10

Cope

Cope had an amazing afternoon at the amusement park with the kids. He'd ridden the kiddie rides with Lizbet, who'd screeched her head off with joy. He ate an entire chocolate cone and half of Lizbet's, and later nearly a pound of pasta at a cute little Italian taverna called That's Amore! He'd taken a ton of pictures of Lizbet and Wolfie with tomato sauce splattered all over their faces.

After he'd given the kids a bath and put them to sleep, Cope picked up his phone and scrolled through all the pictures he'd taken during their trip. There were shots of Lizbet on the beach in her big, floppy hat, Wolf learning to bodysurf on the waves, and Jude and Wolf with matching pink cotton candy mustaches. His heart swelled with love when he saw the happiness reflected in his family's eyes.

Which brought him back to Cyrus Longfellow. He wasn't able to shake the idea of calling Alexandria since Jude had suggested it earlier in the day, especially in light of the fact that Cyrus hadn't asked him to make contact.

Cyrus had been dead for fifteen years. As far as he could tell from speaking with him, no other psychic or ghost hunter had been able to make contact with him since that fateful night. If Cope had been in Cyrus's shoes, the first thing he would have asked was for the medium to get a message out to the people who were most important to him. Cyrus hadn't asked him to contact anyone.

Cope knew Cyrus was unlike any spirit he'd ever spoken to before, but it rubbed him the wrong way that the ghost had no one he wanted to make amends with. No one he wanted to apologize to or to say "I love you" to one last time.

Back in their motel room, Jude and Cope snuggled in bed. Cope was about to suggest watching a movie when a knock on the room door broke Cope out of his thoughts. When Jude opened the door, it was Jake Powell, the manager of the motel.

"What's up?" Jude asked.

Cope peered over his shoulder, not able to read what the manager wanted.

"Phone call for you. Down in the office. Follow me." Jake stood back from the door and stuffed his hands into his pockets.

"One sec." Jude ducked back into the room and knocked on the door connecting his room to Ronan's. Cope heard them whisper for a few seconds, and when Jude came out into the hallway, Ronan was with him. "Ten's gonna watch the kids. Do you have any idea what's going on? No one knows we're here, and anyone who would want to speak with us has our numbers. All they'd have to do was text or call us directly."

"I'm not getting anything," Cope said. He agreed with everything Jude had said about friends of theirs having their numbers. He had no clue what was going on; his gift was strangely silent on the matter.

Following behind Jude and Ronan, Cope went down the stairs and into the front office, which smelled like onion rings and stale cigarette smoke. Cope tried to breathe through his mouth so he wouldn't gag in front of the motel manager.

"Follow me." Jake led them into the back office, which was neat as a pin. There was a small table with several folding chairs and a multi-line phone. "You can take the call here. Pick up the receiver and press the blinking light. Good luck." With those words, Jake Powell was gone.

"Who the hell says ‘good luck' before you take a phone call?" Ronan asked.

"We're about to find out." Jude reached for the receiver. He hit the flashing light to answer the call like Powell advised but also hit the button for speakerphone. "This is Jude Byrne."

"Mr. Byrne," a cultured voice said, "my name is Alexandria Longfellow. I hear you have been trying to dig up leads on my son's murder case."

Cope didn't know which way this was going to go. Either Alexandria was going to be thrilled someone was working to solve Cyrus's murder, or she was about to raise hell. He had no idea which.

"Not exactly, Mrs. Longfellow. My family and I are on vacation." Jude shrugged as if he had no idea what else to say.

"I see." She paused. "So the video of you and your psychic husband being interviewed at the Four Star about solving my son's murder was what, my imagination playing tricks on me? AI technology that was able to synthesize your voices?"

Ronan's eyes darkened as the woman kept throwing out scenarios. It was obvious he didn't like what was happening.

"Mrs. Longfellow, my name is Copeland Forbes, of the New Orleans's Forbes family. I believe your husband knew my father, Buford."

"Indeed, Mr. Forbes. Lucius always spoke highly of your father." Cope could hear a smile in the woman's voice when she mentioned her late husband. "I am counting on you to please tell me the truth of what's going on in Maine."

