Double Booked for Death

by Ali Brandon

  “Retract what?” he demanded, looking from her to Darla in bemusement.

  Before Darla could explain, Jake cheerfully went on, “You just broke the first commandment of Darla: thou shalt not ever call her ‘Red.’ That is, not if you value your man parts.”

  Reese’s bemused look turned faintly disbelieving, but he took a prudent step back anyhow as he asked, “Okay, and why not?”

  “Because my ex-husband used to call me that,” Darla spoke up in a tight voice.

  Reese shrugged and raised both hands in mock surrender. “Good enough reason for me. Sure, Darla, you can come.”

  “Fine.”

  She jangled the keys, feeling a bit embarrassed at her abrupt reaction to the nickname, which she knew had been meant in a comradely way. Face it, she told herself, with hair this color, there’s always someone who’s going to call you that. Time to toughen up.

  Summoning a conciliatory smile to smooth things over, she added, “So, what are we waiting for?”

  They walked quickly over to the garage, where Darla took the service elevator to the level where her late aunt’s sleek, midnight blue sedan sat patiently parked. She unlocked it and slipped behind the wheel, not bothering to suppress the reflexive “ahh” as she sunk into the cushy leather seat in contrasting gray. A hint of Dee’s favorite perfume still lingered, despite the fact it had been half a year since the last time the old woman had driven it.

  Darla had never owned a car this nice. Her ex had somehow always ended up with the more expensive vehicle in the family. His excuse had been that his job often entailed whisking customers about town, and he couldn’t very well pick them up in a cloth-seated compact. Whenever it came time for her to purchase a new car, however, he invariably laid the whole environmentally conscious guilt trip on her and insisted that, since her commute was longer, she should opt for a cheaper, more fuel-efficient model. And so she’d spent most of her adult life driving cars that sipped fuel but did little to nourish her inner diva. By contrast, her inherited Mercedes barely got double-digit mileage in town, but compensated for that lack with its air of pure luxury that made her feel to the manner born.

  Darla had last driven the car about two weeks earlier, and so she held her breath as she waited for the engine to turn over. To her relief, it caught with a purr that would have put Hamlet to shame. She slid open the moonroof and then put on the eighties-era pair of black-framed Wayfarers that she had found tucked behind the visor the first time she drove the car.

  She wasn’t sure if said sunglasses had belonged to Great-Aunt Dee or the last of her late husbands. Still, in Darla’s opinion the retro eyewear added a nice, adventurous vibe to her usual sedate fashion choices. She didn’t have time this day, however, to admire the effect in the rearview mirror. Instead, she hastily put the Mercedes into gear, and a few moments later she was downstairs again at the entry where Reese and Jake awaited her. Both had donned sunglasses as well, though theirs were the mirrored, police-issue variety.

  She powered down the driver’s side window and frowned in Reese’s direction.

  “No way,” she told him when he appeared headed toward her door. “The computer’s one thing, but no one drives Maybelle except me. You can ride shotgun.”

  She thought for a moment he’d argue the point. To his credit, however, he only said, “Nice shades,” and opened the rear passenger door for Jake. Then, politely closing it after her, he walked around to the front passenger side.

  Jake, meanwhile, had leaned over the front seat, chin almost on Darla’s shoulder. “That was pretty bold of you, telling a Jersey boy he has to sit there and let a broad drive him around,” she said with a grin. “Now, show a little compassion and don’t rub it in.”

  “I won’t,” she promised as Reese opened his door and slid in. He shot her a look. Or so she presumed, since she technically couldn’t see his eyes behind the sunglasses.

  “You won’t what?” he said.

  “I won’t break any traffic laws getting there. Now, how about some directions, before the Lone Protester flies the coop again?”

  Reese gave her the name of their destination, which was literally “A Cuppa Joe”—she had thought he was indulging in cop-speak before—and pointed her in the direction of the expressway. Once they were well on their way, he settled back in his seat and gave an experimental sniff.

  “Smells like Chanel No. 5.”

  “Yep. That was Great-Aunt Dee’s favorite.”

