One Way Ticket: A Lee Smith Mystery

By Jay Forman

Somebody tried to kill me.

Travel writer Lee Smith experiences a bumpy landing when she returns to Canada from a Caribbean cruise. A text from her best friend, billionaire Jack Hughes, appears on her phone before her plane has even reached the gate in Toronto—Somebody tried to kill me.

Even worse, it happened

• Language: English
• Publisher: Level Best Books
• Release date: Mar 6, 2020
• ISBN: 9781087868943

Jay Forman

Jay Forman was once a relatively sane television producer. Since walking away from the cameras she's been crazy busy adding mother and mystery author to her list of credits. She's now locked her focus on sending Canadian travel writer Lee Smith and Jack Hughes (Lee's best friend with many benefits, not least of which is that he's a billionaire philanthropist) to wherever bodies are found.

Book preview

Chapter One

Karl couldn’t do it to her. The crappy lighting over the visitor’s parking lot made the Mulsanne look dull grey, but he knew the official name for the Bentley’s colour was tungsten. It wasn’t just her paint that he didn’t want to tarnish; it was his true admiration for what was hidden inside her—over 1,000 N.m of torque. You had to show respect to a car that had enough power to reverse the earth’s rotation. So he peed on the Porsche instead.

It was a Cayenne Turbo. A performance SUV. Karl zipped his fly back up and chuckled to himself. Talk about an oxymoron. There was no good reason to put that much power into a soccer mum car. Then again, the mothers of the little brats he was supposedly guarding were several marble steps above soccer mums—they were polo mums. When they could manage to squeeze a few seconds of parenting into their hectic social schedules, which wasn’t often. That was why they stuck their kids up here; boarding them like kennel dogs and only letting them out for show.

He didn’t give the KIA a second glance as he walked past it to get a better look at the classic Austin-Healey. That was the best thing about working nights when there was a Board of Governors’ meeting; they turned his rounds into a car show that rivalled any concours d’elégance. The 3000 Mark 1 was a real beauty. Mr Allenby had sure brought her out early in the season. Even though it was April and winter was officially over there was still a chance of snow this far north of Toronto.

With ten minutes left before anyone would expect him back manning the monitors in the office he had enough time to smoke the joint he’d tucked under his toque and he’d just filled his lungs with the sweet smoke when he heard two girls yelling at each other. Why did teenage girls do that so much? They were always yelling or squealing about something. Not for the first time Karl wished that the boys were housed in the upper dorms at the front of the school. If the girls’ dorms were in one of the back buildings their screams wouldn’t reverberate off the stone walls, all the way across the quad, screeching their way to a direct bull’s eye on Karl’s eardrums. If they were in the rear dorms the only living creatures who would have to suffer their verbal assaults would be the loons on the lake. The real loons. Not the crazy rich cottagers.

He was just about to suck in a second toke when a girl let out a blood curdling scream that made the fillings in his teeth hurt. He felt more than heard the weird thud that came next. It sounded close. Close enough to make him flick the joint into the bushes and run.

The wooden planks on the bridge that had once been a drawbridge were wet from the afternoon snow showers and he almost slipped and slid into the archway under the keep, but regained traction once his feet hit the flagstones. His hand automatically swiped his keycard to unlock the double glass doors that opened onto the quad, but his brain couldn’t process what his eyes were seeing. It took real effort to force his feet to walk across to the steps that led up to the school’s main entrance.

Her arms and legs were splayed out on the flagstone steps and her white prefect’s blazer looked like it had been tie-dyed with blood. The tassels on the end of her gold braided boarder captain’s belt were lying in a spreading pool of blood, soaking it up like candle wicks. A piece of her skull was stuck on top of the head of one of the stone lions who guarded the steps and a swath of her long blonde hair was draped over his chiselled mane.

Karl’s puke splattered onto her grey kilt.

Chapter Two

Somebody tried to kill me .

