Chapter 28. Is This What They Call a Kill Switch?
Is This What They Call a Kill Switch?
It takes us a moment to recover from the crash. But not as long as you’d think, since we’re used to attempts on our lives by now.
So, after less time than you might expect, this is what we discover:
There’s a crude mechanism under the bed that worked to release the heavy object that was the ceiling fan.
The mechanism is creaky and sticks, which is why it didn’t fall until now, we assume.
If we’d been under the fan, we’d both be dead or at least seriously injured, since it weighs at least two hundred pounds, by Oliver’s estimation.
So, yeah.
That happened.
“This is why our room got changed,” I say once we finish our inspection.
“It got changed because of the dead body,” Harper says.
“But why was the body in our room? It never made sense why they’d kill him there. It was to move us into this room.”
“Why, though? Couldn’t they set this up in our original room?”
“It probably took a while to set this up,” Oliver says. “This room isn’t rented that often, I bet, which would give them the time they’d need.”
“So someone was trying to kill you,” Harper says, her eyes round.
“Yeah.”
“Yikes.”
“Who, though?”
“It must’ve been Marco and Marta. They had access.”
“And it fits with the small group pattern. Gun, poison, rope, heavy object…”
“Oh! That double poison. Inspector Tucci … it didn’t fit the pattern because he faked his death.”
“Right,” Oliver says. “So, who are they going to use the knife on?”
“Who’s left?”
“Connor.”
“Of course he is. He always slithers away from danger,” I say.
“It’s over then,” Harper says. “The cycle is complete?”
“But we still don’t know who did it.”
“Weren’t we going to Brian’s room?” Oliver says.
Harper shakes her head. “You don’t think that’s dangerous?”
“You just said the cycle’s complete. I think we’re safe.”
“That’s a stupid and dangerous assumption. Even if I said it.”
“Fair.”
“But we’re still going, aren’t we?”
“Have you met me?”
She pulls a face, then glances at the bed again. “This isn’t over.”
“I’m sure you’re right. But it won’t be until we solve it, so…”
“Once more unto the breach,” Oliver says.
“Once more.”
And then never again, I vow to myself.
After this, I’m retired.82
“We should’ve done this a long time ago,” I say as we creep through the hedges toward the staff area with my heart beating too fast. It’s just me and Oliver in the jungle. Harper thought the three of us would make too much noise.
Or she didn’t want to get arrested.
Same, same.
“We kind of did, didn’t we?”
“That was Guy’s office.”
“True.”
“Do we even know which room is Brian’s?”
“No, but I assume there’s caution tape on it.”
“Good point,” I say. “Did you bring your lock-picking tools?”
“I have them on me at all times.”
“Even when we’re sleeping?”
“Nearby.”
“So prepared.”
He pulls a face. “Don’t call me a Boy Scout.”
“I wouldn’t dream of it.”
“I’m not perfect.”
“Did I say you were?”
“No,” Oliver says, pushing a palm frond aside. “But I know you think about me that way in your head sometimes.”
“Is there a way I can turn off this access you seem to have to my brain? Like that locator thing Harper has on my phone?”
“Watch your step.” He points down to something slithering near his foot. It’s a black garden snake.
I hate snakes. Like Indiana Jones. I hate them a lot.
“Is that poisonous?” I ask.
“I have no idea.”
“I bet it is. Which is why I’m making a vow. From now on, I’m living my life in a way that’s not getting me involved in more murder plots.”
“Sounds like a good plan. Ah, here it is,” Oliver says. “The tape is still up.”
He points to a white door with yellow caution tape over it. It’s part of the same complex that Guy’s office was in, but farther away from the main resort. There’s a half-dead palm tree above it, its fronds scratching gently against the roof.
“That’s not going to stop us,” I say about the tape.
“No, but it is a crime scene.”
“Our room was the crime scene. This is just crime-scene adjacent.”
“Pretty sure that’s not how that works.”
“Fine. You picking the lock or chickening out?”
“I’m doing it.”
He makes short work of it, and in a minute, we’re inside. It’s a small white room, one bed, a dresser, a small window, a sink in the corner, and, yes, an entire wall of photos of me made from pieces ripped out of actual newspapers and printouts from the internet.
“Well, that’s creepy.”
“Seriously,” Oliver says. He stands in front of it. “Where did he even get all of this stuff?”
“The internet?”
“Some of it. But some of it’s actual paper.” He points to a yellowed review. “That’s your first New York Times review.”
“I guess he got it from a library?”
“Or he’s been obsessed with you forever. We should ask Harper if he’s in the crazy file.”83
“I haven’t had a man in there in a long time. Only women.”
He tilts his head at me. “Wonder what that means?”
“No idea.”
He steps closer. “There’s a lot of stuff in here that’s old. But if he’s been obsessed with you for this long, how did he get here?”
“Maybe he was posting about me in one of those forums. You know, the Vacation Mysteries Extended Universe ones?”
“Hmmm. Or someone gave him all of this.”
“Why would they do that?”
“To divert suspicion?”
“So the plan all along was to kill Brian?”
“Yes. When he wasn’t useful anymore.”
I turn my eyes back to the wall and try to trace its history.
At first, it seems chaotic, but there is a pattern.
The articles go back to the very beginning of my career.
The press leading up to my first release.
The glowing reviews. The profile in the New York Times.
All the stuff I felt lucky to get then, but now I know how truly lucky I was.
So many people don’t get the chance I did.
But it also means something. This isn’t a new obsession. It’s someone who’s been watching my career the whole time. Who’s been angry about it from the beginning.
And I’m about to be convinced that it was Harper all along when I spot something poking out from underneath a review of my fourth novel.
