by Lee Hollis
Poppy was convinced Tony had Alden Kenny planted on that jury and paid him handsomely for his trouble. Glenda Felson had already confessed to making sure Kenny was selected. But why him? Why the young man who was cheating with Tony’s wife? Of all the people he could have bribed, why Alden Kenny? Tony Molina was still adamantly denying being involved and had been calling poor Glenda a starstruck liar in front of the press. And for Glenda’s part, she was still refusing to identify Tony’s bodyguards as the couple who had first approached her. And with Stoney Peterman claiming that the money he paid Kenny had nothing to do with jury tampering, that it was just to make Kenny go away and to keep his mouth shut about his affair with Tofu so Tony never found out, then there was still no hard evidence that could be used to indict Tony for any crime. They needed more, and Poppy knew they were not going to get it from Stoney Peterman, who was specifically paid to keep all of Tony’s dirty secrets buried.
There was still the possibility that she was wrong. Maybe Tony had no idea that the kid he had paid to be a jury holdout was planning to spill all to Poppy about how he got paid to get Tony off the hook from going to jail for assault. If that was true, then Tony would have had no motive to kill him or have him killed. In fact, the only person she could think of who would have a reason to get rid of Alden Kenny was his best friend and business partner, Jay Takamura.
He had fifty thousand reasons.
Chapter 38
Poppy watched proudly as Violet, who had gussied up in a chiffon pleated floral print dress she dubbed “a conversation starter,” sashayed across the floor of the Spa Resort Casino, passing the bells and whistles and colorful lights of the slot machines, and made her way to one of the blackjack tables. Violet was eager to prove herself to be an effective undercover operative, especially when it required an older woman’s touch. She had felt in recent months that she had been underutilized so she was thrilled when Poppy suggested she get off the bench and be put in the game.
It was no secret after Iris had hired Jay Takamura to clean her carpets that he had a taste for the ladies, especially those who were postmenopausal, and since Iris had already been deployed twice to pump him for information, it struck Poppy as too much of a coincidence if Iris suddenly showed up again at Jay’s regular haunt, the famous Palm Springs casino where he gambled nearly on a nightly basis. Matt had spent the past two nights following him around, and like clockwork, Jay ended both evenings right here, slumped over his favorite blackjack table, downing one whiskey straight up after another, sometimes beating the house, but more often than not bleeding out his cash.
In order not to be seen by Jay, who had already met them, Poppy and Iris sequestered themselves inside the Oasis Buffet, where they could sit at a table, both of them fitted with earpieces so they could listen to Violet, who was wired with a tiny microphone pinned to her bra underneath that conversation starter of a dress, as she interacted with Jay.
Iris was already piling food from the buffet onto her second plate as Poppy sipped her cup of coffee at the table and spoke softly to Violet. “Have you spotted him yet?”
“Yes,” Violet reported. “He’s at his regular table and there is an empty chair next to him. I’m going in.”
Poppy could hear some rustling and then Violet greeting the dealer. Violet wisely chose to ignore Jay, whom they suspected would notice her soon enough. The dealer began doling out cards to the players at the table and Poppy suddenly heard Violet gasp. “What is it, Violet? What’s wrong?”
She realized Violet couldn’t answer her because she was sitting at a table with several other players as well as the dealer. Poppy heard a couple of the players instructing the dealer to hit them with another card, then a slurping sound, probably Jay sucking down another whiskey. And then, after a few moments of silence, as players turned over their cards, she heard Jay murmur, “Busted,” indicating he had gone over twenty-one. Then she heard Violet squeal with delight, “Look, blackjack! I won! A king of hearts and an ace of spades!”
Violet didn’t really have to describe her hand to everyone at the table, who could all plainly see it, but Poppy knew Violet was doing it strictly for her benefit. She could hear the dealer pushing some chips over in front of Violet. As the next game commenced, the dealer shuffled the deck and distributed more cards. Violet gasped again.
