“Zoya’s signature.”
She scrunched up her brow even further, and for a moment I thought that if you wrapped a shawl around her, put her hair in a bun, and removed the blonde hair dye she really would look like an old grandmother. But then her brow smoothed out and she looked like her old self.
“The signature! That was her autograph, wasn’t it? With the big Z.”
“That’s right. She didn’t sign that contract.”
Susan slapped her hands down on her knees in realization. “Polly faked Zoya’s signature! Well, that explains that. Do you remember I told you it seemed unlikely Zoya would have signed it? I was right!”
I nodded at her. Must have been nice to be proven right.
“And to think I was going to go into business with her! If she would fake a dead woman’s signature, what else might she do? Cheat? Steal?”
I raised my eyebrows at Susan. She’d stolen a contract herself to cheat her way into a deal. She caught what I was implying immediately.
“That’s different. Of course, maybe she would be doing it in our favor…”
Susan lapsed into silence and sat back on the sofa, her arms crossed in front of her.
“What about you two? Do you have anything to say for yourselves?” Ethan’s voice was weary. The two jewel thieves were an unnecessary annoyance on top of everything else happening aboard the ship.
“My husband’s an idiot,” said Patsy.
“My wife’s a… a… bigger idiot,” said Jimbo with a frown, annoyed he couldn’t think of a better insult.
“So what did you do?” I asked them. “One of you distracted someone while the other raided their cabin? Is that it?”
“Yep,” said Patsy.
“It’s not that simple!” Jimbo said, seemingly outraged at how I summed up their ‘method’ in just a few words.
“Oh?”
“There’s scouting them out, figuring out who really has nice jewelry, checking schedules. It’s a lot of work, you know.”
“Work?” asked Ethan.
Jimbo nodded. “It’s a tough job.”
“Stealing is not a job,” I said.
“It’s a job to us. Well, it was. I don’t suppose you’ll let us continue?” Jimbo had a hint of hopefulness in his voice.
“No.” Ethan’s word had so much finality to it that the couple didn’t try to protest. “You two are going to spend the rest of the cruise in the brig.”
“I want my own brig,” said Patsy snootily. “I don’t want to share with this idiot.”
Ethan shrugged. “I don’t want to risk another murder. Separate cells for you two it is.”
“Can we still use the pool?” Jimbo asked.
Ethan raised his eyebrows in an ‘are you serious look?’ at him.
“Just asking…” muttered Jimbo.
“What about me?” asked Susan.
Not only did she have the twin motives of jealousy and financial gain, we also knew she was a thief in her own right.
“You broke into my office. You stole from my office. Under normal circumstances, I would put you in the brig too, and then have you disembarked at the next port and everything referred to the police. But you are still supposed to participate in more events, aren’t you?”
Susan nodded.
“And we might need to ask you more questions about Zoya.”
Yeah, because you probably killed her!
“So you will remain aboard for the time being. But Susan, don’t do anything—anything—else, okay? No more break-ins, no more stealing, no more… anything.”
No more killing!
“Thank you! I’ll be on my best behavior.”
I rolled my eyes at that.
“Right.” Ethan stood up. “Let’s get you two to your new accommodations.”
Jimbo perked up for a moment before he realized Ethan meant the brig, and his face fell again.
Susan tilted her head in my direction.
“Lunch?”
Chapter Twenty-Six
I couldn’t believe she was inviting me to go to lunch with her. After all that had happened. After I’d just caught her with a stolen contract. After I’d figured out all the motives she had for wanting to kill Zoya.
And she wanted to have lunch.
But if she wanted to spend time some together, it was fine with me. She might slip up and reveal some information that would tie her to Zoya’s death. Or maybe even something that would help clear her.
The two of us made our way outside.
“International Buffet?” I suggested.
“No, I want to be outside. And it’s the worst place for cocktails on the ship.”
She was right about that. While you could order cocktails, they were always slow to arrive and the atmosphere was all wrong. Not that I ever had cocktails with lunch. It’s another thing Swan doesn’t allow its employees to do while on duty. While it seemed like a reasonable rule to me, Cece complained about it all the time.
“Then let’s go to Hemingway’s. They grill burgers at lunch, and they do the best daytime cocktails.”
We walked through the ship together, exiting the interior next to the Lagoon Pool and walking around it to Hemingway’s tropical bar.
We chose a bamboo table shaded by a palm-leaf canopy. As soon as I’d sat down, Susan stood up. “I’ll order at the bar. Cheeseburger?”
“Yes, please. And an orange juice.”
“Right,” she said with a funny look. “Orange juice.”
Susan went up to the bar and placed our order. When she walked, it was with the grace and poise of someone who had worked on her movements all her life. You see it in dancers, actors, gymnasts, and even beauty pageant contestants—they move with a lightness and consideration the rest of us don’t have.
After completing her order, she sat down again across from me. She had a manner that made it hard to dislike her, even though I suspected her of murdering Zoya.
I’d met all kinds of people working on a cruise ship, and it was interesting how some of the ‘worst’ of them could also be the most charming—and some of the most unpleasant people never actually did anything wrong.
