After Olivia packed, Wayne helped her carry her belongings down the hallway to a different room. Neither of them said much as they placed her things down carefully in the new suite.
“I hope you’ll be comfortable here,” Wayne commented as Olivia looked around. It was decorated with casual but expensive wicker furniture, and occasional tables with clusters of seashells on them. How long would she be staying? Was this to be her new home? Fortunately, two narrow glass doors opened to an outdoor balcony with chairs and a small glass table. It overlooked the water and Olivia appreciated that immensely
Olivia walked briefly out onto the balcony. The suite overlooked a long, low garden filled with tropical blossoms, palm trees, and the sound of chirping birds. Her heart ached as she smelled the incredible fragrance. Why wasn’t Todd beside her, sharing this with her? What had truly happened to him, and how could she go through the days without him now?
“Thanks so much for everything,” Olivia said to Wayne when she walked back in.
“I’m sorry for your loss,” he replied. “You’ve been a good sport. Very few women could have held up the way you did and gone through questioning so soon. Just rest now.”
Then without even the sound of a knock, the door to the room suddenly flew open as Olivia’s twin sister, Mauve, rushed in. She was dressed in a navy linen dress and blue silk scarf, her hair pulled tightly from her face.
“I got here as fast as I could,” she breathed.
Wayne spun around and did a double take.
“This is Mauve, my twin sister.” Olivia smiled at Wayne’s reaction.
“I thought I was seeing double for a second,” Wayne murmured. “The two of you are identical.”
People often reacted that way. It took them a while to realize that although Olivia and Mauve were physically identical, that’s where the similarity ended.
Mauve looked back and forth quickly between Olivia and Wayne, a look of confusion crossing her face.
“Thanks so much for being here,” Olivia said, taking a few steps toward her sister. “This is Detective Wayne Darington.”
“Detective? Why?” Mauve’s puzzlement deepened. “Was Todd murdered?”
It was just like Mauve to look for the worst, thought Olivia. Mauve’s natural reaction was to go on the offensive. It particularly upset Olivia now.
“Olivia’s been a champion.” Wayne quickly deflected the question. “Todd’s death has taken everyone by surprise.”
“I have no idea who Todd is,” Mauve replied, perturbed. “No one in our family does. We haven’t heard a thing about him.”
“That’s not true,” Olivia quickly replied. “I mentioned him to Devon.”
Mauve rolled her eyes, walked further into the room, and placed her small suitcase down on the far side.
Wayne seemed taken aback by Mauve’s reaction.
“What’s really going on?” Mauve turned to Wayne. “Our entire family is totally confused to find Olivia in this predicament.”
“Well, thanks for coming down to be with your sister,” Wayne replied. “You can imagine what a shock this must be to her.”
“It’s a shock to everyone,” Mauve responded. “This is the last place any of us planned to be.”
Olivia was irritated. This trip wasn’t about Mauve or her endless plans.
“Life happens, Mauve, and we can’t always plan it,” Olivia remarked sharply.
“You don’t think Todd was intentionally poisoned, do you?” Mauve turned to Wayne. “I heard in the news that there have been several cases of food poisoning at that hotel in the past several months.”
Olivia was horrified. “Why was the restaurant still open?” she asked Wayne.
“The hotel has been thoroughly inspected and cleared by now,” Wayne replied.
“What did they find the food poisoning due to?” Olivia felt alarmed.
“A cook there, Tomas, was held responsible,” Mauve chimed in again. “I heard he even spent a short time in jail. Of course, Tomas doesn’t work at the hotel any longer, but there were unanswered questions and they couldn’t hold him for very long either.”
“Hygiene at the hotel could have also been involved,” Wayne felt compelled to respond. “And the situation isn’t similar. Nobody died from the food poisoning. Not one person!
They just got sick for a while.”
“But I heard Tomas is out of jail now.” Mauve stayed on the offensive. “He was released just two weeks ago.”
Olivia was aghast. “A culprit on the loose, possibly?”
“For all we know,” Mauve continued, “it may not be a coincidence that the man who was responsible for the food poisoning was recently released?”
“We’re definitely looking at all possibilities,” Wayne quickly commented, as he looked at his watch. “Sorry to rush away, but I have to join the detectives down the hallway now.” Then he turned to Olivia and handed her his card. “If you need anything at all, please give me a call.”
“Thanks so much,” Olivia responded, as Wayne turned and walked out the door.
“How did you meet this detective?” Mauve piped up, unimpressed.
“He’s on the case,” Olivia replied, “assigned to help me get my bearings.”
“The case?” Mauve looked appalled.
“A sudden death always has to be investigated,” Olivia replied. “It’s a matter of protocol. In fact, the police are going to be in my old room now, checking everything out.”
Mauve wouldn’t let it go. “What else are you hiding from us, Olivia?” Mauve always thought Olivia was hiding something from her, no matter how forthcoming Olivia had been.
“You’ve had a long trip, would you like something to eat?” Olivia changed the topic of conversation.