“Don’t be so obvious, Violet,” Poppy warned. “Put on a poker face if you’ve got another good hand.”
There were groans from the other players as Violet dutifully reported out loud that the dealer stood at a soft hand of seventeen, a six of clubs and an ace of diamonds. Jay went bust again with cards totaling twenty-three. Violet squealed again with delight as she turned over her cards. “Two queens! That’s twenty! I win again!”
“Lady Luck seems to be shining on you tonight, ma’am,” a man said, presumably the dealer.
Iris returned to the table and sat down with a plate heaped with tacos, BBQ, orange chicken, rice, green beans, pizza, and pasta.
Poppy’s mouth dropped open.
“Don’t you dare fat shame me,” Iris growled. “I did not eat lunch and I always get carried away at buffets.”
Poppy mimed zipping her mouth shut, promising not to say a word.
Iris began stabbing at her green beans. “How is it going?”
“So far Violet is cleaning up, but she hasn’t broken the ice with Jay yet.”
Iris opened her mouth and devoured a forkful of beans and then began adjusting the earpiece lodged behind her lobe. “I can’t hear anything. Can you turn the volume up on this thing?”
“Maybe yours has a battery issue. I can hear just fine,” Poppy said.
Iris was more interested in concentrating on her plate of food than the actual reason they were at the casino, and so Poppy decided to take over surveillance duties and let her be so she could enjoy her haul of food in peace.
Poppy listened to Violet play a few more rounds, losing a few, but then making up lost ground, doubling down, and continuing her winning streak. She was worried Violet’s surprising luck would turn off Jay, who might sour over losing so much, but as the dealer shuffled the cards for another game, she heard him say, “I’m Jay.”
“Violet.”
“What a pretty name.”
“Thank you.”
“A pretty name for a pretty lady.”
Poppy couldn’t help but roll her eyes.
“Flattery will get you everywhere!” Violet giggled, no doubt batting her eyes at the same time.
“Good to know. Can I buy you a drink, Violet?”
“That would be lovely. I’ll have a Rose Kennedy.”
“I’m sensing a flower theme. Violet. Rose.”
“Not to mention my dress!”
“You look beautiful in it.”
They were interrupted by the game.
Jay finally beat the house and got back a few of his chips.
“Looks like your luck might finally be changing,” Violet said.
“I wouldn’t bet on that,” he said. “I don’t even want to tell you how much I’ve lost this week. You probably wouldn’t believe it.”
“Try me.”
There was silence. He was hesitating.
“I don’t want to embarrass myself.”
“Over a thousand?”
Jay snickered. “Try twenty times that.”
Violet gasped again, this time much louder.
“I know, you’d think I would take the hint and stay away from this place.”
“I can’t imagine losing that much money!” Violet gasped. “Well, I’m sure you do very well in business if you are able to gamble away that kind of cash.”
More silence.
Another game played.
Jay won again, feeling more emboldened as the dealer shoved more chips back in his direction. Jay took a break to order more cocktails from a passing waitress, and then turned his attention back to Violet.
“Carpet cleaning,” he said.
“I beg your par
don?” Violet peeped.
“I own a carpet-cleaning business.”
“You must have a lot of customers!”
Poppy anxiously adjusted her earpiece. She didn’t want to miss a word. She felt in her gut that Jay was about to give them something useful.
“I do well, but not well enough to piss away twenty grand. Luckily I recently came into some money unexpectedly.”
“Did someone write you into his or her will?” Violet asked, mustering up as much of an innocent tone as she possibly could.
“You might say that,” Jay sneered. “It’s made my losing streak here a lot less painful.”
That was it.
He had to be talking about the fifty grand deposited into Alden Kenny’s account, or, more likely, a joint account for the business to which Jay had access. But that was only a motive to commit murder, hardly proof that he actually carried out the dirty deed. It was also entirely plausible that Jay accidentally discovered that money after somebody else offed Alden and simply took advantage of the fact his business partner was no longer around to spend it.
