Baked Alaska (38 page)

Mary Anne patted her arm. “I’ll keep an eye on that man of yours—don’t you worry.”

That was precisely what Sadie
was
worried about. “That’s very sweet of you. I’ll take a few turns around the ship and see if it loosens up.”

“I thought you were going to put ice on it.”

“Right, a few turns, then I’ll bring the ice back with me.”

“Before you go,” Mary Anne said, putting a restraining hand on Sadie’s arm. It was all Sadie could do not to shake it off. “I had a message from the head security guy on my phone a minute ago. He has more questions for me and said he’ll ask someone to interpret for me. What exactly did you tell him I said about the man in the buffet?”

“Um, I just said you were the first to tell me about it. I really don’t know why they are so interested in talking to you about it. They’re talking to Jen, too, since she was the one who knew the man’s name.”

“So, they think I know too much? Is that what they are going to ask me about? Glen’s the one who told me about the man; I only told you what Glen said to me.”

“Oh,” Sadie said with a nod, “then you have nothing to worry about.”

“But Glen does,” Mary Anne said. “It’s really
him
they want to talk to, right? Since he’s the one who told me. Remember what I told you about him, about his...problems?”

“Right. You should tell security about that, then,” Sadie said, shrugging. “Honesty is always the best policy. If there’s nothing to hide, then there’s nothing to worry about.”

“Well, I have nothing to hide,” Mary Anne said, looking across the casino toward her husband. “But sometimes Glen really worries me.” She turned back to Sadie. “Maybe you should come with me when I talk to them; you could tell them how strange Glen’s been acting.”

“I only met Glen an hour ago, Mary Anne.”

“But I’ve told you all about him. You’re like a character witness.”

Sadie was becoming increasingly uncomfortable with whatever agenda Mary Anne was trying to pin onto Sadie. “Oh, I don’t know. I better get moving on this knee before it stiffens up too much. I really want to get back for the end of the tournament.”

Mary Anne pursed her lips together and looked toward the windows, thoughtful and not pleased, though she nodded.

“I’ll be back in a bit,” Sadie said, taking a limping step toward the casino’s entrance.

Mary Anne offered to come with her again, but it was halfhearted, and Sadie insisted Mary Anne stay. Finally, Sadie hobbled out of the casino, and Mary Anne headed toward the tables. Sadie waited until she was out of view, then experienced a miraculous healing and took long strides up the stairs to the reception area where there was a courtesy phone.

“Security,” Hazel said after picking up the phone. “Is this an emergency?”

“No, or, well, I don’t know. Can I speak with Officer Jareg, please?”

“I’m afraid he isn’t available. I can send a security officer to meet you.”

Sadie shook her head. “No, I need to talk to Officer Jareg.” What should she do? She could talk to someone else, but they might not know the context of the entire situation. And Sadie did have that room key...“Would you tell him that Sadie Hoffmiller called and that I have information regarding Glen and Mary Anne Rydell. Tell him I’ll be in the casino along with Pete Cunningham and that he should come as soon as he can.”

Hazel wrote down the message and read it back to Sadie. By the time Sadie finished the phone call, her anticipation levels were causing her hands and feet to tingle.

Sadie headed for the stairs again. Should she have said this was an emergency? No, that might have brought more security guards and a medical team. She didn’t want that, she just needed to pass on some information.

When she reached the stairs, she stopped long enough to remove the ship-card from her sock and check for the room number. It was on deck six, the same level as the casino—convenient for gambling-addicted Glen.

“Room 616,” she muttered when she got back to deck six. Glen and Mary Anne’s cabin should be on the aft end of the ship. Room numbers started on starboard aft, then increased as the cabins moved forward.

The steward’s cart was a few doors down from 616 when Sadie got to that portion of the hallway, but she didn’t see the steward himself. When she arrived at the door, she slid the card into the slot and let herself into the room. The steward had already made up the bed, which meant she didn’t have to worry about him coming back while she looked around.

The room had the same layout as the one Sadie shared with Breanna, except that there was one bed in the center of the room rather than twin beds against the walls with an aisle in between. The bed frames were flush against the floor, which meant Sadie didn’t have to check underneath them.

