by Rosie Sams
"Do you have any idea who would have wanted to kill Mr. Atkins?"
"No, well, yes, actually. Alexis Garnett is one of our competitors. Earlier tonight, she flew into a jealous rage… she threw a drink in Ronald's face. I had to have her escorted out of the party. Security brought her to one of the dressing rooms backstage to sleep it off. She was quite drunk, you see."
Melody touched Alvin's arm to get his attention. He stepped back from Penelope and listened to what Melody had to say.
"I saw Alexis throw her drink in Ronald's face. It was a red drink, maybe a cranberry cocktail or something like that. Her sash was stained with it. I noticed because all of the other women were perfect, but Alexis was looking quite disheveled."
Alvin nodded. He went inside the office and examined the sash.
"Mel, look at this. Does this look like her sash?"
Melody nodded. "Yes. Do you see all those red spots? This is definitely her sash." Melody pointed to the red stains she was referring to without touching the evidence. Then, they walked back to the reception area.
Alvin radioed for one of the deputies to come to the office.
"Process this area and send for the coroner. I want lots of photos and make sure you handle the murder weapon properly. Make sure someone seals off the back of the building, too."
With orders issued, Alvin questioned Penelope for a few more minutes, before letting her go. Then, he and Melody headed backstage. Sure enough, there they found Alexis Garnett in one of the dressing rooms. She was lying on a sofa, moaning in discomfort.
"That's her," Melody said, confirming it. "I'll go get her some coffee. She's going to need it."
"Alexis Garnett?" Alvin asked.
Alexis groaned; her eyes still closed. After Alvin repeated her name, she opened one. It was barely a squint.
"Yes. That's me." She hiccupped and tried to sit up. Melody returned and helped her right herself into a sitting position.
"Drink this." Melody handed her the cup of hot coffee.
Alvin gave the woman a moment to orient herself. He watched as she sipped then appeared repulsed by the bitter taste.
"Is there any alcohol in here?"
"No. You need to focus now. I have some bad news," Melody said as she took a seat next to Alexis.
"Did I lose the pageant?"
"No. The pageant will most likely be postponed." Alvin crossed his arms over his chest.
Alexis looked up at him, both of her eyes now opened and focused. She looked confused. After all, she didn't know either of them.
"You're that bakery woman, right?"
"Yes. My name is Melody Marshall. Earlier this evening, Ronald Atkins was found murdered." Melody noticed Alexis wasn't wearing her sash, which only confirmed her suspicion.
"Good. Ronald was a liar and a cheat. He also made a lot of promises that he had no intention of keeping." Alexis gulped the coffee. Melody noticed her tone, nor her body language showed any signs of remorse.
"He was strangled with your sash." Alvin gave Alexis a moment to process his words.
"Well, I didn't do it! Go talk to one of his other ‘beauties.’ There’s a bevy of them!"
"You seem to have a lot of resentment against Mr. Atkins. Are you sure this resentment didn't motivate you to end his life by choking him with your sash?" Alvin asked.
Highly offended at the accusation, Alexis rose to her feet, fully intending to storm out of the room. However, her eyes rolled, and she fell back down to the sofa too tipsy to take even one step.
Melody rose from her seat and pulled Alvin aside. "Look at her. She's not going anywhere. I doubt she would have had the strength to strangle a grown man in this condition. She's way too intoxicated," she said.
Alvin nodded. “That was my thought too.” He shifted his eyes to Alexis as if he was assessing her. Melody imagined he was roleplaying potential scenarios in his mind.
"Alexis!" Alvin called her name to get her attention. She was drifting back to sleep. "Do not leave town. The murder is under investigation, and we’ll need to ask you more questions when you’re in a proper state of mind to answer them. Do you understand? I am placing a deputy outside this door."
"Yeah, yeah. Shut the lights on your way out." Alexis waved her hand at them as if she was dismissing them. "I need my beauty sleep. Get it? Beauty sleep?" But, before they could answer, she was snoring.
Alvin spoke to the deputy to see that Alexis’s clothing was processed though he doubted that they would find anything. The girl could barely stand.
