“Nice to meet you, Priscilla.” Sofia wasn’t going to let this get awkward. “Where are the Maloneys?”
Aidan came out of Brendan’s office. “Good morning.”
He was positively glowing, like pregnant women were supposed to glow but usually didn’t. Maybe it was the pink reflected off the walls.
“Coffee?” Sofia held up his cappuccino.
He looked toward Priscilla. She shook her head.
“I only Drink Swiss glacier water,” Aidan explained. “It’s calming and better for the pores.”
The pores? This episode of The Twilight Zone was getting weirder and weirder. She decided to run with it. That was what she’d learned in improv—go with the flow, stay open to the situation, just say “yes, and” to everything. “Anyone else want a cappuccino?”
“I’ll take it.” The painter who had let her in held out his tanned hand.
“You bet.” She handed the painter the cappuccino. A regretful expression flashed across Aidan’s face, but he didn’t say anything.
“I thought you were on vacation,” Aidan said.
“Got back last night.” She took another sip of coffee and waited. She’d decided to play this as Cool and Unflappable Private Eye. “Where’s Brendan?”
“In San Diego for a conference.”
“I wonder why he told me to come in today for an early meeting.” She arched one eyebrow. Unflappable.
“He asked you to come here? Today? This morning? By eight?” He wasn’t doing very well on the unflappable scale. He looked positively flapped.
She checked her phone. “Meeting starts in five minutes.”
He went pale. Apparently glacier water wasn’t so calming after all.
“I have to say I’m surprised Brendan wants you to paint the walls pink.” More than surprised.
“It’s not pink.” Priscilla wagged a white-lacquered finger at her. “It’s grapefruit.”
Now that she mentioned it, the walls did look like a giant pink grapefruit. This was probably not a distinction Brendan was going to care about.
“Besides,” said Priscilla, “Brendan Maloney doesn’t make all the decisions around here.”
Someone in the doorway cleared his throat, and everyone turned.
There stood Brendan Maloney, owner of Maloney Investigations, the kindest and calmest person Sofia had ever met. He looked from the grapefruit walls to his son. Then to Priscilla and to Sofia. Then to Aidan again.
She wished she’d brought popcorn. This was going to be a show.
Then she felt sorry for Brendan. He had dark circles under his Irish blue eyes, and he looked pale. Was he sick? How much had changed while she’d been gone?
“I brought you coffee.” She walked over and put it into his hand. “Black, like you like it.”
“Thank you, Sofia.” He took a slow sip, then a long one. It looked as if he was counting to ten. Twice. “We have a client meeting in a few minutes.”
“I know,” she said.
“Aidan,” Brendan said, in his deceptively calm voice. Aidan must have recognized it too, because he flinched. “May I see you in my office?”
Oh, to be a fly on that wall.
“You, too, Sofia,” said Aidan. He clearly didn’t want to be alone with his dad. She got it. Nobody wanted to be around Brendan when he used that voice.
The three of them headed to Brendan’s office.
Then it got worse. Brendan’s desk was gone, his filing cabinets, which held years’ worth of case files, too. His eyes moved around the room and he gripped the coffee cup so tight the lid popped off. She picked it off the bare concrete and handed it back to him.
“The files are in storage,” Aidan said. “Don’t worry.”
“The files?” Brendan turned in a slow circle. At least his walls weren’t pink yet.
She decided someone had to talk about the giant pink elephant in the room. “Tell us about this remodel, Aidan.”
“Priscilla brought in contractors from her design firm. They’re working for a huge discount. They’ll even paint the floors.” He was talking fast. “New furniture will be delivered later today. I was going to surprise you guys. We’re going for modern. Professional. Sleek. Snow-white furniture.”
“Snow White? Princess-approved?” She couldn’t help herself.
Brendan took another long sip of coffee. “I need to speak to Aidan alone, Sofia.”
Aiden looked ready to melt into the concrete. She’d hate to miss this, but she wasn’t about to risk getting into an argument with Brendan today. She went back to the main office, closing Brendan’s door carefully behind her. The painters had gone back to work, and the grapefruit-color was spreading. It actually looked pretty good.
