Cruise Ship Cozy Mysteries 09 - Lethal Cruise

by A. R. Winters

  The four ladies walked up, two pairs, arm in arm, all dressed in expensive summer dresses, pearl necklaces, and haircuts that probably cost more than my phone. They chatted in friendly, teasing tones, and all seemed to be absolutely delighted to be embarking.

  “Welcome aboard!” I said.

  “Well, hello there,” said the lady at the front.

  I stared at her for a moment too long as I tried to figure out how old she was. She had the air of someone in her late sixties or early seventies, but the face of someone in her forties.

  “I’m Miffy,” continued the first woman. She had shoulder-length blonde hair and her dress showed off that she had a more than an admirable figure. Slim in the waist, but not at all in the chest. I figured she and her friends were definitely aboard the right cruise, though I wasn’t sure how much more augmentation they could really take.

  “I’m Bitsy,” said the woman locking arms with Miffy. She was shorter, barely coming up to my shoulders, but had big, rosy cheeks, naughty eyes alight with life and energy, and a curvy figure.

  “I must warn you though…” Miffy said, leaning toward me, her tone serious but eyes twinkling.

  “Oh?” I asked with an amused smile.

  “We’re going to be trouble.” Miffy stopped and laughed, and then turned to the two women behind her. “Aren’t we, girls?”

  “Hellraisers!” said a red-haired woman behind her.

  “Old rascals!” said the only woman whose hair looked to be approaching its natural color—it was a bright, shiny silver that had clearly been improved upon with the aid of some ‘natural’ dye.

  “Not that old,” Bitsy said.

  “Indeed, after all, you’re only as young as you feel, isn’t that right girls?” Miffy said.

  “As young as the man you feel,” Bitsy said.

  “Speaking of which,” said the red-haired woman, “we hear there’s going to be some models aboard? Male models?”

  “Umm, yes, I think so,” I said, amused. Although I hadn’t seen them yet, I doubted any male models would be within their strike range.

  “Excellent,” said the red-haired woman, clapping her hands together in apparent delight. “I’m Chastity, by the way, and this is Esmerelda,” she said, nudging her friend.

  “Essie,” Esmerelda said. With her silver hair and quiet but confident tone, she had a regal air about her.

  “Again, welcome aboard to all of you. Could I take a picture of you together? You look like you’re going to have a fun cruise.”

  With delighted smiles, the four women got in a line together, arms intertwined, while I took their picture.

  “And another one!” Miffy ordered.

  This time she put on a sultry pout on her face, and, following her lead, her three companions did the same.

  I smiled. “You’ll have all the gentlemen fawning over you.”

  “That’s the plan,” Bitsy said.

  “I’m not interested in gentlemen,” Chastity said with a wicked leer.

  The other three all cackled with glee. Looking at Chastity, I couldn’t help but think that Cece would be like her in about another half a century.

  “You can check in over there. Someone will take you to each of your staterooms,” I said, pointing the way.

  The women went off together to begin their vacation. While they seemed lovely, I hoped they wouldn’t be quite so bad troublemakers as they claimed. We’d had enough troublemaking passengers.

  A few more couples and groups walked by, and I let them pass while I fiddled with my phone. In the lulls, I was editing the pictures I’d taken, adding captions and filters to them, and sending them out to our various social media feeds.

  When I’d first started onboard the Swan of the Seas, my old cruise director told me to make sure I was posting at least hourly, and I still tried to stick to that. Of course I didn’t literally send things out every hour; I set things up so that they would drip feed out over most of the day. The collection of photos I was getting during the boarding process would go out over the coming hours so I could take a few moments to relax if I needed them.

  After a few more groups had boarded and checked in, my eye was drawn to a lone traveler. While we do get solo passengers, they’re usually older—people who’d lost a spouse but wanted to continue going on vacation. We didn’t get many young lone travelers.

