One Hot Mess

by Lois Greiman

  He glanced at me through thick lashes. “I don’t watch much television. You said she was royalty or something. I…” He shrugged.

  “I meant she’s an actress—and gorgeous.”

  “Is she?”

  I canted my head at him. “If we don’t keep armed guards close at hand, men tend to throw themselves at her feet.”

  “Why?”

  I blinked. “Because she’s gorgeous.”

  “Is she?”

  Ahh, so there was the problem: He was nuts.

  “I’m sorry” he said, fiddling with a half-empty glass. “It’s just that I… I don’t…” He paused and took a deep breath. “I can’t tell.”

  “You can’t tell…” I waited for him to fill in the blank.

  “I can’t tell if women are attractive or not. I don’t know why. I think there might be something fundamentally wrong with me.”

  I opened my mouth to remind him that he had dubbed me “spectacular,” but he spoke before I embarrassed myself.

  “You make me laugh,” he said. “I like to laugh. And when I’m around you my heart feels kind of… soggy.”

  I reached for the tab, just delivered by a slick-haired server dressed in black. I was eager to see how much I wasn’t paying. “Soggy?” I said.

  “I’m no better with words than with clothes,” he said, and, smoothing his tie again, took the bill from me.

  “I have a coupon,” I said, but just then he removed a wad of bills from his wallet and shoved them into the folder. Not counting, not looking at the charges. Nothing. I wasn’t positive, but I was pretty sure I saw a half dozen hundreds in there.

  The server bowed reverently and strode off, possibly to retire.

  I rose to my feet. I think I may have also reached wistfully after him as if to draw back the cash. “I think… Did you just give him a million-dollar tip?” I asked.

  Donald rose beside me. “I’m not very good with math, either. Listen, Christina…” He shuffled from foot to foot. “I think I really like you.”

  Okay, so he was overweight and not terribly self-confident, but he was kind of sweet and apparently ungodly rich. I glanced around.

  “Christina?” he said.

  “Usually at this point someone tries to kill me,” I said.

  He grinned a little. “See any likely suspects?”

  “Not—” I began, but suddenly Rivera appeared in my peripheral vision. I think I actually did a double take. I mean, what were the chances? I’d seen him just a few hours before, but now, unlike earlier, he was dressed in dark dress pants and a smooth, body-hugging jersey that highlighted the shift of every sensuous muscle. His midnight hair was combed back, and his eyes were as intense as a hunting falcon’s. It wasn’t until he leaned toward his companion that I realized he was with anyone at all.

  “Thea,” I breathed, barely able to force out the name.

  “What’s that?” Archer asked.

  They looked like an L.A. version of Ken and Barbie. Him dark. Her fair. Both so beautiful it made my insides hurt. I turned to Archer, breath held.

  “You like me?” I asked, voice barely audible to my own ringing ears.

  He didn’t bolt for the hills, but he did step back half a stride. “I think so. But—”

  “You find me attractive?”

  “Like I said, I can’t—” he began.

  “Is there someone you’d give your kidneys to make jealous?”

  One thing about Archer: He wasn’t stupid. He didn’t look away didn’t so much as glance to the side. “Does he have a good view of us?”

  “If he were any closer we’d be standing on him.”

  “How do you feel about French kissing?”

  “Right about now—” I began, but he was already pulling me into a full-body hug and locking his lips to mine like a starving man at an all-night banquet.

  24

  Some people say the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach. In actuality, you have to make an incision through his skin, both dermis and epidermis, then carefully sever and separate the sternum. Only upon viewing the exposed thoracic cavity can you reach the heart—if indeed the male of the species actually possesses such an organ.

  —Dr. Sarah Kaminsky, Chrissy’s psych

  professor, who displayed a strong

  interest in medicine and perhaps a

  little bitterness toward men

  AC. MAC!”

  I came to slowly. Archer might be overweight and underassured, but he could kiss like a drunken sailor.