“So,” she said to Priscilla, “when did Aiden hire you?”
“He didn’t exactly hire me. It’s more of a favor.” Priscilla smiled.
Sofia finally got it.
Aidan and Priscilla were dating.
“About two weeks?” Sofia asked. “Give or take?”
“It’s been a whirlwind.”
Sofia tried hard not to look at Priscilla’s enormous boobs. “I bet.”
A muffled rumble came from the office behind them, and the painters looked over nervously. It sounded like Brendan was just getting started.
“Excuse me, Priscilla,” she said. “I need to go outside to make a call.”
By the time Aidan and Brendan came out to the parking lot, she’d solved one problem.
“I apologize for making you come in so early for nothing, Sofia.” Brendan looked like he’d run a marathon.
“I called Cassie from upstairs,” she told him. “Her team is at an off-site meeting this morning, and she’s coming over with a key any second. We can use their conference room for the client meeting, and we’ll have the place all to ourselves, in case the meeting is a delicate one.”
Cassie ran the temp agency in the same building, specializing in administrative assistants, bookkeepers and a little IT. Sofia had figured it was a long shot to ask for her help, but Cassie had come through. Maybe she wanted to see the remodel.
“Good work, Sofia,” Aidan said.
He almost never complimented her. Clearly, the situation was bad.
Before Brendan could say anything, Cassie arrived. She was a well-dressed brunette in her early forties. She’d tied her hair up in a bun and wore oversized black-framed glasses. Her green business suit and silk shirt looked tailored. She reminded Sofia of Lynda Carter as Diana Prince, secretary and superheroine. Sofia made a mental note to save her look as “sexy but smart businesswoman” in case she ever needed it.
“Thanks for coming out so early,” Brendan said. “We appreciate it.”
“I’m always happy to help you, Mr. Maloney.” Cassie straightened her glasses and smiled up at Brendan.
That was a fine bit of flirting. Sofia glanced over at Aidan to see if he’d noticed, but he was too wrapped up in his own drama. Brendan was wearing the half-smile that made his dimple stand out and might even have blushed. He must be picking up on it, too.
Cassie unlocked her door and went inside, turning on lights. “I’ll brew some tea, then make myself scarce. Miss Salgado said it might be a tricky situation.”
“I appreciate your discretion.” Brendan stood in the middle of the room and looked around uncertainly.
“The conference room is on your left.” Cassie pointed.
Sofia went in. The conference room was tidy and much nicer than Brendan’s office had been, even before the arrival of the Priscilla tornado—clean walls painted a pale green, a wooden table, and comfortable office chairs a few shades darker than the walls. Cassie even had a living tree in the corner. It was a ficus, like in their office, but hers was leafed-out and bright green instead of brown and dying. Sofia looked around to make sure no one was watching, then touched a leaf. Real.
Brendan came in and visibly relaxed. “This is perfect.”
“Thank you,” Cassie called. “I’ll b
ring in tea when it’s ready. How many cups?”
“Four,” Brendan said. “Five to be safe. If it’s not too much trouble.”
“You got it.” Cassie disappeared and rattling noises came from the kitchen.
“I’m going downstairs to catch the client before she goes into our regular offices,” Brendan said. “And, Sofia, thank you. You really saved our bacon.”
He left, and Aidan collapsed into one of the green chairs, dropping his head into his hands. He looked like a man who needed a cappuccino more than he needed Swiss glacier water.
“So,” she asked, “what have you been doing since I went on vacation?”
“I know it was an awkward first meeting, but Priscilla’s amazing.” He smiled in a goofy way and sighed.
She crossed to the window to watch Brendan waiting in the parking lot. “I bet.”
“Don’t be that way, Sofes. I think you guys could be really great friends.”
She didn’t think Priscilla wanted to be her friend, but she supposed she’d have to try. For Aidan, two weeks in a relationship was like ten years for a normal person. “What’s she do?”
“Has her own design company. But she’s not going to stop there. She has big plans, and she’s ambitious, organized, and brilliant.”
