Roses Are Red; He's Dead (A Mellow Summers Paranormal Mystery Book 9) Read Free Page B

not on this one. Its pillow must have been three times as thick, and ten times more comfortable. Patrick came back within minutes with another drink—the same kind as Aimie’s and mine—in his hand.
    “Is this your first time here?” asked Aimie.
    “Yes,” I said. “Greg planned the trip for us as a getaway vacation. We had both been working hard lately and needed a break.”
    “This is the place to do it,” said Patrick.
    “This is our second stay,” added Aimie.
    “Really?” I asked.
    “Our first visit here was great,” said Aimie, “but we felt like we didn’t get as much out of it as we could. So we came back.”
    “Best decision we ever made,” said Patrick. “There is so much to do here.”
    “Tell me about.” I leaned closer. “I am trying to come up with some activities for Greg and I.”
    “Well, for starters,” said Aimie, “there is the ‘Lover’s Hiking Trail’.”
    “More of a nickname,” chuckled Patrick, “but it does seem to live up to it. There are a lot of out of the way places it takes you to.”
    “Places where you and your boyfriend can be totally alone,” Aimie said with a hint of scandal in her voice. “There is also the sauna. They have individual stalls for couples, and don’t worry, they’re soundproof.” She winked at me.
    “And,” said Patrick, “there is a town only a quarter of a mile from here. They have a wonderful restaurant there that serves real Indian food; I mean, from India. The owner is a marvelous gentleman who loves entertaining couples.”
    “Tomorrow there’s a couple’s yoga,” said Aimie. “You should come!”
    “Couple’s yoga?” I said.
    “Uh-huh. They do all sorts of couple’s things around here. In the morning, they have yoga, in the evenings, they have karaoke—oh, you gotta come to that. They also have live band concerts sometimes, star gazing, and they always have places you can go to be alone.”
    “I just might take you up on that yoga,” I said. Movement in the corner of my eye made me glance to my right. Standing in a doorway, was the same man I had seen in the spa, except he looked a bit transparent.
    “Something wrong?” asked Aimie.
    I jerked out of my internal musing and realized that I had been staring at the same doorway for over a minute. “Fine. Everything’s fine. I just thought I saw something, that’s all.”
    “Oh.”
    “Well, I better finish my walk and get back to Greg,” I said. I fiddled with my empty glass, unsure of where to put it.
    “Here,” Patrick took it from me and held it in the air. Within seconds, a man in a white outfit took it. “See? They don’t want anyone to have to do too much work around here.”
    I smiled. “See you tomorrow?”
    “Looking forward to it,” said Aimie.
    I left the two of them and hurried over to the doorway, but the man had gone. I almost stopped when I stepped through it and into a room the size of a dining hall with a humongous fireplace in the center—complete with the dancing flames—and plush sofas and chairs surrounding it. High, vaulted ceilings stretched above me with triangular windows that let in the sunlight. A chandelier of antlers hung from the rafters, releasing a soft glow.
    A lump on one of the couches caught my attention. I moseyed over to it, thinking that maybe someone had left a blanket behind, or had fallen asleep; it was warm and cozy. As I neared the lump, something didn’t feel right. Once again, the hair on the back of my neck stood up and the sensation that I was not going to like what I found struck. The lump came into view and I realized that it wasn’t a lump at all, but the same man whom I had found in the spa. I looked around. I was the only one in the room.
    “Sir?” I said. “I think you need to wake up.”
    Nothing. No snoring even; another telltale sign that something was amiss. “Uh, sir, this isn’t funny.”
    Still no answer. I reached out to shake him away, but jerked my hand back as I remembered the