Handbags & Homicide

by Anne Marie Stoddard

  The smile disappeared from Felicity's face, and I felt a sense of satisfaction when she gulped audibly. The journalist was quick to recover. "Yes, I know," she said with an exaggerated eye roll. "I'm not allowed on the premises. I need to get back to the office anyway," she added, giving me a snide grin. "I've got a story to write." She started down the hallway. "I'll see myself out."

  Jimmy stepped in front of her, his bulky frame blocking her path. "I don't think so," he said gruffly. "I don't want you lurking around the resort and harassing our paying guests—or our staff," he added, looking at me over her shoulder. I smiled gratefully back at him, but he didn't break from his intimidating character. Though I knew Jimmy personally and considered him to be one of the friendliest guys on the island, I'd seen him in action before in his security role. I would hate to be on his bad side.

  "Whatever." Felicity stuck out her chin. She darted one last look over her shoulder at Noa and me before Jimmy ushered her into the elevator. I sagged with relief when the doors closed behind them.

  Noa glanced at his watch. "I need to head down to the locker room to change into my swim trunks before my lifeguard shift." He looked up at me, his brow creased with concern. "Are you sure you don't want me to take you home?"

  I forced a smile. "If I didn't know any better, Mr. Kahele, I'd think you were trying to weasel out of working today."

  He grinned, showing off the kind of dimples that most Hollywood A-listers had to sell their souls to their plastic surgeons to achieve. "Maybe I am. If it means I get to spend more time with you, then it's worth a smaller paycheck." Noa's gaze moved from me to the closed door of Bryan's suite. His expression turned serious. "Do you think he could've killed his own girlfriend? Don't they always look at the spouse or boyfriend first?"

  I sighed and retrieved my flip-flops. "I don't know, but I think this time, I'm going to leave it up to Detective Ray and his men to figure it out." The last time I'd been involved in an investigation, I'd wound up in danger. I would much rather leave the crime-solving to the professionals. It was their job, after all. Plus, I had other things to worry about, like consoling Emma and doing my best to ensure she got the bachelorette weekend she deserved, despite the tragic circumstances.

  Noa and I took the elevator this time, crowding in with five surprisingly fit elderly women in bikini tops and sarongs. We wedged our way into one of the back corners and rode in silence as the ladies chattered excitedly about their morning hula dancing lesson.

  "You're going to need a new phone," Noa said as we stepped off on the ground floor. "Even if it's only a temporary replacement."

  "Oh, right." I sighed. In all the excitement, I'd forgotten that my phone was sitting in a plastic evidence bag—along with my keys and wallet. In addition to needing to obtain a phone, at some point, I was also going to have to run back home to Rikki's to retrieve my spare key, passport, and emergency credit card.

  "Why don't you get up a little early tomorrow morning and I can take you to pick out a new phone before your plans with Emma and the other girls?" Noa offered. He grimaced. "Assuming they'll be up for any more festivities after all this."

  I squeezed his arm. "That's sweet of you to offer. I'll let you know once I've checked on Em—I'll pop by the pool before your shift ends." I gave him a quick kiss. "Thank you for being so supportive. I know having to be on the same flight back to Atlanta with Bryan on Sunday isn't exactly your idea of a good time. If I'd known he was going to be here, I would have warned you."

  Noa's face clouded. "The flight on Sunday," he repeated, his tone troubled. "I don't think that's such a good idea."

  "What?" I felt my face go slack. Was he really bailing on me right now?

  Noa crossed his arms over his chest. "How is it going to look to the police if you hop on a cross-country flight after your ex-husband's girlfriend has just been murdered—with your purse found on her body?"

  "Oh." I shut my mouth with a click. He had a good point.

  "And besides," Noa continued, frowning. "The police might not even let anyone from the wedding party go home until they find out what happened to Valentina."

  I took a step back, feeling my chest tighten. I hadn't thought of that either. Emma wouldn't be able to make it back in time for her own wedding.

  Noa must have read my emotions in my expression. "Hey, I didn't mean to upset you," he said softly. "I'm sorry." He took my face in his hands and tilted my chin so that I was looking up at him. "I need to get to work, but I'll see you later." He gave me a soft peck on the lips before turning to go.

