Deadly Cruise: A Humorous Cruise Ship Cozy Mystery (Cruise Ship Cozy Mysteries Book 7)

by A. R. Winters

  “Because it got spilled.” I nodded my head sadly and squeezed his shoulder.

  “Spilled? No. I could have just topped it off with some water. No, that’s not why.”

  Topped it off with water!?

  “Oh?”

  “The girl. She wasn’t what I thought she was. She was just leading me on.” He frowned and then scraped some beans onto his fork. He lifted it into the air, hovering it in front of his mouth, and then seemed to think better of it and lowered it back down again.

  “Who found Zoya?” He looked up at me with sad, round eyes as he spoke.

  “It was me.” I frowned, as I realized that wasn’t strictly true. I was the one who reported it. “Actually, no. Susan Shelly found her first, but I was there just after. It was very sad.”

  “Terrible. She was stabbed with a knife and found by Susan. Ironic, isn’t it?”

  “Is it?” I pulled out the chair opposite Kirk and sat down to stop from hovering over him while we talked.

  “Don’t you remember Competition Corpses?”

  “Err, remind me?” I wasn’t really up to speed on old horror B-movies.

  “In Competition Corpses, Zoya played a ballerina who hunted down her rivals and killed them with a knife.”

  “Oh, how horrible.”

  “No, it was one of Zoya’s best movies! At the end of it, Zoya was the only survivor. She killed her last rival by stabbing her at a drive-in movie theater. So it’s ironic that she was stabbed at a drive-in theater.”

  Kirk really had my attention now.

  “That sounds like a fascinating movie.”

  “It won awards. It was really very good. It made her a star! But of course you know the rumors.”

  Of course I didn’t know the rumors.

  “Which ones in particular?”

  “Well, the rumor was that Zoya didn’t film a lot of the scenes. Susan stood in for her. I never believed them. I thought I could recognize Zoya’s perfect body, no matter how dark or grainy the film, or whatever angle it was shot from. I thought it was all vicious lies by people jealous of her success.”

  “But you’ve changed your mind?”

  “The poster for Penultimate Victim wasn’t her! For years I’ve had it on my wall in my living room. And one in my kitchen as well. And another in my bedroom. I thought it was her all these years! But it turned out that was Susan. So what else was Susan? Maybe those rumors are true. Guess we’ll never know.”

  Since Susan was on this very ship, it didn’t seem like an impossibility to find out. On the other hand, now that Zoya was dead, Susan could lie and exaggerate her role. Maybe Kirk was right; maybe we would never know. Not that I cared in the slightest which actress played a killer in an old, forgotten horror film.

  “It’s like being betrayed, isn’t it?” Kirk asked.

  “I guess being misled can feel a little bit like betrayal.” In the background, jaunty saloon music was playing, but listening to Kirk was bringing me down. “Enjoy your meal. I’ve got to get back to work!”

  I waved my phone in front of him to indicate just how hard I was working. He raised his hand in a mopey little gesture of goodbye. I vowed not to try and cheer anyone else up until I was feeling more optimistic myself.

  Circling the room, I got some good pictures of people in their costumes as well as the cowboy-themed meals. Just as I thought I was done, I ran into a familiar cowgirl.

  “Well, howwww-dee,” I said, tapping Cece on the shoulder. She was wearing an old sheriff’s uniform, complete with a big star badge pinned to the chest.

  “I look good, don’t I?” Cece twirled around so I could admire her outfit. “Ryan and I have been playing dress-up. This cruise is actually pretty fun when I’m not cleaning.”

  “How are you and the good doctor doing?”

  “Oh, you know.” She grinned. “Awesome.” Cece dropped her head back and laughed in what could best be described as a cackle. She and Doctor Ryan Wilson had been seeing each other for a while, and both seemed completely enamored with each other. Though Cece would never let on that she had actual feelings.

  “Say,” said Cece, taking me by the arm and leaning in, “did you get into the captain’s room?”

  “Nope.” I didn’t feel like getting into what had happened to me that morning right then, so I stopped there.

