by Sharon Dunn
EIGHT
After getting a few hours’ rest in the infirmary, Maya and David were released. They agreed that trying to work through the night with most everything shut down would be pointless though both of them were anxious to track down the poisoner.
They returned to their respective rooms to get more sleep so they could start the morning stronger and feeling more like themselves. Her stomach and throat still felt raw. She was going to have to eat very bland food for a while. At her request, Noah brought Sarge back to Maya’s room.
Once the security officer identified himself, she opened the door. Feeling a rush of affection, she gathered Sarge in her arms. “There’s my good buddy.” She leaned back and stroked his soft head. “I missed you.” Sarge wagged his tail and leaned into her petting.
“He’s a good guy,” Noah said.
She stood up and held a hand out to him. “Thank you for taking care of Sarge.”
“No problem.”
At least Noah was the one green-eyed crew member they could cross off the suspect list. “Were you able to track down the woman who delivered our food?”
“Yes. Angie said she didn’t see anything out of the ordinary. I questioned the rest of the crew who were on shift at the time your meal was being prepared, and all of them gave the same report.”
“So a dead end.” Still, it helped to know that they weren’t looking at passengers as suspects at this point.
She said good-night to Noah and closed the door making sure it was locked and dead bolted. Maya crawled into bed and invited Sarge up as well. Normally, the dog slept on the floor, but she’d missed him and the scare over harm coming to her partner made her want to be close to him.
Sarge snuggled in at the foot of the bed.
After taking the sleeping pill the infirmary had given her, Maya stared at the ceiling. Her mind raced with all that had happened. She’d have to at least text Lorenza about the poisoning and being able to narrow the suspect down to crew members. She wondered how things were going with the other cases the unit was dealing with. It wasn’t just the missing bride/wedding party murder investigation that was on the docket. There were two other much more personal cases. Eli Partridge the tech guru who helped the unit out was desperately trying to find his godmother’s survivalist family before it was too late. His godmother had cancer and her only wish was to see her son and his family.
Maya rolled over on her side hoping the sleeping pill would kick in soon.
The other investigation that was very personal for the whole unit concerned Lorenza’s assistant Katie whose aunt ran the family reindeer ranch, which had experienced the theft of some of their stock as well as someone opening a pen and letting reindeer out.
Hopefully, she would be back on shore and ready to help out soon enough. She closed her eyes, as her muscles grew heavy and she fell asleep.
She slept through the night until she heard David’s soft tapping on the door between their rooms.
“You up?”
“I’m awake but not ready.”
“Look, I’ve got a security situation that requires my attention. Once you’re ready, call me or get Hans to escort you. Text me and I’ll let you know where I’m at on the ship.”
“Okay.” Though she felt groggy from the sleeping pill, she sat up. David still seemed to keep military hours. He must not have taken the sleeping aid.
Maya got up, showered and dressed. When she texted David, he said he would meet her in ten minutes at her door. She read her Bible and waited.
Ten minutes later, a text popped up on her phone.
I’m here.
She hurried toward the door, slid back the dead bolt and prepared to turn the knob. But then a thought occurred to her. How hard would it be for the attacker to steal David’s phone or somehow make it look like the text had come from his phone?
She rested her palm against the door. “David, I need to hear your voice.”
“Maya, it’s me.” Even with the barrier of the door between them, his voice sounded strong. His voice possessed a warmth that made her feel inexplicably drawn to him.
She opened the door. David smiled, making his blue eyes light up. Maybe she was reading into things, but something about him seemed different. With all they had been through together, she was starting to feel a deep bond toward him. She couldn’t quite sort her feelings out. Especially since David had walls around his heart no one could climb over or break down, and he’d made it clear that he was a confirmed bachelor.
“I’m not sure where to start today with figuring out who is behind this,” he admitted.
“I assume all staff and crew have photo IDs, right?”
“Yes, the IDs allow different crew members access to different parts of the ship. Just like a driver’s license it lists eye color and all of them would be on file.” David confirmed. As the two of them discussed their next move, they walked side by side through the corridor. “Green is not the most common eye color, but we are talking a lot of guys to call in for questioning. We’d have to sort through the IDs by hand, though, because I don’t have software that would do that.”
As they stood by the elevator waiting for it to arrive, his blue eyes locked on hers. Her breath caught in her throat. What was going on here?
The doors opened, and they stepped inside. “I suppose we could head to the security office and at least get an estimate of how many suspects we’d be looking at.”
Maya was trying to concentrate on the case, but she couldn’t let go of why her heart was fluttering every time David looked at her. Sarge, who had taken up a position between them, seemed to pick up on her change in mood. The dog shifted his weight and then lifted his chin and made a noise that was between a moan and a growl.
David gazed down at Sarge and the elevator rose up another floor. “What’s up with him?”
“He’s just asking me a question.”
“About what?”
Her cheeks felt suddenly flushed. She stared at the wall. “David, do you suppose you’d ever consider having a home that wasn’t moving?”
