A Gift for Murder

by Capri Montgomery

  The other employee in the room was Kaitlin Morris, the facial expert. Kaitlin was more caramel tan than brown. Her hair was cut short but the part of her hair she let stay styled a little longer was straight because of the relaxer she sported. Her eyes were more walnut in shape but the brown was so dark it almost looked scary black. Her eyes were like one of those science fiction movies of the alien to run from. Since she had heard Kaitlin say she had an audition tomorrow for a local; show Megan figured Kaitlin might be able to get a role as a deliciously beautiful alien who could pose as human and fall in love with a cop who would keep her alive when the entire world turned against her. Of course, right now, her audition didn’t count for anything with the dead man being found in the spa this morning. Although, if Kaitlin would stop trying to sneak and read the audition info on her smart phone she might see the tall and black walnut dark officer checking her out more than the situation he had walked in here for. He was at least six foot two since he was a little taller than Merck. He was also strong muscles. Those tight chest and solid arms couldn’t all be complimented to the vest he had to wear. Forest Springs had never been devoid of good looking men; that was for sure. As a child she never noticed, but she did notice how the ladies raved about the men running on the trails, lifting weights in the garage across the street from them or helping change tires that wouldn’t have needed help changing if the women hadn’t intentionally let the air out in the first place.

  Forest Springs had attractive men who seemed to get a lot more attention than the not so attractive potato on the couch looking men. The officers made a little sense to be in shape seeing as they were the ones who had to be able to foot chase bad guys. Although there were some poufy cops, they just seemed to be stuck behind the desk more than not.

  Megan figured humans saw what they wanted to see, not always what was right in front of them.

  Megan thought about the women who were back in this room as customers. She knew that the woman sitting cater-corner to her, the one with the waffle size reading glasses kept picking through a magazine digging for the love course cup. Megan knew what that particular magazine had in it because it was the magazine that she backed on the table. First of all she wasn’t there to greet over magazines. Second of all she really wasn’t interested in anything that had anything to do with men, women, relationships that go wrong in this weather the world or anything else. But she knew that there were a few different horoscopes section because they were all sitting right there on the front with a page number. She sat there there’s going about the fact that she was going into the steam room and she was going to get her steam on. But as she was just digging through the magazine she kept mentioning something about the love horoscope. She apparently didn’t want the health horoscope but who really would if one would think about the fact that the health horoscope was more likely to tell you if you are going to have a healthy season or if you were going to be set off season. For anybody who really believes in horoscopes that would be the worst one to an entire season on. There was another one that mentioned financial of which she figured probably was the way to tell people financially this season the you’ll either the rise and make lots of money or you will file and moves lots of money. The only one that it looked like the woman across cater-corner to her would actually look at would be the horoscope on love. Maybe, what was most strange about the women with the waffle size glasses is that she kept reading about the fact that she thought the steam room might just bring her last. Megan was not a psychologist but she did wonder why would anybody think that a steam room was going to be a magical bearer of love. Of course the women seemed very happy about finding the love horoscope, reading whatever she read from it and then the fact that she was going to be going to the steam room as soon as it was ready separate humans inside of there and she might find love in there. Unless that woman knew what was in the steam room already and she figured that she could buy in love with the dead man hurt over exaggerated happiness over a magazine article wish just odd.

  Then there was the other women, the Kermit the Frog lookalike woman. She just sat there smacking on her teeth. She kept eyeballing the one man with the reading glasses right she either wanted to hit her or kill her. She could not make out a sack leave with that woman was thinking because she did not know where and sin she did not know her it made it difficult to figure out the level of her sanity or insanity.

  All of the women in that room seems so different not just in looks and finances but in personality as well. Of course no two people were ever the same but they all seemed to have something different, like a secret that they did not want anybody to find out especially the officers that were here now.

  None of the women actually talk to each other. It was like they were strangers and of room who had no interest of uttering a single word to the others stranger in the room. In some ways it felt like all of them were trying to stay away from each other as far as they could. Something just was not right. There was a huge difference and not wanting to associate with people and trying to avoid it like the other person was the plague waiting to unleash its evil upon them. Or maybe they were afraid if they spoke they just might give away all of their darkest, most scandalous secrets.

  Did they all know each other? Did they all come here around the same exact time? If they did know each other maybe they all knew something about each other. Megan would not be able to tell but maybe Merck could sort them all out.

  She knew the moderate history of Merck. He used to see bad before…no, while it was happening. Since he was standing in the corner faking still writing down some notes on some of the interviews already done while other officers took basic name, number and eye color. Merck had already spoke with some of them before letting them know he would be with them all shortly. He, to her anyway, seemed to be watching the women. Watching how they sat, how they held their hands or crossed their legs. It was as if he was reading their body language to make answers about them for himself. Or maybe that’s what she was doing.

