Murder Most Lovely

by Hank Edwards

  Stewing over the rumors Christy always subtly dropped every time he saw her, Michael looked at Steve, then to Ezra over his shoulder. “And to answer your question, even though it is of a more personal nature than I care to address—” Dammit, there was that persnickety personality trait of his again! “—I have sampled from other parts of the buffet and am quite happy with where I ended up.”

  Steve nodded as he turned off Lake Shore Drive and onto the access road for Hardscrabble Beach. “Good to hear, good to hear. I’d hate to think you didn’t at least indulge in a free sample at one time or another.” He eased the van between two sheriff’s cruisers with their red-and-blue light bars flashing. When he was satisfied with the position of the van, he stopped and shifted into Park, then looked at Michael and winked. “Because I took a sample or two from other parts of the buffet in my younger days. I didn’t mind it, kind of liked it, actually, but it didn’t seem to stick with me. Shall we?”

  Michael watched Steve step out the door. He shot Ezra a startled look, and the young man’s brown eyes were huge behind his glasses.

  What had they just heard? Was Steve bisexual? Or had he merely been bi-curious when he was younger?

  And why the hell was Michael thinking about any of this now when there was a body on the beach he needed to tend to?

  Steve was already out of the van, and Ezra climbed out the same side as Michael.

  “Sir?” Ezra began quietly.

  “I’ve told you that you can call me Michael. But yes?”

  Ezra blushed and studied his feet for a moment. When he looked up, he was smiling. “Um, I’m gay too. Thought you should know.” Then he scurried away to assist Steve with the gurney and body bag.

  Surprised once more, Michael stood there with his mouth open, then snapped it shut. He’d had his suspicions about Ezra, but never intended to ask. He smiled to himself.

  Who knew his understudy would be an awkward gay Jewish man, just like himself?

  Head back on the job, Michael stood by the hood of the van to survey the scene from a distance. The police had laid a tarp over the body and weighted it down with rocks bigger than Todd Witlow would have been picking out of his ass after prom—damn Steve for putting that image in his head—then strung crime-scene tape between a few stakes hammered into the ground. Big waves rolled onto the sandy shoreline, splashing high across the unusual outcroppings of rocks here and there, the broken fragments of the high bluffs south of town. Far to the north, the Lacetown Light stood sentry on the coast while seabirds shrieked and circled overhead.

  It was all just like a scene Brock Hammer would have worked.

  Turning to look back the way they had come, Michael noted how close the body was to the outdoor deck of Joe’s Fishery, one of Lacetown’s most popular seafood restaurants. A good number of tables were already occupied, the diners all staring raptly at the crime scene. Head held high, Michael trod through the white sand, his shoes flicking the uncharacteristic little rocks that had given the beach its name.

  “Mikey!”

  Oh dear God. Not now, and not here. It couldn’t be, could it?

  A hand waved from one of the tables up on the deck. Even from this distance, Michael could discern the liver spots and wrinkles of his grandfather, Joel Fleishman. A widower long retired from the funeral business, Grandpa enjoyed drinking manhattans and flirting with the Lacetown senior women. And he was the only person in the world who called him Mikey.

  “Mikey, over here!”

  Michael nodded and lifted a hand to show he’d heard, then quickly turned his back. It was time to get to work.

  “What have we got?” Michael asked as he approached the sheriff, who stood alongside two of his deputies, Mark Tanner and Greg Tompkins—the male half of the Tompkins twins.

  Sheriff Hilton Musgrave was about as wide as he was tall, and he looked at Michael like he’d just farted in church. “A body, washed up on the beach, with his hands cut off. I told you this over the phone.”

  “Yes, right. Of course.”

  Dick, Michael thought, then set down the black leather bag he carried for his coroner work and snapped it open. He handed latex gloves to Steve and Ezra before pulling on some himself. He knelt beside the tarp and let out a sharp exhale as one of the hidden rocks in the sandy beach dug into his knee. He reached down to flick it away and find a softer spot to kneel, but not before Steve noticed.

  “See?” Steve smirked and winked. “Imagine how poor ol’ Todd felt after prom.”

