Death in Paradise (21 page)

"Yes." She seemed relieved that I'd gotten the same message. "You don't think he—"

"I doubt it. Whoever killed Martina planned it. If Lewis ever were to kill someone, it wouldn't be premeditated. It would be impulsive and inept. He'd probably leave his wallet behind in his haste to escape, and then whine 'Poor me, she made me do it' all the way to jail."

She shook her head sadly. "This is all so ugly. Did you see the paper this morning?"

There had been one outside my door, but I'd just carried it in and tossed it on the bed on my way out. I hadn't even looked at the headlines. "Bad?"

"Not too. Well... the whole business is bad, but the story doesn't say much about the crime, probably because the police don't know much. And it was very positive about what a wonderful person Martina was."

"Billy Berryman," I said. William Berryman, known to everyone as Billy, was our public relations guy. Billy was young. He looked like a geeky twelve-year-old who ought to be in his room making explosives with his chemistry set, but appearances can be deceiving. In my opinion, Billy was brilliant. He could read minds and he could telegraph thoughts and ideas to the press so well they never knew what hit them. He also possessed the magical ability to seduce cameras, so that on the screen, his geekiness fell away and he looked young and earnest and winningly sincere.

"You bet. Where'd we find the guy, anyway?"

"Oh, those gals at EDGE Consulting. Once in a while they do something right."

She was surprised. "You and Suzanne found him?"

"Nah. We made him in the back room from excess body parts."

"This morning, that doesn't seem at all funny."

"You're right." I switched to another topic. "Is there going to be food?"

Shannon leaned into the conversation in time to hear my question. "Honey, if there is one thing we headmistresses know, it's that tragedy and food go hand in hand. Never leave anyone alone to discuss disaster without a sandwich, right, Zannah?"

Zannah, in a pink dress, looked like she'd been spit polished before leaving her room. Every hair was in place—not that that would be true of mine even if I used a gallon of shellac—and her outfit was impeccably pressed and accessorized. "Maybe it's the Jewish mother in me," Zannah said, "but I don't think you can have a conversation without food."

I stared. "Jewish mother?"

"You didn't know? I was adopted when I was four by Mel and Sarah Steinberg."

"People!" Jonetta rapped on the table. "People. Time's a wasting. Let's get this show on the road." Like the nice girls and boy we were, we took our seats. I wondered why she was running the meeting instead of Jolene. She nodded toward the man at the head of the table. "This is Denby Inashima, hotel manager." Mr. Inashima bowed and said good morning.

The second we were in our seats and Mr. Inashima had bowed, a brisk cadre of servers spread placements before us and set down steaming plates of food. This was no muffins-and-coffee buffet. This was a meal. An eggs-and-bacon-and-potatoes-and-toast meal, the kind no one eats anymore because it pushes all the bad-for-you buttons. I sighed and smiled and waited for Mr. Inashima to continue. "On behalf of the hotel, I apologize for the problems there have been with some of your arrangements," he began. "There have been some miscalculations, which I deeply regret." He bowed again. "However, we are meeting this morning to determine how we may all work together to ensure that despite this... tragedy... which has occurred, the conference can proceed as smoothly as possible. First of all..."

On cue, a tall, slim, middle-aged woman with her hair in an efficient chignon, entered the room. "This is Mrs. Sato, our assistant manager. She will be working with you on every detail to ensure the success of the remainder of your convention. Mrs. Sato will be going over all of the details with you, as she would have with Mrs. Pullman. I can assure you that everything will be given her personal attention." Mr. Inashima bowed again. "There is no one better than Mrs. Sato." He said a few more consoling and reassuring things, and then checked his watch. "Unfortunately, I must now attend another meeting. Please call upon Mrs. Sato for your every need." He rose gracefully from his chair, bowed again, and departed.

