by Rick Copp
In the interest of time, Laurette chose to forgo the usual wedding traditions of announcing the bride and groom, the first dance, the tossing of the garter, and a receiving line. But since she worshipped food, a devotion both she and I shared, the cutting of the cake was an absolute must. The head caterer did indeed have the foresight to protect the cake and move it under the tent before it began pouring, knowing the bride would blow her stack if one creamy frosted flower got hit with a single raindrop. She’d taken longer picking out the cake than she had picking out a husband.
Laurette pushed her way through the crowd, advising people to eat immediately because the staff had to commence with cleanup in a scant twenty-six minutes; otherwise she’d be charged an additional hour at a whopping cost of a cool five grand. A lot of guests felt so much pressure, they simply couldn’t eat at all. I didn’t have that problem. Charlie and I grabbed plates and dived right in, starting with the cheese and crackers. Before I had a chance to start sampling, Laurette was hovering behind me.
“Jarrod, my dumb ass sister got wasted and banged one of the groomsmen last night, big surprise, and now she’s so hung over she doesn’t want to make a toast. I know what she’s doing. She’s pretending to be sick so she can steal focus from my big day. So typical. Could you do it?”
“Do what?”
“Make a toast.”
“But . . . but I haven’t prepared anything.”
“Oh, honey, please,” she said confidently. “You’re fabulous with improv. You should have your own sketch show. And I know you’ll be brief, unlike that loser of a minister. Could you believe him? I told him to keep his sermon down to three minutes. Doesn’t anybody ever listen anymore?”
“What do you want me to say?”
“How much you care about me, how perfect you think Juan Carlos is for me, how happy we’re going to be together. Blah, blah, blah . . .”
So she wanted me to lie.
“Laurette, I don’t know . . .”
“He’d be happy to,” Charlie interjected, squeezing my arm tightly, sending me a clear message to just shut up and do it so everyone could go home happy.
“All right, sweetie,” I said. “Just tell me when.”
“Be ready in seven minutes. If I can get that lame duck photographer who’s always running out of film in place, we can cut the cake at the same time.”
I was so happy Laurette was taking the time to enjoy her big day.
She hurriedly checked her watch. “I better grab a ladyfinger before the caterers start packing up.” She lifted her dress to barrel her way to the dessert table when she stopped cold.
“Who’s that?” she said.
I turned to see Juan Carlos engaged in a heated discussion with Dominique. Her eyes were bloodshot from crying and her hand shook as she pointed her finger in his face, on the verge of losing her composure completely. Juan Carlos stood fast, arms folded, a thin smile painted on his face, trying to downplay the seriousness of their conversation.
“Oh, that’s an old friend of Juan Carlos’s. We met on the bus up here,” I said, also trying to downplay the seriousness. Laurette was too smart for that.
“I don’t remember her on the guest list. Is she just an old friend or an old girlfriend?”
“Um, girlfriend, I think.”
“I see,” Laurette said. “Excuse me.”
She seized the hem of her wedding dress, and plowed through the crowd toward her new husband like a linebacker carrying the ball to an end goal. She was upon them in seconds, and stuck out her hand to introduce herself to Dominique.
“This is going to be good,” Charlie said, smiling.
The blood drained from Juan Carlos’s face as he offered up introductions. Dominique never cracked a smile. She was too upset, and quickly walked away after shaking Laurette’s hand. There was nowhere for her to go. There were too many people packed into the tent. She found herself face to face with Austin. He grinned and gave her a hug, but she recoiled and hissed something at him. She was furious with him, and I half expected her to spit in his face. He seemed to be enjoying her fury, almost relishing her discomfort. Finally, she pushed past him and left the protection of the tent, racing toward the line of parked buses that waited to transport the guests back down the hill to their cars. Dominique and Austin were both from Florida, and obviously knew each other despite their quick denials on the bus. My curiosity was piqued. What was Austin Teboe’s personal business with the groom all about? And what was his relationship with the groom’s ex-girlfriend Dominique?
