Peril at Granite Peak (7 page)

“Yeah,” Joe said. “I happened to wake up around midnight and spotted Stanley through the window.” He shrugged. “Well, I didn't know it was him at the time. But we ran down and got Cody and Blizz to get out there and take a look, and the rest is history.”

Poppy looked impressed, and I could tell Joe was eating it up. “I can't believe I missed the whole thing,” she said. “Sounds like I was the only one. I'm a pretty sound sleeper.” She leaned forward. “So was Stanley okay? How'd the Gallaghers react when they found out?”

“He seemed okay to me,” Chet said. “We haven't seen him since—”

“Excuse me,” Poppy said suddenly, cutting him off. “I just remembered I, um, have to go. Sorry.”

She leaped to her feet, grabbed her laptop, and raced away, disappearing through the door leading into the side hallway, where the lodge's small gift shop, public restrooms, and various other amenities were located. I stared after her in surprise.

“That was weird,” I said.

Chet shrugged. “Maybe she really, really felt like shopping. Or needed to use the bathroom.”

Joe rolled his eyes. “You really don't know anything about girls, do you, dude?”

“Never mind that.” I'd just noticed Josie rushing toward us, Toy Toy clutched in her arms. She must have come in from the lobby while we were focused on Poppy's departure.

“Have you guys seen Stanley?” Josie blurted out. “He hasn't shown up here, has he?”

Joe shrugged. “Not that we know of. But we just got here ourselves.”

“Why? Is everything okay?” I asked.

“I just want to make sure he's all right.” Josie bit her lip, looking anxious. “You know—after last night. I'm sure he's very upset.”

Nate leaned over again from his table. “Are you talking about Stanley? I saw him a few minutes ago out in the lobby, complaining to Mr. Gallagher about something.” He rolled his eyes. “In other words, he seems to be back to his usual self.”

Joe let out a snort of laughter, and Chet grinned. But Cassie gave her husband a disapproving poke in the shoulder, and Josie just frowned.

Meanwhile, I tried to add cream to my coffee and discovered the pitcher was empty. “Be right back,” I said, standing up. Yeah, I could have asked Josie to go get me some. But she seemed a little distracted right now. Besides,
she already had enough to do—there only seemed to be maybe half a dozen employees left on the property other than the Gallaghers.

On the way to the kitchen, I passed the Richmonds' table. One of the kids appeared to be having a meltdown.

“I didn't lose them!” the little boy was insisting, his face bright red as he glared at his parents. “I left them by the fire to dry, and someone stealed them!”

“You mean stole them.” Mrs. Gallagher sighed. “And nobody stole your boots, kiddo. I promise. Who would do that?”

I paused by the table. “Lost boots, huh?” I said with a friendly smile. I hadn't forgotten that the Richmonds had been willing to let us cram into their already crowded van. That made me like them. “I'll keep an eye out for them, buddy. What do they look like?”

“They're red.” The little boy gave me a slightly suspicious look. “And they didn't get lost. They got stoleden!”

I chuckled and traded an amused look with the boy's parents. “Well, maybe you can ask the Gallaghers to make an announcement,” I suggested. “I'm sure they'll be able to help you solve the mystery.”

“Thanks.” Mr. Richmond smiled and winked. “We'll do that.”

I moved on to the coffee station outside the kitchen. I turned back toward the table just in time to see Stanley
march into the dining room. He didn't look happy.

“Be careful, everyone,” he announced loudly. “Don't go anywhere alone unless you want what happened to me to happen to you, too.” He scowled and shook his fist. “This place is a deathtrap!”

I
ROLLED MY EYES AT
Stanley's Melodramatic announcement. But Frank was frowning as he returned to our table, and Chet looked worried.

“What a jerk,” Chet said as Mrs. Gallagher appeared and started talking soothingly to Stanley while steering him toward the coffee station.

“Yeah, he's a charmer all right.” Frank sat down and poured milk into his coffee. “I wouldn't pay any attention to him.”

Chet still looked upset. “Maybe you wouldn't, but what if other people do? One jerk like Stanley could be all it takes to ruin the Gallaghers' business!”

