Watchin' The Detective: A Mystery Dinner Romance

by Louise Hathaway

  “Yeah. Can’t you just see me on the cover of a Nancy Drew book with my flashlight? ‘Discover what terrors lurk behind the doors of the murder mystery dinner theater’.”

  Nicole starts laughing and says, “What did you mean by ‘we could go there’?”

  “You like playing golf, don’t you?”

  “Yeah. Miniature Golf.”

  “Have you ever played a real golf game?”

  “Yeah. In high school.”

  “Well, there you go. We can ask Josh to join us,” she suggests as a further temptation.

  “That might be fun.”

  “You like him, don’t you Nicole?”

  “What’s not to like?”

  “He’s a really good dancer and he’s very romantic.”

  “You better let him down easy. I don’t want to be the one who has to come in to sweep up the mess.”

  “Are you kidding? He’s going to be the one to drop me like a hot potato when he realizes that you’re the one for him.”

  “We shall see.”

  “I’ll call him later. Right now, he’s in a bit of a bad mood about his car.”

  “What happened to his car?”

  “Someone stole the front windshield.”

  “You’re kidding?”

  “No. I’m not.”

  “Did this happen on your date last night?”

  “I was with him when he found out.”

  “Poor Joshua.”

  “Yeah. Maybe you might want to call and console him?”

  “You think so?”

  “Yeah, I’m just saying.”

  “Okay. I think I will.”

  “Great! Hey…I just thought of something. Why don’t you be the one to invite him to play a round of golf with us? That way, the focus will be more on you. And, while you’re entertaining him, I can go snoop around.”

  “That might be fun.”

  “Give him a call this afternoon and maybe we can all meet at the dinner theater after work tonight.”

  “I hope he’s had a new windshield installed by then.”

  “Me, too. Poor guy,” Isabella says.

  *******

  Around 5:30 PM, Isabella and Nicole pull into the parking lot of the golf course. They look around for Joshua’s car, but don’t see it yet. Nicole has changed into some cut-offs which show off her great legs. Isabella is wearing sweat pants and a baggy t-shirt that has some olive oil stains on it. She wants Joshua’s attention to be totally focused on her friend and how good Nicole looks.

  “There he is!” Nicole says, recognizing his VW.

  He waves at them and pulls into to the parking spot next to Isabella’s car.

  He gets out of his car and walks over to Isabella and gives her a kiss.

  She says, “Hi, Joshua. Well, I see you have a windshield now. Was it a big hassle?”

  “No. It wasn’t too bad,” he says and notices Nicole for the first time. “Hi, how are you doing?” he asks her. Try as he may, he can’t help but notice how good she looks in her cut offs.

  Isabella is doing her best not to get jealous. This was my idea, after all. It isn’t his fault, she reminds herself. She breaks up the awkwardness of the situation by saying, “So, are you two kids ready to play some golf?”

  “Sure. Let’s rock and roll,” Joshua says.

  They rent some clubs and set off for the first hole. Isabella says, “You guys go ahead. I’ll catch up later. I have some business to attend to in the clubhouse.”

  “What business?” Joshua says.

  “I’ll tell you later,” she reassures him.

  “Do you want us to wait for you?” Joshua asks.

  “No. You guys go ahead. It’ll only take a few minutes.” She thinks, ‘He is so sweet and considerate.’

  “Okay. Bye for now,” Joshua says, as Isabella watches two of her favorite people walk off together.

  Do I really want to give him up? she wonders. Think about that gorgeous detective right now. He’s the one you want, she reminds herself.

  She sets her clubs against the wall and walks into the restaurant where the mystery dinner theater performs. She looks around and doesn’t see anyone; so, she walks over to the table where she was sitting on the night of the murder and sits down in the chair where she had sat that night. She looks across the room to where the man was shot. Then looks over to where the actors came out with their flashlights. There is a partition that separates the dining room from the kitchen, so she gets up and looks behind the screen.

