by P. Creeden
After a few moments, the door swung in and Jenna stood in the doorway, in her pajamas. “I was just getting some things situated and announced on YouTube that I wouldn’t be posting the eclipse tonight due to personal reasons. I didn’t tell my followers what was going on with Stephanie, but I didn’t want them waiting up for me, either.”
“Oh no!” Cora cried out. “I forgot all about the eclipse now.”
Because the woman seemed like she was ready to break down in tears again, Emma put an arm around her and gave her a side hug. “It’s okay, once people find out about the situation, they’ll all understand why she didn’t post. It will be all right.”
Cora shook her head. “I don’t know what I’m going to do now. It’s not like I can take over Stephanie’s sites. She has this certain magical quality. Flare. When she turned on the charm, everyone paid attention to her—like Marilyn Monroe. That was her idol, you know?”
Emma shook her head. “No, I didn’t know that. But it makes sense.”
After choking down a sob, Cora attempted a smile, but to Emma, she still looked very sad.
“Come sit down,” Jenna said. “This has been a terrible tragedy, and a huge loss for the social media influencer community. I’ll make some tea.”
Cora’s brow furrowed as she looked over at the small kitchenette’s counter. “Is that a bottle of Sunshine Lemon Tea?”
After freezing for half a moment, Jenna turned about with a sad smile. “Yes. Stephanie gave it to me.”
Another sob bubbled up Cora’s throat. “Even though she often seemed mean, Stephanie was such a generous person. That was her favorite tea—it was why she wanted the account so badly.”
As Cora started toward the kitchen and the tea that was her target, Jenna shook her head and ushered her back toward the sitting area. “No. No. You sit down and take a moment. This has been a tiring day and too much for one person to handle on their own. I’ll finish making some hot, soothing tea in a jiffy and bring it out to you.”
Once Cora was seated, Emma took the chair beside her. “It really is probably for the best. You said Stephanie was a generous person?”
Cora nodded and pulled out her phone. “Yes! See. Her last video was all about her giving back to the community and encouraging others to do the same. She was donating books and things to the local women’s shelter.”
There on the small screen of the phone, a video of Stephanie looking very much alive and smiling and much like Marilyn Monroe, played. It was a side of her that Emma had not seen before. Then she remembered what Stephanie had said earlier when she’d threatened Jenna. There was something in this video that proved that she knew Jenna’s secret... whatever that might be. As the video finished, Emma asked, “Do you mind if I watch that again?”
“Oh!” Cora said as she handed Emma the phone and pressed the play button on the screen. “Of course not.”
The video had Stephanie donating a good number of designer clothes and then a stack of children’s books. The funny part was that she was showing each of the books individually, placing specific emphasis on the titles of one of the books in the collection. “Out and In, a Liar’s Tale.” Emma frowned. What could that mean exactly?
“Stephanie’s mother was abused by her father for almost two years. Stephanie lived in a shelter for abused women and their children to hide. That’s actually where we met,” Cora said with another sniffle. “She was always giving back to both the women and the children of the shelter. Most influencers with a little bit of fame have a favorite charity that they give to.”
Emma nodded as Jenna came back into the room with cups of tea. After accepting her tea, Emma met eyes with Jenna. “Do you have a favorite charity, too?”
Jenna grinned. “Of course. I am constantly giving to organizations to stop bullying and LGBQT organizations. I think we all tend to choose causes that are dear to our hearts based upon our childhoods.”
“That makes a lot of sense,” Emma said, taking a sip of her tea and mulling over what she’d seen and heard. Things were falling into place, and she was beginning to feel that one of the girls in the room with her were a killer, but there was only one thing left that she needed to check. While the other two were talking, she downloaded the drone’s app on her phone.
After their cups of tea, Cora and Emma started out of the room. Once Jenna’s door was shut, Emma turned to Cora. “Actually, could you do me a quick favor? Could you stand in front of Jenna’s door like you’re going to knock?”
Though her brow furrowed, Cora nodded.