I was about to embark on a fishing expedition and strike up a conversation with him when angry shouts steered my attention toward the buffet table. Juan Carlos was yelling at the antisocial obese man from our bus trip up the hill. He slugged him in the stomach, but the man’s massive bulk prevented Juan Carlos from doing any serious damage. Within seconds, several groomsmen appeared on the scene, and began manhandling the big guy. As the groom’s posse physically hustled the man away from the party, Juan Carlos, flushed with anger, dusted himself off, took a brief moment to cool down, and then rejoined his bride. He was back to smiling and glad-handing within seconds.
Laurette waved us over, and Charlie and I wandered over to the happy couple.
“We’re just about ready for the toast, Jarrod,” she said.
“Is everything all right?” Charlie asked Juan Carlos pointedly.
“Yes, why?” Juan Carlos said as if the previous scene had been magically erased from his memory.
“I thought there was going to be a fight.”
“Oh, you mean Rudy Pearson?” Juan Carlos said, his voice full of disdain. “He’s just a little bug. Not even worth the effort to squash it.”
To my surprise, Laurette jumped in with an explanation. “He’s a writer for Soap Opera Digest. He’s been following Juan Carlos around ever since he played that rapist/preacher on The Hands of Time. He’s called my office every day for the past two weeks trying to get the exclusive of our wedding, but I told him no press. This was our private day, not to be shared with the public. Besides, Juan Carlos isn’t doing soaps anymore. There’s no reason he should be following Juan Carlos around. I think the guy just has a big crush on him.”
“He’s a sleaze ball. If he comes around again, I swear I’ll rip his face off,” Juan Carlos said, seething.
“Don’t you just love that fiery Latin passion?” Laurette said.
I glanced at Charlie. Neither of us thought much of Laurette’s new husband, but neither of us was willing to express that out loud. Yet, anyway.
It was the time for my toast. The rain had subsided and the winds had died down, so luckily I wasn’t going to have to shout my sentiments. The clock was also ticking. The caterers had begun wrapping up the food and folding up the card tables. We were down to two minutes before we had to vacate the premises. The buses were already sputtering to life in anticipation of our journey back down the hill. The staff quickly poured plastic flute glasses of champagne and handed them out to all the guests.
Charlie gave me an encouraging pat on the butt and sent me up to the front of the tent, where I addressed the crowd.
“When Laurette asked me to say a few words, and believe me, few is the key word since we all have to be out of here in less than two minutes,” I said as the guests laughed politely, “I wracked my brain trying to come up with something profound or moving or funny or—”
“One minute, Jarrod!” Laurette said, prodding me to edit myself and keep it moving.
“But in the interest of time, I will just say this. To Juan Carlos and Laurette, every day may you . . . light up each other’s lives and give each other hope to carry on.” Okay, so I plagiarized Debbie Boone. But it worked in a pinch. Charlie chuckled, instantly recognizing my source material. Laurette and Juan Carlos didn’t get the reference at all. Laurette, teary-eyed, her mascara running, blew me a kiss then grabbed the man of her dreams and sucked on his face some more. The rest of the guests wisely chose to wash down my
treacle with champagne.
Someone started coughing. I looked around and spotted Austin Teboe, having just downed his glass of champagne. He was gasping and choking and gripping his throat with his hand. Everyone stood, stunned for a moment, before one of the groomsmen, who had just returned from ousting Rudy Pearson, ran forward and grabbed Austin in an attempt to give him the Heimlich maneuver. But Austin wasn’t choking on a chicken wing. This sounded different. A white fizzy liquid spilled out of his mouth as he broke away from the groomsman’s hold and staggered through the throng of people. His eyes bulged, his face was ghostly white, and his wheezing and coughing came to an abrupt halt as he stopped in his tracks, the life swirling out of him. There was an absolute stillness as all eyes in the tent watched him. He then fell forward, belly flopping dead into Laurette’s perfectly decorated three-tier German chocolate wedding cake.
