Beauty Queens and Cruises: A Humorous Cruise Ship Cozy Mystery (Cruise Ship Cozy Mysteries Book 4)

by A. R. Winters

  Ruth considered my words carefully before responding.

  “Okay.”

  “Well?”

  “The crown was left outside the door of my cabin. Obviously one of the poor pageant victims placed it there as a sign of solidarity with me.”

  Obviously. There couldn’t be any other possible explanation in her narrow-minded view of the world. I could immediately think of several other reasons.

  The crown could have been placed there to taunt her.

  The crown could have been given to her in a weak attempt at framing her for murder.

  The crown could have been left there in a you’re next kind of warning.

  But we didn’t need Ruth to worry about any of those possibilities just yet, so I decided to play along with her explanation for now.

  “But you don’t know who it was? Could you hazard a guess?”

  Ruth shook her head. “I don’t know who it was. Unfortunately, the poor pageant women are too afraid to reveal their dissatisfaction to me personally. It’s a secret message of solidarity from the shadows.”

  Ethan and I exchanged weary glances. Why had it taken her so long to reveal so little? Perhaps she just liked the attention.

  Ethan cleared his throat, leaned forward on his desk, and gave Ruth a hard look.

  “Ruth, I understand your political and social views. I’m sympathetic to them. I really am. But I have to keep our ship safe and secure for our passengers, and I have a duty to ensure that the other passengers, who have all paid good money to be on this ship, can enjoy their cruise without disruption.

  “I need you to stop these protests,” he went on. “If you do not, you will forfeit your right to be a passenger on this ship.”

  “Are you threatening to execute me? Make me walk the gangplank? That is just typical of the male-centric—”

  “No. I’m saying that you will be confined to a secure location. By which I mean the brig, also known as the ship’s prison, unless you stop your protests.”

  Ruth smacked her hands down on the back of the chair she was standing behind.

  “Have you ever heard of a little thing called the first amendment? I have a right to—”

  I stopped her there. As a former journalist, I was well versed in that particular amendment.

  “Ruth, you have a right to say what you want, but Swan has no obligation to provide you with a platform with which to do so. It’s not a public space, and you don’t have permission to protest here. The first amendment doesn’t give you the right to interrupt or interfere with private events, or give you the right to demand a private enterprise provide you with a platform for your opinions.”

  Ruth stared at me for a moment, then muttered under her breath but didn’t offer further complaint. I suspected she knew what I was saying already, but had been hoping to bamboozle us with her talk of the Bill of Rights.

  Ethan picked up where I left off.

  “This is our final warning and I want you to take it seriously. If there are any further protests, you’ll be sent to the brig and as soon as we return to American waters you’ll be removed from the ship. That is my decision and it’s final. Do you understand?”

  “It’s what I expected,” said Ruth, standing up straight. “You’ve all been brainwashed. Still, I hope I’ve planted some seeds of hope in the minds of some of the pageant victims.”

  “I’m sure you’ve given them all a lot to think about,” said Ethan charitably.

  “They certainly won’t forget you,” I added. I didn’t mention why they weren’t likely to forget her though, as I didn’t think she’d appreciate that much.

  “May I leave now?” Ruth looked toward the door behind her.

  Ethan couldn’t agree fast enough, and after extracting a final promise from her to cease her protests, we were alone again.

  “Do you think she’s going to behave?” asked Ethan.

  “Probably not,” I said. “But what more can you do? She’s had a final warning now.”

  “You know, her idea about the gangplank may not have been such a bad idea after all.”

  We both laughed at that.

  While of course he was kidding, he was running out of options with her. He really would have to lock her up if she kept disturbing the smooth operation of the ship and its events.

  “What was the other thing you mentioned?”

  I stood up, reached into my pocket, and placed the silver bracelet I had found into the gift shop onto the desk, next to the crown.

  “Was that Diana’s too?”

  “Yep. She was wearing it when Ruth did her stage invasion on the pool deck.”