Mrs. Sato did a liquid slide into his seat, pulled some papers from a leather folder, and spread them on the table before her. "This morning you have scheduled four conference rooms," she said. "Yesterday there was some confusion...." And we were off, taking care of business. Room sizes, PA systems, signage. Tour buses and boat trips, snorkel trips, and bike trips. This evening's banquet. Our PR person would be meeting with their PR person. There would be no more glitches. The hotel would align their press releases with ours. A one-page letter from the manager would be slipped under every door. They did not, any more than we, wish to have anyone's vacation/conference marred by dwelling on violent death.

Seven-thirty came. Mrs. Sato ran a red-lacquered fingernail down her checklist. "There is one remaining thing," she said. "The guest count for this evening's dinner. If I could have that, please, we can be sure there are no problems such as have occurred before."

She waited. None of us spoke. It was an uncomfortable silence. Finally Jonetta broke it. "I'm afraid Ms. Pullman's assistant has that information and she isn't here this morning. We will have to get that information to you later."

Ms. Sato looked down at the list again while she evicted displeasure from her face and reinstated placidity. "Certainly," she agreed. "As soon as you can." She slid out of her seat and glided away.

Billy Berryman took her place. Billy was neither quiet nor graceful. Papers spilled from his hands and words spilled from his mouth and after the peaceful approach of Mr. Inashima, it was like being sucked into a whirlwind. Names of newspapers and contacts poured out. Details of press releases. Suggestions about damage control. More suggestions about damage control. Billy was reassuring. If such a thing had to happen, better that it should happen here than in Washington, where Martina and Jeff were well known, while here we were transients and it was the aim of the tourist industry to keep a lid on things and not scare the customers. As he spoke, he was passing things out. Copies of the press coverage "back home." Copies of what he'd released, what he was planning to release.

"I'd like to get something on the record from Jeff," he said. "Could you fix that up, do you think, Jonetta?"

"Shouldn't we leave the poor man alone?" Jolene said. "He's just lost his wife. Surely this is no time to be worrying him with our concerns."

Billy shook his head. "Don't forget, Joly, Jeff's a pro. Tragic mourning for murdered wife will get him some sympathetic ears when he gets home. And from our point of view, Martina's loss as a spokeswoman for America's girls is a headline we don't want to pass up."

"That's ghoulish," she said.

"Au contraire," he said. "It's memorializing. It's press inches. Martina loved press. You wouldn't deny her in death what she so cherished in life."

"Billy, darlin," Shannon said, "you could get a serial killer of children a job in a day-care center, you know that? You positively scare me sometimes."

"Sometimes I scare myself. Okay. Jonetta, you're going to get me some time with Jeff, right? And Thea, I need a copy of that speech you gave yesterday and about half an hour of your time. And what are we doing about tonight? Who's going to introduce the speaker? Thea, I think that's you as well. We'll work on it together. Something nice and juicy about the next big area of focus, the hot-button issue for the millennium, whether public schools can offer girls the opportunity for single-sex education or whether they'll run afoul of the separate-but-equal problem. I love it! Nothing is more fun than being on the cutting edge."

Rob Greene was edging his way toward the door. "Hold it! Rob! Don't try and get away. We've got some brainstorming to do. Think memorial service. Think memorial acts. We handle this right, and Martina can be even bigger in death than she was in life."

"Billy, that is utterly tasteless," Jolene said. "Can you at least pretend not to be so enthusiastic? More than any of us, you should know that appearances count."

"You bet, Joly. But hey, I'm among friends. The second I walk out of this room, I shall assume the solemn mask of tragedy. Oh, yeah. Almost forgot..." He started digging through his bag. I didn't want to give him half an hour to write an intro to the dinner speech and talk about spin. I wanted to slap him upside the head and tell him to cool it for a while. I wanted to remind him that good as he was, no one is irreplaceable, especially if they offend the client. I wanted to remind him that in business, you are never among friends. Your clients are your friends only as long as it is expedient.

He pulled out a stapled stack of photocopied sheets. "Get a look at these, will you? Makes you wonder if maybe we can't stop looking suspiciously at each other, doesn't it?"

