Murder Ahoy!

by Fiona Leitch

  “I thought Susie gave you a pack, with the story and all the characters - ”

  “She did, but I’m only supposed to look at it if my group are completely useless and we don’t get any of the clues,” I explained. “I don’t want to know. It’s more fun if we don’t, innit?”

  “True…” Will laughed. “You can tell which one of us works in law enforcement, can’t you? I don’t want to test my detective skills, I just want to know who the murderer is.” He frowned suddenly, narrowing his eyes and reaching out to pluck something from behind my ear. “I just found that other pillow chocolate…”

  I laughed as he managed to unwrap the extremely squashed truffle and held it out to me, teasing me with it, then popped it in his own mouth.

  “It tastes strangely warm…” he said, chewing.

  “Serves you right. Anyway, the important question now is…” I draped myself languidly across the hopefully chocolate-free pillow, pouting in what I hoped was a seductive fashion but probably looked like someone sucking a lemon. “…have you ever had sex on a boat?”

  Will raised an eyebrow. “No, but I thought about it in Venice… I thought about getting a sign for La Sirena, that night we had dinner on her.” Will and I had met in Italy, when I was trying to find inspiration for a new book, and he’d certainly provided that. “Something like, ‘if my boat is a-rocking, don’t come a-knocking.’”

  “Classy. You’d definitely have got my knickers off with that line.”

  We managed to contain ourselves and instead of ripping each other’s clothes off (which, not having been married that long, we were still in the habit of doing), we changed into more formal outfits and headed for the bar. I had to restrain myself from wriggling, as the dress I was wearing kept riding up over my knees and I was worried about giving the other passengers an eyeful of my massive Harvest Festival pants (so called because ‘everything is safely gathered in’). As I would be hosting a table at dinner every night, when the murder mystery game would be played out, I couldn’t get away with skulking about in the cabin in my jeans and trainers, and would have to dress like a grown-ass, sophisticated woman for a whole week. It really would be murder.

  The bar looked like something out of the Great Gatsby, beautifully decorated in warm wood tones with gold and bronze accents, lots of geometric-shaped mirrors and plush red velvet seating. Waiters did the rounds with glasses of champagne and wafted past with trays of delicate, delicious canapés. Guests came and went, some watching from the sidelines until they were imbued with enough Dutch courage to join the melée, others confidently diving straight in, clearly old hands at cruising. Will grabbed two glasses of Bucks Fizz and led me over to a seat. I’m not shy, but the thought of just going over and talking to someone I didn’t know - no thank you. I’m a writer, and most of the people I talk to are in my head or on a page.

  “I should probably mingle…” I said weakly, but Will shook his head.

  “Let them come to you,” he said. “They will.”

  He was right. They did. I’d barely taken a sip when a woman of around 60 with bright blue eye shadow and a hairstyle so heavily lacquered you could probably have cracked open a coconut on it nervously approached me.

  “I’m sorry to bother you,” she said, “but you are Annabelle Tyson, aren’t you?”

  After that, it was Game On. The passengers had found out whose teams they were on when they’d checked into their cabins, and my team were quick to introduce themselves. Helmet Hair lady’s actual name was Sylvia, and she was on the cruise with her best friend Heather. They were from Derbyshire and were officially Off Men, but from the way the two of them were looking around at all the single males in the room (particularly young Karl, who was helping to entertain some of the quieter guests), I got the impression they would both be back On (or possibly Under) Men by the end of the week. There was a married German couple, whose names I instantly forgot but who seemed nice enough, and Harvey and Michael, who were on their honeymoon and so clearly madly in love that I fell for the two of them straight away. Will watched them too, smiling, and when they left to get drinks we both looked at each other and said, “Aaah!!”

  There were several more team members who hadn’t come along for the welcome drinks, but I was quite pleased about that; meeting loads of new people at once can be overwhelming.

