An Unwanted Guest(64)

‘Shit,’ Lachlan mutters.

Crows gather and fly overhead, dark against the pale sky, and Sorensen watches them for a moment.

‘No signs of trauma,’ Sorensen says finally, glancing at Lachlan.

‘But who was she running from,’ Lachlan says, shaking his head, ‘out here without a coat?’

‘I don’t think she even knew.’





Chapter Thirty-two


Sunday, 10:05 AM


SORENSEN AND LACHLAN return to the hotel and deliver the bad news. Sorensen doesn’t think anyone expected Riley to still be alive, but it is difficult nonetheless. Predictably, her friend Gwen takes it the hardest. She sobs loudly and begins to rock, wailing uncontrollably. Sorensen sits beside Gwen, a hand on her shoulder until she calms down.

Finally, she and Lachlan leave the group and go to the privacy of the dining room, where Perez and Wilcox soon report that they are certain there is no one else in the hotel other than the people they know about. There are no signs of anyone having left. They tell her about the broken window and the branch, but they feel the branch likely broke the window on its own. Which means, Sorensen realizes, that it is highly likely that one of the people here is a murderer. For now, each one of them is a suspect. ‘I’d better caution all of them,’ she says to Lachlan. ‘To be safe.’

Sorensen’s first interview is with the hotel owner, James Harwood. She calls him into the dining room, where she has set up an interview table. Some of the warmth from the kitchen filters through. It’s taking a while for the heating to come back up. The shutters have been opened so that the room is filled with daylight. In the natural light, James looks terrible. She wonders how he will be able to go on without Bradley. He sits down in front of her. Beside her, Lachlan has his notebook out. She advises James of his rights, and he indicates that he is willing to proceed.

She begins gently. ‘James, I’m so sorry about Bradley.’

He nods, his lips firmly together in a deep frown, fighting back tears. She knows he’s no stranger to misfortune. His wife died of cancer some years back, and he’s raised Bradley these last few years on his own. He’s had his struggles with Bradley.

She leans forward a little and says, ‘This might be difficult to talk about, James, but you know I’ve known you and Bradley for a long time.’ He looks up at her with red-rimmed eyes. ‘You know I liked Bradley.’

He nods. ‘You’ve been good to us,’ he says, his voice a broken whisper.

‘So don’t take this the wrong way.’

He hunches his shoulders warily, as if he knows what’s coming. Of course he knows what’s coming. She’s certain he’s had these same questions himself, especially since Bradley was killed.

‘Is there any way Bradley could have been involved with this – this situation?’ She looks at him intently, with compassion.

He looks back at her tearfully. He takes his time answering. ‘Bradley was a lot of things, but he would never be involved in something like this,’ James says, his lips trembling. ‘He had his problems. You know that. You know what he was like. He was impulsive, he liked excitement – he thought he was invincible. Driving too fast, running with the wrong crowd. The drugs.’ He sighs heavily. ‘He liked money, and what it could buy. He didn’t want to have to work too hard for it. And he didn’t always know when he was crossing the line. But he was a good kid.’ His eyes flood with tears. ‘He wouldn’t do anything really bad,’ James says.

‘James, I don’t mean to suggest that Bradley could have had a hand in these killings,’ she says. ‘But perhaps he stuck his nose in, perhaps he knew something, something that got him killed.’

‘I’ve wondered that,’ James says at last, exhaling heavily. ‘He had this look that I recognized, the look he had that time he got caught dealing drugs. Remember? He was always so cocky, but he knew when he was in over his head. That’s the way he looked after we found Candice’s body.’ He shakes his head. ‘And I thought he looked tired, like he hadn’t slept that night, the night Dana went down the stairs.’ He looks up at her. ‘What if he saw something? What if he saw who did it?’

‘Did you ask him about it?’ Sorensen asks. James nods, tears running freely down his face now. He wipes them away. ‘What did he say?’

‘He said he was just freaked out about the murders, like everybody else.’ He looks down. ‘I didn’t push it.’

She puts her hand on his shoulder. ‘James, I doubt there was anything you could have done to make things turn out differently.’

He sniffs loudly. ‘Maybe if I’d tried harder to talk to him. I should have. And now he’s dead!’

She lets him cry, her hand resting on his shoulder. Finally, he wipes his eyes and blows his nose. He looks up at her and says, ‘Room 202, with the unmade bed.’

‘Yes?’

‘There’s no way that room was missed,’ he says. ‘There’s no way it wasn’t made up properly after the last guest left. That has never happened before. And once you can talk to Susan, the housekeeper, I think you will find that she says the same thing.’

‘So what do you think?’

‘I don’t think there’s anyone in the hotel we don’t know about. I never did. I know this hotel like the back of my hand. If there was someone else here, I think I’d sense it somehow. Or Bradley certainly would have. And he was certain there was no one else here. Maybe he knew who the killer was.’ He chokes back a sob. ‘I think that one of the guests is the killer, and whoever it is got into that room and messed it up to make us think there was someone else in the hotel. Bradley thought so, too. He told me.’ He looks at her harshly. ‘One of them killed my boy.’