Mauve would have none of it though. “Should we get you a lawyer?” she asked, although she herself was a tax lawyer, working and living in Boston about a mile away from the family.
“Of course not,” Olivia responded quickly. As usual it was hard to be with Mauve. The two of them had a completely different way of perceiving the world. Olivia thought how much she’d rather go down the hallway now to the room she and Todd had stayed in. She wanted to see what the police were doing, and if anything turned up.
“Why don’t you take a rest for a while now,” Olivia said to her sister. “I’ll be back in a few minutes. I want to check on what’s going on. In the meantime other rooms at the hotel are being prepared for you and the family.”
Mauve seemed relieved at the suggestion as well. She seemed suddenly tired and out of sorts. Mauve never did well with an unexplained turn of events. She always needed answers for everything.
“I have a thousand questions for you, of course,” Mauve replied. “I guess they can wait.”
They have to wait, Olivia thought. “I’ll answer all your questions later,” she said hastily as she rushed out the door, down the hall, and to the suite she and Todd had been so happy in.
*
Olivia stood outside in the hallway as her old room was being cordoned off. The police weren’t taking any chances, and a buzz of activity was going on inside. The room was filled with cops, detectives and photographers; photos were being taken and evidence collected quickly. The room was being scanned for fingerprints, DNA, and patterns of possible blood spattering.
A good-looking female detective in tight slacks and a button-down shirt open at the top had a prominent role in directing the activity.
“I’m ordering surveillance be collected from all hotel videos, everywhere,” she demanded, “especially the kitchen and dining room. We’ve got to do this fast. I don’t want anything slipping through the cracks.”
“We’re on it,” a younger male police officer trailing her replied.
“Once all the surveillance is collected, get it to Wayne right away,” she added.
Busy on the other side of the room, Wayne cast a quick glance her way. “Get what to me, Lorna?” he called out.
“I want you to go over all surveillance video as soon as possible,” she called back in a no-nonsense manner. “Make sure you especially check the kitchen and restaurant where the victim ate his last meal. The news is all over the case already,” Lorna continued. “They’re saying it looks like another in a string of food poisonings at the hotel.”
“We don’t know that for sure yet.” Wayne walked over to her, seemingly to calm her down.
“Put two and two together,” Lorna shot back at him. “Tomas just got out of jail.”
“You’re jumping to conclusions.” Wayne tried to stop her. “We don’t know yet what the current victim died of.”
Lorna’s eyes flashed. “All the symptoms point to food poisoning.”
“I’m going down to the hotel kitchen to see what they’ve found,” he said.
Olivia stepped back as Wayne left the room and rushed down the hallway to the elevators. Flustered, he pressed the elevator button hard, eager to get where he was going. Olivia didn’t want to go back to the room where her sister was waiting. She wanted to follow Wayne downstairs, be a fly on the wall and listen to what he found out. Staying informed was good for her, kept her mobilized, prevented her from falling into the bottomless well of pain she felt growing within.
Of course, she couldn’t go to the kitchen with Wayne, though. It would look too odd. Instead, Olivia turned and walked back down to her suite to spend time with her sister.
*
The elevator dropped Wayne at the lobby. He got out and quickly headed through a long narrow corridor, toward the back of the dining room, then the hotel kitchen. How could Lorna be so positive that Tomas was responsible for this? he thought, irritation growing. It was easy enough to pin everything on Tomas, say he was escalating. There was plenty of evidence that those who killed using poison became serial killers, but Lorna had an agenda, was researching it day and night. Once she got hold of an idea, she wouldn’t let go. Wayne needed solid evidence. He approached the hotel kitchen now more determined than ever to proceed slowly.
There was such commotion inside that nobody noticed Wayne walk in at first. The kitchen workers were talking heatedly about the recent death. Wayne walked right into the middle of it. The place was being scoured by cops, photographers, and forensics, just as the suite had been.
“Okay, tell me what you know,” Wayne started, approaching a large man, Gianni, the main cook.
“Nothing, nothing.” Gianni shrugged his shoulders again and again. “Everything’s perfect here. Clean as a whistle. Nobody else got sick last night, nobody. Everybody loved the food. We got lots and lots of compliments.”
The other workers gathered like flies around Wayne, familiar with him and feeling good around him.
“It has nothing to do with us,” another cook, Ramon, insisted, rubbing his hands on his big apron. “Why are all the cops around?”
“People get sick, it happens,” a third worker piped up. “The guy who died was probably sick long before he got here.”
“They have to check everything, nobody’s accusing you,” Wayne replied. He sensed everyone’s heightened anxiety and wanted to calm them down. Unlike some of the others, Wayne was committed to letting facts on a case unfold naturally, not prying false confessions out of terrified bystanders. This was so important to Wayne he’d recently become involved with the Innocence Project. Of course, this created alarm on the force, especially from Lorna.
“I just want to know if you noticed anything that was different that night?” Wayne asked the kitchen workers now. “Anybody see anything?”
Gianni stepped forward. “The restaurant was packed. All kinds of people came to enjoy themselves. It was a beautiful night. We were proud of ourselves. Nobody did anything wrong.”