Part 2: The Man in the Raincoat
For a moment, I thought I was still dreaming.
“Arrest?” I croaked. “You think I did that?”
Officer Miller’s grip tightened on my wrist.
“The video shows you carrying the bag onto the beach at 3:47 AM.”
“Yes,” I snapped. “To dig it up!”
The younger officer’s expression didn’t change. “Convenient.”
Goldie barked again. Louder this time. It wasn’t strong, but it was sharp. Defiant.
“Listen to him,” I said, my voice shaking. “Does that sound like a dog afraid of me?”
Miller hesitated. Just a flicker.
“Sir, the footage shows you arriving with the bag.”
“That’s impossible,” I said. “The bag was buried. Anchored. With a twenty-pound dumbbell.”
They exchanged a look.
“You mentioned a weight in your post,” the woman said. “There was no weight found at the scene.”
My stomach dropped.
“I left it in the hole,” I whispered.
“We searched the location,” Miller replied. “There’s no hole.”
The world tilted.
I stepped back onto the porch. “You think I staged it? In the middle of a hurricane? At my age?”
The young officer studied me. Not angry. Curious.
Goldie barked again. Then whimpered.
That changed something.
“Can we see the dog?” she asked.
Miller frowned. “Protocol—”
“If he’s injured, we need to document it.”
There was a long pause.
“Fine,” Miller muttered.
They stepped inside.
Goldie was lying on the kitchen rug, wrapped in my late wife’s old quilt. His eyes followed me when I entered. His tail thumped once.
The officers crouched.
The woman gently examined his collar. The tape marks were still visible around his muzzle. The rope fibers still clung to his fur.
“He was bound,” she murmured.
Miller’s jaw tightened.
“And hypothermic,” I added. “Check his gums. Pale this morning.”
She did.
“They’re pink now,” she said quietly. “He’s stabilizing.”
Miller stood slowly.
“Where’s the weight, Mr. Vance?”
“I told you. In the hole.”
“There is no hole.”
That’s when it hit me.
The tide.
The storm surge had been brutal. High winds. Coastal flooding warnings all night.
“If someone went back after I left,” I said slowly, “and filled it in… the tide would smooth it out by morning.”
Miller didn’t respond.
But the younger officer did.
“Or,” she said, “if someone saw your post before sunrise.”
Silence.
Miller pulled out his phone.
“Dispatch,” he said. “I need timestamps on that forum post and confirmation of the first call-in complaint.”
He paced toward the living room while we waited.
Goldie struggled to sit up.
“Easy,” I whispered, helping him.
He leaned against my leg.
And then something strange happened.
The younger officer noticed it first.
“There’s something on his collar.”
She tilted it.
A small metal tag dangled beneath the rabies tag. It wasn’t a name.
It was an engraving.
“Property of S.H.”
My heart skipped.
“S.H.?” I repeated.
Her eyes flicked toward Miller.
“The North Pier development project,” she said carefully. “Sandhaven Holdings.”
The biggest real estate company in town.
They’d been trying to buy up the old coastal houses for months. Mine included.
I’d refused every offer.
Too many memories here.
Miller came back into the kitchen, face pale.
“The first complaint about Arthur being ‘erratic’ came in at 4:12 AM,” he said.
I stared at him.
“I posted at 4:09.”
The room went very still.
“That’s a three-minute window,” the younger officer said softly. “In the middle of a hurricane.”
Miller exhaled slowly.
“And the security footage,” she added, “only shows him arriving. There’s no footage of him burying anything.”
Goldie whimpered and pressed closer to me.
Miller looked at the dog. Then at me.
“Mr. Vance… have you had any recent disputes? Anyone angry with you?”
I thought of the letters.
The “final offers.”
The polite threats about “eminent domain discussions.”
Sandhaven Holdings wanted beachfront property for a luxury marina.
And I owned one of the last untouched lots near North Pier.
“They offered me half a million last year,” I said quietly. “I told them my wife’s ashes are scattered in that yard.”
The younger officer’s eyes darkened.
Miller ran a hand over his face.
“If someone wanted to discredit you,” he said slowly, “a public animal cruelty accusation would do it.”
“Make the old widower look unstable,” she added.
Goldie suddenly barked again — stronger this time.
Three sharp barks.
Not afraid.
Alert.
We all turned.
A black SUV was parked across the street.
Engine running.
Watching.
Miller swore under his breath.
“That vehicle’s been reported circling the pier area all morning.”
The SUV’s windows were tinted.
But I could feel it.
The same cold rage I’d felt on the beach crept back into my chest.
“They came back for him,” I said.
The younger officer stood.
“Stay inside,” she ordered.
Miller stepped onto the porch, hand near his belt.
The SUV’s engine revved.
For a split second, I thought they’d drive off.
Instead, the passenger door opened.
A man stepped out in a dark raincoat.
The same kind I owned.
He smiled.
And raised his phone.
Recording us.
Miller’s voice hardened.
“Sir, step away from the vehicle.”
The man didn’t move.
He just called out, loud enough for me to hear:
“You should’ve stayed out of it, old man.”
Goldie growled.
Low.
Deep.
Instinctive.
Not the bark of a frightened puppy.
The sound of a dog who remembered.
And then I realized something terrifying.
Goldie wasn’t just a victim.
He was evidence.
And someone was willing to come back in daylight to erase it.
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