Cope winked at his husband. Money knew money, as the saying went. Cope knew all he needed to do was let this woman know he was in the club, and he would be able to speak with her on a more friendly level. "Mrs. Longfellow, my husband got an unsolicited email inviting us to come stay at Four Star for the long weekend at a reduced rate. Wanting to give our kids one last taste of fun in the sun, he booked the trip, only to find out that it was a ruse perpetuated against us by a news reporter named Chet Hines."

"Yes, I'm aware of Mr. Hines. He's a rather persistent little gnat. Always calling me to pry additional information out of me in regard to my son and his life prior to his death, under the guise of pretending to care about me and my family. I do not believe he is truly interested in solving Cyrus's murder, but rather wants the glory for himself."

"You have that right. Not only did he get us up here under false pretenses, but he also sent anonymous messages to other members of the southern Maine media, which is how you ended up seeing my husband and I on television. I can assure you that before we came up here, I had never heard of your son or his murder." Cope cringed over his last words. He couldn't imagine Alexandria would be pleased to hear that Cope had no idea who her beloved son was.

"Hmm." Alexandria paused. "Your detective husband and his band of merry men aren't in Maine to solve Cyrus's murder?" Her tone was level, not betraying which answer to the question she would prefer.

"No, they're not. Jude wanted to take the kids to ride the Ferris wheel at the amusement park and to teach our son how to bodysurf. I can absolutely assure you that working a case he has no jurisdiction over never crossed his mind." Cope was sure it absolutely had crossed Jude's mind, especially during his long conversation with Cyrus Longfellow. If the spirit had named his killer, Cope knew without a shadow of a doubt that Jude would have done whatever it took to bring the killer to justice at long last, jurisdiction or not.

"It's been fifteen years since my son was killed. No one has been able to solve the crime. I have given up all hope that my son will get justice. Is there anything you can do with your psychic powers that could help the police solve the murder?" Again, Alexandria's tone didn't give a hint as to whether or not she actually wanted Cope to do that very thing.

For some reason, Cope's gut told him not to reveal to Alexandria Longwood that he had spoken with her dead son's ghost. "I didn't notice anything off about the room when we arrived at the motel. After Chet Hines explained to us what had happened to Cyrus, I tried to reach out to his spirit."

"Were you successful?" Mild curiosity lit Alexandria's voice.

"I was not. I tried several times and was unable to make contact." Cope crossed himself. Yes, he was lying to the grieving mother of a murder victim, but he knew it was the right thing to do. "It's possible Cyrus has crossed over and is enjoying his reward in heaven."

Ronan rolled his eyes. He'd obviously had enough of sitting on the sideline. "Mrs. Longfellow, my name is Detective Ronan O'Mara. I work for the Salem, Massachusetts, cold case team. I was able to read the police file on your son's murder, and like you said, it was very thin. Since Cyrus only vacationed here, is there anyone you can think of from New York that would have wanted to hurt your son? Friends? Scorned lovers? Someone he owed money to?"

"I have no idea, Detective." For the first time in the conversation, Alexandria's mask slipped. The woman sounded tired and worn to the bone. "We had a falling-out a few years before he died. I'm afraid we weren't all that close before that last argument. I don't know who any of his friends were, and as for lovers, start with the letter A in the Manhattan phone book. You'll find dozens. Men and women." Alexandria sighed heavily. "All I can tell you is that my son was a good boy. He was kind and generous, with a big heart. He didn't spend time with hooligans, thugs, or bookies, even though there were plenty to be found. If I were a detective, I suppose I would speak with the dancers my son lavished his money upon. I seem to remember the names Baked Alaska and Vixen being mentioned by Jake Powell as people who had visited my son during his last stay in Maine."

"Neither of those names were in the police file. Thank you for the lead, ma'am," Ronan said, shaking his fist in the universal jack-off gesture. Obviously, he wasn't best pleased by how the local police had handled the investigation. "One last question. Are you calling to ask us to investigate your son's murder or to tell us to stay in our own lane?"

