Elisabeth Crabtree - Pink Flamingo Hotel 01 - Death by Pink Flamingo (20 page)

“And if Jesse d
idn’t give him one?” I asked, praying that if Luke had caught up to Jesse, he had surrendered.

“Oh, I doubt Jesse will
have done that. As far as Jesse knew, Luke was planning on killing him.”

“Why
would he think that?” I asked, wiping away a tear that had spilled over onto my cheek.

He widened his eyes innocently. “Because I texted him an hour ago. Not with my own phone of course,” he assured me. “I sent him a friendly warning that Luke’s a loose cannon and he better watch out.” He looked up. “
If I’m really lucky, they killed each other. I think Jesse has it in him.”

My mouth dropped open. I could understand
Ryan wanting Jesse dead. It would be much easier to pin the deaths on a dead man who couldn’t defend himself, but why would he want to kill Luke? “He’s your partner, for God’s sake. I would think out of anyone you’d have some feeling for him.”

“You watch too much TV,” he chided. “It’s not like that. I couldn’t care less about him. Don’t get me wrong. I don’t hate the
guy, but it would make my life so much easier if he was dead.” He grimaced. “He scares me. He asks too many questions. How I’ve paid for my house, my car, my clothes. He’s been really subtle about it, but he’s been checking up on me. It’s only a matter of time before he catches on that I’m not exactly as in love with the rule of law like he is.”

“You don’t say. What happens if Jesse survives?”

He shrugged. “It’s possible. Did he tell you about his service record?”

I raised my eyebrow.
Service record
?

“Pretty
impressive, but Luke is pretty impressive too. Even if Jesse survives, he won’t for long. I don’t care how good he is. He’ll have the entire police force against him. We’ll hunt him down.” He widened his eyes. “I have to avenge my partner’s death, after all. Oh, and yours and Blake’s, as well.”

“Blake?”

He nodded toward the doors. “I lured him outside and bashed his head in.”

Swallowing hard, I asked,
“He’s dead?”

“If he’s not, he will be by the time I leave.” He reached under his coat and brought out his gun. “So, will you.”

“You’re going to shoot me with your service revolver? Isn’t that a bad idea? Won’t they be able to trace the bullet to your gun? You’re taking a bunch of risks.”

He rolled his eyes. “I’m not going to shoot you. Not unless I have to.” He motioned for me to move to the corridor past the front desk.

“What are you planning to do with me?”

“I’m so sorry, Anna,” he said sadly. “I always liked you. Who knows, if you hadn’t been with Jesse all those years ago, you and I may have …” At my withering look, he shrugged. “Well, maybe not.”

When we reached the door to the pool, he ordered me to rip the police tape down and unlock the door. Once we were inside, he shut the door behind him and replaced his gun. “Don’t worry; I’ll make it as painlessly as possible.”

I backed up as he held up his hands and advanced towards me.

“I wouldn’t do that, Ryan,” I said breathlessly. “You don’t want another murder charge added to the ones you already have.”

Stopping, he looked at me curiously. “What do you mean by another? I don’t have any murder charges against me.”

I reached into my coat pocket and brought out my cell phone. I held it up for him to see. “I think Luke would like to speak to you. I was on the phone with him when you showed up. He heard everything you just said.”

His hands shook as he jerked the phone from my hand and brought it to his ear. He stood there silently listening,
his face getting paler with every passing second. His voice lowered to a bare whisper as he spoke very softly into the phone. “Well, you’re not here yet, are you, hero?” He suddenly tossed the phone into the pool and in that same soft, low voice, said, “You know what, what’s one more murder?”

He ran at me, his hands reaching for my neck just as I reached into my pocket and pulled out a small can of mace I had kept on my keychain for the last four or five years. Turning away and shutting my eyes tightly, I sprayed it in the general vicinity of his face, praying that it was still effective. I wasn’t sure how much hit
him, since he knocked the can out of my hand in less than a second, but I was relieved when I heard him let out a grunt and then a guttural sound of pain.

Hoping the spray had incapacitated him enough to allow me to get away, I whirled around and raced toward the door. I didn’t get very far. He lurched forward, blocking my escape route. I turned around, preparing to dive into the
pool, when I felt him grab the edge of my raincoat and pull me back and down to the floor.

I lay on my back, panting, looking for a way
out, when I heard the sound of a siren in the distance.