  She noticed that she only saw two women who were customers and not workers who appeared very jittery nervous and four who looked perfectly comfortable like they could fall asleep in the chair. Megan had heard once before being jittery could be a mix of guilt or innocence. An innocent person would probably be worried that they would be suspected of committing the crime. They would be so jittery because they weren’t sure that the cop investigating can investigate correctly. That they would avoid being blamed for a crime they did not commit. Megan could understand that theory however she did not kill the person who was found in the steam room and yet she also was not nervous that she would be thought to have done that. She actually did not see the man, did not know the man of which she had heard others saying the man’s name was, and she had never been in the steam room one day in her life. So yes she was comfortable but now she was not going to follow the fleet in our own chair.

  The second part that they mentioned was that a guilty person might just still comfortable enough to fall asleep because they knew that they did not leave anything behind to point to them. Of course they usually get leave something behind or they opened their mouth and set things that they won them down if they happened committed the crime. It was always that way. Criminals always ended up telling it on themselves in one way or another and if people listened, paid attention to body language, they shell expression and it even if the crossing of lax they just might understand what was truth and what was lie and also wet was guilt hidden under they all know I would never do that towel.

  The reality was that nobody actually saw the guy in the steam room other than the owner, Heather Bishop. Of course she was stuck in today with a massive dose of crazy. She was in this place with everybody else being questioned about their connection with the dead guy. She was scared about things that were happening in her own spa. Never before had a murder happened anywhere near where she was ever.

  Heather had a little bit of energy that made Megan wonder if she knew the victim in mor
e intimate ways than normal boss employee would, or did she kill the man and needed to look frazzled to make herself believed to be innocent?

  Only the detective investigating this crime would be able to figure out which one of these women might be involved in the murder. It is possible that none of them are that something gave Megan a feeling that at least one of them probably was. But again the detective will have more access to what the victim did when he was not working, who his friends were, how much money he owed to anybody and what enemies he might have. Of course the real problem with the hell did anybody he had angered get the ability to freeze him in the spa and move his body to the steam room too. The reality was that it would have to be somebody who had access to the spa one, to get the man frozen and two, to move him to the steam room.

  Megan was glad that she was not the investigator here. There were too many of those tied strings for the crime to be solved before the end of the day. She was not here to investigate, this crime. All she wanted to do was get out of here and go back to her home into her own café that she was going to open as soon the business approval heads got the rest of the papers stamped giving her the okay she needed from the business district supervisors. She was here on a mission and that mission did not have anything to do with becoming the female sleuth to save the world in Forest Springs. There wasn’t any way that she wanted to be pulled back into a life of solving crimes when she never asked to be given that responsibility in the first place.

  No, no and no again. She had left this place to get away from everything and she did not want to be pulled back into the past because she wanted to focus on her life in a happier way with her new café. And since she had actually made the move and brought all of her stuff with her, not to mention the fact that she had setup her the café there was no way in the world she could just pack it all up again and flee from Forest Springs.

  What she needed was a postcard that she could hang up and tell people don’t ask me I don’t know a thing and I don’t want to know a thing either. That is that she didn’t know a thing about the crime because technically she knew a lot even if nobody realized she did do more than just what they perceive to be a woman that should be left out of everything because nothing could ever came with her there. Although in her defense every time she was somewhere she was not the one who committed the crime she wished just the person who solved the who done it part of the package.

  Megan sighed thinking how today was going to alter her idea of staying invisible to everybody who were bullies to her almost her entire life of living here. Maybe she show us take on that maybe she came back for a reason. Maybe fate was telling her this is where you are suppose to be and Lady Justice wants you to stay where you are meant to be, so solve everything. This is what you have to do even if you do not want to.

  Why, just why, did she have to pick today to claim her free day at the spa? Or more like, how did she win the prize anyway?

  Megan never entered to win a prize so she was severely surprised when she got the call and more surprised when the certificate arrived before the call came in. Megan laughed to herself thinking about the fact that her mother, though cruising on a massive ship first class with her guy called her not even an hour after it arrived to her. Knowing her mother Megan figured now that she was the one who entered her into the contest to win. How she beat the other women who lived here for the prize might just be a mix of luck and unwelcomed fate.

  If the murder just had to happen Megan wished it could have happened some other day. A day when she wasn’t here in this spa. The thing is, it had happened some other day. The body had just been discovered today.

  Murder was murder. Murder was never good but it always happened somewhere on this planet earth. If humans were less viciously evil the world could be a much better place. Megan was hoping Merck could find the killer faster than any shade of normal. The sooner the murderer was caught the less likely whoever it was would kill again.