  So when we did get someone under the age of about sixty who was traveling with neither friends, family, nor a spouse, I was always a little intrigued. Sometimes I was actually a little envious. Wouldn’t it be fun to go on an adventure alone, without knowing anyone?

  I’d only tried that twice in my life. Neither had been a success.

  The first time, I’d done part of a road trip all on my lonesome. That was fine… until I got kidnapped. Not only had the trip been a disaster, it still affected me. Literally. Someone knew about the kidnapping and had been taunting me with that knowledge since I’d started working aboard the ship. Ethan and I were hoping to figure out just who it was during this cruise though. We had a list of suspects that we intended to get through as quick as we could, until we could nab the person who’d been hassling me.

  My only other attempt at ‘traveling’—working on the cruise liner—alone had also ended in failure, though of a much more pleasant sort. I left Nebraska, got a job on this very ship, and had been ready to embark on my new solo journey through the world.

  That lasted about two minutes, until I found Sam, my best friend from back home, waiting for me in our shared cabin. She’d followed me and gotten a job as a customer liaison aboard the very same ship. Although it was absolutely wonderful to be working with her, it had nixed my attempt at some genuine solo-adventuring.

  So when I saw this man, who looked to be only a few years older than me, happily boarding the ship, completely alone, it was with a mixture of curiosity and envy.

  He had on horn-rimmed glasses, a sensible, old-fashioned side-parted haircut in his nut-brown hair, and he was well dressed in an understated manner, in a blazer, corduroy pants, and brown brogues.

  “Good afternoon!” he said when he saw me standing by the entranceway. “Bruno Jones.”

  “Adrienne James, social media manager. Welcome aboard the Swan of the Seas! Is this your first time?”

  “It is. My first time aboard this ship, anyway.” He paused to look around, staring at the people ahead of him checking in and hanging around the lobby area as if searching for someone he knew.

  “You’re going to have a great time. Are you looking for someone?”

  He took off his glasses and began rubbing at them with a handkerchief while I spoke.

  “Oh, no. Not really. But do you know if Nurse Jessica Jameson has boarded?”

  “She has. Is she a friend of yours?”

  He shook his head. “Oh, no. I just know her by reputation. I was thinking of getting… well, no need to bore you with that.”

  He put his glasses back on. Although there were faint traces of wrinkles beginning to form around his eyes, I didn’t think he needed Botox or anything else. The hint of wrinkles made him look more distinguished.

  “I don’t think you need any treatment,” I said with a smile.

  He gave a little nod, accepting the compliment with grace. “Thank you. It was just a thought. I didn’t book this cruise because I was interested in beauty treatments, but I was thinking, when in Rome…”

  “…get stuck with needles?”

  We both laughed.

  “I always wondered how that saying ended. Now I know!” After another brief chuckle, he looked behind me. “I think I’ll check in now. Over there, is it?”

  “Yep. Could I get a photo of you?” I held up the phone.

  “Ah…” Bruno paused and frowned. “I’d rather not, if you don’t mind. No, thank you.”

  And with that, he went to check in. At least he’d been polite about rejecting the picture. Not everyone was. While Bruno left, a slightly worn-out couple emerged into the arriv
als area next.

  I smiled at them as they approached, though from their mood I wasn’t overly optimistic about how friendly they were going to be.

  The woman looked to about thirty years old and had shoulder-length black hair and big hoop earrings. She was dressed in tight jeans and a t-shirt, and I could see that she had what looked like a dragon tattoo starting just above the elbow and snaked up and under her T-shirt.

  The man was perhaps ten years older than the woman I assumed was his wife, dressed in the typical vacationer attire of khaki shorts, brown sandals, and a short-sleeved button-up shirt that was a bit too big, probably in an attempt to hide the stomach beneath it.

  “…just get the booking paper out and we can check in!” said the exasperated woman.

  “But I thought it was in your bag, if—”

  The woman had stopped speaking abruptly and was staring behind me.

  I glanced over my shoulder, to see that Bruno had turned around and was staring back at the woman. He smiled at her. It seemed Bruno knew more than just Nurse Jessica.

