Inn Dire Straits

by Dixie Davis

  Lori took a deep breath. “You told me yourself, Brett. You wouldn’t put it past any one of you.”

  He didn’t respond other than to mutter goodbye before the call ended.

  Lori stared at the number in front of her. With every suspect — every member of the crew — that she eliminated, the more and more likely it became that she was trying to spend time talking to a killer. Alone with a killer, possibly. Trying to outsmart a killer.

  She didn’t think of herself as dumb, but going toe to toe with someone who’d taken a life was not something she really felt equipped for, not even after doing it a couple times.

  She needed to handle this carefully. This wasn’t something she wanted to leave to a text message, that could be read and interpreted in too many ways. Lori entered the number in her phone and hit the button to call.

  Serena answered right away. “Hello?”

  “Hi, Serena, this is Lori.” Serena didn’t greet her, so Lori added, “From the Mayweather House?” Obviously she wasn’t asking her whether that was true, but she hoped the questioning tone would soften the memory jog.

  “Oh. Yeah. Hi. Do you need something?”

  Lori steeled herself. “Yes, we need to talk.”

  “Is it about my job?” Serena’s cringe was almost audible.

  “Um.” Well, the correct answer was yes, Serena was definitely fired after this week. It was one thing to be mourning a friend, it was another thing to perpetually fail to call in.

  And then there was the case. A phone conversation was better than a text message, but Lori would much rather talk face to face, where she could gauge Serena’s reactions better. “Do you think we could meet sometime this afternoon? Or evening?”

  “I guess so.” She hesitated before adding, “But I’m not going back out to Dusky Cove tonight.”

  Of course not. “Let me get your address.”

  Serena hesitated again, and Lori pushed forward. “I have a treat all ready to go into the oven, and I wanted to bring some by. Do you like . . . ?” What did they have left over? “Danishes?”

  Serena snorted. “Only if they’re cinnamon.” She rattled off her address in Hinckley. “I won’t be home until after four, though.”

  Where was she now? The police station? Lori hoped not, but she didn’t think she could pry quite yet. “Okay, I’ll be there.”

  Serena ended the call without a goodbye. Just as well. Lori hurried to the kitchen. Cinnamon Danishes? Was that a thing? Lori opened the breadbox where she stored the emergency pastries.

  It was empty.

  Lori sighed. She had to bring something. Nothing softened a blow better than food, preferably a sweet treat. Lori had promised cinnamon Danishes. What could she deliver on?

  She pulled the fridge open. What did she have that was dough-like? She could make biscuits or baking mix biscuits, which could work in a pinch. She had a pop tube of cinnamon rolls, but those might be pretty old — and they were her emergency stash, lightning-fast breakfasts she could break out if she ran out of everything else. Her favorite way to use them was to cut them up into a cinnamon roll pull-apart loaf, like monkey bread.

  She moved a gallon of milk aside and then she spotted it — the box of puff pastry she had thawing for quick turnovers. It was probably ready to use now. How could she pull off a cinnamon Danish?

  Lori glanced back at the pop tube of cinnamon rolls — with cream cheese icing.

  Could she pull off a cream cheese monkey bread Danish?

  She could try. She grabbed the box of puff pastry, another of cream cheese, some butter and an egg.

  The pull-apart aspect of monkey bread was a major part of its appeal, so Lori had to keep that. While the oven preheated, she trimmed a sheet of puff pastry into a square, and sliced the leftovers into smaller pieces.

  Next, she raided the pantry for cinnamon, sugar, and a cookbook with a good pastry chapter. That yielded a Danish recipe to help her make the streusel topping and the cream cheese filling, scaled down considerably, since she wasn’t making a full batch with a pound of pastry.

  Once she had those components ready, she was almost to the point of assembly — but she’d need some way to get the cinnamon and sugar to stick to the puff pastry pieces, which was still fairly dry on the surfaces.

  Lori firmly believed in the philosophy of “When in doubt, use more butter,” so she cut off a few tablespoons and melted them in the microwave. A quick toss in their butter bath and the puff pastry pieces picked up their cinnamon sugar perfectly.

