Dosed to Death

by P. D. Workman

  “Yes... I don’t think it could be Mrs. Hubbard. She’s pretty broken up about having lost everything,” Kenzie pointed out.

  “It could be an act,” he argued

  “I don’t think it is.”

  Tyrrell shook his head. “That Burknall is kind of creepy. He could get anywhere, do anything he wanted to.”

  He did have opportunity, Kenzie had to admit that.

  Kenzie looked at Zachary. They didn’t seem to be any closer to figuring it out.

  “Who else knew someone who was going to be here?” Zachary asked, bringing the conversation back around.

  “Well... Vance Stiller and Brittany seem to be a thing. So they must have planned to be here together.”

  “Could one of them have poisoned the other? In hopes that they would overdose or have an adverse reaction? Or be able to get the other alone and they just happened to fail at that part?”

  “Vance had cardiovascular disease. I certainly wouldn’t recommend someone like that take Jimson weed.”

  “It could have killed him?” Zachary asked.

  “It could have killed anyone. But someone with heart disease? He would definitely be more susceptible than someone who was healthy.”

  “Like Brittany.”

  “Brittany takes pretty good care of herself,” Kenzie said, remembering the exercise equipment. “So... a lot less likely than Stiller to die, if they were both poisoned. if she were the poisoner, then she could avoid eating whatever was contaminated and eliminate the possibility of overdosing herself.”

  “What reason would Brittany have to kill Stiller?” Zachary asked.

  Kenzie couldn’t come up with anything. The two seemed to like each other and to be a good match. They weren’t married, but it was possible that Stiller could still have left something to Brittany in his will. “Stiller seems like he got a pretty good dose. He couldn’t remember anything that happened the day before, and slept pretty heavily all that night and the next day. That’s typical of Jimson weed. Brittany, on the other hand, didn’t really act like she’d been dosed at all.”

  “So that’s a possibility,” Zachary said.

  “But without a motive...?”

  “We don’t know,” Tyrrell said. “Maybe he had done something to someone in her family in the past and she was out for revenge. Or he insulted her, or thought her business and fame was a sham. We don’t know what went on between them.”

  65

  There were voices outside the cabin. Kenzie turned her head and looked out the window. It was getting brighter outside, the sun up over the horizon. Raven and Jack were walking by, returning from the site of the fire up the hill. Kenzie studied their body language as they approached their cabins. She had wondered before if there were a previous relationship between Raven and Jack. They had not said so, but they seemed very familiar with each other and to have a sort of rapport between them. Sometimes, people just clicked the first time they met, but they acted like people who had shared something before they had come to the Lodge. It didn’t feel like a first meeting to Kenzie.

  But she could be wrong.

  Raven’s voice was raised as they walked near the cabin. Not just a typical talking voice. Maybe she had been affected by all of the excitement. Maybe, like with Zachary, the fire triggered some emotional reaction in her and she was agitated by it. But she seemed angry.

  “What’s going on with them?” Tyrrell asked.

  “I don’t know.” Kenzie leaned closer to the window, trying to pick up their words. “Arguing about something, I think.”

  Watching their faces and straining for their words, Kenzie thought Raven said, “What were you doing up there?”

  She frowned at Zachary. “What was he doing up there?” she repeated. She shook her head in confusion. “He went up to the house when he saw the fire. To make sure that everyone got out safely.”

  Zachary raised an eyebrow. “Is that what he told you?”

  “Well... yes. It is. He said he got up to go to the bathroom, and he saw the fire, so he went up to make sure that Mrs. Hubbard and Samantha got out okay. And a good thing he did. It would be awful if we had lost someone in the fire. A third death, or a third and fourth, that would have been terrible.”

  “How did he get up there so quickly?”

  “He saw the flames when he got up in the night,” Kenzie repeated. “Just by luck. He was the first one to see them, so he was the first one to the house.”

  “And he didn’t wake up anyone else? Try to get help? He just decided to run up to a burning house and try to rescue everyone himself?”

