Ms America and the Offing on Oahu (Beauty Queen Mysteries No. 1) Read online

  I’m about to go back to my front-row seat in the empty auditorium when I hear footsteps behind me in the backstage area. These are way too purposeful to be made by Magnolia. Then I hear voices. It’s Cantwell and somebody else. I sidle up against the wall and listen.

  “—before and I’ll say it again. You’re barmy if you think whoever killed that woman is part of the pageant! I tell you, man, look outside this organization.”

  Cantwell said the same thing to me the morning after the finale. It’s his enduring refrain. Whoever he’s talking to, a man apparently, mumbles something I can’t make out. Is it Momoa?

  Cantwell again. “And for God’s sake, put some welly into the damn investigation! Keeping all these women here so you can trundle along at your snail’s pace is costing me a bloody fortune. This goes on one day longer, I’ll have my barristers draw up a suit.”

  If it’s not Momoa he’s talking to, it’s somebody else from Oahu PD. And as it occurred to me last night, Cantwell does not like having to pay to keep us all here on the island, rich as he is.

  The footsteps get closer. I realize I’d better reveal myself or it’ll be clear I’m eavesdropping. I stride toward center stage as if to head down to the auditorium floor when Cantwell calls my name. I spin around. “Yes, sir?” I see then that it is Momoa with Cantwell.

  Cantwell frowns at me. “The detective has something to discuss with you.”

  Fabulous. But especially in Cantwell’s presence, I’m required to be gracious. “How can I help you, Detective?”

  He holds something up. A videotape. Initially I get excited. The one of Misty and Dirk, I think? Or of Tiffany and Keola? Maybe Momoa wants to ask me about them, involve me in the investigation.

  Then no, I realize, that can’t be one of those videotapes. Magnolia’s camcorder recorded via memory card. That’s what she told me Tiffany ripped out of her camera.

  Momoa solves the mystery for me soon enough. “This,” he declares portentously, “is a recording drawn from one of this hotel’s surveillance cameras. Specifically, from one positioned on the basement level of this hotel.”

  My stomach drops. I half expect it to land on the stage floor beneath my billowing fuchsia satin.

  “Ohio,” Cantwell thunders, “what do you have to say for yourself?”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  Things I learned as a kid from getting caught with my hand in the cookie jar come flying back to me. Tops on the list: Don’t admit to anything you’re not sure they know you did.

  “Whatever could be on that tape that concerns me?” I ask. I’m trying to sound innocent even though I expect it to fly about as well as a one-winged canary.

  “What concerns you, Ohio,” Cantwell blares, “are segments of this videotape in which you’re scurrying like a cockroach through the basement corridors of this hotel!”

  Uh oh. Goodbye, crown. How in the world did I not see that there was a surveillance camera down there? I guess it’s like me not noticing that Magnolia was videotaping constantly during the weeks of preliminary competition.

  Then again, I should be glad of one thing. No one has yet mentioned a box. Maybe the camera caught me in the basement level but not pilfering U.S. mail addressed to someone other than myself. In which case I really would be dodging a bullet.

  Cantwell continues. “Do you care to explain your behavior?”

  I face Momoa, who amazingly is less scary to me right now than Cantwell. I trot out the same lie I told the concierge. “I went down to the basement to get a box from the mail room because I’m buying so many souvenirs here I won’t be able to carry all of them home in my suitcases.”

  That won’t do it for Momoa. “That does not explain your skulking in the corridors.”

  “I was just having a little fun, you know, a James Bond’y kind of thing.” Lame, so lame. “I know it must look odd but I used to play spy games with my daughter when she was younger and I just kind of got into it while I was down there.”

  Momoa rocks on his heels. “Ms. Pennington, something strikes me. And that is that as I conduct this investigation into the tragic demise of Tiffany Amber, I repeatedly run into you.”

  I can only thank the heavens that it seems Momoa remains unaware of my nocturnal tour of Tiffany’s hotel room. If he knew about that, too, I would surely be toast. “It is because I was one of the last people to see Tiffany alive that I’m so desperate to know what happened to her.”

