Dosed to Death

by P. D. Workman

  Zachary wandered farther into the cabin. The living room and kitchen were together in the right side of the cabin. He went through a hallway to the left to check out the other rooms. Kenzie followed.

  There were three bedrooms. Lots of space for them to spread out. They wouldn’t be right on top of each other for a week. Zachary picked one of the bedrooms and put their clothing down. He took the bags of food back out to the kitchen.

  “You brought a lot of food with you. He said that they have dinner every night in the main house.”

  “I know. And there is a continental breakfast, and sandwiches and cold cuts for lunch. But I wanted to make sure that you had familiar food that you like. I know how hard it is for you to eat when your meds make you nauseated.”

  She had packed chocolate chip granola bars, one of the only things he could get down in the morning. And the various other snack foods that he subsisted on when they didn’t have meals together. She didn’t want him to have any excuse for not eating. The vacation was to fatten him up, not to let him waste away any more.

  “Thanks,” Zachary said, sounding surprised, like he was amazed that she would have considered such a thing.

  “We take care of each other,” Kenzie said simply.

  It wasn’t just her looking after Zachary when he ran into problems. He helped her too, when she was working late, when she had run into trouble at work and needed help with a case.

  When he had jumped in between her and a crazed killer at the masquerade ball. He’d only needed a few stitches, but it could have been much worse.

  7

  They were both tired from the packing and the drive, so they ended up napping most of the afternoon. Kenzie was up before Zachary, which, if he weren’t recovering from his treatment, would have been remarkable. Even just sleeping during the day was unusual for him, despite how little he slept at night.

  Kenzie got up slowly, careful not to wake him up. She got out one of her paperbacks and curled up to read it on the couch. Zachary was up in another hour, rubbing his eyes sleepily.

  “How are you doing?” Kenzie asked. “Good nap?”

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to sleep the whole afternoon.”

  “You’re still recovering. Don’t worry about it. We’re here to rest.”

  “Rest, yes, but not to sleep the whole vacation away.”

  “You won’t. I slept a lot of the time too. You weren’t the only one. Are you getting hungry?”

  Zachary shrugged. “I could eat something.”

  For him, that was about as good as it got. He usually said he didn’t want anything, so Kenzie took it as a good sign.

  “Great. They’ll be serving dinner at the farmhouse pretty soon. Do you want to go up and meet the other guests and have dinner together?”

  Zachary hesitated, then nodded. “Yeah, sure. That sounds good.”

  “You sure?”

  “You don’t want to stay in the cabin all day, do you? And you’ll want a good dinner.”

  “Yes, but we don’t have to rush into it. If you want to just have dinner ourselves tonight, we can do that. I brought plenty of food.”

  “No. Let’s go have dinner with the others.”

  Kenzie smiled. She was looking forward to meeting the other vacationers. It felt like going to camp as a kid. She’d never gone to any that were real wilderness experiences. Lisa, her mother, had only selected camps with modern facilities. But Kenzie had enjoyed being closer to nature, making new friends, and trying new things. It was always an exciting time. Maybe that was why she had been drawn to the Lodge.

  “Great. Give me a few minutes to freshen up, and then we’ll head up and join the others. They have cocktails before dinner, so we can meet everyone and mix a little.”

  Zachary’s eyes followed her as she got up and headed back to the bedroom. “I guess... I should change and shave.”

  She stopped in front of him and laid her hand over one whiskery cheek. “If you have the energy. If not, there’s no dress code. You can go looking like a mountain man, I don’t think anyone will object.”

  He put his hand over hers for a few seconds, his fingers warm and his touch light. “I’m not sure this rises to the level of mountain man, but it could use a trim.”

  “Okay. I’ll see you in a few minutes.”

  Kenzie changed into a blouse and slacks. She didn’t want to be overdressed. She would see how everyone else was dressed before going to dinner in a dress. She applied fresh red lipstick and touched up her makeup in front of the mirror in the bedroom. She could hear Zachary’s razor buzzing in the bathroom.

