Lemonade & Loathing

by Beth Byers

  “Do you think Melody would mind if I came by and talked to her? Tried to get an idea of who Danny was and what was happening in his life?”

  Paige grabbed my hand and held it tightly before she fervently said, “I knew I could count on you Rose. I knew you would care about Mel and know that she’s not a killer.”

  I wouldn’t go that far. I’d understood where murderers were coming from too many times to rule anyone out. I think I could list the number of people I trusted to not murder someone on one hand. Simon. Carver. Maybe Zee. Because if you threatened someone Zee loved, I could see her killing you and burying your body in a vat of lyme. Then again, I could see her just ruining you and leaving you in the remnants of your life. So Zee was a toss up as a possible murderer. Beyond that—I trusted only my mom.

  I was forced to see how being involved with so many cases was messing up my life. I could not wait until we could escape Silver Falls for our honeymoon. I was going to spend the entirety of the three weeks in a hammock, a lounge chair, or one of those beds with canopies that the nice resorts had. And I wasn’t going to think about murder one time. Not once. When we came back, I hoped to never get involved with another case again and never again realize just why one person killed another.

  “I’m sure your Melody is a good girl,” I said, refusing to comment on whether I thought she could be a killer.

  “She is! She’s working hard at school. She helps her mom so much. Me too. She…she’s just a good kid.”

  “What can you tell me about Danny?”

  “Well..” Paige glanced to the side as if her conscience was warring with speaking ill of the dead versus her desire to gossip.

  “I need you to be straight with me,” I told Paige, solving the problem for her. “Or I can’t help Melody.”

  That was all it took for the flood gates to open about Danny.

  “He was charming,” she said. She wasn’t lying, you could tell she really thought he was a charming man. Especially because she seemed so disgusted by the attribute even though she tried to smile after she said it.

  I’d assumed that he was charming, of course. You had to be pretty charming if you got into so many beds.

  “But…a bit of a player?” I was leading the witness, I thought. But I already knew he was a player. I wanted to see if Paige knew it. It was an interesting thing when your family knew your boyfriend was a player. What were the side conversations about? Are you sure, Melody? Are you sure you want to commit to Danny? Are you sure you trust him? Maybe little sideways comments about to illustrate that he couldn’t be trusted without actually saying it?

  “Well…” Paige trailed off, looking over my shoulder. I was sure she was fighting against gossiping about a dead man again. I wanted to shake her. I needed the truth.

  “Maybe a bit of a player. But he was such a good kid. He took good care of Melody. Helped her with her car breaking down recently. And he always took her to nice restaurants. They’ve been house shopping, and he was even looking at places right on the beach.”

  That sounded like nonsense to me. But if you knew the real estate agent and were playing on your girlfriend’s wants…maybe? It seemed like something the Danny Harvey I was coming to know would do.

  “I’ve heard some things about him and Lettie.” I raised my brows and met her gaze, not letting her easily slip away from staring me down.

  Paige nibbled her bottom lip and pressed a hand against her chest before she said, “I don’t think those are true.”

  What a huge whopper of a lie, I thought. She might not want to believe they were true, but her body language said Paige was—at the minimum—concerned about what she’d heard. I cleared my throat and said, “Are you trying to protect Lettie or Melody?”

  Paige blushed, and I bet she was trying to protect Melody by not talking about Lettie. If there was anything that got a woman to kill another, it was being betrayed by your own best friend.

  “How long have Lettie and Melody been close?”

  “Oh since grade school. Maybe even preschool,” Paige gushed. I was sure she was thinking finally something I can say that won’t get Melody in trouble not even realizing that it was another tick in the Melody motive sheet.

  “All through school then?”

  “And after! Mel was the first…” Paige choked a bit and I glanced at her.

  I hoped I looked as irritated as I felt. But I said, “The first person she told about getting married?”

  Paige nodded and smiled, trying to pretend like she wasn’t attempting to hide things from me.

  “And Mel was the maid of honor? For me, Zee has been helping me every step of the way even though she hates it.”

  “Melody helped through all of the wedding. Even when Lettie was losing it.”