  Ethan picked it up and held it to the light, slowly examining it.

  “Where did you find it?”

  I explained that I had found it in a pile of boas in the gift shop after I’d accidentally crashed into Rolf. I didn’t mention the housekeeper I was following though, glossing over that part. Ethan had enough to worry about as it was, and I wanted him to keep his focus on Kimberly and Rolf for now.

  “That must have been quite a scene!” he said with a chuckle. “And you’re sure the bracelet came from Rolf?”

  I shook my head. “I can’t be certain. I suppose it could coincidentally have been on the floor there. But that doesn’t seem likely, does it? On a ship this big? That I would just run into it after crashing into Rolf? If that was the case I should probably buy a lottery ticket too!”

  “Yeah, I see your point. So, is that three suspects we have?”

  “I guess. I wasn’t really counting Ruth though.”

  Ethan shook his head. “I don’t think we should discount her yet. She had the crown after all, and she hated the beauty pageant. It would be quite a statement, wouldn’t it? Strangling the beauty queen with her own sash in protest?”

  “Yeah, but I don’t see it. I really believe that she thinks she’s on the side of every woman on the planet. I don’t think she would deliberately hurt another woman. I just don’t see it. Now, if it had been Rolf that had been strangled…”

  Ethan nodded along but I could tell he wasn’t entirely convinced. He was welcome to follow up on Ruth, but I would stay focused on Kimberly and Rolf. I had serious questions for both of them, and I couldn’t imagine that their answers were going to be entirely innocent.

  “You may be right,” Ethan said, “but I want to keep all our options open. Let me know what else you find out. But be careful. Don’t let yourself be alone with any of them. We’ll go to Kimberly’s cabin together later to speak to her, assuming she’s there.”

  I nodded agreement. It would be nice to do something together with Ethan. While questioning a potential murder suspect wasn’t exactly top of my list of potential date ideas, it would at least be memorable.

  “Will do. Let me know if you find anything else out too. We might be able to put together connections if we stay informed.”

  “Yep. By the way, I still owe you the rest of that dinner. As soon as this is all over with…”

  I grinned at him. I’d almost begun to think he’d forgotten about our interrupted date. But of course he hadn’t. Ethan wasn’t the kind of person to forget about anything.

  “Promise?” I asked.

  “Scout’s honor,” he said with a grin.

  Despite my near-death experience, the recent murder, the constant protests of Ruth, and the continuing existence of my stalker, I left Ethan’s office with a happy smile on my face.

  Happy, but nervous.

  I had a lot to do.

  Chapter 17

  Ethan and I met near Kimberly’s room and walked over together.

  “Do you think she’ll be there?” asked Ethan.

  “I sure hope so. If she isn’t, or she won’t talk to us, we’ll know something’s up for certain though.”

  Outside her door we rung the bell and waited for her to answer. Although there wasn’t really any reason to be, I felt nervous. She should be the one feeling nervous, I thought, not me, but my brain didn’t
operate on logic.

  After a moment, we heard her approaching, and then the door swung open to reveal the messy room beyond.

  Kimberly was wearing shorts and a T-shirt and her hair was wet. For once, we saw one of the beauty queens in a more natural state. She’d just come out of the shower by the looks of it. She had managed to apply a light layer of makeup already though.

  “Why, hello there,” she said as she slowly ran her eyes over us. She spent more time looking at Ethan, and there was a little nod of approval as she scanned his pristine uniform. Finally, she turned her gaze to me.

  “So you made it down from the wall then, did you, darlin’?”

  I put on a smile to show that I wasn’t bothered. Even though I was.

  “Oh yes, no problem. It was great fun.”

  She narrowed her eyes at me, clearly not believing a word I was saying. “What can I do for y’all?”

  “Could we come in and talk to you for a moment, please?” said Ethan.

  “Well you can, but my room is a mess. But y’all are welcome. Come on in.”