Emma held the mini drone up against the door just underneath the peep hole. “Was this about where the small package taped to the door was?”
Cora’s frown deepened. “Yes. What is that?”
Emma shook her head and looked down at her phone to make sure the drone was recording the scene she wanted. “Just look around a bit and back at the drone, too.”
“Drone? I thought they were great big things that people fly overhead to record stuff.”
“They come in all sizes, now.” Emma said. After getting the length of footage she wanted, Emma pulled down the drone and stepped away from the door. “Come on. Let’s go.”
The wrinkles didn’t leave Cora’s forehead. “What’s going on? What are you doing?”
“I just need to test my theory. To do that, I need to find Colby and my dad.” Emma said as she started up the stairs to return to the third floor.
Chapter 6
When they got to the third floor, Emma was happy to find the door to Stephanie’s suite shut. She stepped up to the door, got her smartphone ready, pressed play and knocked, covering the peephole area with the screen of her camera.
“What are you doing?” Stephanie asked in a whisper.
The door pulled open after a moment, her father frowning at her from the other side of the yellow police tape. “What’s going on Emma? I swear a second ago I only saw Cora in the hallway.”
Emma nodded. “You did. I only have one question, Dad. How did the victim die?”
Tilting his head and scratching his chin, Sheriff Wright looked past Emma toward Cora and then leaned in toward her. “Blunt force trauma to the head. The medical examiner believes he might be able to determine exactly what kind of object once he gets to the morgue and runs tests.”
Emma shook her head. “No need. I believe I know what the object is. Can you and the arresting officer come downstairs with me. I’ll explain everything.”
Colby peered over her father’s shoulder. “What’s going on?”
After lifting up the police tape, the sheriff said, “Get Officer Daniels. Emma’s solved the case.”
Blinking, Colby disappeared into the room. The sheriff stepped into the hallway.
Cora suddenly clung to Emma’s arm and whispered, “What does your dad mean? Did you really solve the murder? How?”
With a huff, the sheriff shook his head. “That’s what I’d like to know. It’s going to be quite the story if you’ve solved the case without even seeing the crime scene this time. How could you possibly?”
“Intuition.” Emma nodded. Colby and Officer Daniels both came under the tape and pulled the door shut behind them, but not before Emma saw the one thing that she’d suspected would be there sitting upon the counter just inside the door in a neat row. Five bottles of Sunshine Lemon Tea.
Back downstairs, the group of them stood in front of Stephanie’s door. Just like before, Emma pushed her phone in front of the peephole, pressed play, and then knocked upon the door.
As the door swung open, Jenna said, “Cora! What could you possibly need—” and cut herself off as her eyes widened, taking in the number of people in the hallway. “What’s going on?”
Emma stepped in, crowding Jenna so that Jenna stepped back. “We just have a few questions for you. You don’t mind, do you?”
Brow furrowed, lips thinning, and head shaking, Jenna said, “Of course, I don’t.”
Once everyone was inside, Jenna shut the doo
r but leaned against it with her back as though she was already clinging to her only means of escape from the small confines of the suite. Emma turned toward her. “When you looked into the hallway just now, how many people did you see through the peephole?”
The frown didn’t leave Jenna’s face as she answered, “One.”
“And yet there were five people standing there,” Emma said. “Because I used the same trick you did.”
Her frown deepened. “What are you talking about?”
“Earlier, you had Cora come down to your room and knock on the door. A small square package with polka dots on it sat on the door. It was easy to hide the camera’s eye.”
Then Jenna crossed her arms over her chest. “I don’t know what you mean.”
Emma pulled out the mini drone from her purse. “This was in the package, with the camera pointing out toward the hallway. You asked Cora to come down here simply so you could record her knocking on your door with this. I found mustard on your door, but you hate mustard. It could only have come from the drone that you crashed into Colby’s hotdog earlier.”
“Wow,” Jenna said, huffing a laugh. “That’s a bit of a stretch. Why on earth would I go to all that trouble?”
