by B. T. Alive
“Were they all Dante’s guests? Not Lee’s?” I said. “I mean, besides you?”
Frannie raised her eyebrows, as if the question were impertinent. “I can see you already have your suspicions.”
Behind the counter, Natisha grumbled that I should mind my own business.
“For what it’s worth…” Frannie sighed. “I suppose it’s no secret. Lee asked me to be her matron of honor. I was touched, but neither of us would have said we were close. Not these days. Lee’s a very hard worker… I don’t know that she had any friends who were coming in, and I know that I’m the only family who still had the health to be present. I say all this because it’s nothing she wouldn’t have figured out…” She gave Tina a brusque nod. “… if things had gone as planned.”
“I see,” I said. “Thank you.”
“You can thank me by staying away from her. From Lee,” Frannie snapped, with a sudden vehemence that startled me. “I saw her this morning, and she’s in no condition to be pestered by a couple of amateur sleuths. He meant everything to her. It’s bad enough she’ll have to deal with Jake. I know it would be pointless trying to get you to completely mind your own business, but I hope you can at least confine yourself to hassling those guests, rather than the grieving.”
The outburst was so harsh, so surprising, that some of the nearby tables had gone quiet. Even Ambrose, standing at her side, looked pained.
I had no idea what to say, so I just nodded. “I understand,” I said.
“Good,” she snapped. “And remember: this town has a long memory. People don’t rest easy with ‘mysterious’ accidents. I hope, for your sake, that your snooping bears fruit.”
“Me?” I said.
But she was looking at Tina.
Chapter 17
Despite Frannie’s creepy sendoff threat, both Tina and I were feeling pretty good as we hustled up to the Inn.
We had people to interview, and they were all at the Inn, so Tina knew exactly where to find them. As we had on previous investigations, we could simply knock on each room’s door and present ourselves as solicitous hotel staff… it felt like old times.
Of course, hotel staff didn’t usually walk around carrying a huge, adorable cat. True, this was Wonder Springs, but we realized that since we were back in the Inn, Tina would probably be safe without her feline shield. Plus, without Mr. Charm, she’d probably have an easier time using her empathy to read these people’s feelings. And I could always run and grab him if she started raging out.
Funny what starts to feel like normal.
We dropped off Mr. Charm in the Inn kitchen—I’m not sure what the Health Code would say on that, but no one feeds that cat like Vladik, our chef. Vladik is this huge Russian dude who will blast almost anyone with a stream of bilingual invective on the slightest pretext, but the second he sees Mr. Charm, he starts murmuring sweet nothings and filling a plate. Between Vladik and Tina, I was lucky Mr. Charm still slept in my room.
“So who’s first?” I said, as we exited the dining room, cat-free.
Tina frowned, studying the forwarded email on her phone. “Let’s start with the Shains. They’re a couple on the ground floor.”
“A couple?” I said, as we crossed the wide lobby and slipped into a wainscotted hallway. “I hope the wife was totally over Dante.”
Tina frowned, but she said nothing.
Every hallway in the Inn has its own particular touch; here, the Victorian wallpaper behind the bronze sconces featured the twining vines and abundant clusters of, yes, grapes. The still, peaceful air even seemed to smell of a vineyard: not only the sweet scent of the fruit, but the warm, green smell of the sun-drenched vines and earth. Where did Grandma find this kind of air freshener?
Tina stopped at a thick door, checked the quaint pewter numerals embedded in the oak, and knocked.
“I’ll do the talking,” I said. “See if you can get a read on the wife, whether she lies. I’ll work around to Dante and whatever she was doing last night.”
Tina nodded, her face tight.
It occurred to me that, with all the drama of busting Tina out of jail that morning, I still hadn’t gotten the details of what she’d been doing last night—why exactly she’d been on that bridge. She’d told the sheriff in her initial statement that she’d never even seen Dante, of course, only found the railing smashed and then frozen in horror. But that didn’t explain what she’d been hoping to do at that house. Had she come to see Dante, or Lee? Or both?
