by Winnie Reed
Maybe he was supposed to come home already, and they were wondering where he was.
My heart sank for a bunch of people who might not even exist.
“Did you hear what happened?” A perfect stranger with hot pink pigtails practically ran me down as I stood in line, waiting to take advantage of the continental breakfast.
“Pardon?” I asked, a little taken aback. “Did I hear—”
“The murder!” She was so excited to tell me, I didn’t have the heart to cut her off. “At least, it looks like a murder. The dude who died harassed somebody yesterday. He bullied them. And now, he’s dead.”
Whew. Word had traveled fast. A little too fast. And I didn’t like it.
“Do you know who he was bullying?” I asked. Did I sound casual enough?
Pigtails swung back and forth when she shook her head. I wished I had the courage to pull off something like that. My blond hair would take to the color easily. Mom would have a conniption fit.
That could’ve been a mark in either the positive or negative column, come to think of it.
“No, nobody knows. I’ve talked to so many people already this morning. Nobody knows who she was. Just that she was waiting in line at the front desk when he came up to her.”
Hmm. That was good, anyway. Nobody knew for sure about Georgia. Why I felt the need to protect her was a mystery. A penchant for wanting to help people alone, on their own, with few friends in their corner.
“Have you seen the police around at all?” I asked. “I mean, are they talking to people?”
“Yeah, they’ve been around this morning. I was down here early for a writing session with some friends and saw cops wandering around. The management is pissed about it.”
“I can only imagine,” I whispered, remembering the pregnant manager. I hoped she was okay, that this wasn’t too much for her.
Yet another person whose problems I took on my shoulders. Maybe I needed professional help?
When it was clear I wasn’t in the mood to gossip, my pink-haired friend turned to the person behind her and started the whole spiel again. This time, the person in question was way more interested and dying to speculate all over the place. Good thing.
Though it wasn’t good for anybody interested in the truth of what actually went down, since the second woman had heard there was a message left with the body. Unless there was something I’d missed, no such thing had occurred.
“I heard his head was all bashed in,” somebody else muttered further down the line. Also untrue—I’d seen the body pulled from the water, and while it hadn’t thrilled me there was no heavy damage to the skull.
“Can you imagine? Somebody capable of doing something like that is walking around here. What if it was one of us?”
A man turned around and laughed. “I’ve known some vicious writers, but I can’t imagine any of them murdering anyone. Unless the guy left nasty reviews online.”
I chuckled along, just to be part of the group. No sense drawing attention for not laughing at what I guessed was an in-joke for authors.
Boy, some people were morbid.
Then again, I’d only ever written about food. Nobody was going to leave awful reviews on that. It was probably pretty excruciating to put your best work out there, only to have some lamebrain tear it to pieces. And the internet made it so much easier for everybody to think their stinky opinion mattered.
Not only that, but that it needed to be broadcast to the rest of the world.
After putting together what seemed like a reasonable breakfast of fruit, a bagel with lox and cream cheese, and a cup of coffee that would surely have to be followed up with a second cup, I wandered around until I found an empty seat at a mostly empty table. With my back to the wall, I had the chance to observe what went on in front of me.
Some of the men and women—more women than men, though I was hardly keeping count—chatted with those around them like they were old friends. Maybe they were, maybe people had known each other for a long time and made plans to meet up at the conference.
This left me wondering if I should’ve tried to make a friend, but where would I have started? I had only been working for Haute Cuisine a few months, so it wasn’t as if I had a ton of advanced warning. I’d been so busy with my assignments and travel that it hadn’t occurred to me to look online and see if people were connecting there prior to the event.
Next time, I would be better repaired.
To my relief, when one of the two women seated across from me lowered her phone, she revealed that her name badge was the same color as mine. This meant she was a food writer.
And when she saw me, she smiled. “Hey, it’s good to see another foodie here.” She stood up, leaning over. “Susan Odell.”
“Emma Harmon, as I guess you can see that from a name tag.” Gosh, it was so awkward. Had I always been this awkward? I made a mental note to ask Raina or Darcy, though I had a feeling what they would say.
“And who do you write for?”
“Haute Cuisine.”
Susan’s eyes widened. “Impressive. Who’s the editor there now?”
I didn’t have the chance to answer before somebody else answered for me. A short, rather round man with tinted glasses and a neckerchief to die for spoke up as he took a seat next to Susan. “Marsha and I go way back,” he explained. “Marsha Wallis.”
Oh, geez, I had almost completely forgotten. “By any chance, are you Brian Murphy?”
He laughed, putting his hand to his chest and batting his eyes. “My reputation precedes me,” he laughed.
“Marsha asked me to look for you! I’m so glad we ran into each other.”
Just like that, he forgot all about his seat with Susan in favor of sitting next to me. “And how is old Marsha?” he asked with a grin and an emphasis on the word old. I wondered if a man with more salt than pepper in his hair should be calling anybody old.
“Don’t let her hear you say that,” I laughed, thinking of the painfully fit, trim, polished Marsha.
“Oh, then she hasn’t changed.”
