Dying To Marry

by Janelle Taylor

  Holly smiled. “Don’t worry, Jake. It’s not that Pru’s smart; it’s that she’s shrewd. There’s a difference.”

  “Maybe so, but her shrewdness has us loitering in front of an auto body shop.”

  Holly glanced at her watch. “Let’s go get something to eat and talk this out. Between the two of us, we’ll figure out what game Pru is playing. And we’ll beat her at it.”

  Jake’s stomach rumbled at the mere mention of food. “No wonder I can’t figure out how the most visible woman in Troutville disappeared into thin air. I’m starving.”

  Holly laughed. “C’mon. Let’s go have burgers at the best burger joint in Troutville.”

  Jake grinned and led the way across the street to Morrow’s Pub, where in addition to two frosty sodas, the most delicious hamburgers in Troutville and a basket of golden onion rings, they received hugs from Holly’s Aunt Louise.

  “Aunt Louise,” Holly said, “Have you noticed a flashy young woman with long, curly brown hair around here lately? Perhaps with a tall, muscular guy wearing a cap?”

  Louise refilled their mugs from a pitcher of soda. “Funny you ask. A couple of weeks ago I did see a flashy gal with long blond hair with a guy wearing a cap. And then just a few days ago, I saw a brunette with the same guy.”

  Jake and Holly exchangd glances. “You saw the same guy with a blonde? Are you sure?” Jake asked.

  “Very sure,” Louise said. “I was about to walk inside the pub when I noticed a young couple walking down to the railroad tracks. A woman with beautiful, long blond hair, white-blond, like Pru Dunhill’s.”

  Holly almost gasped. “Pru Dunhill? Was it her?”

  “I don’t know,” Louise said. “The couple wasn’t facing me. But I don’t think it was Pru. I mean, why in the world would Pru Dunhill be walking along the railroad tracks Down Hill with a mechanic from the auto body shop next door?”

  Jake and Holly looked at each other. “How do you know it was a mechanic? Jake asked, sitting on the edge of his seat. “And which one was it?”

  Louise shook her head. “Can’t tell you which guy it was—as I said, the blonde and the guy were facing away from me, but I know it was a mechanic because I recognized the dark blue jumpsuit and the cap.”

  The cap! Jake thought. Pru’s mystery man at the reunion had been wearing a cap.

  “Tall guy?” Holly asked, clearly thinking the same thing. “Muscular?”

  Louise nodded.

  “Were they arguing?” Jake asked. “Could you tell anything from their body language?”

  “If they were arguing,” Louise said, “I didn’t hear. They were too far away, almost by the tracks when I spotted them. From their body language, I wouldn’t say they seemed friendly. Well, maybe the blonde. She touched his arm a couple of times, and he sort of pulled away. I don’t know—maybe they were arguing.”

  “And then you saw the same guy a few days ago with a brunette?” Holly asked.

  “Yes, and it was strange because I saw them in almost exactly the same place, down by the tracks, almost hidden from view. I saw them for only a moment, though, before they disappeared around the bend.” Louise smiled. “Hey! Is this official private investigator business?”

  “Just might be,” Jake said.

  Two businessmen entered the pub, and Louise excused herself to lead them to a table.

  Jake leaned back in his chair. “Well, at least we now know we’re not crazy—we did see Pru walk into the auto body shop. And now we know why—her mystery man works there.”

  “Okay, so we’re not crazy, but I, for one, am more confused than ever!” Holly said. “We saw Pru as Pru, not in disguise, at the reunion with the mechanic—at least, we’re pretty sure it was him, from Aunt Louise’s description of him. They were arguing. Then, Aunt Louise saw them a few weeks ago, and this time, Pru was trying to get friendly and the mechanic wasn’t buying. Then Louise sees Pru in disguise as the brunette with the mechanic just a few days ago, but she couldn’t tell if they were arguing or not.” Holly let out a breath. “What the heck is going on? Who is this mechanic? And how do he and Pru know each other?”

  Jake polished off the rest of his burger. “And how do he and the brunette know each other? Does the mechanic know it’s Pru in disguise?”

  Holly shrugged. “Okay, let’s try some possibilities. Let’s say that Pru wanted to hurt Lizzie and her friends and needed a hired thug. I could see her going to a Down Hill guy and offering a pot-load of money to do her dirty work.”

