by Skylar Finn
“Don’t call her that,” I warned.
He bulldozed ahead like the snow plows we all wished for. “It’s all a s-scam. You want drama for your web show, a character for your viewers to root for.”
“I don’t have to listen to this.” I tried leaving the kitchen once more. “You don’t know anything about me, Liam.”
“Really?” he called, struggling against Daniel, who was trying to keep him from standing up too quickly. “Then why have you been filming us without our consent?”
The accusation iced my veins. Technically, I wasn’t the one sneaking around the resort with a camera in hand. That was all Riley. Jazmin had been the one to set up the smaller, hidden cameras in the lounge and lobby. It didn’t matter who had performed the actual deed. It was illegal, and the three of us were in this together.
Liam’s face split into a devilish grin. I’d pegged him wrong on my arrival to King and Queens. He seemed like a nice enough kid at first, polite, quiet, and helpful. At one point, that probably had been his personality, but with Thelma’s death, Tyler’s threats, and the snow-in, Liam—like Oliver—had lost a bit of his sanity. He’d reached the level of needing to blame everything on someone else. Terrible situations always felt better when you had a guilty party to hold responsible for your frustrations.
“Lucia, what is he talking about?” Daniel demanded.
Liam shivered violently. Too bad it wasn’t keeping his mouth shut. I turned on the oven to a low temperature and opened the door.
“W-what are you doing?” Liam said, inching away from the appliance as if waiting for me to shove him inside and cook him.
“Making your idiot self comfortable.”
As the heating element glowed red, subtle warmth emanated from the oven. Liam shuddered beneath his tablecloth blankets, but his shoulders relaxed as the cold began to leave his body.
“Let me get something straight,” I said, hand on the oven door to demonstrate who had the power play here. “I never laid a hand on Thelma or Tyler Watson. Riley is the most important person in my life next to Jazmin, and I would never compromise her safety. You, Liam, are completely irrelevant to me. However, you’re a human being, and I’m a sane person, which means I don’t have the stones to attempt murdering you either.”
Liam trembled and flinched as I slammed the oven door shut, cutting off the flow of warmth. I accidentally shouldered Nick on the way out. He absorbed the hit, managing to stay upright though his cane was tucked under his arm. If Liam was trembling, I was flat-out shaking, but it wasn’t from fear. I was angry, not just because of Liam’s accusation, but because of everything. If I hadn’t been so obsessed with myself—with Madame Lucia’s Parlour—then I wouldn’t be in this mess. I never would have dripped blood on Odette’s old picture album. Jazmin and I would be at her apartment, hunting for a new place for me to live. She’d cook amazing food, and we would eat it out of cereal bowls and fall asleep in front of the television in her living room, our Netflix queue steadily playing in the background. Two weeks ago, everything was that easy, despite how hard I thought I had it. I wished for that simplicity back. It was tough feeling like a failure, and King and Queens accentuated my complete fiasco of a life.
In the lobby, I didn’t know where to go. Upstairs, Jazmin and Riley waited for me to return with a verdict on Liam. What could I tell them? After all, he probably wasn’t the killer. Not many people would go as far as to lock themselves in a freezer to prove their innocence, especially when there was no guarantee the right person would come to free them. Down here, someone was bound to find me. Daniel or Nick or Odette. These days, someone was always chasing after me, always hunting me down. I looked toward the hallway to the old wing. I longed to stroll in, back straight and chin high, demanding to know the truth about everything. The ghosts watched the resort closer than any security camera Oliver installed. They knew everything, from how the 1988 fire started to who murdered Thelma Watson. If only I could get them to tell me the truth.
“Lucia!”
Daniel was the winner of the race. He called my name again from the top of the Eagle’s View stairs, projecting his voice across the lobby as if shouting for me across a valley from an outlook on the mountain. It echoed all the way up to the domed glass ceiling. I looked up, wishing I could float away with the sound of my name. The sky was gray and white, heavenly as long as you didn’t think too much about the cold.