“This job suits me. I don’t like the idea of being settled anywhere.” The doors slid open. “Why do you ask?” He stood aside so she could leave first.
She noted the probing intensity in his expression when she looked at him. “Just trying to get to know you better. Even with all that has happened, working this case with you has been good.” She stepped out with Sarge heeling beside her. Well, that was that. The little spark she felt began to wane. They were two very different people with incompatible ideas about what a good life looked like.
David moved to walk beside her. “You don’t think you’d ever like living on a ship?”
With his question, her feelings swung back toward attraction. “The ship has been fun...in the short term even with the investigation putting me in peril. I’m kind of a homebody though. Besides, Sarge needs a place to run and train.” His question made her wonder if maybe he was having some of the same feelings as she was. Hard to tell with this man, though.
David’s radio made a crackling noise. He pulled it off his belt and pressed the talk button. “Yes.”
“Missing child from the play area. Mom just called it in two minutes ago. Female three years old. Wearing yellow pants and a matching top.”
The voice was not Noah’s. It must be a different security officer.
“On it.” David broke into a run.
She and Sarge kept pace with him as they hurried to the deck where the play area was. Once they arrived there, it wasn’t hard to spot who the mom of the missing child was. The stricken expression on her face told Maya this was the woman.
There were people milling around the play equipment looking in nooks and crannies. A blond man in a security uniform hurried toward them.
“Hans what can you tell me?” David asked.
“We’ve locke
d down this deck, so no one can leave. The play area has been searched pretty thoroughly. I think the kid wandered off...or...”
Hans didn’t say what everyone feared. That the child had been abducted. Maya assumed if that became the presumed theory, hiding the little girl would be hard given that they could probably lock the whole ship down and room-to-room searches would have to be conducted. She hoped it didn’t come to that. Then another thought occurred to her, an even worse scenario but one that was more likely on a ship. What if the little girl had fallen overboard?
David scanned the play area and the shops beyond. “Obviously, we need to widen the search.”
“Some volunteers have already started to spread out,” Hans told him. “We’ve got an alert sent out. Any shop owners or passengers who see her will let us know right away.”
“Lot of area to cover,” David said. “Let’s go.” He took off at a jog, then looked back over his shoulder at her.
Maya waved indicating he should keep going. She’d be safe, Sarge was with her and there were plenty of people around.
She looked toward the mom who was clutching a stuffed animal to her chest. Maybe her K-9 partner could help out. Sarge was not a trained tracking dog but if he could follow the scent of a weapon, he might be able to pick up on that of a little girl.
Maya ran over to the mom. “Is that your daughter’s?”
The woman didn’t answer, but the teenage girl standing beside her did. “Yes, it belongs to my little sister Bess. We found it over there.” The teen pointed toward a slide.
“If we could borrow the toy, my dog might be able to pick up the trail of where your sister went.”
The teen nodded and lifted the stuffed animal out of the dazed mother’s hands.
“Find my little girl. Find my baby.”
“We’ll do our best.” Maya hoped her words communicated some degree of reassurance. She bent down and waved the toy in front of Sarge’s nose. The dog’s ear perked up, but then he sat back down on his haunches. Fighting off the disappointment, Maya kneeled so she was at Sarge’s level. She wasn’t going to give up that easily. Again, she lifted the toy to Sarge’s nose. “Come on, buddy. Do this for me.” She gave him the same command she used when he was tracking the scent of a weapon. “Find.”
Sarge stood up. He wagged his tail as if asking her a question. She nodded and stroked his head. “You can do this.”
Sarge stepped side to side and then put his nose to the ground. He took off toward the playground equipment ending up at the slide where the toy had been dropped and the little girl had last been seen. Sarge had the scent of the missing girl.
The dog yanked on the leash as he left the play area. Maya sprinted to keep up with him. The scent was probably fresh enough that it was still strong and distinctive. Sarge veered away from the main thoroughfare of shops and eateries down a side corridor, behind the establishments, where the employees entered and probably received deliveries to restock inventory when the ship was in port.
The dog doubled back and shot down a side corridor running even faster. Then he stopped and alerted beside a door. The sign indicated that this was the back entrance to a French bistro.
Maya glanced up and down the corridor not sure why Sarge had stopped. Praying he hadn’t lost the scent, she was about to open the door to the back side of the café when she heard an odd squeaking sound. Sarge let out a single yipping bark.
He tugged on the leash. Straining toward the noise, they turned down yet another hallway. Up ahead a woman pushed a cart stacked with fresh folded table linens. The bottom of the cart was concealed by a fabric skirt.
Sarge jerked on the leash and yipped again.
The woman pushing the cart craned her head to look back at them.
“Could you wait up for just a second!” Maya jogged toward the linen cart while Sarge heeled beside her.
The Malinois shifted his weight side to side.
“Your dog seems upset,” the woman said.
