While I could've argued that a homicidal chef had hardly been my fault, the special events and media planning had never been my strong suit anyway. The idea of leaving that to someone else wasn't altogether unpleasant. Then again, it all depended on who that someone else was. "May I ask who the cochairman will be?" I said.
"We have decided that the natural choice is someone who is familiar with the Royal Palace, has the social and traditional media contacts to properly promote our casino, and experience planning large-scale promotional events."
I nodded along with them, agreeing on all points. "And that person is?"
Alfie spoke up beside me. "Rafe Lorenzo." He grinned again, his eyes lighting up in a mischievous way that told me he might have had a hand in the selection.
I watched the board members nod their agreement to each other as the white-haired man went on to talk about all of Rafe's wonderful qualifications for the position. But in all honesty, I was kind of only halfway listening at that point, relief ringing in my ears that the Royal Palace really was going to be okay. I had to agree that Rafe would be perfect for the job. He'd practically handled all the planning for the Battle Buffet show anyway. And while he wasn't ready to retire from snowboarding anytime soon, using his celebrity in this capacity was a natural progression of his career.
My eyes had wandered to the large windows overlooking the sparkling crystal blue Lake Tahoe and the snowcapped mountains beyond. Now that I had an official partner in crime, I might even actually have some free time to paint. I could almost feel my fingers tingling with the itch now as I watched the bright March sunlight create sparkling diamonds across the surface of the lake. I swore I could almost see my father winking at me in the twinkling lights.
"Tess? You okay?" Alfie asked, coming up behind me and putting a hand on my shoulder.
I turned to him, not able to keep the smile off my face. "Never better, Alfie. Never better."
* * * * *
FREE BOOK OFFER
Want to get an email alert when the next Tahoe Tessie Mystery is available?
Sign up for our newsletter today
and as a bonus receive a FREE ebook!
* * * * *
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
Gemma Halliday is the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of the High Heels Mysteries, the Hollywood Headlines Mysteries, the Jamie Bond Mysteries, the Tahoe Tessie Mysteries, as well as several other works. Gemma's books have received numerous awards, including a Golden Heart, two National Reader's Choice awards, and three RITA nominations. She currently lives in the San Francisco Bay Area with her boyfriend, Jackson Stein, who writes vampire thrillers, and their three children, who are adorably distracting on a daily basis.
To learn more about Gemma, visit her online at http://www.gemmahalliday.com
Connect with Gemma on Facebook at:
http://www.facebook.com/gemmahallidayauthor
Sue was born and raised in the small town of Grinnell, Iowa. At the age of 21, she moved her family—parents and all—to the beautiful Ozarks region of Missouri where they have lived since. She is blessed with an adoring husband, two wonderful kids, the best sister in the world, and amazing parents. Writing has always been a passion in her life, to which family and friends can attest. From her first attempt at a spin-off of Dick and Jane, to her latest novel, her heart and soul has been poured into each word. Her most sincere wish is that you will find as much enjoyment in reading her stories as she did in their creation.
To learn more about T. Sue, visit her online at: http://tsueversteeg.com
* * * * *
BOOKS BY GEMMA HALLIDAY
High Heels Mysteries:
Spying in High Heels
Killer in High Heels
Undercover in High Heels
Christmas in High Heels (short story)
Alibi in High Heels
Mayhem in High Heels
Honeymoon in High Heels (novella)
Sweetheart in High Heels (short story)
Fearless in High Heels
Danger in High Heels
Homicide in High Heels
Deadly in High Heels
Suspect in High Heels (coming summer 2016!)
Tahoe Tessie Mysteries:
Luck Be A Lady
Hey Big Spender
Baby It's Cold Outside (short story)
Jamie Bond Mysteries:
Unbreakable Bond
Secret Bond
Lethal Bond
Bond Bombshell (short story)
Dangerous Bond (coming spring 2016!)
