Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
Acknowledgements
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
PRAISE FOR THE “WHERE ARE THEY NOW?” MYSTERY SERIES
Who Killed the Pinup Queen?
“A fast-paced read that fans of television nostalgia will quickly add to their must-read lists.”
—The Mystery Reader
“Fascinating. Readers will root for the admirable heroine and seek her previous ‘Where Are They Now?’ investigation, Curse of the Kissing Cousins.”
—Genre Go Round Reviews
“Interesting foray into the world of pinups and television westerns. Recommended.”
—I Love a Mystery
“First class! Not only a solid mystery, but an interesting look at old-time television and pop culture. Two thumbs up!”
—Mystery Heel
“Enjoyable.”
—Over My Dead Body
“This series is a must for anyone with a love of popular culture, especially of days gone by.”
—Seattle Mystery Bookshop Blog
Curse of the Kissing Cousins
“An engaging premise and an engaging heroine make Curse of the Kissing Cousins one of the pleasure reads of the year.”
—Charlaine Harris
“A merry chase through cyberspace and stacks of dusty magazines, adding in a little romance to keep things humming.”
—Publishers Weekly
“Sassy . . . Laced with Hollywood tidbits that may please trivia fans.”
—Kirkus Reviews
“A well-written thriller. Secondary characters add zest to the story. Author Toni Kelner has taken a page from her heroine, Tilda; she delivers the goods. I look forward to reading more adventures of Tilda Harper, and so will you.”
—Romance Reviews Today
Berkley Prime Crime titles by Toni L. P. Kelner
CURSE OF THE KISSING COUSINS
WHO KILLED THE PINUP QUEEN?
BLAST FROM THE PAST
THE BERKLEY PUBLISHING GROUP
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This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.
BLAST FROM THE PAST
A Berkley Prime Crime Book / published by arrangement with the author
PRINTING HISTORY
Berkley Prime Crime mass-market edition / February 2011
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eISBN : 978-1-101-47701-4
BERKLEY® PRIME CRIME
Berkley Prime Crime Books are published by The Berkley Publishing Group,
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BERKLEY® PRIME CRIME and the PRIME CRIME logo are trademarks of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.
http://us.penguingroup.com
To Valerie Dare Kelner: I expected having two kids to be twice as good as having one, but somehow Valerie quadrupled the fun.
acknowledgments
I want to thank:
Stephen P. Kelner, Jr., who reads drafts while on planes to far-away lands.
Charlaine Harris and Dana Cameron, who take time away from their own work to help with mine.
My daughters, Maggie and Valerie, for their patience.
Joan Brandt, who got me this far.
Joni Langervoort, who donated actual money to charity so I would name a character after her.
Jerry Frazee, creator of Nazrat, for sharing his experiences in the world of comic books.
Chapter 1
flash-forward n Simply put, the opposite of flashback; a filmic technique that depicts a scene, event, or shot taking place (or imagined) or expected that is projected into a future time beyond the present time of the film, or it can be a flash-forward from the past to the present.
—TIM DIRKS, WWW.FILMSITE.ORG
IT was a perfect night for romance. The moon was full, the temperature cool enough to make hand-holding desirable, and the only sounds were seabirds calling and the lap of the ocean waves. All that was missing was for Dylan O’Taine to leave the sanctuary of Pharos, his mystic lighthouse, to share some of his magic.
Unfortunately, Tilda was alone except for a cell phone, and though she was talking to a man, he was quite happily married.
The man in question, Tilda’s friend Cooper, asked, “How much longer are you going to be on the Cape?”
“As long as I can get away with. Did I tell you what Dianne brought home last week? A snake!” Dianne was Tilda’s latest roommate.
“Don’t tell me you have a snake phobia. Do you know how Freudian that is?”
“Of course I know. My sister is a psychologist. But I don’t have a snake phobia. As pets go, snakes aren�
�t too bad. Except that she put it in the living room, and she was going to feed it in there.”
“I’m guessing that it doesn’t eat Purina Snake Chow.”
“Try mice. Cute little white mice who squeal when the snake starts swallowing them.”
“That is gross. You have terrible luck in roommates.”