  When I looked back at the woman, she’d given Bruno a little smile too but seemed to be distracted or confused.

  “Can I help you?” I asked them.

  “No, no,” said the man. “We’re just getting sorted out. I—”

  “Yes, please,” said the woman, interrupting him. “I’m Brenda, and this is Darren McClain. We’ve booked under his name, but he’s lost the paper with our check-in information.”

  “I haven’t lost it. It’s just—”

  “He’s lost it,” she said, interrupting him again.

  “Not to worry! They’ll have all your details on the computer. You just need your passports.”

  “Good,” said Brenda. “Come on,” she said, yanking her partner toward the check-in area.

  I caught Sam looking their way, judging them to be likely too much trouble for her, and she held up a clipboard help up in front of her in an attempt to look busy. I couldn’t help but smile as she began to make her way back toward me.

  “Did you get the beauticians checked in?” I asked her.

  “Yep, all done,” she said with a happy nod. “Did you meet the cougars?”

  “They seemed very sweet.”

  “Yeah… but I wouldn’t like to be a guy around them!”

  We both giggled, only stopping when I heard a sharp intake of breath and Sam clutched my forearm a little too hard.

  I looked up, expecting from how shocked Sam seemed, to see perhaps a hijacking or a group of aliens.

  I gasped when I saw it too.

  “Am I dreaming?”

  “Only if we both are…”

  I don’t know what the correct term for a group of models is, but it felt like “vision” might be appropriate. Half a dozen handsome men with toothy smiles and dreamy eyes were making their way toward us.

  “Hey,” said the blond-haired guy at the front. He was about six foot six, wearing a white T-shirt that seemed to clutch at his torso so tightly I was pretty sure I could make out his abs underneath. “Can you help us?”

  “Anything!” said Sam with more enthusiasm than I’d heard from her in forever. “I mean, what can we do for you?”

  Behind the blond-haired guy were five more of them, all of them tall with broad shoulders, tapered V-shaped torsos, and eyes that flickered with life.

  “We want to check in. But we’re not VIPs. Can we board early anyway?”

  “You can do anything you want,” said Sam.

  I nudged her. That was not true at all. There were all kinds of rules aboard the ship. Of course, she completely ignored me, too busy running her eyes over each of the men in turn.

  “Aren’t we VIPs?” asked another model from behind.

  “No, that’s Very Important People. We’re just… VPs.”

  “Very People?” said another with a frown. “That don’t sound right. Just… VIs, I think.”

  “Aboard the Swan of the Seas, all our models—I mean, guests—are important people,” Sam said, taking the arm of the man in front. “Come with me and I’ll make sure you get checked in.”

  “Can I take your pictures first?” I asked.

  The man at the front flashed a cocky smile. “Sure.”

  “Get me with them!” Sam said, sliding into the gaggle of men and interlocking her arms with them before they could protest.

  I snapped away, taking a dozen or more pictures of them all.

  “Why don’t you get in with us?” said a dark-haired model with puppy-dog eyes and distracting cheekbones.

  I didn’t usually get in the pictures I take for the social media streams, but since he asked so nicely…

  After handing my phone over to Sam, she disentangled herself from the models and took a few pictures of me with them.

  To my surprise, I saw Cece making her way over to us from across the other side of the lobby. As a member of the housekeeping department, she didn’t have anything to do with check-ins. At least not normally.

  “Right, are you the models?” she asked in a loud voice. She spoke with so much confidence even I was convinced she had some new role I wasn’t aware of.

  “Y-yes,” said the blond guy at the front as if he wasn’t quite sure.

  “Good. I’m Cece, and I’m here to take care of you.” She spun so that she was facing away from them, and then turned her head over her shoulder, putting out two arms behind her. She gave the two closest models meaningful looks. To my amusement, they took her hands.

  “Come on, boys. Let’s get you settled.”