  Darla managed a fond smile even as she negotiated a tricky lane change and then ignored sign language from the driver she passed.

  “I can remember her wearing it from the time I was a little girl,” she went on. “I think the scent permanently permeated the seat leather of this car after ten years of her driving it. The apartment used to smell the same way, but now it’s dissipated. I kind of miss it, though.”

  “Yeah, my ma liked Chanel No. 5, too. She’d save up a whole year to buy herself one of those little bitty bottles, and she’d make it last until the next year. I always told her someday I’d buy her a whole vat of it, so she could bathe in it if she wanted, but I never got the chance.”

  Darla glanced Reese’s way in time to see him shrug. From the way he let the subject trail off, she had to assume his mother was long dead. She didn’t know him well enough yet to broach a potentially awkward subject like that, so instead, she took the safe way out and asked, “Is this my turn coming up?”

  “Next block,” he told her. “And while we’ve got a minute, how about a description of your girl? Jake’s already given me hers, but we’d better compare notes in case she changed her hair or put on glasses or something.”

  As Darla relayed what she’d noticed, another thought occurred to her.

  “Wait. I know someone else who has seen her up close and personal. Juanita Hillburn.” When he merely stared at her, expression quizzical, Darla added, “She’s one of the local television news people. You know, blond, obnoxious, in-your-face.”

  “Reese doesn’t watch anything except ESPN and the History Channel,” Jake interjected with a grin.

  Reese gave her a quelling look over his shoulder and then asked Darla, “This Hillburn woman . . . when would she have seen the girl?”

  “The day of the autographing. She was interviewing me and mentioned she’d also talked to the Lone Protester. You must have noticed her news van on the street.”

  “Yeah, well, I was kinda busy then, and that was before your author got herself killed,” he said with a shrug as he reached for his cell phone again. “I’ll have someone check that out with Hillburn. Maybe she’s got some tape we can pull. What station did you say she was on?”

  Darla gave him the call letters while he dialed his precinct. Once he’d relayed that bit of information, he snapped the phone shut again with a satisfied nod. “If we need it, it’s ours. Now, turn here.”

  They reached the coffee shop a few minutes later. A young couple and a college-aged boy sat at two of the three outdoor tables, meaning the Lone Protester—if she was still there—must be enjoying her brew inside the café. As to be expected, every parking spot on the block was taken, except for one Mercedes-sized opening in a restricted loading zone.

  “Park there,” Reese instructed, pointing to said illegal space. When she gave him a questioning look, he added, “Don’t worry, we’re on police business. Anyone tries to tow you, I’ll show ’em my badge.”

  “Works for me,” Darla replied, secretly hoping a tow driver would try to drag Maybelle off, just so she could watch that badge-fl ashing action in person. After all, it always looked pretty cool and official on the television cop shows.

  She slid into the spot with a brisk efficiency that earned her a nod of approval from the detective. His next words, however, took some of the glow off that unspoken praise.

  “You wait here in the car while Jake and I go inside to see if anyone matches your girl’s description. If we find someone, we’ll have you ID her through the window. But in the m
eantime, keep your head down. You’ve already scared her off once. We don’t want you spooking her a second time. Got it?”

  “Got it,” Darla agreed, tone resigned as she switched off the key. “You two play good cop and bad cop, and I’ll just hang out here and play sit-on-my-ass cop.”

  “Don’t worry, kid,” Jake assured her as she unfolded herself from the backseat, “sitting on your ass is one of the first things they teach you at the academy. It’s a vital skill, but hardly anyone ever fails that course. I’m sure you can handle it.”

  The pair of them exited the car. Jake hastily lit a cigarette, took a couple of quick puffs, then tamped it out and tucked her arm through Reese’s. This presumably was so they’d look more like a couple stopping in for lattes than a cop and his retired partner out prowling about for suspects. In Darla’s opinion, however, the effort ranked as an epic fail, as her teen customers have would put it.

  “Talk about scaring off suspects,” she muttered as she watched the two enter the coffee shop. The pair might as well have had “Police” stenciled on their foreheads, trailing as they both did a whole kick-butt aura about them. The sunglasses didn’t help, either.

