by Sophie Sharp
In the center of the board was an internet photo of Veronica Corsello, the victim. Surrounding Veronica’s face, Mia had drawn images: a camera to represent the blackmail photos; a mermaid’s tail for the necklace; two red triangles connected by a squiggly line for the deadly chocks; a black square for the truck lot; a little book represented the funeral guest book (aka, absentee list); and two curved arrows intersecting to represent the random list of people who might have a murderous grudge such as Sahara, ex-boyfriends, Veronica’s maid, the dog walker, and goodness—most of the world. She’d put angry-faced emojis on the corners of the camera and the parking lot because they incited motives.
Branching out from the camera and possible blackmail partners were two groups: The Means and Victims. The Means included Danika and Tabitha, because each knew how to doctor photos, but Mia had already drawn a question mark through Danika’s name thanks to Aunt Molly. And knowing, now, that Tabitha’s daughter had a negative relationship with Veronica, Mia couldn’t imagine Tabitha wanted to help Veronica with blackmail. She put a question on Tabitha’s name too. She’d love to cross both their names off the list, but until she could find out more from Tabitha, a question mark it would remain.
The Victims stemming from the camera/blackmail were the truckies who’d confirmed they received doctored photos, which, except for her aunt, included the full lot: Anthony admitted to having something even if he hadn’t shared the dirty details. Asil, Sherman the shoe shiner, Pamela the pet groomer, Ben the barista, Carl the cleaner, and vegan Vicki. Each name branched out from the square truck lot, and Mia had drawn dotted lines between their names in each group.
Using dotted lines instead of harsh solid ones was an act of good faith, a belief that everyone was innocent until proven guilty. Mia knew how it felt to be wrongly accused, and she was determined not to draw in solid assumptions—or lines—without utter confidence she and her aunt had their killer.
Once Aunt Molly returned with the guest book, they could add names outside the funeral guests and cross off names from the other groups if they were at the funeral. But so far, she’d be remiss not to add her own, Asil’s, Tabitha’s, Damion’s, and Sahara’s names to the absentee list.
From the mermaid tail, Mia added four sub-groups (five if you counted her name as the distributor): a checkmark for those she sold to and who still had their necklace; a question mark for those Mia knew she sold one to but needed to confirm they still had it, and an exclamation point for those she sold one to but they no longer had it, and “Unknowns” for those she couldn’t remember selling one to. That group would remain empty thanks to Mia’s poor record keeping. The checkmarks only included Danika so far, which further supported crossing her off the “Means” of the blackmailer. Question marks: Anthony, Nell, Tabitha, and Damion. But the fact that they couldn’t confirm any exclamation points so far was exactly why they needed the visual reminders the board provided.
Unfortunately, the only name branching out from the bloody chocks so far was Mia’s name. And it didn’t make her feel any better that she was connected to most of the buckets. Granted, she didn’t own a truck in the lot, but she did have a vested interest in her aunt’s livelihood with Glam Van, so she couldn’t excuse herself from the bubble. And the only thing not connecting her to the camera and blackmail victims, so far, was an assumption that Aunt Molly either wasn’t going to be blackmailed or that the blackmail didn’t include anything to do with Mia.
Ugh. Ugh. Ugh.
“Okay,” Molly said as she rushed into Glam Van, closing and locking the door behind her. “I got the book. And I don’t know if this is anything or nothing, but I think I passed Damion on the way.” Molly screeched to a halt. Her storage room had truly become an expert situation room. “Wait. Whoa. This is amazing. You’re amazing.”
Mia blushed and smiled from ear to ear. “I wanted you to be proud.”
“High five,” Molly said and stuck out her palm. “I’m always proud.”
Her niece had a knack for visualizing the crime. Molly could easily identify the motives and the common names across all groups. She clenched her fist, stopping herself from rushing to the board, gabbing the brand spanking new eraser, and rubbing out Mia’s name everywhere she could find it.
“So where did you see Damion?” Mia asked, once Molly settled down.
“On the road up to the estate. At least I think it was him. I didn’t see him clearly. Whoever it was, they almost ran me off the road.”