Hollywood Headlines Mysteries:
Hollywood Scandals
Hollywood Secrets
Hollywood Confessions
Twelve’s Drummer Dying
Young Adult Books:
Deadly Cool
Social Suicide
Wicked Games (coming soon!)
Other Works:
Play Nice
Viva Las Vegas
A High Heels Haunting (novella)
Watching You (short story)
Confessions of a Bombshell Bandit (short story)
BOOKS BY T. SUE VERSTEEG
Danger Cove B&B Mysteries:
Killer Closet Case
Tahoe Tessie Mysteries:
Luck Be A Lady
Hey Big Spender
Baby It's Cold Outside (short story)
Other works:
My Ex-Boyfriend's Wedding
Twisted Fate
Secrets of the Sapphires
Another Time, Another Place
* * * * *
SNEAK PEEK
If you enjoyed this Tahoe Tessie Mystery, check out this sneak peek of
UNBREAKABLE BOND
by
GEMMA HALLIDAY
&
JENNIFER FISCHETTO
CHAPTER ONE
"Pick one."
Two eight-by-ten glossy photos dropped onto my desk.
I looked up. "Excuse me?"
Paul Levine, my weedy looking attorney, sighed, then sank into the imitation leather chair opposite my desk. "You've been running in the red for the last three months. You've got a balloon payment on the business loan coming up, and this month you pulled in fifty percent less revenue than last. Unless you want to drown in your own debt, you need to fire someone." He gestured again to the two photos. "Pick one."
I glanced down at the two pictures. A leggy brunette and an all-American-girl blonde. I shoved them back across the desk.
"No way."
Levine did another deep, theatrical sigh. "I had a feeling you'd say that."
"Look, business is just a little slow."
"It's a tortoise, Jamie."
"It's been the off season."
"There's an 'on' season for infidelity?" he asked, doing air quotes with his fingers.
"We'll take out some ads."
"Which cost money. Something, my dear, that you don't have."
I narrowed my eyes at him. "I'll think of something."
Levine leaned forward, the overhead lights shining unattractively off his bald spot. "Let's face it, people just aren't getting divorced these days. With the economy the way it is, women would rather turn a blind eye to their husbands' indiscretions than try to exist on half his income. It's cheaper to stay together and pretend to be happy."
"No one can pretend for that long."
"Pick. One," Levine enunciated.
I looked down at the two photos, which incidentally consisted of 50% percent of the Bond Agency. The problem wasn't that I'd over hired. The problem was I knew jack shit about running a business.
Men. That's what I knew.
When I was seven years old Chad Fischer's Mom packed him a Snickers bar in his lunch. And not those fun size suckers. This was a king-sized log of nougat, caramel, and sugar induced highs that would last well past the end of afternoon cartoons. I wanted it. Every kid in second grade wanted it. But I tossed my blonde hair over one shoulder, batted my baby blues at Cha
d, and promised that he could stand underneath me while my little pink skirt and I did flips on the monkey bars at recess. I got the Snickers. That was my first lesson in how easy men were.
Fast forward a few years, and my fifteen-year-old self was hanging out at the Northridge mall slurping a Jamba Juice when I'd been spotted by Maurcess DeLine, owner of the world renowned DeLine Models. Suddenly I wasn't just working the boys at my school; I was working every guy that bought a magazine with my body on the cover. And getting paid handsomely to do it. I'd been DeLine's top model for over a decade when Maurcess had started to drop hints that my fresh innocence act wasn't cutting it anymore. I was twenty-six. A dinosaur in runway years.
That's when I moved back to L.A. and decided to take over the family business.
Domestic espionage.
Really, there was very little difference between making love to a camera and making a married man forget his vows. In fact, this was sometimes even easier. Men with adultery already on their minds were simple targets. It was like taking Snickers from a second grader all over again.
Unfortunately, getting their wives to pay was a whole other matter.
I glanced at the two photos staring up at me. Truth was, I needed both of these women.
