“You put a tracker on me?” Jessie demanded incredulously.
“Out of love,” Kat tried to claim. “I was worried about my friend’s well-being, what with investigating a possible murder and all.”
“Wait,” Hugo interjected. “How well do you know these people?”
“Keep up, Hugo,” Kat teased.
“We go way back,” Jessie told him. “And I appreciate my dear friend’s concern for me. But she’s leaving out a crucial detail: we hugged before I told her about the Newhouse case, which means she put the tracker on me prior to having any reason to worry about me. Isn’t that right, Kat?”
The private eye shrugged meekly.
“I might have also thought that keeping tabs on you would get me closer to solving my case,” she said, looking down at Ronnie. “Did it, by the way? Did I tackle a thief or a killer? Maybe both?”
Ronnie, who had finally regained the ability to speak, protested.
“I didn’t do any of that stuff!”
“We’ll see about that,” Ryan said, hoisting him up. “But I have to say, making a run for it before we could ask you any questions doesn’t reflect super well on you.”
“I was just scared,” Ronnie insisted. “I thought that you might be serving me papers from my ex.”
“That’s sounds believable,” Ryan said rolling his eyes as he turned to Hugo. “Do you have a conference room where we can speak to Ronnie privately?”
“I’ll do you one better,” the security officer replied. “We have an interview room in the security office. It has recording equipment and everything.”
Ryan, though he was still struggling to catch his breath, couldn’t help but smile.
“Lead the way,” he said.
*
“I’m telling you, you got the wrong guy,” Ronnie said again, this time more combatively than the first time.
Jessie didn’t find him any more convincing this time around.
They were in the security office interview room, where, after having his rights read and waiving them, Ronnie Nance had continued to expound on the elaborate tale of how he was just trying to avoid getting served by his ex, who claimed he was the father of her newborn baby and was trying to force him to take a paternity test.
“I don’t know anything about no stolen crap or any dead people,” he maintained. “What I do know is that I’m going to sue that chick who cheap-shotted me. Why don’t you invite her in here so we can go at it a fair fight?”
“First of all,” Jessie replied in reference to Kat, who had been specifically prohibited from entering the room and was sitting in the security office waiting area, “that ‘chick’ is a former Army Ranger who could kill you with just her thumb and forefinger. So I wouldn’t go making any challenges. You got off easy. Second, you’re still not winning me over here, Ronnie.”
“What are you talking about?
“You started working here six weeks ago,” she reminded him. “The thefts began two weeks later. You have a record of theft. A man died today under questionable circumstances. You have a record of assault. Doesn’t that all seem a little too coincidental to you?”
Ronnie opened his mouth but before he could reply, the door opened.
A well-groomed man in an immaculate suit stepped in.
“This interview is over,” he announced.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Jessie and Ryan exchanged shocked looks.
She could tell he was pissed even before he turned to the guy in the suit.
“Excuse me?” he said, struggling to keep his irritation from being apparent. He did a pretty good job, despite the tightness in his voice and his clenched jaw. “Who are you?”
The man, tall and thin, was completely bald. His suit, which looked like it had just been pressed, came complete with matching yellow tie and handkerchief. He appeared to be about forty.
“Care to tell them, Hugo?” the man said officiously, looking at the embarrassed security officer.
“Detective Hernandez, Ms. Hunt,” he said quietly, “this is Peter Lane, Peninsula’s senior resort manager.”
“That’s correct,” Lane said. “And I insist that this harassment of our employee end immediately.”
Jessie saw that Ryan was about to blow up and tried to short circuit it.
“Why don’t we continue this discussion outside,” she said quickly. “While we do, Ronnie can stay in here and try to refresh his recollection.”
“I’m gonna be recollecting all this harassment, like Mr. Lane here said,” Ronnie declared as they left the room.
They passed through the waiting area, where Kat sat, silently watching the group traipse into Hugo’s office. Once the door closed, Ryan spoke up.
“I’m a little confused here,” he said slowly. “Didn’t the resort hire Katherine Gentry to look into the recent string of thefts here?”
“Yes,” Lane said. “In fact, I hired her personally on Mr. Cosgrove’s recommendation.”
“Okay,” Ryan replied. “And aren’t Ms. Hunt and I here to get to the bottom of what happened to Scott Newhouse?”
“That was my understanding,” Lane confirmed superciliously.
“Then where is this harassment crap coming from?” Ryan demanded. “We were in the middle of determining if the guy in that room is responsible for one or both of those crimes. Isn’t that what you want?”
“Yes, but I want it done quietly,” Lane hissed. “That’s why we had Ms. Gentry pose as a guest. We wanted her to present her findings to us so we could resolve the situation without fanfare. Instead, you initiate a wild chase through our laundry facility, nearly knock over a septuagenarian guest in the courtyard, and almost ruin the wedding rehearsal of a family that is spending a quarter of a million dollars to be here this weekend. That is not the Peninsula way.”
Jessie found herself losing patience with this stuffed shirt too. Not even the dollar figure he’d just mentioned, still ringing in her ears, was enough to give her pause.
“Is the Peninsula way to interfere with a potential murder investigation, Mr. Lane?” she asked, “Because by storming into that room and asserting ‘harassment,’ you may have irrevocably destroyed out ability to get honest answers from Ronnie Nance.”
Peter Lane’s nose went even higher in the air if that was possible, and when he spoke, he sounded more like a corporate lawyer than a fancy hotel manager.
“It is the opinion of the Peninsula that Mr. Newhouse died as a result of a suicide or at the hands of someone he knew. We have no reason to believe that an employee was involved.”
“It’s the opinion of the resort?” Jessie asked incredulously. “Where did the Peninsula get its degree in criminology, I wonder? I’ve got to tell you, Mr. Lane that it sounds suspiciously to me like the Peninsula is concerned that a staffer being charged with murder might hurt business. And if you’re not careful, you may find yourself dangerously close to being charged with obstructing an investigation—you personally, Mr. Lane, not the Peninsula.”