No One Else to Kill (Jim West Series) (2 page)

The young, bleached blond clerk at the quiet little store
had caused his delay.

“I’m bored,” she exclaimed in response to his rhetorical
“how’s it going” comment when he walked by her after entering the store.

He hadn’t intended on having a conversation.
 
Yet the way she had said it, and the way her
eyes had fixed on him, stopped him in his tracks as effectively as a barbed
wire fence.

“You’re only the second person who’s been in here today,”
she said once she had his attention, “and my boss, who’s usually here with me,
had to stay home today to tend to a sick kid.”

“That’s too bad,” Sean responded, not really knowing what
to say.

“How come I haven’t seen you before?” she asked, her
question punctuated with a smile that drew Sean closer, like a moth to a flame.

Forty minutes had passed before Sean made it out of the
store.
 
He realized right away that he
would never make it back before dark, but at the time, the flirtation had left
him feeling exhilarated. Nothing would come of it.
 
He knew he would not violate his commitment
to his wife, Sandy, but still it had spiced up his day.

Now, however, he quickened his pace and wondered why he
had dallied so long.

“
Ooooh
,” a soft moan came from
somewhere off to his right.

He stopped and stared into the blackness.

“Anybody out there?” he shouted.
 
Silence.

He resumed his fast walk toward the cabin. Climbing a
small rise about thirty yards further, he could see the dim light from the
solar powered lamp that marked the entrance to the cabin’s short driveway.

Not far now, he thought, and fought the urge to run.

A cough, no, it sounded more like muffled gagging, broke
through the semi-silence of the night.

“What in God’s name is out there?” Sean murmured to
himself. Tomorrow he might come back and look around, but at the moment, the
safety of the cabin remained his goal.

He reached the cabin’s front door and had the key in his
hand.

“
Ooooh
.”
 
This time it sounded ghostlike and closer
than he liked.

He stepped inside and locked the door behind him.
Instinctively, he walked around the small cabin and ensured the back door and
all the windows were locked.
 
He peered
out the front window and saw nothing.

“A Halloween prank?” he asked himself aloud.

He put the chips in the cabinet and the salsa in the
refrigerator, grabbing a Michelob at the same time.
 
Picking up the latest mystery by Robert
Parker, Sean sat down in the large recliner and felt his blood pressure come
down a few notches.

Suddenly, something banged against the front door with a
thud. Sean jumped up. He waited a few seconds before moving.
 
Silence, again.
 
It hadn’t been a knock at the door. Whoever
was out there trying to scare him had thrown something against the door. Anger
replaced fear, and Sean grabbed the poker from the fireplace before moving to
the front door.

“Who’s out--!” Sean started to shout when he pulled the
door open.
 
At that point, Sean’s life
changed forever.

Everything seemed to move eerily in slow motion. He
realized that the sound he now heard, which sounded less intelligible and more
frightening than those he had heard earlier, erupted from his own throat.

A body had collapsed upon the door, making the thud he had
heard.
 
As the door opened, a brutalized
woman fell onto his shins and feet, and her face stared up at him with open
eyes that gave no indication of life. Blood drooled from her mouth and spread
from a variety of wounds staining her yellow sweatshirt and blue jeans.
 
Dirt and blood patterned her bare feet.

It took all Sean’s strength to reach down and touch the
woman. He had never seen her before.
 
Could she still be alive?
 
He had
to do something, but what?
 
He pressed
his fingers against her throat looking for a pulse.
 
Suddenly, a bloody hand shot up and grabbed
his arm.

Sean’s world began to spin around.
 
He fought the dizziness and tried to sit down
next to her. Then everything turned dark as he blacked out.

ost impressive,” the tall man
standing next to the white Lexus crossover said to his travelling companion.

“I like it,” his friend replied.
 
“It definitely wasn’t here when I was here
last.”

The tall man stood next to the open driver’s door.
 
His companion had gotten out of his side of
the vehicle and walked around to the open trunk.

“Afternoon,” I said to the man by the trunk.
 
I had just returned to my Mustang from inside
the lodge, where I had checked in and gotten my room key.

Rather than return the greeting, the man by the trunk
looked at me quizzically.

I let it go and got my suitcase out of my trunk. After I
closed the trunk, I glanced over at the Lexus while I made my way back to the
lodge.
 
Both men stood together at the
rear of their car, but instead of removing anything they stared at me.

“Creepy,” I mumbled to myself.
 
Putting the two of them out of my mind, I
studied the front of the lodge.

“Most impressive, indeed,” I thought.
 
The lodge looked like a huge, fancy log
cabin. Lengthy flower boxes lined the ground floor window sills.
 
A large wooden bear’s head growled down at
anyone entering the building through the massive front doors.
 
The doors had to be twelve feet high and
nearly that wide across.
  
Large brass
handles and knockers adorned each door.
 
A front porch jutted out ten feet and extended about thirty feet on both
sides from the main doors.
 
A thick,
highly lacquered oak hand rail lined the porch.

