Hang Ten Australian Cozy Mystery Boxed Set

by Stacey Alabaster

  “I’ll help you look for it,” Bianca offered.

  I almost said don’t even bother, but instead, I gritted my teeth. “Fine.” I was going to need all the help I could get.

  Of course, my old friend Mr. Concierge did not want a part of me. Nigel, his name was, I finally found out. “Nigel. I was a guest in room 203. If you don’t let me look for my diamond, I will essentially consider that to be theft.” He just ignored me and attended to a guest that was checking in. But I got my way in the end by saying, “This is terrible customer service. An actual outrage. I will be letting all the online review sites know about this and giving you zero stars on each. And now that I know your name, I can specifically mention how unhelpful you’ve been.” I was finally allowed access once more to room 203 and handed him my credit card for protection.

  But he insisted on walking us up the elevator and down the corridor of floor 20 and wouldn’t even let us go into the room unsupervised. I started putting my hand down into the cracks of the sofa and looking under benches while I felt his hot eyes on me.

  When he was called away to take care of a plumbing emergency on the second floor, I was relieved. Even though I wasn’t doing anything wrong, him watching me like a criminal made me feel like I was. But I was starting to reach frustration point. No sign of the diamond.

  Bianca reached underneath the sofa and stretched her hand right underneath. When she pulled something out, I become hopeful. But it was far, far too big to be a diamond and my heart sank again. “What is this?” she asked me, turning it over.

  I walked over and took it off her. Woah. It was a small medallion. “It’s a prize from the surfing competition that Alyson is in.” For third place. But it was strange. I didn’t think it belonged to Alyson. She’d never entered that competition before so it couldn’t have been from a previous year, and she hadn’t even reached the final of this year. And what was it doing pushed so far underneath the chair? Ah well. Maybe it was just a fake one she had gotten made up so that she could ‘manifest’ the real one. That was definitely something she’d do. I wasn’t sure why she’d go for bronze instead of gold, but she probably had some ridiculous explanation like it was a ‘more realistic manifestation to aim for’ or something.

  I placed it in my pocket to give back to Alyson when she finished her semifinal today. Maybe it would even be a sort of olive branch. She was probably looking for it and I was sure she’d think it was a good luck charm. I checked the time. We had about forty minutes before it started. Time to get looking for that diamond.

  It finally hit me where it would be. I strode into the bathroom and checked behind the cabinet.

  “Found it!” I called out as Bianca came running. It was going to require a trip to the jewelers to get it reset, but I could worry about that later. Fat lot of use Bianca had been to me, though I supposed that she had found Alyson’s fake medal.

  “We’d better hurry,” I said, glancing at the time. I still wanted to leave a bit of a window. We hurried out and I spotted the maid with the pink hair in the hallway. She scowled at me and sort of shouted, in a very rude way that one should never use with guests, “I thought that room was unoccupied! You should not be in there!”

  Yikes.

  “We, uh… We are just leaving,” Bianca said. She raised her eyebrows at me and whispered, “Maybe we haven’t been tipping the staff enough.”

  “Come on,” I said, not really caring if Bianca came with me or not. But I had to make it to the beach before Alyson started to surf and also before the maid took that plunger off her trolley and hit me over the head with it.

  I thought I still had plenty of time. I thought her round started at 1:30 and that she wouldn’t be in the water until at least 2:00.

  But I had already missed her.

  19

  Alyson

  I toweled myself off. It wasn’t like I wanted her to watch anyway. And if she would rather run off and have fun with her new bestie, then good for her. What did I care? J ran up and gave me a hug, and Dovey told me that she had never seen anyone surf like that. I supposed the judges had been pretty impressed as well. Three 9.5s meant I was in the final.

  “Hey,” I said to Dovey. “Would you mind watching J for an hour or so while I go back to the hotel to shower and change?” My victory was feeling a little bittersweet, even though of course I didn’t care that Claire wasn’t there. I just wanted a slight breather. Some peace and quiet to gather my thoughts. Dovey grinned and said she would love to.