“Tell me about it.” Tilda was apparently incapable of finding a roomie she could put up with for longer than a year. Only three months into the lease with Dianne and she was already poised to toss the woman and her never-ending pet parade into the street. It made the Cape Cod stay, even without a nice bit of arm candy to walk with in the moonlight, all the more enjoyable.
“Gotta head out,” Cooper said. “Let me know how it’s going.”
“Will do.” She hung up the phone, and once she’d put it into her pocket, realized she could hear voices. Up ahead, she saw two people walking along the other side of the road, probably heading for the building where she’d just had dinner.
The Glenham Bars Inn was on Shoreline Road, the unimaginatively named seaside road in the town of Glenham. The main inn building and cottages of varying sizes and levels of luxury were scattered on both sides of the road. With lights strung in the trees, it looked like a nicer brand of carnival, though the brochure described it as a fairy-tale setting.
From behind, Tilda heard the sound of a car engine, and stepped several more feet away from the edge of the road. The graveled path was plenty far enough from the roadway to be safe, but after an unfortunate incident some months back, being around cars tended to make her skittish.
The vehicle was going considerably faster than it should have on the curved road, and Tilda flipped him a bird as he zoomed past her. She opened her mouth to add a description of his parentage, but it turned into a gasp as the car veered into the other lane and straight at the people walking toward her. There were screams, flying gravel, and a thunk. Then the car swerved back onto the road and sped up as it went past the inn.
Tilda started running. Both the people struck were down on the ground, and only one was moving. As she reached them she realized she knew who they were—it was John Laryea and his assistant Foster. Then she realized something else. She’d recognized the vehicle, too. It hadn’t been just any car. In fact, it hadn’t been a car at all. It had been a black stretch limo, one with a very recognizable license plate. And she’d been in that limo just three days before.
Chapter 2
The Blastoffs, a live action Saturday morning show of the early eighties, featured a musical pair of brothers—Sid and Marty Blastoff—who toured the galaxy with their alien babysitter/ manager, Posit, spreading “love and groovy tunes.” Only eighteen episodes were filmed, and the show would probably have disappeared into obscurity like its contemporaries, Laverne & Shirley in the Army and Turbo Teen, had the show not introduced John Laryea.
—SATURDAY MORNING SPREE BY CHARLES M. LUCE
TILDA and Pete Ellis could have waited inside the limo that day, but had agreed that the unseasonably warm October weather was too nice to waste, so instead were leaning against the side of the glossy black vehicle enjoying the sun when Tilda’s cell phone broke into the opening bars of the theme from Buffy the Vampire Slayer.
“This is Tilda.”
“What was your favorite Saturday morning show?” a familiar voice demanded to know.
“Forget it, Cooper. I told you, no more polls.”
“Come on, Tilda, I have to get a dozen more people.”
“Then you shouldn’t have laughed your ass off when I answered your questions about the shows that make me cry.”
“I couldn’t help it. I mean, you cry at A Pinky & the Brain Christmas Special.”
“Which everybody on Facebook now knows, thanks to you. They also get to mock me for my favorite romantic heroes.”
“Jonny Quest was a romantic hero?”
“Good-bye, Cooper.”
“Please, please, please. I swear, I’m on my knees. I can take a picture right now and send it to you.”
“It wouldn’t help.”
“Ten minutes. I just need ten minutes.”
“I don’t have ten minutes. I’m at the airport and John Laryea is going to be out in five.”
Pete Ellis, the limo driver, cleared his throat. “Actually, I just got word from Dom. There’s been a slight delay with the flight, and Mr. Laryea won’t be deplaning for another twenty minutes. Then they’ll have to get his luggage, and . . .”
“Thanks a lot,” Tilda said. Then inspiration struck. “Cooper, you need some fresh blood. I’m handing the phone to my new friend Pete. I know he’ll love answering your questions.”
Ignoring the look of panic on Pete’s face, she pressed her phone into his hand, and leaned back to drink a Dr Pepper from the limo’s refrigerator while he admitted to Cooper that he’d always been a fan of Scooby-Doo, Thundarr the Barbarian, and The SuperFriends. She’d halfway expected him to mention The Blastoffs, since they were waiting for the star who’d made his first foray into show business singing his way across the universe in that show, but it didn’t happen.
