The Mystery Guest by Nita Prose

Author:Nita Prose [Prose, Nita]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
Published: 2023-11-28T00:00:00+00:00

I did not sleep well. I tossed and turned all night. I reached out for Juan Manuel, found him absent, missing, only an empty space left behind on the mattress. I thought of calling him in the middle of the night, telling him everything that’s happened over the last couple of days, but at such a distance, he can’t do a thing to help me. And what was I supposed to say to him? Juan, I failed to inform you that a man dropped dead in the hotel tearoom two days ago. His death has since been deemed a murder, and it’s entirely possible the killer is on the loose in our hotel. Oh, and one more thing—our very good friend, Mr. Preston? He’s a thief. And now I’m starting to wonder if he might be something worse than that.

No wonder I didn’t sleep a wink.

I cannot erase the unthinkable thoughts from my mind. What if Mr. Preston, my dear friend and colleague, a man whom I’ve considered the purest personification of a good egg, is a thief? And if he’s capable of stealing, what else could he do?

It’s ridiculous. Absurd. I hear Gran admonish me in my head—Only fools jump to conclusions.

She’s right. And yet there’s no refuting what I saw at that pawn-shop—Mr. Preston, selling a rare first-edition copy of J. D. Grimthorpe’s The Maid in the Mansion the day after the author died and the value of said book skyrocketed. Is it possible that Mr. Grimthorpe was murdered out of pure and simple greed? And is it possible that Mr. Preston could have something to do with it? That’s the improbable, inconceivable notion that has me turned inside out.

I tear the blankets off me, jab my hot feet into my slippers, and stomp into the kitchen. It’s five in the morning, far too early to get up, but I can’t lie awake any longer. I grab a bucket from under the sink and fill it with water. I root around in the drawer for a reliable cleaning cloth, then I march into the living room and set my supplies down beside Gran’s curio cabinet.

I turn the TV on as a distraction, but sure enough, the news channel is replaying yesterday’s press conference in which Detective Stark declared Mr. Grimthorpe’s death a murder. I watch as reporters pelt Stark with questions.

“Detective, do you have any leads?”

“We’re following every lead we have,” Stark replies.

“Detective, is the murderer a guest or a hotel employee?”

“If I knew that, would I be here?” she replies.

“Detective, you said his tea was poisoned with antifreeze. Do you know how that could have happened?”

“We’re working on that,” she says. “We’re tracking an important piece of evidence.”

“Detective, do you have a message for the killer?”

Stark pauses. It’s as though she’s looking right through the TV at me. “You can hide the truth for a while, but it won’t stay buried forever. Just remember that,” she says, before walking away from the scrum.

I turn off the TV.

I pick up my cloth and carefully open the glass doors of Gran’s curio cabinet.

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