“I didn’t put him in the freezer,” I told Daniel as he jogged down the stairs to catch up to me. “I was with you the entire time. There’s no way I could’ve done it.”
“He says he was in there for half an hour,” Daniel said. “We only talked for a few minutes. What were you doing before that?”
“I was in my room with Jazmin and Riley. Go ask them!”
Daniel brushed his hair from his eyes. It had flopped over in his haste to reach me. “I don’t think you pushed Liam in the freezer.”
“Then why are you chasing after me?”
“Because I want to know if the rest of it is true,” he said. “Have you been filming people in the resort?”
“No.”
The slight second of hesitation before my answer gave Daniel everything he needed to know. Furthermore, it triggered his bad cop side. I watched his visage morph from one person to another. He was no longer the Daniel who sat at the bar with me that first night at King and Queens, talking about nothing and everything until we could pretend we weren’t strangers anymore. He was Detective Hawkins, and he had a case to solve.
“Why would Liam accuse you of something if you’ve done nothing wrong?” he demanded. “That observation didn’t come out of nowhere, Lucia. He told me he saw cameras planted around the lounge, and since you’re the only person here with that kind of recording equipment, I can’t help but think you’re lying to me. I thought you were the one person here I could count on to be honest with me.”
“Liam’s brain probably looks like a pink slushie right now,” I reminded him. “He’s scared and angry, and he needs someone to blame. I was right there.”
“Don’t play games with me, Lucia.”
“Games?” I repeated. “Which one of us is playing games? It’s been three days since the storm, Daniel, and we haven’t heard hide nor hair of the Crimson Basin police. Nick had enough cell service to call his employees at White Oak, so don’t give me this crap about the towers getting knocked out. If there’s anything I’ve learned about everyone here over the last few days, it’s that everyone has a secret. What’s yours, Detective Hawkins?”
I hit a nerve. A vein in Daniel’s neck popped and throbbed. His face turned red as his teeth gnashed together.
“You have no idea what I’m going through right now,” he said.
“So you keep telling me,” I replied. “But I have a pretty good idea. You’re pissed off and embarrassed about your divorce. You’re angry and sad about potentially losing your daughter. You’re on the verge of a relapse into alcoholism, and you’re ashamed of the sheer thought. And you can’t figure out who the King and Queens killer is even though all of your suspects are right under your nose. Did I leave anything out?”
Steam practically came out of his ears. “You don’t want to do this, Lucia.”
“No, I think I do,” I said, taking a step toward him. “Because I have to trust you with my safety and the safety of my friends. If you want to demand information from me, then I have the right to do the same. Once again, what’s your secret, Detective?”
“I’ve been suspended from the force.”
The straightforward answer knocked me off balance. I wasn’t expecting him to reply. I thought he would brush me off yet again with a hard look, but his face was shockingly open and honest as he spoke the words that had been weighing on him for days.
“Surprised?” he asked. “Me too.”
“What do you mean you’ve been suspended?” I stepped away, wanting distance between me and him. I eyed the gun in his holster. “Wouldn’t they have co
nfiscated your gun if you’d been suspended?”
“They did. This is my own piece.”
A realization hit me out of nowhere. “You never showed me your badge.”
“That’s because I don’t have one right now.”
“But you were investigating Thelma’s death.” I stood casually, but my hands balled into fists at my side. “When I first arrived, you were here to talk to Oliver. You were questioning the employees too. The first time we talked was after I got you away from Liam at the ski lift.”
“You told me cynical people laugh in the face of the truth,” Daniel said. “I remembered because it’s not true. I’m a cynic, but I can’t remember the last time I laughed. I was here on official police business that day. That night, however, when we sat together at the bar. That was after I’d reported back to my precinct. I’d been sleeping at the station ever since my wife kicked me out of the house. I couldn’t go home and I couldn’t stay at the cop shop once I’d been suspended, so I came back to King and Queens.”