  They met back in the living room. Zachary had managed a trim, and she supposed he had probably run a comb through his close-cropped dark hair, though it was impossible to tell. Which was exactly why he kept it that short. Kenzie touched her own spiraling dark curls. Her hair looked pretty good for having slept on it half the afternoon. Zachary hadn’t changed his clothes. Shaving had probably used up most of his available energy.

  “Looks good,” Kenzie approved. “Let’s go meet the other campers.”

  They walked up to the main house together, Kenzie’s hand through Zachary’s arm. The sky was dark and the stars out, shining brightly overhead.

  “Wow. It’s beautiful,” Kenzie breathed.

  Zachary raised his head and looked up at the stars. “You never see them like that in the city. I’ve seen photographs, but this is... amazing.”

  “How do you take pictures of stars? Do you need special equipment? Because you’re taking pictures in the dark?”

  Zachary went into a detailed explanation of what he would need to do to capture the brilliance of the stars, what equipment he would use and what camera settings. Kenzie didn’t pay much attention to the details, just listened to his voice, relaxed and passionate about his hobby. By the time he was done, they were to the door of the farmhouse.

  A young woman was walking up at the same time, and Zachary opened and held the door for her and Kenzie. The other woman barely acknowledged his existence. She was blond and, Kenzie had to admit, absolutely gorgeous. She probably had all kinds of men running to open the door for her with regularity. Zachary’s eyes lingered on her as she walked away from him. Kenzie wondered whether he was thinking of Bridget, also blond and beautiful.

  But he didn’t watch her for long. He took Kenzie’s hand again and walked with her into the main living room area where the guests were gathering for drinks.

  It was an intimate group, not too noisy and overwhelming. It was a relaxed, peaceful atmosphere rather than a party with music blasting. The blonde went directly to the drinks at the side table and she poured herself a glass of wine before looking around at the other vacationers.

  “Do you want something?” Zachary asked.

  “A glass of wine would be nice.”

  He let go of her and went to the sideboard to pour her one. She watched him pour a glass of ginger ale for himself.

  He returned with her wine.

  “Thank you.” Kenzie looked around, smiling at the others. One man smiled back and approached them, reaching out his hand to shake with them. He had round apple cheeks that made him look very young despite his beard, which Kenzie thought was an obvious attempt to look mature.

  His grip was firm. “Redd Flagg.”

  Kenzie blinked and looked at Zachary to see whether he had heard the same thing as she had. He looked just as bemused as she felt.

  “What?” Kenzie asked.

  “My name. I’m Redd Flagg. That’s two D’s, two G’s.”

  “Oh, well that’s unique. I’m Kenzie, and this is Zachary.” Using their first names only would help to preserve their anonymity.

  “Nice to meet you! It’s a pen name, actually. I’m a thriller writer.”

  Kenzie nodded and smiled pleasantly. It sounded like a good name for a thriller author, but was not one that she recognized. “Would I have read anything that you’ve written?”

  “Not unless you’re a time
traveler. Right now I’m... in the drafting stage.”

  “I see. Just starting out.”

  “I decided to go on my own little writer’s retreat. Just me and my computer, in a room, until I get my manuscript written.”

  “Wow, sounds intense.”

  “How is it coming along?” Zachary asked politely.

  “Well... not as much progress as I would hope. But I’m getting words down on the page. That’s the main thing.”

  “You can’t do much without them,” Kenzie agreed. She looked around the room. “So is this everyone?”

  “Uh,” Redd looked around. “Yeah, most of us. Do you recognize her?” He nodded toward the blonde who had entered the house with them.

  “No. Should I?”

  He nodded vigorously. “Brittany. Brittany ‘the Bombshell’ Blake. You’ve heard of her, right?”

  Kenzie recognized the name of the celebrity, but didn’t know what she was actually famous for. An actress, probably, but backwoods Vermont was a strange place to find a famous actress. If she were a Hollywood starlet, shouldn’t she be living on the west coast and holidaying in a spa? “I know the name,” she said, “but I have to confess... I don’t keep up with a lot of pop culture.”