  She feels a hand on her shoulder and jumps, trying her best not to scream.

  She spins around and finds herself face-to-face with Hamid, the prime suspect, (at least according to her reckoning).

  He asks her, “May I help you?”

  She has to think fast on her feet and says, “Oh, I’m just scouting for locations to have a sweet-sixteen party for my niece. I understand you have murder mystery performances here?”

  “You know that we do, Madame. You were just here.”

  Isabella shudders. Damn. He recognizes me.

  “Well, okay then. I’ll be moving on. I’m playing a round of golf with my friends out there,” she tells him, pointing towards the golf course.

  He tells her, “Enjoy your game.”

  Or else, she imagines the creep saying.

  As she is leaving the restaurant, she recognizes one of the waitresses and “Henri”, from the other night, talking to each other in the bar.

  When she heads out towards the golf course, she is in for another shocker—there in the parking lot is Detective Sterling getting out of his car.

  “Holy crap!” she says aloud. I don’t want him to see me dressed like this!

  She tries to dodge into the restroom before he sees her, but it’s too late.

  “Isabella? Is that you?” he asks.

  Damn! she thinks. Despite her embarrassment, she is thrilled to be in his charismatic presence once again. She tells him, “I’m here playing golf with some friends.”

  “It’s a nice day for it. Enjoy your game.”

  “Okay. I gotta go catch up with them,” she says, wishing she’d worn different clothes.

  “Oh, okay. See you later,” he says and walks into the restaurant.

  She wants to call out, ‘Wait! Come back! Take me to your house in San Juan Capistrano.’ But that isn’t happening today, or maybe ever. I wonder what he’s doing here? she thinks. I’d sure like to know if Hamid is his prime suspect, too.

  In resignation, she heads back out to the course to catch up with Nicole and Joshua. They are already on the fifth hole. Nicole sets a ball on the tee and hits a beautiful stroke that lands her right on the green, almost a hole in one. She hollers, “Yes!” and raises her fist. He pats her on the back, laughing and sharing her joy. They sure are having fun without me, Isabella pouts. Talk about three’s a crowd.

  She changes her mind about joining them, and lugs her clubs back to the patio outside the restaurant, deciding to stay there and wait for their game to be over. She would only slow them down. Besides, they’re having so much fun without me.

  After about twenty minutes, she is still sitting in the patio and looking out at the course, trying to catch sight of them, when she hears her name. She turns around and says, “Detective! Hi! It’s so nice to see you!” She temporarily forgets the way she’s dressed; she so happy to see him again right now.

  “Can I get you something to drink?” he asks.

  God bless you, she wants to say. She was starting to feel like she didn’t have a friend in the world. “A Diet-Coke would be great,” she tells him.

  He buys two Diet Cokes out of a vending machine and comes back to sit next to her at a table. He says, “It’s a beautiful evening, isn’t it?”

  “Yes. It sure is.”

  “I thought you were going to play golf.”

  “I changed my mind.”

  “Is everything okay? You’ve been acting like you’ve just seen a ghost.”

  “I
guess I’m still pretty shaken up by the murder.”

  “It was horrible, wasn’t it?”

  “Yes. Do you have some new leads?”

  “A few.”

  “Are you close to catching the bad guy?”

  “I hope so.”

  “So, do you think Hamid might have done it? Is that why you’re here?”

  “I wish I could discuss it with you, but I can’t. I hope you understand.”

  “Sure. I do.”

  They are quiet for a while, looking out towards the golf course. He breaks the silence by saying, “You must be hot in those sweatpants.”

  If you only knew, her dirty mind thinks, but she modestly says, “I can move about more freely when I wear them.”

  “Oh, I see,” he says.

  What a lame thing for me to say, she tells herself.

  “How’s the library doing these days?”

  “Pretty good. Just the usual stuff.”

  “Oh, really.”

  Why can’t we have a normal conversation? she wonders. I feel like a thirteen year old on her first date.

