Denise Swanson - Murder of a Sleeping Beauty

The teen tried again to free herself. Skye refused to let go. “Oh no, you don’t, you’re staying with me. Let’s check this out. Sleeping Beauty was probably just rehearsing, or taking a nap.” Under her breath she muttered, “Or maybe she was afraid of you.”

Side by side they entered the unlit gym. As her eyes adjusted, Skye could just make out the stage at the opposite end of the room, cluttered with partially completed sets for the spring musical Sleeping Beauty . She moved forward, a firm grip on her prisoner’s hood. Half walls and skeletal trees loomed in the darkness. While they climbed the steps to the stage, Skye wondered if she were doing the right thing. She didn’t think the faculty handbook covered this situation.

To their right, a mock castle bedroom had been set up. Lying on the twin bed was one of the most beautiful young women Skye had ever seen. Her straight blond hair brushed the floor, and her face was a flawless oval. She had passed from the awkwardness of adolescence, and was yet to be touched by the hand of time. She was perfect.

Skye took a closer look. Her skin had a waxy appearance and was almost blue-gray in color. Her lips and nails were pale. Skye rushed to the bed and checked for a pulse. She could feel nothing over the thud of her own heartbeat. She put her ear to the girl’s chest. Again nothing. Finally, she placed the back of her hand to the teen’s mouth. She wasn’t breathing.

Skye forced herself to remain calm and remember what she had learned in her first-aid course. Nothing applied here. Sleeping Beauty was dead.

“Run to the office and call 911.” Skye looked up to find the other girl gone. “Shit, I shouldn’t have let go of her.”

“You shouldn’t say ‘shit’ either.”

Skye’s heart thudded, and her head jerked up. She caught her breath when she recognized Justin, standing near the stairs. It was so rare to hear him speak that she hadn’t recognized his voice. She hadn’t noticed, but he must have followed when the girl dragged her away.

He was the type that blended into the background. Medium height, medium build, and medium brown hair that hung straight from a center part to the middle of his ears.

“Justin, am I glad to see you. Run to the office and call 911. We need an ambulance.”

“Looks more like you need a hearse.” His words were cocky, but his face was pale and sweaty.

“Justin, please, just call 911. Tell them no lights or siren, and no radio.” Skye wondered if there were anything else she should do. “And get the principal. Oh, and tell him to shut off the dismissal bell.”

He shrugged. “He’s not going to listen to me.”

She searched the pocket of her gray wool skirt and found a pad of passes. “Give me a pen.”

The boy handed her the Bic from his shirt pocket.

She scribbled a note and signed it, then handed it to Justin. “Hurry!”

When the boy left, Skye pulled down the sleeves of her pink cardigan and shivered. It was the beginning of April, and it was still cold in Illinois. Of course, it didn’t help that the school board turned off the furnace on March 31, no matter what the weather.

Skye felt a deep sadness settle over her. Why was this young woman dead? She had barely begun to live. This was one Sleeping Beauty who would never awake to her prince’s kiss. Skye’s gaze was drawn back to the girl. What had caused her death? There was no visible wound, no blood, no mark of any kind.

She glanced around. The scene looked ready for a rehearsal. Except—what was that, not quite under the bed? She got down on her hands and knees, and peered at the object. The label had been peeled off, but the bottle’s odd shape teased Skye’s memory.

She sat back on her heels and gnawed at her thumb. I wonder where it came from? The school doesn’t sell anything in bottles.

Suddenly doors flew open and lights snapped on. “Miss Denison, what’s the meaning of all this?” Homer Knapik, the high-school principal, scurried across the gym floor.

As he approached her, a detached part of Skye’s mind noted that between his squat build and the hair emanating from nearly every orifice and covering every limb, the principal looked like a sheepdog—one ready to bite the next lamb that veered from the flock.

Justin followed at a prudent distance, his face still chalky but his brown eyes alight with interest.

Skye met Homer at the bottom of the stairs. “Did you call 911? Did you shut off the dismissal bell?”

“Yes, and you’d better have a damn good reason for your note.” He peered peevishly up at her through the fuzz hanging over his eyes.

“I do.” She pointed to the body on the bed. “Maybe you’d better have the teachers escort the kids out the front door. We don’t want any of them wandering back here.”

Homer took a step closer and squinted upward. “Oh, my God! That’s Lorelei Ingels. She isn’t . . . dead?” When Skye nodded, he scribbled a note on the pad from his pocket. “Boy, take this to the front office immediately and give it to Mrs. Hill.”

“Justin, after you do that, wait for the ambulance crew, and show them the side entrance.” Skye lowered her voice and kept an eye on the teen, who was walking away ever so slowly. “We’d better call the police, too.”

“What?” Homer jumped from foot to foot, as if he were about to pee his pants. “Do you have any idea who Lorelei Ingels is? Her family is one of the wealthiest and most influential in town. She’s won nearly every beauty pageant in the state. We’ve got to be extremely careful.” He stopped hopping around, and his shoulders slumped. “What am I saying? No matter how we handle this or how she died, we’re screwed.”

“A young woman is dead, and that’s your first reaction?” Skye shook her head. She hoped that thirty years in the school system wouldn’t turn her into a bureaucratic zombie like they had poor Homer.

The PA blared into life, making them both flinch. “All teachers are to personally escort their eighth-period students out the front door. Teachers without eighth-period students are to report to the locker area and help supervise. No students are allowed anywhere in the school unescorted.”

When the announcement ended, Homer tried to climb the steps, but Skye stepped in front of him. “What are you doing? Get out of my way,” he demanded.

Skye didn’t budge. “I think we’d better leave things on the stage alone. We don’t want to disturb any evidence.”

Homer gave her a withering look. “Are you saying the girl was murdered? All we need is for a rumor like that to get started.”

“The police will want to know why an apparently healthy eighteen-year-old suddenly dropped dead.”

As if in response to her words, they heard the sound of running feet. Moments later, paramedics rushed through the door. Skye pointed to the bed. They pushed past her and went up the stairs.

Homer grabbed her arm. “I’d better call the superintendent. I’ll be right back.”

Skye watched the principal scurry out of the gym and Justin step just inside the doorway, turning back to the stage only when the EMTs began to fire questions at her. “How long has she been like this?”

“I don’t know.”

“When did you find her?”

“About fifteen minutes ago.”

“Was she conscious?”

“No, just like she is now. No pulse, no heartbeat, no breathing.”

One of the paramedics turned to his partner. “Better call the police.”

The chief of police, Walter Boyd, was the first to arrive. He was tall and powerful-looking, with a muscular chest. Skye watched him swiftly assess the situation, then radio for backup from the county sheriff’s department and the state police. He also called in all four of the off-duty Scumble River cops.