  “I’m sure it was a comfort to Lettie to have Melody’s help.”

  “It was! Of course it was. Melody is a good girl and put aside her own feelings even when Lettie was turning into…well…she was bridezilla. Just awful. But Melody just slapped a smile on her face and carried on with the flowers and the bride gifts and the bachelorette party. All of it. Lettie should have been counting her lucky stars for having a friend like Melody.”

  I smiled, squeezing Paige’s hand before I went for the kill. “That must have made it all the harder for Melody when she found out that Lettie slept with Danny. Especially given all the effort she put into the wedding. Is Melody close with Lettie’s spouse?”

  Paige’s shocked face told me she hadn’t heard the full rumors about Lettie. Maybe a little flirting. Maybe that they’d been seen having coffee or something. Something that was fishy but could be explained away.

  I didn’t believe the same of Lettie. Not when I included what I knew about Danny and what I’d seen from that other bride at the cake shop. It was almost like Danny was—well, he couldn’t be irresistible. But maybe he had just been very, very good at reading women. Either way, I’d seen a bride in love give in, and it sounded to me like Lettie was a spoiled brat who needed to be slapped sideways.

  “Lettie wouldn’t have done that,” Paige said. “She and Tracey love each other. They were a fairytale wedding. They really were! Tracey and Lettie were together forever. High school sweethearts. Football quarterback and captain of the cheerleaders. They’re the perfect couple.”

  I didn’t let my derision show. It wasn’t that I didn’t believe in love. Obviously I did. I even believed that young love could last. But I thought it was a lot harder in general. When you added in that Lettie had been linked with the man who might as well have a tattoo with tic marks showing the number of brides he’d bedded, I was even more incapable of buying this particular case.

  “Perfect couple or not…”

  “I don’t believe Lettie slept with Danny or even…flirted with him.” Her gaze darted to the side Paige had heard the rumors though. I was pretty sure Paige had doubts. She just didn’t want to admit to them.

  Instead of answering in a way that was helpful, Paige descended into a series childhood stories that it took me far too long to get out of. I’d have risen and walked away if I didn’t need Melody’s contact information. And even then, I finally rose and said, “Paige, I have to get back to the diner. Can you message me Melody’s address and number?”

  I wasn’t going to listen any longer to the nonsense. I’d just get Melody…and Lettie’s reaction.

  “Of course,” Paige said.

  “I’ll need Lettie’s as well.”

  Paige’s gaze met mine again, darted to the side, and I could see a sliver of regret flit across her face. I could almost see her thought process morph. Regret, followed by worry for Melody, followed by throwing Lettie to the wolves (me) in order to save Melody.

  Paige nodded once, firmly, and I shot her a commiserating look before I left. I think Paige truly believed that I wouldn’t pursue the gossip trail if it led to Melody. She was wrong. I might have understood where more than one killer was coming from, but I didn’t condone murder, and I would
turn in whoever I found as the killer. My friend’s niece or not.

  Chapter 5

  “What are we going to do for your bachelorette party? Strippers?” Zee’s mean, husky voice seemed to carry far beyond our booth. Thankfully we’d closed and only my friends and the cleaning staff remained.

  “Ew,” I said, frantically shaking my head. “No.”

  Zee cackled while our friends Jane and Maddie tried to hide their smiles.

  “Shut up.”

  “You don’t like men?” Zee asked meanly. She probably just wanted to see me squirm. No, she certainly wanted to see me squirm.

  “I like Simon,” I said, wishing I could scour my brain from thinking of Zee and a stripper at the same time. “You’re a terrible human being.”

  “You like me,” she shot back, “Otherwise you wouldn’t have made me your number one for the wedding.”

  “Simon is her number one,” Jane said. She had bags under her eyes and looked stressed. I wanted to ask about it, but I wasn’t sure I could. During my time in Silver Falls, I’d discovered that Jane had been blackmailed for years because her youngest son was not biologically her husband’s. I was pretty sure she’d never told her husband the truth. But I was also pretty sure, it was weighing more and more heavily on her.

