by Cassie Miles
“Anyway,” Liz said, “I came up with fourteen names, then I narrowed my list to four. Want to hear?”
“No.”
“First off,” Liz said, utterly disregarding him, “there’s Jack. I know he’s my boss and it’s disloyal to accuse him, but he did inherit the whole business when his mother died. And that could have been a motive.”
Dash didn’t want to be sucked into her line of patter, but he couldn’t help pointing out, “Jack was pretty much running the business, anyway.”
“Ah, but he and Agatha had a major disagreement. That was about a year ago. Jack wanted more budget for a grandiose promotional campaign, and his mother refused. Then, Jack had negotiated for a private plane for the company. It was a twin engine Cessna, which, he said, could be used for flying Hector around the world to buy beans. Agatha pointed out the obvious fact, that it would take days for Hector to make those flights in a small plane. Plus, maintenance and upkeep on the aircraft was too expensive. Again, she refused. Jack was furious.”
Dash was interested. This was all good information. “Okay, precious, here’s the deal. You give me this inside dope. Then you step out of the picture. Back off. Understand?”
“Sure.” Her smile was as sweet as strawberry taffy and as counterfeit as a three-dollar bill. “Want to hear more? I can fill you in while we’re on the way. You drive.”
She reached into her purse, fished out her keys and tossed them to him.
Dash looked at the array of keys on a round gold ring and frowned. He didn’t drive. Why bother with cars when he could get where he wanted to go with a couple of swoops of his angel wings?
But Liz was already halfway out the door. “Come on, I’m parked out in back.”
On her way down the rear staircase, she continued with her list. “My favorite suspect is Hector Messenger. But I’m probably prejudiced because I’d love to have his job and I hate the way he pats me on the head and disregards everything I say.”
“Hector?” Dash hadn’t even considered him as a suspect. “The buyer?”
“Here’s why,” she said. “I discovered a discrepancy in the last quarter between the price Hector was paying and the prices other coffee brokers got for the raw beans. There might be some kind of payoff going on.”
“And you think Agatha might have known about it?”
“Before she died, she suggested that I start comparing prices.”
“It’s a motive,” Dash conceded as they descended the last flight of stairs leading to the rear exit. “But Hector’s out of town a lot. On the road. How could he poison her?”
“I guess it depends on how the poison was administered. Do you have any idea how it was done?”
He did, but that wasn’t info he intended to share. Some facts were too dangerous for her to know. Dash stepped through the door to the small parking lot.
“Here’s my car.” She stepped to the passenger side of a little red Honda Civic, about five years old. “I’ll give you directions. It’s easy to find the house.”
The last time Dash had been behind the wheel of a car was in the 1950s, and that was a tank-size Chevrolet. How was he going to get out of this situation without losing face?
He fitted the key in the lock and opened the door, but before he climbed inside, he said, “I forgot. I need to pick something up. At a drugstore.”
Unaccustomed to even telling a little white lie, he stammered over the words.
“No problem.” She smiled at him across the roof of the car. “We can stop on the way.”
His tongue stuck to the roof of his mouth. Why didn’t he just tell her the truth? He couldn’t drive. But that seemed like such a pitiful admission. He was supposed to be a private eye. How could she believe he was an investigator if he couldn’t even manage a vehicle? “You go ahead. I’ll meet you.”
“But we’re supposed to be on a date. It won’t look right if we arrive separately.” Firmly, she said, “We’ll stop on the way.”
He entered the car and reached across to unlock her door. Then he tried to adjust the seat. There had to be a button somewhere. He groped at the edges of the bucket seat.
“Here.” She reached between his legs and pulled a lever. “Push back,” she instructed.
He did, and the driver’s seat shot backward. Now he couldn’t reach the pedals on the floor, and she still had her arm between his legs.
“Adjust it,” she said.
“Adjust what?” He almost groaned. She was so close that he could smell the fragrance of her shampoo.
“The seat, silly.”