  Still, Darla obediently scooched down in her seat, window cracked to admit ventilation without allowing more than the top of her head to be seen. She also slid over to the passenger side, not so much for a better view as to look like she was waiting for the driver to return. It was a trick she’d seen on one of those police procedural television shows years ago, and she figured it wouldn’t hurt to try. Then, peering intently from behind her Wayfarers, she studied the coffee shop.

  From the outside, at least, A Cuppa Joe seemed like one of those trendy spots that tried hard not to be one. A trio of battered wrought-iron bistro tables with matching chairs served as outdoor dining, while the wooden sign hanging beside the door with a crude rendition of a steaming coffee cup looked as if the owner had painted it himself. The interior likely carried on that same “ just folks” casual air, no doubt with mismatched furniture and crockery. But Darla had an idea of what property in this area leased for . . . knew, too, that every vehicle parked nearby would have sported a hefty price tag on the dealer’s lot. Success on this block would require a loyal and substantial following.

  Sure enough, more people began drifting toward its doors, so that now a line had spilled out onto the sidewalk. Darla frowned and glanced at her watch. Jake and Reese had been inside a good five minutes, ample time to have determined whether or not the Lone Protester was there. Either the girl had long since come and gone, or else her destination had been somewhere other than the coffee shop.

  As if on cue, the door to the consignment shop next door opened, and the Lone Protester stepped out onto the sidewalk, shopping bag in hand.

  “Oh no!” Darla sat up straight and shot a look at the coffee shop door. The line was no shorter, and Jake and Reese were still nowhere to be seen. And the Lone Protester was strolling right toward where the Mercedes was parked!

  THIRTEEN

  SCRUNCHING DOWN AGAIN, DARLA GRABBED HER CELL AND quickly dialed Jake’s phone, only to hear the “Yellow Rose of Texas”—the tune Jake had downloaded as the default ring for Darla’s number—playing behind her. Jake’s phone must have fallen out of her pocket and onto the seat when she squeezed out of the back door.

  Darla shut her phone in frustration. She didn’t know Reese’s number, and since she already knew that Jake’s phone couldn’t be unlocked without the correct password, she couldn’t search her friend’s contacts for that information. That meant she’d have to wait until the protester was safely past and then run inside the coffee shop to find them. The problem with that plan was that, in the meantime, the Lone Protester might grab another cab or disappear into another shop. It seemed that her only choice would be to follow the girl once again . . . but this time, in such a way that the teen didn’t know she was being tailed.

  Darla frowned. Though her Wayfarers would serve as something of a disguise, it would be hard to hide her red hair unless Great-Aunt Dee had tucked a convenient scarf a la Audrey Hepburn into the glove box. She made a quick, hopeful rummage through the compartment but came up empty. No matter. The Lone Protester couldn’t be expecting to be followed a second time today, anyhow, right?

  By this time, the girl had passed the car and was continuing at a casual pace down the sidewalk. Darla swiftly made her decision. She’d follow the girl and go on the assumption that her quarry wasn’t packing a weapon or fists of fury, or anything else that might require Darla needing immediate backup should she be spotted and recognized. Not the ideal plan, she conceded, but no way she was leaving Maybelle alone and unlocked. This meant that if Jake showed up at the Mercedes before Darla returned, the most she could do was stare through the car window at her cell phone, which was still lying on the back seat. She could only hope that Jake had her cell number memorized so she could use Reese’s phone to call her and find out what was going on.

  She had just grabbed her purse and was about to reach over and pull the keys from the ignition when a sharp rapping against the driver’s side window glass made her jump. Choking back a surprised gasp, she glanced up to see a beefy uniformed police officer staring at her through the tinted glass, his expression one of extreme disapproval.

  Bad cop.

