Inn Danger

by Dixie Davis

  If this kept up, she’d end up beating the rugs before long.

  The door swung open and in bounced the Besases. Lori smiled, grateful for that one ray of sunshine. “Did you have a nice day out?” she asked.

  “Oh yes,” Chelsea bubbled. “We can’t wait to come back!”

  “Well, I hope we’ll see you again really soon. Want me to go get your bags?”

  “Yes, please.”

  Lori retrieved their suitcases from the corner of her office and handed them over. Both Manuel and Chelsea thanked her and headed out.

  If only all her guests could be that easy. No more murderers, no more murder victims, just happy people coming here for fun and relaxation.

  Lori laughed at herself. That reality existed on the same plane as the perpetual vacation she’d sometimes fantasized about. Certainly not in the real world.

  The door swung open again, and in stepped Shawn. The yellow scrolls of oak leaves on the wallpaper seemed to move a foot closer, as if the room were shrinking. Lori made an effort to look down, focus on what she was doing: scrubbing at an imaginary spot on the sideboard.

  Normally, she set out a snack here for guests. But she’d been so preoccupied trying to figure out if this guest was a murderer that she hadn’t set out any offerings today.

  “Hi,” Shawn said.

  “Hello.” Lori concentrated on a different, equally invisible spot beside the first.

  “You seem . . . frustrated.”

  Lori let go of the rag and looked up. Frustrated? Certainly. But not by any cleaning conundrum.

  There had to be some way she could use this to help her, though. What did she need from Shawn?

  Facebook. Of course. “Actually, I’ve been working on my online marketing today.”

  “Oh,” Shawn said in a tone that seemed to go beyond sympathy to I’ve definitely been there. “What’s the problem?”

  “I’ve been working on Facebook, and I want to start adding guests as friends, but I don’t think it’s working.”

  Shawn’s brow wrinkled. “Why not?”

  “Well, just now, I was trying to add you as a friend — if that’s okay — and invite you to like our page.”

  “Sure.” Shawn pulled out his fancy smartphone from his pocket. “Let me check it out.” He tapped around on his phone’s screen and then turned it to show her. A miniature version of the Facebook website showed with the familiar blue bar at the top. He pointed to the picture of her by her friend request. “Is that you?”

  Lori glanced at the photo. Doug had taken the picture last year, after her makeover, and she still loved it. Didn’t he recognize her? Was he saying she didn’t look that good now? “Yes, that’s me.”

  Shawn nodded and turned the phone back to himself, tapping the screen again. “There you go, we’re friends now.”

  “I guess that makes it official, huh?”

  Shawn managed a small smile. “Glad I could help.” He drew a deep breath and released it slowly. “Feels good to do something for someone else again.”

  Lori studied him a moment. Who was this guy, and why would he want to kill Debbie? How would he even know her?

  Now that they were Facebook friends, maybe she could find out. But first she’d have to get Shawn to move on, since she didn’t have a nice, fancy phone that could get on Facebook right here.

  And that would be rude, anyway.

  “Any plans tonight?” she asked.

  “Just one last quiet night in, thanks.” Although that wasn’t really the end of a conversation, Shawn took it as such and turned to leave.

  As soon as he was upstairs, Lori stowed the dust rag in a drawer and hurried back to her office. She pulled up Facebook and found Shawn’s profile again. This time, she could see everything: pictures, posts, links he’d shared. She clicked on the photos and held her breath.

  The page loaded and Lori started scrolling. The first page held no dark-haired women, just Shawn out on the water in a little boat, or pictures of sunsets and mountains.

  Lori frowned, but scrolled down to the next set of photos. No dark-haired women, just more nature shots.

  The third page of pictures finally did feature someone else: a young, red-headed woman and a little girl with fluffy, strawberry blonde curls.

  If Shawn had just gotten divorced, could this be his family?

  Lori scrolled through the rest of the photos quickly, but found no more helpful pictures, just family and nature photos.

  Her shoulders fell in defeat. She’d been so sure it was him — but she’d been wrong before. Very wrong. It wasn’t impossible.

  Lori clicked back to his main profile and started scrolling there, digging deeper and deeper into his past. Finally, she couldn’t read any more of the words streaming by. She’d already dug far enough to find pictures of his presumably ex-wife.

  She scrolled back up through the page, rechecking for any posts she’d missed. And then she saw it, six months ago:

  I know this is a long shot, but with all the changes in my life, I’ve been trying to get back to my roots. I’m looking for my bio mom. Do any of my friends have any contacts in the Wilmington/Brunswick County NC area? I was born at Dosher Memorial Hospital in 1975.

  Lori sat back in her chair. 1975? Lori turned twelve that year, which meant Mitch and Chip and Debbie were around sixteen.

  Her heart made a slow trip southward as the realization set in. Could Debbie have placed a child for adoption as a sixteen-year-old?

  Lori wasn’t sure if this made more sense or less. Was Mitch or Chip the father? Did Shawn know?

  And if Shawn had finally found his biological mother, how did he end up killing her?