  “Todd Witlow who ran the old bowling alley?” Musgrave said, then laughed. “That dumbass. Nice guy, but damn, he was a dumbass.”

  “Ah, Todd was all right,” Steve said. “He’d never do anyone any harm.”

  “Unless you didn’t return your bowling shoes,” Musgrave countered, then looked at Michael. “Right?”

  Since Michael hadn’t been bowling since a twelfth birthday party, he didn’t really have an opinion.

  “Shall we lift the tarp?” Michael asked, voice a little louder than needed in order to interrupt Steve and Musgrave’s stroll down memory lane.

  “Let’s take a gander,” Steve said and moved to the other side of the tarp.

  “We’ll lift it from this side.” Michael gestured to the edge nearest him, then said to Ezra, “That way we can keep it angled to prevent the curious diners at Joe’s Fishery from gawking.”

  Ezra nodded and from the corner of his eye, Michael saw Musgrave and both deputies turn to look up at the deck.

  “Hey, isn’t that your grandpa?” Ezra asked.

  The sheriff sniffed. “Yup. Probably on his third manhattan by now. Good thing the widows all take turns driving him around town.”

  Michael ignored him. He took a breath, then tugged the tarp out from under the rocks and lifted it. Steve stood on the opposite side and took hold of the tarp, shielding the body from view of the restaurant.

  It was a man, and he wore tight jeans made from a floral-patterned denim, a lightweight red henley, and a gold chain around his neck. Michael noted the bone and exposed muscle at the end of the wrists where the hands had been severed. Looked like a postmortem cut.

  He glanced at the victim’s face. A tremble rattled through him, and a cold burst of shock went off inside his chest like a depth charge.

  Rocking back on his heels, Michael rested his hands, palms up, on his thighs. His surprise must have been evident in his expression, because Steve leaned in over the tarp to peer at the body.

  “You okay, Captain?” Steve asked. “Looks like you’ve seen a ghost.”

  “What?” Michael stared at Steve’s ruggedly handsome face. “Oh. Yes. It’s just that… I think I know him.”

  “What?” Musgrave came around the tarp to stand behind Michael. “You know him?”

  “Well, I don’t know him know him,” Michael said, stammering slightly. “I mean, I know who he is, but not what he’s about.”

  Musgrave and Steve exchanged puzzled looks, and then the sheriff said, “What’s that supposed to mean, Fleishman?”

  Michael gestured toward the body, letting his gaze move over the young man in his very early twenties, blond highlights in his brown hair. “I saw him yesterday at a book signing at the Literary Fest.”

  “Is he a writer?” Ezra asked.

  “No, but he was with one of the authors.” Michael swallowed past a lump in his throat and thought about Jazz.

  He couldn’t have done this, could he?

  No, not his Jazz.

  He shook his head at the possessiveness he’d been feeling about a man he had only just met and never even gone out with for ice cream.

  And now here lay the lover of Jazz’s ex, who had made Jazz so angry.

  “What’s the victim’s name?” Musgrave asked.

  “I don’t remember offhand, but I know someone who might,” Michael said, his heart skipping all of a sudden.

  “Mikey!” The name echoed across the beach from Joe’s Fishery. “Show us the goods! Come on, give us a q
uick look!”

  As one, Michael, Steve, Ezra, Musgrave, and the deputies looked up to the restaurant patio where Grandpa was staring at them, an old lady on each arm.

  “No, Grandpa,” Michael called back.

  “Bah,” Grandpa blustered. “You’re no fun!”

  None of the recovery team responded, but Michael thought he saw a smile from Steve.

  “So you know somebody who might ID John Doe here?” Musgrave reiterated.

  Michael resisted the urge to look at Musgrave like he’d just farted in church. Instead he calmly replied, “Yes, I can get you a name.”

  Michael could have given Musgrave Russell’s name, then let the man investigate on his own. But selfishly and impulsively, he knew that if there ever was a good excuse to call Jazz, this was it.

  Chapter Four

  JAZZ RAN a brush through the lush blonde hair, his fingers trailing after it. “Your hair feels good. You’re still using the hair mask I recommended, right?”

