The Haunting of Riley Watson

by Alexandria Clarke

  She sat at the desk near the balcony doors. The entire world outside was white and glaring. Hopefully, the string of storms would peter off soon. The longer we were stuck at King and Queens, the worse things would get.

  Jazmin opened my laptop and set up my camera bag. As quasi-producer of Madame Lucia’s Parlour for the Dead and Departed, she knew the technical stuff as well, or better, than I did. She plugged in the video camera, the one I’d noticed was missing from my bag yesterday, and the footage began to load on the laptop.

  “What are you doing?” I said, leaning over the back of her chair and resting my chin on her shoulder to watch the screen. The video showed Daniel sliding into the booth next to Oliver’s. Oliver was too distraught to make it to the bar where Daniel was holding the rest of his interviews.

  “I figured it couldn’t hurt to set up some surveillance,” Jazmin said, fiddling with the volume controls. “So I used your camera to film some of the interviews.”

  I reached over her and hit the pause button. “You do realize that’s illegal, right? Daniel’s a detective. These interviews are official police business. You could get arrested for this.”

  “I’d rather be arrested than dead, wouldn’t you?”

  “I don’t think this is a good idea.”

  She spun the chair around to face me, crossing one long leg over the other. “You didn’t seem so opposed to stealing evidence when we poached those photos off the memory card before Daniel could see. Did you change your mind about Odette’s request?”

  “No, of course not,” I said. “We have to figure out what happened here, but I’m not sure this is the way to do it. We have to think about the future. If we solve the mystery but end up in jail, what’s the point of all this anyway?”

  “To stay alive,” she emphasized. “I’m being practical, Lucia. Daniel is in over his head. You’ve seen what he’s like. He’s high strung and stressed out, and to be honest, I’m not too sure he’s got a handle on his sobriety. Are we supposed to trust a guy like that with our lives?”

  “A guy like what?” I said. “He has a problem, Lucia. That doesn’t make him unreliable.”

  “Doesn’t it though?” She had that look on her face, the single eyebrow lifting to show she knew she was right about something. “Daniel’s unstable and alone. If we’re going to figure this out, we have to take some unconventional steps.”

  “He’s going through a tough divorce,” I argued. “Custody of his daughter is on the line, and he’s trapped in this hotel with a bunch of morons and a murderer. You’d be unstable too.”

  “This isn’t about Daniel,” she said, drumming her fingers on the desk. “It’s about you, me, and Riley, though I’m only including myself in that list because I’d like to make it home without twelve stab wounds through my stomach. You’ve known Daniel for a week. Why are you defending him?”

  I sank into the arm chair and pulled the fluffy throw blanket around my head like a nun’s habit. “I don’t know.”

  Jazmin stared intently at me. I hugged my knees into my chest and covered them with the blanket too like a turtle hiding in its shell. Jazmin continued to stare.

  “What?” I demanded.

  “Something’s going on with you,” she said, tilting her head to the side as if viewing me from a different angle might reveal my innermost secrets. “You’ve never been opposed to doing illegal things before.”

  “Levitating a television out of a third-floor window and impersonating a psychic is not the same as screwing around with a police investigation,” I pointed out.

  “No, it’s not that,” she said. “It has something to do with Daniel. You feel sorry for him or something. That’s why you don’t want to get involved with his investigation. You think the Crimson Basin police force will find out, and he’ll get canned.”

  “I don’t care about Daniel,” I insisted, but the high pitch of my voice gave away the blatant lie.

  Jazmin crossed her arms. “Out with it. What’s your deal with him? Did you guys hook up or something?”

  “What? No! He’s ten plus years older than me.”

  “Like that’s stopped you before?”

  “He reminds me of my dad.”

  “Lucia, there’s daddy issues and then there’s daddy issues,” she said. “Please don’t say you have a problem with the latter category.”

  “Ugh!” I covered my head with the throw blanket entirely. “Can you stop? That’s not what I meant.”