  He stands up and says, “Well, I’ve got to get going now. Maybe I’ll stop by the library and see you sometime.”

  “That would be fantastic!” she says, with so much enthusiasm that it embarrasses her.

  He smiles and puts out his hand for her to shake. Once again, he holds hers a lot longer than other guys would, especially with a woman who looks as sloppy as she does right now.

  “See you later, Isabella,” he says and gives her his million dollar smile.

  “Goodbye, Detective Sterling.”

  “Call me Don.”

  “Okay. Bye, Don.” She admires his butt as he walks away. Oh, so we’re on a first-name basis, now. Sounds encouraging, she thinks, giving herself a badly-needed pep talk. She especially needs to be her own “rah-rah club” when she notices Nicole and Joshua laughing together and slowly making their way back to the clubhouse to meet up with her again.

  Joshua sees her and says, “Isabella, what happened to you? We were worried.”

  Yeah, right! Isabella feels like snarkily replying. Instead, she says, “I ran in to Detective Sterling.”

  “Oh, really,” Nicole says.

  “I was surprised to see him.”

  “Why was he here?”

  “He wouldn’t say.”

  “Hmm…,” Nicole says.

  Joshua unlocks his car door and tells them, “I’ll see you guys later. I had great time.”

  “Bye,” they tell him.

  A car pulls up next to Isabella’s and a lady in dark sunglasses gets out. The first thing about her that Isabella notices is that her shoes are gorgeous; they are also the same shoes she saw on the murder victim’s wife the night he was killed. I wonder why she’s here? Isabella asks herself.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Isabella lies in bed listening to the far off sound of an Amtrak train horn. She always loved that sound. It seems to beckon her to come travel somewhere far away. The neighborhood is quiet now except for the occasional cry of a mocking bird that never seems to give up his quest for a mate. She can still hear the cackle of her neighbor’s TV through the screen door, even at 10:30.

  Her brain swims with the activities of the day. She remembers her encounter with Hamid and of course her time with Detective Sterling. I wonder what he’s doing right now? Maybe he’s lying in bed thinking about me. Yeah, right! If only!

  Oddly, her mind returns to the visit that day at the dinner theater. Something stuck with her after she looked at the room in the daylight. Where she sat. Where the man sat who was shot. Where his poor wife sat. The dining room was all in white with fresh table cloths and chairs. It seems miles away from that awful darkness that she remembers. Why did this stick with her so much? It was his poor wife that she remembered most. The look on her face. The sound of her crying out. The look in her eyes. She could not forget that moment. The memory of Hamid touching her shoulder was certainly an awful moment. She shudders when recalling his cold look and gravelly voice. Seeing Detective Sterling brought her out of her dread into another, more wonderful world. She felt whiplashed by all the emotions over that thirty minute timespan. And yet she always returns to the wife. Karen. The look on her face is stuck in her memory.

  Isabella gets out of bed and walks into the kitchen for some water. Taking a sip, she can see the moon just rising over the tops of the Italian cypress trees out the kitchen window. Her backyard looks so bucolic in that light. Her mind wanders back to that man’s wife. She walks into the bathroom and looks at herself in the mirror. What is wrong with you girl? Her eyes stare back, looking for an answer she didn’t have. That’s it! she says to the mirror. Somehow I have to find out what Karen’s story is. She hasn’t been this driven to do something since her childhood days when she read her first Nancy Drew book and couldn’t put it down. She goes upstairs and fires up the computer. She continues her earlier searches in Google when she was at work. She plows through innumerable links and starts learning all about this Karen Black. Isabella has access to many library news search systems and uses them all to put together a picture of this new widow. Where she lives and what her life has been like over the past ten years. Isabella smirks when she thinks about how readily most of this information is. She glances over at the clock and sees that it’s after 2:00 AM. I better try and get some sleep! She shuts the lid on her notebook, turns out the lights, and makes her way down the stairs to try and get some rest before the morning alarm wakes her. Her mind is spinning with her new-found knowledge of Karen Black. Oh man, I wish I could talk to the detective. Wouldn’t he be surprised?