“Where do the years go?” she asked.
“What do you mean?”
“Seems like only a few months ago I left home to go to Hollywood, arriving with bright eyes and dreams of my name in lights. Sometimes when I wake up, I still think that. I forget for a moment that I’m ol—middle-aged, and I’ll never be the starlet who’s the envy of the world.”
“Yes, but you’re still an actress. You could have another big role next year.”
“I could. I won’t though. But even if I did, it wouldn’t be the same. It wouldn’t be a whole lifetime of A-list treatment. No, I missed my chance for that. Sometimes I blamed Zoya, but it wasn’t really her fault.”
A waiter brought over our drinks. Hers was a big raspberry daiquiri while mine was a similarly sized glass of orange juice. I took a big, long sip. Then, I stuck my hand up to my mouth and coughed.
It was not orange juice.
Susan winked at me. “I thought you needed a little pick-me-up, dear.”
More like a put-me-down to bed.
“I don’t normally drink at lunch, when I’m working.”
“In my day, we always drank at lunchtime. That’s how Hollywood worked. And sometimes lunch went right on into the evening…” She sipped her drink while shaking her head. “Some of the best parties I ever went to were lunches that got out of hand.”
“Interesting.” How could you work like that!?
“If I could only go back…”
“What would you change?” I took another sip of what I now assumed to be vodka-orange. It didn’t seem quite as strong the second time.
“Oh, everything. Nothing. Everyone else.” She paused, as if really thinking. “I suppose I would have changed the beginning. When I first got offered the chance to be Zoya’s body double, it looked like a stepping stone to greater success for me. A cha
nce to start to make my mark, the first rung on a ladder to the heights of Hollywood success. But it wasn’t. I kept doing it, kept stepping in for Zoya for too long. By the time I eventually said no, no more, I’m my own person! it was too late. Horror B-movies were all I’d known, and just when I branched out on my own, the trend was dying.
“I only had one reasonable success. One of the last of the seventies horror movies. It was about a bloody high school prom. I thought it was my big break—but nope, horror was over. Done with. No one wanted it anymore. It was all romcoms and action movies. I auditioned for all kinds of roles, but I kept getting told to stick with what I knew—horror—but there wasn’t any! If I’d just stepped away from Zoya sooner…”
“Still, you made a career of it. You’re still here, aren’t you? You still work in the industry.”
“No one goes to Hollywood wanting to be a minor success. No one wants to just get by. It’s almost a worse failure than total rejection—at least then you go back home to Nebraska and start another career.”
“Nebraska? I’m from Nebraska.”
Susan clapped her hands together. “Wonderful. It’s a great place to be from, isn’t it?”
I nodded proudly. It sure was.
“The good thing about being from a place like Nebraska,” she said, “is that you don’t really miss it. If you were from somewhere like Philadelphia, or Boston, or San Francisco, I’m sure you’d feel the pangs of homesickness every day. But Nebraska? We don’t get that. I think we’re all glad to be out of there. We don’t miss it.”
“I do,” I said quietly.
“Do you?” Susan at first seemed surprised, then she looked up thoughtfully. “Perhaps I did when I was your age too. But I can’t remember that long ago.” She tapped her finger on the cocktail glass and I could have a good guess as to why she didn’t remember it all that well.
“Here you go. Two beautiful cheeseburgers for two—”
I looked up, eyebrows raised at the waiter who seemed about to say something that really wasn’t appropriate.
“—people,” he finished awkwardly. “Enjoy!”
Covering her mouth as she laughed, Susan smiled at me. She wasn’t too bad after all. Even if she had forgotten the delights of her home state.
I plucked a fry from my plate and nibbled on it, hoping Susan would continue to talk. With the loosening effect of her cocktail, she might let something slip.
“I wasn’t the best actress, but I was better than some that did make it.”
“You’re a great actress. That scream you did at the first talk…” I shuddered at the memory. Then, I felt sad as I wondered whether Zoya had screamed too.
“Oh, my scream. I used to spend hours practicing that. The neighbors even called the police—that’s when I knew I had it right!” She chuckled at the memory. “Of course, I had to stop practicing in my apartment after that.”
“I bet!”
“Sometimes, it’s just luck. Actually, most of the time. Meeting the right person at the right time. Getting a good script before anyone else. Attaching yourself to an up-and-coming director before people know that they are up-and-coming. Getting the right review from the right critic… so many factors.”
I chewed down two more crispy fries while she talked.
“People like Tom Devlin? It sounds like he had a big effect on Zoya’s career.”
“Tom Devlin.” She rolled her eyes.
“What? You seemed to get along just fine.”
“I’m an actress, dear.”
While she talked, I picked up my burger in both hands and began to dig in.
“Tom Devlin. He’s a dog. And not a nice one. You know that story we spun you, about how Zoya ruined his marriage and cost him a fortune?”
Mouth full, I could only nod in response.
“It was a load of hooey. That’s the story that he tells everyone, and the rest of us play along with it. Because he’s still a critic and he still has influence.”
“Oh?” I could just about say that one single word with my mouth full without embarrassing myself.
