Scottsdale Sizzle: a romantic light-hearted murder mystery (Laura Black Mysteries Book 3)

by B A Trimmer

  As I walked closer to the restaurant, some of my old feelings about Max started to awaken. Over the past two months, I’d learned to keep thoughts of him in a place I reserve for things like red Ferraris, beach houses in Maui, and winning the Powerball. An “it would be great, but will never happen” sort of place. I wondered why Max had asked to see me. Was this really about the horrible events of two months ago or was it only a ruse to get back together with me?

  I guess we’ll find out.

  I walked into the lounge and saw it was relatively crowded for a Thursday night. The tables were filled with businessmen in suits or with nicely dressed couples who were out for a night on the town. The light jazz in the background seemed to go well with the talking and laughing of the crowd.

  I worked my way through the tables and I walked out onto the patio. Although there were several groups of people on the patio, it wasn’t quite as busy as the air conditioned inside. Most of the people on the patio probably lived in Arizona, since they seemed to be unconcerned about the temperature. I also spotted a couple of tables filled with tourists. They were congratulating themselves about how they were able to brave the hundred plus degree heat of a Sonoran Desert sunset.

  It didn’t take me long to spot Max. He had already gotten us a table near the edge of the overlook. He was dressed in white slacks and a light blue polo. When he saw me walking toward him, he stood, and held his arms out to me. I did my best to stay calm and not run to him. This was even though I had an overwhelming desire to jump into his arms, wrap my legs around his waist, and then spend about twenty minutes kissing his upturned face.

  Stop that! You already have a boyfriend.

  Not running and jumping into his arms had been a good decision, I thought as I calmly walked closer. In the heels, running wasn’t a good option. The last time I had tried to run in heels, I had ended up breaking my shoe and twisting an ankle. I’d rather that not happen in front of Max.

  When I finally got to him, he wrapped his muscular arms around me and I couldn’t help but hug him back. I seemed to drift into a dream world. I was enveloped in sensations of desire, happiness, and of feeling safe. I wanted to bury my face in Max’s chest and not let go. I realized my feelings were deeper than how good his arms felt or how great he smelled. I wanted to wake up with him, cook his breakfast, and do his laundry. I wanted him to have me, every night, again and again, until he couldn’t remember what it was like to be with any other woman. I wanted to have his babies, raise them, and grow old with him. I wanted to…

  “Laura?” Max asked, “Are you alright?”

  Shit.

  “Oh, umm, sorry,” I managed to say as I took a step back. “I was sort of spacing out for a second.”

  “Well, it’s good to see you too.” He gave me a small half-smile and quietly laughed, as if he had been reading my thoughts.

  We both sat down and a waitress came to take our drink orders. I took a scotch with one ice cube and Max did the same. We both sat in silence, enjoying the view. The sun had dipped below the mountains to the west and the sky was on fire with yellows, oranges, and reds. I briefly thought about laying on the bed with Les at his granddad’s house as we watched the ceiling turn bright with the colors of sunset. That seemed like a long time ago even though it had only been on Tuesday, just two days ago.

  “Thanks for coming out to meet with me,” Max said at last. “I know it’s been a couple of months since we’ve talked. I can understand if you’d like to put the business with Carlos and the drug cartel out of your mind.”

  “I wish I could put it out of my mind,” I said. “I still have nightmares about that day. I’m thankful we were able to get Jackie out of there in one piece. It could have easily gone the other way. I know I’ve already thanked you for rescuing us from Carlos and his men, but it goes deeper than a thank you. You literally saved our lives.”

  “Don’t worry about it. I was glad we could get you out. You did well that day. People who can remain calm and keep their wits in an emergency are rare.”

  The waitress brought out our drinks and we again sat in the quiet of each other’s company while we watched the western sky fade to a brick red. Overhead the stars were starting to come out. In the distant valley, the lights of the city were starting to come on.