  “I wish I could help. Maybe we could borrow a hammer and a chisel from the maintenance guys and break off the lock?”

  I started to laugh before I realized she was serious. “We can’t do that! That’s literal breaking and entering.”

  Cece just shrugged. She had a rather looser sense of morals than I did and didn’t often worry about whether something was legal or not.

  “Could you do me a favor and keep a lookout for the ring if you see the captain? Or if you see him doing anything suspicious?”

  “Sure. I don’t think it would really suit him, though.”

  I didn’t know what I was going to do next about the captain, but Cece had a knack for finding out all kinds of things. I hoped something would turn up.

  “Ryan’s getting jealous of you.” Cece jerked her head across the room. The doctor was sitting at a table with two untouched plates in front of him, waiting for Cece. He was dressed up like a nineteenth-century doctor, and I was pleased to see that for once he actually did have a stethoscope hanging around his neck.

  “Enjoy your meal!”

  “I will. But it’s dessert I’m really looking forward to!”

  “Oh? What’s for dessert?”

  Cece didn’t answer with words. She just waggled her eyebrows at me and swaggered off to join the doctor.

  Shaking my head after her, I left to go to my cabin. There was work to be done.

  Unfortunately, it was actual social media manager work, not uncovering what happened to the ring. Or Zoya. I had reached an impasse on both of those until I had more information.

  With the cheerful saloon music fading, I descended through the ship to my cabin.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Hair? Check.

  Makeup? Check.

  Clothes? Check.

  “How do I look?” I asked Cece and Sam.

  Sam was up on the top bunk, legs dangling off the edge, while Cece was sitting cross-legged on my bed below.

  “Like a real pro golfer!” lied Sam. Most pro golfers didn’t wear jeans as far as I knew. We had a date at the putt-putt golf course, and I was going for a smart casual, ‘I just threw this on’-look after spending an hour picking out which top to wear. I went with a red one that was pleasingly snug—curve-hugging rather than fat-bursting-out.

  “Like a thousand bucks!” said Cece.

  “The phrase is a million bucks,” I corrected, smacking her on the knee.

  She shrugged. “Yeah, well I’ve got a more blue-collar background than you two. A thousand bucks is a lot of money.”

  I snorted at that. Did it get any more blue-collar than farming? Sam and I weren’t exactly trust fund kids.

  “You look great,” said Sam on the top bunk. “Now hurry up. Fashionably late is what I do—not you.”

  “Nah, keep him thirsty,” advised Cece.

  “I’m going now. I should be right on time. Have fun, you two.”

  “Oh, we will. And make sure to do at least some of things I would do,” said Cece with a leer.

  I headed off on the short walk to the mini-golf course. Although it could seem a little claustrophobic being on a ship all the time—even one as a big as our cruise ship—it was nice not having to drive when you were going out.

  I was walking outside on the constitutional deck to catch the sunset when I got a message on my phone.

  Sorry! Work! Something just came up and I can’t get away. Reschedule?

  Oh, great. Now he tells me. Conflicting emotions welled up in me. Logically, I knew he wouldn’t be sending that message if it wasn’t true. It wasn’t like he was inventing work or blowing me off. But the other side of my brain was saying, Nuh
-uh, this is a load of manure.

  Okay.

  I didn’t feel okay; I felt annoyed and a little bitter. I wasn’t sure at who to be bitter at though—Swan the corporation, or Ethan. Or maybe it was a passenger or crew member.

  I’d been walking on autopilot after receiving his message, and when I realized I no longer had a destination, I stopped and held onto the rail on the side of the ship.

  The sun was just dipping down below the horizon, dunking itself into the sea and setting it aflame with deep oranges and reds. Down here in the Gulf of Mexico, the sun always seemed to set faster than it did back in Nebraska. As you stared at it, you could see it dipping, dipping, dipping… and then it was gone, leaving a majestic deep red, purple, and magenta sky behind. It would be a few more minutes before it was actually dark, the sun still sending up its rays from just beyond the horizon.

