Photo Finished

by Dane McCaslin

  Immediately I gulped in huge mouthfuls of air, getting a little salt water mixed in. Coughing and sputtering with water coming out of my mouth and nose, I was pulled to the shore by a surfer, if the looks of him was any indication. He laid me down on the sand, and Jimmy was instantly at my side.

  "Red! Are you ok?"

  I nodded, too tired to answer. Plus my throat was killing me from all that salt water I'd ingested.

  Jimmy placed his hands on either side of my face. "Someone call the paramedics over."

  "No," I insisted. "I'm fine. It didn't hit me in the head—just knocked the breath out of me. I'm good. Honest."

  I tried to sit up, and Jimmy tugged on my hands, helping me. I dropped my head between my legs. Someone placed a towel around my shoulders, and I was grateful for the warmth.

  "Didn't you hear all the people yelling for you to get out of the way?" he asked, rubbing my arms back and forth, creating a delicious sensation deep in my belly.

  "No. I was looking at the shots I took, and I guess my mind was elsewhere."

  "Red, you gotta pay attention if you're going to do this job."

  "Tell me about it."

  "Seriously though. Are you ok?"

  "I'm fine. My pride is bruised a little, and I'm sure I'll be sore tomorrow, but otherwise I'm ok."

  "You are going to be the death of me, woman," he said, but there was no heat in his words.

  Instead I heard affection and something else I couldn't quite put my finger on.

  His phone buzzed in his pocket, and he looked at the screen. "I gotta take this. It's Detective Ray. Looks like things are happening. You going to be ok?"

  "Go! I'm fine."

  Jimmy kissed the top of my head and ran down the beach. He was absolutely gorgeous, like a lifeguard off Baywatch. Now if only I could do the slow-motion thing like in the show, it would be perfect. I snapped a photo of him since I didn't have a slow-mo reel in my mind. At least I was able to capture the image. Maybe I'd blow it up and put it on the wall in my bedroom. Only, knowing Jimmy, he'd get an even bigger head than he already had.

  I was grateful I hadn't lost my camera in the tumble. I might not be graceful, but I was smart enough to buy a waterproof camera and keep it attached to me at all times.

  A nice nap would have been a great idea, but there were still several competitions left in the day. I set up my long lens and camera on the tripod. As I was lining up my view for the next match, my phone rang from my camera bag.

  Hoping it was Jimmy, I leaned down and grabbed the phone, sliding it to answer without looking at the screen.

  "Hey!" I said.

  "Autumn?" a female voice whispered.

  "Summer? Is that you?" I glanced down at my screen but didn't recognize the number.

  "Autumn, I need help."

  "Where are you?" Panic was clawing at my insides.

  "I'm at Derrick and Patti Stone's house." Summer sounded off somehow, almost as if she was drunk, her words slurring together as she spoke.

  "What are you doing there?" Unease prickled my spine.

  "I need you to help me. Please."

  "Of course, Summer. Just tell me what to do."

  "She said come alone, or she'll kill me."

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  I packed away my long lens and camera into my camera bag as quickly as I could. I left the tripod where it stood. There was no time to mess with it now. Running as fast as my feet would carry me in the sand—which wasn't very fast, considering I'd already run away from Dax earlier and had been run over by a surfboard—I jumped into the car and raced out of the parking lot.

  As Jimmy had indicated earlier, the place was crawling with cops, so my racing was really more of a crawl. I was stopped twice before I was allowed to leave the resort. Fortunately, I had my handy-dandy Aloha Lagoon Resort ID badge and was waved through quickly.

  I knew the Stones were behind the murders, but I still hadn't figured out why they'd killed those young people. And why kidnap Summer? None of it made any sense.

  It dawned on me that I'd left without telling Jimmy. He was going to be so pissed.

  I dialed his number, but it went straight to voicemail. He must have it turned off.

  "Jimmy, it's Autumn. Summer called me. She said she's at the Stones. I think Patti has her. Summer said 'she,' not 'he.' Anyway, I know you're going to be mad, but I have to help her. I'd never be able to live with myself if something happened to her. I'm sorry."