  But I still didn’t know who the other team leaders were. The guests that I spoke to had all been under the same impression as me, that my old crime writing friends Peter and Mark would be hosting the other tables, but apparently the line up had changed right at the last minute. During a respite in the bombardment I looked around to see if there was anyone I recognised; after all, the tickets had been expensive enough for the guests to expect crime writing hosts of a certain calibre, and I thought I knew most of my contemporaries, certainly all the European ones, anyway, from the annual Smoking Gun awards or festivals like Harrogate and Bloody Scotland.

  The room was full and bustling, with guests and crew alike - I’d read somewhere that this ship could accommodate around 2,000 passengers, not that they would all be taking part in the murder mystery - and from my seat it was impossible to see through the crowd by the bar. The moment I thought that, the crowd parted and I gasped. A figure leant insouciantly against the polished wood and chrome counter, tall, slim but in a muscular kind of way, dark haired. They did not talk to anyone, just lifted the pint glass in their hand to their lips and looked around, coolly observing the room.

  “Oh fu -” I breathed.

  “Language!” muttered Will, warningly. I shook my head.

  “No, no… It’s Joel,” I said.

  “Joel? Not - ”

  “Yes, Joel. My ex-husband. He’s at the bar. He must be one of the other hosts.”

  As we watched, Joel, the bastard unfaithful ex-husband, he of the third rate but inexplicably successful crime novels and the string of affairs, turned and caught my eye, and gave me The Look.

  If you’re a woman, you’ll know The Look. It’s the one that turns your knees to jelly and involuntarily loosens your knicker elastic, the one that starts a fire in your nether regions and travels all the way up to your cheeks (the facial ones). Not all men have The Look - Will has A Look, which I love, but it’s not the same thing. The Look comes in different variations - it can be a knowing smile, a twinkle in the eye, even an arrogant, slightly disdainful sneer (Joel’s Look was definitely closest to the latter). But the one thing that all Looks have in common is that the only men who really have them are the ones who have already broken your heart at least once.

  So there stood my bastard unfaithful ex-husband, the one who had already broken my heart several times, giving me The Look. And I’m ashamed to admit that for one moment, it worked. I wasn’t sure if I wanted to smack him so hard in the mouth that his teeth landed in someone’s drink on the other side of the room, or rip his shirt off and lick him like a testosterone-flavoured lollipop.

  “Are you alright?” said Will next to me, and I flushed with shame this time rather than lust. I was disgusted with myself for giving into carnal thoughts of Joel for even one second when my wonderful, loving and sexy new husband stood beside me.

  “Absolutely fine,” I said, not believing quite how calm I sounded.

  “You’d better be, because he’s coming over,” said Will, looking worried. I squeezed his hand and smiled at him, then grabbed another drink off a passing waiter and downed half of it in one go.

  “Bella!” I looked up and there he was, the big beautiful bastard… I tried not to remember the first time we met, when we’d ended up having a drunken shag in his trashy hotel room the night he’d beaten me to a Smoking Gun crime writer’s award. And then I burped, because I’d drunk my glass of bubbly too fast.

  He leaned in to kiss me on the cheek. “You look great, the extra weight suits you.” And just like that I was cured. He was still an absolute wanker. I looked around; our messy and acrimonious divorce was common kno
wledge, of course, and had filled a few column inches at the time as news of his numerous infidelities and my subsequent withdrawal from writing (and life) had spread. Sure enough, the passengers around us were looking over, watching to see how we would react to each other. Let’s give them something to watch, I thought.

  “Oh my god!” I cried. “I’m surprised to see you looking so well. They treated the syphilis, then? Did they manage to save your penis?” Will guffawed loudly before clapping a hand over his mouth, while Joel’s wide smile faltered for a moment and he looked around to see who had heard before he could stop himself. I looked penitent. “Sorry, I shouldn’t have said anything.” I turned to the watching crowd. “It’s a sore point,” I explained to them.

  He was silent for a second, then forced a loud, hearty and unconvincing laugh. “Still the same old Bella,” he said, with a smile that didn’t reach his eyes. His gaze flickered over to Will, who was still standing patiently next to me, grinning. Will wiped the smile off his face abruptly and put his hand out to shake.

