Sweetheart Deal (16 page)

“Oh!” Beti looked up. “I'm so sorry! I didn't realize … If I'd known it was you, I'd never have …” Her cheeks, which already sported a liberal swath of blush, burned crimson. “I'm supposed to discourage … I mean, they generally don't like for people to come in and talk to the manager or any of our salespeople without an appointment. I'll call Mr. Espinoza right away,” she said, picking up the phone.

“Did you say Mr.
Espinoza
?”

She nodded.

“Hang on,” I said before she started dialing. “So Alejandro and Antonio were—”

“Brothers.”

“Brothers,” I repeated, wondering why I hadn't made the connection before, given how similar they looked.

“And Antonio's taking it really hard,” she said. “Other than coming out to do paperwork with you, he's pretty much been sitting in his office staring into space since it happened.”

Hardly the reaction one would expect from a man who'd killed his own brother to get his job. “That's awful.”

“For him, yes.” Beti glanced over her shoulder to make sure no one was coming. “But, between us, this whole situation has made things a bit easier for the rest of us.”

“Because Antonio hasn't left his office?”

“Because Alejandro is gone,” she said.

The fact that Beti was admitting she was glad he was gone told me she probably wasn't a relative, but another member of his
ever-growing
legion of haters. “I've heard he was a bit difficult.”

“Well …” She lowered her voice. “We haven't had a single guest demanding to see the manager since Antonio took over, if you know what I mean.”

“I think I might,” I said. “It certainly explains why you were instructed to discourage unscheduled meetings.”

“In part, anyway.”

Before I had a chance to ask her another question, the front door banged open and the woman who had been sitting near me at the pool came barreling in.

“I need to see the manager,” she said, waving her contract.

“Please sign in,” Beti said with a
there went that
sigh.

“Immediately,” the woman insisted. “We purchased a vacation package that our salesman assured us had a
forty-eight
-hour cancelation policy,
28
but I was just reading the fine print and it seems to say that The Sampler, which is what we bought, is nonrefundable and I—”

“Sign in and take a seat,” Beti repeated, giving me a
see what I mean
look. “There's a guest ahead of you.”

“I don't know how they do it, but I swear they somehow hypnotize you into signing on the dotted line,” the woman said to me. “Did you sign up for this Sampler, whatever it is, too?”

“No,” I said looking out the window toward the pool and noticing that Philip had joined Anastasia and they were conferring with my family and the crew. “I'm dealing with an entirely different situation.”

The situation became more complicated when one of Philip's officer buddies headed in the direction of the bathrooms looking, I could only presume, for me.

“In fact, I'm afraid I'm going to need to reschedule my meeting with the manager for later,” I said. “Hopefully, that will shorten your wait a bit.”

“Here's what we now know,” Philip said, looking at us but clearly aware he was on camera. “Murder is bad for the resort.”

Duh
, I wanted to say, but kept my mouth shut.

Luckily so did the kids, who I feared, judging by both FJ's and Eloise's expressions, might blurt the same thing.

“And seeing as tourism makes this whole area tick, it makes a certain amount of sense, financially and psychologically, that everyone needed Alejandro's death to be an accident.”

“So you agree there was a
cover-up
?”

“I think it's fair to say there's been a widespread
don't ask, don't tell
policy in effect,” Philip said. “But, now, the facts can no longer be ignored.”

“And what are the facts?” I asked.

“We have confirmed that Alejandro died sometime between 8:05 p.m. when he was last seen and 8:45 p.m. when he was discovered floating in the pool. We've also confirmed that while he did have alcohol in his body, the police detected the presence of something else as well.”

“Which was?”

“Rohypnol.”

“He was roofied?” Trent blurted.

“Seriously?” FJ asked.

I was simultaneously bothered and glad my kids were so well aware of what was commonly known as the date rape drug.

Philip nodded. “The new theory is that someone slipped a roofie into his cocktail of the day.”

“Wouldn't he have immediately passed out or something, though?” Trent asked.

“Not right away. Rohypnol commonly causes disinhibition and slurred speech, followed by respiratory distress and paralyzing effects,” Philip said. “And, unfortunately, it's odorless, tasteless, and dissolves quickly—Alejandro wouldn't have noticed until he was feeling the effects.

“Not good,” Trent added.

“As soon as his memory got fuzzy and his inhibitions left him, the killer likely encouraged him to drink more alcohol and somehow coaxed him into the pool.”

“And no one saw any of this going on?” I asked.

“The video surveillance in that pool area was not working that evening.”

“What a coincidence,” I said.

