“Bizzy!” Molly gives a spastic wave and speeds on over. The giant grin on her face lets me know she’s genuinely glad to see me. “I’m so glad you could come out! Have you been here before?”
“No, but I’ve been meaning to check it out.” A weak smile swims on my lips, most likely giving away the lie. “My boyfriend thought it would be a fun date night.” I shrug. “I’m hoping I won’t lose my shirt before the night is through.”
She gives a husky laugh. “Oh honey, with a man like yours, I’d make sure to lose my shirt and everything else—every single night of the week.”
I laugh along with her. If Jasper is the icebreaker between us, so be it. Besides, Molly just might be the link that leads me to the killer.
Someone calls her name from behind and she turns that way.
“Another hour, another fire to put out.” She makes a face. “If I’m not bending over to please a customer, I’m taking it from an employee. But as you know all too well, that’s what management is about.”
“Especially in the hospitality game. Go on. Don’t let me hold you. There’s plenty here to occupy me until he shows up.”
“Okay, but have you gotten your free chips yet?”
“I was just about to.”
“Don’t bother.” She reaches into her pocket and emerges with a fistful of colorful plastic coins. “Take them and have some fun. I’ll try to catch up with the two of you before the end of the night.” Right after I tie my blouse under my chest. After all, company is coming and I need to showcase what my mama gave me. Besides, a nice girl like Bizzy wouldn’t want a cheater on her hands. She needs me to see if Jasper has the tendency to wander. And if he does, she’ll practically thank me for saving her from a wretch like him. I’ll be thanking me, too—right after I thank Jasper for a night to remember.
Lovely.
I take a breath and look around just as Macy pops into my line of vision.
“Bizzy!” She does an odd little mermaid-like shuffle this way.
“Why do you look like a cartoon character trying to evade the cops?”
A giggle trembles from her. “This place is loaded with men! I’ve already got two or three picked out. I can’t decide which one to take a bite out of first.”
“Here’s a hint”—I say, grabbing my sister by the arm—“bite no one.”
A waitress comes by and Macy swipes a drink off her tray.
“Ooh, thank you.” My surly sister is quick to take a sip. “Mmm.” She shudders. “That’s good, champs. You should really have some, Bizzy.”
“I’ll pass. I’m driving. Any sign of Jasper?” I crane my neck over her shoulder. “Maybe we can head back early, and I’ll knock back all the champs I want.” Something tells me I’ll need a whole bottle after tonight.
“No, but if he doesn’t show up, I’ve got a few good men you could borrow.”
“Great. I’ll keep that in mind.”
A tall blonde cackles near the bar and everything in me enlivens. She’s chatting it up with a man in a tan suit. He’s about her height with a somewhat prominent scar that rides along his cheek. There’s a chunk of turquoise cinched at the collar of his shirt where a tie would usually sit. He has cut features, his hair looks teased and blown-back as if it were paying tribute to an era long gone by, and there’s a general hardness about him. But the woman he’s talking to is definitely Mariah Stafford. And she looks every bit like a lady on the prowl in her bright yellow dress and hoop earrings large enough to be bracelets.
I lean toward Macy. “You know what? I think I see someone I know. Good luck narrowing down the field.” And just like that, both Macy and I head in opposite directions.
I stride all the way to the bar where the counter is covered with mirrored bits of glass that create a dizzying mosaic I’m sure Georgie could appreciate.
The man Mariah is currently drooling over slides something across the table her way—something blue and shiny from what I can tell—and she admires it for a moment before dropping it into her purse. He stands abruptly and lands a kiss to her hand before heading over to one of the blackjack tables.
I wonder what that was about. I head that way, less concerned with the odd exchange and more concerned with the fact she might have pushed Siena Thompson off the second story railing at the Chadwick mansion.
“Mariah?” I try to sound cheery as I snatch a drink off the tray of a roving waitress as if I were just as carefree as anyone here.
Her head twitches to the side and she winces my way as if she were having trouble placing me.