Then the door opened, and I forgot all these Tina musings.
Because the man standing in the doorway looked like Cary Grant.
“Good morning! What have we here?” he cried, in his chipper accent. He wore an old-fashioned dressing gown and slippers, and his slicked dark hair wafted a scent of manly hair gel. His dark eyes took in Tina with an appraising glance, but to my surprise, he flicked away from her in an instant and settled on me. Now his gaze lingered.
“Hi,” I squeaked.
Why was I squeaking? Summer!
He snapped his fingers, and he lit up with a smile. “I remember you!” he cried. “At the fountain! Of course! Darling?” He leaned back and called into the room. “Darling? Are you decent? It’s that charming young thing to whom you were so execrable. I believe she’s returned to enact her revenge.” He popped back toward us and gave me an elaborate wink.
“Oh no, we’re not trying to—” I began.
From behind the door came the noise of a low groan.
“Oh no, darling,” said Kelvin Shain, turning back toward the room interior. “Not now. Not when we have guests.”
“Guests?” snapped a woman; I recognized the voice as Adora, his wife. “Who?”
“See for yourself!” he cried, and with a dramatic flourish, he flung the door wide open.
Every room in the Inn is unique and lovely—at least, every guest room—but I’d never yet seen this particular suite. Unfortunately, I wasn’t seeing much now, either, because all the curtains were drawn, shrouding the vintage wallpaper and assorted antique furniture in a gloomy twilight. But there was enough light to discern the aristocratic form of the beautiful Adora, leaning against the bathroom door in her own dressing gown, frowning and shielding her eyes.
“Who are these people?” she snapped.
“Ah!” cried her husband. He turned on us with arched eyebrows. “Lovely to see you. Who are you again?”
“We’re staff,” I said, flat and uninspired. Honestly, I was finding myself disappointed with this Kelvin guy. After that initial flush of surprise and, okay, attraction, I was realizing that he wasn’t nearly as dashing as I’d remembered. On prolonged inspection, he didn’t really look that much like Cary Grant. And he seemed to find himself rather excessively amusing.
So, no Cade threat there. Good news, right?
Except then I remembered how his hand had felt…
“Staff?” Adora snapped. “What do you want? We didn’t call for any staff.”
“Yes, and we appreciate that,” I said.
Beside me, Tina’s eyebrows arched, and she shook her head in an anxious what?
“But,” I continued, recovering smoothly, “we know this must be a difficult time for you, and we just wanted to ask if there’s anything we can do.”
Adora moaned in pain, clutching her head. “Can you extract this meat cleaver from my skull?”
“We could get Cade—” Tina muttered.
But before I could shush her, Adora groaned again. “Make them go away,” she moaned, and she staggered past the bed toward another small door. She wrenched it open, revealing a tiny side room where the window had been blocked with some material so thick that the room was nearly pitch black. She shut the door behind her with infinite care, and the soft squeak of a mattress leaked through the wall as the poor tortured soul sought repose.
Great. Our prime suspect had just walled herself off for a nap.
I slipped Tina a questioning glance, but she gave a minute shrug.
“Do they get worse with stress?” I asked, straining to sound solicitous. “She must be devastated over the news about Mr. Radcliff.”
“It certainly is upsetting,” he said. “Poor devil.” Kelvin rested his gaze on the lush rug, reflective. “But perhaps he’ll turn up.”
“I don’t think so,” I said, wondering how many days this guy thought it took you to drown. “I don’t believe he could swim.”
“Ah,” he said, with grave nod.
“Not that I’d want you to deprive your wife of hope,” I said. “Were they close?”
Beside me, Tina winced, though I couldn’t tell whether she was getting something from Kelvin Shain or just reacting to my hamhanded question. Possibly both.
