What's Done in Darkness (25 page)

“… told you. I don't know what happened.”

“He came here with you.”

“… just stop!”

I knocked on the door.

“… no clue what you want from me.”

I pounded this time. Several seconds later the door flew open. Katrina faced me, her nostrils flaring with anger. At first I thought she was upset with me, until she said, “You deal with her. I'm outta here.”

Katrina charged past me, and I looked into the room, where I saw a white heavyset woman with short brown hair that looked like it hadn't been combed. She looked at me, held my gaze. Her eyes were moist and red, and she held a crumpled Kleenex up to her nose.

I glanced in Katrina's direction, but she had already disappeared down the hallway. Then I looked at the woman again.

“Who are you?” she asked.

It was then that I heard her British accent. Guarded, I stepped into the room. “I'm Jade. Katrina's friend.”

“You came here with her and Christian, then?”

I closed the door behind me. “Y-yes. Sorry, you are?”

“Christian's sister. Melody. I got on the first plane here when I got the call.”

I walked farther into the room and stood opposite her.

“I'm so sorry,” I told her.

“What happened?” she demanded.

I told her what I could. That'd we'd been out for a night of fun. I wasn't completely honest, however. I didn't want to say that Christian had left the bar angry. So I told her that Christian had stepped outside and that we never saw him again.

“Why?” Melody asked. “Why would Christian go outside and leave you two in the bar? He didn't smoke.”

“I…” Should I tell her that Katrina and Christian had had a spat? Or would that make her feel worse about the situation?

“How on earth did this happen?” Melody went on, her throat raw. “You go on a vacation to Mexico—though God knows why when you were already in Florida—and my brother ends up dead? And no one can give me any bloody answers?”

She began to sob into her already-overused Kleenex. The woman was completely grief-stricken, and I felt her pain but had no answers for her.

“I wish I had answers,” I said softly. “Katrina and Christian wanted to go to Mexico. I suppose for a change of pace. Or just to travel. We were in the bar, and Christian … he said he needed air,” I lied. To tell Melody the truth would certainly add to her rage and grief, and I wanted to spare Katrina that. Not to mention myself.

“He went out for air and ended up murdered?” Melody sounded suspicious.

I shrugged. “I really don't know what else to say,” I told her. “It's as shocking to me as it is to you. After spending much of yesterday at the police station, I still don't believe it's real.”

Melody stared at me, her anguished gaze assessing me. “And none of this has to do with the fact that Christian and Katrina fought all the time?”

My eyes widened. Had she heard about the fight at the bar?

“Excuse me?”

“Oh, you don't have to pretend. My brother's dead and gone. No need to pretend he and Katrina had some kind of special relationship. I came here to hear from her what happened, and all she did was get defensive and leave. Christian told us that they had a rocky relationship, that he worried he'd made a mistake. He would call us and tell us about their fights. I told him to be wary of her. That with our family money, he needed to be careful of her intentions.”

“You thought she was using him?”

“Of course she was using him.” The woman looked angry. “The moment I heard about Katrina, I was worried. Everything was moving so fast with her and Christian. Why? I never believed that Katrina loved him for him. To me she sounded like a classic gold digger. A dirty, gold-digging whore who sank her teeth into my brother and didn't let go until he was dead!”

The words were harsh, but Alexis had also implied that Katrina's attraction to Christian was at least in part fueled by his bank account. Still, I hadn't seen signs of Katrina using him for his money. No lavish spending sprees, for example. And Katrina certainly worked hard in the café. She seemed determined to make her own money and take care of herself.

Perhaps Christian had paid for the trip to Mexico, but that wasn't a big deal. That hardly made Katrina a gold digger.

Not to mention the bigger flaw with Melody's theory. If Katrina was a gold digger, Christian would be better off alive so that she could marry him.

“I know you're upset. Lord knows I can't imagine what you're feeling right now. But I'm not sure if you're implying that Katrina killed him—”

“Of course she killed him!”