In either event, he was done talking. After losing three more consecutive rounds, Jay folded and called it a night. He asked Violet for her phone number so he could call her to set up a dinner date, but she didn’t hear him because the celebratory applause of the crowd surrounding her drowned out his voice as she won big again at blackjack. She excitedly shouted that her winnings were now north of seven thousand dollars. Jay apparently skulked away to the parking lot after that.
Poppy looked over at Iris, who was chewing on a barbecued pork rib. “Finish up! We need to get Violet out of here! She’s losing sight of what it means to be undercover!”
Iris dropped the empty bone on her plate and licked the barbecue sauce off her fingers. “I am not done eating yet! The buffet is open for another half hour.”
Poppy stood up from the table and peered out from the buffet and into the casino to see people abandoning their slot machines to gather around the blackjack table and cheer Violet on as she continued to methodically and relentlessly beat the house. “Oh, Violet . . .”
Poppy raced toward the blackjack tables, with Iris, stuffing some dinner rolls she hadn’t eaten into her large purse, on her heels, to spirit Violet, who was now burning up with gambling fever, away from the casino before she wound up on the local news.
Chapter 39
Poppy was just about home from the Spa Resort Casino when her cell phone buzzed. Matt’s name came up on the dashboard screen. She pressed the speaker button on her steering wheel to answer the call. “Hi, Matt.”
“Poppy, you need to help me,” Matt whispered urgently.
Poppy suddenly had a sick feeling in her stomach. “Why? What’s happened?”
“She’s sitting at my kitchen table and she won’t leave.”
“Who? Heather?” Poppy asked, thoroughly confused.
“No, Lara, Rod’s daughter. She showed up at my door and said she had to talk to me, and so I invited her in, and then she started to go on about how much she loves me and wants to be with me. . . .”
Poppy nearly veered off the road from the shock. “What?”
“I tried to tell her I already have a girlfriend, but she refuses to listen, and just keeps talking about how fate brought us together through her Dad hiring me to find her. It’s kind of creepy. You’ve got to help me get her out of here. I’m in the middle of cooking dinner for Heather, who is supposed to be here any minute!”
“How did she find out where you live?”
“Beats me. Maybe she followed me home that day we met her at her father’s house. Who knows?”
Poppy jerked the wheel, turning right, away from her apartment building in the direction of Matt’s house in North Palm Springs. “Hang on, I’ll be right there.”
“Hurry, please, she’s totally irrational!”
Poppy hung up and immediately called Rod, who answered groggily as if he had been asleep.
“Yes?”
“Rod, it’s Poppy.”
His tone immediately went from grouchy to cheery. “Well, hello, beautiful.”
“We have a situation.”
“I hope it’s the good kind.”
“I’m afraid not. It’s about Lara.”
There was a pause, followed by a heavy sigh. “What’s she done now?”
Poppy didn’t go into too many details, but simply told him she needed him to go to Matt’s house and rattled off his address. Rod agreed to get dressed and head right over. By the time he had hung up, Poppy was already pulling up in front of Matt’s house. The whole place was lit up and she could see Matt pacing nervously in front of the large windows in the living room. She could not see Lara.
Poppy hopped out of her car and clattered up the cement walkway that led to the light green one-level midcentury home Matt had rented when he made the decision to stick it out full-time in Palm Springs.
The door flew open before Poppy even had time to ring the bell. Matt looked worn and tired and his whole body was tense. “Thank God you’re here. Come in.”
Poppy followed Matt inside, where she instantly spotted Lara, looking fresh faced and upbeat, in a revealing halter top and skintight jeans, sitting calmly at the dining table, sipping what looked like an iced tea. In the kitchen behind her on the stove top were pots bubbling with marinara sauce and boiling some kind of pasta, and there was the intoxicating smell of garlic bread in the oven. A bottle of red wine had been popped open and two glasses were set out.
Matt nervously checked his phone for the time and threw Poppy a pleading look to get Lara out of his house ASAP.