  “But would a Down Hill guy hurt Lizzie Morrow? Lizzie’s loved Down Hill. She works in Morrow’s, where everyone knows her. It doesn’t add up.”

  “Especially a mechanic who works at the shop across the street from Morrow’s,” Holly added.

  Jake took a sip of soda. “And, where does the disguise fit in? Why is Pru meeting the mechanic as herself and in disguise, as well?”

  Holly shrugged. “I don’t get it.”

  “Okay,” Jake said. “Let’s say that Pru isn’t our culprit. Let’s say she didn’t hire this mechanic to scare Lizzie out of marrying Dylan. What reason would she have for arguing with him? What could their relationship be?”

  “Well, we can discount romance,” Holly said.

  “Although, our lady did protest a bit too much,” Jake reminded her. “Remember how vehemently she denied that she was dating anyone?”

  “That’s true,” Holly said. “But you don’t really believe Pru Dunhill would be dating a mechanic, let alone one from Down Hill!”

  “The odds are a million to one,” Jake agreed. “And, anyway, when we saw them at the reunion, they were anything but lovey-dovey. And when your aunt saw them, same thing.”

  “So what is their relationship?” Holly asked. “No matter how I try to figure it out, I come up with nothing.”

  “Me, too,” Jake said. “Think your Aunt Louise would mind getting involved in some official private investigator business?” Jake asked.

  “I’m sure she’d be thrilled,” Holly replied. “What are you thinking?”

  “Louise could go over, tell that prize of a receptionist that she’d like one of the mechanics to have a look at her car, that it’s making a funny sound. And that one of the guys did some work on her car last year and he was so good she’d love to have him work on her car again, but she forgot his name, could she take a peek at the mechanics; she’d know him right away.”

  “Good idea,” Holly said. “We’d get an ID and his name.”

  Jake nodded. “Mystery man no more. And perhaps I’ll do a little undercover interviewing of our guy and see what I can get out of him. Something along the lines of, ‘You lucky devil, I’ve seen you around town with not one, but two Troutville lovelies.’”

  “Pru as herself. Pru in disguise. Same guy.” Holly shook her head. “Arg! What is her game?”

  “We’ll find out, Hol,” Jake assured her, pulling some bills from his wallet. “I promise you that.” Without thinking, he laid his hand atop hers, startled for a moment by how soft hers was.

  “Jake Boone, you’d better not be thinking of paying for that lunch,” Louise gently scolded. “You know your money is no good in here.” Louise’s gaze stopped on their hands, and Jake could tell she tried to hide her smile.

  Holly slipped her hand away, but not before she acknowledged how very good it felt to have his warm, strong hand on hers.

  Later that night, as Jake and Holly were parked outside the Dunhill Mansion in a rented car, hoping, praying, waiting for Pru to make an appearance so that they could trail her again, Holly found herself staring at Jake’s hand, resting on the wheel. The same hand that had rested on her own just hours earlier.

  Suddenly, the thought of that hand on her face, on her neck, around her waist, touching her, came to her unbidden. She willed herself to think of anything but, yet instead of thinking about Jake’s touch, she started feeling his touch. Well, imagining feeling his touch.

  She sighed.

  “Thinking abou
t the case?” Jake asked, glancing over at her.

  Her cheeks pinkened. If only you knew, she thought. “Um, yes,” she said. “I hope Pru makes an appearance soon.”

  Lie. Total lie. Holly could sit in Jake’s car forever. For most of the time they’d been waiting outside the mansion, they’d sat in companionable silence. She was so aware of him sitting so close to her. So aware of his muscular legs. Those hands. Those shoulders, so close to her own. The clean, soapy, warm, male scent of him.

  Get a grip, Holly, she scolded herself.

  At that moment, the front door of the mansion opened, and Pru Dunhill came out.

  “There she is!” Holly said, nudging Jake in the ribs.

  “Thanks for making it easier, Pru,” Jake said. “She’s dressed as herself tonight.”

  “Perhaps her disguise is in her overnight bag,” Holly noted, eyeing the small black duffel bag Pru had slung over her shoulder.

  They watched her walk down the path and head toward the Volvo instead of the Jaguar she preferred to drive.

  “Off we go,” Jake said, trailing Pru’s car down the street at a safe distance.

  “She’s headed to Down Hill,” Holly said. “Back to the auto body shop?”

  “We shall see,” Jake said.