If I’d thought, for even a second, that Jack’s life had actually been put in jeopardy I would have instantly replied to his text, but odds were he was just complaining about being cut-off by an impatient driver. I was dealing with a more real and present danger—the man in the seat behind me. He was in the process of yanking a clump of my hair out of my scalp as he gripped the back of my seat to pull himself up and out of his own seat. I leaned forward to free my hair and heard his head bang against the overhead storage bin. Served him right. He’d spent what felt like half of the flight violently opening and closing the tray table in the back of my seat. I wasn’t going to bother standing up until after the end of the line had moved past my row. What would be the point? It had only been a minute or two since I’d felt the jerk of the plane stopping at the gate. The first-class passengers probably hadn’t even stood up yet, so it would be a while before the back of the flying-bus passengers were allowed to leave. And really, what was there to hurry to? Another line.

I read Jack’s text again.

Somebody tried to kill me.

With my hair now free from Table Man’s grip, I quickly fired back a suitable reply.

Apparently, they weren’t successful. Just landed. Will call when I get home.

The man who’d been sitting in the middle seat beside me stood up and turned to face the aisle. When he bent over, to keep his head from hitting the overhead bin, his butt entered my airspace and I decided to stand-up—the view would be better. Sometimes there were advantages to being vertically challenged. The bin was so far over my head that I’d have to jump to hit it.

Standing in the line for Customs I did the mental math to add up how many hours it was taking me to get home. Whoever said ‘Getting there is half the fun’ was a moron. Fun was the last word I would use to describe getting anywhere that involved air travel, especially if you had to clear into and out of the U.S. An hour waiting in the lounge for my group to be called to disembark from the ship, another hour waiting to clear U.S. Customs, half an hour waiting for the bus that took me to Miami International Airport, an hour waiting to clear through U.S. security screening at the airport, an hour and a half waiting in the boarding lounge, the three hour flight to Toronto, and now I was at least fifteen minutes away from walking under the Bienvenue au Canada sign that hung a few feet in front of the Customs booths. Over eight hours, so far. There’d probably be a line-up to wait for the shuttle bus to take me to the long-term parking lot. Then there’d be the three-hour drive home. And, given the bitchy look in the female Customs officer’s eyes at the booth I was lined up in front of, I’d probably be spending some time in secondary inspection, too. My passport had so many country stamps in it that it always piqued Customs’ curiosity. That was one of the reasons why I’d learned how to jam enough stuff into my backpack to last me seven days. Eight days in a pinch. It gave them less to search through and eliminated having to stand around waiting by the baggage carousel.

The male officer in secondary inspection was much friendlier. He’d even read some of my travel articles. As he rummaged through the contents of my backpack he asked me if I knew anything about the Caribbean cruise he and his wife were about to take. I’d never spent seven days/six nights stuck on a boat with over 5,000 tourists, most of whom would spend far too much time standing in front of the constantly refilled food troughs (otherwise known as the 24-hour buffet) and perpetually inebriated (to varying potencies), with only short bursts of freedom in overly touristed destinations. I’d been lucky enough to steer my career away from mass travel, but knew that most people didn’t have the luxury of being paid to go on unique trips like mine. They only got to read about them. So, I recommended some of the lesser known places I’d visited on the islands he would soon be cruising to. And I didn’t say anything about the five-star cruise ship I’d just been on; it carried fewer than 300 passengers, didn’t have a rock climbing wall or skating rink, or even inside cabins.

Thanks for the tips, Ms. Smith, he said with a big smile as he zipped up my backpack. You’re good to go.

And go I did, in style. I still felt guilty whenever I saw my car. Even though I’d insisted on paying Jack back when he tried to give it to me as a birthday present, I’d only been able to pay him back for the front tires and headlights so far. The car was the main reason why I’d accepted the incognito assignment to write an exposé on the luxury cruise line — I’d be able to claim ownership of the steering wheel and maybe even the rear-view mirror, once I got paid. It was more than I ever would have spent on myself, but the S beside the Q5 on the front grill had made it irresistible. It was also way too big. (Then again, for someone my size anything bigger than a Smart car was technically too big.)

The tall mound of ploughed snow that I’d parked the Audi in front of a week earlier had melted down to a dirty grey bump while I’d been gone. I started the engine, turned on the heavenly heated seats, and wound my way through the Pac-Man maze of a parking lot. I didn’t jack the tunes until after I’d navigated the rat’s nest of highway on and off ramps and interchanges near the airport, those required full concentration. But once I floored the accelerator on the on-ramp to the northbound 400 I was ready for some musical accompaniment. The highway went in one fairly straightforward direction and, unlike the 401 across the top of the sprawling city, there weren’t sixteen lanes jammed full of barely contained road raging drivers to contend with.