After a little more fumbling, he felt comfortable in the seat—distinctly more at ease when she removed her arm and leaned back in her own bucket seat. The dashboard was full of dials and switches, but everything was labeled, and he managed to get the key in the ignition and the car running. Fortunately, it was an automatic transmission. He wrestled the gearshift into D for drive and lurched ahead.
Though Liz jolted forward in her seat and gave him a curious look, she said nothing.
He tapped on the gas pedal and pulled into the alley behind the house. Too fast! He tromped on the brake. Both his hands gripped the wheel. He grasped a button on the spoke of the steering wheel. The horn honked.
“What are you doing?” she asked.
“Checking everything out.” He turned the wheel, maneuvered carefully between trash cans and bins.
At the mouth of the alley, she instructed, “Turn right.”
As he eased into the street, swinging wide, he heard the squeal of brakes in front and behind.
“Geez, Dash! Watch where you’re going!”
He muttered under his breath about infernal machines and satanic inventions. If ever an angel had wanted to curse, Dash did right now.
By the time they got to the second corner, he was beginning to get the hang of driving. He pressed down on the accelerator and rolled along the street at a speed that was slow motion compared to his flying.
But Liz gripped her legal pad with white knuckles. Tersely, she said, “Slow down.”
“We’re barely moving.”
“I said for you to slow down, buster. And I mean it! I don’t know what kind of high-performance car you’re accustomed to driving, but this is a Honda and I’d like to keep it in one piece.”
He practiced keeping pace with the other cars, stopping and starting and looking far ahead to anticipate hazards. He found himself grinning. Once he got accustomed to being surrounded by this hunk of metal, the challenge of driving was enjoyable. He darted from one lane to another. He couldn’t imagine why he hadn’t indulged himself in driving before now.
“Please, Dash. I hate to be a passenger-seat driver, but I wish you’d use your signal.”
What signal? None of the buttons or gears seemed to be labeled as a signal.
“Turn left at the light,” she said. “And I’d really appreciate if you’d use your turn signal.”
“Got it.” He flicked a lever beside the steering wheel. The windshield wipers dragged across the glass.
“Here.” She unfastened her seat belt and leaned across him to manipulate a lever on the other side of the steering wheel. “Okay?”
He saw a little green arrow on the dashboard to indicate a left turn. Interesting.
“Well?” She stared at him expectantly.
“Well what?”
“We need to turn at the next corner. Get in the far left lane.”
She couldn’t mean that. If he got all the way over, he’d be driving straight into the path of oncoming traffic. He whipped into the farthest lane that he deemed safe. Again, from behind, he heard the screech of brakes and a honking horn.
He grasped the button on the spoke of the wheel and honked back, delighted with the Klaxon sound.
“All right,” she said sternly. “Now we stay on this street for about five miles. Don’t speed.”
“Got it.”
Again, she consulted her notes. “Another suspect from the office is Gary G
regory, the head of accounting. He and Agatha were always fussing at each other about one thing or another. Once, at an executive board meeting, she discovered that he hadn’t made a charitable contribution she’d instructed him to make, and she read him the riot act.”
“Sounds like a typical office squabble,” Dash said. “Not a motive for murder.”
“Maybe not,” she said. “But I was sitting right next to Gary, and I could see the notepad in front of him.”
“I don’t get it, precious.”
“All the time that Agatha was chastising him, he was nodding amiably, but he was scribbling obscene doodles and notes, one of which said, Die, You Old Witch.” Meaningfully, she added, “That’s witch with a B.”
“But what’s his motive?”
“Greed. Power. Gary works with the money, and he’s pretty much autonomous. There could be some funny business with the accounts.” She pointed to the far right. “There’s a drugstore. Let’s stop so you can pick up what you need.”
Dash had forgotten his excuse for not driving. His little white lie. Now he was stuck. If he admitted that he was lying before, then he’d have to say why, then she’d wonder why he didn’t drive, then he’d have to tell her that he was an angel who flew, then…“Okay, I’ll pull over.”