“They've interviewed all the bartenders, servers, and staff who were working when it happened—most of them immediately after the incident. We know he was in the bar, possibly waiting for someone. Then he got a call, headed toward the other side of the property, and never returned.”

I felt my cheeks flush. Seeing as we were on camera and surrounded by Anastasia and the crew, I couldn't quite get myself to admit that Alejandro might well have been in the bar waiting for me.

Or that if I had met him, he might still be alive.

“Are they checking his cell phone records?” I asked.

“The call came from one of the courtesy phones at the resort, so there's no way to know which one,” Philip said. “A cabana boy says he saw Alejandro heading for the pool around eight thirty, and wondered if he was a little tipsy but didn't think much of it because he swam regularly for exercise.”

“Alone?”

“Apparently.”

“Or is that just another
cover-up
?” I asked.

“Maddie believes there was a conspiracy to get rid of him,” Frank said, somewhat dismissively.

“Given how many people disliked the man for one reason or another, it's a definite possibility,” Philip said. “And the local authorities agree.”

“Do you believe them?” I asked.

“They are competent, and we've been assured that the various relatives within the department have been reassigned to other cases, so yes.”

“They've certainly changed their tune down at the station,” I said.

“They claim it was the blood work,” Philip said.

“What about the incident at the water park?”

“That too.”

“Did they find the camera yet?” Frank interrupted.

“Not yet. There are weird tides, and lot of surface area to cover,” Philip said. “As for the Geo incident …”

“Let me guess,” Eloise said. “Another accident?”

“No,” Philip said. “The new working theory is that whoever came after Geo wasn't actually after Geo at all.”

“What?” I asked.

“They don't believe Geo was the intended target.”

“What?” the rest of my family exclaimed.

“Who do they think the killer was after?”

Philip looked directly into the camera. “Ivan.”

“Ivan?” Eloise repeated, reaching for her phone.

Philip saw her move. “You won't be able to get a hold of him, he's down at the station now.”

“OMG!” Eloise said. “Why would someone go after Ivan?”

“That's what we still need to find out,” he said, looking meaningfully at me. “All of us.”

“Cut,” Anastasia said, looking as gleeful as Eloise did stricken. “Perfect.”

twenty-one

“Makes no sense at
all,” Felipe said, shaking his head as he chauffeured us to our afternoon shoot/tour of the local Mayan ruins in a black SUV without so much as a license plate rim or a parking sticker to mark it as belonging to the Hacienda de la Fortuna fleet.

For added safety,
we were told, after being reassured that no one from the cast or crew was in danger because the killer wasn't after Geo or any of the rest of us. Seeing as everyone around from
The Family Frugalicious
let out a collective sigh of relief, I decided not to point out that Geo, who was still hospitalized, had been in someone's crosshairs, accidentally or not.

“You said, ‘What's done is done,' after Alejandro died,” I said to Felipe. “What exactly did you mean by that?”

“Alejandro had his enemies,” Felipe said as the cameraman assigned to capture our various reactions to the latest news zoomed in on him. “But everyone loves Ivan. Who would come after him?”

“Great,” said the assistant director, who rode in the back row of the SUV. “Since we're almost at Tulum, we need to move onto Felipe filling everyone in on the history of the place.”

With that, any additional insight we might have gleaned from Felipe was immediately preempted by his informative, if much less illuminating, monologue on the Mayans:

Cancun as we know it didn't exist prior to the 1970s, but Tulum, the Mayan word for
fence
or
wall
, was built in the thirteenth century during the Mayan Postclassic period …

Everyone had finally admitted they knew that Alejandro hadn't simply drowned. While I could understand why the Powers That Be around the hotel wanted to keep the word
murder
out of the conversation, something still felt orchestrated.

Not to mention secretive.

We have just enough information about the Tulum ruins for the history to become a giant puzzle for us to piece together …

The potential suspects were too numerous to count and included practically everyone—family, friends, coworkers, and hotel guests.

Soon after Tulum was constructed, the Spanish arrived. The Europeans attempted to conquer the Mayans, as well as the
Inca
and Aztec peoples. The Mayans, however, proved difficult to overpower …

What was the connection between the widely disliked Alejandro and affable hippie Ivan? And how had Geo gotten caught in the middle?

The Mayans and Spanish lived alongside each other for two hundred years before Spain finally took control of Mayan lands. Still, the people, culture, and language thrived. Many people living in the Yucatan today are of Mayan and Spanish descent …

How did the
not-entirely
-forthright members of Alejandro's extended family fit into the picture?