I was about to say that Chet was crazy to worry about that. Then I remembered something.

“Josie made it sound like this place is in more serious financial trouble than we realized,” I mused.

“Hmm, I suppose you're right,” Frank said. “In which case, maybe Chet's got a point. The last thing the Gallaghers need is for Stanley to start spreading rumors all over the Internet about this place.”

Chet looked troubled. “Are they really rumors, though? He did almost freeze out there last night.”

“And he could have been injured on that mismarked ski trail the other day,” I added. “Face it, some weird stuff has happened to Stanley Wright here.”

“I know.” Chet bit his lip, looking from me to Frank and back again. “That's why . . .” He hesitated.

Frank sipped his coffee. “What?”

“What if it's not just bad luck?” Chet leaned forward. “What if someone at the lodge is out to get Stanley?” He shot a slightly nervous look over at Nate, who was paying no attention to us whatsoever as he stared deeply into Cassie's eyes. Not that I blamed him. If I was married to a woman like that, I'd never look at anything else either.

But never mind that. “So what are you saying?” I asked Chet.

“I'm saying maybe you guys could look into it—just in case.” He stared at us hopefully. “Please?”

“You mean, like, investigate?” I said.

“Whoa,” Frank said at the same time. “We're trying to stay away from that kind of thing, remember?”

“I know. But I won't tell.” Chet sighed. “I just want to help Cody if I can. He's hiding it pretty well, but I can tell he's really worried about this place.”

I glanced at Frank. “What do you think, bro? Couldn't hurt to check it out. It's not like we have much else to do until the weather clears.”

“I guess so,” Frank agreed slowly.

Chet grinned with relief. “Thanks, you guys! Come on, let's go somewhere more private and figure out how to get started.”

“Okay.” I stood and grabbed my coffee. “But only if we can swing by the buffet table on the way. I need some food for thought.”

It was surprisingly difficult to find a private spot in the lodge. Mr. Gallagher was in the lobby, one of the maids was vacuuming the carpet in the hallway near the side door, and Poppy was poking around in the magazine racks in the library alcove near the gift shop.

Finally we settled in the small lounge that contained the lodge's indoor hot tub. We had a great view of the storm from there through the wall of windows overlooking the bunny slope. Not that we could see the bunny slope. Snow was coming down so fast the whole scene looked like one of those modern art paintings that's all one color. In this case, white.

“Wow.” Chet peered out. “We're not getting out of here anytime soon, are we?”

Frank sat down and took a bite of the bagel he'd grabbed
from the buffet. “It'll probably be another twenty-four hours at least.”

“That gives us plenty of time to solve the mystery.” Chet sank onto the leather couch.

“If there even is a mystery here,” I said. “Well, other than the mystery of how much bad luck one dude can have in a week.”

“Yeah. But it's not too hard to imagine someone might have it out for Stanley, right?” Chet said.

Frank shrugged. “True. He's pretty rude. I can't imagine he's a favorite of the staff by this point.”

“Or anyone else, either.” I stared at my bacon-and-egg biscuit, thinking back to Stanley's confrontation with Nate. “Just about everyone at the lodge probably wishes he'd go away—staff and other guests alike.”

“But is that enough of a motive for anyone to actually try to kill him?” Frank said. “Taking down the closed sign on that ski trail was dangerous. But locking Stanley out in the storm last night? I'd have to call that attempted murder.”

“Yeah, that was pretty hardcore,” I agreed. “Then again, we really don't know much about most of the people here. Who knows what they're capable of?”

Chet looked nervous. “You think someone here is, like, a hardened criminal or something?”

“How would we know?” Frank stirred his coffee. “We've busted some pretty normal-seeming people over the years who turned out to be totally heinous.”

“Yeah.”

I glanced at Frank. He had that look in his eye. The look that meant his logical little mind was working.

“We've got one advantage here,” he said. “A limited number of possible suspects. The incident last night happened after most of the guests and staff had left. If we assume the same person was responsible for the trail sign incident . . .”