He’d found a space and parked before he realized he had another problem. Money. Dash always picked up petty cash for expenses at the office before a case, but his wallet was slim. He hadn’t expected to need much, and now he was going to have to purchase something.
Of course, if the going got tough, he could always conjure up a hundred-dollar bill. But that wasn’t his way. Apart from the flying, Dash tried to follow the restrictions of mortal behavior. To catch a mortal criminal, he had to think like a mortal.
He climbed out of the car and went around to open her door for her, but Liz had already gotten out. She checked her wristwatch. “We ought to hurry.”
“Sure. This will just take a minute.”
Inside the small drugstore, he scanned the shelves for something that was cheap and looked like a necessity. There were shelves and shelves of merchandise, ranging from sacks of fertilizer to perfume.
Liz pointed. “The pharmacy is over there, if—”
“Sure.” He set out in that direction. There were medicines for headaches, stomachaches, itches and smelly feet. A pleasant-looking woman sat behind a counter and smiled at him. “Can I help you?”
His gaze lit on an open box to the right of the cash register. It was filled with foil-wrapped disks that were marked one dollar each. Dash picked one up. “I’ll take this.”
“All right.” She turned to the register beside her and rang up one buck and tax.
Dash pulled out two singles, the only cash he had in his wallet, and paid.
He turned to see Liz standing beside him. Her blue eyes snapped wide. “A condom, Dash?”
At that moment, Dash knew that an angel could blush.
“I don’t believe it,” she muttered. “You had to stop to pick up a condom? An emergency condom?”
He tucked the foil-wrapped disk into his pocket with the receipt. There wasn’t a single thing he could say to ease his embarrassment. This moment, he knew, was the karmic payback for telling that little white lie. Hesitantly, he mumbled, “You never know when you’ll need one.”
“Well, I can guarantee that you won’t need one tonight unless you have a hot date after you take me home.”
In the parking lot, she held out her hand for the keys. “I’ll drive.”
Without protest, he handed over the keys. Dash felt like a prize chump. Usually, he was super competent. But today? Super klutz was more like it. What was it about her that caused him to be so clumsy?
In contrast to his driving, she handled her little car smoothly, talking as they went. “The last of my four suspects has got to be Sarah Orben Pachen. She’ll be our hostess tonight.”
“I know that.”
“Oh, really?” She stopped for a red light and turned toward him. Archly, she said, “After your presumptuous purchase at the drugstore, I’m not sure what else you might have forgotten.”
“Come again?”
“You might not remember that this isn’t a real date. I’m just helping you on a case.”
Helping him? Dash ignored her inference. “Why would you suspect Sarah? She’s a niece, right?”
“Right. The rest of her family lives in Seattle, I think. But Sarah wanted to stay in Denver after her husband died. That was about three years ago. She moved in with Agatha.”
“Did they get along?”
“I suppose so. As well as two women who have nothing in common could get along. Agatha was a hardworking businesswoman who spent her spare time with worthy causes. And Sarah? Well, she’s a first-class shopper. I’m sure she’s memorized every inch of the Cherry Creek Mall.”
“So, what’s her motive?” Dash asked.
“Money again. As you also must know, Sarah inherited the house from Agatha. That’s pretty obvious, as motives go, because this is a fabulous estate. And, from what I understand, Agatha stipulated that after her death, Sarah was supposed to turn the house into a shelter for battered women.”
“Has she?”
“Not as far as I know. Also,” Liz said, “I’ve heard that Sarah and Gary Gregory might be getting married. They might be in this together.”
She’d driven into the exclusive Littleton area and eased her car into a space opposite a lavish home in the English Tudor style. “Okay, Dash. What’s your cover story? What should we tell the people inside?”
“It’s best if we stick as close to the truth as possible. We’ll say that you and I met while you were out jogging. This is our first date.”