  “What?” My voice was mumbly I turned toward Laney like a woman in need of smelling salts, but she only tilted her head toward the front door. I careened my attention in that direction and discovered that Senator Rivera had also arrived.

  Neither Rivera was looking at me—they had their gazes locked on each other. The elder was smiling, but it was the kind of carnivorous expression that belied his perfectly tailored suit, his urbane manner.

  I couldn’t hear the words, but I could imagine them. “May I have a word with you, Gerald?”

  Gerald’s answer would not be so congenial, but the supermodel with the hair was standing right there, watching with the wide eyes of an ingenue. What could he do but ease away from her? The two men stood together now, looking like fuming GQ models. We watched the way one would focus on a train wreck, but it didn’t come to blows. The conversation was short, terse, and packed with enough animosity to blow the roof right off the restaurant. At the finale, the lieutenant leaned in and growled something in his father’s face. Then he stalked off, glanced down at the poor supermodel with the hair, and led her off to their table.

  He never once glanced toward me but kept his gaze glued straight ahead, his jaw set like a recalcitrant pugilist’s.

  “Holy shit.” Archer’s voice was close to my ear. “Is that Lieutenant Rivera?”

  I nodded. His private investigator must have been pretty thorough when ferreting out information.

  “Is that his old man?”

  I’m not sure I even managed a nod that time. Rivera and the supermodel were just being seated.

  “Do you think he saw us kiss?”

  I swallowed, and at that second, like the devil himself, Rivera lifted his gaze to mine. I could swear fire shot from his eyes, devouring me, consuming me. I felt my knees buckle, but Archer caught one arm. Laney caught the other. In a moment they were shuffling me toward the front door.

  Outside, the air felt heavy.

  “You okay?” Laney asked.

  I wobbled a nod.

  “Holy crap!” Solberg was jittering like a June bug. “What do you suppose that was about?”

  “Do you want to sit down?” Archer asked. There was a garden only a few yards away. He herded me in that direction and eased me onto a park bench. Then he sat beside me as Laney and Solberg took seats opposite us.

  “What just happened?” asked Solberg, still jumping even though he was seated.

  “Who’s the girl?” Laney asked.

  I swallowed a lump of unidentified emotion and glanced back at the restaurant. “The supermodel with the hair?”

  “I guess.”

  “Her name’s Thea Altove.”

  “Why was the senator so pissed?” Solberg asked, then apologized for his scalding language.

  I closed my eyes for a second and blew out a breath. Such unsteadiness was ridiculous, of course. “He doesn’t want Rivera to date her.”

  “How do you know that?” Laney asked.

  I tried to refrain from telling the truth, but resistance was futile.

  “Maybe I eavesdropped.”

  “Where?”

  “Caring Hands.”

  She was still staring at me, so I continued. No one can resist Laney and her lie-seeking gaze.

  “In the office next to the senator’s.”

  “And?”

  I shook my head. “I didn’t hear much, only the senator warning Rivera not to date the supermodel.”

  “So he brou
ght her here, to the senators favorite spot?”

  “This is the senators favorite spot?” Solberg asked.

  Laney ignored him. “Why?”

  “Did you see her?” I asked.

  “You think the senator wants her for himself,” Laney said.

  “No shi—No kidding?” Solberg’s tone was raspy. “She’s… like … twelve.”

  “Time-honored tradition,” Archer said.

  We turned toward him. Some of us may have forgotten he was there. I’m not proud to admit I might have been one of them.

  He shrugged. “Wealthy men. Young women,” he explained. All eyes were on him now. “My current stepmother is the same age as my shoelaces.”

  I made a face.

  “Has the senator been wooing her?” Laney asked.

  “Wooing?” I said, still a little disoriented.

  “Don’t think too hard,” she warned.

  I nodded dimly, recognizing good advice when I heard it. “Not that I know of.”

  She was scowling. “Then why not let Rivera have her?”

