Camera Never Lies (22 page)

Strange that calling her a murderer hadn’t caused her any distress, but my knowing that she was in hiding had.

Once Emily allowed Spencer and me into her room, things grew more awkward. What would I ask next?

“Look, you got me, all right? I’m trying to escape my husband.” She tugged at her hair, removing her long, black mane—a wig—and revealing shoulder-length, ash-blond hair. “I think he’s onto me and might be here any minute. So, just tell me what you want. Is it money?”

We needed more time. I looked at Spencer and got his nod of approval. “I don’t want your money. Why don’t we go to my room? That way you’ll be safely hidden, and we’ll have more time to talk.”

She rolled her head back and looked at the ceiling like an impatient teenager. “This has already taken too long, so let’s hurry.”

With Emily’s wig back in place, Spencer grabbed her bags. We headed to the elevators and waited. Emily chewed on her lip and stared at the floor, exuding disquiet. The elevator dinged—in warning, it seemed—a sign I was suffering from empathetic worry.

We made our way to my room two floors down without running into any trouble—Ranger Jennings, Emily’s husband, Mom.…

By the time he entered my room, Spencer was nearly breathless. He shed Emily’s luggage and marched straight to the small desk where my computer sat, smashed to pieces.

“Polly.” His shoulders sagged. “I had no idea it was this bad. I’m so sorry. Seeing this must have given you a fright.” He glanced over at me. “Why didn’t you call me?”

The dejected look in his eyes made me wish I had. Shaking my head, I gave him a warning frown and mouthed, “Not now.”

Emily seemed not to notice our exchange as she tugged the wig off again then pulled the studs from her nose, lips, and ears to reveal they were all fakes. “The tattoos are temporary. Satisfied?”

“You left the good ones, though.”

“What?” Her brows dipped. Understanding dawned and her lips curved slightly, the closest thing to a smile I’d seen on her. She touched the emerald-cut diamonds in her lobes. “These? Yeah, well. I forget to take them out; because I’ve worn them so long.”

I hesitated, considering the best way to proceed. When she squinted at me and tossed a nervous glance at Spencer, it occurred to me that we hadn’t introduced ourselves. After explaining who we were, I posed the question burning in my mind since we left Emily’s room. “Why are you running from your husband?”

She swallowed and looked from Spencer to me. “He’s abusive. I’m afraid for my life.” A mixture of fear and sorrow swam in her eyes. “He’s wealthy—all drug-related and connected.”

Which explained the expensive jewels. “That’s why you didn’t want me to post any photographs of you, in case he or someone he knew saw them.”

“I need to disappear from the face of the earth.”

One glance at Spencer told me he believed her, his face ragged with emotion. “So why did you think Caldera National Park would be a safe hiding place?” he asked.

She rubbed her hands together as she paced. “I flirted with someone in a chat room. He seemed so understanding and filled my desperate need to talk to someone—anyone.” She stopped pacing and searched Spencer’s gaze. Looking for sympathy? I couldn’t help but notice she hadn’t glanced at me. I didn’t like it one bit. Why was she telling us this? She tore her eyes from Spencer’s and began pacing again.

“When I decided to escape my husband, to run away and hide, I didn’t know where to go. But I remembered the guy I chatted with telling me about coming to this national park. I couldn’t imagine a better place to hide. My husband would never look for me here in a rustic lodge in the middle of nowhere. Believe me, I’m not into outdoorsy stuff. But I had to be in order to hide. To be safe. At least for a while.” Emily sounded as though she would cry, but she didn’t. Her husband had probably toughened her up.

I eyed Spencer, wondering where this information would lead us, if anywhere. Would she say more, connecting herself to Alec? When she sat on the bed and shivered, I decided not to press her. She looked liked someone who’d kept her personal-space bubble so small it deprived her of oxygen. She was desperate for air. For love. Her bubble was ready to burst.

She looked at me. “There’s more.”

I released the breath I’d held in hopes there would be.