  “I am sorely tempted to take you downtown,” Momoa informs me.

  That prospect sounds truly terrifying. Somehow I don’t think Hawaiian police stations are any more cheerful than the ones we have back home. “There’s no need to do that. Besides, I don’t want to impede your investigation by forcing you to waste your time keeping tabs on me.”

  “I’m not at all sure that it is a waste of time,” Momoa tells me pointedly.

  “It is, Detective. I did not kill Tiffany Amber. Whoever did is still out there, perhaps ready to strike again.” I’m not sure I believe that but I’ll say anything to move Momoa’s suspicious gaze away from me.

  He steps closer. “Ms. Pennington, I am going to be keeping an even closer eye on you now than I have been before. Do we understand each other?”

  I’m ready to cry with relief. He’s not taking me downtown. Not yet. “Yes, sir.”

  “If I find out that you so much as jaywalked on Kalia Avenue, you will be arrested. Pronto. Do you understand me?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Momoa nods at Cantwell and walks away. He’s barely gone when Cantwell gets about an inch from my face.

  “Ohio, I am this close, this close,” he hisses, his thumb and index finger half an inch apart, “to taking your crown from you and giving it to the third-place finisher.”

  “Don’t do that, please, sir. I will do better, I promise.”

  “If you think for one second that that pitiful excuse for an investigator did not arrest you because he doesn’t have the evidence to do so, you are wrong. Dead wrong.”

  “I’m innocent, Mr. Cantwell. Honestly, I am.”

  “So you keep saying. But I for one find your denials less and less persuasive. Moreover, your high jinks are keeping the investigation targeted on this pageant when we would all be much better served if the focus shifted elsewhere.” He shakes his head. I hold my breath, watching a muscle in his jaw twitch. Then, “Give me one good reason, one good reason, why I should not take the title from you right now.”

  “I can give you two.” The words spill from my mouth. “First, I have it on good authority that you entertained Tiffany Amber in your penthouse suite. Alone. During the preliminary competition. And second, while I have that information, I don’t believe that Detective Momoa does.”

  Cantwell’s blue eyes widen. “You … little … vixen.”

  “We all know that private meeting was verboten, Mr. Cantwell.” My heart is pounding so mightily against my rib cage that I can barely speak. “Pageant rules forbid it. But what makes it even worse is that Tiffany Amber ended up dead.”

  “Are you suggesting,” he’s spitting out his words, “that I killed that woman?”

  “No. I’m merely pointing out that your one-on-one with Tiffany would be of interest to the Oahu police department.”

  “You blackmailer, you!”

  “Nothing of the sort,” I lie. “I just think this is as good a time as any to bring up your clandestine interlude with the murder victim.”

  That shuts him up. He walks a short distance away across the stage.

  I try to calm down, which is what I suspect he’s trying to do, too. I don’t know if it was brilliant or idiotic to say what I did but I really felt up against it. One thing is certain: Sebastian Cantwell recognizes that I have at least one card in my deck. True, now I’ve played it. But I can always play it again with Momoa if need be. I know that, and Cantwell does, too.

  He walks back to me. “Listen, you diabolical female. Not that it is any of your concern but I met with Californ
ia at her request. Curious what she wanted and all that. She had competitive spunk, I’ll say that for her. She wanted me to intercede with the judges so they’d give her serious consideration, as she put it.”

  “Did you agree?”

  “No, I did not agree! The only thing that makes these damn pageants remotely interesting is that they’re genuine horse races.”

  I sail right past being compared to horseflesh in favor of wondering whether Cantwell decided not to pressure the judges before or after he slept with Tiffany. But I lack the cojones to ask that question.

  He delivers his parting shot. “Ohio, California might have been a spitfire but she had nothing on you.”