  For the first time in days, I felt wonderful. Part of it was the beauty of watching a sunset on the patio at the lounge but I knew it was mainly because of Max. It felt good being next to him. I wanted to start chatting about his life and ask him what he’d been up to the past couple of months. I wanted to ask if he was lonely or if he’d found a girlfriend. I wanted to learn about his family and what his secret desires were. But Gina was right, getting too personal with Max was probably a bad idea.

  “Well,” I said. “You wanted to talk about Carlos and his men?”

  Max looked at me for a second. It reminded me of the cop-look Reno gives me. The one where I know he can read my mind. The look quickly faded to mild disappointment.

  “Umm, sure,” he said. “Well, we have indications Carlos will be making a major move against us soon. Tony wants to act before things get out of hand. Unfortunately, we have only limited information about who Carlos has working for him, which makes it harder to set up our defenses. All we have are vague descriptions of men that could be almost anyone.”

  “I’ll help if I can. But there was nothing special about any of them. They were all men in their twenties or thirties. Most of them had short dark hair, brown eyes, and most of them had a moustache. But I know that describes about half the men in Scottsdale. If you had some pictures, maybe I could point them out.”

  “Do you have any names? Even first names would be helpful.”

  “Other than Carlos, I didn’t hear anyone’s name.”

  Is there anything remarkable about any of them? A scar or unusual tattoo.”

  “The little guy who threw the hatchet at me got a face full of wasp spray. It made his right eye bloodshot and gave him a dark red rash on the right side of his face. But that was two months ago and he’s probably healed up by now.”

  “Thanks, I didn’t think you’d be able to add a lot, but I needed to ask.”

  “Let me ask you something,” I said. “It’s something I’ve been worrying about. Do you think Carlos will be able to piece together I was sort of responsible for getting his shipment of heroin confiscated and all of those men arrested? Not to mention getting his car blown-up. Whenever I hear a noise in the middle of the night, I can’t help but think they’re coming for me.”

  “Well, technically, his Ferrari didn’t blow up. We set it on fire and it burnt to the ground. And it was Gabriella who thought that one up.” He sat back and gave a small chuckle at the memory.

  “Jerk, you know what I mean.”

  ”To answer your question. No, we haven’t heard of anything like that. A lot of things went wrong for Carlos that day and you seemed like a minor player. As far as he knows, it was either Tony or the police who were the cause of the drug seizure and the arrest of his men. There isn’t anything to connect you, other than you were there. But so you know, I am keeping an ear open for any talk on the street about you. I’ll let you know first thing if I hear anything. If something comes up we can put you in a safe house until any nastiness blows over.”

  “You’re watching over me?”

  “Of course. Umm, well, we owe you and wouldn’t want to see anything happen to you.”

  “That’s it?”

  “Well, I wouldn’t want to see anything happen to you either. I’ve grown rather fond of you over the last six months.”

  My heart did a flip-flop and I started to tingle all over.

  All right, keep calm. You knew this was going to happen.

  “You’re sweet. I’m glad you’re out there watching over me.”

  I could see this wasn’t the answer that he was looking for. He looked at me for a few seconds, again seeming to read my mind.

  The waitress stopped by the ta
ble and dropped off two more drinks. I hadn’t ordered another one but I was glad to have it. I sipped on the fresh scotch and it seemed to help. We both spent a few minutes watching the lights of the city. As always, it seemed like you could almost reach out and touch them.

  “OK, what else do you want to know?” Max asked.

  How quickly can you come to my apartment for the night?

  “Well, there is one other thing that’s been bugging me. Tony says he owes me two favors. I appreciate it and all, but I’d rather he didn’t owe me anything. I keep wanting to give Tony back his favors, but he’s not very receptive. What’s going on with that? I don’t want to upset him.”

  With the change of subject, Max relaxed. He was now back on familiar territory.