  “Cake is her number two,” Maddie said. She grinned at me, tapped her nails against the booth. “Rose wants cake, wine, and probably Az as well. You can’t have strippers and Az at the same time.”

  “Too true, Rosie luv,” Az said. Everyone else had left except for us, and Az had put a pizza he’d made down on the table as he pulled up a chair next to Maddie. I wasn’t sure they’d started dating, but a frisson of awareness between two of my favorite people caught all of our attention. Maddie’s cheeks turned pink while Az cleared his throat and pulled a piece of pizza onto his plate.

  “What is this?” Zee asked meanly glancing down at her pizza. It was covered with chicken and veggies and she scowled at it, probably offended it wasn’t pepperoni.

  “It’s jerk chicken pizza,” Az said calmly

  Zee’s scowled deepened while Maddie oohed.

  “Yum,” I said, hoping that it would keep Zee from saying something mean all the while knowing it wouldn’t.

  “Yuck,” Zee said and cursed under her breath before she said, “Carver is going to cook anyway.” She shoved her plate away. None of us even reacted to Zee’s semi-tantrum. “So the bachelorette.”

  “Spa day with Az,” I said, grinning at him. “Then cake, wine, and food.”

  “Food where?” Zee looked disgusted at my utter lack of creativity, but I liked massages and facials, I wanted pretty finger and toenails for my honeymoon, and it was—after all—my day.

  “I don’t know. Maybe Chinese? We haven’t booked the wedding yet, so I can’t really…”

  “Just do it,” Zee snapped. “Use the resort or wherever.”

  “I can’t use the resort. The manager is a…” I cleared my throat, considered and then Zee filled in the answer for me with something that ended in itch.

  “Yes,” I said. “That. I don’t like her, and I won’t be hiring her.”

  “What about the chapel on the bluff?”

  I nodded and said, “Honestly, I’d like to do that with a tent like the resort had, but just outside the chapel. I want people to come and do everything and I want to show up, slap on a pretty dress, promise to love Simon forever, and seal it with a kiss and cake.”

  “What kind of cake?” Maddie asked. She was almost as interested in cake as me, so we bumped fists before I said, “Pink lemonade, pink champagne, and strawberry.”

  “Ooh pink lemonade?”

  “That was the best, but I intend on eating all of them on the day.”

  “No chocolate?” Jane asked. She was almost as boring as Simon, but they were cousins so I shot her an irritated look before I admitted, “Chocolate too.”

  Jane laughed while Maddie said, “Sounds good to me. So who killed the guy in the fountain?”

  “His name was Danny Harvey,” I said. “And I don’t know.”

  Maddie’s brows rose and a look of dawning realization crossed her face before she said, “I can see him getting killed.”

  Az shot her a surprised look before Maddie said, “I knew him. We went on a Tinder date—such an irritating dating app. He was slimy. Totally a cheater. The kind of guy who’d sleep with your mom and your girlfriend at the same time. He was…gross. But there was this veneer of…like…charm? Smoothness. Somehow he seemed sort of sexy and nasty at the same time. Anyhow, I can see how he got murdered.”

  “A mom and a girlfriend at the same time?” Az asked in that dark chocolate honey voice that was tinged with doubt.

  “Oh yeah,” Jane said. “I…heard…he had syphilis and gonorrhea.”

  “Heard it?” Maddie asked with a snort. Jane was the town’s only doctor.

  “I didn’t treat him,” Jane said righteously.

  But, I thought, she might have treated one of those brides. Or maybe a girlfriend? Someone who might have traced it back to him well enough that Jane was sure he’d been the source.

  “I wonder how many grooms have come home from their honeymoon with an infection they didn’t have before the wedding.”

  I winced at the heartbreak of that idea. Coming home from your honeymoon maybe? And realizing something was wrong. It would be awful. You’d probably be devastated and then furious. Probably you’d think about the money spent on a wedding. A wedding that was all your bride wanted and she made a mockery of it by sleeping around while she planned it.

  I believed that you could recover from something like that—just as Zee had told the cake shop bride, Lila, but that wouldn’t change how you felt about things. Especially when, years later, you looked back at your wedding and remembered how you were betrayed by your love with the flower guy.