Coughing, Ryan quickly moved away from where I had sprayed the mace and came to stand on the other side of me. He stopped and rapidly blinked his
eyes, which were turning redder and redder as he stood there. “I hate mace. You don’t even have to take a direct hit to the eyes for it to hurt. Luckily, you can build up a tolerance to the stuff. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been sprayed or gotten hit with some of it while spraying someone else.”

I glanced toward the door. The siren was definitely getting louder.

Ryan followed my gaze as the spray caused his eyes to well up with tears. He let out a series of coughs and then cleared his throat. “Luke’s still not going to be able to save you. There’s a huge palm tree blocking the road to the Flamingo. He’ll have to run.” Reaching underneath his coat, he added, “I guess it doesn’t matter whether I shoot you with my gun or not now.”

I held out my hands. “Ryan, wait. Luke already knows it’s you. There’s no reason to kill me.”

“Sorry, Anna. All I need to do is get that the recording Luke made of us talking thrown out of court.” He coughed. “If you’re dead that’s really all they have.”

I glanced over to the door as Ryan continued
mumbling to himself while grimacing. I could have sworn I heard Jesse calling my name.

“No, Ryan!” I said as loudly as I could, hoping that really was Jesse calling for
me, and not just some figment of my imagination. “It won’t work. It’s too late. Give up.”

Ryan ignored me. “Just need a good attorney. They have nothing. If I make that recording Luke made disappear, then everything will be okay.” Obviously in pain, he squinted and tried to focus on me. “I can’t let you testify against me.”

I screamed and crawled back as Ryan kneeled down next to me. He just started to lift his gun toward me when Jesse raced into the room.

Ryan
automatically swung his gun toward Jesse. I reacted more on instinct than anything else. I lifted my leg and kicked out at his wrist just as he took a shot. He didn’t let go of the gun, unfortunately, but his shot went wide, missing Jesse by a few feet and giving Jesse time to tackle him and drive him into the pool. I watched sort of dazed as they both began to struggle in the water, grappling over the gun Ryan still held in his hand.

A few seconds
later, Luke charged into the room. He took one look at me before diving into the water to join the fight. Between Luke and Jesse, they managed to subdue Ryan pretty quickly.

Breathing heavily, Jesse dragged Ryan out and threw him onto the tile. He knelt over the gasping man and reached for his throat. For a horrifying second, I was afraid Jesse was going to kill Ryan right in front of Luke. I was just about to call his name to stop
him, when Luke hopped out of the water and pushed Jesse off Ryan and toward me. Once Jesse was out of the way, he flipped Ryan over and cuffed him.

Relieved, I laid my head back down and closed my eyes. A few seconds later, a shaking and sopping wet Jesse joined me on the tile floor.

EPILOGUE

I walked down the crushed
shell path, moving to the side as a couple of children with arm floaties ran past me toward the outdoor pool. I followed them, smiling, as their parents yelled at them, “Walk! Don’t run!”

By the time I reached the pool, the children were already in the water happily splashing each other and another guest
who was lying on a raft nearby.

I walked around the pool until I reached the last pink
lounge chair and the man lying on his stomach on top of it. I sat down in the chair next to him and leaned back.

Sensing my
presence, Jesse turned his face to the side and lifted one eyelid. “How’s Blake?”

I shielded my eyes from the hot Florida sun as I looked into his handsome face. “He thinks he’ll be released from the hospital in a few more days.”

“Good. Did you tell him I plan on visiting him this afternoon?”

I smiled. “Look at you two. Best friends.”

“Hardly, but I do owe him. If he hadn’t called me and told me to get back to the hotel when he did, I might not have gotten there in time. Does he remember anything yet?”

“
He’s still pretty drugged up right now, but he told me he got scared and decided to call you for help. He said that Ryan showed up a few seconds later and knocked him out when his back was turned. I’m surprised Blake called
you
for help. I thought he was convinced you were the killer.”

He turned to his side and propped his head up with his hand.
“We had a nice little talk after you left us upstairs. I don’t know if I convinced him I was innocent, but I think he started to wonder what was going on when Lizzie got that phone call sending her to Gainesville and then a few minutes later, I got a text message sending me across town.” He reached out and caressed my cheek. “I’m just glad he called when he did. I couldn’t get back here fast enough. I should never have left.”

I brought my hand up and covered his. “Why did you?”

“I got a text message warning me that Luke—”

“No, I mean back in high school. Ryan told me a little bit about what happened,” I
said, before explaining what little I knew about the burglaries and the charges against him.