  But just as I was about to enter my room, I noticed a man, with long dark hair, who looked like a rock star, exiting Dovey’s room. “Who are you?” I asked him, stopping in my tracks. Did Dovey know that he was in her room?

  He looked at me and scowled. He was wearing thick eyeliner on both his top and bottom lashes. He looked like a panda bear. But also kind of hot.

  “I’m Isaac,” he mumbled as he locked the door and pulled the strap of his baggage up over his shoulder. He looked like he was on his way to checking out.

  But that name was familiar. “Wait, what? You’re Issac, Lola Bloom’s makeup artist?” My mouth dropped open. “The one who has been missing for three days?”

  “Yeah, and what is it to you?”

  “It’s everything to me,” I said. “I want to know what happened to Lola. And so should you. But by the looks of it, you are running away. Why are you checking out?”

  He just shrugged at me and threw a second bag over his shoulder. “Because I’ve got the good sense to stay out of this. And so should you. Seriously,” he said with one last meaningful glare before he walked off.

  What was going on with all these people? It was like there was some kind of massive conspiracy. A conspiracy that they were willing to kill to protect. Well, I had reached my breaking point. It was enough with all the threats and intimidations and scowls. I would no longer be put off. All these people were up to something, and I was going to find out exactly what it was. And not even the surfing comp was going to stop me. Not even my feud with Claire was going to stop me.

  “Thought I’d be able to find you here.”

  The karaoke bar was all lit up now that it was evening. As soon as I had seen the sign on the walk to her new hotel, I’d known that she wouldn’t be able to resist. Claire feeds off compliments like they are food. She breathes them like air. And the compliments she finds the most nutritious are those about her voice.

  I glanced up at the stage where Claire was adjusting the mic stand. She pretended to ignore me for a moment and walked off the stage icily towards the bar where I was waiting.

  She was silent for a few moments. “Sorry I missed your comp,” she said. Then, when she realized I wasn’t about to attack her, she added, “How did you do?”

  “I’m in the final for tomorrow,” I said, kind of staring at the floor. I still couldn’t believe it. “So you can always come and watch that… I mean, if you want to…” I mumbled.

  “I will be there.”

  “Cool.”

  She seemed sad, though. We made chitchat for a time while the bar started to slowly fill up with other hopefuls. “I always thought you might be happy if you and I became actual sisters.”

  “Well, it would be sisters-in-law,” I corrected her. “Not actual sisters.”

  She rolled her eyes a little. “You know what I mean. We would actually be related.”

  I couldn’t help myself from teasing, from poking the bear. “Yeah, but wouldn’t that mean that I would have a claim over your bookshop?”

  Claire actually let out a little scoff of laughter at that.

  She pulled herself up onto the stage and sat with her legs hanging over the edge. “I’m thinking about giving it all up, you know. This fight with Bianca just seems too hard. Maybe I should just let her have it.”

  What! That was crazy!

  “You can’t do that,” I said. “It’s your shop. Your baby.” Well, that and her car. But still. “It doesn’t belong to this blow-in who has never even v
isited our town.”

  Claire shrugged. She seemed defeated. “It’s my turn to go on.”

  I was confused. “But it says up here on the sign that karaoke doesn’t start until nine.”

  She glanced up at me a little coyly and couldn’t stop the smug smile from spreading over her face. “It’s open mic before that and I have a headlining spot.”

  Cool. She hadn’t bothered to tell me about any of that. I needed to get back to the hotel anyway. It was the final the next day, and I needed my rest.

  “Well, I suppose I will just leave you to your fun then,” I said, feeling like we were strangers.

  Claire nodded quickly. “Oh, okay. Cool. I mean, I guess this isn’t really your thing anyway.”

  “I’m just tired.”

  Before I walked out, she called to me. “So, Alyson… Are we okay?”

