Stormy Day Mysteries 5-Book Cozy Murder Mystery Series Bundle

by Angela Pepper

  That was all I had? Just my gut telling me not to get any more pedicures?

  I slid out of the chair, my thinking session over. I would go upstairs, get the name of the security company, then satisfy my curiosity about the hallway footage, even if I was falling into some devious genius trap devised by Marie.

  Something nearby made a whooshing noise. It sounded like an office chair having its height adjusted—a hydraulic whoosh.

  I heard someone cough, and then the whoosh again.

  My skin prickled.

  I wasn’t the only one in the spa.

  Chapter 20

  Most people’s ears are sharper than they think.

  That creepy sensory awareness, of knowing when someone’s in a dark room with you, isn’t from any psychic sixth sense. The warning in your head comes from your hearing, detecting a change in the hum of the room because a soft, clothed body is dampening ambient sounds.

  People aren’t that different from bats, who emit chirps and use echo-location to map their surroundings. We don’t have wings or fly around at night catching tasty bugs, but we can use sound to see. Some blind people use tongue-clicks to map their surroundings well enough to ride a bicycle.

  I clicked my tongue against the roof of my mouth.

  Nope, I didn’t have bat powers. Someone was in the spa, but I couldn’t sense where.

  “Hello? Is anyone else down here?”

  Nobody answered.

  I started checking the individual treatment rooms.

  “Hello? Free pedicures for anyone in the spa. My treat.”

  Still no response.

  The washrooms were empty, and the supply closet held only towels and lotions. After opening every door and cupboard in the place, I arrived at the back of the spa, at the last room, the one with the sensory deprivation float tanks.

  The overhead lights were dimmed. Three white pods sat in the middle of the room, glowing blue from built-in lighting, like the furniture of an alien space ship.

  The sleek pods were not the sensory deprivation tanks of the seventies, with their boxy design and industrial rivets. They were fiberglass and pill-shaped, gleaming like something from the future. Even their positioning in the room—arranged like the petals on a three-leafed flower—conjured up images of science fiction, with its theories about altered consciousness and astral projection—the idea of transporting one’s self to another place and time, free floating outside the body.

  The high salt content in the water allowed tank users to float silently and without effort, achieving ultimate relaxation. If the makers of the tanks were to be believed, floating in the saltwater would improve mental alertness, decrease pain, facilitate healing, improve sports performance, wash your car, do your taxes, and clean the clutter out of your attic.

  All three of the wondrous pods were closed, their lids down. I ran my hand over the smooth white surface of the nearest one. The mechanism for the lid’s hinge was hidden, but it could have been responsible for the whooshing pneumatic sounds. If someone was in the spa with me, the only place left to look was inside the pods.

  “Hello? Is anyone experiencing improved mental alertness in here?” I glanced around the dim, blue-glowing room. “Or floating around outside their body?”

  Nobody answered, but that didn’t mean I was alone. The tanks had layers of soundproofing, since their purpose was to block outside stimuli.

  I tapped on the lid of the nearest one. “Anybody home?”

  Still no answer.

  I located the handle and popped open the lid on the first one. The tank was empty. Completely empty. There wasn’t even any salty water.

  I walked to the second one and prepared myself. My heart was racing like crazy. After you’ve stumbled across a dead body or two, your imagination gets a little more active about visualizing bodies inside body-shaped spaces.

  Butch had been asking his insurance agent about deaths on the premises. It wasn’t unreasonable for me to expect to find a body inside one of the tanks.

  I took a deep breath and lifted the lid.

  Empty. No body, no saltwater. Just a single, long red hair. It was the pod Jessica had floated in the night before.

  I went to the third pod and flipped it open, just to be thorough. It contained a large, bald man.

  His eyes flew open.

  I yelped.

  He let out a surprised noise that sounded like a Saint Bernard woofing, then hoisted himself upright, tattooed muscles flexing under his rolled-up sleeves.

