Cupcakes and Murder: A Frosted Love Cozy Mystery (Book 5) (Frosted Love Mysteries) by Carol Durand, Summer Prescott

I’m trying to figure out, because whoever killed Raoul and the
housekeeper, tried to do the same thing to you,” he said, taking her hand.
    Missy’s
eyes grew round. “What do you mean? The night that someone came in and messed
up my room, they were planning to kill me?” she whispered.
    “Maybe,
maybe not. I tend to think that what happened in your room was more about rage
and trying to scare you, more than anything else.”
    “Then
what do you mean?” Missy was puzzled.
    “When
you told me that you had been stung by a bee, I checked the back of your neck
and saw that you had a puncture wound that would be consistent with a syringe
being used to inject you. There was bruising at the sight, and whatever was
injected irritated your skin terribly and caused a swollen spot. You told me
that you had been stung on the path to the beach, so I ran down to check it out
and found a syringe that was nearly full of fluid, lying in some of the
undergrowth. I gave it to Rinaldo for testing, and he confirmed that the
substance it contained was the same poison that had killed the other two
victims. Not only that, but when he dug deeper and examined some unsolved local
cases, he discovered that there were at least four more victims who had been
killed the same way.”
    “Oh
my goodness, that’s awful – we’re dealing with a serial killer,” Missy was
horrified and trembling. “So…who were the other victims?”
    “That’s
the scary part,” Chas grimaced. “I don’t know their names, but Rinaldo
confirmed that they were women, all in their early forties, petite but curvy,
with long blonde hair.”
    Missy’s
mouth dropped open as the enormity of his words sunk in. “So they all looked
just like…”
    “You,”
he finished for her. “Yes, there is a definite pattern, but Raoul and the
housekeeper don’t fit the pattern, which makes it difficult to decide how to
proceed.”
    “What
if someone killed all of those women because Raoul had been suggestive with
them like he was with me?”
    “A
jealous girlfriend? Maybe. But then why would she kill Raoul?” Chas was about
to say more, but cut his sentence short when the doctor came into the room to
let Missy know that she’d be free to go in the morning as long as nothing
changed overnight. Missy thanked the tall, thin woman with the lovely accent
and resumed her conversation with Chas when she left the room.
    “Maybe
he did more than just flirt with those women. Maybe she was tired of his
philandering,” she guessed, shrugging.
    “But
that doesn’t explain why she would kill the housekeeper,” he reminded her.
    “Maybe
the housekeeper was a witness, or maybe she killed the housekeeper in my room
so that she could frame me. If she saw that I spent the day with Raoul, she may
have thought that something other than sightseeing had happened.”
    “People
have killed for less,” he nodded. “I’ll check in with Rinaldo, and let him know
to keep a lookout for a strong-willed lady in Raoul’s life, just in case. In
the meantime, you need to get your rest.” Chas kissed her forehead and headed
for the door, promising to be back in the morning to pick her up. He ran into
the doctor on his way out. She was standing just outside Missy’s door, so he
thanked her again and walked to the elevator, unaware of her gaze following
him. An hour or so later, after Missy was sound asleep, she slipped into the
room, checked all of the monitors, and pulled a syringe from her pocket,
dispensing it into the IV line in Missy’s arm.

Chapter 13
     
    Chas
Beckett was more than frustrated, running into dead end after dead end. After
talking with Rosa, the housekeeper who thought that Miguel Garcia, the
concierge, was the killer, he had learned that there were rumors floating
around the resort that Raoul had actually been married, which would give
Missy’s ‘jealous woman’ theory more weight, but he searched and searched, never
finding evidence of a marriage. He glanced at his