  I watched as Noa headed down the hall that led to the employee locker room, feeling suddenly sick to my stomach. I hoped he was wrong about the police holding the wedding party here until they caught Val's killer—but that wasn't the only thing about his words that was bothering me. Does he still seem like he really doesn't want to go to the wedding? Perhaps I hadn't been imagining his hesitation before. Did Noa secretly think that being my wedding date meant we were getting too serious too soon? Was he having second thoughts about whatever was happening between us?

  Stop it, I scolded myself. Now wasn't the time to fret about my love life. I shoved the doubts aside and turned to head in the opposite direction of Noa, stepping through the double doors that led out into the courtyard. Before I went back to the room to see how Emma was doing, I needed to make a quick stop in the Happy Hula Dress Boutique. I hadn't checked in with Aunt Rikki since the news broke about the murder among the wedding party, and she was probably worried sick about me.

  It was early afternoon, and the lunch rush of shoppers had died down, leaving the store mostly empty with the exception of a handful of guests and the employees on duty. Rikki was in my face before I'd even made it halfway to the front counter.

  "Are you okay, ku'uipo?" she demanded, the collection of bangle bracelets on her wrists jingling loudly as she threw her arms around me.

  "I'm fine," I wheezed. As usual, she was squeezing me so tightly that she was nearly cutting off my oxygen.

  My aunt released me and stepped back. She was dressed in a white linen tunic over floral leggings, and her black hair with its electric-blue streaks was pulled up in a bun that was held together with a pair of bright yellow chopsticks. Rikki's dark brows narrowed. "Why didn't you tell me Bryan was in town? You should have called me," she scolded.

  It was the first time in years that she'd used a reproachful tone with me. My Zen, flower child, Aloha-is-my-way-of-life aunt didn't dislike many people, but she hated my ex-husband.

  "I would have warned you," I said quickly. "But I lost my phone last night, and, well—it's sort of a long story." One that I didn't want to tell in front of the few nosy shoppers who were watching us as they pretended to browse the nearby clothing racks.

  Rikki harrumphed. "That man brings bad energy with him everywhere he goes," she said, frowning.

  "Kind of like you, Kaley." A tall, slender woman in a black dress and hot pink espadrilles smirked as she strode toward us. "After all, wherever you go, dead bodies turn up."

  An elderly woman perusing the beach towel display cut a look in our direction, and I could practically see her ears perk up.

  "Can it, Harmony," I said through clenched teeth. Growing up, Harmony Kane had been the island's resident mean girl and my high school rival. Now, through a cruel twist of fate (or, rather, my aunt's noble yet unwarranted penchant for giving people second, third, and twentieth chances—everyone except Bryan, anyway), we were coworkers. Though Harmony and I had recently formed an unlikely alliance during a dangerous situation, we weren't exactly BFFs. Frenemies might be a more appropriate term—and even that was too strong a word for the most part.

  Harmony shrugged. "What?" she asked, her tone indignant. "It's true."

  I ignored her. "I just dropped by to let you know that I'm all right since I couldn't call," I told Rikki. "Now that I'm temporarily without a working cell phone." I avoided a curious look from Harmony. "But I need to go check on Emma now. She should
be finished speaking to Detective Ray by now, and when I last saw her, she was in pretty bad shape."

  Rikki frowned. "The detective sent one of his men in here, too, ku'uipo. He asked to speak with Jamie. They're in my office right now."

  My chest tightened. Why would the police want to talk to Jamie? Relax, I told myself silently. Either Mia or Emma must have mentioned that she went out with us last night. Of course the police would get her statement, too. You have nothing to worry about. Despite my best efforts, the inner pep talk did nothing to ease the lump of dread taking root in my middle section. It was my gut's way of telling me that perhaps I should make myself scarce before the officer emerged from Rikki's office.

  I gently grabbed my aunt's arm and pulled her away from Harmony. "Tell Jamie to come find me when she gets off work. I'll be in the room I'm sharing with Emma for the weekend."

  Rikki nodded. "Of course." She squeezed my hand. "If your poor friend needs anything, come to me. I have a few teas at home that can cure anything from grief to stress or even the most stubborn Charley horse."