  “I’m Will. You must be Joel?” he said, in a friendly, man-to-man tone. “Bella’s told me so much about you.”

  Joel’s lip curled slightly as he looked back at me. “I bet she has…”

  “Yes,” said Will. “I thought she was joking, though.” He looked Joel up and down, then held his arm out to me. “I believe they’re about to announce dinner. Shall we?”

  “I’d be delighted,” I said, smiling at him. God, he was just The Best. Forget The Look, what every woman really needs is a man who sticks up for her, makes her laugh and buys her sanitary products without complaining. I took his arm and we headed for the door.

  “You are so getting lucky tonight,” I murmured to him.

  “Was there ever any doubt of that?” he asked, smiling, and I had to admit there wasn’t.

  Chapter 3

  There were several different restaurants on board, but the murder mystery was taking place in a smaller, more intimate venue just off the extremely grand, two deck high Excelsior dining room. We walked through the Excelsior, which had dialled up the red and gold velvet theme to 11, and up the sweeping staircase. A smiling hostess in a gorgeous red Chinese silk dress, richly embroidered, greeted us with a smile and showed us through an imposing double door, mirrored and decorated with gilded ornamental wrought ironwork. We had entered the Pearl of the Orient…

  Inside, the interior designer had been given the brief ‘deluxe opium den’, and had run with it. The room was lined with hand-painted Chinoiserie wallpaper in peacock shades of deep blue and green, with colourful exotic birds lurking amongst the emerald fronds of trees and ferns, and the occasional beautiful pinky white rose. At one end of the room was a bar, decorated with more mirrors and again overlaid with gilded ironwork, portraying golden koi carp darting in and out of contorted seaweed. Overhead, an array of pendant lights hung over the dining tables, simple bright white globes that lit up the gilded ceiling like clusters of pearls. The name had made it sound like a Chinese takeaway, but it was an Oriental vision of Paradise.

  “Go ahead if you need to swear,” said Will out of the corner of his mouth, seeing me gawp.

  The Captain stood in the middle of the room, resplendent in his white dress uniform, talking animatedly to the Chief Purser, who saw us enter and nodded slightly. The Captain whirled round and smiled as he saw us. He was a well built man, who had clearly fully enjoyed the dining facilities on this vessel, and he had a great big beaming smile.

  “Ms Tyson! And Mr Carmichael!” he said, as he strode over to us, hand already outstretched in greeting. He had a loud, hearty voice. I sensed Will’s immediate approval of the man for getting our names right. “I’m Captain Butler. So pleased to have you on board.” He grabbed my hand and pumped it up and down energetically, then repeated the process on Will’s. “So pleased. Sorry I didn’t get to have a drink with you earlier, so much to organise on a trip like this.”

  “Of course,” I said, resisting the urge to rub the feeling back into my hand; he had a firm grip. “A ship like this must take some running…”

  “She’s magnificent, isn’t she?” he boomed. “I’ve had the fortune to be in charge of her for three years, and I still can’t quite believe my luck. This is the first murder mystery cruise we’ve had, though, so I’m relying on your criminal expertise to help us run it smoothly.”

  “I’ll do my best,” I said.

  “And you’re Interpol, I believe?” The Captain turned to Will. “Everyone will want you on their team, won’t they?”

  “I’m semi-retired,” said Will. “And there’s only one team I’m on.”

  “And that’s exactly as it should be,” said the Captain. “The other teams have got great leaders as well though, so you won’t have it all your own way. Maureen - you met the Chief Purser earlier, didn’t you? - she’s overseeing a team on my behalf. I wanted to be involved but I’m just too busy to do more than dip in and out.”

  The other diners were starting to enter. I looked around, recognising the members of my team that we’d already met.

  “How many guests are taking part?” I asked. The Captain turned to the Chief Purser, who had joined us.

  “There are just over two thousand passengers on the ship,” she said, “but of course we couldn’t have that many people playing, particularly not on our first foray into it. We’ve limited the murder mystery experience to just twenty, so you’ll have five guests on your team.” She smiled. “Of course, they’re not necessarily all paying guests. We have our murder victims, our murderer and a few suspects in there as well.”