  “I’ve been using raw eggs on it!” His client, Margaret—a woman in her late fifties with sun-damaged skin and eyes the color of new pennies—smiled brightly at him in the mirror. “Does it feel different?”

  Oh, the silly things clients read on the internet. At least it was harmless and she wasn’t using Clorox on her hair to lighten it because she thought that was the ingredient in hair bleach, like she had last summer. It had taken him months to get her hair back in shape!

  “It does. I like it.” Jazz plucked at a small piece of hair. “Oops, there’s a feather. Must be a side effect.”

  “What?” Margaret looked stricken.

  Jazz crouched down behind her and smirked into the mirror. “Just a joke.”

  Margaret laughed and fanned herself. “You had me worried for a minute there.”

  “Well, consider that your cardio workout for the day.” Jazz did a few more touch-ups, doused her good with a firm-hold hairspray, and then pulled the cape off with a snap of his wrist. “Ta-da! All set, Lady Margaret.”

  “It looks great.” She examined herself side to side in the mirror, then did a little hair flip—the surefire sign every woman did when they loved their hair.

  Damn, Jazz loved his job.

  Instant gratification all day long.

  “Jazz, you’ve got a phone call,” Lisa Ann called from the reception desk.

  “Be right there,” he answered.

  After he scanned Margaret’s credit card on his phone app, he helped gather her things, then led her to the desk so she could schedule her next appointment. Being an independent contractor, Jazz had initially taken an income hit leaving his thriving clientele behind when he dumped Russell and moved to Lacetown. But since the previous summer, he’d become just as busy as he had been in Bloomfield Hills, a high-end Detroit suburb. Maybe even busier due to the expensive retirement complex, the Bluffs at Lake View. Hell, some of his more obsessed customers made the cross-state drive anyway.

  He plucked up the hair mask Margaret was supposed to be using and placed it on the counter in front of her. “Alternate this between the eggs, deal?”

  She smiled, nodding at him. “Okay, I will. When should I see you again?”

  “Six weeks,” he told her. “Lisa Ann will get you all set up.”

  “Line one, it’s some guy,” Lisa Ann said, before she began helping Margaret.

  “Ooh, some guy,” Jazz said, winking at Margaret and resisting the urge to add “cream of sum yung guy,” a bad gay joke he’d heard once, because Margaret didn’t really appreciate dirty humor.

  He picked up the phone and pushed the button for line one. “Jazz Dilworth speaking.”

  “Oh, um, hi, Jazz, I didn’t mean to bother you at work,” a man said, sounding rather awkward. “I told your receptionist I could call you later, but….”

  “Michael!” he said, genuinely happy to hear the adorable man’s voice. Jazz leaned one hip on the desk and switched the receiver to his other ear, grinning wide and gazing out the front window of the shop at the lake sparkling in the distance. “I’m so glad you called.”

  “You are?” He sounded surprised. “I didn’t know that this was your work number. I can call back… if I’m bothering you.”

  “I just said I was glad you called, so don’t go hanging up on me now,” Jazz teased.

  “Oh, um, okay,” Michael said, letting out a breathless laugh.

  Yesterday Jazz had been wound as tight as a ball of rubber bands, thinking about confronting Russell, until chance introduced him to the gorgeous funeral director.

  And now, said gorgeous funeral director was calling him.

  Talk about a great day!

  “I was gonna call you when I got off work,” Jazz told him.

  “You were?”

  “Yeah,” Jazz assured him. “Since you’re obviously a booklover, I wondered if you’d be interested in going down to the Literary Fest tonight. There’s supposed to be a beer garden and live music.”

  “You were?” he repeated, sounding genuinely shocked.

  “Interested?” Jazz’s heart fluttered all of a sudden. Michael’s nervousness must be contagious because Jazz was usually much more confident with guys.

  “Oh, um, yes,” he said finally.

  When Jazz heard the smile in his voice, he let out the breath he’d been holding.

  Since when was Jazz shy about asking out a man?

  “I get off at four,” Jazz said. “How about we meet at seven?”

  “Yes, that sounds stupendous.”