  He grumbled, “Miles of unpopulated space all around, and still a man can’t find a quiet place to think.”

  “Were you sleeping in there?”

  He frowned. “Why would I sleep in there? It’s for relaxing.”

  “I’m no expert, but you’re doing it wrong. There’s supposed to be saltwater in here so you can float. It’s about floating. Hence the name, float tanks.”

  “I know what they are,” he said grumpily. He started to climb out.

  I stepped back to give him some space. “Why’d you drain all the tanks? Are they malfunctioning?”

  He cracked his neck left and right, then tucked his shirt back into his trousers. “What makes you think the tanks are malfunctioning? What have you heard?”

  “Just that they were closed for maintenance.”

  “And that’s my job. Maintenance.” His tone was crisp, bordering on aggressive. “If you must know, I’ve been up since four and I’ve had a busy day. I just hammered up some plywood in that room with the broken door, and now I’m inspecting the tanks. I can clean up these messes. I don’t need a helper, and I sure don’t need a supervisor.”

  I stepped back, hands up. “I didn’t say you did.”

  “See you at lunch.” He turned and left, shutting off the lights in the other treatment rooms as he walked, leaving me in the darkness.

  I jogged to catch up with him.

  “Butch, has anyone seen or heard from Franco?”

  Gruffly, he said, “How should I know?”

  We exited the spa, and Butch stopped at the door to his room. “Anything else?” he asked.

  “I didn’t tell Marie,” I said softly. “You need to talk to your wife, but just so you know, I haven’t said anything yet about you and Della.”

  He kept his back to me. “There’s nothing to tell. It’s real simple. I accidentally sleepwalked into her room, and she took it to mean more than what it was. She jumped on me like a rattlesnake, wrapping herself around my body. I didn’t want to disturb Franco, so I took her out into the hallway to talk some sense into her. All of that wasn’t more than ten minutes, tops.”

  “Nothing happened physically?”

  He turned his head just enough to make eye contact over his shoulder briefly, then returned his gaze to his door.

  “I can’t say I was perfect for all of those ten minutes, but I’m only human.”

  “Your wife’s not perfect, either,” I said. “None of us are. But the lodge is beautiful, and everything’s going to work out.”

  “You figure? I told Christopher we weren’t ready for guests, but my cousin doesn’t take no for an answer.”

  “What? Christopher implied that you’d insisted…” I trailed off, because Butch had already disappeared into his room and closed the door.

  I clenched my fists. “Christopher,” I hissed.

  The door at the other end of the hallway opened, and Christopher came through, followed by Dion, Benji, and Jessica, all with damp hair and towels over their shoulders. Dion was grinning, his round cheeks giving his face a diamond shape. Benji’s expression was grim, his eyes downcast behind his foggy glasses.

  “You’re the man,” Dion said as he clapped Christopher on the shoulder. “I didn’t think I could do a headstand, but the way you walked me through it made so much sense, and there I was. Doing a headstand. I feel like a new man.”

  Jessica laughed. “You were a new man for all of thirty seconds before you fell on top of me.”

 
; “That was my big finale,” Dion said. His deep, booming laugh filled the hallway.

  “You guys wanna see a big finale?” Jessica asked.

  Christopher and Dion were enthusiastic in saying yes. Benji hung back a few paces, looking as miserable as the others were happy.

  Jessica waved to me at my end, then gestured for me to move to the side of the hallway. She took a breath, raised her arms to center herself, then ran toward me. Once she hit speed, she did not one, not two, but three forward flips in a row, sticking the landing near where I stood.

  She waggled her eyebrows at me. “I’ve still got it.”

  “You always could cheer circles around me,” I said.

  “But everyone loved seeing you on top of that pyramid.” She grinned. “Do you still have your cheerleader underwear, with the letters on the back?”

  Christopher walked up to us. “What underwear? What letters?”

  “Never mind,” I said.