I flew past the ever spreading collection of new housing developments, the roller coasters and fake mountain at Canada’s Wonderland, and took the big swerving loop up over the highway to the 400 extension north of Barrie. The tires may have squealed when I took the loop a bit too fast, but I couldn’t hear them over the volume of Imagine Dragons’ On Top of the World blasting out of the top-of-the-line sound system. I thoroughly enjoyed the power that that S on the front grill provided for the next sixteen songs as I got further and further away from mass civilization and was singing the chorus of Pompeii right along with the boys in Bastille when I noticed the flashing red lights in my rearview mirror. I didn’t hear the siren until I turned the volume down.

My second welcome home greeting came over three hours after the customs officer’s greeting and it was much more personal.

Where have you been this time, Lee? Constable Denise asked me as I handed her my driver’s license, ownership, and insurance card. Given the number of times she’d pulled me over I half expected her to have my information memorized.

The Caribbean.

Nice time of year for it. We’re still getting snow showers. The speeding ticket she was about to give me came whirring out of the handheld printer in her hands. Good to have you back. It’s easier to make our quota when you’re home.

Finally, I turned off the four-lane highway onto the two-lane regional road and drove past the Welcome to Port Hamlin, Pop. 467 sign. I was almost home.

It was a Monday night before the prime cottaging season would kick into full gear and inflate the population of the township ten-fold, so all of the little trendy shops along Port Hamlin’s main street were closed. The only business that showed any sign of life was the gas station.

Once I drove out of town, less than five minutes after driving into town, even the roadside lights disappeared. Most of the cottagers reached their places by roads south of Port Hamlin. The locals lived north of Port Hamlin and we didn’t need (or get) permanent lighting. The three-foot high drifts of ploughed snow beside the highway kept me on track; they hadn’t been darkened by city pollution. I drove up the big hill and even without lighting I could feel the imposing presence of the walls of the rock cut that the highway went through. Then I crested the hill and down below me I could see the moonlight reflecting off of thin channels of open water on Maple Lake. They spread across the lake like a drunken spider’s web. The ice break-up had started early this year! I’d fully expected the lake to still be frozen over until after I got back from my trip.

The next man-made lights I saw were the outside floodlights at Auntie Em’s place. Through the trees I could see that she’d turned the lights on inside my house. Hopefully, she’d turned the water heater on, too.

The minute I got out of the car I could smell the wood smoke coming from Auntie Em’s chimney. That was the smell of home. That and Auntie Em’s baking.

She was sitting by the fire, the ten o’clock news playing on the television, her knitting needles clacking away as she worked along the rows of a sweater for one of her online customers.

Before you tell me about your trip, she said as she picked up the remote and pushed the button to turn the television volume down, call Jack. He’s in the hospital.

Why?

He was run over by a pick-up truck.

Holy crap! I was already digging my cell phone out of the side pocket of my backpack. Is he okay?

Well, obviously not — he’s in the hospital. But he’s going to be okay. He’s got a nasty bump on his head and a couple of shiny new metal bolts in his ankle. They fixed his dislocated shoulder.

I pushed the speed dial button for Jack’s number. Why didn’t you call me? I asked her while Jack’s phone rang.

What could you have done? You were floating around with that Australian man and Jack was flying high on painkillers. He wouldn’t have known who you were if you’d called and…

What happened? I said more loudly than I’d planned to when Jack answered his phone.

I told you, somebody tried to kill me.

Seriously? Why? Everybody liked Jack. (Everyone except his ex-wife, that is.)

Seriously. Something’s up at Berkshire. That one word shot a jagged icicle straight down my spine. "Do you want the full story or the Reader’s Digest version?"

"Reader’s Digest, details can follow later."

Girl took a header out of the tower, father asked me to look into it. I was looking when the old Berkshire pick-up truck barrelled into me.

I wanted a million more details but, asked for the most important one first. Who was driving?

No one.

I’m coming to see you. I waved at Auntie Em and walked back outside.

Visiting hours ended at nine.

Like I care. I’ll be there in twenty minutes.

