Beach Bags and Burglaries (A Haley Randolph Mystery) (11 page)

A
s I approached the hotel, I spotted Sandy and Sebastian standing near the entrance. He was doing some serious male I’m-a cool-dude posturing, and Sandy was responding with the female wow-you’re-a-cool-dude giggle. Normal stuff. Yet there were things about Sebastian that bothered me.

Or maybe I was a little envious that Sandy had found a guy, despite our no-men-on-this-vacation pact.

Not a great feeling.

“Oh, Haley, you should have been at my art lesson,” Sandy said as I walked up. Her eyes were round and her cheeks flushed. “Colby Rowan—she said I could call her Colby—she’s fabulous. She’s awesome. Oh my God, she really is a celebrity.”

“And this one here?” Sebastian said, and laid his hand on Sandy’s shoulder. “She’s got real artistic talent.”

Sandy blushed and made girl noises. “No, I don’t.”

“Yes, you do,” he insisted.

“No, not really,” Sandy said, and dipped her chin demurely.

“Yes, really,” he told her, and leaned closer.

“No,” she said.

“Yes,” he said.

I had to break this up.

“You were at the lesson?” I asked Sebastian, noting that once again he wasn’t dressed in a Rowan Resort uniform.

“He stopped by to make sure I was enjoying myself,” Sandy explained, and gave Sebastian an endearing smile.

He returned her endearing smile with one of his own.

Okay, these two were starting to get on my nerves.

Sebastian must have picked up on my you-two-are-making-me-nauseated expression, because he stepped away and said, “You two girls enjoy your day. Sandy, I’ll see you later.”

He walked away, then glanced back and waved. Sandy gave him a little wave in return, and he disappeared behind a stand of palm trees.

Her gaze lingered on the palms for a few seconds, then said, “Sebastian invited me to have drinks with him later.”

“That’s nice,” I said, and, really, I could have put a little more enthusiasm into it, which was bad of me, I know.

“Am I doing the wrong thing?” Sandy asked, sounding serious and more than a little troubled. “I mean, I have a boyfriend—a real boyfriend, and he’s abandoned the work he loves to go on sabbatical so he can recharge his emotions and improve his art.”

I had a feeling that Sandy’s tattoo artist boyfriend’s
sabbatical
was code for
Las Vegas
.

“Do you think I’m being a bad girlfriend?” Sandy asked.

I was convinced that if Sandy ever did something not quite right in her relationship with her boyfriend, it was nothing compared to some of the things he’d done to her—long story

“You’re not being a bad girlfriend,” I told Sandy. “You’re just having a nice vacation, that’s all.”

She thought about it for a while, then sighed. “I guess you’re right. And Sebastian is an employee here. He’s probably just making sure I’m having a good time.”

I thought there was a little more to Sebastian’s interest in Sandy than even the astronomically high guest-relations standards the Rowan Resort required of its employees, but thinking otherwise seemed to help Sandy deal with her am-I-being-a-bad-girlfriend situation with that idiot boyfriend of hers. She deserved a guy who would treat her well, and Sebastian seemed to be doing that.

Still, I wished I didn’t have a weird feeling about him.

“Haley, you absolutely have to take an art lesson from Colby,” Sandy said. “She’s so smart, and so gifted. You’ll love her.”

I didn’t really see myself loving an art lesson, but hey, this was my vacation. Maybe I would give it a try.

“She’s super nice,” Sandy said, then frowned. “I don’t think she liked Sebastian, though. She started acting kind of, I don’t know, kind of strange when he showed up.”

Okay, Colby could have acted strange around Sebastian for a lot of reasons, but since I was picking up a weird vibe from him too, I decided I needed to check it out. I knew just what to use for cover.

“Want to go to the beach with Marcie and Bella?” I asked

“Sounds great,” Sandy agreed.

“I’ll meet you there in a few minutes,” I said. “I want to check with the shop and see if my Sea Vixen is in.”