  I hit End and dialed Detective Ray's number. It also went straight to voicemail. The drug bust. They were both handling that right now. Which meant no one would be coming for me.

  Taking in a shaky breath, I left him the same message I'd left Jimmy.

  Before I had another chance to think things through, I was pulling into the Stones' driveway. The place looked sinister this time, a dark shadow falling over the house. A chill crawled over my skin, and I mustered every ounce of courage I had to get out of the car. I grabbed my phone and stuck it inside the waistband of my shorts. It wasn't the best hiding place, but maybe Patti would forget to check me for it.

  Summer's car sat in the driveway, so it looked like Patti had duped Summer into coming to her house on her own accord. I prayed that she was ok. I couldn't stand the thought that something terrible had happened to her.

  It made sense to scope out my surroundings first, so I crept along the veranda encircling the house and peered inside the windows. I checked the kitchen and a couple of the bedrooms and rounded to the front of the house where the living room was. I peered into the window and found Derrick lying face down on the floor, blood encircling his head. His eyes were closed, and I couldn't tell if he was breathing. I ran to the front door and burst inside, rushing over to Derrick. Nothing was adding up. Why would Patti try to kill her own husband? I thought they were in this together.

  I knelt beside him and checked for a pulse. I could feel the slight flutter under my fingers. He was alive. Thank God!

  I reached under the waistband of my shorts and pressed the Emergency Call button. I was startled by a noise behind me and turned my head. Blinding pain shot through my skull.

  Then everything went dark.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  The first thing I noticed was the smell—damp earth and mildew. I cautiously opened my eyes, and pain ricocheted through my head. Gingerly I tried to reach up to touch the back of my head where the pain seemed to be originating but found I couldn't because my hands were bound behind my back. Well that sucked.

  I looked around. It was dark in what appeared to be a storage shed, and the light coming through the door was dimmer than I thought it should be. How long had I been out? I assumed it was the shed Summer and I had snooped around earlier, if I was still on the Stones' property. If it was the same one, someone had moved all the surfboards. Turning my head to my right, I gasped.

  "Summer!" I called out. Her head was lolling on her chest, her blonde hair stringy and sticking to her face. Her eyes were closed, but surely she wasn't dead. I choked back a sob. I scooted over as close as I could get to her.

  Bumping her with my shoulder gently, I tried again. "Summer, honey. Can you hear me?"

  She mumbled something incoherent. Oh, thank God! She was alive at least. But what had Patti given her? And how much?

  I looked around for something I could use to get out of these zip ties. I had one of those moments where I regretted not paying more attention to those videos on Facebook about how to escape from zip ties. Something about moving your hands to the front and pulling? I couldn't remember. It just goes to show, you never know when you'll need seemingly useless information.

  A groan sounded from the far corner of the shed. I peered through the darkness to find a woman in a pink velour tracksuit propped up in the corner. Her head lay listlessly to one side, and she tried to lift it and open her eyes, only for it to fall back to her shoulder.

  Patti Stone. But if Patti hadn't killed all those people, then who—

&nb
sp; "Hello, Autumn. Glad you could join us."

  "You!"

  Standing in the doorway, her mousy brown hair flat against her head, glasses perched slightly askew on her nose, and a sick, twisted grin on her face, was Annie Morris.

  She threw her head back in maniacal laughter. It did weird things to her face, contorting her features as if she was possessed.

  "Of course it was me. Who else would have the brainpower to orchestrate all this? Patti Stone?" She laughed again. "That woman has nothing but hot air up there."

  "I don't understand."

  "That's no surprise. Although you were starting to get a little too close for comfort. When I overheard Patti telling you about the pufferfish and saw you snooping in her office, I knew the time had come to do away with you. I'd hoped all your snooping would lead to Patti dearest and not to me. But you just wouldn't leave it alone." She crossed the threshold and paced back and forth. "You have more lives than a cat. I'd hoped your car would tumble down the embankment or that one of those bullets would have found its place in your skull, but as with everything else, it seems taking care of things up close and personal is the better choice."

