Page 29 of Murder in the Lighthouse

“I don’t know. I didn’t look.”

“Well, look for the card. Read me what the card says. Tell me which florist sent the flowers.”

“Janet’s getting it now. I see it’s from one that I’ve often used. The place is called Petal Paradise. They grow their own flowers in the back of their shop in a huge greenhouse where they cultivate all manner of exotic tropical plants like orchids and African violets. This bunch of posies must have at least twenty kinds of flowers in it.”

“The card, Dad. What does the card say?”

“It’s a rhyme and not a very good one at that. This time, it’s not a love letter. The card reads:Graeme, you may be tall, you may be rich, but I’ll carve you up like a little bitch. You make me cry. You make me sick. Because you’ve been such a nasty prick, these flowers are sent with ill-willed intent. I’ll chop you up fine, my buttercupmine, stick the blade deep, deep into your spine.”

“Ouch. Jeez. Your fan has turned from singing your praises to showing that they have a violent streak. That’s not good. Okay. I’ll get right on it.”

With panic in his voice, Graeme pleaded, “I’m not kidding around here, Lucien. I need to see some results. Look what happened to Rory. Do you want the same thing to happen to me? Do you want someone coming in here and slitting my throat while I sleep? You wouldn’t do this to another client. I’m family. I need you to take care of the problem.”

“I will. I will. I’ll have you an answer by this afternoon,” he promised. “You’ll have a name you can give to the cops.”

“I’ll expect to hear from you, mate,” Graeme grumbled, hanging up.

“Are we going to Santa Barbara?” Brogan wondered.

“No. I have a better idea, and it doesn’t involve leaving the house.”

“I like the sound of that. What’s the plan?”

“I’ll go directly to the source and ask Petal Paradise who ordered the flowers. These kinds of stalkers aren’t always careful with their personal information.”

“I like that idea.”

Lucien looked up the number for the florist and punched in the digits. A woman answered. He asked to speak to someone in charge. After identifying herself as the owner of the business, he gave them his name and explained why he had called, including how the recipient had received several threatening emails and now flowers from her shop and feared for his safety. “Are you in the habit of sending flowers to a person when the message on the card involves a threat?”

“No. Of course not. But we don’t read the cards if the customer comes into the store in person. We honor their privacy if they write the card and seal it in the little envelope. We’re not in the habit of prying into people’s private moments.”

“This private moment didn’t go well with the person who received the flowers. The message was a threat. Did this customer pay cash or use a credit card?”

“The arrangement sent to Mr. Sutter is our top-of-the-line product. It goes for almost four hundred dollars. So, I’m fairly certain they used a credit card.”

“I’ll need the name on the card.”

“I’m uncomfortable giving out that information over the phone.”

“Would you rather I call our lawyersandthe police? Or how about if we called the media and held a news conference in frontof your store? We can make a big stink about this or handle it quietly without anyone knowing you gave up the cardholder’s name?”

The woman let out a resigned sigh. “Okay. Hold on, and I’ll look it up.”

Lucien waited on hold while cheery Christmas jazz played in his ears. After two minutes, the owner returned with the information. “The name on the card is Florence Brown.”

“Okay. That’s all I need to know. Thanks.”

“You won’t say anything negative to the media, will you?” the owner asked.

“As long as the name checks out, you’re in the clear. Thanks.”

“You really made that threat sound real,” Brogan remarked from across the table. “Would you have followed through?”

“Maybe,” he said as he opened his laptop to hunt down anything he could find about Florence Brown. He booted up the software app he hoped would give him an insight into this woman who, depending on her mood, either sent adoring fan letters to a rock singer or threatened to cut him with a knife.

“Found her. Jeez, she’s a fan, all right. Her entire social media presence is full of pictures of Indigo, specifically Graeme Sutter, on stage, going as far back as twenty years ago. And look at this. It appears her cover photo is of all the band members. She posted a picture of your dad, too. Here she is with Graeme. I wonder if that’s photoshopped or if Florence actually met them in person back in the day?”

“Lucien, this woman could be having a mental health issue, a mental breakdown,” Brogan pointed out. “She’s taken obsession to the next level. These are pictures of us when we were in our teens.”

---