  Kimberly swung the door all the way open and padded across the room. She had one of the smaller cabins, and it wasn’t really designed for meetings. Apart from the double bed, there were two padded chairs and a combined desk and makeup table. There were clothes scattered about the room, hanging on the backs of chairs, in a heap on the bed, and strewn across the floor.

  Kimberly pulled out the two chairs so that they were together in front of the bed, and indicated for us to sit on them. She sat on the edge of the bed, her feet barely touching the ground.

  Ethan and I sat down, and Kimberly gave us an expectant look.

  “So what can I do for y’all?”

  “Kimberly, I want to ask you about this,” I said, holding up the little disc I had shown her earlier.

  Unlike last time, there was no wall for her to escape up.

  She stared at it but didn’t say anything. She waited for us to continue.

  “Kimberly, did you cut this from one of Diana Penn’s shoes?”

  She bit her lip and looked around the room, as if looking for an escape route. Finally, realizing there wasn’t one, she answered.

  “I... did.” she stared down at her feet, not wanting to meet our eyes. “But I didn’t kill her!”

  “No one said you did,” said Ethan in a gentle but firm voice. “We’re just trying to figure out what has been going on.”

  “You sabotaged her shoes?” I asked for confirmation.

  “Yeah,” she said slowly.

  “Why? What happened?”

  “I didn’t mean to. Not at first. It just kinda happened.” She paused and looked at us both, biting her lower lip again. I nodded for her to continue. “I went to her room, to make amends. I wanted to put the past behind us.”

  “Are you referring to the fact that you used to be her protege, until she dropped you?”

  “We parted ways a few years ago. It’s nothin’ unusual. A lot of girls change coaches through the course of their career. It’s normal.”

  “From what I heard, there was a rather embarrassing event that precipitated you and Diana parting ways though, right? You fell off a stage?”

  Kimberly’s cheeks flushed slightly and she shifted about uncomfortably on the bed. She clearly did not like being reminded of that time.

  “That was a long time ago. I’m over it now. I admit, I was mad back then. I thought she shoulda supported me more. But now I know I was wrong—she was right to get rid of me when she did. I wasn’t worth it back then.”

  I felt sad for her then. I wanted to go back in time and tell her she was worth it.

  “But we hadn’t spoken since,” she continued, “and I didn’t want to leave things off like that. I wanted to tell her I forgave her, that it was all in the past. That’s why I went to see her.”

  “So you went to Diana’s cabin and… sabotaged her shoes? That doesn’t sound like you were trying to make amends.” Ethan wasn’t going to let her off the hook easily.

  “I didn’t mean to. I went to her cabin to just clear the air. But she wasn’t there, and the door was open. I couldn’t help myself. When I saw her old crown, sittin’ on the nightstand, all those awful old memories came back. How she’d laughed along with the rest of them… and then kicked me out of her squad. It wasn’t fair then, and she never made it right. I thought I was over it all... but when I saw her crown, it all came back. How I felt that day. How everyone laughed. I wanted to make them laugh at her, instead.”

  Ethan and I exchanged sympathetic looks. Although her behavior was almost incomprehensible to us, we all knew what it was like to be embarrassed. I could almost understand how she acted. Almost, but not quite.

  “So you decided to sabotage her shoes? To get revenge?” asked Ethan.

  “Yeah. I went a little crazy. I removed a little bit from one of every pair of her heels. I wanted her to fall off a stage and have everyone laugh at her. See how she liked it.”

  Kimberly had begun wringing her hands together while she spoke, running them over and over each other. She was nervous. But was it just because of what she had done to Diana’s shoes, or was there something more?

  “But I didn’t kill her!” She looked imploringly at the two of us, her light blue eyes seeming to be begging to be believed. “I didn’t. What happened to me happens all the time in the pageant world. It didn’t stop me—I just got another coach. Diana didn’t ruin my career or nothin’. It wasn’t like I was one of the girls in the nude picture scandal or anything.”

  “The what?” I asked.

  Ethan leaned forward on the chair, his hands resting on his knees. I did the same. We might finally be getting somewhere.