I flinched at the words. Then continued. “If you're right about Katrina wanting Christian for his money, then she couldn't have killed him. Why kill him and cut off any access to his money? In fact, if she really wanted his money, wouldn't it make more sense to marry him?”

Melody's eyes narrowed as she stared at me. She regarded me as if I had sprouted a second head.

And then she said, “You don't know?”

“Know what?”

“You said you were friends. How could you not know?”

“Know what?” I repeated.

“They were married. Last week.”

Suddenly the room became very still. Then my stomach bottomed out.

“W-what did you say?”

“I thought it odd, you going on their honeymoon with them.”

“Honeymoon?”

“Why on earth do you think they came here? Christian told me that they got married and they were going to Mexico for their honeymoon. I still never understood. They could just as easily have stayed in Florida. Now I know. Katrina wanted him here so she could get rid of him!”

The room was spinning. I was so unsteady on my feet that I had to walk over to the nearby table and grip the back of the chair.

“I knew it was trouble,” Melody was saying now. “I told Christian not to marry her, but he didn't listen. But I tell you this: It'll be a cold day in hell before she gets her dirty hands on his money.”

“No,” I rasped. “No … it can't be … it isn't … true.”

As I took in a few deep breaths to calm myself, I felt Melody's hand on my back. “It's clear to me that you didn't know. And for that, I'm glad. I worried that the two of you had planned this. Concocted some way to kill him.”

I whirled my head around to face her. “I would never.” My breaths were ragged, my heart beating wildly. “And Katrina … I don't think she had anything to do with it. They were … they'd had a fight. You were right about that. She and Christian fought a lot. And they did at the bar that night. Katrina was flirting with another guy, and Christian got pissed. Then he left. And that was the last we saw him.”

“Oh, I'm sure Katrina hired someone. Probably paid a local a few dollars. Or offered a sexual favor. I saw this happening the moment Christian told me he was marrying her. Do you really think his murder here was a coincidence?”

A lump had lodged in my throat and I swallowed, but it wouldn't go away. “Married?” I asked. “Are you sure? I mean, I've been in Florida with them. If they got married last week, I would know.”

“I'm certain. Before Christian and Katrina left for Mexico, he married her. Against my protests, he married her, and Mexico was their honeymoon. I can't tell you how upset I was when he refused to even get a pre-nup.” Melody paused, a look of anger cutting through the anguish on her face. “Katrina didn't tell you about their marriage. Doesn't that make you wonder why? And doesn't that make you wonder what she has to hide?”

*   *   *

A short while later, Melody left to go to the police station and I went back to my room, where I sank onto the bed and buried my face in my hands.

I was numb. Confused.

And not altogether sure that I believed Melody's bombshell. If Katrina and Christian had gotten married last week, how could I
not
know about it? I'd been there, day in and day out with them at the café. When would they have had the time? And even if they had snuck off to tie the knot, wouldn't Katrina have told me?

Katrina didn't tell you about their marriage. Doesn't that make you wonder why? And doesn't that make you wonder what she has to hide?

I shook my head as I remembered Melody's question. No, it didn't make sense. Melody was wrong. Plain and simple.

Then, out of nowhere, something popped into my mind. A snippet of that argument they'd had when things had gotten ugly after Christian had been drinking and I'd intervened to stop it.

What about today? You're supposed to be my wife.

I felt a jolt, as surely as if I had touched a live hydro wire. My chest constricted.
Oh God …

Closing my eyes tightly, I wracked my brain, trying to remember what Katrina had said in response to Christian's comment. She had immediately scoffed, saying something to the effect that Christian was drunk and out of his mind and that she wasn't his wife.

But hadn't that also been the day that they'd disappeared for a good part of the afternoon?

Slowly, I lowered my hands from my face. They'd gone off and come back even more romantic than ever.