Mia paled. “Intentionally?”
Molly’s face softened. “No. No. Nothing like that. They were either texting or looking at their GPS.”
“Why would Damion be all the way up there?”
“I’m not sure. My guess is he got lost. People always get lost up there.” Molly was telling the truth. People did get lost up there all the time, but she was also skeptical about why Damion would be lost there in the first place, and who he was with.
“With maps on his phone? I don’t think so.” Mia frowned. “What kind of car was it?”
“A silver one. A Subaru Forrester, I think,” Molly said. She realized she didn’t even know if Damion had a vehicle. He tended to ride his bike around like Mia.
“That would be him. Was he alone?”
Eek. She wished she could avoid answering. If her niece was an ounce of the jealous person Lacy was, Mia’s mood could go south quickly. But alas, she couldn’t lie. “No. There was a man in the car with him, and someone in the back, but again, I didn’t get a good look at any of them.”
Mia was silent for a bit and then she said, “I’ll see what I can find out from him later. I’m sure it’s easily explained.”
Whew, she wasn’t showing signs of the green monster, but still, she couldn’t say anything to Damion. “No,” Molly yelled so loud that she almost made Mia drop her phone. “Don’t say anything yet, okay? If he was up to something, we need to keep what I saw to ourselves and not arouse suspicion.”
“So you think it’s suspicious. But I could just ask. I can be subtle,” said Mia.
Oh no. Maybe her niece was jealous after all, just good at hiding it. Molly didn’t want to point out to Mia that when her emotions got involved, she was anything but subtle. “Not yet, okay?”
Mia wrinkled her nose and pursed her lips like she used to do when she was little and didn’t get her way. In fact, doing it as an adult, she looked a lot like her mother.
“Mia, promise me you’ll wait till I give you the A-OK.”
“Scouts honor,” her niece said and looked away, leaving Molly very uncomfortable about what her niece might do anyway.
“Now what was that you said about having the book?” Mia asked.
Molly gave Mia the rundown on why she’d borrowed (not stolen) the funeral registry rather than take pictures. Mia was not happy with her.
“Aunt Molly, how are you going to explain that? He’s going to notice it’s gone. What if he tells Detective Moat?”
“I know. I know. I’ll just have to come up with some commemorative gift for attendees and follow through on a fib that I took it for a gift list.”
“Well, let’s start comparing the attendee list to the names on the board, shall we? Then we will know who still doesn’t have an alibi,” Mia said.
“No time. My next appointment will be here soon. Tomorrow we are closed. I’ll be able to prioritize it and get it back to Max.” They each had action items to address by tomorrow night. Molly would look at the photos for alterations and try to talk to Anthony again. She’d also follow up with Nell about her necklace. And Mia would stay on Tabitha. And not say anything to Damion. Tomorrow, they’d comb through the funeral book together.
“We have to stay focused,” Molly said. “We’re getting close. I can feel it.”
“Me too, Aunt Molly. Me too.”
Chapter Thirteen
The last client of the day had said good-bye, sneaking one last glimpse at her sleek, new Brazilian blow-out and the subtle red fade that Mia had suggest
ed. Aunt Molly had left to take a close look at the blackmail photos to identify the trickery. Now Mia was left alone to close up Glam Van and wonder if and why Damion had been on the private road to Max’s and who had been in the car with him.
Mia didn’t mention it to her aunt, but she was nervous about being left alone at Glam Van. She reminded herself that she was an adult and couldn’t stoop to having her hand held. Still, she had found a body behind Glam Van just two days ago, no one in San Cosmas was who she’d thought they were, and the man who’d known Mia’s full name and had come in to buy the necklace for his “sister” had left her feeling very unsettled. Mia wasn’t normally one to get the willies, but suddenly she didn’t want to be alone. She couldn’t go home, because Uncle Doug would sense something was wrong immediately. He would bake her something delicious and insist she talk about it, but she wouldn’t know what to say, except, “I feel funny.” And she didn’t want to lie to him. Not to mention she’d be the size of a house by Christmas if he kept feeding her emotions with his delicious creations.
