Baked Alaska (7 page)

Cheese

Chapter 6

“Maybe my fingers are just cold,” Pete said, withdrawing his hand and raising his fingers to his mouth so he could blow on them.

“That’s the...” Sadie was having a hard time forming words as she stared at the woman in the chair. The entire ship seemed to spin beneath her feet. “Pete, that’s the woman Shawn was talking to yesterday.” She placed her hand on the outside of her bag. “She’s the woman I chased tonight. I bought her photo.”

“I know,” Pete said, sounding frustrated, as though he’d been trying to talk himself out of believing it. He placed two fingers on the woman’s neck, then shook his head and rolled the woman onto her back.

Sadie heard a gasping breath come from the woman due to the change of position.

“She’s breathing!” Sadie said. But the woman didn’t move, didn’t open her eyes.

“And I found a pulse. It’s weak though, and... ” He lightly slapped the woman’s cheeks, but she didn’t respond and her head lolled to the side. He shook her shoulder. “Ma’am? Ma’am, can you hear me?” She still didn’t respond.

“What’s wrong with her?” Sadie asked, relieved that the woman wasn’t dead.

After a few more seconds, Pete dropped his hand to his side and looked up at Sadie. “Go get security,” he said. “She needs medical attention. Can you smell the alcohol?”

Sadie was still staring at the braids; the woman’s face was turned away from her.

“Sadie.”

She looked up at Pete and blinked, not knowing what to say or what to think.

Pete stared at her a moment, then guided her to another chair. “You sit. I’ll get security. Don’t go anywhere.”

Sadie nodded as Pete took off toward the doors. Sadie hadn’t gotten a good look at the woman’s face. Maybe it
wasn’t
the woman Shawn had been talking to. Could there be two women with the same hair on this boat?

Sadie stood up and walked closer to the deck chair. The woman’s head had fallen to the side and her hair—there was so much of it—covered part of her face. She reached out to move the woman’s hair out of the way.

She hesitated when her hand was a few inches away, but she couldn’t stop herself and carefully brushed the braids back from the woman’s face, touching the woman’s cheek in the process. It was cold. Her eyes were closed and her mouth was slightly open. Her face looked soft in the dim light. She was definitely the woman Shawn had been talking to. Sadie had seen her just a couple of hours ago. Had it been two hours? Two and a half? Who was this woman?

Sadie pulled her hand away, and her eyes traveled to a wine bottle placed near the leg of the deck chair. She bent down to read the label because her investigative mind couldn’t
not
do it. Pinot noir. There was a pale green ribbon tied around the neck and what looked like a gift tag attached to it, though it was facing the bottle. Sadie put her hand in the pocket of her jacket like a glove and leaned forward awkwardly so she could turn the label around.

To Ben & Tanice—May you continue to find every happiness together.

“Tanice?” Sadie said as she dropped the label and looked at the woman again. Like Janice but with a T? In her photo, this woman had been with a younger woman, not “Ben.”

The sound of the whooshing door and footsteps on the deck broke the spell, and Sadie jumped to her feet moments before two security officers, someone who looked like a doctor, and Pete arrived.

Pete and Sadie backed up while the men assessed the woman in the chair. One of the security guards picked up the wine bottle, and Sadie considered telling him not to tamper with evidence. He wasn’t even wearing gloves. Were these men trained for this kind of thing? Wait, why was she acting as though a crime had been committed?

The security guard shook the bottle. From the sloshing of the remaining wine inside, it sounded nearly full.

“Too much alcohol,” he said in thickly accented English.

The medical staff member told the other security guard to alert the onboard physician and order a stretcher.

“I need to talk to Shawn,” Sadie whispered to Pete a minute later when it seemed the men had forgotten all about them.

“Not yet,” Pete whispered back.

Another medical worker joined the group, and a few minutes later two more security guards arrived with a gurney.

Eventually, another man joined the others and, after talking with everyone already there, introduced himself to Pete and Sadie as the head of security. Officer Jareg was from the Philippines like many of the other staff members on the ship, but he carried himself with a more official air. He asked both Sadie and Pete to explain how they’d found the woman. He took notes on their answers in a small notebook just like the ones Sadie had seen numerous detectives and police officers use.

“Do you know her?” he asked after they finished recounting what had happened.

“Um, no,” Sadie said. “Though I’ve seen her on the ship.” She wanted to talk to Shawn before she told this man too much.

Officer Jareg asked for their cabin numbers and told them he’d contact them if he had any questions; he also invited them to come to him if they remembered anything else. “Unfortunately this happens from time to time,” he explained. “Too much vacation.” And yet, when he looked back at the woman in the chair, he looked decidedly worried. As though there was something about this situation that bothered him more than he was letting on. Or perhaps Sadie was simply paranoid.

He turned back and smiled reassuringly. “If you should need me, the security office is located on deck eleven, starboard forward.” He put his notebook away. “We would very much appreciate for you to keep this quiet. A problem like this can be very upsetting to the other passengers. You understand?”

Sadie and Pete both agreed. “Is she going to be alright?” Sadie asked.

“I’m sure she will be fine. The doctor will see to her.”

They were told they could return to their rooms, and together they moved toward the closest set of doors leading into the ship. A security guard had put up plastic signs around the area that said “Maintenance in Progress.”