Tulum was a very advanced society. The Mayans had their own system of writing, were advanced in math and architecture, and invented the zero …

All of my working theories had been and continued to be blown out of the water. If whoever had gone after Geo actually meant to attack Ivan, then it was once again somewhat believable that the crew could be behind it for some extremely
far-fetched
ratings ploy—except not really, and particularly not on camera. Maybe there was a conspiracy to kill Alejandro but, if so, why try and kill Geo/Ivan afterward, for no particular reason, and risk being caught as a result?

In order to figure out who could actually be a suspect, I needed to find out:

1. What happened in the hour before Alejandro's death—what he was drinking, with whom, and why he left the bar area.

2. Why Ivan was also targeted and how the killer had confused him with Geo.

3. Who hated both men enough to try and kill them, particularly with so many cameras around.

We pulled up to the entrance to Tulum and I allowed everyone to pile out of the SUV ahead of me.

“Thank you for the ride,” I said to Felipe as soon as I was the last one in the car.

“
De nada
,” he said.

“Can I ask you a question?”

“Anything for Señora Frugalicious,” he said, looking into the rearview mirror, but somehow not at me.

“You're one of the few people who didn't deny that Alejandro could have been murdered from the very start.”

“I'm not surprised no one wanted to say so,” he said. “The family—they are all very protective of each other.”

“Then you aren't part of the family?”

“Only by marriage,” he said, as though that made him an outsider.

“They definitely seem to hire from within at Hacienda de la Fortuna,” I said.

“That's just how it's done.”

“Is there anyone who isn't related?”

“Ivan,” Felipe said. “Which is what worries me most.”

“Why?”

“Because if he is in danger …” Felipe glanced out the passenger side windows and then over his left shoulder. “Then every single person who works at the hotel could be in danger too.”

“That's all he said?” Frank asked.

“He saw someone walk behind the car, got all nervous, and completely clammed up after that except to add that he would see us at
pick-up
time.”

“That certainly doesn't give us much to go on,” Frank said, sounding dismissive of my sleuthing abilities, “now does it?”

“Something's still being covered up. I'm sure of it.”

“That, or maybe the man is skittish,” Frank said. “I mean, how would you feel if someone tried to kill two people in your life in as many days?”

“Seriously, Frank?”
I said, looking at the kids, who were just ahead of us on the path that led to the ancient walls surrounding the ruins. “I swear, if anything happens to—”

“Nothing will happen to us or the kids.”

“How can you be sure?”

Two of Phil's officer buddies joined the kids, flanking them on either side.

Frank flashed a
self-righteous
smile that made me want to clock him.

As promised, we toured the ruins trailed by a camera crew, taking in the cliffside temple of El Castillo where we learned about the Secret of Tulum—small windows in the shrine that were lined up perfectly with a gap in the offshore barrier reef and reflected during daylight hours to help incoming canoes navigate safely into shore.

“Smart,” FJ said, as prompted.

“There are different windows for night guiding too,” Trent added. “Like a lighthouse, but without a light.”

As our designated tour guide detailed the Mayan obsession with the movements of the heavens, their uncanny ability to mathematically predict almost every astronomical event, and their eerily accurate calendar thousands of years ago, we all agreed the Mayans were a brilliant bunch. We also marveled not only at the architectural achievement of the Temple of the Descending God, but that this and all of the structures were built without the help of machinery or modern technology.

The only real surprises of the afternoon were Eloise's lack of distress about the geckos darting about (Ivan had warned her about them and assured her they were friendly) and the notable break from stress. Despite the minor headaches inherent in TV production, the tour itself was enjoyably sunny, scenic, and predictable. My admiration of the Mayan aesthetic grew as we hiked down and around the sheer cliffs for our
11:00: Family beach frolic
on one of the most beautiful stretches of beach I'd ever seen. We took in the view of Cozumel off in the distance, took off our various
cover-ups
, and were basking in the sun and, in fact, frolicking in the stunning turquoise Caribbean surf as though we truly were on vacation.

That was, until I was reminded that the feeling of
too-good
-
to-be
-true was as potent a warning (at least for me) as the
blood-curdling
cry that echoed suddenly from atop the cliff.

“What's going on?” I asked a fellow tourist after counting to make sure everyone in my family was safe, present, and accounted for.

“I don't know, but we were supposed to meet for our tour right where the screams are coming from,” she said as we scrambled along with the crowd in the direction of the
high-pitched
shriek. “Thank goodness they'd already changed the location.”

Eloise, who'd rushed ahead along with the boys, looked up and stopped dead in her tracks. “OMG!”

