Skiing is Murder Page 9

  “I’ll tell you what, Sara, if we don’t find it on the first time, I’ll come up alone to check the opposite side.”

  “I couldn’t ask you—”

  He pressed a gloved finger to her lips. “You didn’t ask me. I’m telling you.”

  She nodded with his finger still there, and then he let his hand drop.

  “Which side?” he asked again.

  “Left. We’ll call it Lucky Left.”

  Sean put his goggles in place. “You ready?”

  “Yes.”

  HER HEART WAS POUNDING. She could hardly hear anything else between it and the rushing air hitting her ears as she took off down the hill.

  Sean led the way, sticking close to the edge, his body angling left, then right, left, then right. He was cutting his skis into the powder to decrease his speed.

  She was doing the same thing and keeping an eye on him, along with being observant of what lay ahead of her. All it would take was a misplaced twig or an extended branch to wind up in traction or worse.

  Processing all this, she glanced periodically into the woods, only to be rewarded with nothing but tree limbs, stumps, and bushes—nothing that stood out.

  Sean decreased his speed even more and moved off to the side, letting her catch up with him. When she did, they both slowed to the same speed.

  It was then that her eye caught a flicker of yellow.

  She gestured to Sean, indicating that she saw something in the woods, and he nodded. They managed to slow themselves to a stop, but they were easily fifty feet beneath where she had seen the yellow.

  They moved into a den of tree cover.

  “I believe there’s police tape on one tree up there.” She pointed in the direction of where she had seen it.

  “Police tape?”

  “When the body was found, responders had to have some way to mark where to investigate.” She opened her arms to take in the vast area, also inferring the entire run and the other side.

  He lifted his goggles. “Very true.”

  “The person who found Adrian must’ve used other means. A scarf tied around a tree, perhaps.” She waved her hand. “It doesn’t matter. But I’m certain there’s police tape up there. It wasn’t that large of a piece, but big enough for me to spot.”

  Sean unclipped his boots from his skis. “All right. Lead the way, Sara.”

  -

  Chapter 22

  A NEEDLE IN A HAYSTACK

  CLIMBING UP THE HILL CARRYING skis was better than any cardio workout Sean had ever done. He couldn’t complain about the view, though, as Sara led the way. He tried to keep his mind out of the gutter and on the matter at hand but found his thoughts straying. He was a man, after all.

  About twenty feet ahead of him, she stopped walking and looked over a shoulder. “It’s right there,” she said, pointing toward a tree.

  He caught up with her, and sure enough, it was a remnant of police tape. He looked around.

  “So Adrian was found in here.” He swept his arm to indicate the immediate area. “It turns out Lucky Left wasn’t so lucky for Adrian.”

  Sara started laughing. “Now what?”

  “Darling?”

  She shook her head. “We’re nuts, you and I.”

  Was the altitude getting to her? He stepped closer to her. “Are you all right?”

  “I’m fine, Sean,” she said between gasps for breath and fits of hysterical laughter.

  Seeing her like this worried him on one hand and amused him on the other.

  “We came here to get away from murder.” Jovial tears were sliding down her cheeks now. “But we get involved with one anyhow. There’s no place we can go to get away from them. Not even the top of a mountain.”

  “Well, technically, this isn’t the top.”

  Her deadpan gaze had him chuckling now.

  “You’re right. It’s like we’re cursed,” he consented.

  “Cursed?” Another outburst of laughter and then she took a deep breath and closed her eyes. “Okay, I’m better now.”

  “Yeah? Are you sure?”

  She nodded. “It’s just…” Her mouth curved into a smile as she suppressed another giggling fit, given away by the twitching of her mouth. “It’s just that we are obviously meant to solve murders.”

  “We are good at it.”

  Skiers kept whooshing past them. The last one did a double take in their direction, and Sean watched them continue down the hill, hoping they didn’t take a spill from the distraction.

  “We are, Sean.” Sara seemed to have composed herself and stepped farther into the space.

  He took in the area. It had definitely seen a lot of foot traffic with the way the snow was tamped down. Even though there had been snowfall since Adrian was found and there would have been windy moments, the trees had sheltered the ground.

  “Maybe, you were right, Sara. Maybe there’s nothing for us to find. The investigators seem to have conducted quite a thorough—”

  “Sean.” Her back was to him, but she was just straightening up from having been bent over.

  “What is—”

  “Look!” She faced him, a small necklace pendant pinched between her gloved fingers.

  He took it from her. It was a snowflake of silver and diamonds. In the middle of the flake was a blue topaz stone. His heart raced. Did this somehow tie back to the killer who drugged Adrian? As his excitement began to ratchet, his logic weighed him down. “A man had called the front desk, and this”—he held up the jewel—“could have belonged to one of the investigators.”

  Sara shook her head.

  “What makes you so sure?”

  “I’ve seen the earrings that go with this pendant.”

  -

  Chapter 23

  DISTANT RELATIVE

  SARA COULDN’T REACH THE BOTTOM of the hill fast enough. They had a lead and it wasn’t taking them in the direction of Kendra—at least, it didn’t seem so. They still needed to talk to her about getting him up the hill the night he died, though. The pendant was obviously on Adrian’s person, but why? And did it belong to the last woman Adrian had seen before he died? And if so, would she lead them to the killer?

