Cover Your Assets

by Patricia Smiley

  Evan Brice’s homicide investigation was now officially closed. Naturally, Cissy had been cleared of any suspicion, but that might have happened sooner if she’d told the truth from the beginning. A few days after she found out, I got a call from her. She thanked me for helping and told me that she and Dara were going to London to stay with friends for a couple of months, to get away from the media. I assumed that meant I wouldn’t be hearing from her much anymore, which suited me just fine.

  Darcy Daniels must have been crestfallen when she heard that Cissy was leaving town. Celebrity Heat’s ratings had skyrocketed because of the coverage of Evan’s murder. In the process, Darcy had dredged up enough sludge to start her own Roto-Rooter franchise.

  Monique Ruiz was naturally distraught to learn of her brother’s death, but she was shattered by the news that he had killed Evan Brice. Shortly after Gilbert’s funeral, she’d moved back home with her parents to await the birth of her baby. She’d lost her independence, but at least it was temporary, which was more than I could say for Rose Miller. With her unofficial caretaker gone, Rose had been forced to move from her apartment to an assisted-living facility near her daughter’s home in Scottsdale. Her new place didn’t exactly sound like a geezer ghetto, but it didn’t sound like paradise, either. The transition continued to be a rocky one, so I’d been calling her every few days to cheer her up.

  As far as I knew, Charley Tate was still PI to the stars, although I heard he dropped Lola Scott as a client when he found out she’d dumped Jakey and was now dating her lawyer. His pique didn’t surprise me. Tate hated lawyers. I guess the thought of Lola sleeping with one was just too much for him to stomach. If you ask me, Lola made the right decision. Her new boyfriend is a big player in the entertainment biz. I hear he’s working hard to pull the Richard Burnett project out of development hell.

  I don’t know if Charley Tate ever found a new receptionist. Maybe I’ll call him one of these days to find out.

  Deegan offered to drive us to the church, which was fine with me. On the way, he asked how work was going. I told him Eugene had returned from his trip to Palm Springs with a healthy cat and a muumuu prototype for the Hula Bitch line. The focus group had given it rave reviews. They especially liked the matching tote bag and hand-knit scarf accessories. Mr. Geyer was so delighted by the outcome, he had hired me to write a full-blown strategic plan for his business. Eugene was thrilled. Quite frankly, the whole episode had forced me to look at a lot of things in a whole new light, including muumuus.

  I’d picked up a few other jobs as well. The Sinclair and Associates client list still couldn’t compete with the one I’d built in my heyday at Aames & Associates. Not yet, at least. I guess building something solid takes both time and patience. Deegan thought I was onto something there.

  All in all, things were running pretty smoothly for me. Even my aunt Sylvia and her lawyers seemed to be on hiatus from trying to steal my house. I knew the calm wouldn’t last, so I decided to enjoy the respite while I could.

  Eric and Becky’s wedding was being held at the First Congregational Church, an impressive Gothic-style building in the Mid-Wilshire area of Los Angeles, not far from the office where I’d interviewed Amy Lynch. As we got closer, I began to feel tense. In a short time, I’d be seeing people who used to be friends of Eric’s and mine, and who after the divorce had become friends of Eric’s, and who were now friends of Eric’s and Becky’s.

  My ex-in-laws would be there, along with a slew of Eric’s more distant relatives. I wasn’t sure how they’d feel about seeing me again, except for his aunt good-bye-and-good-riddance Lena. I was pretty sure how that reunion would go down.

  As soon as Deegan parked the car, I felt the energy drain from my body. “Maybe this isn’t such a good idea,” I said. “Let’s just go somewhere for dinner and call it a night.”

  Deegan caught my gaze and wouldn’t let go. “You invited me to this thing to show your ex that you’ve moved on. You have moved on, haven’t you?”

  “I think so . . . but I could be wrong.”

  Deegan patted my knee. “Come on, take your medicine like a man.”

  “Is that what your father used to tell you?”

  He smiled. “Nah, my mom.” He got out of the car and walked around to my door. He opened it and gave me that come-hither gesture with his finger.