  Shaping the pastries was the tricky part, though. She brushed the individual pieces into four piles on a baking sheet, pressing them down to form a well for the filling in the center. The streusel topping felt like overkill now, but that was part of a Danish, so she let sprinkled it on top.

  Lori slid the baking sheet into the oven and started to straighten up after herself. The guessing game of baking times was not her favorite part of creating in the kitchen, so she couldn’t stray far from the room while she was working.

  Finally, after twenty minutes, she pulled the pan from the oven. The filling was warm and bubbly, the streusel topping had transformed into the candy-like crust she dreamed about, and the pastry pieces were golden brown.

  She hadn’t tasted it yet, but it certainly looked like she could declare the monkey bread Danish a success.

  Lori let the pastries cool while she made a quick inventory of the inn — no guests that needed her, no check-ins coming until tomorrow, no emergency repairs reported in the rooms. She restocked the guest snacks — again — before she arranged the Danishes on a nice paper plate. Lori kicked herself for leaving a serving bowl at Brett’s. She’d learned long ago that paper plates were so much less stressful on recipients — and friendships.

  Just as Lori collected the plate of warm Danishes, Annie wandered into the kitchen.

  “Finish your movie?”

  Annie laughed softly. “Yeah. Doug fell asleep, and I don’t have the heart to wake him. Can I help with anything?”

  Lori glanced around. The kitchen was already sparkling. “Would you like to check the sodas in the fridge and maybe cut up the fruit for breakfast?” She nodded at a bowl with strawberries and bananas.

  “Sure. Keep them separate or together? Do you have any citric acid?”

  “Separate. In the cabinet above them.”

  Annie immediately moved to get to work. That was so much easier than trying to explain everything to Serena three times (and then usually doing it herself anyway).

  Annie turned back and spotted the plate in Lori’s hands. “Going somewhere?”

  “To talk to Serena,” Lori admitted.

  The name seemed to shock Annie enough to startle her. “You really think she could have done this?”

  “She didn’t have an alibi for last night, and we both saw her in town right after the accident this morning. We need to find out.”

  Annie bit her lip. “I mean, I guess she did date both Nate and Trey in high school. That’s the first thing that sticks out in my mind. You really think this is revenge for high school stuff?”

  “Possibly. Have to find out.”

  “Good luck,” Annie bid her before turning to the fridge and pulling out sodas.

  The inn was in good hands for a little bit.

  Lori headed to Serena’s address in Hinckley. She arrived after four, giving Serena plenty of time to finish up whatever she’d been doing when Lori called.

  Lori pulled up to a brick apartment building and climbed up the stairs to number seven. Two flights of stairs — she was definitely earning a pastry, if Serena felt inclined to share. Four Danishes was a lot of pastry for one person, assuming she lived alone.

  Lori finally reached number seven and knocked at the door. After a wait that felt interminable, the door finally swung open. “Hi, Lori.” Serena’s smile was extra nervous. “What can I do for you?”

  That was honestly the closest Lori had ever heard her offer to help. “Well, first of all,
I brought you these.” Lori held up the plate, as if Serena hadn’t already spotted the baked goods.

  “Thanks.” Serena took the plate. And just stood there.

  This was supposed to be the part where she invited Lori in. After all, she’d brought Serena a bribe — er, a treat.

  “Can I come in?” Lori finally asked.

  Serena glanced over her shoulder, craning her neck to see something inside. “No,” she finally said. “I don’t think so.”

  Lori tried not to frown. “Well, I’d still like to talk to you a little, if you’re willing.”

  She silently sighed at herself. She shouldn’t give a suspect — or an employee — an easy out like that, an opportunity to say no and slam the door in her face.

  Serena didn’t slam the door, but she didn’t open it to Lori, either. She leaned against the door jamb. “Okay,” she said. “Go ahead.”

  “I was thinking we could both do the talking.”