“Because you knew that due to a stalker, Stephanie wouldn’t open her suite door for anyone but Cora. So, you needed to make it look like Cora was the one at the door.” Emma said, lifting up her phone and playing back the video on the screen of Jenna standing in the hallway. “You did that by recording a video like this one and then playing it in front of the peephole. Just like I did when all of us were standing in the hallway.”
“Neat trick. But you have no proof of that.”
It was Emma’s turn to huff a laugh. “No chance you’d let us search your phone to look for the video?”
Jenna’s eyes narrowed beyond her glasses. “Not without a warrant.”
Cora swallowed. “I thought this whole thing might have been about the stalker who’d been following Stephanie. What made you even suspect Jenna?”
Emma frowned and turned toward the girl standing by the door. “Her glasses. If she was getting ready to go outside and record her YouTube video, she’d have had her contacts in. But instead she wore her glasses, knowing full well that she’d have to put on a show and cry a great deal once she found out Stephanie had passed.”
“Wow. That’s a big story you’re telling,” Jenna said, frowning. “Maybe my contacts were just bothering me.”
Emma swiped through her phone again and pulled up Jenna’s YouTube channel. “If you go through all your videos, you’ll see that not once did you do one in your glasses. Even the one you posted tonight with your apology. I’ve seen most of them before, and I didn’t even know you wore glasses until we met you in the lobby of the bed and breakfast this evening.”
Jenna swallowed and shook her head. “That doesn’t mean anything.”
Sheriff Wright cleared his throat. “That does sound like a lot of circumstantial evidence, honey. And a neat trick with the drone, but what makes you leap to the possibility that this young woman could commit murder?”
The tension in Jenna’s shoulders relaxed as she lowered them, and a small smile tugged at the girl’s lip. “At least someone has some sense.”
Emma lifted a brow. “I watched Stephanie’s latest video, and it was easy to see what her message to you was.”
The tension returned and the smile slipped from Jenna’s face as her brow furrowed again. “What are you talking about?”
“You went up to her room,” Emma said, taking a step backward and toward the kitchenette and pulled off a paper towel from the holder. “And played the video in front of her peephole, hoping that she’d open the door for Cora, but you were the only one in the hallway. You confronted her about the video, and when Stephanie pushed you to give in the bet so she could get the Sunshine Lemon Tea account, you grabbed the closest thing to you and smashed her over the head with it.”
Emma picked up the tea by the cap with the paper towel around her fingers. “With this,” Emma said and then nodded toward her father. “If you have forensics take a look at this bottle, I’m sure they’ll find trace evidence of blood and that it’s the murder weapon.”
Chapter 7
Tears streamed down Jenna’s face. “I didn’t do it on purpose. I was trying to reason with her first, but she said I was as bad as a stalker and threatened to call the police.”
Emma frowned. “Police?”
Jenna’s red rimmed eyes met Emma’s. “It was in the video, you saw it. The book title—Hit and Run.”
Slowly Emma nodded. That was the title of one of the books that Stephanie had donated. “You were guilty of the crime?”
“Two years ago I had been drinking a little and drove myself home. I look back on how stupid that was now, but I just didn’t want to leave my car behind and take a cab. It was nearly three a.m. and there was no one on the streets except that one guy. He foolishly wore black. Why couldn’t he have been wearing white? I didn’t mean to hit him. But when I did, I couldn’t stick around and get a DUI. I didn’t want to go to jail. If Stephanie thought I was sleeping just fine, she’d be wrong. I can’t get the guilt out of my head. I’ve been living with it for two long years, trying to figure out how to make up for what I’d done. When I became a social media influencer, I started giving back to the LGBTQ community because I found out that the person I hit was part of that group. I’d hoped I could make up for it somehow. How did Stephanie know?”
Officer Daniels stepped up to her and started cuffing her, but before he read Jenna her rights, Emma had to tell her. “I’m sorry, Jenna. I don’t think Stephanie knew about that at all. After watching her video, I saw she was going to out you for not being gay.”