For practical reasons, a normal sized door stood open
about fifteen feet to the right of the huge doors allowing easy access to and
from the lodge.
 
A small placard on a
pedestal informed guests that for their convenience, visitors and guests should
enter through the door on their right.
 
I
used the “convenient” door and reentered the lodge.

The interior of the lodge impressed me as much as the
outside.
 
Giant wooden beams adorned the
ceiling, and both the registration counter and a large bar located at the east
end of the first floor had been constructed with highly polished wood.
 
Two large chandeliers hung from the ceiling,
and a big window in the back of the room provided an outstanding view of the
distant mountains.
 
The well maintained
wooden flooring capped off the sensation of class.

The west end of the ground floor consisted of the dining
room.
 
I could see the sign identifying
it, but unlike the bar area, the dining room was a separate room and the door
to it was closed.
 
I stopped by the
registration counter again.

“You gave me room 207.
 
Which way should I go?”
 
The
ceiling of the center portion of the ground floor, the immediate lobby area,
extended up through the second floor and effectively cut the second floor into
two wings.
 
A matching set of separated
stairways provided access.

“Take the stairs to the west wing, sir,” the young woman
behind the counter answered.

“By the way, are those real flowers out there?”

“You mean in the planters?”

“Yes,” I answered.
 
“At night, I would think it would be too cold for them.”

“We bring the planters in every evening, and we only put
them outside when the weather permits.
 
At the end of the month, we’ll stop putting them out at all.
 
It’s not really that much work, and the owner
likes them.”

“Nice touch,” I said and headed off in search of my
room.
 
The tall man and his surly
companion approached the counter as I walked away.
 
I didn’t bother to say anything else to them.

For all of its grand theme and near opulent façade, the
Royal Lodge was not as large as I expected, nor fortunately, as expensive. On
the second floor, only six rooms existed in the west wing.
 
I imagined the east wing matched it, later
discovering that wing only had five rooms.
 
A service elevator and a utility room took the place of the sixth room.

Since the third floor ran across the entire length of the
building, there could easily be another fifteen to twenty rooms up there.
 
A note left on the desk in my room, however,
apologized for any inconvenience due to the third floor being temporarily
closed for repainting and new carpeting.

Other than getting the short end of the stick with the
view, since my window faced the front parking lot, the room impressed me as
much as the rest of the hotel had.
 
I
unpacked my suitcase and went down to the bar to get a drink and wait for Stu.
 
His email had said his plane landed in
Albuquerque at noon, and that he expected to be at the lodge between two and
three.

No one except the woman behind the counter was in the bar.

“What can I get you?”

I looked over to the taps and saw they had the basics.
 
“A Bud Light, draft, please.”

She drifted over and started filling a glass.
 
I had to smile.
 
Of all the people, I had encountered so far,
she was the first to look out of place.
 
She had tight, short, black shorts on with those black fishnet stockings
that I’d seen more often on TV or in movies than in real life.
 
Her tight, white, short sleeve, pull over
sweater completed the “look at me” outfit.

“Just get in?” she asked and placed the beer in front of
me.

“Yes, just now.
 
I’m
waiting for a friend, who should be here any moment.
 
Hope you don’t mind if I hang around here to
wait for him.”

“I’m glad for the company.
 
This time of day is normally slow, and now with the construction, it’s
been slow day and night.”

“How long has it been going on?”

“Last week they had the second floor closed and this week
the third floor.
 
It’s worse this
week.
 
On top of that, rumor has it that
somehow word got out to the travel agencies that the lodge was going to be
closed during the construction.”

“Ouch, that could hurt,” I said.

She leaned in closer.

“It has. I hear there’s only going to be a handful of
guests the rest of the week. Anyone driving by and looking at the parking lot
might think we were closed.”
 
She almost
whispered her remark.
 
I wondered if the
management had put out word to the staff not to discuss their current woes.

“That’s too bad.”

“Are you here with the hunting group?” she asked.

“No.
 
I’m here with
the two man hiking group.”

She raised her eyebrows.

“You mean we didn’t make the bulletin?” I smiled at her to
let her know I was joking.

“Well, I did hear that we have a small group of hunters
arriving here today but nothing about a group of hikers.”

“Actually, I do hope we get some hiking in, but Stu and I
didn’t announce ourselves as any kind of a group to the lodge.”

“What’s your name?”

“Jim.”

“Well Jim, I’m Bev.
 
Nice to meet you.”

“Likewise.”

“Stick around,” she said with a smile, as her eyes watched
someone approach the bar.
 
She moved off
to my right.

I looked in the mirror behind the bar and saw the same two
men I had seen outside approach the far end of the bar.
 
The men had changed into matching yellow and
black, Pittsburgh Steelers sweatshirts.
 
Bev approached them, but her smile didn’t draw a similar response.
 
She mixed two drinks for them and moseyed
back to me.

“Sourpusses,” she grumbled.

“I saw them outside.
 
I don’t know
what’s the matter with them
, but
they aren’t too chatty, that’s for sure.”