Glen and Mary Anne would know the stewards would be in and out of their room all day, so they would have to hide whatever it was they had used to induce Ben’s heart attack somewhere that wouldn’t be readily discovered. She checked the drawers carefully enough not to mess them up but thoroughly enough to be sure she hadn’t missed anything. She then pulled the suitcases out of the closet and opened them, checking all the pockets—nothing. She put them back exactly as she’d found them—they filled the entire space—then shut the closet and found herself staring at the safe. Of course! The best place to hide something was in the safe...which Sadie couldn’t access. Why hadn’t she thought of that possibility when she first came up with this idea?

Just in case, though, she examined the safe and realized it hadn’t been used. The door was open, and the safe was empty. That seemed to indicate that whatever they had to hide either wasn’t in the room or it wasn’t obviously suspect. She turned to look at the room again. Could there have been something in Mary Anne’s purse after all and Sadie just didn’t know enough to recognize its purpose?

Sadie had no idea how long she’d been in the room, but it felt like at least five or six minutes. She needed to get out of there soon. She entered the bathroom and immediately spotted several prescription bottles. Could one of them be what caused Ben’s heart attack? She pulled out her phone and took a picture of each bottle so that she could look up the labels later.

She was putting them back in a row when she noticed another bottle set behind them. It was bright yellow with a label that included a tropical fish; it looked completely out of place. Next to it was a small, clear travel bottle, the size that could pass through security in a carry-on bag at the airport. It was filled with a bluish liquid. Was it shampoo? Mouthwash? She took a picture of it and the fish bottle, just in case.

There was a makeup bag and a shaving kit on one of the shelves. The makeup bag didn’t have anything of interest, but there were a few hypodermic syringes wrapped up in a plastic baggie in the shaving kit. That got Sadie’s heart racing. Were either Mary Anne or Glen diabetic? Why else would they have syringes? There were different types of syringes for insulin than were used for other medications, but Sadie didn’t know how to tell the difference.

Sadie was digging through Glen’s collection of hotel soaps and Q-tips in search of anything else when she heard voices outside the cabin door. She paused, then leaned back out of the bathroom. Surely they weren’t voices she needed to worry about, right? There were three thousand passengers on this ship, at least five hundred of them had cabins on this floor.

“Steward!”

It was Mary Anne, and Sadie felt the blood drain from her face. Mary Anne couldn’t get into her room without her ship-card—which Sadie had—but Glen would have a ship-card for the room too. Had Mary Anne realized hers was missing and borrowed Glen’s? Why wasn’t Mary Anne at the game? Had she suspected Sadie’s deception?

Sadie crept out of the bathroom and walked to the door in time to hear the end of what the steward, presumably, said, “...without your ship-to-shore card.”

“But you’ve seen me here for the last five days. Surely you can let me in. I’ve talked to you every day.”

Sadie’s heart rate took off so fast she could barely breathe. She didn’t even need to look around to know there was nowhere in this room to hide. The closet was the obvious choice, but it was full of empty luggage.

Don’t let her in
, Sadie thought to the steward, as though he could hear her.
Stick to the rules, Mr. Steward, and make her go to reception for a new ship-card.

“I can’t find my ship-card, and I don’t have time to get my husband’s key. It’s an emergency. And if you don’t let me in, I’ll sue this company. Believe you me, they don’t need another lawsuit.”

Panic filled Sadie as she turned to face the tiny room as though another hiding place had become available in the last ten seconds. What she wouldn’t do for a Room of Requirement or an invisibility cloak like they had in the Harry Potter books.

She stepped back into the bathroom—hoping Mary Anne’s emergency didn’t include the bathroom—and pulled the door closed while formulating a completely elementary plan. The shower had a frosted glass door which
might
provide her some kind of cover. She reached above the sink and fumbled with the light fixture. She’d expected to have to unscrew the lightbulb but found the fixture to be plugged into an electrical outlet instead. She pulled out the plug, cutting half the light in the room, just as she heard the cabin door open.