  They hurried toward the lift line with a different goal than the last time. Instead of wanting to go uphill, they sought more answers. Maybe Kendra knew who the woman was. All Sara had was the image of the woman’s face clearly in her mind.

  The thirtysomething woman stepped toward Sara with an extended hand, her eyes now full of recognition. “What an honor to meet you.” She shook Sara’s hand, then took Sean’s, which she took longer to release…

  “These people solve murders… Are you here to find out what happened to Adrian Blackwell?”

  The woman who had identified them in the lobby had been wearing the earrings that matched this pendant. Sara remembered thinking that they were stunning.

  But the visual recollection would do them no good without a name. This was where she hoped Kendra might be able to fill in the blank.

  The line to get on the ski lift was long, though.

  “It will take us hours to get up there,” Sean said.

  “That’s why we’re not waiting.” Sara already had her skis and poles in one hand and took Sean’s hand with the other. They maneuvered through the crowd of people who moaned and complained about them butting ahead.

  Sara kept shouting out, “Sorry,” but it didn’t stop the comments.

  They reached the front of the line, stopping abruptly in front of Vanessa. The people who were the next to load gave Sara and Sean nasty glares.

  Vanessa addressed them. “You have to wait in line like everyone else.”

  “We need to speak to Kendra.”

  She regarded their ski outfits. “Listen, you have to go to the back of the—”

 
“I’m her older sister. Please, it’s about our mom.” Sara might burn in hell, if there was one, but she could justify the lie if it brought them closer to solving a murder.

  Concern knitted across Vanessa’s brow, and her eyes flicked up to the operating booth. She stopped loading people, but the lift continued to run. “Your sister’s here.”

  A second later, a voice came back, crackling through the speaker of the radio. “I don’t have a sister.”

  Vanessa lowered her radio, looking at them skeptically. Concern was replaced by anger. “I’m going to call security if you—”

  Sara touched the woman’s arm.

  “Lady, we want to ski,” one man called out.

  Sara acknowledged him by turning his direction. “I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t be sorry, beautiful, get out of the way.”

  She shifted her attention back to Vanessa. “She doesn’t know this yet, but I am her sister. Mom had me before—”

  Vanessa let out an exasperated sigh. “Fine. Let yourself into the booth.” She spoke into the radio again. “These two”—she indicated Sara and Sean with a pointed finger—“are coming to talk to you.”

  Again, over the radio. “I don’t have a sister.”

  “I don’t care, Kendra. The line’s getting held up. Just talk to ’em,” Vanessa said.

  Sara looked toward the booth. Kendra was standing up and looking down at her and Sean. When they stepped away, Vanessa directed people to move forward in line and start loading again.

  “I don’t know who you people are, but you better leave.” Kendra regarded Sara as they entered the booth, eyeing her up and down, down and up. “You’re not my sister.”

  Sara stepped toward Kendra. “No, I’m—”

  Kendra held up her hand. “Who are you and what do you want?”

  “We know that you and Adrian were lovers,” Sara ground out.

  A flicker glazed over Kendra’s eyes. “So what?”

  “You know he’s dead?”

  “Yeah, but that has nothing to do with me.”

  “When did you last see him?”

  “You cops or something?”

  “Or something,” Sean pitched in.

  “Fine. I last saw him Wednesday night.”

  Sara straightened her spine, her heart fluttering. “Did he come out here to ski last Wednesday night? To this run?”

  “Yes.” Kendra was chewing her bottom lip. A single tear fell down her cheek.

  Now she’s showing emotion…

  “It’s not what you think, though,” Kendra went on. “I didn’t kill him.”

  “We don’t think you did.”

  Kendra sniffled. “He was going to meet me back at my place after.”

  “After what?” Sara asked for clarification.

  “After he did the run. He told me to just close up and leave once he got to the top.” She paused and took the time to make eye contact with Sara, then Sean. “Please don’t say a word of this to my boss. Just the fact I was running the lift after hours would get me fired. I’m just lucky no one noticed.”

  “You have our word,” Sara promised, though she was certain it was only a matter of time before management figured out who had helped Adrian to the top of the hill that night. After all, someone had to and it didn’t seem like his relationship with Kendra was a huge secret. Drew had mentioned it without hesitation.

  Kendra nodded, her attention back on the loading platform. Sara followed the direction of her gaze and Vanessa was signaling for her to pause the lift.

  Kendra did so, and seconds later, she hit the button again and the lift resumed operation.

  “When he didn’t show that night, I just thought he’d changed his mind, ya know.”

  “This might be tough for you to hear,” Sara began, “but Adrian had other lovers.”

  “Oh, I know.”

  For the number of times Sara and Sean had heard this from Adrian’s women, one would think the impact would lessen, but each time a woman voiced her acceptance of Adrian’s philandering ways, Sara’s heart sank. What was it about the man that had women willing to look the other way?

  “Did you see him with another woman on Wednesday evening?” Sean asked.