Chapter Eight
"Ronald Atkins was an expert level player! He publicly canoodled with Colleen.” Melody inhaled deeply before continuing to rattle on about Ronald’s dating history to Alvin. “Then, Alexis came in and tossed her drink in his face. After that, Ramona revealed that she was having an affair with him up until a few days ago. Keep in mind that all these relationships were exposed within an hour. Just imagine how much messing around this man has done in his lifetime.”
"How did he find the energy?"
With great force, the reception doors flew open, interrupting their conversation. In stormed Colleen Thorne, her hands flailed through the air in a most dramatic gesture. One of them wielded her cellphone like a dangerous weapon.
"Where is that philandering creep?" she asked in a venomous tone. "If he thinks he can break up with me via text, he's got another thing coming!" Her blonde hair flew as her eyes scanned the entire room.
Melody noticed she had twigs and leaves in her hair. Her makeup was smeared as if she'd been crying, and she still wore the dress that was stained from Alexis' red drink, but now it was also caked in dirt and grass stains.
Talk about a "fall from grace," Melody thought. "Are you all right?" she asked Colleen aloud as she moved toward her.
"I'm fine!" Colleen's tone was shrill. Her eyes were unfocused and filled with rage. Even though her face was pointed at Melody, her crazed eyes continued to bounce from person to person as she searched for Ronald. "Where is he? He has no right to break up with me via text. What kind of man does that? He made promises to me!" Colleen demanded answers.
"Looks like he made promises to anything in a skirt," Alvin said sarcastically under his breath.
"Does he honestly think he can do better than me?" Colleen spoke to no one in particular.
"Come, sit down and please try to stay calm. I have some bad news for you," Melody said as gently as she could.
"I don’t want to sit. I want to see Ronald right now!" Colleen stuck her bottom lip out and looked all too like a petulant child.
Colleen’s eyes fell on Alvin in his sheriff's uniform. At that moment, the rage in her eyes was quickly replaced by worry. By the change in her demeanor, Melody suspected that the gravity of the situation was finally sinking in for her.
"Why is the sheriff here?" she asked. Her voice was now meek, barely audible.
"We have some bad news. Ronald is dead." Melody touched the woman's shoulder. She felt Colleen's body tremble. "He was murdered tonight. His body was found in the office by Penelope Cross."
"That's not possible." Colleen's eyes filled with tears. She was in denial. "He was supposed to meet me by the lake. He's probably on his way there now." She buried her face in her hands as her tears flowed.
"I'm sorry, but his identity has been confirmed. Ronald was murdered by strangulation. Someone choked him with a sash. Sheriff Hennessey is going to ask you some questions."
"Ms. Thorne, what can you tell me about the last time you saw Mr. Atkins?" Alvin asked as he moved closer to Colleen and observed her reaction.
She pulled her hands back from her face and wiped her eyes.
Melody pulled over a chair for Colleen. As the distraught woman lowered her body into it, Melody's line of sight opened. She watched as Denise Newman brought Penelope a glass of water. She was consoling the distraught pageant coordinator while Ramona stood still and expressionless like a stone-cold statue.
Funny, I thought they’d left,
Melody thought. And how is Ramona so together? She's been crying all day, but now she's as cold as ice.
"Yes, we were mingling with the press, and I had brought him a small dessert. Shortly after, Alexis Garnett stormed up to us, and she threw her drink in Ronald's face! She did it, didn't she?" Colleen asked; her eyes narrowed in anger.
"The investigation is still underway, but any information you can tell us about Alexis may help speed things along," Alvin said encouragingly.
"She's a terrible person! Ronald left her for me. At first, she didn't accept his break-up, but he was in love with me…" Colleen's voice trailed off as she appeared to have realized something. "That bastard! He just did the same thing to me that he did to Alexis! Now, I hope she did kill him!"
"May I see your phone?" Alvin noticed Colleen held it with a white-knuckled grip. She thrust her hand toward him, relinquishing the phone. Alvin scrolled through the texts. Melody peered over his shoulder reading along with him, but her eyes shifted every few seconds toward Denise, Penelope, and Ramona.