“No woman wants to be called old,” I chided. He had a funny effect on me; just like that, I came out of my shell and was teasing a perfect stranger.
“Then I won’t tell you the year we met,” he winked. “You seem like a bright young woman. I’m sure you can do math.”
I found myself laughing helplessly. “Anyway, she’s doing great. If I’m doing half as well as she is by the time I’m at the point in my career that she’s at, I’ll consider myself extremely lucky.”
“Oh, my dear. Luck had nothing to do with it. I’m sure there are some who’d like to believe she got by on nothing but her beauty, but nothing could be further from the truth. If she slept at all in those first few years when we worked our way up, I’d be surprised to know it. She put all of us to shame.”
He then leaned in, crooking a finger at me to draw me closer. “Besides, by now she can afford procedures to erase all the damage she’s done, living off nothing but coffee and diet pills for all those years.”
Whoopsie daisy. That was a little more than I needed to know, and Marsha would die of embarrassment if she knew I was hearing this. I chuckled politely before making a big deal of spreading cream cheese on my bagel.
“Did you hear about the death that occurred here last night?” Brian asked the table at large. He struck me as the sort who like to start drama.
Again, I played dumb. Mostly because that left room for other people to talk, but also because I wanted to get a feel for the sort of rumors that were stirring around. It was fascinating, the way a story could twist and turn until it looked nothing like the original circumstance.
As Brian regaled all of us with his tale of a gruesome murder that looked nothing like what had probably happened, I couldn’t help but scan the room for Georgia. If there was a just and merciful God, her name would be kept out of this.
It didn’t take long for me to find her. And when I did, spotting her in line for break
fast, I couldn’t get over how exhilarated she looked.
She was nothing like the girl I’d met in line at the front desk. That version of Georgia had been weak, beaten down, on the verge of tears. This girl, on the other hand, wore a brilliant smile and chatted up the people around her. I could almost hear her laughter cutting through the combined noise from so many other voices.
In short, she was like a new person.
It had to be a coincidence, didn’t it? The fact that she was suddenly so carefree, so easy-going, after the man who’d bullied her had been found dead?
Chapter Eight
The morning’s first session was a welcome speech held in the same ballroom where breakfast had taken place. How the hotel’s crew managed to turn the room around so quickly was beyond my understanding. Where there had been round tables with a buffet set along one side of the room, there were now rows upon rows of chairs without a table in sight. It all took roughly twenty minutes to do.
But while others chuckled politely at the jokes our opening speaker tried to make, my mind kept wandering. I couldn’t help but wonder if I was the only one, and I decided I probably wasn’t.
Considering the amount of gossip floating around during breakfast, there was no way.
Who was the dead man? Where had he come from? What was the actual cause of death—was it the wound on his head, or had he drowned?
And had Joe spoken to Georgia yet? How many interviews had he conducted, if any?
If any. That was a laugh. By then, I knew him well enough to know he would’ve worked through the night. I could imagine him in his little office, with a bunch of chewed up coffee stirrers littering his desk and overflowing the wastebasket.
Instead of eagerness to learn whatever it was he knew, it was a sense of pity that left me wanting to reach out to him. It had to be lonely work, trying to put the pieces together. Learning whatever he could about a dead person.
Would he attend this particular funeral? The way he did when he found a person with no family or friends?
Maybe I was thinking about him too much, and too favorably.
To the point where only the sound of applause brought me back to reality and clued me in to the fact that the session was over. There would be a fifteen-minute break before the next round began. Some people would use this time to pop into the swag room and pick up free books or other merchandise, while others would run out for a smoke break or grab another cup of coffee.
Me? I barely waited until I left the ballroom to call Joe, then wedged myself into a little alcove which looked like it might once have held payphones back when they were a thing. I was officially old enough to remember payphones.
There was a pause between the answering of the phone and Joe’s greeting. “Yes, Emma?” Goodness, he sounded so tired.
Only that fatigue, so evident, was enough to make me bite my tongue rather than asking why he sounded unhappy to hear from me. “How are you holding up?” I asked, and even I was surprised by the amount of concern in my voice.
Another pause. “Is this for real?”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Did somebody steal Emma’s phone? This is not really Emma Harmon?”
I scowled, turning away from the people walking past. “Wow, that’s pretty rude. I didn’t have to call you to see how you were doing.”
“But you did, didn’t you?”
“Yes, because I’m a wonderful person who’s always thinking about the welfare of others. Saint Emma, patron of the downtrodden and overwhelmed.”
At least he laughed. “I’ll agree with you on that, but only to a point. I know you didn’t just call to see how I’m holding up. You wanted to know if I have any breaks in the case. Right?”
Was I that transparent? I didn’t like to think I was that transparent. “I mean, I figured we could get around to that eventually…”
“You know, I do have other cases to solve, Harmon. This isn’t even the only one I’m working on right now.”
“Okay, Sullivan,” I snapped. “Wow. Why are you being so snippy? I didn’t do anything wrong.”
“Are you sure about that?”