She resisted the urge to text Damion. Aunt Molly knew her too well. If Mia saw Damion now, she wouldn’t be able to stop herself from asking questions. She’d promised her aunt she’d say nothing, and she intended to try and keep that promise.
With no other ideas about where to go, she locked up Glam Van, first double-checking all the windows and making sure the curtain to the situation room was fully closed, and rode her bike into town.
Despite harboring a murderer, San Cosmas was a pretty town. Mia rode her bike along the riverside path, flashing in and out of patches of dappled shade and watching the ducks float by without a care. She rode around the back of the old high school and stopped to rest. The school looked to her like the set of a 1950s movie where the boys wore letterman jackets and the girls wore ankle socks and ponytails. Uncle Doug had gone to high school there, along with half of San Cosmas, Veronica Corsello included. Aunt Molly had returned on her own once she graduated cosmetology school in Los Angeles where Lacy and her parents had landed when Lacy had outgrown being a “child star.”
After Mia’s first run-in with Veronica Corsello at the animal rights protest, she’d asked Uncle Doug what Veronica had been like when she was seventeen years old.
“Like a mythical creature,” he’d said wistfully, earning an elbow to the ribs from Aunt Molly. “It’s true. Every boy in school had the hots for her. She was perfect and untouchable, so naturally we all wanted her. She never gave any of us the time of day, of course. Except Max. They had a thing for a while, I think. Good thing, really; she’d have eaten us alive.”
“Plus you were saving yourself for me,” Aunt Molly had said.
Mia hadn’t thought twice about Max and Veronica’s high school fling at the time. It was so long ago, before she was even born. But now that Veronica was dead, even the smallest tidbit could be important. She would have to add his name to the board even though he was clearly at the funeral during the time of death. Killers could be hired though, and Max had money. Could Max have held a grudge this long about a teenage heartbreak? Surely, Aunt Molly would never have gone to his house alone if she thought he was dangerous, would she?
No. She was acting like Lacy again, looking for drama where there wasn’t any. And she had plenty to deal with. The killer couldn’t be Opal May’s son. According to Aunt Molly, he’d only verbally agreed to sell the lot to Corsello Development on the condition Veronica could get city council’s approval for her redevelopment plans. He would be losing millions of dollars due to Veronica’s death. He had nothing to gain by killing her.
Mia pedaled down the alley between Tabitha’s Café and Piping Hot Pizza, which made the best pizza in San Cosmas (but only after Papa Leonardo had closed his Italian restaurant, Mia had been told no less than a dozen times by Uncle Doug) but was run by a Scotsman who insisted on playing “Scotland the Great” on the bagpipes every night. Some days the pizza was worth the noise; some days it wasn’t.
But as she turned into the square, she spotted Damion’s Subaru parked halfway down the block. For a second, she considered riding away, but Aunt Molly hadn’t said to stay away from Damion entirely, had she? It wouldn’t hurt to ride down and surprise him, if she could actually find him.
Turned out she didn’t have to look too hard. He emerged from Wanda’s Wine Bar. If Mia was surprised to see Damion in such a snooty establishment—Aunt Molly and Uncle Doug only went there for special occasions—she almost fell off her bike when she saw he was with someone else—the strange man who had bought a necklace for his supposed sister. With them was a slender woman with a cute pixie haircut that emphasized her pretty features.
Mia’s mind clicked into high gear. Was this the man her aunt saw driving with Damion earlier? And could the woman be the sister the man had bought the necklace for? Why were these three together?
Before Damion could spot her, Mia veered her bike into a gap between two cars and spied on the trio as they walked toward Damion’s car.
The man put his hand on Damion’s shoulder and said something that made Damion laugh. And then, right there in the middle of the street, the man pulled Damion into a fierce hug. The woman did the same, and unless Mia was mistaken, she seemed to hold onto Damion for a really long time. Whoever she was, it was clear that Damion knew her well. Too well, in Mia’s opinion.