I knew my totally fabulous tote hadn’t arrived yet, because I’d just been to the docks and there had been not even the slightest glimmer of a supply ship on the horizon. But it was the easiest way to check out Sebastian without Sandy knowing what I was doing.

We walked into the hotel together, and Sandy headed for the staircase in the lobby. I hung back, shifting into stealth mode.

I figured the resort had a business center, so I checked the directory posted near the snack bar and saw that it was located down the same hallway as the shops, restaurants, and other specialty rooms.

I headed that way, following the signs, changing directions a zillion times, going deeper and deeper into the hotel. The carpet was thick, muting my footsteps. The lighting was low. So far, I hadn’t seen anyone.

My this-place-is-kind-of-creepy meter jumped up a few notches.

I heard the murmur of deep voices coming from a room up ahead, then saw as I passed that, according to the discreet sign beside the door, it was the cigar room.

Luke flew into my head. He told me that’s where he’d been headed when he wandered into my interview with the homicide detectives, so at least now I knew a cigar room actually existed—even though it was nowhere near my interview location.

Damn. Why did I keep thinking about him?

I forced Luke out of my head, turned right, then left, and finally—whew!—found the business center.

Inside were a half-dozen computer workstations, fax and copy machines, and shelves containing every office supply product on the market. It all looked out of place among the dark wood furniture and the black-and-white olden-days photos on the walls.

I had the room to myself, so I chose the computer farthest from the door and sat down, ready to do some serious research on Sebastian. I had only sketchy info on him—his full name, the type of business he owned, and the possibility that he came from a wealthy Connecticut family—but I figured it was enough.

I was wrong.

I Googled everything Sandy had mentioned about Sebastian and came up with nothing. Absolutely nothing. I got no hits on his name, his business, his family, or his home state. I typed every possible combination of info I could think of into the search engine, and still nothing popped. I couldn’t even find a Facebook page for him.

I sat back in my chair, not feeling so great.

True, a great many people probably weren’t accessible on the Internet. It could happen—even these days.

But a guy who claimed he owned a consulting firm? From a maybe-wealthy family? In Connecticut? With a distinctive name like Sebastian Cannon Lane? Not likely.

So that could only mean one thing—Sebastian had lied to Sandy.

And I’d encouraged Sandy to get involved with him.

Oh, crap.

“Was that text from him?” I asked.

“No.” Marcie huffed irritably and tossed her phone into the tote bag—a way cool Coach—next to her lounge chair.

We were on the beach enjoying the sun, the ocean breeze, the smell of fresh salt air—not to mention fruity umbrella-topped drinks. Bella was dozing in her lounge chair, and Sandy was listening to her iPod.

“I’m never going to hear from him,” Marcie grumbled.

Her first-date guy from a few days ago still hadn’t bothered to respond to her text message thanking him for a nice evening—which was really crappy of him, I thought.

“It’s for the best, I suppose,” Marcie said.

Marcie had a way of always looking on the bright side—which could be really annoying, at times. But I decided that if she could let it go, so should I. And I did—kind of.

Ty popped into my head.

Jeez, what was going on with me? I hadn’t thought about him this much when we were dating.

“You’re making that face,” Marcie said. “The one you make when the handbag you’re dying for is not available. Except, you’re not thinking about a handbag, are you. It’s something else.”

How did she know that? Wow, even for a BFF, she’s
good
.

“Ty,” I said.

Marcie nodded wisely. “Have you heard from him?”

I’d only seen Ty one time since our breakup and it hadn’t gone well—something I didn’t like remembering, especially on vacation.

“He’s busy,” I said.

Ty was always busy.

“I can’t believe this trip you won from a Holt’s contest was upgraded from a seven-day cruise to the Rowan Resort, simply by magic,” Marcie said. “Ty was behind it. He had to be. I’ll bet he wanted you two to end up here together, somehow.”

Marcie was almost always right about things, but I couldn’t agree with her on this.

“You remember Ty’s personal assistant Amber?” I said. “I talked to her not long ago, and she said he’s in the middle of another major acquisition. He’s probably not thinking about me at all.”