After Pete was finished with the survey, he handed the phone back to Tilda.
“Now it’s your turn,” Cooper said.
“I don’t want a turn. What I want is for you to deliver a message to Jillian for me. Tell her I’ve got a fresh lead on the last guy from Power Pets—I think I’ll be able to track him down within the week.”
“Oh, about that . . .”
“Don’t tell me she’s spiking the article!”
“No, she still wants it, but you don’t need to find that guy anymore. We found him.”
“What do you mean you found him? I’ve spent the last three weeks looking for him. Nobody knows where he is.”
“We do now. He heard from one of his costars that we wanted to talk to him, and he got in touch with us. Nicole did a phone interview with him this morning.”
“You have got to be kidding me! Which costar? They all swore that they didn’t know where he was!”
“Joy something. The one who did Clueless Cub.”
“Joy Baird? That bitch!” Tilda had known the woman hadn’t liked her because she’d been honest when naming her favorite character on the show—and it hadn’t been Clueless Cub. She’d thought Baird might be holding out on her, but hadn’t expected her to pull an end run. “What am I supposed to do with the interviews I’ve already done?”
“Nicole is going to send you her notes so you can integrate the material with your stuff.”
She took a deep breath. “Fine, I can do that.”
“Um, Jillian says she’s going to dock your pay a little, too.”
“Of course she is. Why would she pay for my epic fail?”
“It’s not epic,” Cooper objected. “Everybody has an off day.”
“This is my second off day in a month.”
“Hey, that other guy wasn’t your fault. How were you supposed to know he’d had a sex-change operation and moved to Denmark?”
“Whatever.”
“Tilda . . .”
“Sorry, can’t talk. Here comes Laryea! Bye!”
Pete was straightening up to greet the arriving star until he realized Tilda was blowing off Cooper.
“Sorry,” she said. “I needed to get off the phone.”
“Anything wrong?”
“I just found out I screwed up an assignment.”
“It happens.”
“I guess.” Except that finding the formerly famous was supposed to be her specialty, and missing two targets in less than a month wasn’t going to instill confidence in the editors from whom she was soliciting work. Entertain Me! was one of her best markets, and if Jillian, the editor in chief, decided they didn’t need her, there went a large slice of her income.
Pete waggled a finger at her. “No brooding. It’s too nice a day for it. Take a deep breath, and let it go.”
It sounded a little touchy-feely, but Tilda did so, just
to be polite. And it did help a little. There would be plenty of time to brood later.
They resumed their lounging, and Tilda found it oddly comfortable for being with a man she’d just met. She took a sidewise look at Pete. He was in his midforties, with a long, angular face, a wiry build, and thick hair that either nature or nurture kept nut-brown. And damned if he didn’t look familiar!
“Pete, have we met before?”
“I don’t think so. I’ve only been in Boston for a few months.”
“Where were you before that?”
“Dallas—that’s where I met Dom, and he talked me into coming here to work for him.”
“You’re not originally from Texas are you? Not with that accent.”
He chuckled. “No, I bounced around quite a bit. I grew up in Colorado.”
“Oh well,” she said, mystified. “You sure look familiar.”
“Just that kind of a face, I guess.” Then Pete put his hand to his earpiece and listened for a few seconds. “Dom says he’s got Laryea and his group, and they’ve got the luggage. They’ll be on the way out in a few.”
He tossed away the Coke he’d been drinking and went to stand at attention by the door.
“What’s the etiquette here? Do I wait inside the limo or greet them outside?” Tilda had interviewed plenty of celebrities, but never in a stretch limo.
She’d been surprised when Dom Tolomeo of Tolomeo Personal Protection had called the day before to offer her a private interview with Laryea. The idea was for her to ride along on the trip from Boston’s Logan Airport to Glenham, the town on the Cape where Laryea was headed to film location shots for his new movie. Dom had sent Pete Ellis, a combination limo driver and bodyguard, to pick her up that morning.
Blast from the Past Page 1
