Page 83 of Dead Men Tell No Shells

The thought no longer seemed impossible. That was what surprised me most. I wasn’t ready to pretend the past had vanished, or that trust could be restored simply because we still loved each other. But I could imagine a future with him without feeling that I was betraying the life I had built while he was gone. The possibility was there, and I was beginning to believe I might be brave enough to explore it.

Josiah set his mug down and looked at me. “I wanted to tell you what happened today, rather than leave you hearing bits of it from everyone else because I know by now you’ve probably heard from someone that was at the salon.”

I appreciated that more than I could easily explain. “Thank you. We heard from Denise at lunch that Joann had been arrested and had confessed.”

“She gave a full statement,” he said. “We advised her of her rights, and she knowingly waived her right to counsel before answering questions. She also provided a written confession. We’ll still need to corroborate the details, and the financial side of the case is far from finished, but we have a much clearer account of what happened at the festival.”

He went on to explain that Joann had confronted Harvey over the years of anger and grief she had carried since he cheated her and Shelby out of their savings. She had opened Harbor Lights partly because she wanted Harvey to see her, to remember what he had done, and to know that she hadn’t simply disappeared from his life. The confrontation at the festival had been the culmination of years of resentment. She had shoved him, he had fallen against the edge of the stage, and after he staggered forward and collapsed, she had panicked and fled.

“I don’t think she went there intending to kill him,” Josiah said. “But that doesn’t change the fact that she left him without calling for help. We have to establish exactly what happened and let the legal process take its course.”

“I understand.”

“There’s another part of this that concerns Simon.” Josiah leaned back, his expression thoughtful. “I spoke to him again. He admitted that the check was the reason he argued with Harvey. Harvey had been diagnosed with heart disease and was suddenly talking about his own mortality. Simon said Harvey had started making comments about how he could have a stroke and drop dead, and that he couldn’t eat bacon or cream anymore.”

Despite the seriousness of the subject, I could almost hear Harvey complaining about his new restrictions. “That sounds like a man who wasn’t accustomed to being told no.”

“That’s what Simon said. The diagnosis seems to have pushed Harvey into thinking about what he’d done and what he wanted to settle before he died. He decided to repay Joann for the money they’d lost in the packing-plant investment when he only put his name on the buy-in and kept all the proceeds before ending their affair, though the fifteen-thousand-dollar check was nowhere near a fair accounting of what he’d made from it and he didn’t even apologize for how he treated Shelby and ignored Joann once she came back to town and opened the salon.”

“So Simon wasn’t involved in the original fraud?”

“No. He was only thirteen or fourteen when it happened, and he only heard about it that day at the bank when he came down to visit his father. His silence and the argument over the check made him look suspicious, but he wasn’t part of what Harvey did. He didn’t want the old scandal dragged back into the open, partly because he didn’t want his father’s reputation destroyed all over again and fear over the blowback, as he works for a financial investments firm himself. I’ve asked him to notify his mother, Harvey’s ex-wife, about Joann’s arrest, so she doesn’t hear the news through the town grapevine or on the news as the scandal is likely to get talked all over the three state area.”

I nodded. It was easy to see how Simon’s reluctance to talk could have made him appear to be hiding something more serious. But being ashamed of a parent’s actions, or desperate to keep a family scandal buried, wasn’t the same as being guilty of the original crime.

“So what had he spent the money on?” I asked.

“That’s where the financial investigation comes in again. Joann said that Harvey invested the money in the old seafood packing plant alongside some of his own money and some other investors. As far as we know, those investors didn’t know where his money had come from. The property was sold a few months later to a developer for a hell of a lot of money when that stretch of the waterfront became part of the second phase of shops along the docks. Harvey made a substantial profit.”

“And he thought fifteen thousand dollars was enough of an apology?” I shook my head in disgust.

“Quite. We’ll trace the original funds, the investment, and the proceeds from the sale. We need to establish how much Harvey made and what, if anything, can be recovered. I’m not going to assume the other investors were involved just because they did business with him.”

I was relieved to hear that. The case had already hurt enough people, and I didn’t want innocent people dragged into it simply because they had been connected to Harvey’s investments.

“What about Shelby?” I asked after a moment. “Did Joann tell you more about why she kept quiet for so long?”

Josiah’s expression softened. “She did. She and Shelby had been best friends as well as sisters since early childhood. Their parents worked long hours, including weekends, so Shelby’s grandmother often looked after them. They stayed late on weeknights and spent many weekends with her. She loved her soap operas and old television reruns, and the girls would sit with her and watch whatever was on. One of the shows they watched together was The Love Boat.”

I pictured two little girls curled up in front of an old television, their grandmother nearby, the world outside their small circle still full of possibility.

“They dreamed of taking a luxury cruise when they were grown,” Josiah continued. “Not just a short trip, either. They wanted the whole experience: fancy clothes, name-brand luggage, a balcony cabin, and shore excursions at every port. They wanted to see the world and enjoy all the things they couldn’t afford as children. They even made a pretend cruise ship for their Barbies out of cardboard boxes, markers, and tape.”

My throat tightened. I could imagine the two little girls with big dreams building their ship on a living-room floor, drawing windows and decks, deciding which doll would wear the best dress to dinner. It was such a simple, hopeful dream, made out of scraps and imagination, and they had believed that one day they would turn it into something real. One that almost did, until one greedy man got his hooks into one of them and swindled the pair of them while whispering false sweet nothings.

“Then Harvey came along,” Josiah said. “They trusted him with their savings. He took their money, made his investment, and left Shelby heartbroken. She loved him, and for years she blamed herself for believing he loved her back. Joann knew how badly it hurt her. They moved away, and she stayed quiet because she didn’t want to make Shelby relive it, and later, after she died, she didn’t want Harvey to forget the woman he had betrayed. ”She wanted him to remember what he did to Shelby, as well as her, every time he had to walk or drive past that salon or saw her out in public.”

I looked down at my hands, trying to imagine the years Joann had spent carrying that anger alone. It didn’t excuse what happened at the festival, but it helped me understand why the hurt had never faded. Harvey hadn’t merely cheated two young women out of money. He had taken something they had worked toward together, a dream that belonged to their friendship as much as to their futures, and turned it into a source of shame and grief. He’d broken Shelby’s heart in two different ways and left Joann walking around with a wound that would not heal.

“She still has Shelby’s ashes,” Josiah added quietly. “She told me she intended to use the money from the check to take them on the cruise they always dreamed of and scatter them at sea. She wanted to at least give Shelby the trip they never got to take.”

For a moment, I couldn’t think of anything to say. Blinking back sudden tears, I imagined Joann keeping the ashes safe all those years, holding on to the memory of her friend and the promise they had made as girls. I imagined the cardboard ship, the carefully drawn windows, the dolls arranged on deck, and the two children who had believed that being grown meant having the freedom to do anything they could dream of.

There was just something heartbreaking about the thought of Joann finally taking Shelby on that cruise alone. It was a beautiful gesture, but it was also a reminder of everything they had lost. Shelby would never see the ports they had planned to visit, never stand on a balcony and watch the ocean stretch toward the horizon, never laugh with Joann over how far they had come from the little girls who had built a ship out of cardboard.

“I hope she gets to take that trip. I hope it gives her some peace,” I said at last.

“So do I.”