They got into Boiling Springs, Pennsylvania late Saturday night and spent most of Sunday researching into the area, with very little success. Supernaturally speaking, the town was pretty inactive. Sam called Ellen to find out if the hotel staff were potential targets (so far, no staff had been involved), and they decide to focus their efforts on the guests. Bright and early Monday morning they checked into the resort and were given keycards for their suites, then told to meet in the dining room. They dropped off their stuff, spent a few minutes admiring the size and luxury of their suites, then headed down to the meeting.
The dining room had been set up with a few chairs at one end. A middle aged woman with red hair and an older, white-haired man were seated in two of those chairs. Fifteen chairs were facing them, lined of in three rows of five. Two of the chars in the front row were occupied by a blonde woman and a brunet man, who looked to be in their late thirties and were holding hands. A blond man in his early twenties was sitting at the end of the middle row, but the rest of the chairs were open.
Phoebe went to sit by the blonde guy and the other woman followed her. Paige sat next to her, then Piper and finally Pru on the other end. Sam and Dean glanced at each other, then sat behind Piper and Pru, respectively.
Phoebe glanced at the man sitting next to her, taking a moment to check him out before focusing her bluish green eyes on his warm brown ones. "Hi, I'm Phoebe," she greeted.
"Kyle," he replied, smiling at her. "Nice to meet you."
"You too," she told him. "Have you been to one of these things before?"
"Nope," he replied. "Which, apparently, is a horrible offense if you've been going to college in Boiling Springs for four years. Some of my buddies found out and made me go. But hey, free vacation. Not like I'm complaining. Well. Maybe just a little." He paused, grinning sheepishly. "Sorry. You were probably just being polite. Shut me up before I tell you my whole life story."
Phoebe smiled. "It's okay. I don't mind."
"Oh, well, in that case, I was born on a sunny afternoon in December, twenty-three years ago. It was unseasonably warm that year, and my grandfather-" he cut off, grinning. "Kidding. What about you? This your first murder mystery too?"
"Yeah," she said. "My sister went to some mystery dinner in high school and apparently really liked it. She wanted to try a week-long one."
"So is she a weird sister whose tastes can't be trusted or the kind where if she says it's cool, it is?" Kyle asked.
She grinned. "Both, actually. But in this case, I think it'll be cool. I was in theater in high school, so it should be interesting."
"That's an interesting tactic. Right away tell me you've acted. If you were one of the actors, why would you admit to that? Unless you were trying to get me to think that, and thus throw me off your trail. Very sneaky, but I didn't fall for it!" he informed her in an overly dramatic tone with a teasing grin.
She smiled again. "So which am I, actor or guest?"
He paused. "I…don't…know. But don't worry. I'll find out."
"You think you're that good?" Phoebe teased.
"You'll have to wait and see," he commented.
"Guess I'll have something to look forward to," she said.
"All right, everyone's here," the woman at the head of the room said, standing up. "Lets get started."
Phoebe glanced around the room and noticed that the rest of the seats had been filled. In the front row, a pretty young woman with curly dark hair sat in between two handsome men. In the row behind Phoebe were three gorgeous women who were huddled close giggling about something. They stopped when the woman up front began speaking again, though.
"Welcome to the Allenberry Mystery Theater 2007," she said. "My name is Leslie, and this is Roger. I'm the manager here at Allenberry resort, and Roger's the mind behind this year's show. Some of you were handpicked to be here, and some of you are just along for the ride. I'm not going to ruin the fun and give too much away, but I am going to give you a few quick rules. First off, everything on the grounds is open, except the staff lounge and kitchens. Meals will be served in the dining room at nine, one, and seven, and there are two small guest kitchens that are stocked, should you need them. You'll find a few brochures in your rooms with a map that includes their locations, as well as information on the other activities and services our resort offers.
"Now, should anything happen during your stay here, we have our own team of investigators, separate from the police, who will take care of everything. Our policy is that we lock down the resort while they conduct the investigation, but if you have an emergency and need to leave, come talk to me. If you wish to conduct your own investigation, feel free, but please do so quietly. Should you think you know who is responsible, come talk to me, and I'll pass the information on to the team. Please don't attempt to confront anyone yourselves. Of course, that's just the worst case scenario. Hopefully your stay will go smoothly." She smiled at all of them and Dean rolled his eyes.
"All right, I think we've taken enough of your time," Leslie said. "Enjoy your stay, and if you have any questions, don't hesitate to ask!"
People began talking amongst themselves again, and a few of them stood up and started heading towards the exit. Phoebe started to turn towards Kyle again, but her attempt at a renewed conversation was interrupted when Paige tugged on her arm.