“Frank,” I said breathlessly. “I'm afraid there may be a—”

“You've got to be kidding me,” FJ said, as we reached the kids before I could utter the words
serial
and/or
killer,
much less add anything along the lines of
on the loose
.

The scene unfolding before us was almost as shocking. And, judging from the strategically placed camera, crew, and assorted equipment, it was a highly choreographed scene at that.

At the top of the steep, crumbling stairs of El Castillo, in front of the shrine, a body lay on a makeshift altar.

Body—as in Anastasia's shapely sister Sara—covered from head to toe in blue paint.

Face, AKA Sally, stood over her, along with her son Liam, Hair's husband Michael, and Dave, Body's weekend squeeze. All were dressed as Mayan priests.

Face held a sacrificial knife.

“That was good for a rehearsal,” Anastasia, announced through a megaphone from the bottom of the stairs. “But remember, Sara, it's an honor to be sacrificed, so I need a scream that's feels as much like pride as it does fear.”

I didn't quite know whether to laugh, cry, or simply give in to what seconds before had felt like an imminent heart attack.

“This time, we're running through the whole scene,” Anastasia announced. “And remember folks, we've only got one take.”

As Dave helped Body up off the slab of stone and everyone headed back down the steps, an assistant rushed over from behind the shrine to
re-prep
the area. The
actors
reached the bottom of the stairway and disappeared around a corner. Hair, AKA Susan, remained in front of a second camera positioned at the bottom of the steps.

“I just can't believe this,” I said to no one in particular as we watched the reenactment from about twenty feet away, along with the rest of the vacationing crowd.

“Believe it,” muttered one of the assistants assigned to accompany us. “Anastasia's sisters wanted more lines so they could get their Screen Actors Guild cards.”
29

“They want to be actresses?”

“Ready, Susan?” Anastasia asked.

The assistant sniffed. “You'd have thought the scenes she already wrote them into would have been enough.”

“To qualify for a SAG card?”

“As if any of them have what it takes to act. They make perfect Hollywood siblings, I suppose.”

“And action!” Anastasia said.

Hair tossed her luscious locks and gave it her all:

“Sacrificial scenes have been depicted in many ancient Mayan ceramics, sculptures, and murals,” she said in a stiff documentary voice. “Typically, animals—including crocodiles, iguanas, dogs, peccaries, jaguars, and turkeys—were sacrificed to appease the Mayan gods. While it may seem shocking to us, ancient peoples did not view sacrifice as a devaluing of life, but believed that life was being given up for a greater purpose. The supreme sacrifice being the human life.” She paused meaningfully. “Truly, it isn't all that different than our
modern-day
willingness to give up our loved ones for the cause of war. In fact, the ancient Mayans actually battled it out through games to compete for the opportunity and honor of being sacrificed.”

The camera panned to Body attempting to look equal parts honored and horrified while being dragged around the corner and up the steep steps by Face, Michael, Dave, and her nephew Liam.

“I can't believe Liam never mentioned a thing about this,” FJ said as they forced her onto the slab and held her down.

“Probably sworn to silence,” Trent whispered.

Hair spoke once more. “After being painted blue, the sacrificial victim was led to the summit of the pyramid and laid over a stone altar. Then, with his or her arms and legs firmly held by assistants, to the high priest, known as the nacon—”

“OMG!” Eloise said as Hair recited something in what had to be a badly mispronounced Mayan dialect. As she brandished the obsidian knife, Body let out a shriek that sounded more like a cat in heat than a terrified maiden about to be sacrificed for the greater good.

“This is horrifying,” I said.

“It's not too accurate either,” a voice said from behind us. “In Tulum, they celebrated the God of Life, so only animals were ever sacrificed.”

A hint of patchouli wafted in the breeze.

Eloise turned and hugged Ivan, who had maneuvered his way through the crowd and was standing behind us.

“I heard you guys were coming here while I was down at the police station,” he said. “I thought I would make sure everyone is doing okay.”

“That's so sweet!” Eloise said, all but batting her lashes.

“I also didn't want to miss how they were going to try and reenact this whole business,” he said before the boys had time to roll their eyes at their sister. “Particularly the cutting out of the heart.”

“They're not really going to …?”

Michael plunged the knife in the general direction of Body's heart and blood (fake, I could only pray) spurted high into the air.

“Whoa!” FJ said over the gasps of the crowd.

We all gasped again as Face reached down and grabbed a bloody, dripping rubber heart from wherever the blood had come from. She held it over her head.