  “One thing you have to understand about all men in powerful positions,” Max said, “not just Tony. They make deals all of the time and yet nothing is written in the form of a contract. I’ve often seen Tony make a deal to spend millions of dollars based only on a handshake. When you do business like that, your word and your reputation are what you live on. To Tony, giving you his word was the same as having a twenty-page contract signed, witnessed, and notarized. When he told you he owed you two favors, it was binding on him. To him, it’s a debt he owes you. He would never think of reneging on the obligation. To be honest, it also will never enter his mind you don’t want him owing you. Actually, if you told him that directly, it would probably hurt his feelings. That usually isn’t a good thing to do.”

  Yikes!

  “So what do I do?”

  “Just go with it and never use the favors. Besides, I know the business you’re in and the risks you take. A favor from Tony may be useful someday.”

  “That’s what I’m worried about, that I’ll need to use them someday. I don’t think I want to ever become that deeply involved.”

  Max barked out a short laugh. “I hate to tell you, but you already seem to be at least sort of involved. Between diamonds and drug smugglers, you always seem to be in the middle of everything we do.”

  “Please don’t take this personally, but I really hope I’m never involved with you, well, in a business sense, ever again.”

  Max caught my qualifier and perked up. He held up his glass.

  “To never being involved, in a business sense, ever again.”

  I held up my glass and clinked it against his.

  After a few more minutes, we had run out of business things to talk about. I could see Max wanted to get more personal but doing his best to be a gentleman about it. At last, the waitress brought the check and Max tossed down some bills.

  “Can I walk you out to your car?”

  You can take me to a hotel.

  “Thank you, but that’s probably not a good idea. Every time we walk together I end up kissing you.”

  “Is that such a bad thing?”

  “Well.”

  “Still having a hard time sorting out your feelings toward me?”

  No, that’s the problem. I know exactly what I want to do with you.

  “Yes, sort of.”

  “Alright, we’ve had this discussion before. I think you know how I feel about you. Are you going to Alex and Danica’s wedding next Friday?”

  Again, the tingles flooded all over my body.

  “Of course, I wouldn’t miss it. All three of us will be there.”

  “Good,” he said. “We’ll be there too. You don’t need to have clear feelings about me to dance with me. I’ll look forward to that.”

  Great, one more thing to stress about.

  ~~~~

  I woke up a little after eight. I lay in bed and stretched until I was mostly awake. I was feeling better than I had in days and I knew a lot of it had to do with my date with Max the night before. Thinking about how good he smelled and how great it was to be in his arms started to get me going. Reluctantly, I stumbled into the shower. I stood with my head completely submerged in the flow, allowing the warm water to cleanse my mind.

  After the shower, I blew my hair dry, put on a pot of coffee, and started thinking about Reno. Thinking of Reno evoked a different reaction, one of wonderful thoughts of protection, being cared for, and long-term stability. Stability has been a rare commodity in my life and it’s something I crave. I could be happy with him and he seems to be happy with me. I’m pretty sure we both love each other, although neither of us spends a lot of time vocalizing how we feel. He does amazing things to me in the bedroom and I know I should be happy. I don’t even think of being with other men. So why do I keep thinking about Max?

  How did life get so complicated?

  I didn’t spend a lot of time in the closet. I grabbed a pair of snug red Capri’s and an oversized yellow tee shirt that had a picture of the Eiffel Tower stenciled on it. I went to the mirror, swiped on some mascara, and tried to do something with my hair. As I did, Marlowe jumped off the bed and began to rub against my ankles. This made it harder to do a good job but over the years, I’d gotten used to it.

  I went in the kitchen and poured myself a coffee. Marlowe loudly reminded me this trip to the kitchen had better be all about the cat. I plopped a spoonful of Seafood Deluxe dinner in his bowl and he scarfed it up in less than a minute. I didn’t want to watch him throw it up so I went back in the bedroom.

  I glanced at the clock and saw it was already after nine. I knew I needed to leave soon to get up to the Tropical Paradise at ten. The thought of having the Fed’s following us around all day was still giving me the willies, but Gina said they weren’t the bad guys. I knew she was probably right. But I also didn’t want federal law enforcement watching my every move. I had an idea and called Les on his cell phone.

  “How are you doing today?” I asked.

  “Actually, I’m feeling great. I slept in until eight. You were right about needing some time to recharge. I spent most of the night at the party down at pool. It was nice. They had a different band and this one mostly played reggae. I was half tempted to give you a call and see if you wanted to come down so you could enjoy yourself too.”

  “It sounds like it was fun. Maybe next time,” I said. “The Feds are probably parked outside of the resort entrance waiting for you to leave. Having them following us around is a variable I’d rather not deal with today. There’s a big maintenance building for the golf course about a mile walk from your room. I’ll pick you up there. We’ll leave the resort on a road they’ll never think to watch.”

  I explained where the building was and Les punched the destination into the navigator on his phone.

  “My phone says I can walk there in seventeen minutes.”

  ”Alright, see you at ten.”