  I took a deep breath. “Okay, you’re right. I can do this.” I swung my legs out of the car. Then I swung them back inside. “It just feels weird, that’s all.”

  He rolled his eyes. “Look, give it a rest. You’re not the only person in the world who’s divorced.”

  I raised my eyebrows. “Yeah? Who else?”

  “That’s for me to know and you to find out.”

  “Don’t patronize me.”

  Deegan took hold of my arm and gently pulled me out of the car. “There are a number of things I’d like to do to you, Stretch, but patronize isn’t one of them.”

  “Okay, okay.”

  The resonant sound of pipe organ music was drifting through the door as we walked up the steps into the church. It left me yearning for enough alcohol to dull the pain. The chapel was decorated with truckloads of flowers. Big, fluffy white bows with streamers hung from the ends of each pew. This was a far cry from my wedding: city hall, dinner at Mario’s, back to our apartment to study.

  I knew I was being silly. I didn’t still love Eric, not in the romantic sense of the word. I’d stopped loving him that way long ago, just as I’d stopped loving Evan Brice. At the same time, I knew my ostracism from the Bergstrom tribe would be final once I heard “dearly beloved” and saw the groom’s cake cradled in net and tied up with ribbon, which would surely be imprinted with “Eric * Becky.”

  An usher escorted Deegan and me down the aisle. Eric’s parents were already seated in a front row. A few minutes later, a thin, well-dressed woman, whom I assumed was Becky’s mother, entered on the arm of a young man. Her hair was teased, lacquered, and shaped into something that looked like one of the Jetsons’ space helmets. She smiled stiffly as she sidled into the pew.

  From a door near the front of the chapel, Eric emerged, followed by six groomsmen dressed in some type of formal attire that I couldn’t quite name. He looked dazed. Before I could read more into his expression, the organ went silent. Then came the sounds I dreaded most: “DUM-DUM-TA-DUM” and the deafening roar of yards of peau de soir.

  “Shit,” I whispered to Deegan. “I hate this part.”

  He grinned. Then he took my hand and massaged my palm with his thumb. I was really enjoying that until I glanced toward the aisle and caught a glimpse of a distinguished gray-haired man. It was Eric’s new father-in-law, his first one ever. He looked uptight and pathologically neat, as though he wouldn’t be caught dead with a loose buttonhole thread.

  I closed my eyes for a moment, hoping he’d disappear. When I opened them again, he was still there. So was Becky. Her tiny little face was barely visible behind her billowing veil. A single ringlet of cinnamon hair had escaped from her headpiece, making her look like a ladybug that had taken a wrong turn into a cream puff.

  Somehow I made it through the ceremony and the post-wedding receiving line. Becky thanked me for coming. Eric’s parents hugged me and said how glad they were to see me again. Eric shook Deegan’s hand and, in a tone that was both sincere and completely oblivious, said, “She’s a great girl. Isn’t she?”

  Deegan flashed me a sly smile. “The best.”

  We stayed through dinner, dancing, and champagne—lots of champagne. In the morning, I knew my eyes would be stuck together like Ziploc bags. I chatted with several people I used to know, and practiced how to be coy while fielding questions about Deegan.

  At some point during the evening, I realized I was having fun. Not just because of the champagne, although that certainly greased the skids, but because I was at a party with a man who was funny and charming, even if it was in an old-fashioned way.

  Moments after Deegan and I had
returned to our table, hot and sweaty from dancing, the waiters began serving the wedding cake. The idea of carrots in a dessert always gives me pause, but this stuff was delicious. I ate the whole piece and pushed back my plate.

  “Now I’ve moved on.”

  Deegan grinned and leaned close. “Good. So are you ready to go?”

  “Go where?”

  He shrugged. “I don’t know. Let’s be creative.”

  “We could go for coffee, but that seems sort of silly. We can get that here.”

  “You’re right. Maybe we should go for something we can’t get here.”

  “Like what?”

  A mock frown appeared on his face. “I’m a patient man, Stretch, but I have my limits.”

  I thought for a moment and then leaned close enough to whisper in his ear, “Did I mention that Muldoon is away for the weekend?”