“You pretended to be a cop?”
“I am a cop,” he replied. “I’m one of the best cops. Otherwise, I wouldn’t be a detective.”
“Then why were you suspended?”
“That impending relapse you just accused me of?” he said. “It already happened a couple weeks ago. I was working a huge case that was over my head. I thought I could handle it when I couldn’t, and I ended up going on a bender I don’t remember.” He tilted his head back to keep a shimmer of tears from falling down his cheeks. “It was a disaster. I woke up in the hospital with a banana bag strapped to my arm. My wife—ex-wife wouldn’t let my daughter in to see me, even though I begged. I’m glad she made that decision. Looking back on it, I never want my daughter to see me like that.”
“Let me get this straight,” I said. “You’ve been suspended, you’re not actually assigned to the King and Queens case, and you’re not sober. Is that it?”
“I am sober,” he insisted. “Now.”
“For how long?”
“Two and a half weeks.”
I planted my hands on my hips. “Why did it take them so long to suspend you? You said you were here on official business at first.”
“They didn’t know about it,” Daniel said. “I begged my wife not to tell them. She went along with it until I got sent here. It’s about an hour drive from our house. She waited for me to get out of dodge before reporting me. While I was here, the station called me back in to take my badge.”
“What else?” I said. “I want to know everything.”
“It’s none of your business.”
“Everything that happens at King and Queens is my business,” I countered. “Because I’m the only one who anyone can actually count on. Tell me.”
Daniel started me down. He wiped an angry tear away from the corner of his eye. “There is cell service, like you said, but I can’t get a hold of my superiors. They won’t answer the phone for me because of my suspension. They don’t know I’m stuck here.”
“What about 911?” I asked. “Did it occur you to call Dispatch?”
“They’re swamped with trying to get everyone free of the snow.”
“Did you mention that we have a dead body in the storage freezer?” I asked. “Or that the crime scene is smelling more and more like the zombie apocalypse with every passing day? Because that might encourage emergency services to make us a priority.”
He stayed quiet, kneading the bridge of his nose.
“Daniel!”
“No, I didn’t tell them!” he confessed. “I thought if I could handle this myself, solve the case and apprehend the killer, my boss might realize I’m still fit for the job. I was wrong, okay? Is that what you wanted to hear?”
“No!” I said. “What I wanted to hear was that you did everything you could to contact the authorities, to get us out of here as soon as possible, before the killer had a chance to put more people in danger. Are you blind or just stupid, Detective? Riley almost died! Liam could have gone the same way, but you’re too busy worrying about your own damn self to address the problems that matter most!”
“I know!” We were full out yelling at each other now, holding nothing back. “You don’t think I know that? I’m freaking terrified! I’ve never been in a situation like this before, and I’ve been shot at multiple times. To be honest, I think I prefer the bullet wounds.” Instinctively, he checked that the gun in his holster was still there. “Look, my goals have changed, okay? I don’t need to prove anything anymore. All I want is to keep the killer at bay long enough for us to make it out of here alive. I want to see my daughter again, Lucia.”
“Call 911 and give them the real report,” I ordered. “I’m not discussing anything else with you until you do.”
I listened in as he obeyed my request, making sure he told the dispatcher every detail concerning what had happened at King and Queens in the last few days. When he hung up, I looked at him expectantly.
“Well?”
“Like I said, they’re backed up,” he reported. “They’re trying to get out here as soon as possible, but conditions are still terrible. They don’t know how long it’s going to be.”
“Can’t they find out a way to prioritize us? We’re bunking with a murderer and a corpse!”
“They think I can handle it,” Daniel said. “Since I’m trained.”
“I noticed you didn’t happen to mention your suspension.”
“I’m not here on police authority,” he countered. “If they figure out I’ve been snooping around in a homicide case they thought was already closed, I’d be screwed.”