  ~~~~

  The drive up to the hotel was uneventful, but I was also starting to get some mixed emotions about my destination. When I had picked out the building where I was going to meet Les, I had chosen a place I knew would be away from the prying eyes of the Fed’s. I didn’t realize how I would feel about going back there until now.

  Well, too late to change it now.

  The meeting place was a big steel building used for repairing the maintenance equipment of the golf courses in the area. I had only been there once before, about six months earlier. At the time, it was the location of an exchange of diamonds between members of the Russian mafia and two brothers from a group called the Consortium. Tony DiCenzo had agreed to provide both the building and the security for the exchange. Unfortunately, the deal had gone badly. As a result, several people were killed and the building had blown up. It was the same building explosion that had ruined by top I had gotten from Sophie. Fortunately, the Consortium had offered to pay for a new building, at least partially in an effort to gloss over the questionable details of the accident. Driving up, I realized this was the first time I had been up here since the explosion.

  With the help of the navigator on my phone, I drove up Scottsdale Road, but turned off well before the resorts. I drove down a couple of side roads, the last half-mile being a narr
ow maintenance road. It ended in a dirt parking lot in front of a large red metal building. I seemed to remember the old building had been blue. The red seemed to be an improvement.

  The parking lot for the building was at least an acre in size. Previously, the parking lot was surrounded by dozens of half-dead fan palms and stunted orange trees. I saw they had been removed, the loss of which was not tragic, but did eliminate any hope for parking in the shade. Stored on either side of the dirt lot were several pieces of golf course maintenance equipment, all in various states of disrepair. I could swear some of them hadn’t been moved in the last six months. The metal building had a large sliding door, which was open to reveal more pieces of equipment sitting inside. I didn’t see anyone working anywhere. Despite the building being new, the entire place had a shabby and depressed feeling.

  I parked and got out of my car. It was already a hundred and five degrees and promised to be another scorcher. Les was walking down a footpath from the direction of the resort. He came around the building and got into my car.

  “I’m glad you were here,” he said. “I wasn’t sure I was on the right path and this is the middle of nowhere. How did you know about this place?”

  “Well, you know me. I get around.”

  ~~~~

  The drive down to the house on Camelback Mountain was uneventful and thankfully free of any sort of tail. As we pulled into the courtyard, I saw the crime scene tape had been removed from the front door. From what Gina had said, I knew the master bedroom would still be sealed but the rest of the house would be open.

  Les pulled out his key and unlocked the deadbolt on the front door.

  “Where should we start?” he asked.

  “Well, we know the jewelry is somewhere in the house.”

  “We already looked everywhere. Plus the police have been over everything.”

  “True, but when we looked the last time we were in a hurry to try to beat your sister in finding the chest. I’ve been thinking. Since your granddad put the vault in a hidden room, perhaps he has another one somewhere else. Let’s start in the basement and go room to room to see if we can find it.”