Randall #02 - Ghost Writers in the Sky (26 page)

“
There you are, you two!” said Donna as she made her way over to us. “You are so, like, totally cool!” Flinging her arms around us both, she planted a patchouli-scented kiss on my left cheek, and then one on Rick’s right.

“
Thank you. Thank you! Thank you for getting my manuscript to Luci. I knew she’d totally love it when she read it. I’m sorry I got in bed with Rick, but swear to God, I thought he was Toby!” She flashed a smile at Rick, then turned back to me. “I did not know about Toby being, like, dead down in the bar. I was way late, and I thought Toby had been waiting all that time—and he’d be all mad at me.” She squeezed my hand. “I wouldn’t do that to you, honestly. The Captain isn’t even my type.”

Rick raised an eyebrow.

Donna tossed back her hair. “I like more Anglo types, you know? You could be my uncle or something.” She grabbed his arm. “It’s not like you’re old and wrinkly like Toby or anything. But—it was so dark. You kept going on about your headache, and then I realized the voice was wrong, so I got the hell out…I tried the other room fourteen, but the key didn’t work. So I put the champagne back in the ice machine. It wasn’t until then I realized I left my manuscript on the nightstand.”

She kept playing with her hair and glancing over at Miguel and Alberto at the desk. I wondered what she was up to.

She went on. “I figured I could come back and get it in the morning, but I slept late and the maid had already packed up the room. I was, like, practically suicidal. That’s the only hard copy. My printer cartridge ran out of ink right before I left home.”

So that’s what the girl had been looking tragic about—her lost manuscript. Not Toby.

She smiled prettily. “Anyway, it finally got to Luci and that’s what’s important!”  She kept watching Miguel, who was now fending off five romance writers who had shared a suite but wanted separate checks.

“
I told you so,” I whispered to Rick. “It wasn’t me giving you that headache.” 

Rick gave an apologetic shrug.

“
But, Donna,” I said, trying to put this new piece of information into the puzzle. “What about earlier? Were you looking for Toby in the cabins earlier? Did you come into my cabin—the Roy Rogers cabin? Did I throw a shoe at you?”

Donna kept watching Miguel. “Why would I throw a shoe at you? Do you know what these shoes cost?”

“
No. I threw a shoe at you.”

“
Whatever!” She gave me a scornful look. “I gotta go!”

“
What do you suppose that was about?” Rick gave me a bemused smile. “Aside from the fact it seems we both nearly got lucky with Donna last night?”

 
I shrugged. I needed to get to Luci’s room before Donna did. Luci had probably contacted Donna right after she snuck out of Plant’s talk. She probably thought Donna had some kind of blackmail thing going herself with those letters. Who knew how she’d treat a girl she believed was poaching on her territory?

I wondered if I should tell Rick about the letters. I needed to be careful. If he told Detective Fiscalini, people’s lives could be ruined. And I didn’t know for sure the letters were related to the murders. The person I needed to talk to first was Plantagenet. He could help me figure out what to do.  

I asked Rick where he was.

“
He and Silas Ryder left for San Luis Obispo right after the talk. They were going to compare their Oscar Wilde find with a book Silas has in his store up there.”

I had a sudden feeling of abandonment. I wished they hadn’t gone off on their wild goose chase without telling me. With all this forgery going on, the whole Oscar Wilde thing had to be a hoax, too. I could have saved them some trouble. Of course, I hadn’t been that available—what with getting stuck in broom closets and listening to concierge confessions.

“
So, shall we go?” Rick said.

“
I don’t think so. San Luis Obispo is over an hour away… ”

“
I meant to go looking for Mitzi. Do you really think she’s hanging with your ex? That can’t be safe. We’d better go look for her. Have you had the pleasure of visiting the Maverick Saloon?”

I tried to think of how I might get out of revisiting the haunt of my biker friend, when there was a howl from the top of the stairs.

Donna clutched the banister above and screamed at us.

“
She’s gone! They took her! Oh my god, I saw the ghost—it flew right off the balcony!” Donna slowly descended, looking as if she might faint. She clutched what looked like her manuscript in her arms. Its crumpled pages dripped with red. “My book—it’s all blood!”

Panicked gasps came from the guests as they ran toward the stairs.

Rick pushed the crowd aside and climbed toward Donna.

“
Who’s gone, Donna? What’s happened?”

“
Luci! I went in her room. I’m sorry. I know I shouldn’t have but…look. It’s all dripping blood!” She waved her red-stained folder at Rick.

He gave her a quick glance but his attention was on the hallway above. He looked like a coiled spring. I could see him feel for his weapon.

“
Have you been hurt?” he said.

She shook her head.

“
How about Luci?” Rick’s voice was metallic, efficient.

“
How should I know? She’s gone.”

Rick ran up the stairs in the direction of Luci’s room.

Donna continued to wail. “Luci must have been reading my manuscript, because the pages were scattered all over…” A typed sheet escaped her grasp and sailed part way down the stairs. “Somebody get that!” she screamed “It’s the only copy I’ve got with me! My printer ran out of ink…” She reached for it and stumbled, sliding down the stairs to the landing.

I ran up to where she lay, covered in her crumpled, red-stained pages, still clutching the much dog-eared gold folder.

Miguel followed right behind me. He ran up to her and felt her forehead.

Donna came to life, pushing him away. “Do not touch me!” She started collecting the scattered pages and stuffing them into the folder and looked up at Miguel and me with disgust. “Can you guys do something useful and help me with this?”

Miguel looked at the pages but didn’t move. He spoke in a sharp voice.

“
Donna, I told you not to disturb Mrs. Silverberg. How did you get into the room?”