  To Sam’s and my astonishment, Cece led the vision of models away, holding hands with two of them while the rest followed like a parade of baby ducklings.

  “Has she changed jobs since this morning?” I asked Sam with a frown.

  “Not that I know of. It’s just Cece being Cece.”

  While we both laughed, I scrolled through the pictures Sam and I had just taken.

  “Better not post too many of them or Ethan will get jealous.”

  “What? They’re just pictures. It’s my job,” I said indignantly.

  Sam shrugged. “If you say so. Make sure you take lots more then!”

  Grinning, I gave my friend a gentle nudge to indicate I was definitely on board with that idea.

  I knew my intuition had been correct. This cruise was going to be fun.

  CHAPTER THREE

  I felt a tap on my shoulder and turned to see Ethan’s smiling face.

  “Having fun?” he asked with arched eyebrows, the corners of his mouth just slightly upturned.

  Was that a look? Had he seen me with the models? Or was I completely imagining things? I smiled innocently up at him, and then thought, Why am I trying to smile innocently? I am innocent!

  “Fun? Oh, no, working hard here!” I waved my phone at him. I don’t think he was overly sympathetic. As First Officer, he had a lot more to worry about than taking a few pictures and writing fluff pieces for the ship’s blog and newsletter.

  “I’m having fun,” Sam said to Ethan. “Did you see those models?”

  “Models? Is that what they were?” Ethan raised his head. “I thought they were life-sized Ken dolls.”

  We all laughed at that and I relaxed.

  “Addy? If you’ve got a moment, let’s talk in my office. I don’t think I’ll have much downtime today.”

  “Sure.”

  On the way over, we talked idly about the start of the cruise, the stops we were going to make, and first impressions of the guests. Each cruise always seemed to have a different atmosphere, even though the ship and crew were always pretty much the same. It was the guests, and their various quirks, foibles and eccentricities—and occasional criminal activities—that gave each cruise its unique flavor. That and the themed events.

  Ethan’s office was a large, spacious room, much bigger than the pokey cabin that Sam and I shared. I didn’t have an office of any kind. When I was feeling optimistic, I liked to think of the entire ship as
being my very own open-plan workspace.

  The walls of Ethan’s office were lined with wood paneling, and there were several large pictures hung on it, including one of several ships, behind which was a semi-secret wall safe. There was a large wooden desk with a big, important-person chair, and two more high-backed chairs in front of it for guests. There were also a pair of sofas with a glass-topped coffee table in-between for informal meetings and chitchat. That’s where we headed.

  As soon as we entered, the familiar aroma of wood and leather relaxed me. Not that I’d been stressed, but meeting so many new people always made me a teensy bit tense.

  We sat down, side by side, legs touching on one of the leather sofas. On the small table in front of us was a manila folder, which Ethan picked up.

  “So,” he said as he opened it, revealing a single printed page within, “this is what we’ve got the list narrowed down to.”

  I stared at it. There were seven names on the paper. One of them had to be responsible for messing with me ever since I’d started to work with Swan. They’d been leaving me clues and reminders of the time I’d been kidnapped on my road trip a year before I started working for Swan.

  I had no idea who was doing it, or why, but I did know one thing: I wanted to get to the bottom of whatever was going on.

  “Just seven names, huh? Hopefully it won’t take too long to figure it out.”

  “That’s what I’m counting on. Now, these names have been narrowed down from the big list of employees I got last cruise. These are the people who would have been able to carry out each of the things that happened. Stuff like that movie script could have been anyone—it was mailed from ashore—but only a few people could have physically gone to your cabin to leave you an Arizona postcard. They would have needed to be aboard the ship to do that.”

  Ethan squeezed my knee with one of his big, warm hands. He was so much more real than the models. He was right when he called them Ken doll lookalikes. Though they sure were pretty…

  “Adrienne?”

  “Yes! I mean, it must be one of them. What do we do with these names? Are you going to interview them?”

  Ethan rubbed at the light stubble on his chin.