The guard let Sadie and Pete through the doors, and they walked to the stairs, their moods sufficiently troubled.

“Do you think she’ll be alright?” Sadie asked Pete. “I got the impression Officer Jareg was more worried than he let on.”

“She was completely unresponsive,” Pete said. “Even a drunk will usually move or attempt to speak or something. But she was breathing and had a pulse and those are both good signs.”

Sadie nodded. “We need to talk to Shawn.” This wasn’t how she wanted to learn about his connection to this woman—Tanice—but it seemed as though the time had arrived.

When they reached Shawn’s cabin, Sadie knocked, waited, then knocked again.

Shawn didn’t answer.

Chapter 7

“He might still be at the club,” Pete said when Sadie knocked for the third time.

“We need to find him.” She hadn’t paid much attention to the different nightclubs on the ship since they held no interest for her, but now she scanned her memory banks. She thought there was one on deck ten. Was another one on deck twelve? She tried to remain calm, but her anticipation of explaining this to Shawn was rising.

“
I
will find him,” Pete said, pulling Sadie toward the stairs. “Why don’t you go to your cabin?”

“There’s no way I’m going to my cabin right now,” Sadie said. “I need to find out what Shawn’s relationship is to that woman. I need to see his face when we tell him what’s happened.”

“This is not an opportunity for you to satisfy your curiosity.”

“Pete,” Sadie said, exasperated, “I’m worried about my son, and now this woman he knows is ill or drunk or something. Who is she, Pete? Why wouldn’t she talk to me earlier? What if Shawn told her to avoid me?” She could hear her own voice rising as she spoke and stopped to take a deep breath.

“This isn’t the time to interrogate him,” Pete said. “This will likely be upsetting for him to hear—especially if you’re there watching his reaction. Just let me bring him up to speed on my own, okay?”

Sadie shook her head. “He’s
my
son, and
I’ll
find him.” She tried to sound confident, but it came across more panicked than she’d have liked.

“Sadie,” Pete said, lowering his chin and holding her gaze with his eyes. “There is obviously some history between him and this woman that he didn’t want to tell you. You being there when he learns that she’s sick—really sick—isn’t a good idea. Let me take care of this, please.”

She didn’t want him to take care of this, but she could also picture exactly what she would do when she found Shawn. She’d either cry or get angry, and neither would be effective. Pete was right, this news would probably be upsetting for Shawn. She didn’t want to make it worse, so she finally gave in. “Will you bring him to my room after you talk to him? Just so I know he’s okay?”

“He’s fine, Sadie, just because she—”

“Pete, with all I’ve seen in the last few years, I want to see for myself that he’s okay. I need that, okay? And I won’t push for any information from him. I won’t freak out.”

He paused a moment before nodding. “Okay.”

Breanna was still asleep when Sadie entered the cabin, which meant Sadie couldn’t turn on the lights or the TV. She settled for propping open the bathroom door which gave her just enough light to see and then spent half an hour pacing the same six-foot area of carpet until she heard a tap on the door. She hurried to the door and pulled it open.

Shawn stood in the doorway, and Sadie took a step into the hallway and threw her arms around his neck, all her determination to be calm drowned out by her concern for him. Shawn let her hang on for a few seconds, but stepped back as soon as she loosened her grip. Pete stood to the side, but Sadie only had eyes for Shawn. “Are you okay? Where were you? Who is she?”

Shawn glanced at Pete, giving Sadie a chance to read the fearful expression on Shawn’s face. “What’s wrong?” she asked, looking between the two of them. Pete had his detective face on, which meant she couldn’t read any of his thoughts. He rarely used it with her these days, and she hated seeing it in place again. It shut her out, and more than anything right now, she didn’t want to be shut out. “What’s going on?”

“I told Shawn he needed to come tell you he was alright, but that the rest could wait until morning,” Pete said, giving her a pointed look. She remembered her promise that she wouldn’t grill Shawn if Pete would bring him to her cabin. So much easier said than done.

“The rest? What’s the rest?”

“I’ve got to go talk to security,” Shawn said, looking to Pete for help, which raised Sadie’s blood pressure even more. Were they ganging up on her? Had Pete told Shawn to wait to tell her whatever she should know right now? Or had Shawn asked Pete to support him in keeping Sadie in the dark?

“Why?” Sadie asked.

“He just needs to talk to them,” Pete said. “To see if he can help. He also needs to find out if she’s okay. We’ll have more information in the morning.”

“You can tell me who she is before you go. Why won’t you tell me?” She looked at her son, who was obviously upset. Why wouldn’t he want his mother to comfort him?

“Mom...”

“Can I come with you?” she asked, trying to think of any way to be a part of this.

“I think it’s best if Shawn and I go to security alone for now. Meet us in the library tomorrow morning at eight, okay?”

“I don’t understand why you won’t talk to me,” Sadie said, hearing her desperation.

Pete took her hands, gave them a squeeze, and told her in a gentle voice that everything would be fine.

They really weren’t going to tell her anything.

She finally nodded, as much out of embarrassment to be losing it as in agreement. But her backing down seemed to be all Shawn needed to excuse himself from the situation. He started down the hall without another word.

Pete glanced at Shawn, and then back to Sadie. “Please trust me on this. We’ll see you at eight. Take one of your sleeping pills; make yourself get some rest. Tomorrow might be a long day.”