  “Then what did you mean?”

  I peeked through the lush fabric. The problem with how close Jazmin and I were to each other was that there was no way to lie to her. She saw through every expression. She knew how my eyes darted from one side to the other and how my nose wrinkled and how my lips twitched if I said something that wasn’t truthful.

  “What do you know about my dad?” I asked.

  Her gracefully arched eyebrows scrunched together like they always did when she was thinking hard about something. “I know what you’ve told me. He was a painter. He loved you more than anything else in the world. He fought with your mom a lot, but they still loved each other. He was warm and kind. He took you to art galleries when you were little even though you didn’t understand much of it.”

  “All of that is true,” I said. “But I left something out. My father was also a recovering addict.”

  It clicked into place for Jazmin, the thing I’d explained to her once and never spoke of again. Her eyes expanded to the size of dinner plates as she realized what this piece of information meant.

  “Oh my God,” she said.

  “Yeah.”

  “So when you—?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Oh my God.” She dropped off the desk chair and sank to the floor, resting her forehead against my knees like a woman come to worship. “Why didn’t you tell me any of this before?”

  I brushed my fingers through her silky hair. It smelled like the artificially-scented strawberry shampoo provided by the resort rather than her usual jasmine essential oils, another reminder that we were out of our element. “I didn’t want you to think poorly of me. My dad wasn’t the man I made him out to be. Half the time, he was the perfect father and husband. My mother was enamored with him, and I couldn’t fathom life without him. The other half was—let’s just say it wasn’t fun.”

  “I’m so sorry, Lucia.”

  “Why are you apologizing to me?” I asked. “You should be running as far away from me as possible now that you know the truth.”

  She hugged my legs and rested her chin on my thigh to look up at me. “Listen to me. This doesn’t change anything. I never thought you were responsible, and I still don’t.”

  “You don’t understand what I’m telling you then.”

  Riley emerged from the bathroom, wrapped in a fluffy white robe that was too big for her as she towel-dried her hair. “What’s going on?” she asked upon seeing Jazmin at my feet. “Are you two okay?”

  I’d been crying. I wiped my eyes and gently pulled away from Jazmin’s half-hug. “We’re good. Did you enjoy your shower?”

  “The water kept running cold,” Riley complained, wandering toward the desk. “Dad needs to get that fixed. Oh, you got the videos up. Have you watched them yet?”

  I looked at Jazmin. “You let her in on all of this?”

  Jazmin sat on the arm of my chair and shrugged. “She needed a break from babysitting her dad. Besides, she’s a big part of this. Don’t you think she should be involved?”

  “She’s twelve.”

  Riley perched her hands on her hips. “You didn’t seem to care about that before.”

  “Riley, I’m sorry,” I said. “I’m trying to keep you safe and out of trouble. If we’re going to do this, you have to stay out of it. That’s the best option for you.”

  Riley glared at me, bright and defiant. With one finger, she tapped the space bar of the laptop to play the video of her father and the detective.

  “Really?” I said, exasperated.
I reached over to stop the video, but Jazmin grabbed me around the waist and pulled me away from the desk. “Jaz, come on. Quit it.”

  “Shh,” she said, tightening her grip. “We’re trying to listen.”

  With Riley at the desk and Jazmin as my captor, I turned my attention to the video. Daniel and Oliver spoke in hushed voices, but Jazmin had attached the external mic to the camera, which was powerful enough to pick up their conversation.

  “We need to talk,” Daniel said as he sat beside Oliver. He offered the other man a glass of water, but Oliver refused to drink. “I know this morning has been absolute hell for you. I know the past couple of weeks haven’t been good at all, but I need to get your side of the story.”

  This must have been early in the day before Oliver had any time to collect himself. His blank stare was unnerving. His eyes were vacant, dull, and heavily lidded. Worse still, he looked over Daniel’s shoulder toward Jazmin’s booth, right into the lens.