  Stupendous? Oh this guy was so cute and old-fashioned. Made Jazz want to bring his mama chocolates and flowers, then ask his daddy for permission to court their son.

  “But, um….” Michael was hesitant again.

  Jazz’s stomach dropped. Was he not interested? Had Jazz forgotten to reset his gaydar?

  “Well, you see…,” Michael began.

  Dammit, he’s not gay. You read that all wrong, idiot!

  “The reason I called is in an official capacity,” Michael went on. “Remember Russell’s young boyfriend at the signing yesterday?”

  Jazz stood up straighter and frowned. “Yeah, I remember.”

  “Well, he’s dead.”

  “What?”

  Michael cleared his throat. “Yes, deceased. And there appears to have been foul play.”

  “Oh my God,” Jazz declared, then shot a look at Lisa Ann and Margaret. Thankfully the phone was cordless, and he was able to walk away for some privacy. “What happened?”

  “I-I’m not at liberty to say,” Michael said. “See, that’s why I called. I was wondering if you knew the deceased’s name or how to get ahold of Russell. We need to speak with him.”

  “Dylan Roberts,” Jazz said, his mind a whirl. “That’s his name. Oh my God, is Russell a suspect?”

  Jazz heard Michael repeating Dylan’s name to someone. “It’s not up for me to decide, but a significant other is typically questioned,” Michael answered Jazz. “Hold on a second.” There was a muffling sound like Michael covered the receiver, and then he said to Jazz, “You know, it might be a good idea for you to go down to the station and tell the sheriff what you know about Dylan. Any information could be helpful.”

  “Of course,” Jazz said at once, but then his throat tightened and he fought back a gasp. A lot of people saw him yelling at Russell at the book signing.

  And if Russell was questioned, that meant Jazz would be too.

  Shit, do I need to call a lawyer?

  “Um, in light of all this sad news, you can have a rain check on tonight if you want.” Michael cleared his throat. “I’m sorry for your loss.”

  “No, no,” Jazz insisted. “I’d still like to see you. And it’s not my loss. I didn’t know Dylan.” Shit, shit! Did that make me sound guilty? “I mean, it’s sad and all, but I don’t know the guy.”

  “Oh, um, yeah, okay.” Then to someone else, Michael said rather sternly, “Yes, I know it’s an open investigation. May I have some privacy, please?�
�� Then he was talking to Jazz again. “The sheriff acts like this is my first rodeo. I’ve been the county coroner for thirteen years.”

  “Oh, that’s cool,” Jazz said, feeling stupid the moment he said it.

  “Jazz?”

  “Yes?”

  “You didn’t have anything to do with this, did you?”

  “Good God, no!” he cried, and everyone in the salon looked up at him. He moved a couple of feet away and lowered his voice. “I totally have an alibi!”

  Michael let out a breath. “That’s good to hear. But, Jazz?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Do yourself a favor and talk to Sheriff Musgrave, okay?”

  “Yeah, I will.” Hoping this whole thing wasn’t going to overshadow the evening he’d hoped for, he added, “Might make me a little late for our date, though.”

  “Yes, that’s okay. I don’t mind waiting for you. Just call me. You have my number.” The pleasure in Michael’s voice came through the airwaves loud and clear.

  “I will.”

  Though Jazz was suddenly afraid he was going to get sucked into trouble right along with Russell, a night of getting to know Michael would make it all so much more bearable.

  Chapter Five

  “SCORING A date at a crime scene,” Steve said as they wheeled the loaded gurney toward the van. “Smooth moves you got there, Captain.”

  Michael pursed his lips in annoyance. Though excited about his date and annoyed that his employees and Sheriff Musgrave had been listening in, Michael was also nervous.

  A jilted lover was always a prime suspect.

  Strangely, Michael believed Jazz when he’d said he wasn’t involved, but he had no evidence. At least not until he conducted a thorough autopsy.

  Steve opened the back doors of the van, and once they had the front of the gurney and poor Dylan Roberts’s remains inside, they collapsed the legs and slid it all the way in. They secured the gurney, and as they slammed the doors shut, Ezra asked, “Who’s your date with? Anyone I know?”