He dropped his hand from my cheek and rolled over on his ba
ck. “It was all so stupid,” he admitted with a sigh. “It all started the day after you left to visit your grandparents in Tennessee for the summer. That night the Crenshaw’s house was hit and Mrs. Crenshaw’s jewelry was stolen. The same thing happened a few days later to the Wallaces. Then my house got hit and everything in our safe was taken. Over six homes were burglarized in a span of one month.”

“Why did the police suspect you
?”

“It was my fault
,” he said reluctantly. “I decided to play detective. I figured out that our next-door neighbors were going to be hit next, so I decided to lie in wait. I thought I would catch the thief and be a big hero. I wanted to impress you.”

“You didn’t need to impress me, Jesse. I loved you.”

“Yeah, well, whether I had to or not, I was seventeen and wanted a big story to tell you when you returned, just in case you found someone else while you were away visiting your grandparents.” His face grew red. “Things didn’t quite work out the way I planned. The only person who got caught was me. They found me hiding under a desk in Christine Hazelrigg’s study. They naturally thought that I was the thief. You want to know what the funny thing was. I was right. Christine Hazelrigg did get hit that night. Over a hundred thousand in jewels were stolen, but they weren’t taken out of her study. They had been stolen from the safe in her bedroom. Despite the fact that I didn’t have any jewels on me when I was caught, everyone was convinced I was the thief, even my loving family. They paid off Mrs. Hazelrigg and the other families and then sent me far, far away, so I couldn’t embarrass them anymore.”

“Why didn’t you call me or write
? Something.”

“I
tried calling. Whenever I could, I’d sneak into one of the offices and use the phones, but the call would never go through. Every time I did that, I’d get caught or my uncle would find out somehow and I’d lose another privilege. I was being watched all the time. I couldn’t even email anyone. The only way I had of communicating was through mail. So, every week for a year, I sent you a letter, explaining where I was and why I left. When a year went by and I hadn’t heard from you, I grew so desperate that I ran away. It took me a while, but I made it all the way back here. I got here on the Fourth of July.” He smiled softly. “I found you in the park. You looked so pretty. So happy. I couldn’t wait to wrap my arms around you, but I didn’t get a chance. Simon came running up. He grabbed you by the waist and twirled you around.” His smile fell. “I stood there and watched as you both fell to the ground and rolled around in the grass. I left without saying anything to you. I found out from some of the kids in town that you and Simon were seeing each other. I figured he was the reason you didn’t write. I went back to the school that night.”

I reached out and took his hand.
“But, Jesse, I didn’t write because I didn’t know where you were. I never received your letters.”

“I know that now
,” he said tracing my wrist with his thumb. “I discovered that when I came back to visit my parents last year. I found all my letters to you in a box in my old room. My uncle had redirected all my letters to home. My dad didn’t want me to have any distractions while I got my head screwed on straight.”

I sat back against the lounge chair, angry with Jesse’s father and the stupid mistakes and misunderstandings that had kept us apart for so many years.
“What did you do after you saw me and Simon in the park?”

“I went back to
the academy, then college. I joined the ROTC and after graduation, I went into the army.”

“Ah, so that was the service record Ryan refer
red to.” I leaned my head back and closed my eyes. “I always wondered what happened to you. I figured you were married with a couple of kids by now.”

He
gently squeezed my hand. “I never forgot you, Anna. I ran into your uncle when I came back to visit my parents last year. He told me that you were in graduate school, but as soon as you graduated, you were planning to come home and help him run the hotel. That’s when I made up my mind to come back for good. When my contract with the army was up, I packed up and made my way back here.”

“And hooked up with Danielle.”

He ducked his head. “I needed to clear myself. There were still people here who believed I was nothing more than a thief. Most of them were in my own family. It didn’t matter what I did since I left, I had to prove myself. I started doing some investigating and discovered one common theme between all of the robberies was Henry Nelson.”

“
Danielle’s father?”

“
Yep, and head of Nelson’s security. He set up the security systems in all but three of the houses that were hit, and for the other three, he either had attended a party or knew one of the members of the household intimately. He died in a car accident a month after the Hazelrigg burglary, which explains why all the burglaries came to a crashing halt at the end of that summer. Which, unfortunately, coincided with my moving away,” he said with a rueful chuckle. “Once I discovered the link between the burglaries and Nelson security, I moved in on Danielle. I was hoping I could find anything that would help me prove that her father was the real thief. While I was investigating her, I learned about the thefts at the hotel. I was determined to stick close to her until I found proof that she and her father were thieves.”