Make it forty. One of the nurses was saying that there’s black ice on the bridges and I don’t want you in the bed next to mine. In my bed — yes; the one next to me — no.

I’m hanging up now.

The nurse had been right, there was black ice on the bridge over the Joe River, but I managed to keep the car mostly under control. Twenty-three minutes after leaving Auntie Em’s place I was jamming the gear shift into park in front of the emergency department at Muskoka General Hospital.

Hey, Lee, the nurse on-duty at the triage desk greeted me. I recognised her but, couldn’t remember her name. What is it this time? Sprain, break or stitches?

It’s not me; I’ve come to see Jack Hughes.

Visiting hours ended over an hour ago.

I know. I smiled sweetly at her. But I was out of town and just got back and I was sort of hoping that…

Oh, go on. You should get some perks for being our most frequent flyer.

Who knew that being a complete klutz would eventually pay off with after-hours benefits?

He’s in room 405.

Of course, he was. Someone with the last name of Hughes was guaranteed to get one of the very few private rooms in the Hughes Wing. I could smell the warehouse of get well flower arrangements the minute I stepped out of the elevator and my allergies kicked in long before I walked into his room.

His face looked like it had been attacked by a cheese grater. His left arm was in a sling and there was a pristine white cast around his left ankle. I noticed the big red label on the IV bag hanging from the stand beside his bed when I leaned down to kiss his cheek. The morphine explained the slightly confused look in his eyes when his eyelids opened slowly.

Hi.

You look like hell. I lowered the bed rail and gently sat down beside him. I would have taken his hand, but the IV needle sticking out of the vein in the back of it grossed me out.

Your nose got sunburned. You look like Rudolph.

Yeah, well don’t get too hopeful, I didn’t bring you any presents.

How was the cruise?

Full of snotty people, kind of like Berkshire on a boat, but I enjoyed the things I did off the boat.

Did what’s-his-name have a good time?

Yup, but we’ve agreed to disagree about him so change the topic.

Is he going to write about the cruise, too?

No, that one’s mine. He’s going to drive Route 66 and do a series of posts about that.

Gosh, it’s a good thing that he hasn’t got any family commitments at home and is free to go half-way around the world whenever you call.

Drop it. Jack would never understand my relationship with Hunter. It worked for us, but Jack was convinced that I was going to get hurt. Hunter and I enjoyed each other’s company and our mutual wanderlust, and the other kind of lust, but he couldn’t hurt me. I didn’t trust anyone enough to give them the power to hurt me. Not even Jack. Besides, Jack only had himself to blame for things starting up with Hunter.

Fine, Jack sighed. So, are you going to trash the cruise in your exposé?

I’m getting paid to tell the truth and the cruise itself didn’t suck. The food was amazing, our suite was huge, and having our own veranda was nice. I liked starting every day sitting out there, watching the world go by. And get this — we even had a butler. His name was Rajiv, such a nice man; he’s from Matara on the south coast of Sri Lanka. He’s got a wife and five daughters back at home. Rajiv brought me a pot of tea super early every morning and…

Let me guess, you talked him into pulling up a chair and having a cup with you, right?

Not every morning! It had taken me a few days to convince Rajiv to take fifteen minutes for himself. So? Anything interesting happen while I was gone? Several days-worth of black stubble was sticking out of Jack’s face and given the healing scabs all over his cheeks I had to wonder when he’d be able to shave again. I usually hated facial hair, but his stubble was surprisingly sexy.

Not much. Except for that truck hitting me it’s been same-old, same-old. He smiled but I could tell it hurt; he’d smiled more on the right side of his face than the left.

What the hell happened, Jack? Joking around and being sarcastic were our normal modus operandi, but I couldn’t keep up the act any longer. My very best friend was lying in a hospital bed; battered, broken and bruised. I felt my eyes start to water and chose to blame it on the pollen count in the room rather than raw emotion.

It depends on who you talk to.

I’m talking to you.

Someone at Berkshire knew I was there to look into the girl’s death, saw me walking to the boathouse, put the truck in neutral and sent it down the big back hill and into me. The wind off the lake was really whipping around, so I didn’t hear it coming until the last minute.

And if I asked someone else? Jack’s fear of moving vehicles (and their operators) often strayed into irrational territory.