“I don’t understand what that means,” I confessed. “You know I didn’t kill that guy. I don’t have it in me. Why are you talking to me like I did?”
“You didn’t kill him. I know. That’s not the problem.”
“What is it, then?” And why did I care so much? It was just that we were finally starting to get along, back in Maryland. I had even been thinking about calling him and seeing if we could get together for dinner or lunch or brunch or whatever. No big deal, no strings attached.
“You could’ve alerted security. More than once. Instead, you insisted on handling things on your own since you believe you’re a superhero or something like it. I wouldn’t know. I can’t make sense of the way you think.”
Evidently, I was that transparent. Indeed. “Yeah, I could have. You’re right. But I still don’t get it.”
“You have selective intelligence. I know you’re smart, but you act dumb when it suits you.” He let me sputter for a few painful seconds before getting to the point. “If you had just described the guy to the security people, you might’ve helped avoid this. You could’ve gone out during that book signing session, found an employee and told them he was acting strange. He could’ve been thrown out of the hotel and asked not to return. He might still be alive now.”
I blew out a long sigh. “You’re right.”
“I’m what, now?”
“I said you were right,” I spat. “Okay? I should stop taking matters into my own hands. You’re absolutely right about that. It’s instinct. I act before I think.”
“You could’ve saved that man’s life if you’d thought first. And stopped believing you’re a superhero.”
“You keep calling me that. I don’t think that.” I sniffled and was intensely angry with myself for doing it. He couldn’t get to me, not that easily.
So why did my nose and eyes sting like I was about to cry?
“Emma?”
“Hmm?” I squeaked.
“Are you crying?”
“No,” I whimpered.
“You are,” he sighed. “Listen. I didn’t mean to be so harsh. It’s just that there are so many cases open, people murdered for no reason. Just… dead. And he’s another one, but it could’ve been prevented.”
I took a few deep breaths. “But maybe it was sorta his fault, and I know that sounds pitiful and everything, but let’s be honest. He was so nasty to Georgia. Threatening. He had her on the verge of tears. Are we sure he didn’t invite this upon himself?”
“You do realize you’re virtually accusing her of murder, right?”
“I’m not trying to,” I insisted. “I know she didn’t have anything to do with it.”
“How can you be so sure?”
“Oh, sheesh.” I leaned against the nearest wall. “For one thing, she’s tiny. Like smaller than me, maybe a hundred pounds. He was much taller than her, and surprisingly strong for somebody so skinny.”
I closed my eyes and wished I could take it back. I completely forgot about that, and now…
“Hold on. Back up.” Naturally, he caught me, Mr. SmartyPants. “What did you just say about him being strong? What’s that all about? How would you know if he was strong or not?”
“Because he grabbed me.”
Silence. It took a while for him to say a word—I thought I might’ve lost him.
I would’ve been lucky if I had.
“When were you planning on telling me this?” he snarled. His voice shook, but he couldn’t scream at me in the middle of the police station. Maybe that was a good thing. Maybe he could stay there.
“I forgot. I was a little shaken up last night, remember. And honestly, it’s not like he hurt me. I forgot about it, is all.”
“You were close enough to him that he was able to grab you?”
“He came up behind me. I’m gonna be late for t
he next session.”
“Too bad.”
“Joe.”
“Detective,” he reminded me.
“Detective, the man is dead. He’s not going to hurt anyone now. I followed him out of the signing yesterday, as you already knew. He came up behind me instead of me catching up to him, and he grabbed my arm. I didn’t see anybody around who could help—security, personnel, whatever. I was looking, believe me.”
“What did he say?”
I closed my eyes, focusing on the memory. On the feeling of his hand on my arm, the sound of his voice. The smell of his breath.
Somehow, that brought things back with great clarity. “I asked what his problem was, and he said I was becoming his problem. And not to make him deal with me, too.”
“You, too?”
“I didn’t get the chance to ask what that meant. He slinked away. More like snuck away, actually. I lost him in the casino. By then, I was glad to see the back of him. He gave me a bad feeling.”
“Oh, Emma. You insist on taking chances, no matter how many people who care about you ask you not to.”
“I know. You’d think I’d know better by now.”
“You would think that.” He groaned. “Okay. So this guy was a threat. He accosted you. He harassed Georgia. We don’t know what he had to do with Deidre Price yet, though who knows? He probably had nothing to do with her at all. He could’ve been an obsessed fan.”
“That’s true. He didn’t look like a fan when he was staring at her.”
“That’s why I called him obsessed. You never know what an obsessed person is capable of.”
“I guess so,” I whispered, remembering that hand on my arm. Yes, he might’ve been dangerous. Very. “I’m sorry. Please, don’t be mad at me.”
He sighed. “I’m not mad at you. I mean, I’m annoyed. Irritated. Concerned. But not mad.”
“I guess that’s as much as I can hope for, huh?”
“Right now? Yeah. It is.” At least he sounded a little more cheerful than before, but I wasn’t fooled. He wasn’t cheerful with me. I was still walking on thin ice.