  She didn’t head to the auto body shop. She drove to the parking lot at the Down Hill square, turned off her car’s lights and ignition, and then tucked her hair up inside a hat and slipped on the sunglasses. She got out of her car, slinging the duffel bag over her shoulder, and ran into the public restroom near the playground.

  “Why do I doubt she suddenly has to use the facilities?” Jake said.

  “Yup, I have a feeling our brown- or red-haired rock-and-roller is going to emerge.”

  Ten minutes later, she did. As Pru Dunhill came out of the women’s restroom, Holly’s mouth dropped open. The brown wig was teased a bit wilder, the makeup a little heavier, the skirt a little shorter. Pru looked like a Down Hill babe on her way to a hot party.

  Pru threw the duffel bag into the trunk and grabbed a small purse, then she crossed the parking lot and headed for the auto body shop. There was a skip in her step.

  Or so it seemed, Holly thought Pru was going toward the shop, but it wasn’t the shop she was headed for.

  “Oh, God, Jake,” Holly said, panic rising. “She’s headed into Morrow’s Pub! For someone about to do some dirty business, Pru sure seems cheerful. Is she going after Lizzie’s mother?”

  “Let’s go in,” Jake said.

  They got out of their car and raced to Morrow’s. “Wait, Jake,” Holly said. “Maybe we should spy through the window first, find out what she’s up to.”

  “We don’t have to be careful,” Jake said. “She has no idea that we’re on to her. Just be mindful of not staring at her or acting any differently. You’re just Holly Morrow, stopping into your aunt’s pub for some dinner.”

  He was right. Okay, Holly-girl. Deep breath and head on in. Act naturally.

  “Just remember that, in disguise, she has no reason to get nervous about us being in there,” Jake whispered to Holly. “And it’s perfectly natural for us to be here. Nothing will happen to your aunt while we’re there, Holly. I promise you that.”

  Holly took a deep breath. “Okay, Jake. Let’s go.”

  The moment they walked in, they were greeted at the door by Lizzie’s mom and given the best seat in the house, near the window overlooking the back garden. Pru was sitting alone at a table for two, facing toward the wall. She’d exchanged the sunglasses for regular glasses, leopard-print red frames. Holly had never known Pru Dunhill to wear glasses.

  “She seems to be really studying the menu,” Holly noted.

  “Or pretending to,” Jake commented. “If she noticed us come in, she’s giving nothing away.”

  Pru ordered a pitcher of beer, a platter of buffalo wings and an order of nachos. Nothing that the elite Miss Dunhill would ever consume normally.

  “What is going on?” Holly whispered. “I assume she’s meeting the mystery man, but it’s looking more like a date.”

  Jake shrugged. “Things are getting weirder by the minute.”

  The door opened and an attractive man, early thirties, Holly figured, wearing a mechanic’s jumpsuit with the name tag Dan on the chest pocket, glanced around, smiled at the sight of Pru’s back, and then sat down at her table.

  The mystery man!

  “Jake,” Holly whispered, “That has to be our guy! He’s the same height, same build. Put a baseball cap on him, and he’s our guy!”

  “Perhaps,” Jake said, confusion on his handsome face. “But he’s also a good guy.”

  “You know him?” Holly asked? “Who is he?”

  “Dan Martin,” Jake whispered, leaning close. “He was a couple of years ahead of us in school. He’s definitely one of the mechanics at the auto body shop. He handles imported cars, the fancy ones, like our gal there drives. I’ve played poker with him a few times. He is a good guy. If he’s involved in hurting Lizzie and her bridal party, I’d be absolutely shocked.”

  Holly seemed to absorb all that. “I wish we could hear their conversation.”

  “I think we should go say hi to my old buddy,” Jake said. “I want to see who he introduces us to. And how she reacts.”

  Holly smiled. “Good idea.”

  They acted as though they were heading to the jukebox. “Dan Martin?” Jake asked. “Is that the best poker player in town sitting right here?”

  “One and the same,” Dan said, smiling.

  Holly quickly glanced at Pru and smiled. Pru was looking up at Holly and Jake with a pleasant expression on her face and as though she’d never seen them before in her life.

  Pru Dunhill was one heck of an actress.

  “It’s been a long time,” Jake said to Dan.

  “Yeah, because you’re driving American and are a terrible poker player.”

  Jake laughed. “Dan, this is Holly Morrow. Her aunt Louise owns the place.” He looked at Pru, waiting for an introduction.