  “She’s a really big thing. Has her own website and this following that call themselves The Bambas.”

  Kenzie wasn’t much more enlightened. But she supposed she could go search the Bombshell up on the internet any time she pleased.

  “Interesting. What’s she doing here?”

  “Getting away from the paparazzi is my guess. Trying to stay under cover. We’ll see how long that lasts. All it takes is one person posting where she is, and we’ll be surrounded by The Bambas.”

  “Well, I hope that doesn’t happen.”

  “Don’t we all,” Redd agreed, but his tone and expression suggested otherwise. Kenzie guessed that nothing would thrill him more than to be able to be caught in the middle of a media frenzy.

  “Who are the lovebirds?” Zachary asked, looking at a young couple cuddling and occasionally smooching on the couch, in danger of spilling their drinks during their amorous activities.

  “The newlyweds,” Redd advised, rolling his eyes. “Mr. and Mrs. Andy Collins. And no, I don’t know her first name at all. She’s just Mrs. Andy Collins, she is so smitten with him.”

  Kenzie chuckled and felt about a hundred years old. She had dated a lot of guys before Zachary, but had she ever been so cow-eyed and dumbstruck over any of them? Not even secret crushes. She’d been out to have her fun, but didn’t think she’d ever been quite that silly.

  “We have another bachelor,” Redd continued, indicating a dark-haired man with a smile Kenzie instinctively distrusted.

  Seeing that they were looking at him, the man approached them. He raised his eyebrows and didn’t offer to shake hands. “Jack Fowler. And you are our newest arrivals.”

  “Kenzie and Zachary,” Redd introduced them. “Just filling them in on everyone’s details.”

  “So you’ve already met our writer in residence,” Jack said sardonically, managing to make it sound like a writer was the most ridiculous career ever. “Be careful or he’ll write you into his story.”

  “It’s a thriller,” Redd pointed out. “Lots of military and spy types. Not...”

  Kenzie suppressed a smile. If he only knew some of the cases that they had been involved in! Redd was just the sort of person they wanted to keep from knowing their actual jobs.

  “I’m a forensic accountant for the IRS,” Kenzie said, making it sound as boring as possible. “And Zachary is...” she trailed off.

  “Between jobs,” he contributed.

  Redd shrugged at Jack and rolled his eyes as if Kenzie and Zach couldn’t see him. “You see?”

  “You think spies would actually tell you that they are spies?” Jack challenged. “You think you would be able to tell just by looking at them? Kenzie and Zachary are exactly the type of ordinary, boring people that a spy would be masquerading as.”

  8

  Redd looked speculatively at Kenzie and Zachary and shook his head. “I don’t think so,” he dismissed.

  Kenzie waited until Redd looked away, then smiled at Zachary, enjoying their shared secret and how wrong Redd was.

  Stuart Dewey, the gray-haired owner, entered the room and called for everyone’s attention. “Dinner is served. If everyone could adjourn to the dining room, we will partake.”

  Everyone started to move toward the dining room, some faster and some slower. Zachary was looking back at something behind him when Kenzie caught sight of the set table, and her heart dropped to her stomach. She moved quickly to Dewey’s side.

  “We need to get the candles off of the table,” she told him urgently. Her mind spun as she looked for an explanation. “You realize they’re against fire codes, don’t you? Like you said, it’s been dry as tinder this year. One accident and everything could go up in smoke.”

  He looked at her. “I’ve been running this facility since you were learning your ABC’s. I think I know the rules.”

  “Can we please get them out of here? They’re not safe.”

  “They’re perfectly safe. We’ve had them on the table for decades of dinners.”

  “Please.” Kenzie put her hand on his arm. “You saw earlier... Zachary has a fear of fire. Can you please dispense with them while we’re here?”

  He rolled his watery blue eyes, raising his brows. “Your boyfriend is afraid of candles.”

  “His house burned down in a fire started by candles when he was ten. Please, have some compassion.”

