Murder on the Riviera Read Free

chain,” I said slowly. “Which means that we can get access to the guest database and find out all the information we need to about those four women…”
    “No, no way!” Charles hissed as the elevator doors opened on our floor.
    “It’s okay, I can work alone,” I shrugged, unwilling to let my husband dissuade me.
    “Chelsea, this is our honeymoon. Let’s just enjoy it. The police know what they’re doing and I still say the poor lady had a coronary or something. Simple as that.”
    “No, I don’t think it’s that simple. Why was she all alone on the beach late at night? Where were the other ladies and why did they let her go by herself?” I posed the questions to a wall of indifference.
    “Those are questions the police are equipped to answer,” Charles sulked.
    I couldn’t blame my husband for being irritated with me. You know your vacation is a disaster when the best part of the trip was driving in bumper to bumper traffic on the freeway. But this wasn’t just any old vacation; this was a once in a lifetime honeymoon on the American Riviera. Plus, it wasn’t the first time I had poked my nose where he thought it didn’t belong. When I got my “hunches,” I was unstoppable…and I was also always right. And Charles knew it.
    “Remember when I got a hunch that you were throwing me a surprise birthday party?” I reminisced sweetly as he frowned.
    “That was different! How can you compare a surprise party to a police investigation?” Charles thundered, slamming the door behind us as we stepped into our room.
    “Let’s not talk about this tonight. It’s been a long day. Our heads are foggy right now. We’ll be thinking more clearly after a good night’s rest,” I soothed, leading him to the bed.
    ***
    Nightmares punctuated my sleep as I tossed in the unfamiliar bed. My husband’s snoring was the least of my problems as I couldn’t shake the image of the dead woman’s discolored face from my memory. Her eyes had been closed and she indeed appeared to be sleeping…or comatose. I thrashed in the bed before awaking with a jolt that left me breathless. Charles was still snoring away as I jumped out of bed and took refuge in the bathroom.
    A splash of cold water on my face did nothing to calm my nerves. And the morning light gleaming against the white tile didn’t set me at ease either. If anything, the arrival of morning only made me more certain of my mission to identify the dead woman and investigate what might have happened to her. The word “murder” surfaced in my mind like a punch to the gut and I intuitively felt this was the only explanation.
    Against my better judgment, I got dressed and crept out of the room, leaving my husband in bed alone. He had made it crystal clear that he had no intention in assisting my rogue investigation, so I would be forced to snoop without him.
    Downstairs in the lobby, a new shift of workers had taken over and the young woman from last night was nowhere to be seen. Before I could hack into the guest records, I needed to know the name of the deceased victim. A stack of newspapers on a bellboy cart beckoned to me. Surely, the woman’s death would be reported in the morning news…
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     

Chapter 3
    Ravenous for information, I searched through an assortment of local newspapers but could find no report about the lounge chair death. Frustrated, I flipped through the American Riviera Times and the Santa Barbara Gazette a second and third time but still found nothing.
    “They’re treating this like a natural death,” I mumbled to myself.
    “You talking about the lady who was found dead on the beach last night?” A tall, lean young man in a freshly pressed black uniform asked in a low voice.
    Startled, I demanded, “Were you spying on me just now?”
    “Um, no. You were rummaging through undelivered newspapers. And it’s my job to deliver them to the guests in perfect condition, which is very difficult to do when someone’s