"Cutting back on personnel only means I can handle fewer cases. I don't see how that's going to help me expand the business," I argued.
"We're not talking expansion here, Jamie. We're talking staying afloat. We're talking not filing for bankruptcy."
"I've got a big client tonight. Judge Thomas Waterston. Superior court. If things go well, I guarantee his wife will have her entire bridge club in here by the end of the week."
"Well, you'd better hope that's true," Levine said, rising. "Because your balloon payment is due on the 1st. You've got two weeks, then…" He tapped the photos. "One of them's got to go."
* * *
"Caleigh?"
"What?" She swiveled in her desk chair, turning her wide eyes my way.
"You're on the Peters case. Care to give us an update?" I tapped open the schedule app on my phone and leaned an elbow across the conference table.
She cleared her throat and shuffled the notes in her lap. Caleigh Presley hailed from the south, claiming she was some distant cousin of Elvis's. Blonde, blue-eyed and bubbly, she'd cornered the market on perky. I'd met Caleigh while doing a Sports Illustrated swimsuit shoot in Cancun. She'd smuggled a bag of fat free Cheetos onto the set, and we'd bonded instantly. Three years later Caleigh foolishly agreed to go out on a date with Nigel Owens, the top fashion photographer in London. I say foolishly because everyone but Caleigh knew about his particular fetish for bondage and tickling. When Caleigh refused to be molested by his feather duster, Nigel had refused to work with her, calling her "difficult". News that quickly spread to other photographers, her agent, and every high profile account in the fashion world. They'd dropped her like a skydiver without a parachute. Luckily for her, that had been just about the time I'd taken over the Bond Agency, and I'd hired her on the spot.
Not, mind you, that I'd hired her out of any sort of pity. Despite her innocent-little-thing looks, Caleigh spoke five different languages and had the computer know-how to hack into the pentagon. Dumb blonde she was not.
"Right. Peters." Caleigh cleared her throat again. "Well, so far I've followed him to the Venice Boardwalk, Element, and out to dinner twice at Formaggio's."
"And?"
She shook her head. "Nothin'. I'm beginning to wonder if his wife isn't paranoid. So far the guy's a straight arrow. Both the dinners were business meetings, and he didn't so much as glance at a bikini on the boardwalk."
I picked up my coffee cup and swished the dregs around in the bottom, trying to remember if Mrs. Peters had seemed the paranoid type when she'd come in last week. Or, more importantly, the type who would balk at the amount of billable hours we'd spent with nothing to show for it. "What about the club? Element?"
Again, Caleigh shook her head. "Sorry, boss. He ducked in for a drink with a buddy, danced a little, then ducked back out. No funny business."
"Fine. If we don't have anything by Monday, we'll call it off. But take Sam with you this weekend," I said, gesturing to the woman sitting next to her, "and tag-team him. Every man has a breaking point."
Caleigh nodded and made a note on the yellow pad in her lap.
I turned to Sam. "Where are we with the Nortons?"
Samantha Cross had come to me from Brooklyn last year. Long legs, perfect mocha latte skin, and thick dark curls, Sam had been a finalist on the first season of the reality show America's New Hot Model and quickly become the darling of the cover girl world. Until five years later when her boyfriend, Julio, had knocked her up. As if taking a nine month hiatus from modeling hadn't been enough to kill her fledgling career, it turned out Sam wasn't one of those lucky ladies whose bodies miraculously snap back after pregnancy. While she was still a knockout among normal people, the two ounces of fat hanging around her lightly stretch-marked belly put a decisive end to her bikini days. So, Sam had packed up the munchkin (Julio was long gone at that point) and headed out to California to make a career change. One I was happy to facilitate. Sam had legs long enough to make husbands forget their vows and, thanks to her military-brat upbringing, knew more about guns than the NRA. And her aim was flawless. Sam could shoot the balls off a fruit fly at fifty yards.
