Chapter 9
Chapter Nine
I cried out in surprise, and Tyler immediately jumped forward, putting a hand over my mouth.
"Quiet," he said urgently. "I'm not here to hurt you. I'm looking for answers." He gave me a pleading look. "Are you going to be quiet?"
I nodded, and he slowly removed his hand from my mouth, his dark eyes searching my face. We stood there in the dim garage, both of us breathing hard, both of us where we shouldn't be.
"What kind of answers?" I asked in a hushed voice. "And don't lie to me that you being here has something to do with the property you want to develop."
Tyler's jaw tightened. He glanced toward the door, then back at me. "It doesn't."
"Did you know Natalie? Are you trying to get information on her?"
"No." He seemed to weigh how much to tell me. "I came here to find out what happened to another woman—Jessica Trent. She disappeared seven months after Natalie."
"I saw the articles about her at the library. I thought she took out a boat and never came back."
"That's the story."
"What does that have to do with the inn?"
"She was staying here at the time, and since another woman disappeared seven months before her, I think there may be a pattern. Your turn. What are you doing in here?"
"Looking for answers," I said, repeating his words.
"About Natalie or Jessica?"
"Actually, someone else. There was a woman staying in the room next to mine.
She looked like she was terrified. I heard glass breaking in her room one night, then crying.
I also saw bruises on her body. And that's not all.
She left the inn this morning with Ellen before dawn.
And Ray, the handyman, was cleaning out her room, and I saw him carry this carpet in here a few minutes ago.
When he drove away, I felt the need to come in here and check out what was wrong with the rug. "
Tyler moved past me, his gaze falling on the rug. He crouched beside it, examining the dark stains. "This looks like blood."
"It could be from when she broke the glass in her room."
"Or something else happened to her." He looked up at me. "This woman—Anna, you said? What's her story?"
"All I know is what I told you."
Before he could say anything, we both heard the sound of the garage door opening.
"Someone's coming," I said in panic.
He grabbed my arm and pulled me toward an old and very large armoire.
There was just enough room for us to squeeze behind it.
I held my breath as I heard a door open and close.
My heart was hammering so hard I thought I might faint, but Tyler was pressed close beside me, his presence keeping me upright, preventing a full-blown anxiety attack.
The footsteps came closer. The door to the storage room opened. I couldn't see who it was, but I heard the sound of something being lifted, something heavy dragging across the floor.
The carpet. Someone was taking the carpet.
More footsteps. The sound of the main garage door opening again. An engine starting. Then the garage door closing.
We stayed frozen in our hiding spot for what felt like an eternity, but was probably only a minute.
"I think they're gone," Tyler whispered. "Let's get out of here."
We emerged from behind the furniture, and I immediately looked for the carpet. It wasn't there anymore. I met Tyler's gaze.
He grabbed my hand and guided me toward the side door, through the garage, and away from the building. I followed without thinking, my mind still reeling from what had just happened.
The bloody carpet—evidence of whatever had happened in Anna's room—was gone.
I was surprised when Tyler took me down a path behind the inn I'd never been on before. It was clearly a different way to get down to the beach and also a little longer, winding through tall trees and thick brush, the ground rocky and uneven beneath my feet.
When we finally emerged onto the beach, we were further down the beach than we'd been the first time we met, and the ocean stretched out before us, gray and restless under the cloudy sky. The wind whipped my hair around my face as he let go of my hand, and I had a chance to catch my breath.
"Why are we here?" I asked. "I could have just gone back into the inn."
"We need to talk. As I mentioned, I'm looking for Jessica Trent. And you seem to be looking for—what was her name?"
"Anna. And it's not just her I'm looking for; it's Natalie Warren. I think there might be something going on at the inn."
"So do I.
"How do you know Jessica?"
He hesitated, then said. "She's a friend.
And she doesn't have anyone else to look for her.
Her parents are dead, and she went through a bitter, ugly divorce a few months ago, where she lost most of her friends.
When she first disappeared, I hired a private investigator, who discovered her last known sighting was at the Stonecross Inn.
But when he came asking questions of the sheriff and Mrs. Clarke, he was shut down.