I took the bundle and scanned it to see what he was referring to. It was a bunch of newspaper clippings about murders. All the murders had taken place in resort hotels. In no case was there a suspect. And the killer, if indeed there was a single perpetrator, was being called, in one of the stories, the lingerie killer. In each case, the victim was dressed in revealing underwear—bustier, thong panties, garter belt—and strangled with a stocking.

 

 

 

Chapter 15

 

Shannon was the first to speak. "Is this one of those cases where bad news is good news?"

"If a serial killer can ever be considered good news," Jolene amended.

Billy just shrugged. "I don't know if that's what we've got here or not. That's for the police to say. The others were in Florida, Colorado, and California, but they were all at resorts. For that matter, I don't even know if the Maui police know about this stuff. I found them by playing on the Internet. And it took me a long time." He raised his eyebrows at me, which meant I was supposed to understand that he was billing for all that time.
Sure, Billy,
I thought,
anything you want.
He might have just gotten the police off our backs. I, for one, would kiss the ground he walked on if that was the case. My vacation fun would not be diminished if I had no more visits from the midnight twins Bernstein and Nihilani.

"Oh, sure," Zannah said. "They're all on the Internet these days. Don't they just tap into their computers and call up the FBI or something? You know, 'Dear Mr. FBI, we just had this crime. Do you have anyone on your serial killers list who fits the bill,' that sort of thing?"

Jonetta shook her head. "Girl, you've been watching too much television. Okay, is everybody cool for this morning? You got your new seminar room assignments that Mrs. Sato handed out? Everyone knows where they're going?"

"Jonetta, most of us will never know where we're going," Rob Greene said. He was rumpled and disorganized this morning. Very unusual for him. Even his mustache was unkempt.

"In the short-term, Rob. In the short-term," she said. He nodded. "All you have to do is introduce the panels and then be there to troubleshoot in case all hell breaks loose." No one said anything. "Fine," she said. "That's it for now. If anyone sees that Rory, rope her and hog-tie her and deliver her to Jolene. She won't answer her door, she won't return phone calls, and I can't get at her files. There are all sorts of things I need from her and I can't get anything. That stuff she delivered so dramatically last night? It was crap. It was for the two days we've already gotten through. We still have nothing for the rest of the conference. Nor for next month's board meeting, nor the articles we're supposed to be considering for the next newsletter, even though Martina promised Rory had all that stuff with her, right on her handy-dandy laptop."

She paused, and we assumed we were all dismissed. Then she said, "May I have a resolution of the board to fire Rory? Effective immediately?"

"I so move," Shannon said.

"Second the motion," Zannah said firmly. That surprised me. Zannah was usually our bleeding heart, the voice for giving everyone second and third chances, for trying to understand why people did what they did. Maybe that's why she'd been able to get along with Martina.

Billy leaned forward and opened his mouth. "Maybe we should..." We waited to see what he had to say, but after a few seconds hesitation, he shook his head and leaned back, folding his arms across his chest.

"All in favor," Jonetta asked.

I was the only dissenting vote. Not because I had any respect for Rory. I didn't. I thought she was being an incredible wimp. Her behavior was tiresome and irresponsible. I dissented because I know how confronting the dead body of someone you're close to can knock you off your feet and make you behave in abnormal ways. In fact, I was glad the vote went against me. Being able to replace Rory quickly, while it might give us a bit of down time at first, was a good first step toward a new regime.

Jolene was the first one up. "Running to the ladies'," she said, "Be right back." She hesitated at the door. "Before I forget. Jonetta, Thea... if you do find Rory... will one of you, please, just take her laptop so we'll have it? Never mind if she screams and hollers. This constantly trying to track her down and wrangle every piece of necessary paper out of her is tiresome and unproductive. Much as she treats the darned thing like a special pet, it doesn't belong to her. It's ours. The association's, I mean." She turned and walked away, shoulders slumped, as though the speech had been hard for her.