But Kelvin arched an eyebrow, and his lips twitched in a mischievous smile. “Small-town gossip. A true force of nature,” he said. “That was all years ago, my dear. You can tell all your friends that when my dear Adora first held the invitation, she expressed her surprise that the man even had her address. The truth is, we only attended as an act of kindness; we know absolutely none of the other attendees, and we had no idea that the group would be so small. And I don’t know what exotic flora you cultivate here, but the pollen is positively weaponized. The poor girl’s been in torment almost since we arrived. The entire night before the wedding, she was prostrate with pain.”
“Oh no,” Tina said, with genuine compassion.
“Really?” I said. “What about last night?”
Oops. Now I really had crossed the line, even for chatty Matinee Man. Kelvin Shain frowned, and he studied me anew, with a keen gaze that was not friendly.
“I believe I should call my solicitor,” he said, evenly.
“No, no,” I said. “I didn’t mean—”
“I’m sure,” he said. “Well. Much as I regret to disappoint your febrile imagination, Adora and I passed a lovely evening last night in your Hearth Room—I believe that’s what you call it, the charming little room from the eighteenth century, with the fireplace and everything made of brick? We spent several pleasant hours playing whist with multiple charming companions, including, I believe, your matriarchal proprietor. I’m sure she’ll be happy to vouch that we were up past midnight—well past the hour when they discovered Radcliff missing.”
He crossed his arms and glowered, visibly seething with indignation.
“Good to know,” I said. “Thanks.”
“You are most welcome,” he said. “And now, if it’s not too much trouble…?”
“Right. Sure. Enjoy your day,” I said, taking a step back even though we were standing in the hall anyway. It was a good thing I didn’t actually work here anymore, or I’d probably have gotten fired.
“And you. Come again soon; it’s always a delight to exchange bon mots with strangers who suspect your wife of murder.” With an elaborate bow, he seized Tina’s hand, pressed it, and raised it to his lips.
As he kissed her hand, a treacherous tremor tingled in my chest. Tina, too surprised to resist, watched him with confusion. Then he turned to me.
Should I? My hand seemed to float at my side, like some separate creature with its own needs, open and receptive and prickling with desire.
But even as he reached, I yanked up my hand and crossed my arms, digging either hand into an armpit. I clenched them tight, as if my hand might reach back of its own accord, bewildered at the force of will this was requiring.
Kelvin clenched his own rejected hand, balling it into a fist. He straightened up and eyed me, his lip curling in scorn.
Regret flooded me. I felt a sudden desperate ache to make that connection… any connection…
But he slammed the door.
Chapter 18
“What was that about?” Tina said, as she led the way up the wooden spiral staircase to the next “suspect” on an upper floor.
“Nothing,” I said. We both knew it was pointless to lie about something like this to an empath, but that didn’t mean I’d lost the right to stonewall.
“You weren’t missing anything, I promise,” Tina said. She wiped the back of her hand on her skirt.
“Oh my gosh, can we just focus?” I said, trying to squash my lingering tremors. “Who’s next? An entire cheerleading squad?”
“Nope,” said Tina, unamused. “A nice single lady named Rhonda Cameron. I’ve seen her at meals, she’s a doll.”
“Perfect,” I said, as Tina stopped at a door carved with sunbursts and knocked. “Feel free to jump in this time.”
“You did fine,” she said. “Adora had alibis. Assuming his whist story checks out with Grandma, she’s all clear. Mission accomplished. One less suspect to worry about.”
“I guess,” I said. Something about the interview didn’t sit right with me, but I wasn’t sure what. Maybe I’d just hoped that it’d be easy for once… the murderer would be the snide, dismissive, gorgeous goddess chick with the lock on the dashing husband… okay, I really had a problem…
In the silence, Tina frowned and knocked again. “Rhonda?” she called. “You there?”
From inside the room, footsteps thudded away from the door. I heard a latch click and the swing of an inner door, and then more steps, and then finally, a lugubrious female middle-aged voice called, “Enter!”
We entered.