"Come on. We need to talk," Paige told her, nodding to Piper, Pru, Dean, and Sam, who were heading to a corner of the room.
"Be right there," Phoebe said reluctantly, then looked back over at Kyle.
"You wanna meet up with me again later?" Kyle asked.
Phoebe grinned and nodded. "Give me ten minutes?"
"I think I can do that," Kyle said, smiling back at her.
"See you soon," Phoebe said, then headed over to join the others.
"Nice of you to join us," Piper commented teasingly.
"Did you get his number?" Paige added.
"Shut up," Phoebe muttered, blushing a bit.
Dean cleared his throat. "Anyway. We split up?"
"Split up, go chat with people, meet back in the common room of our suites in an hour," Pru said, then grinned over at Phoebe. "For the people who missed the planning session."
"Because it so took you all of three minutes to plan that," Phoebe replied, sticking her tongue out at her sisters. "Okay. See you guys in an hour." With that, she headed off to join up with Kyle again.
"Phoebe and her boys," Paige commented, shaking her head.
"With her luck, he's probably the demon," Piper agreed.
"I'm assuming that was a joke," Sam said, making it a half question.
"It was. Mostly," Pru replied with a grin.
"Yeeaah," Dean said. "We'll see you later." He nudged Sam and the two of them headed out.
Piper, Paige, and Pru exchanged glances, then grinned at each other and split up.
After everyone split up, Sam headed to the resort's library. He doubted there would be any books that would be useful in either the current case, or his own research, but he might as well check. And he was just as likely to run into one of the other guests at the library as any other room, except maybe one of the restaurants or the kitchen. Sure enough, when Sam walked into the library, he saw the brown haired young man that had been sitting in the front row.
The man was looking over the book titles, so Sam walked over a spent a few moments doing the same thing.
"Hello," the other man greeted. "My name is Daniel. Do you like reading as well?"
"Sam. And yeah, I do. Thought I'd see what this place had to offer," Sam replied.
Daniel nodded. "I was hoping their selection would be good, because I am imagining that I will be spending a lot of time here."
"What about those other two people you were with?" Sam asked.
Daniel shrugged. "They are my best friends, but they are also a couple. I would not want to interfere with their time together."
Sam turned stopped looking at the books and turned towards him. "Isn't that a little awkward, coming to spend a week get-away with two people who are dating?"
"It is. But I'm used to it. And they asked me to come; I never could deny them anything. Especially not Gabie," Daniel said. "But I enjoy reading. And there's a great selection here."
"There is," Sam agreed, turning his attention back to the books. He was actually a bit surprised at the extent of the available books. "Some of these are pretty rare. This one's in the original Latin."
Daniel frowned at the book that Sam mentioned. "Do you read Latin?"
"Nah, not really. The only word I can ever remember is Christo," Sam said, casually looking back over to see Daniel's reaction.
"What's that mean?" Daniel asked.
"Christo?" Sam repeated. "God, more or less."
"Ahh." Daniel said, nodding. "The name of God and curse words always seem to be the easiest to remember in another language." He smiled. "Sometimes they are the same thing."
Sam smiled back. "It does seem that way. Well, I better go find my brother. It was nice meeting you, Daniel."
"You as well, Sam," Daniel replied.
Pru chose to go out into one of the gardens, figuring if no one was out there she could at least talk to the animals. Fortunately, she hadn't been walking too long when she spotted the curly-haired woman who had been sitting in the front row at the meeting. She was examining a group of gardenia bushes.
"Pretty, aren't they?" Pru asked as she walked over to stand next to the girl.
The woman turned to face her, giving a bright smile. "They're gorgeous. I'll have to get Zac to come out here with me later."
"Zac's one of the guys you were with?" Pru guessed.
She nodded. "Zac's my boyfriend. The other guy, Daniel, he's my stepbrother. And our best friend. It's complicated." She laughed slightly. "I'm Gabie, by the way. We're here on vacation."
"Pru," she returned. "I'm here with my sisters."
"Yeah, I saw you sitting with them," Gabie said. "Are you with those guys, too?"
"Yeah. Well, sort of. It's-" Pru grinned. "Complicated."
Gabie laughed. "I'll tell you mine if you tell me yours?"
"Sure, sounds good," Pru agreed.
"Daniel, Zac, and I, we've been best friends since the fifth grade. When we were fourteen, my dad married Daniel's mom." Gabie laughed again. "I used to have the hugest crush on Daniel. But then we were brother and sister, and it was, like, weird. And then Zac and I fell in love, so it didn't matter. So what about you?"