  “Seems like he’s had long enough to get over it.”

  “Some things you never get over. It’s still really traumatic for him. Can we please?” Kenzie looked back at Zachary. He had seen the candles as well by now, and was standing back in the living room, face pale and sweaty. He was doing pretty well to be able to hold it together, when a bad flashback could send him crashing to the floor, curled up with his arms over his face. The same position he had assumed as a boy, trying to keep the smoke and flames away from his eyes and to make a pocket of breathable air.

  Dewey relented. “Fine,” he said gruffly. “We’ll take the candles off the table.”

  Kenzie helped to blow them out and remove them from the table. She tried to do it unobtrusively, but her actions were out of the ordinary, so people were watching and wondering what was going on.

  “Just need to get these out of the way,” Kenzie said lightly, not trying to explain to the rest of the observers, though some of them had undoubtedly heard Kenzie’s words to Dewey and were looking back at Zachary speculatively.

  When they were all cleared away, Kenzie went back to where Zachary stood. “All clear. Can you do this? Or do you want to go back to the cabin?”

  He swallowed, Adam’s apple straining. “I’ll be fine,” he assured her. They walked together back over to the dining room table and found seats. There was another woman Kenzie hadn’t noticed before. She had apparently joined them while Kenzie was taking care of the candles.

  She was a slim black woman with an afro. She had the effect of studied calm, moving slowly and deliberately and watching everyone around her carefully. She seemed serene, but at the same time, watchful. Kenzie ended up sitting down next to her.

  “Hi. We haven’t met. I’m Kenzie and this is Zachary.”

  “Raven.” The woman nodded at Kenzie and looked past her to Zachary. “Everything okay?”

  “Fine,” Zachary said tersely. “Thanks for asking.”

  “You... had an accident? Your house burned down?”

  “We really don’t like to talk about it,” Kenzie said, raising her voice so that everyone would hear. “Okay? It’s not something that’s easy to talk about.”

  Raven paid no attention to Kenzie’s protest. “Did you get burned?” she asked curiously.

  Zachary was already breathing heavily. Had he brought any of his anxiety pills with him? Kenzie figured
they were going to end up going back to the cabin before dinner was even underway.

  But he pushed up his sleeve in response, showing off one of the worst scars from the fire. Despite the skin grafts, it was still a deep, ugly scar. Everyone stared at it, some openly and some covertly, pretending that they had no idea what was going on across the table from them. Zachary gave Raven a good look, then pushed his sleeve back down again.

  “Kenzie’s right,” he said in a flat, unemotional tone, “I don’t like to talk about it.”

  Raven nodded and turned her attention to her plate and to a fork that apparently needed polishing. They all waited, but no one else posed any questions about the fire.

  Dewey extended a welcome to the newest guests, who had already become the center of attention, and Kenzie and Zachary quietly accepted the good wishes of the other guests.

  “We will have one more guest arriving tomorrow,” Dewey informed them. “Or at least, I assume he will get here tomorrow. Then that’s it for the rest of the week. This will be our group.”

  Kenzie looked around at the others. It was a nice sized group. Most of them seemed friendly enough. She wasn’t sure how big the staff for the lodge was, but she was pretty sure that Dewey was not doing everything himself. Not if they were having “Thanksgiving” dinner every Thursday. There had to at least be a Mrs. Dewey or a cook.

  As she considered this, two women came in, bussing the dishes to the table. An older, white-haired woman who might very well be Dewey’s wife. And a slender, Slavic-looking blond of around twenty-five who gave everyone big smiles as she helped with the table.

  It was a roast beef and potatoes dinner, with several sides of vegetables available. A nice hearty meal for people who had been hiking, horseback riding, or doing whatever other activities the Lodge offered. Kenzie was careful not to take too much. She could always have a snack later in the evening if she wanted to, but if she stuffed herself, she would be uncomfortable all night. And she knew she needed to watch her portions to keep her figure, especially when she spent most of her workday sitting at a desk.