  I couldn't help but grin. Only Aunt Rikki would think that grief could be soothed with a hot cup of tea. "I love you," I said, giving her a quick peck on the cheek before I ducked out of the shop and back into the bright July afternoon. I retraced my steps into the main building and walked down the hall in the direction of the rooms Emma had booked for the weekend. I'd only made it halfway down the hall when I heard someone call out my name from behind. I turned to find Jamie sprinting toward me.

  "Rikki said I just missed you," she said breathlessly.

  "I didn't want to be there when the police came out," I admitted. I met her gaze. "They found my purse—it was buried in the sand with Valentina's body."

  Jamie paled. "That explains a few things," she said, her worry clear in her voice. "The officer asked a lot of questions about you."

  My heart rate sped up to a gallop. I swallowed. "What kind of questions?" I asked, though I had a sinking feeling I already knew the answer.

  Jamie grimaced. "He wanted to know how you were acting around Valentina last night. He asked if you'd threatened her or said anything to me about her that could be interpreted as a threat. Then he asked if there was anything strange about your behavior at breakfast this morning."

  I felt my heart drop down to my toes. Questions like that could only mean one thing.

  The police were seriously considering me as a suspect in Valentina's murder.

  CHAPTER SIX

  "So, I take it we're probably not still on for snorkeling this afternoon?" Jamie asked, attempting a smile, though I could still see the worry behind her eyes.

  "I doubt it," I said wearily. "I was on my way back to the room to check on Emma. I'll see if she and the other girls are feeling up to it, but I wouldn't hold my breath. I think this morning put us all through the ringer."

  Jamie squeezed my arm. "Is there anything I can do for you or the others?" she offered.

  I shrugged. "I honestly don't know," I told her. "I think we all just need to take the afternoon to decompress."

  She nodded in understanding. "In that case, I'm going to head to my apartment and take a cat nap. I'll meet back up with you here at the resort in a few hours." She gave me a hug. "I know you didn't do it, Kaley. If you need help proving that to the police, just say the word and you know I'll have your back."

  "Thanks," I said, returning her hug. I watched Jamie retreat down the hallway before turning and trudging in the opposite direction. I felt hopeless. Detective Ray had let me go earlier, yet the questions he and his men were asking about me could only mean that they'd placed me on their short list of possible suspects. Maybe he'd done some digging into my past conflict with Valentina and had discovered the news coverage of Bryan's cheating scandal. Or was it possible that someone else had pointed him toward some of those old articles during their own statement, hoping to cast suspicion on me and draw attention away from himself or herself? If so, who?

  I found myself wondering if perhaps Bryan really could be guilty. I hadn't meant to implicate him in my conversation with the detective, but I couldn't rule out the possibility that he could have murdered his own girlfriend. After all, Noa had been right—the significant other was most often the culprit. If their passionate-reunion-turned-equally-passionate-quarrel at the airport the day before was any indication, Bryan's relationship with Valentina was far from perfect. I recalled Val sitting at the bar of the Lanai Lounge the night before, tapping angrily at her phone. Had she been fighting with him again? Maybe they'd met up on the beach after we'd returned to the hotel so they could continue their argument in person. I assumed Bryan had probably been pretty hammered himself, having been out celebrating Dante's last few days as a bachelor. If the couple had a drunken argument, could it have escalated to the point of violence? I'd seen Bryan angry before many times during our marriage, but he'd never come close to physically harming me. No, from my experience, emotional and psychological barbs were his weapons of choice.

  Then again, that was just the version of Bryan that I had known—the one who'd sometimes verbally abused me but had always remained faithful. Until I found out he hadn't been faithful after all. If Bryan had secretly been cheating with Val and his other cheerleader floozies during our marriage, what else could he have kept from me? A violent streak? The urge to kill?

  Suppose he's innocent. I turned the situation over in my head. Who else might want Valentina dead? She wasn't from the islands. Since my gut was telling me that her death wasn't a random incident, that meant the suspect pool could likely be confined to the only eight people here who knew her—aside from me, at least. Was it possible that one of Dante's other groomsmen was a cold-blooded killer? Maybe Tom, I thought. With his oversized biceps and mammoth hands, he could have crushed Val like a bug. Truthfully, any one of the fine-tuned football players would have had the strength to overpower her—but what could have been their motive for murder?