  "Derrick. He's up at the house, bleeding. You need to call the police, Annie."

  She laughed that crazy laugh again and shook her head. "How do you think Derrick got in the condition you found him in?"

  "But why? You seemed so grateful to him for the job and home he'd given you."

  "A job. That's all I was to him, stupid man."

  Annie's pacing was starting to make my head hurt.

  "Do you know that for four years he's promised to leave that airheaded bimbo over there? Four years he's dragged me along."

  "But I saw him at the Classic earlier. How did he get here?"

  "Just a well-placed phone call informing him that the cops had the place surrounded and were going to bust him. When he arrived back home, I'd hoped he would take me with him. That finally we'd be together. But he told me to stay behind while he and Patti fled the island. A pewter candlestick to the head took him down. His head wasn't quite as hard as yours is."

  Did that mean he was dead? He'd still had a pulse when I checked him, but maybe he'd died after Annie had hit me.

  "But why kill him?"

  "Why? I've done everything for him. I wasted my best years on him. Lied for him. Killed for him. And what do I get in return? Nothing."

  "You killed Noe, Kailani, and Phil?"

  "Duh."

  This Annie was so unlike the quiet, awkward girl I'd met.

  "And what did he say when I told him? That I'd done it all for him? He called me crazy. Crazy!"

  There she went with the hysterical laughter again. It was the creepiest thing I'd ever heard. I kept waiting for her head to do a 360-degree turn.

  "He said he loved me. But it was all a lie. So he had to die. And her too." She motioned at Patti.

  I followed her gaze and took in the drool on Patti's velour jacket. Patti did not do stoned well. If I hadn't been tied up and looking into the eyes of a crazy person, I might have found that funny.

  "How did you know the cops were there?" I asked.

  "I set it all up. I'm the one that leaked the tip to the police."

  So she didn't know that Dax was working with the police then.

  "So why am I here? And what about Summer? She's innocent in all of this."

  "You were eavesdropping in the hallway at the spa. I knew then that you were onto us. Then I saw you that day from the veranda, snooping around the shed. You knew too much. It's why Kailani and Phil had to die. They'd decided after I killed Noe that they were going to go to the police with what they had on Derrick. Of course they never suspected me. If they'd taken out Derrick, then where would I be? I hadn't had the time to syphon enough funds to get out of here. And don't be mistaken. I plan to leave just as soon as this nasty little business is behind us."

  Annie started towards me, determination in her gaze.

  "Wait!" Oddly enough she stopped her forward progress, her head tilting to the side like those demon possessed girls in horror flicks. I shook off the shivers that ran up my spine and asked, "If you were on to me all this time, why didn't you tell Derrick?"

  She shrugged, looking blankly at Patti as she spoke. "I thought he'd be proud of all I'd done for us. I wanted to handle all the problems myself, not go running to him like a little girl to her daddy."

  Her lip curled as she stalked toward me like a lion to its prey.

  "And you"—Annie pointed her long, skinny finger at me—"with your picture taking. All. The. Time. I mean, what is it with you? I thought stealing your camera would take care of that irritating habit, at least until all this was behind me, but no. You had another one."

  I was getting scared that I wasn't going to have time to get out of this mess. Surely Jimmy had received my phone call by now. Or Detective Ray?

  "So you killed those people? Because they were going to tell the police about Derrick's drug running?"

  "No one suspects the mousy girl that blends in with the scenery. It's amazing what you can get away with."

  She held up her fingers, ticking items off one at a time, backing away from me as she paced again, left to right. It was like watching a tennis match. Except she was a deranged killer and not Serena Williams in a cutting-edge catsuit. "No one saw me set fire to the Royal Orchid, ensuring Derrick would have the home field advantage. No one saw me switch out Noe's plates that night. Killing Patti's favorite pet fish was just an added benefit. It was easy to find his plate since Noe didn't like his food to touch. Prima Donna." Annie whipped back around and walked toward me. "I always have that big bag with me, so it was easy to make the switch as soon as Noe's plate was ready."