  “You didn’t hear about that?” Kimberly seemed surprised. “You don’t follow the news?”

  “I don’t manage to keep up with all the pageant news.”

  Kimberly shook her head with a slight frown, disappointed in the fact that Ethan and I were way behind on all the pageant gossip.

  “A couple of years ago, there was a bit of a scandal. Several of Diana’s girls had pictures stolen from their phones—nude ones—and they were all posted online with nasty captions about beauty queens.”

  “That’s awful,” said Ethan seriously.

  “And you think Diana did it?”

  “Most people don’t. In fact, they have a lot of sympathy for Diana over it. She lost a buncha clients over it. Several of the girls just dropped out of pageants entirely. I heard a couple of them even moved just to escape the whole mess. One even decided to become a doctor instead. Can you imagine? She could have achieved so much, but she threw it all away because of a few silly ol’ pictures.”

  “That’s... a big change from beauty pageants.” Kimberly and I clearly ranked ‘great jobs’ somewhat differently. At least it seemed that way from the disdainful way she said doctor, like it was an embarrassment.

  “But do you think Diana was involved in releasing the pictures?” asked Ethan.

  Kimberly slowly nodded. “I can’t prove it or nothin’. But she had a mean streak—claimed it was the only way to get the best out of her girls—and I can’t help but think she released them to teach them a lesson. Y’know, that they shouldn’t be thinking about boys, they should be focusing on the pageants. Seems like the kind of thing she might could’ve done.”

  “But it backfired and she lost a bunch of her clients?”

  “Yep, as best as I can tell, that’s what happened. But I wasn’t with her then of course, so I only just heard about it all secondhand. Diana denied everything, and most people believed her.”

  Ethan nodded slowly, satisfied with what he’d heard so far. It did seem a little unlikely to me that Diana would have released pictures of her own clients to punish them. But a lot of what these pageant people did was bizarre to me.

  “And could you tell us where you were the morning Diana died?”

  Kimberly looked at me before she answered. And then I rem
embered. I’d seen her that morning.

  “I was with Clarissa, at the Boulevard Café. We didn’t want to stuff ourselves with food like some of the other girls, so we just went for a coffee instead.”

  I nodded confirmation to Ethan.

  “I remember now—I did see her there with Clarissa. Ruth was there too. It was just before I discovered... Diana.”

  “I see. Thank you, Kimberly. Now, do you think there’s anything else we should know about Diana Penn, or anyone else involved in the pageant on the ship?”

  Kimberly scrunched up her face in thought for a moment,

  “No. I don’t think so. We’re all just normal people, y’know?” I most certainly did not know, but I understood what she was driving at. “What happened to Diana was such a shock to everyone. I can’t think of anyone who’d wanna hurt her like that.”

  Right. Sabotaging her shoes is perfectly normal behavior, but strangling someone isn’t.

  “Thanks for your time, Kimberly. Good luck in the competition.” Ethan stood up, picked up his chair, and placed it back under the desk where it had come from. I quickly followed suit.

  “Thanks Kimberly. See you around.”

  “Want to climb with me again? I could give y’all some tips.”

  I shook my head so rapidly and suddenly I put a crick in my neck.

  “Umm, no thanks. I think I’ll stick to the gym instead.”

  Kimberly gave me a quizzical look. “You go to the gym?”

  What was this, an interrogation? I mumbled something under my breath about being too busy and followed it up with a forced laugh.

  “Bye,” I said, opening the door and stepping outside before she could really push me on my exercise habits. I would go to the gym with Cece. Once I had some spare time, anyway. I was just so busy.

  When we were outside of her room, Ethan and I naturally headed toward the outside deck. We needed to confer after our meeting with her and there was too much chance of being overheard inside the ship.

  It was a hot, sunny day, the warmth of the sun’s rays tempered by a salty sea breeze that seemed to effortlessly fill the lungs. Not that breathing was too much of a chore for me—I’m not that out of shape—but there’s something really energizing about an ocean wind.