  “Yes.” Kenzie couldn’t help the way that her voice curled up at the end of the sentence to make it sound like a question. She couldn’t understand what Zachary was getting at. That was exactly what had happened.

  Zachary shook his head. “No way. He was already up there. There’s no way that he saw the flames and got up there before Mrs. Hubbard and Samantha woke up to the smoke alarms.”

  “You can’t know that.”

  “The smoke alarms would have sounded long before the flames were visible through the windows.”

  “But if it started in one room and then spread, he might have seen the flames in the kitchen before they spread to the rest of the house.”

  “I’m with Raven on this one. What was he up at the house for?” Zachary looked out the window at them, having a heated discussion just a few feet from the cabin.

  “Why would he lie? Maybe he went up for a midnight snack. Or a night cap.”

  “Or to see someone.”

  Kenzie looked at Jack. His face was red. From the heat of the fire? The cold air? The exertion? Or something else? Was he embarrassed or angry about Raven’s questions?

  “You think he was up there to see Samantha...?”

  “It’s possible.”

  “I suppose... but she never seemed that interested in him.”

  “She wouldn’t have to be. Attraction doesn’t always flow in both directions.”

  “Well, if we’re eliminating coincidences... then what are the chances that he went up to the house to visit Samantha and there just happened to be a fire when he got there?”

  Zachary nodded his approval of the question. “Maybe because it was no coincidence.”

  “Jack didn’t start that fire!”

  Kenzie and Zachary both startled and looked over at Mrs. Hubbard, who was standing in the hallway looking at them, her eyes blazing.

  Zachary stood up quickly. He faced Mrs. Hubbard, his body language wary. “How do you know that?”

  “He wouldn’t do something like that. When I got downstairs, he was trying to put out the fire!”

  “How?”

  “He was... I don’t know. He was trying to push all of the stuff that was on fire to the side, away from the furniture...”

  Zachary looked at Kenzie. Using a fire extinguisher or trying to beat it out would have made sense, but trying to push burning debris to where it wouldn’t spread didn’t sound quite right. Kenzie saw Jack in her mind’s eye, hunched over the burning materials, whirling around when Mrs. Hubbard came up on him from behind. Stammering out an explanation that he was trying to stop the fire from spreading. And then getting them all out of the house.

  “He was a hero!” Mrs. Hubbard insisted. “He didn’t light that fire! He’d never do something like that.”

  “Do you... know Jack, Mrs. Hubbard?” Kenzie asked tentatively.

  “Jack is...” Mrs. Hubbard shook her head impatiently. “You don’t understand! He was trying to put the fire out.”

  She moved to the door and jerked it open.

  “Jack! Jack, come here!”

  Jack turned from his discussion with Raven and looked at Mrs. Hubbard. It took him a moment to overcome his consternation at seeing her there. “What?”

  “You need to tell them.”

  He walked slowly toward Mrs. Hubbard. He cast one worried glance over at Raven, then looked back at Mrs. Hubbard.

 
“You need to tell them who you are,” Mrs. Hubbard insisted.

  Jack hesitated, stopping just outside the door. He looked back at Raven, then at Mrs. Hubbard. He sighed. “Maybe you’d better come in too,” he suggested.

  Raven scowled. “What’s going on? You can’t just walk out on me.”

  “I’m not. I’m asking you to come in with me. If we’re going to have this discussion... it may as well be all together.”

  “What discussion? I was talking to you, not to... anyone else.” Raven shook her head in irritation.

  “Please, Raven...”

  Raven sighed loudly, then followed Jack, and the two of them entered the cabin. Mrs. Hubbard shut the door. She had eyes only for Jack, not even glancing at Raven.

  “You have to tell them,” she insisted.

  Jack pulled off his hat and gloves and unzipped his jacket. He didn’t take off his boots or his coat. He was clearly not staying. Raven pried off her boots and went directly to the liquor cabinet and poured herself a drink without asking anyone else. She glared at Jack.

  “So what is all of this about?”

  Jack looked at her, then at Zachary and everyone else, waiting for him to say something. He rubbed a hand across his eyes as if he just wanted to go back to sleep, and not to explain anything.