  I smiled. “Not a bad acting gig, is it? Although I suppose if you get murdered straight away you end up confined to your cabin for the whole cruise.”

  The Captain laughed. “Yes, we thought we’d give them one night of freedom before we start bumping them off.”

  “So who’s the fourth team leader?” asked Will. “We saw Joel Quigley in the bar.”

  “And that was a marvellous surprise,” I muttered under my breath.

  Captain Butler and the Purser exchanged uncomfortable looks. “Sorry about that,” said the Captain. “I hope it won’t cause you any awkwardness or embarrassment.”

  “Not as long as he’s one of the victims,” I said. The Captain snorted, amused.

  “I don’t think that’s part of the plan,” he said, “although of course I could have a word with the murderer…” He looked over my shoulder and smiled. “Here he is now, with the other team leader.” I turned around to see who my other rival was, the smile dying on my lips. “Have you met Louise before?”

  “Mother fudger!” I growled. Will looked at me, surprised. “Bloody Louise bloody Meyers.”

  Bloody Louise bloody Meyers (not the name she was born with, obviously) stood in the doorway, arm draped languidly through Joel’s. She was dressed in a glittery black 1920s style flapper dress, her glossy brown hair cut in a smooth bob and her thin lips smeared in bright red lipstick. She paused by the mirrored doors for a moment, framed by them, and looked around to make sure everyone was watching her make an entrance. They weren’t. She threw back her head to laugh loudly - causing Joel, who hadn’t said anything to provoke such a violent reaction, to jump out of his skin - and all eyes turned towards her. She revelled in it, tossing her hair again and bestowing a ‘yes-adoring-fans-it-really-is-me’ look at the assembled passengers.

  Fudging heck. Now I knew why Susie had been so stressed out earlier, and it had nothing to do with us running late. She’d found out who the other team leaders were and knew exactly how I’d react to them…

  Joel whispered something in her ear and Louise laughed again, her eyes - which weren’t amused - darting around the room until they settled on me. She smiled broadly, showing off her crooked front teeth, and tossed her hair again. What was she, a bloody show pony?

  “Is she in a shampoo advert or something?” asked Will. I laughed weakly but he could tell my heart w
as sinking at the thought of being stuck on a boat with the two people I despised most in the entire world (those not involved in politics, anyway). He squeezed my hand gently. “Fork them both.”

  “I may not be able to keep up the non-swearing thing,” I murmured, then took a deep breath as they approached.

  “Bella Tyson!” Bloody Louise. You had to hand it to her, she might have the most strident Northern accent since Ena Sharples had graced the cobblestones of Coronation Street, but she did ‘sincere’ almost convincingly. She must’ve been practising. “Well aren’t you a sight for sore eyes.”

  “Not as big a sight as you,” I simpered, knowing that in about three hours’ time I’d sit bolt upright in bed and come out with a really biting, witty, and perfect retort, and the only audience would be Will, snoring next to me. “Such a lovely surprise to see you here.”

  She smiled. “Yeah, cruises are not usually my kind of thing, they’re so - ” she licked her lips, as if trying to get rid of a nasty taste in her mouth - “middle aged and middle class.” She looked at Will.

  “Yeah, the middle classes have got all the best holiday destinations,” I said. Her eyes narrowed slightly as she tried to work out if I was being sarcastic or not, but she didn’t say anything. “Still, it’s a nice change from Skegness, innit?”

  “Most things are,” said Joel, disloyally. Typical Joel. Her lips tightened for a second.

  “Nowt wrong with staying in touch with your roots,” she said. “Speaking of which, Bell, I think yours need doing. Or are you embracing the grey?”

  “Mother Nature’s highlights,” I said. “I’m happy with who I am, I don’t feel the need to put on a show.” Just a big pair of pants to hide the middle aged spread.

  “The wisdom of age.” Louise smiled at me, like an orca smiling at a baby seal on a wildlife programme; you knew something nasty was about to happen. She opened her mouth to follow up with the killer remark but Joel stepped in and inadvertently saved me.