“We met the other night—at the Chadwick mansion. I’m Bizzy.”
“Bizzy!” Her eyes widen and shine like jade. “Fancy meeting you here. Are you hot on the prowl?” She pulls forth the fruity looking drink in front of her and motions for me to come over and take a seat.
“Hardly,” I say, landing across from her. “I’m meeting my boyfriend here. It’s date night, his pick.” I give a little shrug. “And you?”
“I live here.” Her left eye closes in an odd prolonged blink. “Kidding, sort of. It’s been my usual haunt for a couple of years now.” She shrugs as if she were indifferent to the idea. “You get used to the noise and the crowds, and then when you’re not here it feels as if you’ve fallen into some silent dimension. There’s really nothing for me to do at home anyway. I check in about once a month, make sure the lights are still on, and there’s still food in the fridge.”
“Oh, you have a room here?”
“Yup. Penthouse, if you can call it that. But he does try to please me.” Her lips expand with a greedy grin.
“He? Is that your boyfriend?”
Did I say he? Oh hell, I doubt Bizzy is going to care if Murphy gave me a room or the entire hotel and casino.
Murphy? As in Siena’s father? I guess he does own the hotel. He can give a room to whomever he likes, I’m assuming.
She shakes her head. “Just a friend.” She doesn’t need to know all the dirty little details. “Siena’s father, actually. Siena and I were pretty close growing up. She was like a sister to me.”
“Eww.” If Siena was like a sister, wasn’t her father like a—well, father?
“Pardon me?” She leans in and squints as if struggling to both hear and see.
“I said ooh.” I lace the lie with a quick smile. “That’s very generous of him. He must think very highly of you.”
“Oh, he does.” Or at least he did until his bratty daughter got to him. I could have had everything by now, but Siena always had to go and ruin everything.
My lips part as I try to subdue the shock from what I’m hearing. My God, I might just be inches from a total confession.
Her eyes light up as if a light bulb literally went off in her head.
“Hey? Isn’t your boyfriend that hunky homicide detective that was there that night?”
I guess there’s no point hiding it. I give a slight nod.
She leans in. “I know for a fact Siena was pushed from the second story.”
“You do?” I’m betting it’s because she did it.
Mariah nods, affirming the fact by proxy. “I saw Jackson lure her up the stairs. They were openly arguing and ironically looking for privacy. I saw it with my own two eyes. The next thing I knew, she was dead. I know he pushed her. Either that or she was trying to assault him—and I wouldn’t put it past her. They had already been in the middle of a nasty argument that was dragging on for days.”
“About what?” My finger traces the rim of my glass absentmindedly as if I really didn’t care—as if I wasn’t waiting with bated breath to hear what comes next.
“I don’t know, but whatever it was, it was bad. Jackson and Siena seemed like the perfect couple. Then all of a sudden there was this big blowout.”
“Do you think he cheated on her? Or vice versa?”
“Honestly, I really don’t think so. This was something personal just between the two of them. It was getting ugly. Siena resorted to name-calling.”
“Salty name-calling?”
“Worse—socialite name-calling. She started to refer to him as a blue-collar coward. Jackson used to work retail in the summers while he was in college. He comes from money, but he’s always believed in earning his own way.”
“He sounds like a decent guy.”
“He is. That’s why this whole thing is hard to comprehend. Anyway, you can tell your boyfriend I think it was a lovers’ spat, or I guess it was more of a lovers’ push.”
“Wasn’t Harry there that night? He was Siena’s old boyfriend, right? Maybe that’s what they were arguing about? I bet Harry was making another play for Siena. That could have made Jackson insecure.” And am I really riffling through theories with a bona fide suspect? I’m pretty sure I’d fail Detective 101.
She plucks the cherry from her drink and bites it off the stem.
“Harry was there, all right. Full disclosure, I dated Harry before Siena ever laid eyes on him.” She ticks her head toward the table action behind her. “Molly set me up, just like she says she set up the two of them.” She wags a finger at me. “That’s not what happened. Siena may have met Harry through Molly, but she stole him from me. Stealing my boyfriends was one of her favorite pastimes.”