“What about an occupation? You can’t very well say that you’re a private investigator.”
Or an angel, he thought. “Tell them I’m a philosopher.”
She shook her head. “These are business people. They’ll want to know how you make a living.”
“Being a philosopher,” he said steadily. At least, it was close to truth.
“Okay,” she conceded. “How about a last name?”
Dash had run into this problem before, and he had a standard name he used. “Divine. Dash Divine.”
She nodded. “Let’s go.”
Before she could open her car door, he caught her arm. “Listen, sweetheart. I want to apologize. For the condom, you know. I wasn’t planning to put the moves on you.”
She turned her head and confronted him. In the settling dusk, her smile seemed to glow. “Why not?”
He hadn’t expected that response. “Because,” he said.
“Do you find me unattractive?”
“Not a chance, precious. You’re the tastiest little cupcake I’ve seen in two lifetimes.”
“Cupcake?” She chuckled.
“A hot tamale,” he said. “A cool tomato.”
“I’m a woman, Dash. What do you think of me as a woman?”
He inhaled a deep breath and spoke the truth from his angel heart. “Beautiful.”
She leaned toward him. Holding his face in her slender hands, she kissed him squarely on the lips. Pure sensation flooded his physical body. He had not been kissed, not like this, since he gained his solid form as an angel. Never.
He’d never been this close to any human being. Dash felt like he was going to explode. He reveled in the slight pressure of her mouth on his, the warm whisper of her breath against his skin.
When she leaned away from him, he looked into her face. Her eyes were warm. Her lips were soft. And her flowing hair shimmered. Her loveliness surpassed any miracle.
“Beautiful,” he said.
Chapter Five
She never should have kissed him. Before their lips met, Liz had known she was making a mistake. In that split second, when she held his face in her hands and looked into his eyes, she’d known that she was opening the door into a mysterious world of brilliant hopes and dangerous passi
ons.
But she’d kissed him anyway. Taken the risk. And now there was no turning back.
Though her bruised knee no longer hurt, she walked slowly along the winding flagstone path that led to the carved oak double doors of the house that now belonged to Sarah Orben Pachen. Dash walked behind her, but she could feel his presence all around. She breathed him in on the crisp autumn night. She tasted him on her lips.
The kiss had been an impulse. She’d wanted to embarrass him the same way he’d embarrassed her when he purchased the condom. And she’d wanted to pay him back for insinuating that he hadn’t really been thinking of seducing her tonight. Surely he had. Why else make an emergency stop at a drugstore? And what if he did try to seduce her? What would she say?
Yes. Her heart whispered the answer to a question that had not yet been asked. Yes.
Crazy. Making love with Dash was absolutely crazy. There was no sort of relationship with him. He was a private eye, for goodness sake. He drove like a maniac. His . conversation meandered off into archaic contemplations of good and evil that were, to say the least, unusual. Then there was the way he dressed, in trench coat, fedora and double-breasted pin-striped suit. He certainly wasn’t the kind of guy she could take home to meet her mother in St. Louis. He wasn’t appropriate.
Why, then, did she find him so appealing? And why, oh, why had she kissed him?
At the doorstep, he reached around her to press the doorbell, and his shoulder inadvertently brushed against her back. She quickly moved away. And so did he! It was almost as if he were the shy one, as if he wanted to avoid physical contact with her. But how could that be? He’d marched right up to the pharmacist and bought a condom. Talk about mixed signals!
Sarah flung wide the door to welcome them with open arms. As always, she was overdressed in abundant jewelry and a flowing blue caftan shot through with silver threads. Her flaming red hair shone with unnatural golden highlights. But she was so unrepentantly glamorous that Liz had to forgive the tacky excess.
In her melodious alto, Sarah intoned, “Liz, darling, you look marvelous. And is this your date?”
No, Liz thought, he’s a puppy and he followed me home. “Sarah Pachen, I’d like you to meet Dash Divine.”