I smacked my palms against my thighs to relieve some of the tension and anger building up. “Wasn’t that your original plan? Apprehend the killer and prove your worth? Now all of a sudden, you’re afraid of the consequences?”
“It’d be one thing if I actually caught the killer,” Daniel said. “As it is, I’m looking at expulsion from the force.”
My brain whirred through our options. Somehow, I had to make all of this crap work to my advantage. “Unless we work together.”
Daniel lifted an eyebrow. “Say again?”
“Do you trust me?”
“No, all actors are compulsive liars.”
I bumped his shoulder. “Be serious. If you agree to my plan, I’ll tell you everything I know, and I know a lot more than you.”
“How is that even possible? You’re not a cop.”
“No, but I am a psychic.”
Daniel groaned. “Not this again. How many times are you going to pull the Madame Lucia card?”
“As many times as it takes for you to actually believe me,” I replied. “The killer isn’t our only problem at King and Queens. If you remember correctly, Oliver hired me to investigate Riley’s supposed possession. The thing is she was never possessed. She can see the dead, Daniel. All of the people that died in the fire are still here, including Oliver’s mother and sister.”
“Where do you get this stuff?” Daniel rested his hands on his belt. “Seriously, did you take improv classes in college or something? It’s amazing the stories you can craft on the spot.”
“It’s not a story,” I insisted. “And I can prove it.”
“The last time you tried to prove the existence of ghosts to me, you gave me a camera with no footage,” he said. “And then claimed that it had somehow been magically erased.”
“Because that’s what happened!”
He tapped his boot impatiently. “I can’t take you seriously right now.”
A loud creak interrupted our argument, and we both looked up to find the source of the noise. Above us, the massive chandelier that bathed the lobby in golden light swung to and fro. To Daniel, it might’ve looked like a sudden gust of wind set the light piece swaying. I, on the other hand, spotted Odette right away as she loosened the bolts that fastened the chandelier to the ceiling.
“Odette, what are you doing?” I called up to her.
“H
e said he wanted proof,” she said. “Here’s his proof.”
She disappeared as she worked the last bolt free, and the chandelier plummeted toward the floor. I dove on top of Daniel, pushing him behind the cover of the front desk. The chandelier hit the marble and exploded with a thunderous crash, sending shards of glass flying in all directions. It rained shiny diamond pendants and broken light bulbs. Daniel, out of instinct, covered my body with his, cupping my head to his chest. His heart pounded against my ear, filling my head with the sound of life. As the glass settled, tinkling against the floor, he released me.
“What the hell was that?” he said, peeking over the edge of the front desk for a look at the lobby. It was a damn mess. The chandelier looked a lot bigger on the ground than it did hanging from the ceiling, and that was saying something. The entire lobby was coated with a layer of shattered glass. It caught what little sunlight filtered in from the windows above, casting miniature shimmering rainbows in every direction.
“That was your proof.” I shook slivers of glass from my hair and clothes. Despite our quick dive for cover, we were covered in debris. “Meet Odette Watson. She died in the fire of 1988, but she never left King and Queens. She also happens to be Oliver’s sister.”
He dusted glass from his shoulders. “You’re pulling my leg, right?”
Odette reappeared, this time right behind Daniel. Before I could warn him, she flicked his ear.
“Ow!” He cupped a hand to his ear and looked behind him. “What the hell was that?”
“He’s annoying,” Odette said.
“You’re annoying her,” I passed on to him in a dry tone. “Probably because she dropped a chandelier on you, and you still don’t believe she’s real.”
He hunched up his shoulders, and his neck disappeared as if he were trying to prevent someone from tickling it. “You cannot possibly believe that you’re talking to a ghost. Have you ever had your head examined? Because you should worry if you’re having auditory and visual hallucinations.”
“Maybe you should have dropped the chandelier on him,” I said to Odette. “Because I’m getting a little tired of this crap he’s feeding me.”