"Well mine's not quite as exciting as that," Pru replied. "I work with my sisters, and we just started working with the guys. My sisters and I went here one vacation, and they decided to come, too."
"Lucky you, huh?" Gabie giggled. "They're like, really really cute."
"I haven't really noticed," Pru replied.
"Oh, come on! They're like, completely, totally gorgeous," Gabie gushed.
"We work together," Pru said, wondering if it was the boy talk that had Gabie suddenly acting fourteen or something else. "It's not something I look for." She shrugged and allowed her attention to be distracted by a group of sunflowers. "Ma'heo'o but those are beautiful."
"Ma'heo'o?" Gabie asked. "Forgive me if it's rude, but what does that mean?"
"It's Cheyenne," Pru replied. "It means God."
"Oh," Gabie said. "You speak Cheyenne, then?"
"Learned it the same time I learned English," Pru told her.
"Really? Does that make knowing two languages easier? I speak French, and I guess technically I'm fluent, but French never comes as easily for my as English does," Gabie said.
"Both of them are just as easy for me, so yeah, it probably does make it easier," Pru told her. "I better get back to my sisters, though. It was nice meeting you."
"It was, like, nice meeting you, too!" Gabie agreed cheerfully. "We'll totally have to do it again sometime."
"Definitely," Pru said. "See you around."
There were times that Dean appreciated the fact that he was incredibly hot and damn near irresistible to women. Most times, actually. But unfortunately, this wasn't one of them. He plastered on a charming, interested smile as the woman seated next to him chatted on about how horrible she was at golf. Dean wasn't sure how they'd ended up talking about that, but then, he wasn't sure how they'd ended up sitting on the couch together, with her hand on his knee and moving slowly up towards his thigh. He'd started out talking to both Mr. and Mrs. Kirkland in the lounge, but then Mr. Kirkland had gone to get a drink and Dean had found himself sitting next to the missus while she flirted shamelessly.
Dean made a noise of agreement as she paused and looked at him. She smiled at him and kept right on talking, and he glanced over to the bar. To his surprise, he saw Mr. Kirkland sitting there talking to Paige, who was sipping at a martini and smiling coyly at him. Mr. Kirkland looked pleased enough that he wasn't likely paying any attention to what his wife was doing. As Dean watched, Paige leaned over to pick up a napkin, knocking her drink into Mr. Kirkland's lap in the process. She immediately began apologizing, trying to dry his pants with her napkin, and he didn't look any less pleased than before.
Mrs. Kirkland followed his gaze, then her eyes narrowed.
"Well, it was real nice talking to you, but I'm afraid I gotta go," she told him, pulling her hand from his thigh and moving over to the bar.
Paige spotted her coming and quickly ducked away, tossing him a wink as she slipped out through the back door of the lounge.
Mrs. Kirkland hesitated for a moment, looking after Paige like she was trying to decide if she wanted to follow her. Dean stood, ready in case he'd have to intercept her, but the woman decided she'd rather lay into her husband, which was what she began doing.
Dean shook his head, running his hand across his jaw in frustration. He hadn't managed to get anything useful out of Mrs. Kirkland, and it didn't look like he was going to get any now. Especially not since his hour was almost up. With a sigh, he left the lounge.
And found Paige waiting for him.
He blinked in surprise, then shrugged it off and kept walking towards their suites. "Having fun?"
"Loads," Paige replied, falling in beside him. "I love flirting with married guys fifteen years older than me."
Dean looked at her for a moment. Her tone had been cheerful, and she was grinning, but he was pretty sure she was kidding. Still. "You're not serious."
She grinned wider. "No, I'm not. It's usually Phoebe's job to do the flirting, but she's off investigating her boy, so I got stuck with it this time. Oh, well, least I found out he's not the demon."
Dean raised an eyebrow. "How?"
"Oh, I put holy water in my martini before I spilled it on him," Paige commented.
"Huh," Dean said, vaguely impressed despite himself.
"Yeah, we started off slipping it into their drinks, but unless we were making the drinks for them, that was tricky. So one of us came up with this idea," she said.
"One of you?" Dean asked.
She nodded. "It was either Piper, Pru, or me. We have no idea, honestly. Might've come up with it all at the same time."
Dean eyed her for a moment, then shrugged and continued on the rest of the way in silence.
Author's Note: No song this time, because there's not really a song that fits this chapter well. At least not one that I can think of, so oh, well. Also, this chapter was shorter than usual, so sorry! And as usual, I own nothing!