  “She’s a hottie,” Solberg said. “The old man’s probably working up his nerve.”

  We turned on him as if he’d lost a few brain cells.

  “The senator once called the Speaker of the House a yellow-bellied turncoat,” Archer said.

  We turned on him.

  He cleared his throat, a little uncomfortable under fire. “I’m just saying, I don’t think he lacks nerve.”

  “What, then?” Laney asked, but I had a sneaking suspicion she might already have forged her own theories.

  Archer shrugged. “If he wants her, he’s sure as hell not going to want his son to have her, even if he doesn’t claim her for himself.”

  “But would that be worth making a public scene?” Laney asked.

  “Sometimes men don’t make a lot of sense when their egos get involved,” Archer said.

  We stared at him.

  He grinned a little. “Just an observation.”

  “It seems like the old man would have more important things to worry about,” Solberg said.

  “Like what?” Archer asked.

  It was silent for a second, but after the kiss it seemed like my unfortunate date deserved to know the truth. I gave him the abbreviated version about the deaths and how they involved the good senator.

  “So there have been three bizarre deaths related to Rivera,” Archer said.

  “Loosely related,” Laney reminded him. Of the present company, she was probably the person least wanting to get me killed.

  “How do we know that?” Solberg asked.

  I turned toward him with a scowl.

  “I mean,” he said, “how do we know there haven’t been more?”

  “I checked into it,” I said.

  “How?”

  “On the Internet.”

  “No offense, babekins, but if technology and you were in the sack together, you wouldn’t need no prophylactics.”

  Laney was looking at him with her ever-clear eyes.

  “I’ll look into it, angel,” he said, and she gave him the whisper of a smile.

  His subsequent dowder-headed expression creeped me out a little. “Well,” I said, having recovered enough to be cruel, “looks like it’s time for me to go home, since I don’t like to hurl in public.”

  We said our good-byes. Archer walked me to my car. I turned when I got to my humble little Saturn.

  “I’m sorry,” I said, and fiddled with my car keys.

  “For?”

  I glanced up. There was humor and uncertainty in his voice.

  “Well…” I cleared my throat. “For being an idiot, for one thing.”

  “I don’t think you’re an idiot.” He tilted his head. “In love with another man…” He let the sentence hang there.

  God save me from recurring themes. “It’s not love,” I said.

  “What is it?”

  “I don’t think there’s a name for it that can be voiced in polite society.” More key-fiddling. “The kiss …” I said.

  “What about it?”

  “I’m sorry about it.”

  He glanced over my head. He was just tall enough to do so. “Wish I could be.”

  “What?”

  “Kinda seems if I had a pebble’s worth of pride I’d be pissed, huh?”

  “Aren’t you?”

  “It’s not every day I get to kiss a woman like you, Christina.”

  The sentence was said with sincerity and feeling. If compliments were meals, it would have been prime rib. “It was a good kiss,” I said.

  “I put everything I had into it. Another couple seconds I would have needed a defibrillator.”

  Despite everything—world hunger, the bubonic plague… Rivera—I couldn’t help but laugh. “You’re okay, Archer.”

  He didn’t say anything. Doubts shouldered in.

  “Aren’t you?”

  “Nicer than him,” he said, and nodded toward the interior of the restaurant, where Rivera sat with a girl younger than his dog.

  “That’s not saying much,” I said, and sighed.

  “Then why are you—” he began, but I knew the question.

  “Because I’m demented.”

  He paused a second, then nodded. “It’s an interesting family. I’ve always thought so.”

  I glanced up, curious, heart starting to pound a little. “What do you mean, you’ve always thought so?”

  “Dad was a big supporter.”

  “Of the senator’s?” Paranoia bellied up to the doubt, shoving it rudely aside.

  “Yeah.”

  I felt tense and stupid to be so. “Is that why you’re here?”

  “What?”

  “To protect the senator?”

  “I—”

  “Did you have Manny killed?”

  “What?” He actually stumbled back a step.