“I doubt that,” Marcie said.

I am kind of unforgettable.

Yet Ty had managed to do just that a couple million times while we were dating. His job running Holt’s chain of stores—on two continents—was huge with huger-than-huge responsibilities. I understood that. I’d tried to be okay with it and, finally, Ty had tried to be a great boyfriend, but it was more than either of us could pull off.

“I still say that Ty arranged this contest prize for you on purpose,” Marcie said.

“Look, if Ty wanted us to get back together, he’d just come out and say so,” I said.

Marcie shook her head. “I’m not so sure about that.”

“Ty has never been shy about speaking his mind,” I said.

And it was true. He’d always been up front with me about his dedication to Holt’s and his determination to keep the chain running profitably on his watch. He had five generations on his shoulders; he wasn’t going to fail.

“Ty’s good at a lot of things,” Marcie agreed. “But the one thing he’s
not
good at is admitting he was wrong.”

“Wrong about what?” I asked.

“Breaking up with you,” Marcie said. “It was his idea to break up, right? And you’ve given him no indication that you’d like to get back together, right? So he’s probably unwilling to admit he was wrong, especially if he has no clue about how you feel about getting back together with him.”

Wow, I hadn’t thought about those things.

And I wasn’t going to think about them now—I’m on vacation.

I guess Marcie sensed my feelings—as a BFF would—because she changed the subject.

“You can quit your job at Holt’s pretty soon, can’t you?” Marcie asked. “You’ve got to be happy about that.”

My spirits lifted—more than a little. Working at a midrange department store where I was expected to actually wait on customers—and be nice to them—wasn’t exactly in my wheelhouse.

“I won’t need my medical benefits at Holt’s once my probation is over at L.A. Affairs,” I said.

Honestly, it miffed me a bit that L.A. Affairs required that I wait before they bestowed their benefits upon me.

I mean, jeez, I am, after all,
me
.

“Are you counting down the days?” Marcie asked.

“You bet,” I said.

My spirits lifted further as I closed my eyes and let the vision of Holt’s-free days drift through my mind.

No more customers who, for some reason, actually expected me to wait on them—really, couldn’t they show some initiative and find things themselves? No more screaming children. No more butt-numbing training meetings. No more risking permanent retina damage from looking at the hideous women’s clothing line. I’d never again have to look at Jeanette, the store manager who actually wore Holt’s hideous clothes, or put up with Rita, the I-make-lives-miserable-just-because-I-can cashiers’ supervisor.

I was on my way to achieving complete inner peace when my cell phone rang.

I hate it when that happens.

I looked at the caller ID screen and saw that it was Joy. My spirits soared, sure she was about to tell me that something fabulous had happened—like maybe Yasmin and Tate-Tate-Tate’s wedding had been cancelled—but maybe that would be fabulous only for me. Still, I felt optimistic as I answered my phone.

“Haley, I need you to come right away,” Joy said.

She sounded majorly stressed, which was odd because wedding planners had to be calm to survive the brides they had to work with, so I knew something terrible had definitely happened.

“It’s an emergency with Yasmin,” Joy insisted. “Turn around.”

What the heck?

I sat up and looked back, and spotted Joy standing at the edge of the sandy beach waving frantically.

“Come quickly!” she shouted.

I jumped up, put on my cover-up and flip-flops, dropped my phone in my pocket, and took off.

“W
hat’s wrong?” I asked when I reached Joy.

“I’ll fill you in on the way,” she said,

Joy took off down the road toward the hotel. Wow, she was really moving in those pumps. I had to hurry to keep up with her—and I have pageant legs.

“It’s important that you keep calm when you talk to her,” Joy said. “She’s on the brink.”

A vision of Yasmin standing on the ledge outside one of the hotel’s tower rooms, threatening to jump, bloomed in my head.

“I’ve seen this before in brides,” Joy warned.

My mental picture shifted, and I imagined Yasmin on the ledge holding an AK-47 assault rifle.