“Our culprit has to be someone who's still here now,” I finished. “Okay, so who've we got?”

“What about Nate?” Chet suggested immediately. “He looked like he wanted to punch Stanley's lights out at dinner the other night.”

Frank nodded. “Nate seems like a nice enough guy, but he clearly doesn't like Stanley. He should go on the list.”

“Then there's Rick Ferguson,” I said. “Like we were saying last night, it's a little strange that he was still dressed after midnight. There could be a perfectly innocent reason, but—”

Chet's eyes widened. “He tried to stop us from opening the door, remember?” he blurted out. “What if that's because he's the one who locked Stanley out there? He does kind of seem like a tough guy.” He cast a nervous look around the lounge, as if fearing that Rick could appear out of nowhere and toss him out the window.

“Okay, so we've got Nate and Rick,” Frank said. “Who else?”

I gulped down a bite of my sandwich. “What about
Poppy? She was acting weird just now. And she's practically the only one who didn't hear Blizz barking last night and come out to see what was happening. What if it's because she didn't want everyone to see her looking guilty?”

Frank looked skeptical. “The Richmond kids didn't come out either. Should they go on the list too?”

“Maybe.” I was only half-kidding. “But seriously, it's kind of strange that Poppy stayed behind at the lodge when all her friends left.”

“She said her apartment's being fumigated.” Frank looked distracted. “Speaking of the Richmond kids . . .”

“What?” I said. “You think they're a gang of mini murderers?”

“No, it's not that. But one of the boys was complaining about his boots being stolen.” Frank shrugged, looking slightly sheepish. “I know it's probably not connected, but . . .”

“You never know,” I said with a grin. “Maybe someone's going to try to frame poor Stanley for the theft.”

“You never know,” Frank echoed, grinning back.

I could tell he was enjoying this. So was I.

Chet was picking at his food, not looking like he was having quite such a good time. “Maybe we could try to check out some of these people online,” he said.

“We could, if the storm hasn't knocked out the phone lines,” Frank said dubiously, glancing out at the wind-whipped snow.

“Yeah.” I wasn't holding my breath. There was no high-speed Internet access at the lodge—dial-up only. Yet another reason people were flocking to those other resorts, according to Cody.

Frank popped the last bit of bagel in his mouth. “Well, can't hurt to check,” he said. “I'll run to the office and try the computer while you two start talking to people and sniffing around for clues.”

“Sounds like a plan.” I wolfed down the last few bites of my sandwich and wiped off the grease on my pants. “Chet, you want to talk to Nate or Rick?”

“Um, neither?” Chet looked nervous. “You guys are the experts at this. How about if I go check on the Internet situation while you two do the questioning?”

I traded an amused look with Frank. “Sure thing,” I said. “I'll take Nate.”

Frank nodded. “Then Rick's mine. Let's go.”

I headed back toward the dining room. Before I got there, I spotted Nate and Cassie emerging into the lobby. That was easy.

“Hey, guys,” I said, hurrying over. “Listen, Nate, I wanted to ask you something.”

“Sure thing.” Nate smiled. His arm was around Cassie's shoulders, and he looked relaxed and happy. “Ask away.”

“It's about your little tiff with Stanley Wright at dinner the other night . . . ,” I began.

Suddenly Nate's whole demeanor changed. His face went tight and grim, and his body stiffened.

“Cassie, sweetie,” he said loudly, cutting me off. “I think I left my camera somewhere. Would you mind checking in the dining room? I'll run upstairs and see if it's in our room.”

Cassie looked slightly surprised, but she nodded. “Of course. Meet you back here in a few?”

“Absolutely. Thanks, babe.” He dropped a quick kiss on her cheek.

As Cassie headed back into the dining room, Nate grabbed my arm and dragged me toward the stairs. “Come with me,” he whispered loudly.

“Okay.” Not that I had much choice. The dude was apparently just as strong as he looked, judging by his iron grip.

Soon we were in the upstairs hallway. Nate cast a cautious look around, but there was nobody in sight.

“Listen,” he said, his voice low and urgent. “About Stanley . . .”

I held my breath. Was he about to confess?