  She couldn’t process this on her own, and she couldn’t rely on “ifs” and “maybes” and hunches for something this important. This was too important to bring up with Mitch or Chip without knowing which was the father — or if it was someone else. So who was she supposed to ask?

  Lori’s gaze settled on the wall above her desk. If there were windows there (and in the kitchen, the next room over), she’d be looking right at Dusky Card and Gift.

  Right at Debbie’s parents.

  Surely they were the right people to ask. Lori hopped up and almost ran across the street. At the last moment, she remembered she needed to go around back and diverted for the back door. She was lucky to find it unlocked and offered only a perfunctory knock before she burst in.

  Ray was at the kitchen table, halfway to standing, as if she’d interrupted him as he was coming to answer the door for her. He looked a little less cadaverous than he had over the last two days with the initial shock slowly wearing off. “Well, can I help you, Miss Lori?”

  She gasped for air — then again, and again. She really wasn’t used to running like that.

  The magnitude of what she was about to ask an already stressed and frail old man suddenly hit her. What if he didn’t know about this? What if it wasn’t true? She needed to tread carefully here, if at all.

  Lori held up a wait one minute finger and tried to catch her breath — and collect her thoughts. She hadn’t even brought food to soften the blow. How would this question end up? No way could this bombshell end well.

  Baby steps, she tried to tell herself. She had to take baby steps.

  Finally, she could take a full breath. “I’ve been looking at the case,” she said, building very carefully toward the revelation. “And I came across something.”

  Ray stood again and lumbered over to her, his bushy white eyebrows raised and waiting.

  “So, I have to ask.”

  He nodded for her to go on.

  Carefully. Very, very carefully. “Is there any reason why someone adopted from here in 1975 might think Debbie is his biological mother?”

  Ray skittered back a stutter step. Even in the dim light of the kitchen, his face seemed to grow paler, his age spots standing out. He rubbed a hand over his face and drew a breath, long and dee
p and slow.

  “Yes,” he finally said. “She had a baby, and he was adopted.”

  “He? It was a boy?”

  “Yes. Why?”

  Lori opened her mouth to respond, but then she realized how shaky that evidence was. Dosher Hospital probably had more than one baby adopted that year. How could she claim that Shawn was definitely Debbie’s son, Ray’s grandson? What if she were wrong?

  Even if she were right, she’d want Shawn to be able to tell them himself.

  “I can’t say for sure yet,” she finally replied. “I’ll let you know as soon as I can, though. Thank you for your help.”

  Ray gave the barest nod and shuffled back to his spot at the table. Lori made a mental note to bring over something for dinner in a little while and showed herself out, though she’d barely stepped in. She hadn’t even been there long enough to close the door behind her.

  She didn’t — couldn’t — run back across the street, but she hurried the best she could, still trying to make sense of this latest development.

  Debbie had placed a baby for adoption nearly forty years ago. And now he very well could be grown up and in her inn.

  This also meant there was no guarantee Shawn had killed Debbie. He’d come all this way, searching for years to find his biological mother. Why would he kill her as soon as he saw her? That didn’t make any sense.

  By the time Lori reached the back door of the inn, her heart felt light. Shawn couldn’t have killed Debbie. He wouldn’t. He was looking for her, and he’d finally found her. There was no reason to think he’d hurt her. In fact, he’d probably want to help find her killer, once the shock wore off.

  There might not be a shock, Lori realized, if his mother’s death was the reason he’d been sad most of the weekend. But that was a big if.

  Lori locked the back door before she realized she’d forgotten a very important question for Ray: who was the baby’s father? It didn’t really change anything about Mitch — that was what you did in those days if you were pregnant and too young to marry, and he’d been married to her for over two decades, so she already knew they’d had a relationship.

  But what if it was Chip? Would that change things for Mitch?

  Could they be much worse than they were now?

  Lori’s happy mood had turned a little more somber. She needed to know who the father was. Short of visiting a daytime talk show that would devolve into the usual soap opera, the easiest route would be asking Ray and Katie.

  She could run back across the street, but the first run had nearly killed her. It was the kind of question you had to ask in person. Maybe this was, too, but as a follow-up to the conversation they’d just had, Lori figured it wouldn’t be that big of a faux pas.

  She headed for the office to call Ray’s number. As soon as she rounded the corner to the hallway to her office, though, she noticed something wasn’t right. The door to her office was open.

  Didn’t she usually keep that closed? Lori bit her lip and moved closer — and then she noticed the other person in the dark hallway. She jumped back a step.

  Shawn moved forward into the light, holding up hands as if to calm her. “It’s okay, it’s just me.”

  Had she left in such a hurry that she’d left the door open, or had Shawn opened it? Had he gone inside? This whole area was marked private, clearly off-limits to guests.

  At the same time, she might have just figured out who this man’s biological mother was. She wasn’t even sure whether he knew yet. Should she tell him?

  It wasn’t her place — but then the person whose place it was, was dead. Could she figure out who his father was and get him down here to figure this out?

  Besides, if she said something, then he’d know she’d been snooping on his Facebook profile. Surely that wasn’t why he added his innkeeper as a friend, so she could dig through his metaphorical dirty laundry and not just the physical laundry in his room.