“
Maybe I kind of found the housekeeping key in the desk while you were busy helping those ladies.” She looked up at him with some stagy little-girl eyelash batting. “But it’s not like I knew everything would be all—totally—blood.”

Somebody screamed for help into a cell phone. People started to gather around the bottom of the stairs. A couple of smugsters tried to push past us and climb the stairs. Miguel pushed them back and stood on the bottom stair, blocking them as best he could.

The Englishman shouted, “So what, now the Sheriff’s people aren’t here? Why is law enforcement never around when you need them?”

Donna whimpered as a corner of a page tore.

Santiago
rushed past me and gave Donna one of his odd little bows, presenting her with a fresh gold folder. He crouched beside her, picking up pages, murmuring something in a language I’d never heard before.

I leaned over and picked up a few pages. Some of the slimy red stuff got on my fingers. It didn’t look like blood. Or smell like it. But I recognized it immediately. Not my color, but I knew it well.

“
Donna, this isn’t blood. It’s nail polish. Revlon Always Wild, I believe. Luci broke a nail earlier. She was probably repairing it.” Maybe Donna’s smelling faculties had been numbed by spraying perfume at people every day. “Couldn’t Luci simply have gone out for a walk or something? Maybe she went to the Saloon. I don’t think we have to assume anything criminal or supernatural is involved.”

Donna looked up at me with fury. “I know what I saw. It was a ghost. Out on the balcony. It was huge—like nine feet tall. With no head.”

More screams from below. Donna was good with the dramatics. If she knew how to put that kind of drama on the page, her book would be a best-seller.

 “
Donna, can you stand up? Did you break anything?” Miguel said over his shoulder while he kept watch on the crowd.

Santiago
helped her to her feet, but Donna shook him off.

“
I’m fine. It’s Luci that’s not fine. We have to find her. Who knows what they’ve done to her—if she’s still alive.” 

Below us, the cat woman screamed hysterically into her cell phone, as did the Ralph Lauren woman and a number of memoirists. I searched the lobby for someone who looked competent to help with crowd control. Where were Vondra and Herb Frye? 

Santiago
methodically collected Donna’s pages. As he handed them to her, I saw his eyes were full of hopeless longing. Miguel barked something at him, and he rushed down to pick up a load of bags, but he could hardly take his eyes off Donna. Poor boy. He was crazy in love.

Donna smoothed the pages and put them carefully into the folder.

“
Why do you think something’s happened to Luci?” I asked her. “She might have gone out—for a drink or something. Maybe shopping. She obviously likes that billionaire cowgirl look.”

Donna looked up at me as if I were intellectually deficient.

“
She just took off shopping? Without a car? Or her purse? In the middle of doing her nails? I don’t think so. She even left those fancy cowboy boots.”

“
The nail polish bottle—it was open?” The girl had a point. Luci might have gone out with a different bag, but she would not leave in the middle of doing her nails. She would have closed the bottle if she’d finished the last coat.

If anything had happened to the woman, it was my fault. It sounded as if somebody had searched her room. That somebody had to be searching for the letters. My prime suspect would be Marva. I had to tell Rick when he came down from Luci’s room. I knew she wanted those letters enough to break and enter, and she seemed to know all the secret passageways of this place.

Miguel managed to herd most of the people back toward the desk.

“
Everything is okay,” he said in a loud, if not entirely convincing voice.

Rick reappeared at the top of the stairs. He spoke with calm authority:

“
Luci’s suite looks as if somebody’s been searching in there, but we don’t know she wasn’t doing the searching herself. I don’t see any sign of foul play. She’s probably gone for a walk.” He looked at the crowd below. “Anybody here see Ms. Silverberg after the presentation this evening?”

A couple of people shouted about hearing her tell Alberto that she didn’t want to be disturbed.

“
She didn’t go for a damn walk,” Donna said. “She got taken by a ghost. Swear to God. I saw it.”

Rick gave me a quick look, then turned to Donna and asked her to tell the full story.

Obviously relishing the spotlight, Donna stood on the landing and spoke in a strong voice, as if she were on stage.

“
Okay, so when I let myself into the suite, I heard someone in the bedroom. I thought it was Luci, and I was pissed off because she’d tossed my manuscript all over the place. I ran in the bedroom to give her a piece of my mind, but she was gone. Instead, I saw this thing: it had on a long coat—and no head. It went behind the curtains and out the window. There’s a balcony, but it would have had to fly, because that room is on the second floor.”

The crowd murmured and gasped.

Donna went on. “And after that—the room was empty. Spooky and empty. And the room was trashed. Totally.”

She looked at Rick’s impassive face with obvious exasperation. “So are you going to call that detective, or what?”

Rick gave her his calm-down-now-ma’am look.

“
We can’t waste Detective Fiscalini’s time until we know there’s a problem. He’s the only full time investigating officer in this Valley. He’s got two murders on his hands. A guest leaving a messy hotel room isn’t exactly a crime.”

Donna moved toward him, wincing dramatically as she put weight on her ankle.

“
Luci’s been taken away by those ghosts everybody talks about,” she said in dramatic tones. “I know what I saw.”

The crowd pushed around us as Rick and I helped Donna down the stairs. I didn’t believe her about the ghosts, but I did have a bad feeling about Luci. If Marva had murdered Ernesto and Toby—and ransacked Luci’s room and taken her somewhere—Luci was in terrible danger.

If she wasn’t dead already.

Rick asked Alberto to call an ambulance for Donna.

“
No way!” said Donna. She turned to me. “Don’t let him. Do you have any idea what an ambulance costs? I don’t have insurance!” 

“
Okay, call a cab then.” Rick said.

Alberto shook his head. “Every taxi in the valley is taking people to the airport.”