"Mrs. Norton's lawyer," Sam said, "has requested all of our notes."
"Which we will gladly copy for him. Mrs. Norton has gone through three husbands with the agency. What Mrs. Norton wants, we give."
"Of course." Sam nodded. "I think Mr. Norton's lawyers are close to a settlement." Her brown eyes lit up, and she leaned in close. "They offered a 60/40 split plus the house in Aspen."
"Good for her." She deserved it. Especially after her husband had offered to pay Sam fifty dollars for a blow job in the back of his Jag. Sam had been so insulted that he'd offered less than a hundred, she'd actually hauled off and punched him. I made a note in my organizer to edit that part out before handing the footage over to Mrs. Norton's lawyers.
"Okay, so get the Norton files to her lawyer, then work Mr. Peters with Caleigh."
Sam nodded. "Will do."
"So… new cases this week?" I asked, turning to the woman on my left.
Maya Alexander handled all of the admin for the agency, including scheduling appointments with prospective clients. And if her face looked a little familiar, it was because she was March's Playmate of the month. Lucky for me, not many men recognized her with her clothes on.
"Uh-huh. Two possible new cases. Mrs. Shankmann, who claims her husband, and I quote, 'shtupped the freakin' au pair,' and a Rachel Blake who wants us to test her fiancée before the wedding."
Caleigh raised her hand and bounced in her seat. "Oh, me, me. I love doing bachelor parties."
"Done." I noted it down. "I'll take Mr. Shankmann if we get the account. Right. On to tonight. Judge Waterston."
All three girls leaned forward in their seats.
"We all know how high profile, i.e. high dollar, this account is."
Three heads nodded.
"So, this needs to go off flawlessly. Mrs. Waterston is a big name. She has big friends, who all have big cash on the line should they decide they need our services to bust their prenups."
"We're hitting him at the party?" Sam asked, checking her notes.
"Black tie benefit at the Beverley Hilton. So, I want everyone to look sharp, okay?"
Again with the nods.
"I'm personally running game on this one. Sam, you're camera one. Caleigh, I want you on two. Danny will direct from the van." I paused. "Girls, we need this guy. We can't screw it up."
I didn't add because without him, one of them was looking at unemployment.
CHAPTER TWO
The Beverly Hilton is located on Wilshire in the part of Los Angeles where Mercedes outnumber homeless people fifty to one. An iconic piece of Hollywood history, the hotel
has played host to countless stars, dignitaries, and legends, and holds over one hundred red carpet events each year.
And tonight's affair did not disappoint.
The plush banquet room was decorated in tactful hues of red and gold, accentuated by floral arrangements at every column. A jazz group played in the corner, creating mellow mood music for the hundred-some guests in suits and subdued cocktail dresses, nibbling at their fat-free hors d'oeuvres.
Caleigh stood to the right of the band, wearing a strapless emerald green number. In the center of her bodice sat a jade colored brooch, pointed straight at me. Sam was directly across the room from her, wearing a tight red mini-dress with a silver brooch of her own attached to her right shoulder strap. She held a glass of chardonnay in one hand and swayed slightly to the rhythm of the upright bass.
I leaned against the bar, ignoring the jab of my Glock strapped to my thigh, and lifted a single olive martini to my lips to disguise their movement. "Tell Sam I'll be intercepting the target to her right, near the front entrance," I murmured into my décolletage.
"You got it," a voice sounded in my earpiece.
I waited two beats; then Sam changed her position ever so slightly, shifting to face the entrance.
"She's got a clear shot," piped my earpiece.
"Thanks, Danny."
"Anytime, boss," he replied. Then, "Shit. Incoming at two o'clock, Jamie."
I turned to my left…
But was too late to avoid the guy in the Brooks Brothers suit with "hook-up" written all over his tanned face.
"Hi there," he said, suddenly well inside my personal space.
Hey Big Spender Page 22