Mia had no idea what she was witnessing here, but she knew one thing: if Damion had nothing to hide from her, why hadn’t he simply told her about these people? Why all the stuff about being busy or working on a surprise? And why had he fibbed about where he was that morning? Clearly, he’d been with these two, lost or otherwise, on the Harrison estate drive. And why had the strange man really sought her out? Saw someone wearing one of my necklaces, yeah right.
Just then, Mia’s phone rang in her bike basket. She ducked down between the parked cars. She grabbed the phone, hoping Damion hadn’t heard it because he’d recognize her ring tone.
As if things couldn’t get worse. It was her mother. She hit silence, only to receive a text: Darling. What’s this about a murder in San Cosmas? Call me ASAP.
Mia groaned. Now her mother had heard the news, she’d flip into full-on drama mode. If Mia didn’t calm her down, Lacy would on the next flight north, and the last thing Mia needed was her mother flouncing into sleepy San Cosmas and making a scene.
Mia texted her back. All is fine. You know how the press can be. Miss you.
That should buy her some time.
If you missed me, you’d call me.
Or not.
At some point, she’d have to tell her mom the whole story, but now wasn’t the time. Mia looked up to see what Damion and his “friends” were doing now, but they were gone.
Mia silently cursed her mother for the interruption, but when her phone rang again, she answered it. Damion’s lies had left her feeling alone and deceived. Lacy might not be a good shoulder to cry on, but at least she was familiar.
Lacy didn’t wait for Mia to even say hello. “Oh my gawd, there you are. I was starting to think everyone in San Cosmas was avoiding me. Did you hear about that murder?”
Mia sighed. It had been too much to hope that Lacy would ask how she was, if she was settling in to her new life, maybe say that she missed her one and only child. But no, Lacy had to go straight for the drama. “I heard,” Mia said.
“It’s tragic,” Lacy said. “She was so beautiful.”
“Veronica Corsello was not beautiful, Mom. She was selfish and manipulative. She …” Mia caught herself before she said too much. If she breathed one word beyond what had been reported in the news, Lacy would grab it and blow it into the story of the century.
“You knew her?” Lacy said, practically breathless with anticipation. “They said on the news they found her in a lot behind a food truck. It wasn’t your lot, was it?” Before Mia could decide how to respond, Lacy found her own answers. “Oh my gawd, it was, wasn’t it? That’s why Molly won’t return my calls.”
“Mom—”
“I knew I couldn’t trust her to take care of you. You need to come home right now, Mia.”
“Mom—”
“No, I’m coming to get you. I’ll have Alexis get me on the next flight.”
“Mom!”
“Pack your things. In fact, no, don’t bother. Just leave them. We’ll get you new things once you’re home. Oh, baby, I’m so sorry. I never should have let you go. I’ll never forgive myself or my sister. I …”
Mia held the phone away from her ear and let Lacy find all the ways to make Veronica Corsello’s murder all about herself. She practiced a deep yoga breath, blocking out the sound of Lacy’s meltdown in the background. She didn’t want to get angry and come out fighting for Team Aunt Molly, but frankly, what would she have done without her loving, nurturing aunt?
For a few years when she was a teenager, Mia had enjoyed the beginnings of a real relationship with her mother. Lacy’s career had gone through a lull, she’d disappeared from the celebrity gossip magazines, and their house had stopped seeing a steady stream of hangers-on and started to feel like a home. For the first time, Mia spent more time with her mother than with a nanny, minder, assistant, or bodyguard. Mia and Lacy had taken long trips together, renting a lakeside cabin in Canada, where Mia had run barefoot and picked bouquets of buttercups that Lacy wove into their hair. They had eaten comfort food, not prepared by a personal chef—spaghetti with butter, the limit of Lacy’s culinary skills, but comfort food, nonetheless. Then Lacy had emptied out a small suitcase of expensive beauty products and daubed Mia’s face with a honey oatmeal exfoliating scrub, and washed her hair in a chamomile hair rinse to bring out Mia’s natural highlights.
One night, they had sat on the cabin’s porch, wrapped in a blanket, and Lacy had drunk a whole mug of real hot chocolate dotted with marshmallows without mentioning her weight. Mia had leaned into the crook of her mother’s shoulder and said, “Tell me about my dad.”