  I nodded back to her before I walked out the door. “Sure. Of course.”

  But I had to wonder, were we really okay?

  20

  Claire

  I was swinging to the rhythm again, lost in the music…lost in the vibes. No longer just a karaoke superstar, but a real singer in my own right. I was even getting paid fifty bucks for the gig. I started to add up how many slots I would need to do a week if I moved back to Sydney and tried to make a living as an actual singer. Maybe I could do it, if I survived off nothing but earth worms and fried cockroaches and air.

  There was a warm, loud applause this time and I soaked it all in before thanking the audience. One woman in particular was clapping loudly and started to walk towards the stage as I exited.

  I recognized her as the woman who had been looking after J earlier. According to Alyson, her name was Dovey and she had been Lola Bloom’s hair stylist before she had passed. I said hello and thanked her for coming as I climbed off the stage.

  “You’re a great singer, Claire,” she said. On the surface, it was a genuine compliment, but there was an air of bitterness underneath it. She wouldn’t quite let me past her. I was starting to get used to these obsessive fans. Now I knew what Lola had to put up with. I asked her what she was doing at the bar and if she was going to try her hand at karaoke later.

  She stopped smiling and her face dropped. “Yes, I’ll have to, seeing as I couldn’t get an open mic spot. Not all of us are as lucky as you are.”

  Wow. Someone sure was cranky about not getting an open mic spot.

  She was one of the first of the karaoke participants to get on stage. I decided that I would stick around and watch her in support, assuming that her voice would sound like a cat being swung around a small hotel room.

  But I was stunned to find out that she was a brilliant singer. Perfect pitch, a bit smoky. Interesting and layered. And not only that…her voice sounded strikingly familiar. But I couldn’t quite place where I had heard it before.

  A man wearing leather was approaching me.

  “Oh, hi, Zan.”

  “Hello, Claire.”

  21

  Alyson

  The final round. Bondi Beach was so packed that you couldn’t even get a spot on the sand standing up, let alone on a beach towel. I had to use my surfboard to push people out of the way, and it was only when they noticed the number “42” that I was wearing on my chest that they realized I was an actual contestant and let me through with awe, like I was Moses parting the Red Sea.

  But I didn’t feel like a biblical character. I felt like a total fraud as I reached the edge of the water.

  It was just me versus all the best surfers in the world…an easy task, right?

  I glanced back over my shoulder at the stands. There was a young guy waving at me. He started to race over. All these admirers that we women had, hey?

  “Hi, Yalcin,” I said. I was a little wary. Partly because I knew my name was about to be called to compete and partly because I had no idea what he was doing there. We hadn’t spoken since he’d leaked the news of Lola’s death to the press, and I had no idea what to say to him.

  “We haven’t spoken in a while,” he said. “How have you been?”

  I raised an eyebrow. “You told the press.”

  He nodded and shoved his hands into his pockets. “Right. Maybe I shouldn’t have done that… I was upset. Angry at her for lying to me.”

  I shrugged a little. I still wasn’t sure why he had come to meet me on the beach. Unless he had just replaced Lola Bloom with me. I was the latest target of his love and thus, his sadness.

  “You must be pretty talented,” he commented, looking down at my number 42.

  “I try my best.”

  Yalcin told me that he was over Lola Bloom now. That he’d never been one of her crazy fans in the first place. I laughed a little and told him that I had met some of those crazy fans and described Zan to him. “I was worried he’d started stalking me, but I haven’t seen him here today.”

  Yalcin frowned. “Yeah, I saw a guy like that hanging around a bit earlier…but he seemed more interested in your friend than you, to be honest. You know, that blonde girl? She’s your friend, right?”

  I scanned the stands and realized that Claire was not there. There was no way she would have missed the final. Not with how sorry she was to have missed the semis.