  Serena looked away, pressing her lips together again. “Okay,” she said, her tone resigned. “We can talk.” She disappeared into the apartment for a moment, but before Lori could follow her in, she reappeared — without the plate of pastries. “Let’s go,” she said.

  Lori nodded, hoping her disappointment didn’t show. “Anywhere we can walk around here?”

  Public would be good. Safer. Because if the evidence she’d collected thus far was right, she was interviewing a double murderer.

  Lori followed Serena to a park nearby, and they started around the walking path wandering along the perimeter of the grass.

  Serena didn’t say anything for the first half mile. Lori kept glancing at her, waiting for her to begin. Her fair skin seemed to grow paler and paler every time Lori checked.

  “Am I fired?” Serena asked.

  Was that what she was so nervous about? Lori gave a little laugh although the answer was obviously yes. “Um, I’m here to talk about Nate and Trey.”

  “Trey?” Serena looked at her for the first time, her brown eyes wide. “What does he have to do with this?”

  Oh no. She didn’t know either. Or she was trying to convince Lori she didn’t know. “Trey was hit by a car a little before noon. When we heard the sirens?”

  Serena gasped and turned away. Lori gave her a moment to process, but after three or four minutes, Serena still hadn’t moved.

  “Obviously,” Lori began gently, “this makes it look even more like Nate’s death wasn’t an accident.”

  Serena raked both hands through her hair. “Ten years — ten years. This shouldn’t be happening now.”

  Lori understood the ten years part, but what that had to do with not killing her friends, she had no idea. She couldn’t let Serena distract her, though — Serena was the last suspect. Those ten years of friendship were exactly what made her look guilty. “Where were you before you came in today? And after you left?”

  “I went to the memorial, and then I had to go to my other job.”

  “Wait, you have another job?” That had been her alibi last night.

  Serena nodded. “At the Quik’n Easy here in Hinckley.”

  Lori fixed her with a solemn look — but she needed to build to this slowly. Like the chief had said, the element of surprise, being able to control the information in a conversation, was crucial in an interview.

  Where could she start? Focusing on something that was a little more provable — Brett’s SUV. “Have you ever been to Brett’s house?” Lori began.

  “Huh?” Serena furrowed her brow. “Yeah, all the time in high school. His mom worked at a bakery in Hinckley; we practically lived on day-old doughnuts.”

  Lori tried not to let the idea of that many donuts distract her. She wasn’t sure whether she was envious or queasy, though. “Did you happen to notice where his family kept their keys?”

  The lines in Serena’s brow grew even deeper, and her eyes wandered from side to side, as if she were searching the sidewalk — or her memory. “There was . . . there was something. I know I saw the keys, but I can’t remember where. Why? Is Brett okay?”

  “For now,” Lori said. She couldn’t lie to Serena — if Brett were arrested, he would definitely not be okay. There was no “okay” your first day in jail. “If I told you that he kept his keys by the door, would that jog any memories?”

  Serena closed her eyes and stopped walking a few feet from the park’s picnic area. “Maybe? A rack with his parents’ keys?”

  That was clearly coming from her own memory — but she hadn’t dredged it up by herself. Suddenly, Lori was acutely aware that she was ruining the police’s investigation if it turned toward Serena, and there was no doubt Serena would mention this to the police. Suddenly Brett wasn’t the only one facing a likely jail sentence.

  She’d have to convince Serena to confess to the police, too. As if her task today wasn’t big enough already. She’d barely gotten Serena to admit she’d seen Brett’s keys ten years ago, and she was acting like she had no memory of them without Lori’s prompting.

  Maybe it was time for Lori to push her harder. She decided to drop a bomb. “Brett’s SUV was used today to hit Trey.”

  Serena whipped around to face Lori full on again. “What do you mean? Someone took Brett’s keys and hit Trey with his car?”

  Well, she put those pieces together faster than Lori had anticipated. “I don’t know for sure what might have happened,” Lori hedged.

  “Then what are your other theories?”

  “I — I guess it could have been Brett.” Lori didn’t expound on the rest of the suspect list, but Serena did.

