Murder Takes Center Stage

by Tracy D. Comstock

  The actors appeared to be on a break. A group of four was talking on the grass in front of the stage, and everyone else was drinking coffee or using their smartphones.

  I finally found Katrina behind the stage curtain, sitting with very straight posture in a tall director's chair. She was tapping on her smartphone, and two gorgeous women were doing their best to work on her hair and makeup, not entirely successfully since Katrina had her head bent over the phone. I did a double take. What? She had people to do her hair and makeup even for rehearsals? Meanwhile, another beautiful woman stood by, apparently at the ready if Katrina needed anything. I knew having an entourage wasn't unusual for a Hollywood star, but I'd gotten the idea from her agent that Katrina was low maintenance. She didn't seem to have a security detail, and I wondered what the entourage would do if someone threatened their boss. Throw their curling irons and eye shadow at him? Surely a security detail would have been a wiser choice than the attractive women.

  Everyone, including Katrina, was extremely slender, and I pulled my T-shirt over my stomach. Since my donut consumption earlier in the day, it seemed to have inflated to the size of Tweedledee and Tweedledum's midsections. Put together.

  "Katrina?"

  She looked up from her smartphone. "Yeah?"

  "I'm Ashling Cleary. I'm the manager and owner of StoryWorld."

  "Oh, hey." Back to the smartphone.

  "Is everything going okay? Is there anything you need?"

  She smirked at something she was reading on the screen and didn't answer.

  "Katrina?"

  "What?" Her gaze remained riveted on the phone.

  "Is there anything you need?"

  "I don't know. Not right now. I'll let you know."

  "I have some photos your agent said you'd sign. Could you come and do that now?"

  "No. As you can see, I'm busy."

  Now I understood why Katie was so put out by her. "When, then?" I cringed at the rhyme. The entourage giggled, whether at the rhyme or at me in general, I didn't know.

  "I guess in a couple of hours." She now hadn't looked at me once since I'd introduced myself.

  "Okay. Please be in my office in two hours. It's right behind the gingerbread-house customer service center."

  She didn't answer, and I turned and stalked away, aware of my muffin top showing as my T-shirt rode up over my waistband. I wasn't sure, but I heard what I thought was tittering behind me.

  * * *

  By the end of the day, the gild was officially off Jeremy Fisher's lily pad. Cameron came in after closing and tore off his glasses. He threw them with a dramatic toss into my trash can. They rattled around before falling on top of one of my ubiquitous candy bar wrappers.

  "Problems, Cameron?" I asked.

  "She wouldn't even talk to me, boss. What's up with that?"

  I didn't have an answer for him.

  Joaquin and Brittany had similar complaints when they arrived to turn in their ride keys before leaving.

  "She's completely stuck-up," Joaquin pronounced.

  "And full of herself," Brittany added.

  Katrina never made it to the office to sign the pictures, so I wasn't about to argue with them. I was mad too. But this was all very strange. She hadn't asked ahead of time for any special treatment. She'd declined our offer of a trailer, claiming she would be fine resting and dressing backstage, just like everyone else. Heck, she wasn't even pulling in a paycheck. Half the proceeds from the performances had been earmarked for The Children's Literacy League of California, and, as luck would have it, the CLLC was one of Katrina's pet causes. When she'd heard about the plays, she'd volunteered her services. So why was she acting like such a diva all of a sudden?

  Just as the door closed on Joaquin and Brittany, it opened again. Definitely Grand Central Station around here. This time, Donna stood on the doorstep.

  "Hey, Donna, what's up?"

  "Tell me you can go out with me tonight. Charlie's at a conference until ten. Pleassse." She sounded eerily like Katie.

  "Sure. I don't have any plans." Uncomfortably, I remembered Scott had thrown out tonight as a possibility for our next date in a voice mail message I never returned.

  "I need to vent like I've never needed to before," Donna said. "Let's go to Freddy's."

  That was all she needed to say. (A) I loved Freddy's, and (B) I was famished. I grabbed my purse, and we left.

  * * *

  "That girl is the biggest diva I've ever met," Donna whined after we'd ordered.

  Her attitude surprised me. She was probably the most positive person I knew, and it was strange to hear her complain. Especially since she'd been so looking forward to Katrina's arrival.

  "What is it with her? No one likes her. She wasn't exactly charming when I met her either. Are all celebrities like this in real life?"

  "I hope not. Maybe her role is getting to her. She seems to think she's a real princess. She requires both a morning latte and an afternoon latte and that they be brought over to her at the stage. She sent one of her entourage to relay the instructions almost immediately after she got here. And—get this—she wants decaffeinated lattes with almond milk, sweetened with a mix of three-parts agave syrup to one-part honey. Or maybe it's three-parts honey to one-part agave syrup. At a certain point, I stopped listening."