“I didn’t know the man who helped me when my luggage spilled on the sidewalk. I brought all the jewelry that my husband had given me over the years in case I needed to sell it for money. He’d made sure I had nothing to my name, so the jewelry was all I had.”

Her sorrow gripped me. Tears slid down her face. What must it be like to be married to a man like that?

“When I got to the lodge, I planned to put the jewelry in a safe-deposit box, including my ring, which I would never wear again. Only I couldn’t find it. I suspected that the man who helped me with my luggage had taken it. I kept looking for him, asking around. When I finally saw him, I followed him to his room to confront him, but I lost my nerve. I wanted to remain calm so I would have the upper hand. I left to come back later. When I did…” Her voice cracked. “I knocked on the door and it swung open. He wasn’t in his room, so I took the liberty of rummaging through his things to find my ring. It belonged to me, after all. I couldn’t find it, so I looked in the closet. That’s where I found him on the floor. Unconscious or dead, I don’t know.” Tears flooded her face. “I searched his pocket and found my ring. I took what was mine. But I didn’t kill him.”

She looked at Spencer, pleading. “You’ve got to believe me.”

Was it some sort of can-I-get-more-sympathy-from-the-man-with-my-pouting-eyes that made her appeal to him rather than me? I stood directly in front of her.

Spencer appeared to be mesmerized by either her or the story. He shook his head and moved from the wall where he’d been leaning. “Emily…Raquel.”

“Emily?” She looked at me. “That’s the same name you called me before. Why do you keep calling me that?”

“Oh, just that, well, when I first saw you in the restroom at the restaurant, you reminded me of Emily the Strange, with your black cats and skulls. You know, gothic fashions for preadolescents. So I mentally gave you that name. It sort of stuck.” I shrugged. “Sorry.”

She smiled. “I like it. Raquel isn’t my real name anyway. Let’s keep it.”

I leaned closer, her smile fueling my idea. “Listen, Emily. If you help us solve this murder, then I promise to try to help you.” I wanted to tell her she wouldn’t have to spend the rest of her life running from a drug-dealing, abusive husband, but I didn’t have the resources to give that assurance. I wasn’t even sure what I could do, but I could at least try.

“Ah, Polly.” Spencer put his hand on my shoulder. “Are you sure?”

Spencer was probably reading my mind as I was his, but neither of us wanted to speak in front of Emily. How could we know for sure that she hadn’t done the gruesome deed?

My hero had come to save me from myself. I sent up a silent prayer, hoping that I wasn’t getting in too deep with this woman.

I put my hand over his. “Yes.”

“But what more can I do to help you? I’ve told you everything I know.”

Spencer cleared his throat. “You said you took back what was yours. May we see the ring, please?”

Emily brushed her hair out of her face. “Sure, I never put it in the safe-deposit box after finding it on Alec. I was too scared that it would link me to him if anyone knew about it.” She unzipped her luggage.

I thought of Hillary. I still didn’t know who’d hit her over the head. It could have been Emily, and if Emily found out that Hillary had seen the ring, Hillary could be in more danger.

As Emily rummaged through black clothing, I was surprised to spot some bright articles mixed in.

“Here.” She yanked out a cloth bag and dumped the contents on the bed. Among various expensive-looking jewels, we spotted a ring that left no doubt as to its tremendous value.

Seeing it triggered an alarm inside. Why hadn’t I considered this before? “Is it possible that your husband could have found out about your online chats? And since you’ve left him, what might he think? Certainly he’d be furious, jealous. But if you took the jewels, he might want them back. They’re worth a fortune.”

“So, you’re saying that if he didn’t come after me because he wanted me, he’d come for the jewels?”

“I didn’t mean to put it like that. The jewels add another danger to your dilemma.”

CHAPTER
EIGHTEEN

S
ure, the jewels provided for Emily if she needed money and knew where to sell them, but she had put her life in more danger by bringing them.