  Megan was happy she never wanted to be a cop, not even a crime solving detective, because she couldn’t imagine being forced to wake up every morning in a world like this. A paid homicide detective would never catch a break, especially in a big city. Forest Springs was not always that kind of vicious but this murder here was not the first time a murder had happened in Forest Springs. Megan remembered the serial killer in training, Jip Lord, when they were both here in elementary school. Jip loved murdering pets. A lot of pets went missing that year. Megan had alerted the cops to what she thought but they ignored her on it until Jip’s mother caught him carving up the whining dog. The therapist told the cops he was preparing to switch to killing adults. She remembered Jip being carted off to a mental institution and then his parents selling and running out of town.

  When Megan thought it all, she could see just one more reason people thought of her the way they did. She was simply always this way. She always had a way of seeing things that humans did that led to their evil being found out and punished. The thing was just that it didn’t happen that way with every crime so her ability to read between the lines couldn’t help her catch every bad guy. She didn’t want to be responsible for catching them either.

  Megan hoped that today was the end of her involvement in this spa murder. The cops wouldn’t really need to see her again so once they let them all leave here she would say goodbye spa day hello stay home day. Yes she would be safer just being home alone until she was always in the kitchen after the café opened. Then, after opening, she would just stay safe in the kitchen. To stay safe in the kitchen meant she would have to hire a cashier if her café ever got super busy. Running in and out of the kitchen to take baked goods out the oven and ring up a purchase at the cash register would not be comfortable alone then.

  Megan gazed over the room here now. The officers guarding the doors, the detective investigating and the suspects, the women, itching to get away for more than one reason. They were all stuck here right now. It’s just some of them were paid to be here while others were paying to be here. The cops would still get paid. This is their job. But Heather had already told the two women still stuck here, that worked for her, that since they weren’t technically working they weren’t technically getting paid. What a crappie boss to have.

  Chapter Two

  Lavender Lines

  “Megan,” Merck walked over to her yet again. Technically it was just the second time but he wasn’t helping her get the other women’s eyes off her. Heather had gone back up front to refund money for all of the spa day tickets she booked two weeks ago and now could not do because of the murder in her spa.

  “You just never know when the un expected is going to muck up your business,” Heather had said to her. “I have to cancel everything. The cops up there are not even letting people come in. An Officer Paul Polino said they had to put a table out front for me so take my checkbook with me.” She growled. “Like, hello. I have bills to pay and that dead guy is going to cost me money, not make it for me.”

  Megan understood because the insurance on this place would rise, the business she lost would cut into her account but, above all, if this crime was not solved people would be afraid to come back.

  The murder at the spa was kind of like having somebody kill over after eating the favored dish at a restaurant. Rumors would fly and even if the person died over natural causes the rumors would say poison, poorly cooked food or flat out a chicken bone in the apple pie.

  Rumors could be the death of a business and Megan knew that. She also knew having to shut down until the cops removed the crime scene tape would easily make the regulars go to the strongest competitor—the spa without the murder in the steam room. She could hear people saying the steam room killed him so don’t ever go to that spa.

  The fact that Heather felt the need to moan to her was confusing because Megan had never been here before and Heather had only gone through the off limits and the dos and don’ts with her.

  Megan retuned her attention to Merck as he led her to a table far away f
rom the other ladies.

  “I saw Heather Bishop conversing with you. What did she tell you about the murder?”

  Megan’s eyes bucked at Merck’s question. Why was he watching her while he was interviewing up to the last suspect. Or maybe not suspect but the last woman back in the area for customers getting ready to start their spa day and those that were in one of the facial and body rooms before they were pulled out to sit elsewhere as if they hadn’t moved from the ‘with you soon’ area.

  “She was moaning about the closing of her spa. It’s money lost. She has to refund anybody who prepaid for today and cancel anybody who booked for the rest of the week. Some of them need money refunded too. It’s all about the business. She owns this spa but she is not the only spa on this side of town. Maple And Cats is larger and classier than here. Despite the name of the place it has five star ratings with reviews that claim it is Hollywood celebrity glitz because some celebrities do show up their every season. Plus cats are allowed. They get a spa day while the woman, or man, being pampered gets their own relaxing spa moment. That place costs thousands for just signing your name on the appointment book.”

  Merck’s eyes widened and oddly enough she knew what he was thinking. No, she hadn’t gone there before, and now, she didn’t come to Seaside and Oceans just to solve the murder before the murder happened.

  “If you read Forest And Business News you would know about the businesses making the most money here. Read Forest Daily News and you will find out everything about what to do, what’s in town for the day or week and where all the ten percent off sells are. You need to read more about your town, Detective.”