  He strides away. I’m shaking, from terror, relief, exhaustion, I don’t know what. But it appears I may have lived to wear my tiara another day.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  Shanelle is not in our room when I get back. I don’t know if that’s good or bad. Part of me wants to vent. Another wants to crawl under the covers and wait until Momoa releases us queens to leave Oahu, though at this point I expect one notable name would be absent from the CLEARED TO GO list.

  I choose a happy medium. I unlock the mini bar and crack open not only the little bottle of chardonnay but the bag of potato chips. The happy-go-lucky time when I cared about calories, sodium, and saturated fat is long past. At the moment I’ve got problems way more pressing than water retention and thunder thighs.

  I stand on the balcony to consume my wicked repast. After a while I notice several sunbathers on the opposite side of the pool shading their eyes to witness me nine floors up in my fuchsia satin gown, rhinestone tiara, and Ms. America sash devouring potato chips and glugging white wine straight from the bottle.

  Maybe it’s the first time they’ve seen this behavior from a beauty queen. Let them stare. If by some act of God and Sebastian Cantwell I retain my crown, it won’t be the last.

  I can’t even imagine how horrible it would be to lose my title, totally through my own doing. How could I hold my head up? I’d be an embarrassment to myself, Rachel, Jason, my parents …

  In short order the chips and the wine are but a memory. I emerge from a quick shower to find Shanelle back. “How did the shoot go?” she asks me.

  “The shoot was fine. It’s what happened afterward.”

  Wrapped in a towel, I tell the tale. Shanelle is aghast. She shrieks, screams No!, paces, slaps her hand upside her head—in short, she exhibits all the symptoms of deep upset. Eventually I realize that she may not be concerned only about me. “Don’t worry,” I tell her. “I really don’t think they saw me with the box. So they have no idea you helped me hack Tiffany’s computer.”

  She flops onto her bed. “I don’t know why I care anyway. Hell, my pageant career is over. You got a lot more to lose than I do.” She eyes me. “So what are you gonna do?”

  I start to moisturize my face. “Be more careful.”

  “You’re not going to stop investigating?”

  “How can I? The only way I can get out from under this black cloud of suspicion is to figure out who killed Tiffany Amber.”

  She gets up and heads for the mini bar. She’s disciplined enough to limit herself to a Diet Coke. “In that case, you up for the luau?”

  “I completely forgot about that thing. Is it tonight?”

  “Biggest draw on the island of Oahu.”

  I’m not sure about that but the Royal Hibiscus does do it up big one night a week. “What the hell. I may as well enjoy my freedom while I can.”

  Half an hour later I’ve got my face and hair done and am wearing a lime green chiffon babydoll dress with spaghetti straps and a twist of charmeuse at the bodice. Very on trend. Shanelle’s in a strapless lightly beaded hankie hem dress with a dramatic floral print on a black background. Her hair’s back to a natural Afro tonight.

  “We look good, girl,” Shanelle pronounces.

  I agree. “No one would guess we narrowly avoided incarceration today.”

  And we’re off. The lobby is mayhem what with the crush of people assembled for the luau.

  “Nothing like roast pig to draw a crowd,” I tell Shanelle.

  Some people have taken the luau theme and run with it. I see one couple who are clearly ready to party. The woman is wearing a grass skirt, bikini top, lei and straw hat, and her other half is in boxer shorts and undershirt with a bright pink pool noodle around his waist and a snorkel mask over his face.

  It’s such a horde in the lobby’s central courtyard that I can barely move. Shanelle is several people to my right, as immobilized as I am. The pulsing crowd is pushing me left into a palm tree and a stand of birds of paradise. One real live bird is only a few feet from my face. The blue and gold macaw, whose name I’ve learned is Cordelia, is perched on her tree just in front of me.

  All of a sudden I feel hands in the middle of my naked back. They push, hard. I can’t help myself; I pitch forward.

  I see everything like it’s unwinding before me in slow motion. My hands flail in empty space. In front of me is Cordelia. She’s looking right at me with astonishment written all over her narrow parroty face. I’m going straight at her; there’s no denying it. She knows it and I know it. She squawks. I shriek. I fixate on her beady black eyes and quite sizable black beak, both getting closer by the nanosecond. There’s nowhere to go but in one direction. My hands wave desperately in front of me. Then Cordelia’s beak latches onto the index finger of my right hand. And bites down. Hard.