She appeared to grapple with an appalling thought. “Do you think he could have killed Alec?”

The picture she painted of her husband made for a scarier villain than I’d faced so far. Goose bumps crawled down my legs and over my arms. “I don’t know how he could have known that Alec had the ring, so it doesn’t seem very likely.”

The clock on the side table read twelve fifteen, reminding me I’d told Mom to expect me within the hour. I was late. But I wasn’t finished with Emily yet. “In the meantime, why don’t you stay with me in my room?”

She gave me a questioning look. “But why—” “You’d be safer staying with us.” I had to convince her to stay, at least until we solved the mystery. “Mom won’t mind. It might be a bit crowded at first, but we’ll figure something out.”

“I’m not so sure about this. It would just be putting off the inevitable. Eventually, my husband will find me.”

Spencer blocked the door. “Though that might be true, you could have more on your heels than your husband—you could have the authorities. What we know about you now could be enough—”

“I gotcha. You don’t have to spell it out.” Emily furrowed her brows and rubbed her arms, pacing. “What are you going to tell your mother?”

“I’ll think of something.” I wasn’t happy with how things were working out, but I had to keep both sparrows in the same cage. I needed to go get Mom, but I wasn’t sure I trusted Emily alone with Spencer. She seemed bent on appealing to his chivalrous side with her pouting, needy eyes. “Spencer, why don’t you keep a lookout in the hallway while I—”

“While you what, Polly? I’m not letting you go anywhere alone.”

“That’s awfully brave of you, my prince, but who’s going to protect Emily?”
Or keep her from running away?

“Tell me, what exactly are you going to do?”

I brushed past him and put my hand on the knob. “I need to get Mom. That’ll give us enough time to think about how to proceed.”

“Miss Perkins. Polly?” Emily sounded exhausted. Maybe her disguise had finally taken its toll.

“Yes?”

She stood staring at me, wringing her hands again. “I want to apologize to you. I feel terrible about this, but…”

Her words put me on edge. I knew I wasn’t going to like the rest of what she had to say. “Go on.”

“I was in your room, searching to see if you’d taken photographs of me. I saw you at the Terrace Café yesterday. It looked like you were taking pictures of me again. I planned to delete them if I found them. But then the housekeeper came in.”

“You? You hit her over the head?”

She nodded.

Her confession made me fear that she’d done the same to Alec, that she’d lied to us.

“But why did you hurt Hillary?”

“I know what this must look like, but you have to understand how desperate I was. My only intention was to delete any photographs you’d taken that included me.”

I thought to repeat my question about Hillary, but keeping silent sometimes elicited more answers.

“I was afraid of what she might think if she found me in your room. I only meant to knock her unconscious.”

“Well, you did that. But why did you put her in the closet?”

“I was scared. I wasn’t thinking.” She sent doleful eyes toward Spencer.

Did that tactic really work these days? She seemed to try too hard to convince us. Or rather, Spencer. Her actions made me wonder about her story of running from her husband.

“On the contrary, you
were
thinking.” Bravo. Spencer hadn’t fallen for her wounded-soul technique either. “You figured since someone had done that already, then they could get the blame for the housekeeper, too.”

My turn to fill in the blanks. “Then you came back last night to destroy my camera and computer.”

“No, I didn’t come back. I was too scared. That’s when I decided to check out of this place first thing this morning, because it was no longer safe. I’d already answered questions from the rangers. They had no reason to keep me.”

“But they have every reason to keep you now. You’re in up to your neck. Still, you claim you didn’t kill Alec.” If she was telling the truth, then my initial suspicion that Mom destroyed my computer and camera were back in place. But that would mean she had to have broken into my room in her sleep. It didn’t make any sense.

The room seemed stuffy all of a sudden, so I pulled the curtains apart and opened a window. “First, Hillary hits Alec on the head and leaves. If you were telling the truth about what you found, then you would have come into the room after Hillary left. You found Alec in the closet and took the ring.”