I reach out to touch it.
“That’s evidence.”
“I need to see something.” I lift up the newspaper clipping. It’s an old photo of me at the very first conference I went to. The one where I met Shek and Elizabeth and Sandrine.
Elizabeth is ten years younger. She was in her sixties, but she looks much younger.
What a difference a decade makes.
To me, too. Back then, I was so full of hope, and I look like a baby, fresh-faced and starry-eyed. But what were those bangs? A terrible decision.
Elizabeth and I are standing next to each other.
It’s the four of us. Sandrine and I are on one end, with Elizabeth and Shek to my left.
We’re all smiling at the camera, me with a silly grin on my face, Sandrine in her serious-author pose, Elizabeth with a small smile, and Shek, looking like the cat that ate the cream.
My eyes track over the photo. It must mean something.
And that’s when I see it.
Shek has one arm around my shoulders, but his other hand is by his side, next to Elizabeth’s. No, intertwined with Elizabeth’s.
They’re holding hands.
Oh, shit!
Elizabeth asked me about how he died. They didn’t just know each other from the literary circuit. They knew each other.
I close my eyes, trying to think back to that night.
So long ago.
Shek was nice to me. We had a drink at the bar, and he gave me some advice. He was acting like a mentor then. Before he trashed my book in the New York Times. Before he started to see me as a rival. Before he started to treat me like an object.
Or maybe that’s what he was doing even then. I didn’t know back then about all of the author hookups that happen at conferences. How certain men troll the bars looking for new members of the clan to lure back to their rooms.
I wasn’t in the whisper forums.
I hadn’t been warned.
Maybe it was my naivete that saved me or … wait … no … It was Elizabeth.
She tapped me on the shoulder, and we started to talk. At the time, I was so flattered I didn’t even think twice about it. It was Elizabeth Ben! I was meeting Elizabeth Ben. She was taking an interest in me. But maybe that’s not what was happening at all. Maybe she was saving me from Shek.
Hold up. She wasn’t saving me.
She was jealous. Jealous that he was giving me attention. She was stopping him. Letting him know that she knew what he was about.
Later, after Sandrine drifted into our orbit, we got a picture together. The picture I’m looking at now.
And he reached down and took her hand to reassure her.
She’s smiling in the photo. She was happy. She was safe.
She was his.
“What are you looking at?” Oliver asks.
I point to their hands.
“Oh.”
“You knew?”
“There were rumors years ago. You know how everyone in the business talks.”
“I hadn’t heard that.”
“Doesn’t matter.”
“I think it does, though.”
“Why?”
“Because she’s been angry at me for ten years.”
“Who?”
“Elizabeth.”
“About? I thought the blurb thing just happened.”
“No, that was the icing on the cake. Or maybe it had nothing to do with it. But it all started here.” I point to the photo. “And it’s because of Shek.”
“What? Why?”
“She loved him, I think. But he only cared about himself. She got jealous.”
“He made a pass at you?”
“I guess. I wasn’t paying attention. But she was. She paid attention to everything. That’s why she was the best.”
Oliver shakes his head slowly. “So she was behind all this?”
“I think so.”
“But she’s dead.”
“Is she?”
“Come on,” Oliver says. “There can’t be two people who faked their death on this trip.”
“No, you’re right. She’s dead.”
“Then who killed her?”
“I don’t know. But we have to talk to Vicki.”
But first:
“My, my, Eleanor, what a glorious tribute.”
I sigh and turn. Sandrine and Connor are standing in the doorway. They look like two peas in a pod, and maybe they are. They’re the same, in a way. I was extremely close to both of them, and they both betrayed me, but I can’t seem to shake them out of my life.
“What are you doing here?”
“We could ask you the same,” Connor says.
Sandrine shrugs. “We were waiting for Officer Rolle to give us the all-clear together. Safer in twos.”
My God. Sandrine didn’t also sleep with Connor, did she? No, no. She’s diabolical but not stupid. She’s never seen the appeal of Connor; she’s told me that herself many times. Safety in numbers is smart.
“How did you know we were here?” Oliver asks.
They’re silent, and I get a flash of insight. “Harper told you, didn’t she?”
Neither of them says anything, and I park my anger. Harper will have some motive for sending them here that makes sense in her mind, because it always does. Maybe she also thought there was safety in numbers if there was a killer still on the loose.
Only the list of suspects has dwindled to the people in this room, give or take Crazy Cathy and a wannabe TikTok star.
Are they the ones who’ve been plotting together this whole time?
Sandrine and Connor?
Does that make any sense? Together, they have the information necessary to do it, and Connor was involved in the plot with Guy to get us all here.
Has this been a triple bluff? But if so, why?
Why would Connor conspire with Sandrine, of all people, to kill me?
What does either of them get out of my death besides satisfaction?
“Did you find anything?” Sandrine asks, breaking into my thoughts.
“Yes, actually—” Oliver starts before I cut him off.
“Is it you?” I say, looking at Sandrine. “Are you behind all of this?”
She makes eye contact, and for a moment, the creases around her eyes soften. “It isn’t me.”
And maybe this is crazy, but I believe her. There’s no big protest, no pleading. Just a simple statement of fact.
It’s enough.
Besides, we have our killer, finally. The spider who’s been weaving her web.
It’s Elizabeth.
But I don’t want it to be her, so I’m falling back into her trap. I’m pointing to a more likely suspect when I should be laser-focused on the person who seems the least likely to have done it.
Because that’s how it works in these kinds of books.
There’s no escaping your fate when you’re the protagonist. Or the reader, too.
“We have to talk to Vicki,” I say.
“Why?” Connor asks.
“Because she’s the only person left.”