At least he was referring to her intangible assets and not the two that had stopped the surfer-painter in his tracks. “What kind of plans?”
“Big ones. For herself, for me, and for us.”
“Did you use the word us in a sentence about a woman?”
He sighed again. “Yeah.”
He had it bad.
3
“Client on deck,” Sofia said.
In the parking lot below, Brendan shook hands with a woman wearing a red scarf over dark hair, sunglasses, and a red trench coat. She was dressed for the part of Mysterious Client. Or Carmen Sandiego. She’d arrived in a spotless black Mercedes.
A minute later, Brendan and the client were in the conference room. Mysterious Client didn’t take off the scarf or the glasses. She must be working hard to preserve her anonymity. Even so, she looked familiar, and Sofia racked her brain trying to place her. Brendan helped her off with her coat. Underneath she wore black, also just like Carmen Sandiego.
Cassie appeared discreetly. “I’ll take the coat for you, Mr. Maloney.”
She placed a tray with a bone-white tea service on the table in front of Sofia. Clearly, Cassie expected the woman on the team to pour. It rankled, but Cassie was doing them all such a huge favor, Sofia didn’t want to think uncharitably of her. Cassie draped the coat over her arm and left quietly.
“Aidan,” Brendan said, “how about you pour the tea?”
He hurried to obey. He knew he was in trouble. She almost felt sorry for him. Almost.
The woman looked over at her. “Sofia Salgado? From Half Pint Detective?”
“I’m retired from acting. Doing this now.”
The woman pursed her overly full lips. “You’re not preparing for a role?”
“She’s not,” Brendan said. “She’s a regular member of the team.”
“A junior member,” Aidan said.
She wanted to kick him under the table, but she just smiled. She’d recognized the woman. “I understand the value of confidentiality more than most, Mrs. Solov, particularly for celebrities such as yourself.”
She was being kind. Donna Solov hadn’t been a celebrity in fifteen years. Back then she’d been a sultry leading woman, specializing in bad-girl parts. Her poster used to hang in a store in the mall in Indiana before Sofia and her family had moved to Los Angeles. Of course, she’d been Donna Lodge then. Then she’d married, changed her name, and retired from acting.
Donna Solov inclined her head toward her and took off the scarf and glasses. Sofia blinked once, but otherwise she was pretty sure she’d managed to keep her face expressionless. That was years of training paying off.
Neither Aidan nor Brendan had reacted at all.
Probably because they didn’t know what Donna Solov was supposed to look like. Back when Sofia was in grade school, Donna Lodge had been voted the most beautiful woman in the world. She’d earned it, too. Gorgeous bow-shaped lips, cheekbones sharp enough to cut glass, and sultry eyes. Plus bombshell curves.
She’d lost the curves, but she was toned and fit. A lot of actresses lost weight when they got older, as curves can sag. That her body had changed shape wasn’t what had surprised Sofia. It was her face. Sofia was used to seeing women, and men, so Botoxed that their faces looked like Halloween masks and, yes, Donna Solov had had more than her share of Botox. But it wasn’t the worst of it.
She’d also had way too much plastic surgery—excess filler in her lips, her nose shaved down to a blade, her sultry eyes lifted tight, and even her famous cheekbones didn’t look right. Sofia thought she wouldn’t have recognized her with the sunglasses off, because the closer she looked, the less the woman in front of her resembled the Donna Lodge she’d seen on countless magazine covers. She was still beautiful, but she didn’t look anything like herself.
“What would you like to talk to us about, Mrs. Solov?” Sofia recovered quickly.
Aidan passed out cups of tea, and Mrs. Solov lifted hers to her lips with a familiar elegant movement. Sofia watched, transfixed.
“What are you looking at, Miss Salgado?” she asked.
“The way you drink your tea.” Sofia lifted her cup in the same way. “I studied your movements for hours once for a movie because I thought how you drank tea was the most sophisticated thing I’d ever seen.”
“Maroon?” Mrs. Solov guessed.
“Yes!” Maroon had been a well-reviewed independent film, but Sofia had always thought no one but her mother had actually seen it. “I never got it quite right, though. You can’t improve on the original.”