“We don’t want this situation to turn into a full-blown crisis,” Joy said.

Now, in my head, Yasmin was picking off loving couples strolling through the gardens. And Joy expected me to talk her down?
Me?

Honestly, my people skills aren’t the best.

“Where is her mother?” I demanded as I followed Joy through the hotel grounds.

Joy shook her head. “Yasmin asked for you. Only you.”

Great.

We circled the hotel, and Joy stopped.

“She’s inside,” she said, pointing.

I hadn’t seen this section of the hotel before, an area with numerous pergolas draped with white, billowy curtains set amid ferns, small palms, and flowering shrubs. I smelled scented candles and heard prerecorded rain forest sounds.

Hang on a minute.

“Is this the spa?” I asked.

Joy didn’t answer, just darted between the pergolas and disappeared through a set of open French doors. I followed the sound of her clacking pumps on the tile floor and caught up with her in the pedicure salon.

“Call if you need backup,” Joy said, and headed for the door. “Good luck.”

I definitely heard a “you’ll need it” undertone in her voice.

I spotted Yasmin seated in one of the pedicure chairs, both feet in the water. The pedicurist was cowering on a stool looking like a bomb disposal expert watching the timer tick toward zero.

What the heck was going on? And—more important—why was I here?

Yasmin spotted me and shrieked, “Haley! You came! Oh my God! You came!”

Three other women were having pedicures. They all turned and stared at me.

“You
have
to help me, Haley,” Yasmin called, waving me over with both hands.

A zillion possibilities flashed in my head: Tate-Tate-Tate had called off the wedding—not that I blamed him—or her mother had a stroke—I could definitely see that happening—or maybe her only attending guest had cancelled—which I totally understood.

Whatever the crisis was, it seemed that I alone was needed to deal with it. I braced myself to hear awful news, shifted into I-can-be-supportive-if-I-absolutely-have-to mode, and walked over.

“I don’t know what to do,” Yasmin moaned, and threw herself back in the chair. “I just don’t
know!
”

I glanced around the room trying to pick up on some tiny clue of what was going on. I got nothing.

“This is just—well, it’s just too much,” Yasmin said, and flung out both hands. “I can’t do this. I can’t!”

“Can’t do what?” I asked.

Yasmin looked at me as if I’d just suggested she carry a knockoff Louis Vuitton clutch on her honeymoon.

“Decide!”
she wailed, pointing at her feet. “White or pink? I can’t
decide!
”

“White or pink what?” I asked.

Yasmin jerked her feet up, splashing water everywhere.

“Toenail polish!” she exclaimed in a why-doesn’t-anyone-
get-it
voice.

Okay, now I
got it
—and I wasn’t happy about it.

My worry bypassed annoyance in a heartbeat, and amped up to anger. I guess it showed on my face, because the pedicurist rolled her stool farther away and leaned forward, ready to make a break for the door.

I’d be right behind her.

Yasmin deflated like a week-old birthday balloon and sank back in her chair.

“Everything has to be perfect for my wedding,” she said, tears pooling in her eyes.

Okay, now I felt kind of bad. Of course she wanted perfection on the biggest day of her life.

I drew in a big breath, forcing myself to calm down.

“I have really cute toes,” Yasmin said, gazing at her feet, twisting them left, then right. “Tate says they’re the most beautiful toes he’s ever seen.”

No way could I stand here and get mired down in another Tate-Tate-Tate story. I pushed through.

“Okay, so what color nail polish do you like best?” I asked.

Yasmin studied her feet for another long moment, then finally said, “I think I’ll get white.”

Wow, that was fast.

“Okay,” I said, and turned to leave.

“No, pink. I think pink would look the best,” Yasmin said.

Crap.

“What do you think?” Yasmin asked.

“Pink would look great,” I told her.

“Do you think so?”

“Yes, I think so. I definitely think so,” I said.

“White is more fitting for a bride,” Yasmin pointed out, “more virginal.”

I was positive that train had already left the station, but I rolled with it.