My God, was it true? Had they gotten married that day? And if so, why had Katrina lied about it?

I went to Katrina's door, hoping that she had returned. I needed to talk to her. But she didn't answer. So I returned to my room and tore a piece of paper off of the notepad, wrote a message asking her to come to my room when she got back, and then slipped it under her door.

In the hour that it took Katrina to knock on my door, I had gone over the facts as I knew them countless times. And I finally decided to dismiss what Melody had said. More than likely, she had her facts wrong. Christian and Katrina had talked about marriage; Katrina told me that he'd proposed to her. But if she had married him and Mexico was their honeymoon, too many things didn't add up. For one thing, why was I here with them? That was just crazy. And two, why would a newlywed be all over another man in a bar?

When I heard the knock, I jumped up from the bed and ran to answer the door. I looked through the peephole first and saw Katrina, looking distraught.

I opened the door. Then hugged her. “Hey. I was worried.”

“I needed some space. I couldn't handle Melody's accusations.”

“She's upset. And that's understandable. Her brother was just killed. She's looking for someone to blame.”

“I guess so. But still, she's got to understand how devastating this is for me. I loved Christian.”

Emotion caused Katrina's face to collapse. The stress had aged her practically ten years overnight.

I led her into the room, where she sank onto the armchair and pulled her knees to her chest. Then I waited for her to regain her composure, because I needed to address what Melody had said.

“Look,” I began gently. “Melody said something. I'm sure she's mistaken, but I figured I would mention it. Because I bet she's going to bring this up with the police, and you need to be ready.” I took a breath. “For some reason, she's under the impression that you and Christian got married?”

My voice ended on a questioning note, and I waited. Waited for Katrina's eyes to grow wide, for her to ask how on earth Melody would have gotten a ridiculous notion like that.

Instead, something unreadable passed in Katrina's eyes. Then she rose from the armchair and walked past me to the window that overlooked the vast blue ocean.

A few beats passed, beats in which my stomach began to twist painfully. “Kat? You didn't—”

She faced me, and the look in her eyes conveyed the truth.

But still I went on, not wanting to believe what now seemed irrefutable. “Tell me it's not true. You wouldn't have married Christian without telling me?”

Katrina expelled a loud breath. “We thought it best to keep it secret for the time being.”

And with her words, I felt the sensation of falling, as surely as if someone had pushed me through my hotel room window and I was now sailing through the air from the sixth floor.

“You—you
married
him?”

“And that's exactly why I didn't tell you. Because I knew you would think I was crazy.”

My feeling of disorientation passed, leaving anger in its wake. In fact, I could hear my pulse thundering in my ears.

I was enraged. I felt betrayed. And stupid. “When? And my God, why? The way both of you were always fighting?”

“It was a small ceremony last week. And I didn't tell you because I knew how it would look—we'd been fighting all the time, and you would have tried to talk me out of it. But I loved him, and I wanted it to work between us. I figured that once we got married, everything would work itself out.”

I scoffed. I'd never heard something so ridiculous in my entire life.

“So this is really your honeymoon? You made up all that bullshit about going to Mexico for a few days in the sun?”

“If I wasn't telling you that we got married, I certainly couldn't tell you that this was our honeymoon.”

“And why am
I
here?” I'd never felt good about going on this trip with them to begin with, and now I felt even worse.

“I've already gone through the inquisition with Melody. Can you please give me a break? My husband was just murdered.”

My husband …
This was absurd. I narrowed my eyes as I regarded Katrina, wondering if Melody was right. Had Katrina married Christian for his money? Was that why she hadn't told me about it? And was Christian dead now because she stood to inherit a fortune?

Katrina saw the look in my eyes, and it was clear she read what I was thinking when she said, “Melody has her suspicions, but she couldn't be more wrong. In fact, after we got back from Mexico, Christian and I were going to go to a lawyer. I was going to sign an agreement saying I didn't want his money.”