Chapter 5
CHAPTER 5
“ S o it’s your second time around the block, too, huh? I guess we’re both veterans in the marriage department.” Jennifer Mitchell grimaces as if she were terrified of the prospect of walking down the aisle again. Ironic, since we’re standing at her own Bachelorette Bonanza kickoff right here on the lido deck while she wears a pink glittering sash that pins her as the bride-to-be. “Are we insane to do this again or what?”
“Well, if your fiancé is anything like mine, we’d be insane not to.”
“ Aww ,” she coos. “That says a lot about your future husband. Mine is a little rough around the edges, but that’s exactly how I like them.” She wrinkles her nose. “My ex was a little too rough around the edges—so much so that other women found him just as irresistible. And well, he returned the sentiment more than once.”
“I’m so sorry to hear it.” My heart genuinely breaks for her, and my temper genuinely rises for her. “My ex was a cheat, too.”
“You’re kidding?” She inches back and we share a mournful laugh.
“Nope. I caught him with an entire bevy of floozies in my bedroom the day we were set to depart on our twenty-fifth wedding anniversary cruise right here on this ship.”
“Please tell me you’re kidding.” She gasps at the thought and I shake my head. “Well, if it makes you feel better, I caught mine cheating on me with my yoga instructor. I found out when I walked into my own living room to see them practicing downward dog together.” She says practicing in air quotes and we both share another mournful laugh. “Are there any good ones left?” She shakes her head as her laugh peters out. “How long have you been divorced?”
“Just under a year. And you?”
“I’m going on two.” She sighs. “I’ll admit, not having to share the remote or have anyone steal the covers has been bliss. Sometimes I just lie in the middle of the mattress and make snow angels just because I can. And boy, is it heaven.”
We share another laugh.
“Having the whole bed to myself is pretty nice,” I confess. “But I cannot wait to share that bed with Ransom. That’s my fiancé.” I blush just saying the word fiancé . Then a thought hits me. “Oh wow, I just realized that I broke the news to my kids and my ex in a text. The kids loved it, of course. My ex, not so much.”
“Oh, who cares.” She rolls her eyes. “He doesn’t have a say in it.”
“You’re right. And my kids have already met Ransom and they just love him. They’re older and in college, so I’m free to live here—and, well, sail off with the man of my dreams.”
“Wow”—she shakes her head at me with a look of awe—“I want to be you when I grow up.”
We share another laugh, but her jovial state is cut short once she spots something or someone in the crowd.
“Excuse me, Trixie. There’s someone I need to speak with. But hey, let’s get together again.” Her eyes land on mine and there’s a sincerity about them. “As fun and light as everything looks, I feel like I’m still processing everything. And you and I are in the exact same boat—quite literally. I hope you don’t mind if I bend your ear a bit.”
“Are you kidding? I can’t wait to bend your ear, too. In fact, after I unload on you, I’m half-afraid you’ll bill me for the therapy session.”
We share another quick laugh before her attention is snagged again and she takes off into the crowd.
I head for the dessert bar with Bess and Nettie and load up on all of the mini guava-filled croissants and raspberry cheesecake bites that I can handle.
We watch the crowd and sway to the music as the Emerald Queen glides smoothly through the Atlantic.
An odd sight catches my attention as I spot Jennifer again, and it looks as if she’s giving that redhead, Lucy, a piece of her mind.
“That doesn’t look too friendly,” I mutter under my breath and Bess shakes her head.
“Not friendly in the least.”
Soon, Lucy takes off and runs into that other redhead that Jennifer had pointed out—Amber, the other charter member of their book club. And by the looks of it, they’re having a rather nasty exchange as well. Poor Lucy.
A crowd moves between us and another thirty or forty minutes go by before the entire party begins to disband. I’m about to pop another salted caramel brownie into my mouth when I spot a man standing by the Blue Water Café, watching this area of the lido deck rather intently. And I’m not sure why, but I find the way he’s leering at us a bit too creepy for my liking and a shiver runs up my spine because of it.
“What are you looking at?” Bess asks, staring in the same general direction.
“That man,” I whisper. “For some reason, the sight of him is giving me the creeps and making me shiver. Although I’m not sure why.”
“I call dibs,” Nettie says without hesitation. “Any man who can make you quiver is good enough for me.”
“She said shiver, not quiver ,” Bess says as she swats her. “And if he’s spooking Trixie, then the man is probably a serial killer.”
“What’s more exciting than that?” Nettie sounds twice as interested. “And once I land me a serial killer boyfriend, the two of you had better be extra nice to me.”
“There won’t be any of you left to be nice to,” Bess says, exasperated. “Not after he chops you up into pieces!”
“The more of me to love.”
“There’s something familiar about him, too,” I say, inspecting him with his ball cap pulled low over his forehead. He’s wearing a dress shirt and slacks and— “Oh, he’s the man I saw at boarding,” I say as I shake my head at the lunacy of it all. “For Pete’s sake, he’s just some poor man who happened to step onto the wrong deck at the wrong time. I think I need a cool drink. Scratch that,” I say, looking at my watch. “We’d better head to dinner.”
First dinner seating is just about to start and the three of us decide to head back to our cabins to freshen up.
We exit the elevator on deck fourteen where we usually—scratch that, always reside. Since we’re regulars, we simply purchase the very same cabins for each trip. Ransom used to live in a penthouse cabin that was two stories tall, but the ship is refurbishing it and turning it into two different suites so he’s been staying on our deck lately as well. Although I don’t know where he’ll be for this trip. Who knows? He might just end up in my cabin yet.
That will be a first—or it will be if he stays all night. And how I cannot wait until he stays all night. Let’s just say there won’t be a whole lot of sleeping going on.
Ransom and I haven’t exactly hit a home run in the bedroom just yet, but we’re rounding out the bases nicely.
“We really need to throw you a bachelorette party, Trix,” Nettie says as she swills the remnants of her fruity cocktail my way.
“No way,” I say a little too sharply. “I’m not cut out for anything like that. I just want a small, peaceful wedding.”
“Well, too bad,” Bess says. “I think Nettie is right. You’re one of us now and we need to give you a proper send-off.”
“Et tu, Bess?” I tease just as we come across a cabin with the door slightly ajar.
I slow down, fully expecting someone to step out of it when I spot a shoe caught in the door—a black loafer with squared-off toes and a shiny gold buckle. “Hey, I recognize that shoe,” I say. “This must be Lucy’s room.” I give a gentle knock on the door. “I’ll let her know we’re just across the hall. Lucy?” I call out and knock again. Only this time the door pushes in slightly to reveal the fact that the shoe still has a foot in it.
We gasp in unison as I open the door another notch, only to reveal a woman lying on the floor with a knife in her back.
Lucy Taylor won’t have to worry about being called a prude or anything else anymore.
Lucy Taylor is dead.