  “No, but I was working all day.”

  “Did Adrian seem drunk or high to you?” Sara inquired.

  Kendra looked over Sara’s face. “He did seem a bit tipsy. When I asked him about it, he said he was fine and that he’d done the run a hundred times.”

  Assuming Kendra was being honest with them, Adrian had already been feeling the effects of the insulin by the time he reached the hill. Adrian’s response to Kendra’s concern also showed a strong-willed nature; he was determined to ski no matter how he felt and clearly thought he could handle it.

  “So after Adrian got to the top, did you leave as he told you to?” Sara asked.

  “I did.”

  “And when he didn’t show up, what did you think?”

  “I just figured he fell into some other woman’s bed.”

  Nonchalant. There definitely wasn’t any underlying jealousy.

  “Only a couple more questions,” Sara said. “Did you regularly run the lift for Adrian after hours?”

  Kendra blinked slowly and then nodded.

  “And, my last question…” Sara pulled out the snowflake jewel and extended it toward Kendra. “Have you ever seen this before?”

  Kendra took it, holding it between two fingers. “It’s beautiful,” she said as she handed it back to Sara. “But I can’t say I’ve ever seen it before.”

  “You’re sure?”

  “Sorry.”

  Sara nodded. She was hoping for a name, and with that dashed, any lead gained by the pendant had just hit a dead end.

  -

  Chapter 24

  BURIED MOTIVE

  BACK AT THE RESORT, SEAN stuck his skis and polls into the ground next to the patio. Sara did the same.

  “How do we find her, Sean? She could be anywhere by now.”

  “Maybe we call Dale and see if he knows anything about an older woman who was seeing Adrian.”

  “She only appeared to be in her thirties, not a whole lot older than us, you know.”

  “But Adrian was twenty-six. That is quite an age difference.”

  “I suppose.” She winked at him. “I do, however, think that woman is involved. What about Gina and Brent? They said they didn’t know any woman’s name but Stephanie’s. However, Brent had mentioned he was good friends with Adrian.”

  “I imagine Adrian as a kiss-and-tell kind of guy,,” Sean said.

  “We need to find out why—and what—he’s at least hiding.”

  Sean’s phone rang, and he checked the screen. “It’s Adam,” he said and then answered the phone. “What have you got?”

  Sean turned the volume up and tilted it so Sara could nudge in closer to hear. With the people around them, they couldn’t put Adam on speaker.

  “I was able to get ahold of Adrian’s phone records.”

  “And Tony’s financials?” Sean asked.

  “Still working on that, but let me tell you this first: Adrian’s records show a call between him and Tony Frasier a week ago Monday. It lasted less than three minutes.”

  Sean lowered the phone slightly and spoke to Sara. “We need to find out what they talked about.”

  “Sean?” The arch and volume to Adam’s voice told Sean he’d said his name more than once.

  “I’m here,” Sean said into the receiver. “Sorry.”

  “There were also a bunch of calls to this other guy,” Adam continued. “I did a search on his name, and it turns out he works for Glacier.”

  “That’s Arctic Blast’s largest competitor,” Sara said.

  “Oh, hi, Sara, I didn’t know you were on
the line, too.”

  “Hi, Adam.”

  “What’s this guy’s name?” Sean asked, moving ahead.

  “Roland Carson. Now, while we don’t have any way of knowing what was talked about on the phone calls, I was able to recover some e-mail correspondence between Adrian and Roland. Apparently Adrian was going to leave Tony’s company and go to Glacier.”

  “If Tony found out about this…” Sean began.

  “So much for the fight being staged,”’ Sara went on. “And how much do you want to bet Gina and Brent knew that it wasn’t?”

  “They probably gave us a rehearsed PR speech.”

  “So what else are they holding back from us?”

  “Ah, guys, that’s all I’ve got for now,” Adam said.

  “That’s all?” Sean laughed. “Terrific job so far, Adam. Let us know when you have Tony’s financials.” He ended the call and turned to Sara. “Tony could have killed Adrian because he was going to break their contract.”

  “Brent did mention that Adrian made Arctic Blast a lot of money.”

  “Tony wouldn’t be willing to just let him go.”

  “And maybe there was even more at stake for Tony, something on a personal level. I can’t imagine Arctic Blast keeping him as an employee if he lost Adrian Blackwell.” Sean could feel in his gut that Tony might be the killer, as much as he didn’t like to rely on it.

  Tony would have had strong motive, and a man had called down to the front desk. Now they needed to prove he had opportunity. Was Tony booked at the resort or somewhere else in the area? Next came proving means. But they knew Tony wasn’t a diabetic. He shared his thinking with Sara.

  “All right, then where would Tony get insulin?” Sara tapped her lips with a fingertip. A few seconds later, she stopped, her gaze intense. “Was Tony married? I’m just thinking…”

  Sean dialed Adam and held the phone for Sara to hear.

  Adam only got out part of his greeting when Sean blurted, “Is Tony married?”

  “He is. I remember reading that,” Adam replied. “Her name is Julie.”

  “See if she has diabetes,” Sara requested.