Chapter 4
Laurette was wrong to worry about her drunken, trampy sister stealing focus from her big day. The dead body in front of the buffet table was going to do the job for her. By the time the local San Simeon police arrived on the scene, the guests had been herded into the Refectory, the hilltop’s sole dining room located in the main house, usually cordoned off for tours but today reopened due to the unusual circumstances. Charlie and I huddled with several of Laurette’s fellow talent agents, who were all buzzing about the identity of the deceased. No one seemed to have the slightest idea who he was.
“Austin Teboe,” I offered, never one to refrain from a good dish session. “We rode up the hill with him today. He worked in a restaurant in Florida, but he never told us whether he was a waiter, or worked in the kitchen, or parked cars.”
“So he was a friend of Juan Carlos’s?” asked a tiny woman in a smart suit with frizzy hair so big I was surprised she could hold her head straight. I recognized her as another agent in Laurette’s Sherman Oaks office.
“He said he met Juan Carlos at the restaurant. And that the two had personal business that he was here to take care of . . .”
Charlie interceded and gently took my elbow, steering me away from the enraptured group of gossipmongers. “I think the police are ready to talk to us now, Jarrod.”
We walked over to the corner of the room where four police officers stood over Juan Carlos and a confused and dazed Laurette, who sat on an antique love seat from the nineteenth century, ignoring the clearly marked sign that said DO NOT SIT ON FURNITURE. The team of investigators were led by a grizzled, balding, pot-bellied detective, who might as well have walked right off the set of Hunter, the Fred Dryer action series from the eighties, where I once guest-starred as a convicted counterfeiter’s wayward teenaged son in their memorable sixth season opener.
He shook Charlie’s hand. “Lieutenant Cranston.”
“Charlie Peters, LAPD. This is my partner, Jarrod Jarvis.”
Cranston nodded, ready to welcome me into the brotherhood of peace officers. “You guys up here working on a case?”
“No,” I said. “I’m his partner in life, not crime.”
This took Cranston by surprise. But it was a new world so he simply grunted and declined further comment.
Charlie was right in his element. He compared notes with Cranston. “We met the victim earlier.” Charlie recounted our bus ride up to the Hearst Mansion, and how Dominique and Rudy Pearson, who were both fiercely determined to attend today’s nuptials, had left rather abruptly. One by choice. And one by force.
Cranston turned to Juan Carlos. “How did you know the victim ?”
“I didn’t,” said Juan Carlos, as he sat comforting Laurette.
Either Austin Teboe was lying. Or Juan Carlos was. I’d put my money down on the slippery, opportunistic actor any day.
“Well, according to Mr. Peters here, Mr. Teboe claimed to have known you, and that the two of you had some personal business he was here to talk to you about,” said Cranston in a slightly confrontational tone.
“I said I never met him,” said Juan Carlos.
Laurette took her husband by the chin and gently turned his face toward hers. “What I want to know is, who is this Dominique person?”
Juan Carlos glanced in my direction, trying to judge whether or not I had any knowledge about his past with her. I decided to make it easy on him. “An ex-girlfriend.”
“How come you never mentioned her?” Laurette said.
“We only dated a few weeks. She meant nothing to me.”
“Then what was she doing here?”
“She’s had a little troubling letting go. I think she may be a little obsessed with me.”
“A little obsessed? Honey, she crashed our wedding.”
“I didn’t want to worry you.”
“Why? Has she tried contacting you before?” Laurette said.
“Yes,” he said. “For some time now.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
Cranston stepped forward, interrupting the newlyweds. “Look, the ex-girlfriend is not why we’re here. As far as we know, she’s alive and well. Our focus is on Mr. Teboe, who sadly is not.”
“I’m sorry,” said Juan Carlos. “I can’t help you. I already told you I’ve never met the man in my life. And if he’s saying I did, he’s got me mixed up with somebody else.”
Charlie and I exchanged looks, both silently agreeing that Juan Carlos wasn’t a very good actor after all.
“That’s an awfully big mix-up if he traveled all the way from Florida to track you down at the Hearst Castle, which is up here in the middle of nowhere,” I quietly offered.
Laurette stood up, and glared at Charlie and me. Then she pushed forward in my direction. “Jarrod, may I speak to you privately, please?”