Her mouth was so dry she couldn’t swallow. She quickly stepped inside the shower and reached up to unscrew the recessed lightbulb there. On the third twist, the room was plunged into darkness. She tried sliding part of the shower door closed, but it made a scratching noise she couldn’t afford. She crouched down as low as she could and pressed herself as far into the corner as possible.

The bathroom door opened. Sadie held her breath and heard the click of the light switch located outside the bathroom. Of course no lights turned on.

“What the—?” Mary Anne said out loud. She clicked the switch twice more. “For heaven’s sakes,” she said, then louder added, “Steward!”

Sadie heard a muffled answer.

“The light in my bathroom is not working.” The switch clicked some more. “This is unacceptable. I don’t have perfect vision, you know. This is a hazard!”

“I am sorry, ma’am. I will have maintenance see to it immediately.”

“I need my husband’s medication right now. Don’t you have a flashlight or something?”

Medication? That was the emergency? That meant Mary Anne would be coming into the bathroom.
Please don’t have a flashlight.

“Yes, one moment.”

Mary Anne muttered a racial slur, and Sadie visualized herself becoming smaller and smaller in the corner. She was hidden behind two layers of frosted glass and the room was dark except for the light coming in through the doorway. If no one peeked into the shower or shined a light right at her, she might get out of this. She could feel her lungs compressing, the earliest sign of a panic attack coming on, and she clenched her eyes closed harder than ever while forcing herself to breathe as deep as she could and trying to convince herself that she was okay. For now, at least. Her face was hot, and her hands started to shake. She clasped them more tightly together around her knees.

She opened her eyes in time to see a beam of light cross the bathroom floor. The light looked hazy through the panes of glass, and she hoped it wouldn’t show the shape of her hiding in the shower.
They aren’t looking in your direction. They just want the pills.
Still, she couldn’t breathe while Mary Anne was rummaging around.

“Okay, I have what I need,” Mary Anne said. Sadie was still trying not to lose it. “You better make sure that light is fixed before I get back or I’ll be asking for a discount on my room.”

“Yes, ma’am,” the steward said as the bathroom door shut. A few seconds later the cabin door clicked shut as well, but it was nearly a minute before Sadie stopped shaking. She hadn’t been caught. Once the adrenaline faded, she unfolded herself from the corner of the shower and stood carefully, her muscles protesting as she straightened up on shaky legs.

It wasn’t until she was standing that she realized the bottom of the shower had been wet, and since she’d sat on it, her backside was now wet too. There were worse things, she told herself. Take it in stride.

She reached above her head and screwed in the lightbulb, then stepped out of the shower and into the bathroom to plug the light fixture back in as well, further illuminating the small space. She looked at the bottles of pills, consulting the pictures she’d taken in order to see what, if anything, was missing. All the prescription bottles were there.

She checked the shaving kit and confirmed pretty quickly that the needles were missing. She looked back at the shelf of medications. She moved the bottles out of the way and realized that while the tropical fish bottle was still there, the plastic bottle of blue mouthwash was missing.

What was happening here? Was Mary Anne involved instead of Glen? Or was it both of them?

Sadie let herself out of the bathroom, feeling another rush of adrenaline that sent her out the cabin door and into the hall where she came face-to-face with the steward before she’d had the chance to consider the possibility he’d still be there. He blinked at her in confusion as the door snapped closed behind her.

“The bathroom lights are fixed,” she said.

He looked at her in confusion, but then smiled and shrugged. “I won’t tell,” he said.

“Thank you,” Sadie said. She stepped around him, but he grabbed her arm. She instinctively pulled out of his grip, leaving him blinking again, his arm extended but holding nothing. “Sorry,” she said. “Um, I’m in a hurry.”

His extended hand turned into a point. “I was going to say that...uh, your bottom...”

Sadie put her hands on her bum and felt the wetness from the shower again. Shoot. She didn’t have time to change. Khakis were the wrong pants to wear when hiding in a wet shower.

“Here,” he said, handing her a staff uniform shirt that he pulled out of the cleaning cart. It was mustard yellow, not her color, but it would save her from embarrassing notice. She took the shirt and smiled. “Thank you so much.” She put her arms through the sleeves, checking to make sure the hem hung low enough to cover her bum.