“I had a friend like that. And now she just so happens to hold a prominent position in my town. But thankfully, she seems to have outgrown her annoying boyfriend-stealing habit. And I’m happy to report we each have a man of our own.” I still have no idea what Leo sees in Mackenzie. Love must truly be blind. Either that or she’s easy. Knowing Mack, it’s probably the latter.
A brief visual of her rolling around with Leo pops through my mind and I’m quick to shoo it away.
“So you and Siena had a riff because of that, I take it?” I ask. “How could you not?”
“Believe it or not, Siena wanted me to accept the fact she could take whoever I had in my life and make him her own. Right up until she couldn’t. And that ended badly.” She says that last part mostly to herself.
“You found a great man who wouldn’t look her way?”
Her mouth opens as if she’s said too much already. “Something like that.” It just so happens her father was the one man she couldn’t steal.
I gasp at the revelation as sure as if she said the words right to my face.
Mariah shakes her head. “Anyway, he dumped me. Even though Siena couldn’t steal him, it didn’t mean she couldn’t control him.”
“Ouch. I’m sorry to hear it.” Siena must have really made her father feel bad for dating her friend. It sounds as if she got him to cut Mariah loose at her command. I can’t blame her. I’m not sure I’d want my father dating any of my friends, or any of my loose acquaintances for that matter.
A couple of men in dark suits stride by and I watch as Mariah’s face bleaches out at the sight of them. They head over to the man with the tan suit who slipped something blue and shiny to Mariah just before I sat down.
Mariah takes another sip of her drink in haste. “I gotta run. I’ve got an early day tomorrow.” She goes to grab her purse and my elbow knocks it right off the edge of the table, spilling her things right out of it and onto the floor below.
“I’m so sorry,” I say, quickly dropping to my knees and helping her scoop up the rolled away lipsticks and errant receipts when my fingers scoop up a gorgeous cobalt blue necklace with scalloped edges and dark antique silver filigree set around each stone. “Oh, wow, this is gorgeous.” I’m about to hold it up when she snatches it out of my hand and buries it deep into her bag.
“A friend gave it to me as a gift. It’s an heirloom. It was nice talking to you. I’ll see you around.” She hops to her feet and bolts for the nearest exit.
Mariah sure has fancy friends. But then, as a socialite, this shouldn’t surprise me.
I glance in the direction of the blackjack table, toward the man in the tan suit, but my eyes snag on a far more interesting man, one with silver eyes and a naughty smile riding up his cheeks.
Jasper Wilder has commanded the attention of every woman in this place as he strides his way over, his eyes locked over mine.
“You missed the party,” I tease as my arms circle his waist.
His spiced cologne greets me, right along with his wily grin.
“One look at you, Bizzy Baker, and I was hoping the party was just about to begin. What’s a guy got to do to get you alone?”
“A quick round of blackjack? Loser has to give Gassy Gus a ride back to Rose Glen?”
His head cocks to the side. “Why does that sound like a dangerous proposition?”
“Believe me, it’s downright nuclear.”
Jasper and I play best out of three, and even though I win, I take Gassy Gus home myself. I couldn’t do that to Jasper.
Instead, I lure Jasper back to my cottage in an effort to show him exactly what I could do to him—right after I tell him all about Mariah and her relationship with Murphy Thompson.
Jasper holds me close as we sit on my sofa with the flames crackling and snapping while Sherlock and Fish nestle beside the fireplace.
“She thinks Jackson did it?” He shakes his head. “Could be. Whoever it was, it’s not a far stretch to assume it was done in the heat of the moment. But we can’t rule out the fact it was premeditated. Whoever pushed Siena could have very well wanted her dead.”
The echo of those internal voices from the night of the murder comes back to me.
“Or—wanted her quiet. Wanted her stopped.”
Chapter 8
It’s safe to say there is no scent more divine than that of a batch of brownies baking in the oven.