“Then get white,” I said.

Yasmin tilted her head, studying her toes from different angles, and said, “I’ll probably like pink better.”

I huffed. “Do you want me to decide for you?”

She looked relieved. “Yes.”

“Okay, get white.”

Yasmin frowned and said, “Pink would be prettier.”

“We’re done here.” I turned to the pedicurist. “Put on the white.”

I left the salon, fuming, annoyed beyond belief with Yasmin but also with myself.

That’s what I get for taking time off from my investigation. I should have stuck with it and found Jaslyn Gordon’s killer, so I wouldn’t have to deal with all this wedding crap—I’m on vacation.

As if I weren’t already annoyed enough, I realized I’d taken a wrong turn somewhere and ended up inside the hotel. Good grief. How did Sidney Rowan’s kids ever find their way to their bedrooms at night?

I turned a corner, then another, and oh my God, there was Sebastian ahead of me, walking into one of the rooms.

My anger flared again.

Perfect. Just the person I could take it out on.

I hurried down the corridor, questions of just who he was and what was up between him and Sandy filling my head. No way was I going to let him hurt my friend.

I charged into the room, ready to blast him, only—he wasn’t there. Nobody was there.

I froze and looked around. It was a small lounge, with sofas and chairs, two tall bookcases, and a flat screen on the wall.

This was crazy. What the heck was going on?

I looked around the room, into every corner. I was absolutely positive this was the room I’d seen him duck into, but he wasn’t here.

How could Sebastian have disappeared? Was I losing my mind?

I scanned the lounge for a couple more minutes—just to be sure my eyes weren’t playing tricks on me—then darted into the corridor searching for Sebastian.

No sign of him.

I power-walked along the hallway, checking the shops, the restaurants, everything.

Nothing.

Sebastian had disappeared faster than Kate Spade handbags at an outlet store. How could that be? I’d recognized him—yes, okay, it was from the back—but I was positive it was him, and I’d definitely seen him duck into that lounge. Yet he wasn’t there a few seconds later when I walked in? How had he simply vanished?

And why was I involved in this whole Sandy-and-Sebastian-thing, and why was I in the middle of Yasmin’s—I hate her—wedding? None of this was supposed to be happening. I’m on vacation.

By the time I reached the hotel’s main corridor I was completely rattled. I spotted the snack bar, rushed inside, and picked up three packages of M&M’s. I dumped half a package into my mouth before I reached the cashier—she didn’t blink an eye; obviously mine wasn’t the first chocolate emergency she’d witnessed—and walked outside into the courtyard.

The day was beautiful. A mild breeze stirred, the flower blooms were fragrant, and the trickling fountains were soothing.

Yeah, okay, the place was beautiful, but the sights and sounds didn’t help like the M&M’s did. I was two whole bags in before I calmed down.

I collapsed onto a bench near a water feature that looked like a brook winding through a village of tiny fairy cottages.

The chocolate kicked in big-time, and Sebastian filled my head. Something was weird about him. Shane, the bartender at the beach bar, had called him golden and warned that he was trouble. Sandy had said that at her art lesson she’d gotten the impression that Colby Rowan hadn’t liked him. I’d found nothing on the Internet—zero, nada, zilch—about him, his family, or the supposed consulting firm he owned.

Something wasn’t right about Sebastian. But what, exactly?

Was he one of those scam artists who hung with the rich and famous, even though he was completely out of their league? A male gold digger who thought that, since Sandy was a guest at the I’m-so-rich-I-brush-my-teeth-with-gold-dust Rowan Resort, she was wealthy?

Or was something else going on?

I finished off the last package of M&M’s, but my supercharged chocolate-coated brain cells didn’t reach a higher level of consciousness. Sebastian was definitely up to something, but I couldn’t figure out what it was.

I was tempted to head back to the snack bar for another round of brain-boosting chocolate—maybe I’d have better luck with a couple of Snickers bars—but my cell phone vibrated. I pulled it from my pocket and read a text from Marcie letting me know they were leaving the beach, hungry for lunch. I texted back that I’d meet them in our room, and headed upstairs for a quick shower.

