No One Else to Kill (Jim West Series) (5 page)

Already agitated over my self-flushing toilet mystery, I
decided I could at least solve, as Dr. Watson might have titled it, “The
Mystery of the Sobbing Man.” I put on my jeans and wandered out into the
hallway.
 
The lighting had been dimmed in
the hallway but was sufficient to allow me to easily see that no one was out
and about on the entire second floor.
 
The crying seemed to have stopped, but I had come this far and decided
to take a peek at the third floor.

A door at the end of my hallway, only a few paces away
from my room, gave me access to the stairs that led to the third floor.
 
A similar door on the third floor had a sheet
of paper taped to it warning people to stay out due to the ongoing
construction.
 
I ignored it and pushed
the door open.

As the door swung open, I heard, just for a second, the
sound of a man crying again.
 
The door
made a loud creaking sound when it was about two thirds open.
 
I held the door still and waited.
 
The crying stopped.
 
The hallway lights were out and tarps that
hung off a number of ladders scattered throughout the hall blocked most of my
view of the first twenty or thirty feet of the hall that the light from the
stairwell illuminated. The more distant ladders could almost be people draped
in sheets.
 
Spooky, I thought.

I looked around for a light switch but didn’t see one.
Soft footsteps broke the otherwise total silence.

“Hello.
 
Is
everything alright?” No one answered. I heard what sounded like a door opening
and shutting at the other end of the long hallway. A glimmer of light briefly
entered the hall from the far end.
 
My
view was partially blocked, and I had the sense that the door had only been
opened wide enough to allow a person to sneak through.

I stood still for a few seconds.
 
Silence and darkness dominated my senses
until a faint odor of cigarette smoke drifted by me.
 
If I’d had a flashlight and a lot more nerve,
I might have explored the floor.
 
Someone
could still be up here, but I doubted it.
 
Whoever it was had left upon my arrival, so I retreated to my room.

To calm my jittery nerves, I rechecked my entire room for
anything out of the ordinary before climbing back into bed.
 
Just before I fell back asleep the howling of
a distant wolf or coyote gently broke the silence.

It’s a rare morning when my eyes don’t open within a few
minutes of seven, and in fairness, my middle of the night escapade around the
hotel may have thrown me out of cycle. However, when I opened my eyes and saw
that the bedside clock said eight thirty, I initially thought the clock was
broken. My cell phone surprised me by agreeing with the clock.

I skipped shaving.
 
After all this was supposed to be a vacation and more importantly, I
didn’t want to miss breakfast.

Once again, I had the dining room to myself.
 
I saw evidence that other tables had been
used that morning, but no one else had selected the late shift for
breakfast.
 
A different waiter than I had
seen the night before came up to my table.
 
He looked at his watch before he addressed me.

I had the feeling he wanted to tell me I had missed
breakfast.

“Coffee?”

“Yes, please.”

“Would you like to see a menu?”

“Sure,” I said, and he drifted away in disappointment.

A figure caught my eye at the door.
 
I didn’t recognize her at first. Decked out
in all black, black hair, and if my eyes didn’t deceive me at this distance,
black lipstick. She wore a metal chain of some sort around her neck. Tight
black jeans reached down to her black, spiked heels.

She waved at me and approached my table.
 
Fascinating.
 
The lady had guts.
 
Whether she had taste, I couldn’t be
sure.
 
After all, this was all out of my
league, and I had missed out on the Goth era. I managed a smile.

“Morning, Randi.
 
Would you like to join me?

“Hey, Jimmy.
 
How
are you this morning?”

“Fine,” I stood up and pulled out a chair. “Have a seat.”

“No thanks. Sounds nice, but I just came by for a big mug
of coffee.”
 
Her eyes stared at me. I
don’t think they blinked. Luckily, the waiter returned to my rescue.

“Here, take mine.
 
I
can get another.”

“Well, thanks, Jimmy.
 
Maybe we could do lunch,” she said and walked away.

We both watched her leave.

“That is one hot babe,” the young man next to me said.

“I hear she’s single,” I said.

“Might be, but when she was in here earlier, half the men
in her group were hitting on her.”

“How about getting me another cup of coffee, and do you
have cinnamon rolls?”

“Yes.”

“Then I’ll just have a cinnamon roll with the coffee.”

“Want the cinnamon roll heated?”

“Please.”

While I waited for my breakfast, I thought about
Randi.
 
Cross hadn’t implied she might be
a little weird. Last night’s look struck me as weird, but it hadn’t fazed
Cross. This morning’s look ranged more in the bizarre category.
 
I could see it in a misguided teenager, but I
placed Randi somewhere around forty.

“Here you go, sir.”
 
He put the coffee and
roll
in front of me on
the table.

“Was she wearing that same outfit this morning at
breakfast?”

“Yeah.
 
Hot, wasn’t it?”

“Yeah,” I said just to be agreeable.
 
“I heard the same group came here last
year.
 
Did you work here then?”

“No, I’ve only been here two months.”

A gun shot and then another echoed in from somewhere
outside.

“That sounded close,” I said.

“The lodge has a private range where customers can sight
and check their rifles.
 