  As the sun disappeared, a loud cheer erupted nearby. It was coming from the direction of the pool deck, which was now only a short walk away.

  With nothing better to do, and not really wanting to go back to my cabin to see Sam and Cece just yet, I wandered in the direction of the noise.

  Kelly had sent out a message earlier that the pool deck had now been re-opened. There was nothing more Ethan’s security team could do with the location, investigation-wise. They’d collected all the evidence and photographed everything they could. If there had been any trace clues left, Mother Nature would have removed them by the time we returned to New Orleans anyway.

  So the deck had been opened again and the drive-in movie theater was back in action.

  There were dozens of people sitting down on the seats across the pool from the big screen. I stared underneath the dropdown movie screen, at the spot where I had discovered Zoya. The makeshift memorial had been cleared away, and there was no sign that anything untoward had happened there.

  There were several large car props set up around the edge of the seating area, and there was a waitress on roller skates taking orders for popcorn and drinks, zooming around like she was in a nineteen-eighties roller skating teen flick.

  On the screen was a projected image listing the night’s entertainment.

  Terrifying Double Feature!

  Competition Corpses

  Penultimate Victim

  Both of them were Zoya Maxwell movies. Originally, they had been chosen so that she could introduce them and the audience would be able to meet the star. But later, the decision had been made to keep the double bill as a kind of tribute to her. Underneath the text were two large images of the original movie posters for the films.

  It did seem a little tasteless to be showing movies about people being murdered with knives when the star who was supposed to be presenting them had just been murdered with a knife. But it didn’t seem to bother the impressive crowd that had turned out to watch.

  I was hanging near the edge of the seating when a passenger seemed to recognize me.

  “Hey, are you going to watch?” asked a lady in her fifties. She was slim, and she seemed to have styled herself after Zoya, with long blonde hair and some bright red lipstick that matched the poster for Competition Corpses. I hadn’t met her before, but her face was familiar from all the events I’d been to.

  “Probably not. I’ve got a… something to do. Everyone seems pretty excited, though. It should be fun.”

  “Shame,” said the woman. “Competition Corpses is a really good movie. Very underrated outside of horror fans.” She patted the empty seat next to her and raised her eyebrows in an ‘oh go on’ look.

  I hesitated a second but then decided to join her. I had nothing better to do that evening, not unless Ethan texted me again. Old horror movies weren’t exactly my favorite, but I figured if I hated it, I could just walk away.

  “Betty Lyons,” she said, sticking out her hand.

  “Adrienne James.”

  “Look!” Betty nudged me, pointing at the screen.

  An animation effect had been applied, and now blood was running down the screen, obscuring the letters. I nearly jumped out of my seat when a loud scream burst from the speakers around us. The words and pictures on the screen fell down to the bottom, and the whole screen became red. The lights around us were dimmed.

  There was no way not to feel excited. Whoever it was in the Events team who organized the evening’s show had done a very good job.

  The screen faded to black, and then the first movie, Competition Corpses, began.

  The roller-skating waitress, recognizing me, brought me over a complimentary bucket of popcorn and two cans of pop. I thanked her, gave Betty one of the drinks, and shared the popcorn with her.

  The movie was surprisingly gripping, but I found myself a little too nervous to really enjoy it. Many of the scenes were set at night, in the dark, and I found myself glancing behind me and side-to-side, checking for hidden killers while we watched.

  Zoya, as the star of the movie, had a large speaking part near the beginning, but as the movie progressed there was less and less of her. Most of it focused on the victims rather than her as the killer. Zoya would be a shadowy figure outside their window, in the dark looking in. Or hiding in the backseat of their car. Or as a silhouette up in the rafters, staring down at the next ballerina victim.

  When we were about halfway through, I realized that I didn’t actually see Zoya at all for most of it. Even in the obligatory nude scene, where she supposedly seduced one of the other competitors’ boyfriend, you didn’t see her.