  “Is he looking at the camera?” I suppressed a shudder. Oliver’s wooden gaze got inside my lungs and sat there like cancer.

  “There’s no way,” Jazmin said. “I was hiding it beneath a sweater. He couldn’t have seen it.”

  Oliver’s eyes burned into the screen.

  “Tell him that.”

  “He looks so empty,” Riley said, studying her father’s face. “Defeated. He was never like that before.”

  “Losing half of your family will do that to you,” I said. “Everyone hush. I want to hear what he says.”

  “Look who’s into breaking the law now,” Jazmin said. I wrapped the throw blanket around her and pulled it tight like a straightjacket. She shut up.

  “Oliver?” Daniel said on screen, tapping the other man’s arm to get his attention. “Can you tell me about that night? Where were you before you came to check on Tyler in the morning?”

  Oliver blinked but did not emerge from his distant state.

  “Can you remember anything?” Daniel pressed. “I’m no forensics officer, but by the look of Tyler’s body, he’d been lying around like that for a couple of hours. That puts the murder at around three or four in the morning. Were you awake?”

  Finally, Oliver muttered something under his breath. Daniel leaned in.

  “What was that?” he asked.

  “How dare you,” Oliver said. He repeated himself again and again, each time escalating in volume. “How dare you? How dare you? How dare you?”

  In the background of the shot, reflections of the other people in the lounge window turned to stare at Oliver and Daniel. Daniel, trying to contain the situation, reached out to pat Oliver.

  “Don’t touch me!” Oliver said.

  Somewhere offscreen, the mic picking up the humiliation in her voice, Riley said, “Uh oh. Here he goes again.”

  Oliver exploded like a pipe bomb. He shoved Daniel out of the booth and slammed his fists against the table. “Why?” he sobbed, garbling his words. “Why me? Why is this happening? I’m a good man.”

  Real-time Riley hit the button to fast-forward the video. “I don’t need to relive that part if you don’t mind. I saw it in person.”

  “I didn’t,” I protested. “Where was I?”

  “This was before you came downstairs again,” said Jazmin. “We can watch it later.”

  Riley scowled as she pushed play. On the screen, Daniel walked toward the camera. Jazmin pulled the camera further into her sweater to hide it better until all we could see was a tuft of green cotton and Daniel’s utility belt.

  “Riley, do you mind talking to me for a bit?” Daniel asked. “It’s about last night. I need to know where you were, if you saw your dad, stuff like that.”

  “Did Oliver say it was okay?” Jazmin asked. “You need permission from a parent or guardian to question a minor.”

  “Oliver’s not in shape to give his permission,” Daniel said. “We need to crack down on what happened last night. That means questioning family members first.”

  Riley slid out of the booth, my Blondie shirt flashing across the screen as she did so. The camera jostled and went black.

  “What happened?” I asked.

  “Shh,” Riley said.

  “It’s okay, Jazmin,” Camera-Riley said. Though the visuals were gone, we still had audio. “I don’t mind answering the detective’s questions. Should we go somewhere quiet?”

  “The bar is fine,” Daniel answered.

  Static rushed through the mic. Riley was carrying the camera. When the visual came back, the shot was cocked at an angle. She’d hastily set the camera without checking the framing. A third of the picture was obscured by a napkin dispenser, but Daniel was in the shot, his back turned to the lens. The camera was in position to catch the remainder of Daniel’s interviews.

  “Did you put her up to this?” I asked Jazmin. “Did you ask her to bring the camera to the bar?”

  “No!” Jazmin insisted.

  “She didn’t,” added Riley. “It was my idea, and if I hadn’t done it, we would have lost whatever information Daniel got out of the other employees, so can you stop scolding everyone and get down with the plan?”

  I crossed my arms. “Fine. What did you tell Detective Daniel?”

  “Watch and see.”

  On screen, the auto-focus feature struggled to capture Daniel and Riley in the same shot. Either he was fuzzy, or she was. Daniel cleared his throat. He seemed more nervous to speak to Riley than he had to Oliver.