Don’t
worry.
 
There are a bazillion safety
rules they have to follow.”

A few more shots that sounded like they came from high
powered rifles were followed by one that sounded like a small caliber one.

“It could get noisy around here,” I said.

“The range is only open from nine to nine thirty in the
morning.”

“Not much time.”

He shrugged and walked back to the kitchen. I heard a
couple more shots from high powered rifles, but that was all.
 
I imagined having its own limited use firing
range was a plus for a lodge trying to attract hunters.

I finished my cinnamon roll, which was a bit of a letdown,
got a second cup of coffee, and went out on the front porch. The sunshine
almost overwhelmed me at first, and I had to cup my free hand over my eyes as
they tried to adjust. It felt too warm to be the end of October. I decided to
stay one more day and take a long hike through the forest.

A dark van with tinted windows pulled into the parking lot
from a dirt road that joined the lot on the near side.
 
It parked nearly in front of me and Cross’
group climbed out of it.
 
They were
carrying rifle cases and ribbing one another for their lack of success in
hitting the targets they had apparently used to sight their rifles. Randi and
Cross were absent from the group.

“Morning,” one of the men said to me as they passed.

“Great day isn’t it?” said another to me.

“Sure is,” I acknowledged.
 
I wondered if Randi and Cross didn’t feel a need to check out their
rifles or if they even hunted.
  
I
thought Cross did from the comments he had made at dinner, but I had no idea
about Randi. I smiled to myself as I imagined the different outfits she might
wear if she did.

Suddenly, a piercing scream burst through the open doorway
to the lodge, followed by another and then a third.

I hurried inside and saw a flood of people rushing down
the ground floor hallway.
 
I didn’t rush,
but I did follow the gaggle into the east wing.
 
A crowd had formed at the end of the hall.
 
Everyone seemed to be staring into the last
room on the left.
 
One of the hotel staff
held a crying Randi in his arms.

The receptionist who had checked me in ran past me to the
front desk.
 
I followed her.
 
She grabbed a phone on the counter and dialed
911.

“We need help.
 
One
of our guests has been shot.
 
I think he
may be dead,” she paused. “Yes, that’s us. Do you know how to get here?”
 
Another pause, “I don’t think we have any
doctors here.”
 
She looked up at me, and
I shook my head.
 
“Yes,” a long pause,
“no, no, okay, I understand.
 
Please
hurry.”

She hung up and rushed by me, heading back to the scene.

I considered getting my stuff and heading straight back to
Clovis at this point.
 
This didn’t
involve me.
 
My feet had a mind of their
own, however, and before I could drive any common sense down to them, I found
myself standing among the crowd just outside the door to what looked like an
office.

I squeezed by enough of the crowd to see two men from the
hotel staff and one man from the hunting group stretching Cross out on the rug
and trying to administer first aid.
 
From
my position, I couldn’t see a wound on Cross or any blood in the room.

Randi started crying louder again. Geri, the other female
in the hunting group, had taken over comforting duties.

“Now, now,” Geri said softly. “Let’s get you back to your
room.”

They started their weave through the small crowd, but as
they passed me, Randi looked up at me and collapsed.
 
She fell more into my arms than toward the
floor. I held her upright, steadying her.

“Whoa, girl,” Geri said.
 
She looked at me. “Sorry about that, but seeing as she’s attached to
you, would you mind helping me get her to her room?”

A scent of perfume wafted by and through the middle of the
chaos got my attention.
 
Randi was about
as close to me as you can get with your clothes on, and Geri came attached to
one of Randi’s arms, so she wasn’t much further away.
 
I guessed the perfume belonged to Geri.
Whereas Randi dressed unusual, Geri looked sharp in her pressed khaki slacks
and turquoise sweater.

“No problem, lead the way,” I said.

“I’m dizzy,” Randi mumbled after we had only taken a few
steps.

“Here,” I said and picked her up.
 
She was surprisingly light in my arms.
 
I followed Geri to a room on the east wing of
the second floor.
 
She opened the room
with a card key.

“Her room?”

“No, actually it’s my husband’s and mine.
 
Put her on the bed.”

I did and noticed Randi’s eyes were open and focused at
me.

“Someone shot him,” she said.

“I didn’t see a wound.”

“It was right here,” she touched the back of her
head.
 
“Who would do such a thing?”

“I don’t know.”

“Here’s a drink of water.
 
Sit up a little.”
 
Geri moved in
close to her, and I took a step away.
 
The perfume definitely belonged to her.
 
After Randi took a sip of water and placed her head back down on the
pillow, Geri began to gently rub her face and neck with a wet wash cloth she’d
brought over with the glass of water.

“That feels good,” Randi said.
 
She unbuttoned the top two buttons of her
blouse and Geri expanded her massaging with the wash cloth.

“Try to get some rest, Randi.
 
If you’re up to it, maybe we’ll do that lunch
after all.”
 
I left the room feeling a
little uncomfortable.
 
I didn’t have a
big desire to eat lunch with Randi, but despite the rational part of my brain
telling me to stay out of it, my curiosity of what she discovered in that room
had gotten the better of me.