Cora gasped. “That makes sense! Because you give so much to the LGBTQ community, most of your viewers believed you are gay. Much of your following is from the LGBTQ community and if Stephanie outed you, it would probably cut your following in half. I remember her saying something about it now.”
Jenna’s eyes widened. “I don’t care about that. No. You mean... I killed Stephanie... No.”
Officer Daniels started to recite Jenna’s Miranda rights as he escorted her away. Cora just stood there, wide eyed with tears streaming down her face. “I can’t believe this is happening.”
Emma pulled her into a side hug again and squeezed Cora’s shoulders. “It’s quite a shock. Do you have someone to stay with? Do you want to go back to our house with us? This isn’t a good time to be alone.”
Cora’s wide eyes fixed on Emma’s as she nodded. “Are you sure? I don’t want to impose.”
“Of course, she’s sure,” Emma’s father said, setting a hand on her shoulder. “We’d be glad to have you stay with us. Please come and feel safe.”
The girl swallowed, suddenly looking younger than Emma. “Thank you so much.”
Molly jumped all over both Emma and Cora when they returned to the house. Macy stood outside on the back deck, a camera pointed at the moon. When she looked up and saw them, she offered a wide smile and pointed. “Look!”
The moon was almost entirely covered by the shadow of the earth. Emma blinked at it. “Wow. I thought we were going to miss it. Hasn’t it been hours?”
Macy nodded. “It’s been a little more than two hours. An eclipse is slower than you’d think. Did you all work everything out okay?”
Emma’s father nodded. “Yes. Emma figured everything out without even seeing the crime scene.”
“She was like a regular Sherlock Holmes,” Colby said with a proud smile.
“And it looks like you brought Cora back with you?” Macy asked.
Emma nodded. “She’s going to stay with us for the rest of the weekend. She’s had quite a traumatic experience.”
“Sorry to impose,” Cora said, just as her stomach growled audibly. A blush rose to the girl’s cheeks.
“Nonsense.” With a frown, Macy nodded and wrapped an arm around the girl.
“The more, the merrier. Now let’s see what we can do about that growl. We’ve got plenty of food in the kitchen.”
“I’ll warm up some burgers and help out,” Emma’s father added as he opened the door for the two women and headed inside with them.
Emma sighed and stepped to the edge of the deck, watching as the shadow completely covered the moon. The waves lapped against the shore on the beach in front of her and she could just barely see the lights of a ship as one passed on the horizon. Molly leaned against her leg as if knowing that she needed that little bit of comfort.
“You really are incredible. You know that?” Colby whispered as he came up beside her.
The breeze picked up, bringing with it the slightest chill. Gooseflesh rose on Emma’s arms and she shivered. She rubbed her forearms while continuing to look at the sea beyond the beach. Just then, a jacket fell around her shoulders. Colby’s heady scent filled her nostrils as the warmth of his body heat remaining in the cloth seeped into her. With wide eyes, she peered at Colby as she pulled the jacket tighter around her body. He was wearing only a plain white tee-shirt now. She frowned. “I don’t want to take your jacket. You’ll get cold. We should go inside.”
He shook his head, leaned against the deck railing and peered at the moon. “No. I’m fine. I just want to stay out here a minute more, just me and you. Once Macy and Cora and your Dad come back out, we won’t have a moment to ourselves again, and I want to watch this for a minute with just you.”
Emma’s heart fluttered, and she swallowed hard. Did Colby really enjoy time alone with her? She leaned her elbows on the railing next to him, and cautiously leaned her shoulder against his. Instead of pulling away, he leaned into her as well. Her heart raced in response. It beat so loud in her chest, she was afraid that Colby would be able to hear it.
“It’s really beautiful here,” Emma said, and slowly, she pulled her gaze away from the moon and met Colby’s eyes.
“It sure is,” he whispered, but he wasn’t looking at the moon—his gaze was still fixed on her.