“Add another cup of chocolate chips,” Emmie says the words slow and measured as if she were instructing me how to defuse a bomb. And she might as well be. I’ve been known to be a terror in the kitchen.
Contrary to my surname, I’m no baker. Try as I might, and boy have I ever tried, I seem to be a walking, talking curse. But that’s never stopped me from entering a kitchen and pretending to be large and in charge. I love to bake—even if baking refuses to love me back and takes out a restraining order to prove it. Emmie was nice enough to let me help with adding the ingredients for another batch of those magical rocky road brownies of hers.
“You should have seen the casino,” I say. “It was dripping with glitz and glamour and—”
“And not me.” Emmie offers me a stern look. Her dark hair is swept back into a bun and her eyes glow a stunning shade of glacial blue. “How could you go out and have a good time without your best friend? I’m starting to think I’ve lost my shine.”
“You sparkle and we both know it. Besides, your nose should thank me. I had to leave the windows down in my car last night. I’d rather risk having a raccoon gnaw off the steering wheel than have a single trace of Gassy Gus left behind. I’m shocked he didn’t melt a hole in my seat. Georgie needs to find another man asap or invest in gasmasks for her friends and family.”
Emmie leans past me. “I think she’s opted for the former. She just put in her order, and I have no clue who that guy next to her is.”
I turn around to find a man with shoulder-length gray shaggy hair pawing all over her as Georgie pays for their orders.
“Not only is he manhandling her, he’s making her buy his lunch. Good luck with the brownies, Emmie.”
“I’ll have better luck once you leave the kitchen.” She gives a cheeky wink my way as I boot-scoot to the counter.
The café has always reminded me a bit of a quaint little bistro with white and black wrought iron tables. There’s a huge glass sunroom off the back that overlooks the sandy beach and the briny Atlantic just beyond that. And today just so happens to be getting drummed on by rain. There’s a storm pushing through, and judging by that choppy gray sea, it’s not leaving anytime soon.
“Georgie Conner,” I say as I take in the silver snake slithering behind her. “You have a new friend, I see.” I use the term friend loosely. More like mooch.
&n
bsp; She retrieves her change and steps my way, bringing her senior appendage along with her by proxy. His arms glide around her waist and his left hand is traveling upward in an effort to hit second base.
“That I do, Bizzy Bee. Meet Andres Gorchakov, an ex-Russian ballet dancer who’s got more moves than a Rubik’s Cube.”
I twitch at the thought. “Considering the fact a Rubik’s Cube has endless moves, I’m thinking we should skip the twists and turns and show him a move of our own—a boot to the rear.”
“I speak English,” he says as he brushes a kiss over her ear.
“I don’t care.” I do my best to bat him away and Georgie quickly takes on a karate stance as if she were about to teach me a lesson.
“Andres”—she gives him a gentle shove and he floats away as if he were in a pool of water, I’m thinking we should recreate the gesture in the icy Atlantic—“find a seat by the window. And ignore Bizzy. She’s in the middle of a highly sexually repressed era in her life right now. We’re all doing our best to tolerate her at the moment.”
An errant applause comes from my left and we turn to find Mayor Mack—Mackenzie—Woods looking every bit her ornery self. Her long, dark hair is strewn in Medusa-inspired waves and her bright red lipstick looks more like a slick of blood.
A dark smile rubber bands over her face. “I just love when Bizzy’s lackluster private life is aired for all to poke fun at. What should we laugh at next, Georgie? Her lackluster hair?”
Georgie’s breakfast order arrives and she quickly prepares to snub us. “I don’t have time to delve into that mane.” She starts to take off, then backtracks. “Oh, and Mack? I’m running low on supplies for the mural. I’ll need to see about getting the city to release some of the funds allocated to the project.”
Mackenzie flicks a glance out the window. “There’s not much left. Try to be resourceful. I thought you said all you needed was a bunch of sea trash to get this done?”
Bow Wow Big House Page 6