  I snorted. "Yeah, right. Like you would stock all that stuff."

  "The Jack Sprat has a nice selection but really! After a lot of back and forth—through her lackey, not her, mind you—she finally agreed to decaf with regular nonfat milk and two teaspoons of sugar. The first of which I brought over to her. You'd think I offered her poison. She took one sip and screwed up her mouth at me. Although it must not have been that bad, because she still wanted the second one this afternoon. Which I personally delivered again, with not so much as a thank you in return. Or even an acknowledgment, actually. The second time she just seized the cup out of my hand and didn't say a word."

  A busboy appeared and placed two glasses of water, along with a basket of sourdough bread and a ramekin of butter, on our table. I grabbed a piece of bread, buttered it liberally, and stuffed half into my mouth.

  Donna gave me a surprised look.

  "What? I'm hungry." My mouth was half-full, so this came out more mumble than words.

  "You know I'd never criticize you, but are you sure you're all right these days? You've been eating a little more than normal."

  "Are you saying I'm fat?" I huffed.

  "Of course not. And if you were, I wouldn't care. I just want you to be healthy. I want you to stick around for a long time."

  I was unpleasantly reminded of Jamie. I'd wanted him to stick around for a long time. "You're right. I know. I've been eating out of control lately. I just can't seem to feel full."

  "Why, hon? Is it grief? You said you were doing better about Jamie."

  I nodded. "And I am. Really. I still miss him like crazy, but missing him is more a part of me than something I'm fighting against or trying to get through."

  "But what about Scott? We never got to finish our conversation."

  I looked around the restaurant in an effort to collect my thoughts. Freddy's didn't have the greatest ambiance, with its dull brown walls and fake foliage. A crack ran down the glass container showcasing the desserts, and the carpet needed a thorough vacuuming. But I loved the food. When I was a teen, my mom, stepdad, and I used to come to Freddy's once a week on what we called "Splurge Day." We stuffed ourselves with nachos, club sandwiches, and fries and somehow still had room left for slabs of mud pie. Jamie and I used to frequent Freddy's as well, but we chose the healthier options like salads and salmon.

  It was nice having someone special to share my life with, and frankly, I wouldn't mind having that again. But, in order to have that, I needed to be able to kiss someone new without bursting into tears. And I probably had to allow him to do more than just kiss me, and I didn't know how I would avoid that next step for much longer.

  "I'm not sure I w
ant to be in a relationship. I like my independence." Because it wasn't the whole truth and maybe not even the partial truth, I didn't look her in the eyes.

  "Come on, Ash. I know you. There's something more to it. Are you scared?"

  I reluctantly met her eyes. "No."

  "I think you are. Maybe you just need to forge ahead."

  "Maybe. I don't know."

  "At any rate, you shouldn't keep Scott on the hook forever. You need to make a decision."

  "I know. I will." I armed myself with another piece of buttered bread. "Now. About Princess Katrina. Tell me more."

  "You should have seen her face when I delivered that first latte. She looked like a spoiled five-year-old."

  Donna continued on in the same vein until our orders arrived. I slathered ketchup and mustard on my cheeseburger and stuffed tomato slices, red onion, and lettuce under the top bun. The onion rings came with ranch dressing, and I poured the creamy liquid across the pile. Before I knew it, I'd devoured everything on the plate, including the orange slice and parsley garnish, and possibly some of the china. Then I finished every piece of bread from our basket, slathering each one with globs of butter from the ramekin.

  Donna was far more restrained with her personal-sized olive and mushroom pizza. She didn't even finish the whole thing and asked for a doggie bag. Sadly, she didn't offer the leftovers to me.

  "How's Charlie?" I asked as we waited for the doggie bag to arrive. I tried to not stare at the leftover pizza. If I looked at it much longer, I was going to swipe it from Donna's plate.

  Donna's husband, Charlie, taught botany at the local university and was über-passionate about his subject. He grew exotic plants in a greenhouse behind their home and tended to their garden religiously. He'd even been known to hop out of a still-moving car to examine a shrub or tree, at which point he'd regale his fellow passengers with a litany of its origin, Latin names, and practical uses.

  "He's having problems with insomnia. He's not coming to bed when I go to sleep." Donna looked wistful.

  I laughed. "The two of you are so cute. Still close after all these years." Donna and Charlie had married when they were eighteen, after dating exclusively all through high school. I made a mental note that their twenty-fifth anniversary was coming up at the end of the year. Twenty-five years! I'd only been with Jamie for five. A deep feeling of longing surfaced in my chest.

  "Ash, you could have that kind of relationship too…"

  I just nodded and picked up the dessert menu. What did I feel like? Cherry cheesecake or mud pie?

  THE PRINCESS AND THE POISON

  available now!