At the top of the stairs I saw two housekeeping carts at the opposite ends of the hallway and hoped they’d already finished with my room. There’s something really nice about coming into a neat, freshly cleaned room—especially if someone else had done the work.

I opened my door and saw that the beds had been made, and I headed for the bathroom. A knock sounded on my door. I figured it was Marcie, so I opened it. Only it wasn’t Marcie. It was Tabitha.

She darted into the room, forcing me to step back, then slammed the door and fell back against it.

“What are you—”

“Shh,” Tabitha said. She whipped around, looked out the peephole, then turned to me again and said, “I’m not supposed to do this. It’s against the rules. I could get into big trouble.”

Her eyes were wide and I could see that she was trembling slightly. Obviously, Tabitha had no stealth-mode skills. Maybe I’d work with her on that later.

“I saw you come into your room,” Tabitha said. “I’ve been watching all morning. I have to talk to you.”

My this-could-benefit-
me
instinct took over.

“Sure,” I said, using my tell-me-everything-so-I-can-use-it-for-my-own-good voice, something I’d picked up from my beauty queen mother at a very early age.

“I saw you talking to Gabe,” Tabitha said, and for some reason she was whispering.

“When?” I asked, and for the same reason—whatever that was—I was whispering too.

“I was on the tram and I saw you two talking,” Tabitha said. She drew back a little. “Are you two, you know, are you dating or something?”

I got a weird feeling. Was Tabitha interested in Gabe? Had she come here to find out if I was trying to move in on him? To stake her claim? Tell me to back off?

Maybe she was stealthier than I thought.

Not a good feeling.

“Heck, no,” I said.

Tabitha looked relieved—but not in a good way.

“He’s kind of, you know, kind of crazy,” Tabitha said. “He gets really mad, really quick. You should stay away from him.”

My internal this-could-definitely-benefit-me alarm went off.

“Did Jaslyn know he was like that?” I asked, anxious to move the conversation toward a new clue. “Was she afraid of him?”

“She was acting, I don’t know, kind of weird the last week or so before she ... before she died,” Tabitha said.

Gabe had told me the same thing, but he claimed he didn’t know why. I wondered now if he himself had been the reason—an excellent clue I could use for solving the murder.

“Was she acting weird because of Gabe?” I asked. “Did she want to break up with him, maybe?”

“No. It wasn’t because of Gabe,” Tabitha said.

So much for that clue opportunity.

“There was something about Jaslyn,” she went on. “Men liked her a lot. They kind of wanted to own her, you know? She had such a free spirit, it was like they wanted to put her in a glass jar or something. You know?”

I didn’t recall any man wanting to be with me that badly, but I could understand what Tabitha was getting at. It reminded me of something Gabe had mentioned about trouble with someone at a previous job.

“Did Jaslyn ever mention any problems with someone at her last job?” I asked. “The one she worked before she started here at the resort?”

“Oh, yeah, that guy.” Tabitha nodded. “He kept calling and texting her, but she wouldn’t have anything to do with him. It was kind of crazy.”

Or maybe the guy was kind of crazy.

“Did she ever tell you his name?” I asked.

Tabitha thought for a few seconds, then shook her head. “I don’t think so. It was in L.A. Some magazine or something. She got hired there because she knew a lot about paintings and that kind of stuff. They wanted her to stay, become a permanent employee, but she wouldn’t do it.”

I figured that if Jaslyn, an art major, had left that sort of job she must have really wanted to get away from the guy who was psycho-interested in her.

“So why do you think Jaslyn was upset the week before she died?” I asked.

Tabitha shrugged. “I don’t know. She just started acting weird. She got kind of quiet, you know? She didn’t talk to me very much. She wanted to change teams. She volunteered for extra work.”

Volunteering for extra work definitely sounded weird to me.

“I think she got into trouble,” Tabitha said.

My major-clue antennas sprang up.