  “Well, Jake, meet Suzy, love of my life,” Dan said, taking Pru’s hand. “We met just a week ago and can’t get enough of each other. Suzy, this is Jake Boone. He’s a private investigator.”

  Suzy? Holly thought. What is Pru up to?

  Pru smiled at Jake and Holly. “Nice to meet you,” she said in a high-pitched voice.

  If Holly wasn’t one hundred percent sure this woman was Pru Dunhill, she wouldn’t have recognized her. Aside from the wild wig, tinted eyeglasses, and rock-concert-esque outfit, she wore glittery eyeshadow and lots of pinky-red lipstick.

  “And this is Holly Morrow,” Jake said. “Nice to meet you, too, Suzy.”

  Pru offered a small smile. “You, too,” she said in a voice that wasn’t her own. Had Pru been taking how-to-disguise-your-voice lessons?

  What the heck was going on?

  “Well, good seeing you, Dan. Nice to meet you, Suzy,” Jake said, and then, smiles and pleasantries over, they headed back to their own table.

  “They’re holding hands, smooching over the table,” Holly said, incredulous. “I don’t get it. Blond Pru and Dan argue and fight, yet redheaded Pru and Dan are in love?”

  “Let’s just chow down on some wings and listen in and hope she gives something away,” Jake said.

  Two baskets of wings later, Holly’s stomach so full she couldn’t even take another sip of her soda, Pru Dunhill had given nothing away. For an hour, Pru in disguise had had the time of her life, talking, kissing, even dancing to a couple of songs on the jukebox. No one recognized her.

  “You’re sure he’s a good guy?” Holly whispered. “No chance he’s a thug in disguise? Hurling stones through bridal shop windows, leaving nasty messages on walls and lawns?”

  “I’d bet just about anything on it,” Jake said. “He’s the real deal.”

  “Then how could he like her?” Holly asked.

  Jake smiled. “She’s not ‘her,’” Jake pointed out. “She
’s Suzy.”

  Holly glanced over at where Suzy and Dan were sharing a wing between their mouths. They each bit closer and closer until they were kissing.

  The front door opened and in walked Dylan and Lizzie. Holly saw Pru freeze, then pretend great interest in the scarred tabletop.

  Dylan waved at Jake and Holly, then stopped dead in his tracks. “Pru? Little early for Halloween, isn’t it?”

  Holly held her breath.

  Pru said nothing. She slid the menu closer to her face.

  “Pru?” Dylan said, tweaking the menu down with his finger.

  “Who’s Pru?” her date asked, an expression of confusion on his face.

  “I’d know my baby sister anywhere,” Dylan said, grinning.

  Pru glared at her brother.

  “Suzy, I didn’t know you had a brother,” Dan said. “Hi, it’s nice to meet you. I’m Suzy’s boyfriend, Dan Martin.” Dan stood and shook Dylan’s hand. “Aren’t you Dylan Dunhill?”

  “Guilty,” Dylan said.

  Dan looked from Pru to Dylan. “You’re a Dunhill? I thought your last name was Morelli.”

  Pru let out a deep breath and took off her glasses. Then she took off the wig. Her blond hair was in a tight low bun at the nape of her neck.

  “What the hell—” Dan began. “You’re Pru Dunhill?”

  She gnawed her lip, then nodded slowly. “I brought my car in when it was having trouble and you barely gave me the time of day. So I decided to become someone more your style, and you fell for me immediately.”

  Dylan, Lizzie, Jake and Holly all stared at Pru.

  “Look, I’m not getting this at all,” Dan said, visibly upset. “Are you playing some sort of game?”

  Pru shook her head wildly. “Dan, when I saw you for the first time, I—I fell completely in love. That’s never happened to me before. I’ve never had that kind of reaction to any man before. I saw you and then I watched you work for a little bit and it was like I had the wind knocked out of me. I tried to flirt with you, but you weren’t interested.”

  “And I made that perfectly clear the night I ran into you at your high school reunion,” Dan said. “I happened to be in the Troutville Plaza Hotel that night to have a drink in the bar with an old friend who was there for the reunion, and you came barging in, interrupting. ‘Come talk to me, Dan. Come have a dance with me.’ I told you I wasn’t in your class and didn’t feel comfortable crashing the party, and you thought I meant your class as in your station in life. That’s how snobby you are, Pru. I meant your class in school.”