Unlike the twilight Shain room downstairs, this room was flooded with sunlight. So much so that I had to blink a second and squint before I could make out where the woman was standing.
She was outside, on a balcony, with both French doors thrown wide and streaming in the morning sun. The sky this morning had been mostly overcast, gunmetal gloomy with the threat of a future storm, but just this minute the sun had broken through, and somehow, the overcast background for the mountains on the horizon made the sunlight on the treed slopes shadowed and dramatic.
Or maybe the drama was this Rhonda Cameron herself. The woman was poised at the railing, head high, surveying the landscape with nostrils flared. A strong cool breeze was ruffling her brightly blonded curls, billowing her loose light shirt, and cavorting with her long, red silk scarf so it waved behind her like a flag.
Oh wait. I’d seen this woman before. The scarf lady. With the tilting cone of frozen banana scoops. Great.
If she’d been some emaciated model in her 20s, the dramatic look might have worked. But her face was stamped with a kind of irrepressible silliness; maybe her turned-up pink nose, or the crooked looseness of her lips, or the gleam in her goggly little eyes. She looked like a Muppet who thought she was starring in an ’80s romcom.
As I caught myself thinking all this, part of me was like, Geez, that’s harsh. Tina was already rushing over to say hi.
But I realized that I wasn’t just thinking. I was actually feeling bad… all the trembly, uncertain desire that had been stirred up by Mr. Shain had now completely transmogrified into a visceral aversion.
Seriously, the woman was giving me a stomachache.
But she hadn’t even done anything. Not to me. What was wrong with me? She was just doing her thing, striking a pose. On her balcony. In her ridiculous outfit.
Maybe I was allergic to self-delusion?
No… maybe it was that she’d expect me to approve. To get dragged down into the whirlpool with her, contaminated by her touch, down into the cold depths of helpless self-deception, objects of scorn for any intelligent observer.
Whoa… was that really how I felt about interacting with people? Did I really see this goofy lady as a… threat?
I could intellectually disapprove of that all I wanted. But if I was honest, my gut was churning and my back was tense. That was how I felt.
Well. Okay. What was I supposed to do about it?
Act all friendly, like Tina?
I’d done that all my adult life, one sales pitch after another. But at a certain point… wasn’t that fake?
Just as fake as this lady, with her scarf and her dye and her preposterous pose?
Maybe Fiona was right.
“Hi, Rhonda!” Tina chirped, and she leaned down to give the woman a hug. The woman exclaimed with delight, rubbing Tina’s back as if they were long-lost relations.
I stood by in the suite’s living room, awkward and undecided, and pretended to study the decor. As in all guest rooms at the Inn, several vases held fresh flowers, but this woman must have swapped in her own. Instead of the usual discreet wildflowers that were still in bloom all over the island, these vases were gorged with vast, showy bouquets, with gigantic gaudy blooms that I didn’t even recognize. She could have had a wedding right here.
But then I noticed the objects on the table.
On a long, antique table by a window, a strange collection of small items were lying in a row. The shapes were odd, and I struggled to make sense of what I was seeing.
The first was the simplest: the ornate tag of a bag of tea. The little white string had been snipped, and about an inch of string still hung from the tag’s loop. The white was stained brown.
Next, a few inches to the right, was a short, snipped lock of human hair. The hair was gray, and thick, and vaguely familiar. And unsettling.
Finally, the third item was the oddest of all. I had to stare at it for several seconds before, with a sudden rush of dread, I understood what it was. Now my gut really wrenched.
“Oh!” cried Rhonda. She scuttled inside and rushed over toward me, Tina in tow. “You found my keepsakes!”
“I did,” I said, trying to stay calm. “Is that a… snipped grapevine?”
Not that I needed the woman to confirm it. Her third little “keepsake” was clearly at least four inches of grapevine, complete with a shriveled grape.
Bold move, Rhonda, I thought. Not even bothering to hide the evidence.