  “I am Stuart Dewey’s son.”

  There was dead silence. Kenzie tried to reconcile this to what she knew. She remembered the picture beside Dewey’s bed, the picture with his wife and son. A blond boy. Fair, not dark like Jack. Their faces had not been the same, and it wasn’t just a matter of hair color. He was also, Kenzie thought, younger than the boy in that picture. Too young to be claiming Dewey as his father.

  “I don’t think you are...”

  “Not that one,” Jack shook his head. “And... not by his wife.” He looked at Mrs. Hubbard. “Someone else.”

  That explained his not having the same last name. Or there being any pictures of him around the house.

  “You’re Dewey’s son,” Zachary repeated. “Are you... his only issue?”

  “His heir?” Jack asked. He shrugged his shoulders and spread his hands apart. “I haven’t seen his will. But... I could be. Or I could contest it, if he’s left me out of it. As far as I know, I was his only living child.”

  “Why are you here? And did he know who you were?”

  “He knew. Didn’t want to talk to me, but he knew who I was. Not that any of that matters anymore.” He shook his head. “It’s not like I’m going to get to know him now.”

  “You hadn’t ever met him before?”

  “Met him? Didn’t even know he was my father. Not until recently.”

  “And you were staying here... to meet him?”

  “No. Maybe. I wanted to see the place. Where... my roots were. Whether it meant anything to me.”

  If he had set fire to the place, Kenzie assumed that the answer to that question was no.

  “That’s why we’re here?” Raven demanded. She slugged back a swallow of her whiskey. “Because the old man was your father?”

  “Yes.”

  “I thought...”

  It was clear what she had thought. Even if she didn’t say it in front of Zachary and Kenzie, they understood. She had thought that he had invited her there on a romantic getaway.

  But that still didn’t explain why Jack had gone up to the house. If he knew his father was dead, what was the point in going to the house? To search for his will or some other documents? To break into that bedroom and get a good look at his deceased father?

  Or to burn it all to the ground?

  “I thought that you went up there to see—”

  “Raven.” He shook his head, trying to silence her.

  “I won’t shut up! Why should I? I haven’t done anything wrong.” Full of righteous indignation, she turned to Kenzie, her closest ally in the room. “He stole my things!”

  Jack opened his mouth to protest.

  “Where did they go if you didn’t take them?” Raven demanded. “Clothes don’t just go walking off by themselves. You were the only one with access to my cabin.”

  Jack shook his head. “Raven...”

  “I couldn’t understand why you would take them. Then you were up there. Going to her! So I knew you had taken them. To give to another woman as some sort of sick gift.”

  Jack continued to shake his head. “You don’t know what you’re talking about. Raven, please...”

  But it was too late to stop her. A picture was already beginning to form in Kenzie’s head. Why would Jack take Raven’s clothing? Especially if they were lovers. He didn’t need any kind of trophy.

  Why had the house been burned down?

  What would Jack have done with Raven’s clothes? It wasn’t, as Raven thought, to take them as a gift for his new love interest. And he hadn’t been trying to stop the fire from spreading when Mrs. Hubbard had come upon him.

  He’d been trying to destroy the evidence. Raven’s bloody clothing.

  66

  Kenzie looked at Jack. He was still shaking his head at Raven as if he could put the words back in her mouth. He pressed his hand to his forehead, focused, trying to think his way out of this one. Too many people knew. Now it wasn’t just him. Zachary, Kenzie, Tyrrell, Mrs. Burton. He couldn’t silence all of them. He needed to change his approach.

  “Look...”

  “Was Raven the one who killed Brooke Collins?” Kenzie asked, her voice flat. She wasn’t making an accusation. She didn’t want them getting all emotional and overwrought. If Raven had killed Brooke in a hallucinatory or agitated state because she had been poisoned with Jimson weed, then she wouldn’t necessarily be guilty. If she hadn’t voluntarily taken Jimson weed, but it had been administered to her without her knowledge, she couldn’t be held responsible for what had followed.