Poppy approached Lara, smiling, trying to be motherly. “Lara, dear, what are you doing here?”
“That’s between me and Matt,” she said matter-of-factly.
Matt sighed, irritated, and spoke directly to Lara. “I already told Poppy what you said to me. She knows everything.” He began pacing again.
Lara put down her iced tea and swiveled around in the chair. “Oh, I see. You’re more than willing to talk to your mother about our relationship, but not me.”
“Poppy’s not my mother. She’s a friend,” Matt said.
“Whatever. I mean, she might as well be your mother. She’s old enough.”
Poppy took a deep breath and said, “I believe Matt has made it quite clear that he is not available to pursue any kind of relationship with you and so I think you should respect that and leave.”
“That’s not the impression he gave me when we first met at my father’s house. He was giving me all sorts of signals that he was available and interested,” Lara insisted.
Matt was genuinely dumbfounded. “I didn’t do anything of the kind!”
“I was there too, Lara, and I don’t recall Matt coming on to you in any way,” Poppy said gently.
“That’s because you were too focused on flirting with my father to notice much of anything,” Lara huffed.
Poppy was taken aback. This girl was just making up stories out of whole cloth. “However you may have interpreted things, the fact of the matter is Matt is currently involved with someone else, and I should know because she just happens to be my daughter.”
“I know, you don’t have to keep telling me about your precious daughter,” Lara said before turning toward Matt. “Didn’t she just get out of prison? Is that the kind of woman you really want to be with? Seriously?”
Poppy stepped forward, her fists clenched. “I think it would be best if you leave now, Lara.”
Lara didn’t make a move to stand up. It was as if she wasn’t even listening. She just picked up her iced tea and took a loud sip.
Matt began to panic. “Poppy . . .”
Poppy held up her hand, assuring him she had everything under control. “Lara?”
Lara rolled her eyes and sighed. “What?”
“Are you going to finish your tea and leave?” Poppy asked quietly.
“Not until Matt admits he has feelings for me, and
tells me I’m not imagining this connection we have,” Lara said, now stirring the tea with her index finger.
Matt threw his hands up in the air. “I can’t do that! I would be lying!”
The doorbell rang. Matt gasped. “That’s her! Poppy, what are we going to do?”
Poppy signaled him to stay calm and then crossed to the door and opened it. Rod Harper, looking confused, stood outside. “Come in, Rod.”
Rod followed Poppy into the living room. He didn’t see his daughter at first, seated at the dining table that had been set for two people. He was entirely focused on Poppy. “You look lovely tonight, Poppy. Have you been out?”
She had no intention of telling him that she had been at the casino overseeing an undercover operation because it was none of his business. She simply waved in the direction of Lara.
Rod glanced over to see his daughter, Lara, who had suddenly and out of the blue worked up some tears that were now streaming down her high cheekbones.
“Lara, honey, what’s wrong?”
“Oh, Daddy, I’ve never been so humiliated!” She jumped up from the table and ran over to him. He enveloped her in a hug.
“Why, baby? What happened?”
Before Poppy had the chance to explain, Lara was already spinning out her latest web of lies. “I told you how Matt has been calling me and telling me how pretty I am and how I’m totally his type and that he would like to take me out. . . .”
“Yes,” Rod said, glaring at Matt.
“Sir, I most certainly have not—”
Lara didn’t let him finish. “Well, he’s so handsome and charming, and he told me he was no longer seeing Poppy’s daughter, so how could I resist, right? And so when I finally relented and I came here for dinner tonight, I find out he’s still seeing her!”
More tears, but these were less convincing. Because the scene she was playing was so entirely far-fetched and ridiculous, she couldn’t possibly deliver an authentic performance.
Poppy could tell Rod was questioning his daughter’s story, especially as he saw the disbelieving looks on both Poppy’s and Matt’s faces as they watched the scene. But he had wanted to reconcile with Lara for so long, had spent thousands of dollars trying to locate her, he desperately wanted to give her the benefit of the doubt.