  Facebook could be a double-edged sword, she realized.

  And at this point, the silence was becoming awkward. Lori had to settle for asking, “Can I help you with something?” just to be able to say something when she really wanted to say everything.

  “Uh, yeah,” he said slowly. “I’m having a bit of a problem in my room.”

  Lori glanced at the ceiling. “In your room?”

  “Well, obviously I’m not in my room, but the problem is.”

  “Sorry, I’m short a handyman right now, so if it’s that type of problem, we might just have to make do for a little bit.”

  Shawn nodded, very understanding. “Sure, sure. I just — it’s not a problem in my room, per se, it’s a problem with my room.”

  “Oh?” Lori wasn’t sure why that changed things so much, but she was sure that it did. A problem in his room could be anything — his own luggage, dropping a book in the toilet, depression. Not really things she could help with. But a problem with his room definitely fell under her purview.

  It was entirely likely that any problem with his room would also require a handyman’s expertise, but Lori felt compelled to check now. If it could easily be resolved and everyone would be settled and comfortable, she’d definitely take the chance. And if not, at least she’d know what kind of help to look for.

  “Can I show you?” Shawn finished.

  “Of course.” Lori gestured for him to lead the way. She paused just long enough to pull the door to her office shut as she passed, then followed Shawn up the stairs.

  When they reached the upstairs hallway, though, Shawn hesitated. “Uh, can I ask something weird?”

  Lori didn’t know whether to agree without knowing what “something weird” might entail, but she just waited for him to say his piece.

  “I was just wondering — my room is so nice, very on-theme, and I was wondering — could I get a peek at the other rooms up here? If nobody’s staying in them, I mean.”

  “Oh. Sure.” She turned to head back down the stairs to get her keys, but Shawn beckoned for her to follow him again.

  “Actually, I think this one’s unlocked right now.”

  It was? Lori waited to see as Shawn tested the knob to the Carolina Beach Room. The handle turned.

  Had she been so distracted when she finished cleaning that she left it unlocked? Lori shook her head to herself and made a note to lock that door on her way out, too.

  She reached the door and pushed it the rest of the way open. “This is the Carolina Beach Room,” she announced, falling naturally into her grand tour spiel. “Like all of our rooms, it’s named after a local community here. This one happens to be Carolina Beach, which is about ten miles northeast of us as the crow flies — but it’s on the other side of the river, so you have to drive clear to Wilmington to get across.”

  “Ah.” Shawn nodded, meandering further into the room, admiring the large wooden cutout in the shape of the state with a weathered North Carolina flag painted on it. “Did you make that yourself?”

  “I commissioned it from a friend of a friend.”

  He turned to the large curtains strung across the far wall. “Does the room have a good view?”

  Lori crossed the room and pulled the cord to open the curtains, revealing the Cape Fear River flowing past the front porches. “Pretty much the best.”

  But rather than an appreciative response, Shawn just craned his neck. “Is the view better on the porch?”

  She tried not to frown but unlocked the sliding glass door and pushed it open, stepping out onto the porch. “See for yourself.”

  Again, she waited to hear his praise, and again it didn’t come. She turned back to him just in time to see the sliding glass door slam shut behind her.

  Shawn flipped the lock on the door and backed away a step.

  “Wait, what are you doing?” Lori slapped the glass, not hard enough to break it — was she willing to do that, when she wasn’t really in danger — yet? “Shawn!”

  He didn’t respond to her
, walking away to the door. Was he locking it?

  “What are you doing?” she called again. “This isn’t a good idea!”

  Shawn crossed the room back to her. “I’m sorry, but you know too much.”

  He didn’t look very sorry. And he must have been in the office. But what did he know?

  Lori turned away, looking out over the view that normally she loved. This wasn’t her favorite way to view it, however. The one problem with this view was that it was isolated. If they’d been on the other side of the house, facing the road instead of the river, she probably could have flagged someone down quickly. Here, someone would have to almost be on her property to see or hear her.

  But she was going to get out of this. She peered over the balcony railing. The direct route was probably not the best way. She’d already broken one foot investigating murders. No need to make the rest of her body match.

  Lori hugged her arms around herself. Winter was fighting back against spring, and tonight it was winning with the wind coming off the river. She didn’t have many alternatives right this second, but maybe her best choice was to get Shawn talking, explain why he was doing this, and think while he talked.

  What had he told her? That she knew too much? “Why? What do I know?”

  “I saw her picture in your office. I saw my Facebook post up. Should have deleted it.” He shook his head, his jaw clenched, as if he couldn’t believe his own stupidity.

  “So Debbie was your mother?”

  Shawn only fastened her with a steely glare for a long moment. “My real mother was named Melony.”

  Lori noted the past tense there, though she didn’t think that information would be very helpful. Of course he must mean his adoptive mother. “Okay, right, Melony, of course. So who was Debbie to you?”

  He snorted. “Not what I thought. I wanted — I don’t know what I wanted.” He ran his hands through his dark hair and finally turned away.