  Oh my gosh. Claire had been singing at that stupid karaoke bar. What if she had been right all along? What if she really was glamorous enough to be the next victim? Zan might have mistaken her for an upcoming pop star and now that he knew Lola was dead, he might really have gone crazy.

  “Alyson Foulkes.”

  My name was being called over the speakers.

  But I couldn’t stay. I couldn’t surf. My best friend needed me.

  Yalcin looked flushed with the thrill of the hunt. I thought he was just excited to be hanging out with a girl, to be honest. I’d called a cab to take us to Claire’s hotel. She wasn’t answering her phone and I figured that would be the best place to start looking. “Thank you!” I said, hopping out of the cab.

  “Where are we going?” Yalcin asked, confused when we headed for the parking lot.

  “To look for a gold Porsche,” I said. “Trust me, if the car is here, then Claire is here.”

  On the cab ride over, Yalcin had told me that he had seen who he thought to be Claire talking with who he thought to be Zan and had seen them leaving the stands together. I just hoped this was where they had come to. When I saw the gold sheen, I heaved a sigh of relief. At least we had the right place.

  Just as we were about to leave, I saw a woman wearing a leather coat with a fur trim collar walking into the parking lot in the vague direction of the Porsche. But I assumed she was heading towards the entry way to the hotel. Strange. Wasn’t she still staying at The Onyx? She reached into her purse and pulled out her keys like she was about to use them as a weapon.

  “What is it?” Yalcin asked.

  “Wait,” I said, hushing him as I pulled him back out of the way so that we were hidden behind a thick column. We had accidentally gotten far too close and he was smiling at me with his arm wrapped around me. I sure hoped he didn’t think we were about to kiss.

  “What is she doing?” I whispered

  Yalcin shrugged a little. “Why don’t we just go ask her?”

  I just stared at him. Didn’t he know how this worked at all? You couldn’t just go up to someone and ‘ask’ them when they were doing something suspicious. You had to hide in the shadows and watch them.

  “She is pretty,” Yalcin commented.

  He seemed to think every woman was pretty, especially if they had blonde hair. He probably thought that Claire was as well. “She’s my friend’s cousin.”

  Oh my goodness. She was heading straight towards Claire’s car and its paint job with the keys ready to go. “The Porsche!” I whispered in a sort of muffled scream, then put my hand over my mouth in case she heard me.

  “Where are you going?” Yalcin asked me.

  “To save Claire’s car.” She’d never forgive me if I just stood back a
nd watched her baby get murdered.

  “Got you!” I screamed, jumping out at a stunned Bianca.

  Bianca spun around and looked like she’d seen a ghost. She tried to make a dash for it, but Yalcin was on the other side and she was trapped. I nodded at Yalcin and gave him a little wink of approval. He looked proud of himself.

  “So you are the one who attacked Princess’s car?” I was breathless both with outrage and also shock at the fact that I had been right. Bianca was bad, bad news. We should never have trusted her.

  Bianca was like a cornered animal. She still had the keys out, ready to pounce on the Porsche if either Yalcin or I got too close to her. “So what are you going to do about it?” she asked in a low growl. “If you tell Claire, it will be your word against mine.”

  I laughed. Claire would believe me, and we both knew it. “Well, your plan didn’t even work. You didn’t scare Claire off,” I said, taking a step towards her. “And it won’t work this time either. When she finds out about this, she is going to fight even harder to keep the bookshop and you also will have lost your new best friend for good.”

  She put the keys back in her pocket and pushed past me to storm out.

  Hey, she could very well come back as soon as we left the parking lot, but we had other things to attend to. I grabbed Yalcin by the arm and started to head towards the door that led from the parking lot to the ground floor of the hotel. Now that Princess had downgraded, there was basically no security to stop me.

  “This is fun,” Yalcin said.

  I glanced back over my shoulder before we exited. No sign of Bianca coming back. But if she was the one who had attacked the car, had warned Claire to back off the case, then didn’t that mean that I had been right—that she had been involved in Lola Bloom’s death?