Sofia wasn’t saying that to suck up: Donna Lodge had been amazing.
“You were wonderful in Maroon,” Mrs. Solov said. “The scene in the church. Amazing!”
Sofia blushed. “That means a lot.”
Mrs. Solov took a careful sip. “What a lovely oolong!”
Sofia glanced at Brendan and Aidan. They seemed nonplussed. Either they didn’t know that oolong was a kind of tea or they hadn’t seen Maroon. Probably both.
“I’ve always liked oolong.” Sofia kept the conversation going.
The Maloneys gaped uselessly.
Sofia forged ahead. “What have you come here to discuss with the agency, Mrs. Solov?”
Mrs. Solov tensed. It was hard to tell because the Botox meant that her face didn’t move very much, but her shoulders rode up. “What do women usually come here for?”
Temp work, Sofia wanted to say, to put in a plug for Cassie. Instead, she said, “We handle a wide variety of cases. I think you can say we’ve seen it all.”
“We have a reputation for discretion,” Aidan had finally found his voice, “and expertise in handling sensitive cases.”
Sofia kept a laugh inside. He hated sensitive cases.
“Melissa Fairbroad said you helped her out,” Mrs. Solov said.
Melissa Fairbroad had come to them because she suspected her husband of infidelity. Before they could prove that one way or the other, he’d been murdered and Maloney Investigations had worked to get her out of jail after the police thought she’d committed the crime. Mrs. Solov probably wasn’t here about a murder case. Sofia was pretty sure she’d have heard about that. Infidelity, then.
“Difficult domestic situations are a specialty.” Aidan had reached the same conclusion.
Mrs. Solov played with her sunglasses, opening and closing the expensive frames. “So many?”
“Marriage is a complicated undertaking,” Aidan said.
Mrs. Solov took another graceful sip of tea. “My husband, Leonid, is a brilliant doctor. He has his eccentricities, but what man doesn’t?”
Sofia nodded in what she hoped was a sympathetic way. She was pretty sure Mrs. Solov wasn’t there to
talk about how brilliant her husband was.
“What kind of doctor is he?” asked Aidan.
“A plastic surgeon. One of the most highly regarded in Malibu. He owns Solov Clinic.”
“I’ve heard of it.” Sofia hadn’t made the connection until just then.
“He’s even done a few minor procedures on me,” Mrs. Solov said.
Sofia glanced at Aidan. He was usually really rude about people who had work done. He thought everyone should age naturally. Easy for him to say. Men were allowed to get older. Women, and especially women in the industry, were expected to look young forever.
Sofia had more sympathy. It had to be hard to turn down a quick facelift if it meant an actress would get another multi-million-dollar movie, maybe her last. Even so, she took the risk that the facelift would go wrong and she’d face harsh ridicule from friends, fans, and the Internet. Not an easy choice.
“I can’t believe you’ve had work done!” Aidan sounded like her friend Gray after a couple of drinks. He’d recently gone undercover as an exotic dancer to help a friend of Sofia’s mother who’d been blackmailed. Maybe it had changed him. “You look amazing!”
Brendan cleared his throat. “Indeed. But may I ask why you’re here?”
Another sip. Clearly, drinking tea was how she stalled. “My husband has been less attentive lately, and he’s started working on Saturdays. Not just a quick stop to check on patients in recovery, but the entire day.”
She looked straight at Sofia, as if she expected her to know what she meant. Sadly, she did. “And you worry he might be . . . working on something else?” Sofia asked gently.
She needed to study up on euphemisms for ‘you think your husband is banging a younger, hotter version of you’. For now, she put on a sympathetic face.
“I hope so.” Donna Solov smiled, and Sofia recognized the sultry bad girl from the movies. A chill went down her spine.
“I beg your pardon, Mrs. Solov?” said Aidan.
“We signed an iron-clad prenup and my settlement, should he stray, would be quite sizable. And you can call me Donna.”
Sofia wasn’t sure if first-name usage applied to everyone or just Aidan.
F is for Fred Page 2