Poppy Harmon and the Pillow Talk Killer by Lee Hollis (famous ebook reader .txt) 📗

could have already hacked her phone, or Fabian’s phone, and might be following their communication in real time. No, it was probably safer if she followed his instructions and drove herself over to the Parker immediately.

Poppy turned back around, marched outside to her car parked in the driveway, and drove to the elegant Parker Hotel just off Highway 111 near the border of Palm Springs and Cathedral City. She parked on the street and headed into the lobby where a bright-eyed, sun-kissed, perky hotel clerk awaited her behind the opulent reception desk.

“Can you please direct me to room twelve?” Poppy asked.

“That’s one of our poolside rooms. Just follow the path outside past Norma’s, and you’ll see signs pointing you in the right direction,” the bubbly girl answered.

“Thank you.”

Poppy continued on outside, past the brightly colored open-air terrace restaurant Norma’s, which was still serving a few guests, and quickly spotted a sign that led her to a long hallway with doors leading to the room.

When she reached number twelve, she knocked but there was no answer. She tried again. This time a little more forcefully. The third time she pounded on it with her fist, startling a couple returning from a night out on the town. They were a little tipsy and eyed her suspiciously, the husband nodding as he passed, “Good evening.”

“Good evening,” Poppy responded with a smile.

The couple moved on down the hall and let themselves into a room on the end. When they were safely inside, Poppy tried the door handle to room twelve. It was locked. Then she remembered the clerk saying the room was a poolside room. Perhaps there was another way in on the opposite side.

She scurried back to where she had come from, circled around to see a petite aqua gem of a pool with soothing lighting, one of several on the property, and counted the bougainvillea patios until she got to the one she assumed was number twelve. She glanced around to make sure no one was watching her. There was an older couple in the pool smooching and not paying any attention. No one else was around. She quietly tiptoed over to the sliding glass door. When she reached for the handle, she realized it was already open and the curtains inside were wafting in the soft night breeze. Poppy pulled them aside and entered the room, which was dimly lit and eerily quiet.

“Fabian?”

No answer.

“Fabian, are you here?”

Nothing.

She had thrown caution to the wind by coming here, but now she felt a nervous twinge. Perhaps this had been a mistake. She was about to turn around and hightail it out of there when she noticed a flickering light coming from the bathroom. The door was wide open. She slowly, cautiously stepped toward it until she was close enough to see a mason jar candle burning on the tiled sink. There was a strong vanilla scent. Her eyes fell upon the bathtub, which was filled with foamy white bubbles that covered the top of the water. Instinctively, she slowly walked over, reached down with her hand, and began clearing the bubbles off to the side until she could see the haunting, dead eyes of Fabian Granger staring up at her from underneath the water. Poppy reared back, screaming, slipping on the wet floor and landing hard on her bum.

She scrambled to her feet and ran out of the bathroom just as the doorbell to the room rang. She raced over and whipped it open to reveal a portly young smiling waiter with a rolling room service cart and a plate covered with a metal tin, a bottle of Pinot Noir, a wineglass, and utensils rolled into a cloth napkin.

He started to push his way inside with a friendly wave when Poppy threw herself in front of the cart, and cried, “There is a dead body in the bathtub! Call nine-one-one!”

The startled waiter’s smile quickly faded and he grabbed his phone from his back pocket and fumbled to make the call.

Poppy was feeling faint from the shock of discovering poor Fabian Granger dead, and had to sit down on the couch in the living area to collect herself.

Within ten minutes, the room was crawling with police officers. Poppy cringed when Detective Jordan swept inside, conferring with a couple of his subordinates, a man and a woman, not yet spotting her.

“Who discovered the body?” Jordan asked gruffly.

The female detective pointed at Poppy sitting stiffly on the couch, hoping that if she did not move and pretended to be invisible, she would not be noticed.

No such luck.

“You have got to be kidding me!” Jordan roared.

“Do you know her?” the male detective asked.

“I’m afraid so,” Jordan spit out. “She just stalked me and my wife while we were having a nice dinner out, and now, once again, she turns up at another murder scene!”

“Another murder scene?” the female detective asked, incredulous.

“Don’t get me started!” Jordan bellowed.

Poppy knew at this point she was going to be in for a very long night.

Chapter 31

Poppy yawned and rubbed her eyes while sitting at her kitchen table, sipping coffee, holding her cell phone out in front of her, the speakerphone enabled. “You’re going to have to repeat that.”

“I’m afraid our installation team will be unable to complete the job today,” the representative from Smart House Security said, trying to remain chipper.

Poppy sighed, agitated. “Why not?”

“We overbooked. I swear to you, this never happens,” the girl promised.

“Well, it just did,” Poppy said through clenched teeth. She was dead tired, having not arrived home until after three in the morning due to exhausting questioning from Detective Jordan at the Parker Hotel crime scene. Then, she had to set the alarm for six-thirty in order to be up in time to greet Smart House Security, which was scheduled to install her new home security system, but now was a no-show.

Poppy had waited over an hour before calling the company to find out what was going on. After another fifteen minutes on hold, a