Page 9 of Tangled
Ryan wagged his head, and Mari pulled out a notebook.
“We found the body of a woman this morning in the woods between the lodge and town. She had no ID on her, but we ran her prints, and she came back Maria Abel. She was on your housekeeping staff.”
Brad frowned. “What happened?”
“She’d been strangled. The ME is working on a more precise time of death, but we think it happened as she walked home from work yesterday evening.”
“That’s terrible,” he said. “Does she have any family? Is there anything I can do?”
“No family that we’ve been able to find,” Mari said. “But we were hoping to interview whoever she worked with yesterday and any of her friends.”
“Of course,” Brad said, pulling up the housekeeping schedule. He found yesterday’s assignments, then sent the list to the printer.
“Did you know her?” Mari asked.
Brad shook his head. “I’ll pull up her employment file as well. I don’t know all the staff, but her manager is Dean Travers.He’s probably the best person to…” He paused, then frowned again as he studied the schedule.
“What?” Ryan prompted.
“Maria wasn’t supposed to work yesterday,” he said. “I don’t know if that matters or if it’s important, but there’s a Scarlett Nesanet who usually works that shift. She called out sick, and Maria was brought in.”
“When you say she usually works that shift, how ‘usual’?” Ryan asked.
Brad scrolled through the last four weeks. “Every day except Mondays, which is her day off. She’s had that schedule for at least a month,” he replied.
Ryan and Mari shared a look. “You want to take the staff interviews and I’ll take Ms. Nesanet?” Ryan suggested.
“You got it,” Mari said, shuffling through the papers she’d grabbed from his printer. “Where would I find Dean?”
“His office is in the main block. It’s the middle one on the east side,” Brad replied. The administrative and operations staff worked in cubicles and offices on the top floor of the hotel down the hall from his own office.
“Got it, thanks,” she said. “I’ll see you back at the station,” she said to Ryan before exiting the room.
When she was gone, Ryan turned to him. “Do you have an address for Ms. Nesanet?”
Brad glanced at the file on his computer and nodded. “She’s in the seasonal housing. The Aspen building, unit 210. Do you mind if I go with you? I don’t know anything about her, but some of our staff aren’t comfortable with police.” Ryan arched a brow, and Brad rolled his eyes as he rose and grabbed his winter jacket. “A few did serve time for petty things years before coming here. But mostly, a fair number of them are from areas where the police aren’t the good guys, and you make them nervous.”
Ryan inclined his head. “Fair enough. Are we walking?”
Brad wished, but he didn’t have the time. Instead, he led them to one of the enclosed ATVs the staff used to move around the property. As they made their way to the block of four buildings on the west side of the resort that housed seasonal workers, they caught up on Operation Baby-watch. With three Warwick wives due within the month, and two with twins, the family had gone into high alert. Ryan’s wife, Olivia, was due first but everyone expected either Tia, Cody’s wife, or Ellie, Asher’s wife, to go into labor any day. Apparently, early births were more common with twins than singles. A little something that he’d learned after Cody had spent four hours pacing his living room in a panic after hearing that stat from Tia’s doctor.
They parked in the open-air garage, then made their way to the corner unit, where Ryan took the lead and knocked.
“Who is it?” a voice came from behind the door. A vague sense of familiarity rippled through Brad, and his body tensed.
“Mystery Lake Police,” Ryan responded. “We’re looking for Scarlett Nesanet.”
Footsteps shuffled across the floor, and Brad found himself holding his breath. The door inched open enough for her to look out. “I’m Scarlett,” she said.
And Brad’s knees nearly buckled.
“Magi,” he said, his voice coming out in a harsh whisper.
Her gaze swung to him, and a heartbeat later, her eyes widened. “Cooper,” she replied as her hand fell from the door.
No longer held shut, the door swung open. Revealing her. The woman he’d been thinking of almost nonstop for months. The woman he’d been wondering about, worried about. The woman he’d only minutes earlier had asked Ava to track down.
Standing there in a pair of flannel pants, wool socks, and a thick sweatshirt, she looked as beautiful as he remembered. He wanted to reach out and take her in his arms. He wanted to pull her to him and feel her body against his.
