Bone Island 01 - Ghost Shadow by Heather Graham Read Free Book Online

If I know the story right, he was engaged to the girl. And she was found dead, right where you came upon him tonight.”
    “I don’t think they were engaged anymore,” Katie said.
    “And there the point. Motive for murder.”
    “So you think that he did it.”
    “No, actually, I don’t think so. But a ruined romance? That’s a motive for murder.”
    “You’re watching too much TV,” Katie said.
    “Hmm. TV. Such an amazing and wonderful invention. So vastly entertaining!” Bartholomew agreed. “But it’s true. He was a spurned lover. That’s a motive. She was leaving him. For a brute of a game-playing fellow. That is, by any reckoning, definitely a motive for murder.”
    “He was cleared,” Katie said.
    “He wasn’t arrested or prosecuted. He had an alibi. His alibi, however, was his family.”
    She turned to him sharply. “I thought you just said that you didn’t think that he murdered her?”
    “True. No. No, I don’t think he killed her. He was rude, but I know many a fine fellow who can actually be rude. But murder, especially such a crime of passion-he doesn’t look the type. He seems to be the type who easily attracts women, and therefore, he might have been heartbroken, but he would have moved on. I mean, that’s the way I see it. The man is-appears to be, at least-a man’s man. He could completely lose his temper and engage in a rowdy bar fight, maybe, but murder… Ah! But then again, what does the type look like? Now, in my day, many a man looked the part of a cutthroat and a thief-because he was one. But these days…ah, well. We did come upon him at the scene of the crime.”
    “It wasn’t actually the scene of the crime. She was strangled, but the police believe she was killed elsewhere and brought to the museum. I was a child when it all happened. Well, a teenager, at any rate, and it was a scandal, and I know it disturbed Sean… I vaguely remember that he and David Beckett were…friends. They both loved sports, football, swim team, diving, fishing…all that. But then David left. And never came back. And the talk died down. Mainly, I believe, because everyone loved Craig Beckett. But if David Beckett is innocent, I really don’t understand his position-or yours. And he’s deserted Key West. So?”
    “I have to admit, I rather admire the fact that he’s so determined, especially because he doesn’t want to stay here. He doesn’t want to see anything like it happen again, whether it affects him or not. I’ll still do my best to take him down for you, though!” he vowed.
    The streets here were quiet, with only the sound of distant, muted laughter coming to them now and again. Even that was infrequent now. The hour was growing late-or early.
    They came to Katie’s house. She’d left lights on in the kitchen, parlor area and porch. The two-seater swing on the porch rocked gently in the breeze. She had a small-very small-patch of ground before the steps to the porch, but her hibiscus bushes were in bloom and they made the entry pretty.
    Set in stained glass from the Tiffany era on the double doors, a Victorian lady and her gentleman friend sat properly, immortalized in timeless ovals.
    Katie unlocked the door and stepped in. Her world was familiar. Her parents were now boating around the world, her brother would always be off filming another documentary and the house was hers. Certainly, her folks had given her a bargain price. But she had purchased it through a bank, she had come up with the down payment and she had never missed a mortgage payment.
    She loved the house. She was delighted that she owned it, that she had kept it in the family.
    And yet, as she stood there, she wondered about the years David Beckett had spent away. He had gone to exotic places. He had discovered the entire globe.
    She’d gone away, too, she reminded herself.
    Right…all the way up the eastern seaboard!
    “Katie?” Bartholomew said.
    She looked at him.
    “What’s the matter now?” he