  "And then Kailani. She was so trusting. No one saw me knock on her door that day. She never suspected the shy, meek personal assistant would do her harm. Boy, was she surprised when I injected her with heroin. I had to give her a lethal dose so that I could get her into the tub to slit her wrists. Who knew she was so heavy?"

  "But how did you get the drugs?"

  I knew the answer. At least I thought I did. But I wanted to hear her say it.

  "Why Derrick, of course. I just snuck a little here and there. Enough to make my victims practically comatose, giving me ample time to set up the crime scene to make it look like suicide."

  I wasn't getting out of this alive. The thought hit me like an anvil falling from the sky. No way would Annie be spilling her secrets if she intended to give me any chance of escaping. I couldn't see a single way out of here, but I hoped if I kept her talking it would give someone enough time to rescue me.

  "And Phil?"

  "Phil was another matter altogether. Once he was paralyzed, stringing him up was a bear. That boy was heavy."

  The nonchalant way she spoke of hanging Phil sent chills scattering across every nerve ending in my body. These were no crimes of passion or even a jilted lover. This was the cold, calculated acts of premeditated murder.

  "Everything I did, I did for Derrick. What did I get in return? Nothing. But who gets the last laugh this time? I do. And since he and Patti gave me all the passcodes and account numbers for their bank accounts, and since they'll no longer be among the living to protest, I'll be living in paradise for the rest of my life, while he's rotting in the ground."

  I'd never thought about what evil personified looked like. Maybe Charles Manson or Osama bin Laden. But right then, looking into the eyes of Annie Morris, I was encountering evil at its finest.

  "He made me feel special," she continued, not even concerned now if I was interested in listening or not, so caught up in her own tirade. "But it was all lies! And that, that tramp! Always getting in my way. And now she'll pay."

  Annie walked over to Patti, and even though I wasn't Patti's biggest fan, I didn't want to see her killed right in front of me.

  "Wait! Why did you pull Summer into all of this? What has she done?" I asked, hoping to divert her attention from Patti
back to me. It worked like a charm.

  "She was here that day when Patti opened her big mouth about that stupid fish. Plus, she's your friend, and I figured you'd shared your assumptions. I can't have her sticking her nose into things once you wind up dead."

  "But how did you get her to come here?" I ignored the part about my impending death.

  "I told her Patti lost the paperwork that Juls wanted signed to renew their contract with the resort. Of course she said she'd do it on Monday, but I explained that Patti was frantic and was insisting a new copy be brought over today. Patti's reputation was enough to convince her I was telling the truth, and she hurried right over."

  Poor Summer. I hated that she'd been roped into all of this. Now she was going to die just for being my friend.

  "How do you think you're going to get away with killing all of us? The police will figure it out as soon as you disappear, and you'll spend the rest of your life looking over your shoulder."

  "Why, a murder-suicide of course!"

  "I don't understand."

  "You and Summer stopped by the house unannounced, more of those annoying photos you take, and you stumbled upon Patti standing over Derrick's lifeless body. She was enraged and hit you both over the head with the same pewter candlestick. Don't worry. I'll give you the good stuff like I gave Kailani and Phil. You won't feel a thing."

  "But the police—"

  "The police will find the confession note, written by Patti, confessing to be the one to kill Noe, Kailani, Phil, and Derrick. Patti was jealous of the surfers' affections for Kailani. If she couldn't have them, no one could. She'll tell them that Derrick was responsible for the drug ring, and then she'll shoot herself in the head—too guilt ridden to continue on."

  The picture she painted sent cold ice crawling down my spine. Annie reached behind her, pulling out a syringe and a vial. "Don't worry, Autumn. Just a little prick, and it will all be over."

  She was going to kill me. She was going to stick that needle in my arm, and I wouldn't be able to fight her off. I had to do something. I wasn't going down without a fight!