He was told that she rented a boat for a morning sail and never returned.
The next day, her boat was found crashed on the rocks about an hour north of here.
There was no sign of her body. The consensus was that she couldn't handle the strong wind that came up that afternoon.
She lost control of the boat and eventually ended up in the water, where she drowned. "
"But they never found her body."
"No. Which is why I'm not convinced that's what happened.
Since asking outright didn't get my investigator anywhere, I arrived last week with a cover story.
Actually, it's not really a story. I am creating an architectural plan for the owner of the house I'm staying in.
But that's not the only reason I'm here. "
"I get it. This town doesn't like questions."
"They don't. Let's talk about you and your friend.
You've been telling everyone you're writing a book about inns, but I looked you up online, and I couldn't find you anywhere.
No website, no previous book reviews or listings.
And you've been all around town asking questions about Natalie.
What are you really doing here, Cassidy?
"We're not writing a book," I admitted. "Tessa and I have a podcast called Mysteries Uncorked. We investigate true crime cases. We picked Natalie because she's like us. She's about our age and lived in New York and just disappeared."
"A podcast?" he said, surprise running through his brown eyes. "That is not what I expected you to say. I thought you might have been a friend of Natalie's."
"I never met her, but I know a lot about her, and I've spoken to her brother.
He's been devastated by her disappearance.
I'd like to help him and her family get closure.
And now that I know Jessica and perhaps others have mysteriously vanished after staying here, I'm more determined to find out what's going on. "
"How exactly are you going to do that? Do you have investigative experience?"
"No. But the police and investigators have come up empty, so it's not like we're stopping anyone else from doing the job. I wouldn't think an architect has much investigative experience, either."
"Fair point. But I'm determined to get the truth, and no one else is even looking for Jessica."
"Tessa and I feel the same way. Natalie had a family, but she was estranged from them. They didn't even know she was missing for a couple of weeks. By the time they started looking for her, the trail was cold."
"What if Natalie just walked away, changed her name, started over?" Tyler suggested. "That's the popular story around here."
"What if Jessica did the same? Maybe she used the boat to get somewhere else and disappear."
"I've considered that, but I spoke to her ex-husband before I came here, and he said she always got seasick when he tried to get her to go sailing. That doesn't sound like someone who's going to take a boat out by herself, does it?"
"No."
"I don't think so, either. By the way, where is your friend?" Tyler asked curiously.
"Tessa is having lunch with Finn Kelly."
"Why?"
"She's good at charming information out of men. She's hoping Finn is less committed to the party line since he lived away from Stonecross for many years."
"I don't know about that. Finn Kelly seems very close to the sheriff and his family. And his sister works at the inn."
"That's true, and nothing may come of their lunch, but it was worth a shot." I paused. "Speaking of getting information, I saw you with Becca last night. What was that about?"
He started. "I didn't realize you saw us."
"Well, you were sitting by the window. Did you get any information about Jessica?"
"Unfortunately, not. Like your friend with Finn, I was hoping to charm Becca into talking," he said with a small smile.
"And your charm didn't work? That's hard to believe," I said dryly.
"I was charming. She just didn't have anything to say."
"Or at least none she wanted to share. What about the sheriff? Have you talked to him?"
"Yes, but I didn't tell him why I was asking. He thinks I'm just concerned about buying property near an inn getting bad press. He reassured me there was no evidence of anyone being hurt at the inn. It was all just speculation."
"Maybe that's because they get rid of the evidence, like the bloody carpet that disappeared from the storage room." I paused. "Becca met Anna. She took Becca's yoga class. I wonder if she'd tell you more about Anna."
"I can bring it up next time we meet." He took out his phone and said, "What did Anna look like?"
"She had brown hair and eyes, average height, looked like she hadn't eaten a solid meal in days. Why?"
"I want to show you something." He scrolled through his photos and then held the phone out to me. "This is Natalie Warren."
I looked at the screen. "I've seen this picture." It was Natalie's professional headshot, from a social media site. She had been a pretty woman with dark brown hair, brown eyes, and a smile that didn't quite reach her eyes.