  The other two men had disappeared into their rooms to shower. Jessica slipped away next, leaving me alone with Christopher in the hallway.

  I had a bone to pick with him, and now was as good a time as any. “Christopher, remind me again, why are we up here? Was it really because your cousin Butch wanted a trial run before the opening?”

  “What did Butch say?” Christopher wiped his face with his towel and nodded for me to step into his room.

  I followed him in. “Don’t you dare answer my question with a question.”

  “Fine,” he said. “Butch told me he had everything under control, but I didn’t believe him.” Christopher ducked into his washroom, turned on the shower, and returned without his shirt. I caught an eyeful of muscles I’d never seen before. I’d seen them on fireman calendars and sometimes in my imagination, but never on Christopher.

  “Family helps family,” Christopher said. “You can’t be angry at me for trying to help the guy, can you, Stormy-Lou?”

  I heard him, but I wasn’t listening. I couldn’t take my eyes off his muscles. “Are you taking steroids?”

  He slapped his taut abdomen. “The only drugs I’ve taken were in that smoothie, and that was an accident. This is all me, all natural.”

  Steam billowed from the bathroom door behind him, enfolding us in warm fog.

  I pointed at the indentations and ridges between his muscles. “Is this why you brought me up here? So I could see your new muscles and see what I’m missing out on?”

  He slipped his arms around me and kissed the top of my shoulder.

  “That shower’s nice and hot,” he said. “Let’s keep talking in the—”

  I pulled away from him, grabbed the door handle, and was back out in the hallway in three pounding heartbeats.

  I’d barely caught my breath when someone said, “There you are.”

  Della.

  She looked furious. She grabbed my forearm with the daintiness of an eagle helping a salmon up the river. I twisted my arm free and demanded an explanation.

  “You have to move your car,” Della said. Her dark sunglasses covered her eyes, but I could feel them flashing rage at me. “Get your keys and move your car, or I’ll move it for you.”

  Chapter 21

  I did always enjoy the feeling of my keys in my hand, the jingle and heft that meant I was on my way to something.

  After Della changed her tune to a more polite one, I agreed to get my coat and keys so I could move my car for her. She wanted to leave the lodge, and I wasn’t about to stand in her way.

  As we walked down the hallway, I squeezed the ring of keys in my hand. I didn’t need them, since my car had keyless entry and ignition, but they would serve as a substitute for brass knuckles in case Della decided to slap me the way she had Butch.

  We passed Marie in the lobby. She was sitting on a pile of wood, drinking wine.

  “Now what?” Marie said. Della didn’t stop to explain. I followed her through the main doors, outside.

  A blast of wind-blown pain smacked me in the face.

  Sleet. The sort of semi-frozen rain that’s all corners and sharp lines.

  In the time since I’d seen a handful of dark clouds gathering, a storm had whipped itself into a frenzy. The downpour of needle-like rain obliterated the remainder of snow around the building, exposing a stretch of mud between us and the parking lot.

  With one arm up to shield my eyes, I picked my way across the muck under the punishing sleet. It was barely mid-afternoon, but the sky was dark and ominous.

  Della needed me to move my car because her green Volkswagen Beetle had been boxed in by trailers full of building materials and tools.

  We reached the cars, and I said, “Della, you shouldn’t leave alone.” I tried to be as reasonable as I could with icy water pelting me in the teeth. “What about Franco? You can’t leave him.”

  “I won’t. He’s probably out there on the road, walking into town. He’s stubborn like that, and he was mad. You saw the room.”

  “But this storm is bad, and your little car barely made it up here in good weather.”

  “I’ll come back,” she said over the howling wind. “I just need space right now, but I promise to come back.”

  While we were talking, Marie emerged from the front door and ran toward us, her red rubbery clogs splashing through the mud.

  “Now what’s the matter?” Marie demanded. Her words were slurred, and her eyes unfocused.