  It made me think of Susan. How she had supposedly performed a lot of scenes for Zoya. How much of this movie had Zoya actually made? How much of it was actually Susan? I knew she was the body double for the nude scene, but what about the rest of it?

  If I’d been Susan, I would have been very annoyed. And we knew Susan had been jealous—her vandalism of the poster showed that.

  I found myself staring under the screen again, where I’d found Susan standing over Zoya’s body. Susan, who wanted the same role Zoya wanted in the movie Judd was going to produce. Susan, who had played second-fiddle to Zoya for years.

  I shoved popcorn into my mouth, chewing it like it was my job while I thought about it all. Actually seeing one of the movies, and knowing how much of it wasn’t down to Zoya at all, put it all into perspective for me. It really brought home how annoyed it would have made Susan to see Zoya’s name all over the posters, and on everyone’s lips, despite Susan doing so much of the work.

  “Amazing, isn’t it?” said Betty in my ear. She had assumed my mindless munching and staring at the screen were me enjoying the movie, when in fact I’d been lost in a world of my own, thinking about Susan and Zoya.

  “Yeah.”

  It was amazing how much motivation Susan could have had to kill Zoya.

  When the movie was over, I handed the bucket of popcorn over to my new friend.

  “Gotta go. See you later.”

  Betty looked disappointed to be left alone as she waved me off, but I really didn’t think I had the nerves for another horror movie. And I had a lot to think about, anyway.

  With my hands in my pockets and my face pulled into a frown, I walked back inside. Maybe the Polly stuff was just a mixture of fraud with a fake signature. A coincidence.

  Maybe it was Susan I should still be investigating.

  Susan, who had damaged the poster.

  Susan, who wanted the same part as Zoya.

  Susan, who had missed out on the adulation heaped on Zoya that rightfully should have been hers.

  “Susan…” I said to myself, under my breath, as I walked under a canopy of stars.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  The next morning, I was eager to talk to Ethan again about Susan, but he had bridge duty followed by a department heads meeting, and then lunch with some VIP passengers I hadn’t had the displeasure of meeting yet.

  After breakfast, I was scanning the list of daily events and deciding which ones would be most interesting for social media. I was leaning toward the
Audrey Hepburn marathon when my phone rang. It was Cece.

  “Yo! Found it.” She didn’t really go in for all the pleasantries with her phone calls like other people. She cut right to the chase.

  “What? What did you find?”

  “Your ring. At least I think I did. Come and meet me and we’ll see if we can get it back.”

  While getting the ring back wasn’t the only thing bothering me, it would certainly be a big weight off my shoulders. Then I could really focus on Zoya. And Susan.

  Cece told me she was just outside one of the ocean-view junior suites with balcony. When I arrived, she grabbed my arm and led me a short distance away, to stand in front of a vending machine.

  “Pretend you’re shopping,” she said, nodding her head at the machine.

  Shopping seemed to me to be far too extravagant a term for what you did at a vending machine, but I knew what she meant.

  “Okay. I’m window shopping. Why? Where’s the—”

  “Shh!” She lowered her voice to a noisy whisper. “It’s in there.” She jerked her head to a cabin door just down the hallway. “But so are the guests.”

  “So what happened?” I whispered.

  In front of me, I could see rows of candy bars and chips, and despite having breakfast only a short time ago I would have been tempted to share a mid-morning snack with Cece. But I didn’t have any cash with me—I rarely needed it aboard the ship.

  “They didn’t answer when I knocked on the door, so I went in. This woman was holding up a ring in the air, like she was examining it. I thought that was weird, because you don’t do that with stuff you already own, right? And then I immediately thought of you. As soon as she saw me, she told me to get out, but I told her I didn’t hablo Inglés and walked right up to her, to get a real good look. It’s exactly like your one.”

  “What happened then?”

  “She led me out the room by the arm and told me to learn English.”

  “Charming.”

  “…you do it!”

  “No, you do it!”

  The shouting was coming from the room Cece had indicated. The words were muffled by the door and the distance, but a few of them came through clearly.