  “Or Annie. Or me. That’s what you’re saying, isn’t it?”

  Lori glanced at the one family in the picnic area. Of course she hadn’t actually said that, but it was what she was thinking. Except that Annie had an alibi.

  Serena shook her head, her lips pursed. “You really don’t know anything, do you?”

  “Excuse me?” Lori couldn’t help gaping at her. Serena, of all people, was taking that attitude with her?

  Serena marched ahead and Lori hurried to catch up. “What do you mean I don’t know anything?”

  “First of all, you think that I could have done this.” She huffed out a frustrated sigh. “I mean, I get that you hardly know me, but seriously? I’d go and murder my high school boyfriends ten years later? Why would I do that?”

  Lori hadn’t quite gotten that far in her thinking — but, then, with how secretive these kids acted, perhaps that was to be expected. “Why don’t you tell me?” Lori said. “And you can disprove that theory while you’re at it.”

  Serena scoffed and didn’t slow down in her march. “Let’s see. Because I dumped Nate and then Trey dumped me, ten years ago? What, seeing Annie suddenly triggers the homicidal jealousy I’ve repressed for a decade?” She rolled her eyes.

  “Well, when you put it that way,” Lori muttered. No, it didn’t sound credible.

  Serena did a double take, then slowed to a stop. “Wait. You really don’t know, do you?”

  Lori stopped too, studying Serena’s face. “Don’t know what?”

  “I thought for sure you had to know, and that was why you were defending us with the police last night.”

  Had she? Well, yes, she had defended them — but now she was pretty sure one of them had to be guilty.

  Unless there was a lot more going on here that she didn’t know about.

  Serena’s shoulders fell. “You’re not going to stop pursuing this, are you?”

  “No.” Conviction rang in her voice.

  “You remember the cop from last night? Eddie O’Connor?” Serena asked.

  Lori nodded. That was the second time one of the fivesome had brought him up today.

  “You don’t know what happened to his little sister?”

  Lori hesitated. She knew virtually nothing about Eddie at all — not if he was married, not if he was local, not if he even had a little sister. “What happened to his little sister?”

  Ser
ena stared at Lori, and this time, Lori was sure she grew paler with every second until the contrast against Serena’s dark hair made her look whiter than a ghost. Serena opened her mouth to speak, but nothing came out.

  She forced a nervous smile and a little laugh. “I can’t believe how hard it is to say this.” She shook her head. “I’ve never said these words out loud.”

  As Serena’s strained silence stretched on, the hairs on the back of Lori’s neck stood on end. Whatever she was trying to say, this was very, very serious.

  Lori had known this fearsome fivesome had a secret, but how deep — and how dark — was that secret?

  She was about to find out.

  Serena started walking again and Lori followed. “Eddie’s little sister?”

  “Her name was Corinne.” Serena sighed. “She went to high school with us, maybe a year or two younger. We’d seen her at a few parties, but we didn’t really know her.”

  Lori nodded slowly. Did Serena say her name “was” Corinne because she was talking about things that happened ten years ago, or because Corinne wasn’t alive anymore?

  Where, exactly, was this story going?

  They passed the playground with its squeaky swings screaming at them. Serena’s voice and her feet began picking up momentum. “One night, it was the end of the summer. People were going to start leaving for college soon, and it was supposed to be our last big hurrah. We’d been at a party, and the five of us — Nate, Trey, Brett, Annie and me — piled into Annie’s car. We were going to Annie’s to hang out for the rest of the night.” She rubbed her forehead. “We were crazy. Messed up. Stupid teenagers.”

  Lori had to hurry to keep up with her steps and her story. “So you were in Annie’s car,” she prompted when Serena hesitated.

  “Right. It’s . . . Like I said, I’ve never told anyone this. I’ve tried to not even think about it for so long. It’s hard to start now.” Serena sniffled. “Nate, though — it seemed like it was always with him. Sometimes, I’d just look over at him and know — he’s thinking about that night, about what happened.”