I nodded and followed Laurette into the adjoining Assembly Room, where William Randolph Hearst had once smoked stogies with Clark Gable and Jimmy Stewart. I didn’t dare take a seat on the historic antique furniture that gave the elongated space its Renaissance flair. Laurette was just too angry to sit.
“Why are you and Charlie attacking my husband?” she said.
“We’re not attacking him. But there are a lot of unanswered questions involving his relationship with the deceased.”
“What relationship? He’s already told the police he didn’t know him.”
I gave Laurette my best “let’s not fool ourselves” gaze. “I just think we should look a little deeper into this and see who might have had reason to off the murder victim.”
“How do we even know he was murdered? Maybe it was a heart attack or a stroke or something?”
Laurette had seen the white fizzy liquid come pouring out of Teboe’s mouth herself. You didn’t have to be William Peterson or Marg Helgenberger to assume it could have been some kind of poison. It was only a matter of time before the coroner would be able to confirm it.
“I can see what you’re doing,” Laurette said.
“What?”
“You’re going to get your kicks again playing Nancy Boy Drew. Just like you did last year when Willard Ray Hornsby died.”
“Yes, but if you recall, somebody did indeed murder Willard, and I got to the bottom of it.”
“You’re not a detective, Jarrod. You shouldn’t be sticking your nose into things that don’t concern you.”
“Why not? Because I might stumble across some dirty laundry belonging to your husband?”
“How dare you? You barely even know him.”
“And how well do you know him? For God’s sake, Laurette, how could you marry a guy you only met a few weeks ago?”
“Because I love him!”
We both stopped before we said things neither of us would be able to take back. Our relationship had always been strong and solid, but I was reluctant to go traipsing into uncharted territory that could do serious damage to our decades-old friendship. And sometimes Laurette was more manageable when she was hearing things she wanted to hear.
“Honey, I’m sure he’s everything you think he is.” A little white lie never hurt anyon
e. But a big one like this could bring the roof down on us. “But a man has died, and I think we owe it to him to find out what really happened.”
Laurette sighed. “I hate when you get like this.”
“Like what?”
“Like a pit bull that’s gotten a hold on an old shoe. I can see it in your eyes, Jarrod. You see Juan Carlos as that shoe, and you’re not going to let go no matter what.”
She was right, of course. I was certain Juan Carlos was lying about not knowing the murder victim, and I wasn’t going to rest now until I unearthed the truth. Unfortunately, this time it meant straining my bond with Laurette. But in the end, I knew whatever I found would be beneficial to her. Either it would put her mind at ease about the commitment she had just made, or more realistically, it would give her enough information to extricate herself from a catastrophic mistake.
Laurette whipped around, gathered up her bulky dress, and headed for the door leading back to the Refectory.
“Fine,” she said. “Sniff around all you want. Once the police are done questioning us, we’re off for a fabulous honeymoon in Maui anyway.”
Still stung by my suspicions, Laurette marched off back inside the dining room to join her husband and her other guests. I could tell there was a sinking feeling deep inside her gut that was gnawing at her, reminding her that she didn’t know Juan Carlos as well as she thought. And perhaps maybe there were dark secrets swimming their way to the surface that might wash away the rosy hue on her rose-colored glasses.
To my surprise, the police released the newlyweds and most of the wedding guests within an hour after writing down all of our contact information. The Hearst staff was anxious to clear us out so they could resume their meticulously scheduled tours of the expansive property.
Laurette declined to toss the bouquet. We weren’t allowed to throw rice or anything, given the time it would take for the staff to clean it up, so the process of sending off the bride and groom lacked the traditional fanfare and was decidedly anticlimactic, especially given the dramatic events at the reception. Laurette simply waved to all her friends and family, then climbed into the back of a white stretch limousine. It quickly began its descent down the long, winding paved road. Within moments, the giant limo was the size of a matchbox car and it suddenly vanished behind a lush green hill. All the guests then quietly formed a single-file line to board the blue tour buses for the fifteen-minute ride back down the mountain to our cars.