  That was Darla’s reflexive categorization of the broad-faced, mustachioed officer as she recalled Reese’s earlier take on this new kinder, gentler breed of law enforcement. As for Reese, he fell into the infamous never-one-around-when-you-need-one cop category. Here, he’d instructed her to park illegally, and now he wasn’t available to do the promised badge flashing to get her out of it. Frantic, she glanced from the coffee shop door to the Lone Protester’s retreating figure. Not only were they going to lose their sole suspect in Valerie Baylor’s possibly suspicious death, but she was about to get slapped with a substantial fine as well. She needed to talk her way out of this ticket, and quickly.

  She took a deep breath and powered down the driver’s side window via the center console, and then leaned toward the uniformed man.

  “Hello, Officer,” she said with a broad smile, deliberately thickening her East Texas twang into even more honeyed southern tones. She’d found that most middle-aged New York men responded positively to that accent. “Gorgeous day, isn’t it? Is there something I can help you with?”

  “Yeah,” he replied, still disapproving and apparently immune to sweetness and light. He flipped open his citation book and started to scribble. “You can make sure whosever’s car this is gets this little love note. In case you didn’t notice, lady, you’re in a loading zone.”

  “Are we? Oh dear, and here my friend, Detective Reese, said it was fine for us to park here while he checked out a suspect.”

  “Suspect?”

  The cop paused to squint at her, and Darla anxiously pointed to the Lone Protester, who now was peering into the window of a shop a few doors down.

  “That girl with the long dark hair and black scarf, right near the red awning,” she said, giving up the southern-girl routine and cutting to the chase. “I was just about to go after her. She knows something about a murder. If we lose her now, we might never find her again.”

  “Yeah? So where’s this detective friend of yours, and where’s his parking placard? And why isn’t he following this so-called murder suspect?”

  “He would be, but he’s still checking out the coffee shop,” she exclaimed, not bothering to correct his assumption about who owned the Mercedes. Shaking her head in frustration, she grabbed the keys from the ignition. “Look, if you need to write a ticket, write it, but I really need to go now.”

  “Lady, where you really need to go is out of this loading zone. You’ve got the keys, so do your friend a favor and move his car for him. I still see it parked here a minute from now, I’m booting it and calling a tow truck.”

  Baring oversized teeth in what probably was supposed to be a smile, he ripped the citation from
the book and tucked it under the windshield wiper. “Now, you have a nice day,” he told her and climbed back inside his patrol car.

  Biting back a groan of frustration, Darla powered up the window again and yanked open the passenger door, almost falling out it in her haste. She climbed up on the door frame for a better look at her quarry. The Lone Protester had moved on down the block now and was approaching the busy intersection. The familiar orange hand flashed on the pedestrian crosswalk sign, meaning Darla still had several seconds to catch up before the light changed again. Otherwise, the girl likely would escape her a second time. She hopped down again and slammed the door, only to hear Reese’s voice behind her.

  “I told you to wait in the car. Your protester sees you hanging around here, and she’ll take off again.”

  Darla whipped about to find him and Jake surveying her with the same disapproving look Officer Bad Cop had just used on her. The needle on her own disapproval meter promptly swung way over into the totally p.o.’d zone.

  “Where in the hell were you two, roasting your own coffee beans?” she demanded. “The Lone Protester wasn’t in the coffee shop, she was next door in the consignment store. And now she’s standing on the corner about to vanish again as soon as the light changes.”

  Though, in fact, the light had already switched over from orange hand to walking man. As Darla pointed in the girl’s direction, the latter stepped off the curb and headed down the crosswalk with another dozen or so pedestrians.

  Reese said nothing but dashed off in that direction. Jake was on his heels, though not before she ordered, “Wait here, Darla. We’ll be back in a minute.”

  “I can’t wait,” Darla called after her, waving the ticket like a flag. “I just got fined for parking in a loading zone. The cop is going to call a tow truck on me.”

  “We’ll take care of it,” Jake’s voice drifted back to her.

  Despite her limp, the older woman was swiftly closing the gap between her and Reese. He, in turn, had already reached the corner. Unfortunately, from what Darla could see through the passing traffic, the Lone Protester had already made her way safely across the street and was headed down the next block, oblivious to any chase going on behind her.