Hotel Nigh

Chapter 05

The Accomplice

Another note was shoved under my door whilst I'd been prowling the internet for more news on Hotel Nigh.

I didn't find it until it was nearing three in the afternoon. I never heard it being shoved through the crack. But it was the same scrawling handwriting of the first note I'd received back at home. The murderer was definitely here now. I knew that for a fact.

I see you've solved the first mystery of the missing child. Word got around the hotel to me. I bet you're wondering what mystery is next, huh? Well you'll find out. You've got the mystery of every lodger in this hotel, including me. Once you've found who I am, let me know, because I won't be giving off any hints or leaving any clues for you to find and figure out.

I discarded the note in my suitcase where the first note was. Then I yanked out a piece of paper from a notepad I'd brought with me and withdrew a pen. Then I began writing names of people I'd met. It was best to keep a record, after all.

Mr. Perry: Manager of the hotel.
Rose Siren: Chef.
Danny Price: Bit-of-everything guy.
Elliot: Handyman.
Melina Nicole: Staying in room DAWN.
Writer: Room next to mine. Trying to write a new book.
Man in wheelchair: Man in wheelchair?
Family (Little Jenny): Little Jenny likes adventures and to explore the hotel.
Old woman: Staying in NIGHT.

For the rest of the evening until dinner, I spent the time cooped up in my room, seeing if I could overhear the conversation with the writer in the room next to me. Occasionally I could. Sometimes I could even hear the tapping of keys on a laptop. Periodically people would be meandering about on the corridor outside my room and I'd be able to hear the floorboards creak and groan under the weight of the unidentifiable figures.

The door was propped open again in the lobby and the sign had been switched to OPEN rather than CLOSED. I stepped in just as a small, running body was hurling towards me. She brushed against my legs but then stopped and hid behind them. Little Jenny. A moment later her dad was gasping for breath as he jogged towards us. He spotted Little Jenny behind my legs.

"Sorry to bother you," he began, though his voice trailed off question-like as if he was searching for my name somewhere in his brain.

"Jason," I supplied. Guess his memory wasn't so good. "And it's fine."

"Jason," he repeated. "Jenny, please come out from behind Jason's legs."

Showing evident reluctance, Jenny stepped out from behind my legs towards her dad who was red in the face. He smiled at me and held Little Jenny's hand as they ambled back into the dining room in which I followed them. Danny was by the door who greeted me with a broad grin. We were never this close in high school, but I guess he didn't exactly mature as much as I did in the years since we'd left.

"Table for one," he said to me after stepping out of the way to politely let Little Jenny and her dad back into the dining room.

Danny merely pointed to the table in the far corner nearest to the door to the kitchen. It wasn't even a free table because Melina was sitting there, chin in her palms and gawking at the pictures on the wall. When I yanked the chair out on the opposite side of the table to her, she glanced around and said, "You know there are other available tables, right?"

"Danny directed me here," I said, plonking myself down. "Have you ordered yet?" I didn't point out that she came and sat at my table without any instructions when it was lunch and I was the only one who occupied a table.

"Not yet. Danny's meant to take the orders."

In the few minutes that followed, silence dwelt. It got me thinking whether Melina was a good to be trusted or not. Whether I would actually need an accomplice on this mystery I was about to embark on on my own. With two brains, it could be a whole lot better than one, especially if she was able to see the finer details on things that I'd overlook originally.

"How are you at solving mysteries?" I asked abruptly.

Melina turned to me slowly with an expression of shock on her face. There was a glint in her eyes. "All right, I guess," she replied slowly. "Why do you ask? Reading an Agatha Christie novel you need help solving before they reveal the murderer?" The corners of her lips curved into a smirk.

"After dinner, come up to my room with me and I'll show you why I asked."

The smirk dropped. "That better not be an innuendo, Jason."

My head tilted to the side. "It's not," I said bluntly. "I got a note back at home," I said, lowering the tone of my voice, "before I got to the hotel. It told me to come here, and then I got another one a few hours ago basically congratulating me for finding Little Jenny. There's a whole story behind this person and the notes."

Melina stared at me for a moment and then nodded her head. "Okay, when we've eaten we'll go back to your room."

It took Danny a little longer before he took everyone's food and beverage orders. Then it took him even longer to actually convey the food and beverages to the appropriate tables. Little Jenny, whose table was on the opposite side of the dining room to Melina and I's table, was becoming exceptionally ravenous, picking the crumbs off her bread roll that had plummeted to the plate. I'd eaten my bread roll about ten minutes ago.

"Service is a little slow tonight," Danny told Melina and I when he put our food orders in front of us, though he'd gotten them mixed up. Melina's was one without vegetables, whilst mine was. As soon as Danny turned his back to us, we switched the plates with a small smile on my lips.

Halfway through our meal, Mr. Perry graced everyone with his presence and clapped his hands together. "I'd just like to announce that the storm has started. I apologise to anyone that needed or needs to go out of town in the next few days, but I do think it's out of the question. Lightning is soon to strike in a few hours and the rain isn't meant to cease until the end of the storm. Taxis won't be as willing to travel to the hotel to pick anyone up and take them into town and whatnot, so I advise you all to stay in the hotel where you will be safe from the storm."

We might be safe from the storm, Mr. Perry, but we will not be safe from the murderer who's rampaging around the hotel secretly with a concealed identity. Of course, however, I did not voice this.

Everyone clapped and thanked Mr. Perry for the announcement who smiled at everyone and backed out of the room.

Melina and I finished our meals, skipped dessert and were the first ones that left the dining room. We walked up to my room in silence and she sat on my bed whilst I raided my suitcase for the notes I'd received off the murderer. I handed them to her.

Being in this hotel made me want to always watch my back and glance over my shoulder if I thought I was alone in a corridor or room. I wasn't as naïve as I used to be. It was a well-known fact to me that people kept a hell of a lot of secrets to themselves and although it destroys them, they still do it to protect themselves from other people.

"Well that's something," she said. "That's just... crazy." Then she dropped her head and said, "I heard about Ethan McCann's murder. I didn't realise you were his brother at first. I thought there'd be no way. I remember hearing about it in the newspapers at the time."

"It's someone in this building," I said. "And now there's a storm coming and we're stuck inside the hotel with this murderer. It could be absolutely anyone here. I don't even know who the other residents are. There's not even a room free in this hotel."

"Well you know Danny stays in a hotel room," she elucidated. "So, there's one less room to figure out who's staying in there. Oh, and Elliot the handyman. He has a room on this floor. Danny's is on this floor, too, incidentally. And the chef, Rose."

I perched down on the bed next to her and sighed. "Where do we even start?"