Spring Break Murder Page 9

  "No, it isn't another dead body," I said, rolling my eyes at him. "But I did find something that may be a great clue. Come over here."

  Trevor scurried around the pool but as he got closer, he stopped short and put his hands up. His mouth was puckered and his eyebrows were drawn together into an incredulous look.

  "Wait, it isn't something that incriminates Mandy, right?" he said. "Because if it is, we should get rid of it."

  "First of all, I am not investigating this in a way that means I could potentially be locked up for hindering a police investigation," I said. Trevor looked at me like I was some sort of traitor. "If we found something that pointed towards Mandy, we wouldn't destroy it. We would just leave it but we maybe wouldn't tell the police we had found it."

  "Isn't that kind of the same thing?" Trevor said.

  "Umm it is and it isn't," I said, realizing that he was totally calling me out on my hypocrisy. "But second of all, do you really think I would be excited to find a clue that pointed to Mandy being the killer?"

  Trevor shrugged his shoulders at me. I took a tissue out of my pocket and bent down, stopping before I picked up the metal object. I had known what it was the moment I saw it. By now I would be able to spot the official pin of the Dolls anywhere, especially because it said "The Dolls" right on it.

  I was more interested on what was written underneath. The way it was sitting on the ground meant the reflection was obscuring the name that was engraved on the bottom of the pin.

  "Sally told me that all of the Dolls have one of these," I said, pointing to the pin as Trevor knelt down beside me. "You can only have one if you are a member and they are all personalized. So when we pick it up, we will be able to see whose it is."

  "But how do we know that it belongs to the murderer?" Trevor asked.

  "Well, we don't," I admitted. "But I think we could narrow down how long it has been here depending on whose it is. The Dolls wear these pins to all of the social functions they attend in the park and tons of pictures were taken that night. We can check to see if they were all wearing their pins that night."

  For a moment, Trevor and I both crouched together. We were in one of those moments of anticipation where I knew once we looked at the name, there would be no going back. It would set us on a path that we wouldn't be able to get off of. This clue could make or break our investigation.

  Trevor nodded at me and I gingerly picked up the pin and held it on top of the tissue in the palm of my hand. I moved it so that it was in the shadow. As it moved out of the sun, the name at the bottom became clear.

  LOUISE

  I sucked in a large breath of air through my nose, half hoping I was reading the pin wrong and half trying not to let my mind race too much. Honestly, any of the names would have surprised me. I knew Louise wanted to fit in with the Dolls, but would she be willing to kill for that? Being a part of the Dolls didn't seem worth murdering poor Hilda, but I remembered Louise's desperate attempts to fit in with the more elegant ladies. She seemed willing to do almost anything to have the ladies like her more, even though she was already in the club.

  "Trevor," I said. "I think it's time for you to meet Louise."

  Chapter Eighteen

  Louise's trailer wasn't hard to find because somehow it managed to resemble her. Where the other trailers were cutesy in an elegant sort of way with wicker deck furniture and beautiful cushions and pillows, Louise's trailer was trying too hard. Her furniture was over the top, painted wacky colors that didn't fit together. The cushions were all different patterns and while I know that pattern mixing can be quite chic, these patterns were just clashing.

  Louise was sitting on a love seat with a little white dog on her lap. As we walked up the street and turned into her driveway, the dog stood up on Louise's legs and let out a small yip. The dog was wearing a little pink dress that was covered in rhinestones that shimmered in the sun.

  "Eleanor, no bark," Louise said. "Hello there Tessa! Who is your friend?"

  "Hi Louise," I said as we started up her deck stairs. "This is Trevor, Mandy's boyfriend."

  Louise's face fell and she held her hands out to Trevor. Her hands were covered in big gaudy rings and while one or two of them probably had real stones, most of them appeared to be costume jewelry. Trevor stared at her hands for a moment before awkwardly bringing his hands up to hold them.

  "I'm so sorry to hear about Mandy," Louise said, sniffing a few times. "She really is so sweet and I'm just sure she didn't do it."