  Jack just looked at her, pain in his eyes. He didn’t say anything to Raven to explain or defend his actions.

  If he had knowingly destroyed evidence, then Jack was guilty of something. And if he had been the one to put Jimson weed into the food, then he might be responsible for Brooke’s death to some degree. And what about Mr. Dewey? Had he killed Dewey when the man refused to acknowledge him or have a relationship with him? He could have burned Raven’s clothes in his own fireplace. He’d wanted to destroy more than that.

  “What are you talking about?” Raven asked.

  “You don’t remember everything that happened that night,” Kenzie suggested. “One of the problems with Jimson weed is that it causes memory blanks. Episodes of amnesia that can cover hours or days. Sometime that night, you went out and met up with Brooke Collins in the woods. And when you went back to your cabin, or to Jack’s cabin, you were covered with her blood.”

  Raven’s eyes widened. She looked at Jack, no longer accusatory. “No.”

  “Jack?” Kenzie pressed.

  Jack nodded, not looking at her. “Soaked with blood. And cold as ice, out there without any coat or warm clothes on. You’d just put my boots on. I... helped to warm you up. I tried to wash them, but they didn’t come clean. And all of those TV shows, they say that you can never get all of the blood out.”

  “So you burned them. Along with the rest of the evidence. Brooke’s body. Anything that might point to what Raven had done. Or what you had done.”

  “I didn’t do anything,” Jack shot back. “None of this had anything to do with me.”

  “The Jimson weed was yours. That makes you guilty of Brooke’s death, even if it was Raven who had killed her.”

  “No! Jimson weed? I don’t even know what that is. You’re crazy. I don’t know what happened that night. What she did,” Jack looked at Raven, “but it was nothing to do with me. She has...” His eyes moved back and forth between Zachary and Kenzie, trying to identify which of them would be the most sympathetic. “She has problems. Medical problems. Something set her off. Andy and Brooke fighting. I don’t know. But something happened.”

  Raven’s whole f
ace was a scowl. “You think I had a psychotic break that night? I didn’t. I would know.”

  “Do you remember what happened? Do you remember coming back covered in blood? What happened before that?”

  She shook her head.

  “Then you had a break,” he insisted.

  “It wasn’t just Raven,” Kenzie said. “Others had hallucinations, strange behaviors, fights,” she reminded him. “That’s why we searched everyone’s cabins.”

  “But you didn’t find anything.”

  “Are you the one who stole the medications too?” Kenzie challenged. “You know, other people need those. Just like Raven needs hers.”

  Jack looked at Raven and didn’t admit to it. But Kenzie had a pretty good idea he was the one who had drilled the safe. He had been worried about making sure that Raven got her meds. Or he’d wanted something else in there. Maybe he’d needed a tranquilizer in order to stay calm and function, knowing that his girlfriend was the one who had killed Brooke. And he’d lost his father, too. Had that been a coincidence? An accident?

  If they weren’t accepting coincidences, then why had Dewey died? Had Jack intentionally killed him? Had they had an argument? Had Jack tested out the Jimson weed on him, and then given it to everyone else to cover up what he had done?

  “How did you know who Jack was?” Kenzie asked Mrs. Hubbard. “Had Mr. Dewey told you about him? Did he know that Jack was coming?”

  “We knew who Jack was.” Mrs. Hubbard didn’t explain how they knew. “We knew he was here to confront—to talk to Mr. Dewey.”

  “Who is included in the ‘we’? How many people knew that he was coming?”

  Mrs. Hubbard shrugged. “I don’t see how any of it matters,” she declared. “It was just me, and Harold, and Mr. Dewey.”

  “Harold?” Kenzie repeated stupidly.

  “Mr. Burknall.”

  “Oh. Sure. So it was only the three of you who knew who he really was? That he wasn’t here to vacation, but to see Mr. Dewey and to talk to him.”

  “It was a vacation,” Jack said. “I wanted to bring Raven here, see what she thought about it. Relax and enjoy the atmosphere. The planned events. Meals. It was a nice retreat. I don’t take a lot of vacations.”