  “How ya holding up?” he asked.

  “Really?” she said. “This is how we’re going to do this?”

  He shuffled on the bar stool. “I don’t know what you mean.”

  “You can’t treat me like a kid,” Riley said. “I might be young, but I’m not stupid. You’re using me to get information about my dad and my brother. You might as well be up front about it.”

  “No, I wasn’t—” He quickly changed his tune at the look on Riley’s face. “Fine, that’s exactly what I was doing. I had no idea why I thought it would work. My daughter’s about your age, and she would’ve seen right through me too. I should have known better than to underestimate you.”

  “Yeah, you should’ve.”

  “I won’t make that mistake again,” Daniel promise. “Can you tell me what happened that night? I know it was a rough one for you. Lucia said she found you screaming in the old wing. Something about being set on fire?”

  It was Riley’s turn to shift around in discomfort. “I’m sure you know my dad hired Lucia to purge me of evil spirits, right?”

  “I do.”

  “And you probably don’t believe in it.”

  “I’ve never been particularly spiritual or religious.”

  “Then let’s call them nightmares,” Riley bargained. “I have nightmares about the people who used to stay in this resort. Sometimes, they cause me to sleepwalk. It’s not really sleepwalking, because I’m not asleep when it happens, but I don’t have control over it, so that’s the best explanation I have. That night, after Tyler dropped me from the mezzanine, I had a nightmare and sleepwalked into the old wing. That’s when Lucia found me.”

  Daniel scribbled notes in his booklet. “Right, I was busy taking Tyler to his room during that time. Where did you go after?”

  “I wanted to stay with Lucia, but my dad wouldn’t let me,” Riley said. “He tried to make me stay in his room, but it’s too close to the old wing for my tastes, so I went back to my own.”

  “Not to Lucia’s?”

  “I would’ve gone to her suite, but my dad walked me to my own room to make sure I got there okay,” she said. “He worries too much about me.”

  “And then what? He left?”

  “Yup.”

  “And what did you do?”

  “I went to sleep,” Riley said.

  “Did you have any nightmares?”

  “No.”

  “Can anyone clarify that you were in your room for the duration of the entire night?” Daniel asked.

  Riley
narrowed her eyes at him. “What are you trying to ask me, Detective Hawkins?”

  He squirmed hearing Riley use his full title. “You mentioned not being in control during these sleepwalking episodes. All I want to know is if you remember leaving your room that night.”

  “Do you think I killed my brother?”

  “I’m hoping to ascertain that you didn’t.”

  Riley respected his frankness. “I was in my room the entire night.”

  “But no one else can confirm that. Is that correct?”

  She rapped her knuckles against the bar, a nervous tick. “Yeah, I guess so.”

  Daniel flipped the cover of his notebook shut. “Thanks, Riley. That’s all I needed to know. You can head back to Jazmin now. Send Nick Porter over, would you?”

  Riley stood up, leaving the camera where it was. She paused, half in and half out of the camera frame. “I didn’t do it, Detective Hawkins. I know I have plenty of reasons to kill my brother, but I’m not like that. I don’t even know where to get a knife like that.”

  “You saw the stab wounds?”

  “I was in the room this morning, remember?”

  Daniel covered his eyes. “I’m sorry you had to see that. I should have taken you out of there sooner.”

  Riley lifted her shoulders. “It’s not your fault. You were preoccupied.”

  “Still.” He coughed to cover up the awkward moment. “Nick Porter, please.”

  “Yeah, sure,” Riley said.

  She walked beyond the frame. For a minute, Daniel reviewed the notes he’d taken during her interview, circling or underlining here and there. Nick Porter took up Riley’s empty seat, groaning as he lifted his stiff leg into place on the rung of the barstool.

  “Rough morning, eh?” Nick said as he placed his cane on the counter in front of the camera. Now only the top two-thirds of the frame was of any use to us.