  Tears were forming in her eyes as she squeezed Trevor's hands. He winced in pain, but Louise didn't seem to notice. She started to loudly sob, her whole body shaking so much that the little dog on her lap bounced up and down, wildly shifting from side to side as she tried to keep her balance on Louise's leg.

  "That's actually why we are here," I said. "Would this be a good place to talk?"

  "No, no," she said. "Come on inside and we can have a little more privacy."

  Following Louise through the door, the inside of her trailer was just as gaudy as the outside. There were trendy wall signs and knick-knacks everywhere along with overly dramatic curtains on every window. The couch had a loud, red and black plaid slipcover on it with some oversized cushions. Louise motioned for us to sit down on the couch. I wasn't sure if we were supposed to move the cushions or not when we sat down, so I just sort of scooted it to one side and squeezed between it and Trevor.

  "Let me make us some tea," Louise bustling into the kitchen area.

  "Do I really have to have tea?" Trevor asked quietly.

  "Yes," I hissed at him. "But if things go the right way, we won't be here long. I don't want to drag this out too much."

  I sat and took a longer look around at Louise's living space. The kitchen had things hanging off of every cabinet knob but as Louise opened and closed them to get things out, somehow she managed to not slam any of them in the doors. The counter had bowls of fruit, canisters of baking supplies, a coffee maker, and all sorts of other things. While those were all totally normal things to have on a kitchen counter, an RV kitchen only has a very small amount of counter space. I wondered where she did any of the actual cooking.

  In a way, the 'in-your-face' aspect of the RV made me feel a softening towards Louise. She could be loud and brash and, in your face, but I wondered if it was all just a cover like all of these things were a cover. Louise seemed like she desperately wanted to be liked but just wasn't sure how to make that happen.

  "Here we go," Louise chirped as she set a tray of steaming teacups on a small TV tray in front of the couch. She shuffled back to the kitchen and came back holding her own teacup. She perched on a turquoise overstuffed chair that looked like it was too big to have been brought through the front door. I briefly wondered how they had managed to get the chair into the RV but then I remembered I had something much more important to focus on.

  "Thank you so much Louise," I said. "You have a lovely place here."

  "Oh geez, thank you Tessa," Louise said. "That's awfully nice of you to say."

  "You know Louise, we were actually just out at the pool and we found something interesting," I said.

  Louise was taking a sip of tea, but I could see her eyes widen over the rim of her teacup. Trevor wasn't even paying attention to what was going on. Instead, he was trying to figure out how to hold his steaming hot cup. He was holding the delicate handle between his thumb and forefinger while also trying to steady it with his other hand without burning his fingers. Once again, I could see that he was not going to be any help.

  "Oh what were you out at the pool for?" Louise exclaimed. "If you wanted to show Trevor the sights, you probably didn't need to show him a place where someone died."

  "Actually, we were there to investigate a little bit," I said. "See, I'm pretty sure Mandy did not do this and Trevor is also sure of that. So we decided to take matters into our own hands and poke around a little bit to see if we could help her out at all. And you know what? We found something pretty interest
ing there."

  I reached into my pocket and pulled out what we had found. I slowly unwrapped the tissue from around the pin, being careful not to touch it. As the tissue fell away, Louise gasped and put her free hand over her face, her other hand still clutching the thin handle of her teacup.

  "Obviously this is yours," I said.

  Louise couldn't even look at the pin as she started to cry again. Trevor took advantage of Louise's distraction and set his teacup down on the tray. I almost elbowed him but as I went for the wind-up, a few drops of scalding hot tea spilled up and over the side of my teacup and burned my hand. I grudgingly put my cup down also, realizing that this wasn't the time for politeness anymore.

  I looked back at Louise just in time to see the tea cup start to slip out of her hand. Leaping off of the couch, I stuck my hands out to grab the tea cup before it shattered on the ground. I managed to save the teacup, but only because I stuck my hands directly underneath all of the burning hot liquid that was falling out of the cup.

