A Knock At The Hotel Room Door

The heavy oak doors closed, sealing the cold wind out.

Nico carried Ruby straight upstairs to the master suite. He wasn’t going to let her sleep in the guest wing again.

I stood in the bright foyer, staring at the crumpled piece of paper in my hand.

If Nico finds out about the brakes, show him the drawing.

I turned the paper over.

It was a typical eight-year-old’s masterpiece.

A yellow sun in the corner. Green grass. A large, square house with a red roof.

There were three stick figures standing in the yard.

A tall man with dark hair. Nico.

A little girl in a pink dress. Ruby.

And a woman with long yellow hair.

I had seen Ruby working on this drawing at the kitchen island last Tuesday.

Brielle had walked in, looked over Ruby’s shoulder, and smiled.

“Is that me?” Brielle had asked, pointing to the yellow-haired figure.

Ruby had looked down and quietly said, “Yes.”

But looking at the drawing now, my stomach twisted.

There was a thick, dark smudge of black crayon over the yellow-haired woman’s hands.

And in the background, parked next to the red-roofed house, was a car.

A blue car.

Beth drove a blue sedan.

I heard Nico’s heavy footsteps on the stairs. He came down slowly, looking exhausted.

“She’s asleep,” he said, unbuttoning his suit jacket. “Mrs. Turner is sitting by the door.”

He looked at me. He saw the tension in my shoulders.

“What is it, Hannah?”

I held out the drawing.

“Marcus dropped this in the driveway.”

Nico took it. He read the cursive note on the back first.

His jaw tightened.

He flipped it over and looked at the picture.

“Ruby drew this,” he said softly.

“Yes, sir. Last week.”

“Why would Brielle give this to Marcus as leverage?”

“Look closely at the car, Mr. DeSantis.”

Nico frowned, bringing the drawing closer to the light of the chandelier.

He saw the blue car.

Then he looked at the yellow-haired woman. He saw the black crayon smudged heavily over her hands.

“Brielle thought Ruby drew her,” I said quietly. “But Brielle wasn’t around two years ago when Beth drove that blue car.”

Nico went completely still.

“No,” he whispered. “She wasn’t.”

“Beth had blonde hair too, didn’t she?” I asked gently.

Nico nodded slowly.

“But Beth’s hands weren’t black,” I continued.

Nico stared at the crude crayon lines.

He traced the black smudge on the stick figure’s hands.

Then he looked at the car again.

Underneath the blue car, drawn in small, erratic strokes of brown and black crayon, was a puddle.

“Oil,” Nico murmured. “Or brake fluid.”

He looked up at me, his eyes wide.

“Ruby was in the garage the night Beth died,” he said, his voice shaking. “She was supposed to be in bed, but she snuck down to say goodbye before Beth left for her charity dinner.”

“Did she see someone tampering with the car?”

“No. If she had, she would have told me.” Nico dragged a hand through his hair. “But she drew this. She saw something.”

“She saw a blonde woman with black grease on her hands,” I reasoned. “She thought it was her mother.”

“But it wasn’t Beth,” Nico said, pacing across the marble floor. “Beth didn’t know how to change a tire, let alone cut a brake line. And she wouldn’t have left with grease on her hands before a formal dinner.”

He stopped pacing.

“Who else had a key to the garage?” I asked.

Nico looked at me, a cold realization settling over him.

“Brielle.”

“But you weren’t dating Brielle then.”

“No. But she was Beth’s best friend. She came and went as she pleased.”

The pieces were slamming together.

“Brielle tampered with the car,” I said, my voice barely a whisper. “Ruby saw her, but thought it was her mother in the dim light. Brielle gave this drawing to Marcus to prove that if he talked to the police, she would blame the sabotage on Beth. She’d say Beth committed suicide.”

Nico crushed the drawing in his fist.

“She killed my wife.”

He walked toward the front door, grabbing his keys from the console table.

“Mr. DeSantis, wait!”

He didn’t stop.

“Nico!” I yelled.

He froze with his hand on the doorknob.

It was the first time I had ever used his first name.

I took a deep breath and walked up behind him.

“If you go find her right now, you’ll kill her,” I said softly.

He didn’t turn around. His knuckles were white on the brass handle.

“She deserves it.”

“Maybe,” I said. “But Ruby doesn’t deserve to lose her father to a prison sentence. And you don’t have enough proof for the police. A child’s drawing and a dry-cleaning receipt won’t hold up in court.”

Nico slowly let go of the doorknob.

He turned around.

The grief and rage in his eyes broke my heart.

“Then how do I destroy her, Hannah?”

I thought about the rusted key in Nico’s pocket. The one Marcus had dropped.

“The safety deposit box,” I said. “Marcus wanted money in exchange for whatever is inside it. Which means it’s proof.”

Nico pulled the rusted key out of his pocket.

“The banks open at eight A.M.,” he said.

“We go together,” I told him.

He looked at me, really looked at me, for the first time since this nightmare began.

“You’ve done enough tonight, Hannah. You should go rest.”

“I’m not leaving,” I said firmly. “I started this when I picked up that coffee pot. I’m finishing it.”