"Two weeks ago, I was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, Detective O'Mara. According to my medical team, I've got six months left to live. If there is something you and your partners could do to solve this case before I take my final breath, I would be forever in your debt." She quickly rattled off her phone number. The phone clicked twice before the dial tone sounded. Alexandria Longfellow had hung up the phone.

"Well, shit. Just when we were starting to get somewhere." Jude set the phone receiver back in the cradle. "Do you really think she saw footage of Chet Hines trying to interview us the other day, or do you think Jake Powell called and gave her the heads-up?"

"No clue," Ronan said. "Although it seems odd that with her money and connections that she called the hotel to speak to you instead of getting your number online."

"I was thinking the same thing," Jude said. He turned to his husband. "Did you get anything from her?"

"She's hiding something." Cope gave his head a shake. "Something about her son, but I don't know what that thing is. Appearances are everything to a woman like Alexandria Longfellow. Something as small as her son being caught smoking in the boys' room at school could be cause for scandal. We also know from firsthand experience that people lie. It could very well be that her entire story about her son was bullshit. Maybe Cyrus wasn't kind or generous. Maybe he was an asshole. There was nothing warm or fuzzy about his mother, and apples don't usually fall very far from their trees."

"Going along with that same line of thought, I'm betting that if a stripper or someone else of less than worthy character was the one who killed Cyrus, she might not want that information getting out to her rich friends," Ronan said.

"If that's the case, then it also stands to reason that Cyrus could be keeping his mouth shut for the same reason. To keep from humiliating his mother further, from the grave." Cope would have done the same thing for Elizabeth. He wouldn't have hurt his mother for the world.

"What about the money?" Jude asked, sounding as though he was talking to himself.

"What about it?" Ronan asked.

"It's possible the person who killed Cyrus was just after the money, that his murder wasn't personal at all. The people who lived and worked around here would have seen Cyrus flashing cash around. Word like that doesn't stay quiet for long. I'm sure there were a ton of people looking to get in on the Longfellow gravy train, which, of course, opens a nearly impossible pool of suspects." Jude shook his head.

"Right," Ronan agreed. "From strippers, locals, tourists, and every thug in between."

"The murder happened fifteen years ago. There's no way to track down the people who might have been in town the night of the murder, and it's likely that anyone who worked at the Jungle and knew Cyrus is long gone." Jude shook his head. "It's a damn good thing we're not on this case."

Cope couldn't have said it better himself. They had only a few short days left to enjoy the end of summer, and the last thing Cope wanted was for Jude to stick his nose where it didn't belong, especially when the man who was murdered told them he wasn't giving up the name of his killer.

Cope had worked with enough grief-stricken mothers over his career to know pain when he heard it. Although her emotions were well controlled, he could tell Alexandria loved her son dearly. Her cold affect was most likely the result of her breeding and not publicly wearing her heart on her sleeve.

Cope was glad he never had to find out. He was going to enjoy the rest of this vacation with his family and friends before going back home and getting Wolf ready to start the new school year.

"I say we try to find out about Vixen and Baked Alaska," Jude said.

Ronan nodded in agreement.

"Wait! You all want to investigate this case? What about our vacation?" Cope's mouth hung open.

Jude held up his hands. "Here's the deal. Let's see if we can find the strippers tomorrow. If not, we're done. Ronan?"

"I agree. If we talk to them and get some info, you can bring it back to Cyrus and see if that changes his mind about telling us who the killer is. Either way, we're done. Cope, what do you think?" Ronan wore a look to say he didn't care what Cope decided, but Cope knew the exact opposite was true.

"Okay, fine. You've got one day. We spend our last day here as a family. And I'm absolutely not going to pester or bully Cyrus into confessing what he knows. If he tells us what happened that night, fine. If not, we're done."

"Deal!" Ronan and Jude said together.

What the hell had Cope gotten himself into? At the very least, Jude and Ronan would head over to the strip club tomorrow afternoon and see what was what. He'd try to reach Cyrus one last time, and that would be that.

Cope had a funny feeling that wouldn't be that at all.