  “What makes that dude so special, huh?” Az asked. He seemed baffled, but he was a good guy like Simon. He wasn’t going to sleep with the girl delivering the cake on his wedding day anymore than Simon would.

  I shook my head because I couldn’t give him an answer. What did make Danny so special?

  I wanted to talk to that bride—Lila. Only when her mom wasn’t around. And I wanted to talk to Lettie when Melody wasn’t around and then Medley when Lettie wasn’t around. I examined Zee and wondered if she’d be helpful. She was blunt which I was fine with, but I wasn’t so sure anyone would talk if she were shaming them about being cheaters.

  Yet…she’d calmed that bride down. I wouldn’t be surprised if Lila truly repented and changed after talking to Zee. It was even more awkward talking about this around Jane. She had to know we could project on her. After all, she’d cheated on her husband. She’d even had another man’s baby and then lied about it.

  I wanted to squeeze Jane’s hand, but I didn’t want to draw attention to the fact that she was in my mind in the same slot as Lettie, Lila, and the other brides. Was that wrong of me? I loved Jane. And I hoped she knew it. That even though I didn’t condone the fact that she’d cheated on her husband—and even more—that she’d lied to him about their baby. Gah! I was so conflicted.

  “I’m such a fool,” Jane said. She sniffed and muttered, “I need to talk to Hank about things.”

  “Yes you do,” Zee said. For once she was gentle. Gentle, but firm.

  I pressed my lips together and took Jane’s hand. I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t know how to comfort her. I could see why her husband would be furious, and I couldn’t lie to Jane to comfort her. The truth was—her husband’s reaction would be what it was. Nothing I said or did would change that. But I still felt that he needed to know. Her son needed to know. Didn’t they?

  “It’s going to ruin everything,” Jane said. “I’m not a young bride like these idiots. I have years of lying behind me. Years of my mother-in-law talking about how J.J. is just like Hank and I just smiled and nodded.”

  “Hank loves J.J. He isn’t going
to stop caring because he isn’t genetically his dad.”

  “Not about J.J, no. It’s me I’m worried about. With both of them.”

  “Maybe you should wait,” Maddie said but Zee shot Maddie a nasty look.

  “No,” Zee said. “Hank is going to her about this case. This case embedded in adultery. He’s going to ask you about it, like he always does. Because he does, doesn’t he?”

  Jane nodded, rubbing her fingers against her lips.

  “And if you don’t confess before that, it’ll be one more round of lies and deception.”

  “He might not forgive me.”

  “He might not,” Zee agreed. “But you need to be able to live without this burden.”

  Jane’s eyes filled with tears. She cursed and then said, “I am such an idiot. If I had been honest from the beginning at least J.J. might not hate me.”

  Zee looked Jane over and said, “None of us can tell you that your marriage will survive. But from what I can see, you messed up once years ago and you’ve been true ever since. Hank loves you. It might not end everything.”

  Jane shoved herself to her feet and said, “I’ll be for whatever you want to do. I hope you find who killed Danny, Rose. It’s not your job, but— Maybe if you are the one who finds the killer you’ll remember just because we’re cheating idiots it doesn’t mean we should die.”

  “Jane,” Az said, surprising me given how quiet he usually was when the ‘girls’ got together. “You are not this Danny guy. Your husband travels for months at a time and he leaves you behind with all the kid stuff and all the work you do yourself. I’m not saying what happened is ok. But it’s way different to weasel your way into engagement after engagement and take advantage of stressed out, nervous brides.”

  “And J.J.’s bio-dad wasn’t married. You didn’t break up something between him and someone else. You…”

  “I thought I was in love,” Jane said. “I was in love. I mourned Jason for a long time.” She shoved her tears away. “It took a long time to fall back into love with Hank.”

  Jane left before we could fail to comfort her again. Did she regret sleeping with Jason? I was sure she did. But I bet she didn’t regret her son. She probably just wished she could somehow magically make him biologically her husband’s rather than her boyfriend’s.