"You said you were with him when Alexis threw the drink in his face?" Alvin asked as he studied the messages.
"Yes. Here are the stains proving it." She pointed to the red marks between the dirt and the grass stains on her dress.
"How did you get so dirty?" Melody asked.
"After Alexis threw the drink in his face, I was so angry. My dress was ruined. I'll never get those stains out. To cheer me up, Ronald suggested we go to Mission Lake for a romantic, midnight swim. It's our favorite spot. I left first with the understanding that he would follow right behind me. He wanted to say goodbye to Penelope. When I got to the lake, I set out the blanket. That's when I started to receive these messages about breaking off our relationship. At first, I thought he was joking. His messages made no sense at all. We had such a deep connection so fast, you see. I got flustered by the messages. I wasn’t watching where I was walking, and I fell when I was trying to get back to the car."
"Didn't Ronald lose his phone?" Melody asked.
"Oh, did he, no, he can’t have done. I have been getting texts."
"So, you're saying you were at Mission Lake at the time of the murder?" Alvin observed her reaction to his question.
"Yes! I left him alive, and I was at the lake up until now, obviously!" She moved her hand over her ruined dress to remind him of the grass stains and the dirt she just explained.
Alvin stepped away from Colleen and motioned Melody to follow. He showed her the texts.
"Look at the times on these texts. Are they in line with what you witnessed?" He handed the phone to Melody so she could scroll on her own.
"Yes, I was outside with Smudge during the time of these two last texts. We went for a walk to get some fresh air."
"And here, look at these texts." He pressed his finger to the phone and scrolled up. "You see how in these exchanges, before the event, he refers to her as 'Dove.' He never refers to her by name. I suppose it's some sort of nickname." Then, Alvin scrolled to the section of texts that Colleen would have received around the time of the murder. "Now, look at these, he refers to her as Colleen, and he even misspells her name using one ‘L.’"
"These messages were definitely sent by someone other than Ronald." Melody sighed deeply. "You don't think Colleen had anything to do with the murder though, do you? I saw her leave the reception. Ronald was alive, and she is covered in dirt."
"She is, but she could have also left through the front, rolled around in the dirt, and then slipped in the back door. You saw how irate she was, and by her own admission, she confirmed that Ronald treated her exactly how he treated Alexis."
Alvin walked back to Colleen, and Melody followed.
"Ms. Thorne, it appears you've got a convenient alibi; however, I'm advising you not to leave town while there's an ongoing investigation."
Colleen jumped to her feet and raced for the door, but Kerry intercepted her accidentally!
"I didn't kill him! I love him! He promised me we'd be together forever!" Colleen said to Kerry, who found herself holding the sobbing woman to her chest. She looked toward Melody for help, but Melody shrugged hopelessly.
“Talk to her,” Melody silently mouthed the words. She could use Kerry’s help right about now while she and Alvin focused on the investigation.
"There, there, it'll be all right." Kerry frowned as she stroked Colleen’s hair, reluctantly at first, but she certainly couldn’t stop consoling the woman now. Kerry may not have been supportive of pageantry, but she wasn’t going to let another woman hurt alone. So, she sighed and accepted her role in Melody’s grand scheme of things. "Tell me about Ronald. It may help to get it off your chest."
Satisfied that Kerry had Colleen handled, Melody turned her attention back to aiding Alvin. "Something doesn't feel right at all."
"What's on your mind, Mel?"
"Well, Colleen is an emotional wreck. We can probably find a way to verify that she was at the lake. But, look over there." She pointed toward Denise, Ramona, and Penelope. "Do you see how calm Ramona is?"
"Isn’t she one of Atkins’ other lovers? I thought you mentioned her?" Alvin asked as he studied the young woman’s body language from across the room.
"Yes, and she was a mess all day. She's been crying since the morning, and now she's so collected. Plus, that's her mom talking to Penelope, and that woman could make a Zen master a nervous wreck."
"I'll talk with them, but first, I have to go meet with the coroner. Stay out of trouble." Alvin gave Melody a quick kiss and headed off for the office.
Kerry stayed with Colleen.