  *******

  The alarm clock radio comes to life with a searing bit of Queen telling Isabella that they are the champions. Reaching over, she turns off the alarm and falling back into bed, stares at the ceiling debating whether to call in sick. I have to go: I’ve got that meeting at 10. If I don’t show up for my own meeting, I’ll never hear the end of it. Dragging herself out of bed, she jumps into the shower as her mind immediately clicks back into Karen Black mode. She is trying to organize all the facts she’s discovered as she shampoos her hair. Stepping out of the shower, she sees her tired self in the mirror. It’s been a rough night. Maybe this is what old spinsters look like, she tells herself.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Isabella is late for work and hurries past the courthouse and Joshua’s coffee cart. He has a long line and is deep into mixing up coffee drinks for the overwhelmed public thirsting for caffeine fixes. She smiles and looks his way, but he’s too busy to notice her. Slipping quietly in the back door of the library, she tip-toes past the office of the director hoping she doesn’t notice she’s late.

  “Good morning, Isabella. Had another late night?” the director says to her, without looking up.

  Sheepishly, Isabella replies, “I’m sorry Mrs. Rogers. I just lost track of time.”

  “Please try not to make a habit of this. Nicole has been looking all over for you. Something about a meeting you scheduled?”

  “Yes, thank you. I’ll just go and speak with her.”

  Isabella slinks over to her desk and sees Nicole glaring at her, not saying a word. Two men are sitting with Nicole, looking very much out of place there in the library in their three piece suits. Nicole gets up and excusing herself, walks over to Isabella’s desk.

  “Where have you been? It’s past 9 o’clock already! Did you forget the meeting you scheduled with these publishers?”

  “I’m so sorry, Nicole, I just lost track of time. I thought the meeting was at 10. Why are they here so early?”

  “Ten? You told me it was nine.” Nicole passes her a note written by Isabella clearly showing the meeting was to be at nine.

  “Geez Nicole, I’m losing my mind. I’m so sorry. Please forgive me. Why don’t we get the meeting started and get this over with.”

  They walk back to Nicole’s desk as both men stand and shake hands, exchanging all the re
quired niceties. They all gather in the conference room and begin to talk about books and publishing. Even though Isabella arranged this meeting, Nicole has found herself doing most of the talking, working out the arrangements for new books and subscription details. Isabella smiles blankly and thinks about nothing but Karen Black. The conversation fades in and out of her ears, but the image of Karen Black sticks in her mind. Finally, after an hour of talking and proposals, everyone stands, shakes hands and agrees on a follow-up meeting next month at the same time. Isabella offers her apologies again and promises she’ll be better prepared next time. Nicole walks out with them and Isabella returns to her desk. Fighting the urge to return to Karen, she start’s working through her email, sorting the good and bad and answering those that she can. Nicole returns and motions for her to follow her to the conference room. Nicole shuts the door behind her and they both sit down.

  “What is going on with you, girl?” Nicole asks. “You’re a million miles away!”

  “I can’t stop thinking about that night. That night at the mystery dinner theater. After our visit, or maybe I should say, my visit to the restaurant yesterday, I came away with more questions than when I came.”

  “Isabella, are you going nuts in love with that detective? Is that what it is?”

  “Well, it’s that too. I mean, I can’t stop thinking about him, sure. I just can’t stop thinking about the poor woman, that widow. Something about her is making me crazy.”

  “I guess so!” Nicole says.

  “Nicole, last night I spent four hours researching the woman and what I’ve found only makes me wonder more! It’s like I’ve stumbled into a mystery story in a parallel universe!”

  “Did you drink something funny last night?”

  “No, no. I was totally sober. No alcohol in the house. Maybe if I did, I wouldn’t be in this situation. And to make things even stranger, when we left the golf course last night, I saw that woman, Karen Black, drive in and park right next to me.”

  “It was pretty dark, Isabella. How could you be so sure?”