  “Was he going to cause trouble for the senator?”

  “What are you talking about? Manny was a drunk. As far as I know, he passed out cold and fell headfirst into the river.”

  “Do you think I’m planning to cause trouble for him?” I was rambling. I know I was rambling. Maybe I even knew then, but I couldn’t stop myself. “‘Cuz I’m not. I didn’t want anything to do with another Rivera. He came to me. Asked me to look into the deaths. Ask him yourself.”

  “Listen, honey, you should forget about all this.”

  I narrowed my eyes at him, thinking. Manny had started a lawsuit against Ironwear. Essentially, Archer was Ironwear. Maybe that’s why Emanuel was now in the morgue. Or maybe it was even more twisted than that. Maybe Archer was behind all of it. All the deaths. Maybe he had an unrevealed past with the senator. Maybe the old man had slighted him, or run over his cat, or, more likely, slept with his girlfriend. “What was your last girlfriend’s name?” I asked.

  “Debra. Why?”

  “How long did you date Cynthia?”

  He stared at me. “I don’t know what you’re thinking,” he said. “But I swear I’ve never dated a Cynthia.”

  “How about a Cyndy?”

  “No.”

  “Cyndra?”

  “Hey,” he stopped me, expression concerned. “I don’t even vote.”

  “What?”

  “I wouldn’t know a Republican from a Hoosier.”

  “You’re not planning to kill me to protect his reputation?”

  “Geez, Chrissy!” he said, and, despite the fact that I insisted on speaking, took my hand in his. “What has the world been doing to you?”

  I swallowed. The feel of his skin against mine was kind of soothing. “It hasn’t all been great,” I admitted.

  He sighed. “You’re not going to drop it, are you?”

  “I need the money,” I said.

  He canted his head.

  “The senator paid me,” I said. “To figure out if the deaths were accidents.”

  “That seems like a pretty strong case for his innocence.”

&
nbsp; I shrugged. “People are … complex.” I was going to say something less positive, but Archer was a nice guy. Maybe.

  “I could check things out,” he said. “See what the senator’s been up to. My dad’s…” He shrugged. “He’s smart, but he’s not…well, he’s not real nice, still I could ask what he knows about the Riveras.”

  “What do you mean, not nice?”

  “I’m the prince of understatement.”

  “You think your father might have some dirt on the senator?”

  He nodded, and then, leaning close, he kissed me. It was nice, gentle but evocative. “You’re as crazy as an avocado, but I kind of like you,” he said, and left.

  I was halfway home before I remembered the prince-of-understatement statement.

  25

  I don’t need no PMS. I can be a bitch under my own steam.

  —Shirley Templeton,

  God love her

  UNDAY PASSED IN A HAZE. I spent three hours with Laney shopping, laughing, and catching up on the minutiae of our lives.

  Monday attacked me before I was ready. “I talked to the sister.” Micky Goldenstone was back, but he wasn’t crying. Neither was he sitting. He was pacing, prowling around my office like a sleek black panther.

  “Lavonn.”

  He nodded, but I wasn’t convinced he’d heard me. He may have simply been agreeing with some unheard dialogue that tolled in his head alone. He continued to pace.

  “What did she say?”

  He closed his eyes, and I wasn’t sure he would answer, but then he did. “Said she remembers me.”

  I braced myself. Mickys sessions were more like a highspeed roller coaster than therapy.

  “She smiled,” he said, and stared out the window. “Like I was her best friend in the world.” He nodded. “Invited me in. Asked if I wanted a Coke or something. Said she’d had a crush on me. That all the girls did.”

  I took a careful breath, not wanting to disturb him. Trying to wait. But it was no good. He was lost in the turmoil of his past. “So Kaneasha didn’t tell her about the incident.”

  I knew the instant the question left my mouth that I had chosen the wrong phrase. Micky wasn’t one to mince words. He was more apt to serve them whole and let you choke them down or puke them up. Didn’t matter to him.