“Just excited,” Maya explained. She lifted the fabric skirt and let out a huge sigh of relief. It was Bess. The little girl, all dressed in yellow, was asleep on the folded linens. Curly brown hair surrounded a round pink-cheeked face, and the child sucked on two fingers while she slept. Maya straightened up and spoke in a whisper. “You’ve been hauling a sleeping toddler around.”
“What?”
“You must have had the linen cart close to the playground at some point.”
“Yes, I parked it there while I went in to talk to a friend who runs one of the nearby shops.” The woman looked a little guilty.
“No harm done. She must have crawled on when no one was looking.” Maya lifted her head, searching for a sign or direction arrows that might tell her where she was. “If you could just tell me what this part of the ship is called.”
“This is the east corridor hallway deck four.”
Maya pulled out her phone and texted David.
Toddler has been found. Bring her mom. She texted the location.
Bess made a moaning sound and started to stir. Maya feared if the little girl woke up and saw only strangers she might be scared. All her concerns were allayed when she heard a sweet voice say, “Doggie.”
Leave it to Sarge to break the ice. He wagged his tail but looked to Maya for permission to move. Bess poked her head out. When she looked at Maya her forehead crinkled. Her gaze wandered to the hallway and the feet of the woman who had pushed the cart.
“Bess, your mom will be here in just a minute. May I help you get out of there?”
The toddler nodded.
Maya reached in and pulled Bess out, setting her on her feet. The little girl took her fingers out of her mouth and pointed again at Sarge.
“You can pet him.”
Bess giggled as she stroked Sarge’s head. The dog leaned into the child’s touch clearly enjoying the attention.
Footsteps muffled by carpet rushed up the corridor. Bess’s mother ran toward them and swept the toddler up into her arms. She was laughing and crying at the same time as she held her child close.
David had been right behind the mom. Bess’s sister followed, rushing toward mother and child.
“You scared all of us kiddo,” the sister said.
After thanking Maya several times, the family headed down the hallway. The mom held Bess and Bess’s sister patted her sibling’s curly head as they disappeared around the corner.
“I’m glad everything turned out okay. Happy endings are always the best,” murmured the woman pushing the linen cart. “I have to get back to work.”
David’s expression’s glowed with affection as he looked toward Maya. “Good job.”
“It was mostly Sarge’s nose and instinct. He’s always had a connection with kids.” Again, when he looked at her, she felt that heart flutter.
“Maybe someday, you’ll be married and Sarge will have some kids to watch over.”
“I wouldn’t count on it,” she said. “Dating and being a K-9 officer don’t seem terribly compatible.”
“You never know.”
She wondered why he was bringing up kids and marriage. As they stood there alone in the hallway and she felt the jolt of attraction between them, she had to remind herself not to read into the conversation. David had told her flat out that he was not interested in any kind of settled life.
“Are you hungry?” he asked.
“Starving.”
“Let’s go down to the crew kitchen. We’re going to have to cook our own meals from now on. Or eat things sealed in packages.”
“That seems like a reasonable precaution,” she agreed. “Maybe we can kind of casually ask around while we are making breakfast. I know Noah asked some questions of the crew that was on duty last night, but it never hurts to probe people’s memories.”
David fell in step with her. “Soun
ds good. We can poke around and see if we can find any possible sources for the poison although I suspect that if there was anything left of what was used, it’s been tossed overboard.”
“It’s just a little two easy to get rid of evidence on a ship, isn’t it?” She said.
“Yes, and bodies too. Not trying to be morbid. But in some ways a ship is a perfect place to commit a crime.”
She kept pace with him. “Except that the culprit is trapped on the ship.”
“Until we get into port.”
As they made their way through the ship to the crew kitchen, Maya felt a tension in her muscles. They had to find the murderer. The clock was ticking.
* * *
By the time David and Maya entered the crew kitchen after leaving Sarge in the room, the early morning rush was over. His stomach growled. There were only a few stragglers and one chef cleaning up. Most of the people still in the kitchen probably had the day off or worked night shifts and could afford to have a late breakfast.
He turned toward Maya. “What do you feel like eating?”
Her face blanched. “What would be the safest?”
She must be remembering the trauma of the poisoning. “The safest would be dry granola bars, but I think if I make pancakes from scratch, we should be fine. The place is not crowded. Chef is just finishing up. We’ll be the only ones in the kitchen so we can keep an eye on everything.”
“Great, and I’ll scramble some eggs.”
He fired up one of the griddles while she searched one of the industrial-sized refrigerators. She returned with eggs and milk. He went to the pantry to retrieve the flour and baking soda. On his way, he flung open a cupboard where he knew cleaning supplies were stored. It seemed a futile activity to try to figure out what had been used to poison them. Once they could get the samples to a lab, maybe they would reveal something about the killer, but for now it seemed the best choice would be to try to narrow down the suspects.
He returned to where Maya was waiting for him.
“I got the eggs mixed up in a bowl. But I didn’t want to pour them on the grill until the pancakes were close to being done. That way everything will be warm and yummy.”