  I turned my thoughts to the other women in the wedding party. The obvious choice was Coco Becker. While I couldn't fathom sweet Emma or mousy Mia being capable of such malice, Coco sure fit the bill. She'd been the best of pals with Valentina in public, but according to Mia, behind closed doors they'd been at each other's throats. It was no secret that Coco had been jealous of her cheer mate for landing my ex after they'd both hooked up with him. Now that her competition for his affection had been eliminated, perhaps she thought she could swoop in and win him over. She had wound up in Bryan's room awfully fast to comfort him. Was it because she'd already known that Val was dead before the rest of us had found her body?

  There was also the fact that Coco hated me. She could've easily been the one to swipe my bag—she'd been at the club and on the bus with me the night before, giving her plenty of opportunity. Had she been the one to plant my purse on the corpse? Was the flighty cheerleader bit just an act? Deep down, was Coco diabolical enough to murder Val and set me up to take the fall?

  So much for staying out of it, I thought glumly as I reached our room. Though I wanted nothing to do with the investigation into Val's mysterious death, if Detective Ray and his men were trying to build a case against me for the crime, I wasn't going to go down without a fight. I also couldn't stand idly by and let their case potentially ruin Emma's bachelorette weekend and keep her from making it home in time for her own wedding. I was going to have to do whatever it took to find out the truth about what happened to Valentina, both for my sake and Emma's.

  I slid my key into the card slot on the door and pushed it open. The room was empty. Emma must have gone upstairs so Dante could console her, or perhaps she was next door with Mia. I walked over to the door that connected the two rooms and knocked softly. Mia opened it after a few seconds. She looked as exhausted as I felt. "This day has been a total nightmare," she said, and even her voice sounded tired. "Where have you been?"

  "At the dress shop," I replied. "I dropped in to see my aunt and let her know that I was all right sin
ce word about what happened to Val has gotten around the resort." I left it at that, not wanting to divulge that I was being considered as a person of interest by the police. "Is Emma in there with you?" I asked, peeking over her shoulder.

  Mia shook her head. "Upstairs with Dante. She's taking this all really hard." Mia's forehead wrinkled. "It's just so surreal," she said quietly. "I mean, one day Valentina is here, and the next…" She let her words hang in the air for a few moments and then dropped her gaze to the floor. "Do you want to come in?" she offered, stepping back and opening the door wider to let me through.

  The room was a mirror image of the one I was sharing with Emma, with the same decor but the furniture arrangements reversed. "Is Coco here, too?" I asked, glancing around the dimly lit room. Mia had the curtains drawn, and one of the bedside lamps was the only source of light to illuminate the space, adding to the gloom.

  Mia dropped onto one of the two beds. "Nope. I haven't seen her since before…well, before we went to the beach."

  I crossed the room and hesitated next to the second bed, reluctant to sit on it knowing that one of its occupants was now dead. Instead, I perched on the love seat, folding my legs underneath me. "Did anything about Coco's behavior this morning strike you as a bit odd?" I asked, looking Mia in the eyes.

  She cocked her head. "What do you mean?"

  I shrugged. "You mentioned that she and Valentina were bickering in here last night before dinner, and then she didn't seem concerned when Val wasn't at breakfast this morning. It was almost as if she wasn't surprised when she didn't show up."

  Mia was silent for a moment. "Maybe," she said finally. She rolled over on her stomach and propped herself up with her elbows. "I didn't notice anything unusual about the way she was acting at breakfast, but I guess I was still in a fog from last night." She frowned. "But now that you mention it, I do think it's pretty weird that she disappeared as soon as we found Val. I tried calling her when the police arrived, but she didn't answer her phone and still hasn't called me back." Her lower lip trembled. "I just thought she should hear about it from one of us, you know?" When I nodded my understanding, she continued. "I'm sure she knows by now—at least, I hope so." She looked up at me. "Where do you think she could have gone?"