The police say it might have been the age of the truck; that the parking brake was probably rusted and just let go, but they’re wrong.

Are we talking about Old Pete’s 1950 Chevy? The one he used to leave parked at the back end of the soccer pitch?

It’s not there now! It went through the ice. They’re going to pull it out and examine it once the ice has gone out.

Oh boy. We were in irrational territory. Jack, that thing has been up there for decades. Old Pete probably hasn’t driven it since the eighties. The parking brake could have easily rusted out, heck the body was fifty percent rust when we were at Berkshire and that was over twenty years ago, and the ground’s wet from the thaw, so the most likely thing is…

Kind of strange that it chose that exact moment to go, don’t you think?

What moment?

The moment when I was just starting to investigate a possible murder.

I stood up and looked at the bags hanging from the IV stand. How much of this stuff are they pumping into you?

Not now, Lee. I’m being serious. Just hear me out, okay?

I’m listening. I carefully stretched out on the bed beside him. I didn’t have to worry about my feet bumping into his cast; his feet were over a foot away from mine. We’d had some of our best conversations while lying side-by-side on slabs of sun-heated Pre-Cambrian Shield. The lumpy mattress was softer, but the hospital-beige ceiling was a poor substitute for clear blue skies or the galaxies of stars over the Torrance Barrens Dark-Sky Preserve.

Three weeks ago, Kayla Wilkes either fell or was pushed out of the tower window. I was there, at a Board meeting, when it happened. A suicide note was found…

Then why…

You can’t listen if you’re talking. He waited to see if I’d stay silent. It took effort, but I kept my mouth closed. The police are investigating and Kayla’s mother is pushing for them to say it was suicide. Her father, on the other hand, thinks someone pushed her. He asked me to look into it. And before you bite your tongue off I’ll answer your unspoken question — why me, right?

I nodded.

Because I have some clout with the school so he knew they couldn’t tell me not to. And he knew that his ex-wife’s financial power wouldn’t faze me. I felt his head turn on the pillow to face me. If you’d met him I know you wouldn’t have been able to say no to him, either.

I just shrugged my shoulders. The girl’s father may have touched me emotionally, but I still would have said no to any involvement in anything related to Berkshire.

I told him I’d do what I could and decided to start by talking to the one person who has always known all the school gossip. The truck hit me when I was walking to her apartment over the boathouse. She moved out of the teacher’s residence last fall. Mademoiselle Cailleux—

My mouth flew open. She’s still alive?

Very much so. She’s gone a little dotty, but—

She’s been at the school since the Nonsuch sailed back to England with the first load of Hudson’s Bay fur pelts!

Berkshire wasn’t even built until the late 1800’s, so that’s a gross exaggeration.

She hated me.

You think everyone there hated you.

They sure acted like it.

I didn’t.

True.

Anyway, as I was saying before I was so rudely interrupted…

I poked him, very gently, with my elbow.

…Mademoiselle Cailleux has always had her finger on the pulse of the place and I was hoping she’d be able to tell me more about Kayla, but then the truck hit me. So, as of right now, I know very little about Kayla other than the basic facts that are in the yearbook. She was just seventeen and her father is absolutely devastated. She was his only child.

I felt bad for him, but I’d never admit that to Jack.

I’ve called a Board meeting to discuss all of this the day after tomorrow, which brings me to—

No.

I haven’t even said what—

I’m not going to Berkshire.

But I have to be there. I gave Kayla’s father my word.

Then go. I’m not stopping you.

I can’t drive while I’m on painkillers and they say I’ll probably need them for a couple of days, at least.

Crap. With anyone else in Jack’s position I could have suggested a chauffeur, a taxi, anything other than what he was asking for. But it was Jack. He hadn’t trusted his life to another driver (of any sort of vehicle) since the day a pilot’s error had buried his parents in the Arctic tundra. He didn’t even let me take the stern when we went canoeing. They probably had to drug him heavily just to get him to agree to get into the ambulance that brought him to the hospital. Driving him to the school didn’t mean that I’d actually be entering the place. I could stay outside, or go for a drive and then come back to get him when his meeting was over.

How long is it going to take you to think this one through? He knew me too well. "The painkillers are on a timed release and I should be getting another squirt soon. I’d