  “Owwww!” I scream.

  Cordelia lets go, then screams, too. She’s terrified, I recognize that, but I will admit I’m more worried about myself. I lurch forward into the birds of paradise and end up sprawled on all fours in the exotic flora and fauna. All I know is one thing: my finger hurts like hell.

  Actually I know a second thing. I’m bleeding like the poor stuck pig all we luau goers are preparing to devour for dinner.

  It’s pandemonium behind me. I hear Shanelle’s shout cut through the noise. “What the hell happened to my roommate?”

  Somebody pushed Shanelle’s roommate, that’s what happened. But what I care about now is the throbbing pain in my finger. I force myself into a kneeling position and look at my hand. It’s like it belongs to another person. It’s trembling and you’d think I could control it but I can’t. And that blood I mentioned? Oh, yes. It’s everywhere. Splotching my lime green dress and the birds of paradise like a crime scene.

  Somebody rushes up behind me and takes me gently by the shoulders. I turn my head to look. I expect it to be Shanelle but it’s Mario. I’m happy to see him even though he’s fully clothed.

  “What in the world happened to you?” he asks me.

  I cock my chin at the macaw. “Cordelia. She bit my finger.”

  “Come on,” he says. “Let’s find a doctor.”

  In short order he has me vertical. Then I have a Moses moment. In the face of my injury, the crowd parts before me as if they have all the room in the world. With his arm around me—believe me, I’m not complaining—Mario leads me across the lobby and down a short corridor to the hotel doctor’s office. Clearly the Royal Hibiscus is equipped for anything.

  Shanelle appears and she and Mario get me seated in the waiting area. I presume the on-duty doctor is in the examining room treating some other ill-fated tourist; that door is closed.

  Meanwhile the blotch on my dress is getting more impressive by the second. Shanelle sits down next to me. “You’re bleeding bad, girl. Did you trip on those heels and fall into that bird or what?”

  “Somebody pushed me.”

  Mario halts his pacing to frown in my direction. “Are you sure about that?”

  “No doubt in my mind. I felt hands on my back.” I wince. The pain is no joke.

  Shanelle rubs my good arm. “They shouldn’t have that dang macaw free in the courtyard like that. It’s a menace.”

  “Don’t blame Cordelia,” I say. “I provoked her when I launched in her direction. She must’v
e been petrified.”

  The examining room door opens and the doctor appears. I make that brilliant deduction from the young Asian woman’s lab coat and stethoscope. Her smile fades fast when she sees my hand. “What in the world happened to you?”

  “Cordelia. It’s not her fault, though.”

  “This is a first,” the doctor says. “I’ve never known her to bite anybody.”

  Minutes later, still in the waiting room, the doctor cleans my wound and teaches me a bit of bird lore. I learn there’s only one poisonous bird in the world and it lives in New Guinea. I hope the hotels there have the good sense to keep it far from the tourists. Then I watch the doctor insert aloe vera gel into a short rubber thingie that looks like a condom. She slips it on my finger. “This will stop the pain,” she tells me. “It’s also good for helping to keep the bruising and swelling down.” She instructs me how to take care of my finger. And she proves right about the pain receding. But as one woe recedes, another advances.

  Who pushed me? Was it a warning? Is my investigating, such as it is, making somebody nervous enough to try to shake me off? If so, it means that Tiffany Amber’s murderer truly does lurk among us. He or she must be one of the people I’ve talked to.

  Mario sits beside me. He’s as adorable as ever in twill cargo shorts and a navy slim-fit polo with white piping along the color, placket, and cuffs. I have to say, it’s pretty fun being the object of his concern. “How are you feeling now?” he asks me.

  “Better.” I raise my condomed finger in the air. “The aloe vera is working.”

  “Do you really think somebody pushed you?”

  “I’m positive.”