“Sounds like what Hudson was doing.”

“I discovered that Hudson was one of the few detectives around at that time that believed Henry Nelson was involved in thefts. I thought, great, finally someone that might believe that I was innocent.” He looked down as he rubbed a hand along his thigh. “Only, he didn’t believe me. As far as he was concerned, I was nothing more than Nelson’s accomplice. Nothing I said could convince him otherwise. I even tried to hire him, but he told me he was retired and to get lost.”

“
Did you two meet here at the hotel?” I asked, remembering the story Ryan told me.

“Yeah, I invited
to lunch, so I could talk to him about the case. It didn’t go well, at all. When he wouldn’t listen to me, I got angry and told him off. I told him he was a poor excuse for a detective and that just because Henry Nelson was dead, didn’t mean he couldn’t find out the truth. I then told him that if he really wanted to know what happened and to prove to everyone that Henry Nelson was the thief, he should look into what Danielle Nelson had been doing lately and why jewelry kept disappearing at the hotel.”

“What did he say then?”

“He said that I needed to bring him proof. Nothing I did since I was seventeen mattered and he wasn’t going to waste his time until I brought him some kind of evidence. I told him that if I had any evidence then I wouldn’t need him and I left. I didn’t even realize he was missing until you said something.”

“Now that Danielle’s dead, how are we going to find proof that she and her father were involved in the thefts nine years ago?”

“I already found it.
I finally found it the night Sylvia died. Mrs. Hazelrigg had an old locket she had gotten from her father on her sixteenth birthday. Wasn’t worth much, but she loved that locket. I think she was angriest about losing that than any of the other jewels. The night Sylvia died, I broke into Danielle’s apartment and found Mrs. Hazelrigg’s locket and a few other stolen items that I guess Danielle’s father gave her in an old shoebox in Danielle’s closet. That’s why I was looking for Danielle that night. I wanted to confront her with locket. I wanted her to confess, but I didn’t find her. I found you.” He squeezed my hand.

I smiled. “I’m so glad
you did. What did your parents say when you showed them the locket?”

“They asked where the other jewels and money that were stolen were. When I told them I didn’t know and that Danielle and her father stole them and not
me, they slammed the door in my face.”

“Oh, Jesse.”

“It’s okay. Mrs. Hazelrigg was happy. She said she forgave me and invited me in for tea.” He sighed. “I’ll never live that one mistake down. I’m sorry, Anna, I should have told you what was going on with Danielle and me, but I was afraid of your reaction. I didn’t want you to look at me the way my parents do.”

“I don’t think I could.” I linked my fingers through his. “I wish you had trusted me enough to tell me the truth. It could have helped.”

“Well, another reason I didn’t say anything was because for a second there, I thought you were a murderer.”

I dropped his hand. “What
?” I asked outraged.

“Only for a few seconds
, I swear. By the next day, I was like ninety-five percent sure you were innocent.”

I shrugged. “That’s okay. I was only
fifty-five percent sure you were innocent.”

He arched one dark-blond
eyebrow.

“Okay,
sixty-five percent; maybe seventy, depending on the hour and who I was talking to.” I lay back and closed my eyes. “I wish you had stuck around that July fourth.”

“I didn’t want to be a third wheel.”

I lifted my head and looked at him. “Wheels would have been nice. Simon and I could have used a ride to the hospital.”

“The hospital?” he asked in surprise.

I nodded. “Simon fractured two of my ribs when he fell on me and then twisted his ankle trying to help me get to the hospital.”

His eyes widened.
“You’re kidding?”

“I wish I was. It completely ruined my summer.”

“I’m sorry, I had no idea. I just assumed you and Simon …”

“
No, not really. Simon was nice and he was a good friend and a great comfort to me when you went missing—well, when he wasn’t accidentally putting me in the hospital—but he couldn’t replace you, Jesse.”

He swung his legs around and sat up. Reaching forward, he caressed my cheek. “I love you,
Anna. I never stopped.” He didn’t give me a chance to respond. He leaned forward and kissed me, only breaking away when a couple of guests walked by on their way to the pool. Smiling down at me, he asked, “So, what do we do now?”

Feeling happier than I had in quite some time,
I took his hands and stood up, dragging him up with me. “Well, for starters, you can go dig up Felix from wherever you buried him. I think it’s time to put him back where he belongs,” I said as I wrapped my arms around his waist, thankful Jesse was finally back where he belonged.

The End

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