  As I screamed, Trevor jumped to his feet and grabbed the teacup out of my hands. In one swift motion, he tossed it onto Louise's lap while he used his other hand to drag me back up to my feet. My mind was racing and I was trying not to focus on the pain that was shooting through my hands.

  Trevor steered me into the kitchen and turned on the faucet. Once he was sure the water was the right temperature, he forced my hands under it. The cool water flowed over my hands and I tried to take deep breaths through it.

  After I was able to calm myself down a little, I could feel that while my hands definitely hurt and the burns would be annoying, it wasn't too terrible. If the tea was cool enough for Louise to be drinking, it wasn't hot enough to do any permanent damage.

  Thinking of Louise, I turned to see what she was doing. To my horror, she was bending down to pick up her pin. When I leapt up to grab her teacup, I had dropped the pin on the ground. I wanted to go over and grab it from her, but Trevor was holding my wrists tightly, forcing my hands under the running water.

  It was no use. Louise had already pinned it back on her shirt and now any evidence that may have been on it was ruined. I let out a cry as I realized how stupid the idea to confront Louise with her pin had been.

  "It's okay Tessa," Trevor said quietly. "Your hands will be okay. We need to leave them under the water for another minute or so and then I'll drive you to the doctor to get them bandaged. They look okay though."

  Trevor's quiet calm was so all encompassing that I immediately felt my heart rate go down a bit. I took a deep breath. Louise was sitting back in her chair, sipping her tea and absentmindedly petting Eleanor. At least she wasn't going to try to run away because I had already made one huge mistake and I didn't feel like making another.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Trevor kept glancing at his watch, timing how long my hands had been under the water. For someone I usually saw as a useless layabout, this must be the other side of him. This was the emergency dispatcher who kept calm and helped frantic people through some of the worst moments of their life. It did seem odd to me that these two people somehow inhabited one body, but maybe this was what Mandy could see in him that I couldn't.

  At some point, Trevor let go of my wrists and turned the water off. My hands were red, but didn't look as bad as I thought they would. This was certainly not going to help my vacation, although that feeling of relaxation had gone out the window a while ago.

  "Thank you, Trevor," I said. "I really appreciate it. I'm not sure what I would have done if you weren't here. But before we go, I'd like to just ask Louise one more thing."

  Trevor nodded, doing the macho thing where he has a hard time accepting thanks. He took me by the elbow and guided me back to the couch where I sat back down. This time I didn't care about the cushions, sitting right on top of them.

  Louise was still in her chair with Eleanor the fluff ball, who was contentedly sleeping as her back was being scratched. Louise looked exactly as she had before our little medical interlude at the sink except now she was wearing the pin evidence. I wanted to kick myself for having dropped it.

  "Louise, before we go to the doctor, I need to ask you how the pin got on the pool deck," I said. "Were you there when Hilda died?"

  I wasn't going to mince words. I didn't have time to spend dancing around the point as I could feel the pain slowly coming back. The cool water had helped soothe them, but I needed to get to a doctor for some kind of cream and bandages soon. I glanced down at my red hands, glad the tea hadn't been any hotter or I may have been in serious trouble.

  A loud cry broke the tension. Louise was sitting with her head thrown back, tears running down her face making black mascara paths. Her mouth was wide open in the sort of ugly cry that is uncomfortable to be an audience to, especially when it is coming from someone who is virtually a stranger.

  I glanced at Trevor who glanced back at me with the same confused expression. Was this scene an admission of guilt? I didn't want to jump to conclusions since I had already made enough stupid mistakes today, but this was not the reaction of an innocent person in my mind.

  The door of the camper flew open and Louise's husband Roger came dashing in. He was dressed in a pair of khakis that had creases ironed into them and a button up shirt with a tie. It was a bit too formal, especially considering it was mid-afternoon and I was pretty sure he wasn't coming from any sort of job.

  "Louise, what's wrong baby?" he said, looking back and forth from his sobbing wife to the two strangers sitting on his couch, one holding her beet red hands in the air.