Unsettled by the scene, Melody called for Smudge, who had gone to Leslie in search of butter cookies. Together, they approached Denise, Ramona, and Penelope.
"Honestly, Penelope, I don’t know how you handle all this stress. Between the weight of the pageant and finding Ronald dead, you must be in a state of shock," Denise Newman said.
Ramona nodded silently in agreement.
"Good evening. I thought you two left," Melody said to Denise and Ramona as she approached with Smudge at her side.
"We did not." Denise's tone was terse as she corrected Melody.
Melody suspected Denise thought she was a nuisance.
"If you must know, I was in a dressing room with my daughter. We've been here the whole time."
"You two seem unaffected by Ronald's murder. I thought you would be upset, Ramona. Wasn’t he a close friend of yours, maybe even a little more than a friend?” Melody asked.
Penelope looked up at Melody then to Ramona suspiciously. Ramona was visibly taken aback by Melody's question.
"Mr. Atkins is ... was a lovely man and an acquaintance. I'm sad for his family and for Ms. Cross, of course, for having to find him in such a manner."
How rehearsed and robotic of her, Melody thought. It was as if she was answering a pageant question. Melody also noticed Denise's eyes boring into Ramona as if telepathically willing her to respond a certain way. She nodded in time with Ramona's response as if approving her statement.
"Yes, we’re all very sad about the poor man's demise, but as the saying goes, 'the show must go on,’" Denise said, smiling contrarily as she added to Ramona’s formal statement.
But you're not sad, Ms. Newman. In fact, you look quite cheerful.
Chapter Nine
Alvin blew on the cup of coffee Leslie handed to him. She and Kerry had set the dessert station up with leftovers and coffee for those that were still at the reception center.
"I needed this," he said to Melody as he took a big sip. "I spoke with the coroner and got a closer look at that sash. It does appear to have red stains on it, like the ones on Colleen's dress. We’re going to process both to make sure they’re a definite match. This guy, Ronald, sure had a way with women."
"I believe it. Good ol’ Ronnie tried to have his way with me, too."
Alvin's eyes narrowed behind his cup as he paused mid-sip. Melody thought she saw smoke coming out of his ea
rs, but it was just the steam coming off the top of the hot coffee.
"Don't worry. I can take care of myself, Sheriff Hennessey." Melody grinned and kissed him quickly.
"Oh, I know you can, but that doesn't mean I'm not annoyed at his advances toward my fiancée."
Melody blushed. It always tickled her when Alvin called her "his" fiancée.
"That's how I knew he lost his phone."
"What do you mean?" he asked.
"Ronald wanted me to put my phone number into his cell phone, but when he went to pull it from his pocket, he noticed the phone was gone."
"That supports our theory that someone else texted Colleen from his phone."
"Indeed," Melody said with a nod of affirmation. "He said it's in a gold case, and that his initials are engraved on it."
"I'll let the deputies know to keep their eyes open for a phone fitting that description. In the meantime, let's go talk to Ramona and her mother. I saw them as they headed toward the dressing rooms. I have a few questions for them."
Alvin radioed the information to the deputies, including the one he had sent to investigate Mission Lake. Then, the pair, along with Smudge, sought out Ramona and Denise.
In the back dressing room, Ramona sat facing the vanity mirror. She was finally out of the magenta gown and now wore a fluffy pink robe over street clothes. Denise criticized her daughter while brushing the girl's hair. With each stroke, Ramona winced.
"Now, remember, back straight, stomach in, chin up, and smile!"
"Yes, Mother. Ow!"
"Beauty requires a little pain, dear."
Alvin knocked on the door to get their attention as Melody introduced them. "Ramona. Ms. Newman. I'd like you to meet Sheriff Hennessey. He has some questions regarding this evening's events." Then, as she stepped aside to give him the floor, she whispered, "Good luck, Al. You're going to need it."
"Honestly, Sheriff!" Denise said in a huff. "It's so late, and Ramona needs her beauty sleep. This stress is not conducive to the health of her skin. She will lose her glow. We need to do this another time. We've been here long enough, and it's hardly acceptable for you to be in her dressing room while she's indisposed."