“Zoya didn’t tell his wife about the affair because of the bad review he gave her. That’s a story he invented years after. It was actually the opposite.”
Susan picked up a couple of fries and popped them in her mouth. I urged her on, dropping my chin and raising my eyebrows.
“What actually happened is that he was hitting on Zoya. But she rejected his advances. And you couldn’t blame her. She was gorgeous back then—we all were—and he was a scruffy overweight slob of a man. The only thing attractive about him was the reviews he could write.”
I shuddered at the thought.
“That’s why his review was so nasty for Painted Little Flower. Did you see it?”
I shook my head no.
“The movie wasn’t actually that bad. Not like he said it was. It was a solid movie, and Zoya’s performance was fine. But he lambasted her in print and got some of his critic friends to do the same. All because she rejected him. That’s what Hollywood was like back then.” She paused. “I mean, it’s still full of creeps, but back then it was even worse, if you can imagine. If you refused to sleep with a man, he could ruin your career.”
It was depressing to get an insight into what went on behind the scenes of the movies so many people loved to watch.
“So after she turned him down, Tom did his best to kill Zoya’s career. And he pretty much succeeded. That’s why she sent those pictures to his wife—to stand up for herself and her decision not to sleep with him for a review. It’s terrible, isn’t it?”
“Yes, absolutely awful.” I sipped my drink, feeling even more sorry for poor, dead Zoya.
“Who do you think killed her?” I asked bluntly.
“I don’t know. You’d think it would be someone who knew her, obviously, and there aren’t that many of us on board. I mean, who had anything to gain from it?”
I took another bite of cheeseburger and shrugged, hoping she’d answer her own question. She did.
“There’s Polly Stratton. With Zoya dead, she could fake that signature for her contract. But really, it couldn’t be worth that much, could it? She might be a crook, but a killer?”
“There’s you,” I said, trying to make it sound a little light-hearted. I didn’t want her storming off on me.
Susan laughed. “Me? Because of that movie role?”
“Why not?”
“Look, I’ve been in the business long enough. That role—it’s nice enough. I’m sure the movie will be fine. But it’s not going to be a breakout success. It’s not going to make me into a mega-star, and nor would it have Zoya. It’s not going to make us millions. It’s just a role in a movie. We’ve all done dozens like it. I know Zoya made it sound bigger than it was, but really, I can’t imagine it ever being more than a footnote on either of our careers. And anyway, Judd and I already have a… special relationship. I wouldn’t need to get rid of Zoya to make sure I got the part.”
That last statement was probably the best evidence I had that Susan didn’t have much to gain from killing Zoya. She could have gotten the role in the movie anyway, thanks to her affair with the producer.
We lapsed into a surprisingly comfortable silence while I finished off my burger. Susan had barely touched hers, just nibbling at the fries.
Something caught her eye, and she immediately frowned, a worried look on her face.
She leaned over and pulled out a big floppy hat and glasses out of her canvas bag, throwing them on in a hurry.
“The sun can be deadly,” I suggested.
Actually, we were shaded by the palm-leaf canopy above us, but maybe she was worried about a few stray rays making their way through.
“Not as deadly as the fans! Shh!” She leaned over the table, hat pulled down.
Ah. She was hiding from someone. I glanced around and then smirked when I saw who it was. Kirk Field. He saw me and but didn’t stop. His gaze didn’t linger on Susan at all, so her disg
uise must have worked.
“It’s safe now. He’s gone,” I said with a laugh.
“Thank goodness,” she said sitting back up. “Since Zoya passed away, I think he’s decided to be my fan instead. He said he was going to make me a website just like the one he did for her.”
“Oh, lucky you.”
“I know, right?”
With my plate empty, and feeling like I now knew Susan a little better, I was ready to move on. I took another sip of ‘orange juice,’ just about managing to keep a straight face.
“Time to get back to work.”
“Can I have the rest of your drink?” she asked, staring at the almost-full glass.
“Sure thing. It’s a little much for me at this time of day. Have a good afternoon.”
As I left her, I still wasn’t entirely convinced she wasn’t guilty. But she had grown on me as a person. If she was a murderer, she was a nice one.
And then with a little laugh to myself, I realized I never had thoughts like that back in Nebraska.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Ethan sent me a message, asking me to meet him at Two Scoops. He would be about half an hour, so I took my time, strolling through the ship, trying to look at it with the eyes of a guest instead of a worker.
I was considering writing a little article about the “Ten Neatest Things Aboard The Swan of the Seas,” but it was hard to notice what the actual ‘standout’ places and things were, since I’d become so accustomed to life aboard the ship. Nothing seemed to stand out anymore.
The fountain in the middle of the Grand Atrium could be a good one, I thought, as I walked past it. There was a young couple there having their picture taken just as the center of the fountain shot water up several stories high, almost hitting the glass roof above.
Two Scoops could be another. I glanced around to see what else was nearby. Ah-ha. Daffodils, the flower shop. I began to wander over in that direction. As I stood outside, I had second thoughts. A flower shop probably wasn’t that interesting for an article.
I glanced inside and was amused to see Kirk Field again. He was standing at the counter, paying for what looked to be a dozen roses.
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