
    Ernie reached out and wrapped his long fingers around her arm. “What is it, darlin’? You look like you been hit with some powerful bad news.”
    “Yeah. It just”—she pulled herself together with an effort—“just doesn’t get much worse.”
    Ernie loosened his grip and rubbed her arm. “It’s all friends here, girl. You can tell us.”
    “I can’t believe it,” she said, but the fear in her eyes told us she maybe could believe, though she didn’t want to.
    “That was Riley,” she said unnecessarily; they’d all heard me call him by name. “Bobby’s back in jail. Bail revoked.”
    “But that really isn’t your problem, is it?” Ernie was genuinely puzzled. “It means you’re off the hook for the bond. And you said Riley would pay you back for the fee.”
    “He will, for all the good it did him. But that was never the issue.”
    “Then what is the issue?” Felipe blurted out.
    “There’s no bail this time because he’s charged with murder. One of Bobby’s diver clients was just found behind The Tank with a gaff hook in his chest.”
    Felipe turned a sickly green at her description.
    I looked down and found myself staring at the dark brown-red of the red velvet cake. My stomach roiled, the dark black coffee suddenly turning to burning acid, and I pushed the cake away. I couldn’t bear to look at it.
    “Oh man! You didn’t need to know that,” she moaned. “I shouldn’t have told you.”
    “No, no,” Ernie murmured, still stroking her arm. “You can’t keep something like that bottled up inside.”
    I got up and moved around to stand beside Karen’s chair. I put my arm around her shoulders and she leaned against me, as if she couldn’t hold herself upright.
    “So what do we do now?” I asked her.
    She hesitated, and I knew what her answer was. Riley needed her, and she needed to go.
    “I’ll clean up,” I said. “You go do whatever you need to.”
    She looked up, clearly relieved. “You sure?”
    “Sure I’m sure,” I answered. “It’s family. You need to go.”
    It took another few minutes for Karen to gather hershoulder bag, which bulged suspiciously, like someone had stuffed in a change of clothes. The ruse wasn’t lost on Felipe and Ernie, and as soon as she was out the door they were on me like ticks on a hound, wanting to know what exactly was going on.
    “I don’t know exactly ,” I said. It was the truth. I had some suspicions, but no real confirmation. “It’s clear that she and Riley are still close, maybe closer than I thought. But this is about family. Karen has her own family, true, but the Freeds made her part of their family long before she married Riley.
    “I always figured that was a big part of why she and Riley stayed so cordial after the divorce: his folks would have lost their only daughter.
    “Now I’m not so sure there weren’t other reasons.”
    I cleared the table while I talked. Ernie came over and started loading the dishwasher, and Felipe stowed leftovers in the fridge.
    Our cake sat on the table, still untouched.
    “You should take that home.” I dug out some plastic containers from the bottom cupboard and rooted around to find the matching lids. But this was Karen’s kitchen, and I finally settled for stretching pieces of plastic wrap over the tops.
    Karen did have a cover for the cake plate, a diner-style pedestal that echoed the mid-century design of her dinette. I