  The dog lifted her head and wagged her tail up and down a few times in greeting while Louise waved her hands around, fanning her face to dry the tears that had already ruined all of her eye makeup.

  "Okay, I may as well tell all of you at once," Louise blubbered. "Roger, sit down honey."

  Instead of finding a chair, Roger immediately plunked down on the floor where he had been standing. He crossed his legs like a kindergartner at story time, but his face was etched with worry.

  "I was with Hilda at the pool last night," Louise said. "But I swear I didn't kill her."

  Another sob escaped her mouth as the tears started trickling down her face again. Roger scooted himself forward enough that he could grab onto her hand and hold it. She looked at him with a pained expression. He squeezed her hand in response, making her smile a little.

  "Why don't you back up and tell us from the beginning," I said, trying to stay calm even though my hands were feeling more painful by the minute.

  "Okay, so after the dance got all ruined last night, I wanted to find Cindy and Hilda to try to smooth over what had happened," Louise said.

  She sniffled on and off as she talked. Trevor leaned forward and handed her a tissue that he had produced from somewhere. Louise grabbed the tissue and dabbed her cheeks with it, drying her tears and smearing the mascara.

  "I just wanted to be the peacemaker because I thought that might help solidify my place in the Dolls," Louise said. " I always feel like I don't quite fit in and I've been doing everything I can to try to make sure they don't kick me out. I figure one way to cement my place was to fix this whole Cindy mess."

  "But how did you end up with Hilda instead?" I asked.

  "When I slipped out of the dance, I saw Hilda going into the pool area and I thought maybe Cindy was already in there," Louise said. "So I followed her in, but she was alone. I scared her even though I didn't mean to. Hilda said Cindy told her to come in and make notes about the fact that Bill hadn't done his job of closing up the pool for the night. She said Cindy was hoping to use it as part of her plan to get Bill and Sally kicked out of the park."

  Louise let out another cry as Roger leaned over and patted her leg. She put her hand lovingly on his face and gazed into his eyes. They both might have trouble fitting in, but they seemed to fit together perfectly.

  "I tried not to get mad, but Hilda got all high and mighty about how she and Cindy were going to 'clean u
p the park' by kicking us all out," Louise said. "Hilda just wouldn't stop and she was smiling in such a smug way. And then I just snapped."

  The air was all sucked out of the trailer as I hung on every word Louise said. I almost fell off of the couch with anticipation, biting my tongue to keep from spoiling the moment. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see Trevor's hands nervously clutching at the couch cushions.

  "What happened between you and Hilda?" I asked quietly, trying not to prompt her too much.

  "I pushed her," Louise said. "I put both arms up and I shoved her by the shoulders as hard as I could so that she fell backward. She tried to grab at me and that is when she must have hit my pin off of my shirt. Hilda fell right on her back and she hit her head on the pavement."

  "And then she rolled into the pool?" I asked.

  "No, at that point I ran away," Louise said. "I swear that when I left, Hilda was still just laying on the pool deck. I was so panicked at that point that I just needed to get away because I knew I could get in huge trouble for pushing her."

  "How did Hilda end up in the pool then?" I asked. "Was she unconscious when you left?"

  "No, she was totally with it, but she was mad as a wet chicken," Louise said. I could hear Trevor swallow back a laugh at Louise's language mistake. I almost elbowed him but neither Louise nor Roger seemed to notice it. Louise was taking some deep breaths while Roger held her hand.

  "What did you do after that?" I prompted. Usually I tried to just let people talk, but my hands were starting to throb.

  "Well, I was running towards home when Susie found me," Louise said. "She helped me the rest of the way home and asked if I was okay, but I couldn't possibly tell her what had just happened. The only thing I could say was that I had done something bad. Once I was all settled in, Roger came back home looking for me. I tossed and turned all night and then when I was puttering around making breakfast, I heard Sally scream up at the pool. That's when I went up there with Roger."