  “She wants to leave,” I explained. “I’m going to move my car so she can go.”

  Marie slapped the keys out of my hand, into the mud.

  She snarled at Della, “What’s wrong with you? Are you pouting because you’re not getting enough attention from all the men? Why even wear a dress at all? Why not prance around here naked?”

  Della turned to me and whipped off her sunglasses so she could glare directly into my eyes. “You told her about me and Butch.”

  I tried to signal Della to calm down, to let her know that I’d done no such thing, but we could all barely keep our eyes open with the stinging sleet.

  Marie jumped in with a drunken, “Stormy’s the best detective around, and she’s my friend. She tells me everything.”

  Della wiped a layer of rain from her face and squared up to Marie. “I know about you and your crush on my man. You think I don’t check his phone? Maybe if you weren’t so busy sending Franco messages about some TV chef you’re jealous of, you could be taking better care of your man.” She leaned forward, getting her face right in Marie’s. “If you kept a tighter leash on Butch, he wouldn’t be sneaking into my bed.”

  Marie recoiled, drew back her right arm, and tried to punch Della. Luckily for Della, she missed. Unluckily for me, she punched me right in the solar plexus. I’d been on guard for blows from Della, not Marie. I sank down into the mud.

  On the plus side, I found my keys.

  What happened next sounded like a dozen tomcats fighting in an alley, and ended with Marie falling on top of me. In my struggle to get up, she mistook my movements for aggression, and started wrestling me. She had the upper hand, and shoved me face-down into the mud, one arm twisted behind my back.

  From that position, I watched Della rev her car and drive it right into my bumper. She backed her Beetle up, then rammed my car repeatedly until it rolled forward enough for her to squeeze by.

  I flung Marie off my back and got to my feet just in time to watch Della’s taillights disappear around the bend.

  Chapter 22

  I returned to the room caked in mud, looking like some wild forest creature in search of a human victim.

  Jessica took one look at me and said, “New spa treatment?”

  “Hah! We’ll see how funny you are when I’m eating your brains.”

  “What happened? Did you fall down the side of the mountain?”

  I groaned and rubbed my ribs. “More like the mountain fell down on me,” I said. “Actually, it was Marie. She might look harmless, but she gets mean when she’s drinking.”

 
Jessica helped me into the tub so I could get undressed without messing up the room. I told her about my day so far. She already knew about the smashed patio door and extra-marital activity between Butch and Della. I filled her in on Marie’s suspicions regarding Butch’s calls to the insurance company about liability for accidental deaths on the premises, and the existence of security footage from the hallway outside our room.

  She held her hand to her mouth. “You’ll see me kissing Dion if you watch that footage.”

  “I’ll fast-forward the mushy stuff,” I promised, then I told her about finding Butch in the empty float tank, and how he swore his body contact with Della had been minimal. By contrast, Della had painted a much more shocking image when she’d gotten into the catfight with Marie. I didn’t know who to believe.

  Jessica asked, “Why would Della even feel threatened by Marie? So what if she and Franco were sending messages about cooking shows. You and I do that sort of thing all the time. It’s what friends do.”

  “But a friend doesn’t lure a friend up to the honeymoon suite on the top floor, then whip off her gray dress to reveal some very complicated underwear.”

  Jessica’s bright blue eyes widened. “Marie did that?”

  “Last night. I was outside chasing Jeffrey up a tree when I saw them in the upstairs room and heard everything.”

  She blinked. “Everything?”

  “Franco left before things got X-rated, but he promised he would meet her up there again tonight.”

  She took my clothes as I passed them to her and rinsed them in the sink while I started the shower.

  After a few minutes, she said, “I think everything around here has gotten weird enough to justify going home early.”

  “We can stay if you want. You and Dion are looking cute together, and I wouldn’t want to pull you apart.”

  “He is sweet, which is a good reason to try that whole hard-to-get thing. If he wants to take me out, he can do it back in Misty Falls.”