Buttercream Bump Off

by Jenn McKinlay

  “Sorry about that,” she said as she approached the group. “Mom’s a little excited.”

  “I think it’s sweet,” Poppy said. “Don’t you, darling?”

  She glanced at Jay out of the corner of her eye. Mel noticed it was a measuring look, not one of adoration, like she had supposed, but more speculative, as if Poppy were checking to see how much attention Jay was paying to her.

  He gave his wife a warm smile. “Very sweet, but not as sweet as you.” Poppy looked mollified, and he turned to Mel. “You must be feeling uneasy.”

  “Why’s that?”

  “It sounds as if your mother hasn’t dated in a while, and she’s dating a man you don’t know,” he said. “What was his name, Baxter something?”

  “Malloy. Baxter Malloy. Have you heard of him?” Mel asked.

  “No, I can’t say that I have,” he said.

  “Well, I have,” Mr. Felix said. “He’s one of those investment guys. His name is always in the business section of the paper. He’s so good at making money that my company invested all of our pensions with him. We’re looking at a much more comfortable retirement now.”

  He and Mrs. Felix exchanged a smile. Mel glanced back at Jay. “Well, that sounds promising.”

  “It does,” Jay said. “Mr. Felix, I had no idea you had such a head for business.”

  “Oh, I don’t,” he said with a shake of his head. “I just try to keep up with where my money is going. What about you, Dan? You’re an accountant. Have you heard of Baxter Malloy?”

  Dan started to splutter and cough, and Irene whacked him on the back. “That’s what you get for snitching the Hershey’s Kisses.”

  Red-faced, Dan glared at her, and the rest of the class looked away.

  The men started talking finances, but Mel tuned them out to contemplate the bomb her mother had dropped. Joyce had a date with a stranger.

  It made Mel feel uneasy, and she wondered if she should have Uncle Stan check Malloy out and how mad her mother would be if she did. Hmm. Now she knew how the parents of teenage girls felt. Was there a man good enough for her mother? Not hardly.

  Mel stared at the man sprawled out on her futon. His head was tipped back, and soft snores were being emitted from his mouth. He looked as settled in as if he lived there.

  Certainly, his clothes were as at home as the rest of him. His red power tie was askew beneath his unbuttoned collar. His charcoal suit jacket was draped over the arm of the foldout bed, and his shoes had wandered off to the other side of her white shag area rug, leaving him plenty of room to stretch out his long legs. For one man, he sure took up a lot of space.

  Mel’s studio apartment above the shop was just right for her, but when Joe DeLaura showed up, suddenly it felt pinched like a pair of pointy-toed high heels that were two sizes too small.

  He had arrived an hour ago with takeout from Pei Wei and a lovely bouquet of tulips. They were yellow with red edges and were now perched in a clear, square glass vase on the counter of her kitchenette. They were lovely. And they almost made up for the fact that he was dead asleep and snoring. Almost.

  They had been dating, if you could call it that, for three months. Just after they’d gotten together, the biggest case of Joe’s career landed on his desk. As an assistant district attorney, he was prosecuting a serial shooter, and the case was a 24-7 nonstop work-a-thon that didn’t leave much time for Mel in his life, unless you counted the amount of time he spent sleeping on her futon.

  If she hadn’t been half in love with him since she was twelve years old, and if he weren’t so darned handsome, she probably would have kicked him to the curb by now, but she just couldn’t turn her back on twenty-two years of longing. She was determined to wait it out.

  As was becoming her habit, she prepped for lights-out and then rolled him one way and then the other as she made up the bed. The man didn’t flutter an eyelid, not even when she took off his tie so he wouldn’t strangle himself in his sleep. She snuggled in next to him, and he rolled over and pulled her close. He was solid and warm and, despite the fact that she longed for one or both of them to be naked sometime when they did this, she fell fast asleep.

  Mel woke up to the sound of a mug of coffee being plunked onto the table beside her head. There was no better sound in the world. She cracked an eyelid, and there hunched Joe, giving her a wry “there’s a crick in my back, but you’re worth it” smile that meant more to her than even the tulips he’d brought the night before.

  “I fell asleep on you again,” he said.

  “Hmm,” Mel hummed in agreement.

  “I’m sorry,” he said. “It’s this case, it’s a . . .”

  “Killer,” she finished for him. “Sorry, couldn’t resist.”

  He grinned at her. Leaning close, he pulled her into his arms.

  “As soon as this case is over, I am whisking you away to a place where no one can find us.” He lowered his head and whispered in her ear, “Then I am going to have my way with you . . . repeatedly.”

  Mel felt her entire body grow hot. “Sounds like a plan.” Her voice came out in a froggy croak, and she cleared her throat.

  Joe kissed the top of her head and said, “I’ll call you later.”

  She watched him leave and decided he was definitely worth the wait.

  “Does this make my butt look big?” Joyce spun around in the three-way mirror at Dillard’s, and Mel stifled a yawn. Seven hours, thirteen stores, a number too high to count of rejected outfits, and the beginnings of a blister on her heel, and Joyce had yet to pick a dress for her date. Mel was at her end.

  “No, Mom, you look fabulous,” she said.

  “You’re not even looking at me,” Joyce chided her. With a miffy humph, she grabbed another selection of outfits, snapped “Excuse me” at a woman in her way, and stomped back into her dressing cubby.

  The woman in the way turned and gave Mel an unhappy look. She was standard Scottsdale issue: blonde, buxom, dripping in diamonds, and wearing a body-hugging Dereon animal-print top that showed off her girls to perfection. Mel was willing to bet she’d paid more for her boobs than Mel had for her bakery. Then again, Mel had Tate for financial backing. She glanced at the woman’s chest. Yeah, she probably had a financial push-up, too.

  “Rude,” the woman huffed with a hair toss in Joyce’s direction.

  Mel frowned. “Didn’t I see you in the changing rooms at Nordstrom?”

  The woman’s eyes widened and then narrowed. “I sincerely doubt it.” She scurried into a vacant changing room and slammed the door.

  Mel sighed. Obviously she’d been at this too long if she was beginning to think she was seeing the same people at different stores. She took out her cell phone and texted an SOS to her brother Charlie, who lived three hours north in Flagstaff.

  Within thirty seconds, her cell phone chimed its distinctive Gone with the Wind ringtone.

  “Charlie, rent a plane, fly your behind down here, and save me,” she said.

  “That bad?”

  “Worse,” she said.

  “You just hate shopping,” he said. “Man up.”

  “I have a blister,” she whined. “And if I get spritzed by one more department store perfume girl, people are going to start thinking I’m a ho.”

  “All right, sis,” Charlie said. His voice sounded strained, as if he was trying not to laugh. “Here’s what you do: When she comes back out, you need to sell her on whatever she’s wearing, once and for all.”

  “I’ve been trying. Don’t you think I’ve been trying?” Mel’s voice came out in a pitch so high she was sure only dogs would be able to hear her.

  “It’s time for backup,” Charlie said. “You need a man. If a man says she looks great, she’ll buy whatever she’s wearing, even if she looks like a pumpkin.”

  “I’m in the women’s dressing room. Where am I supposed to find a man?”

  “Pop your head out and see if there’s one of those old guys holding his wife’s purse by the door,” Charlie said
. He always could think on his feet.

  “Fine. I’ll call you later.” Mel ended the call and poked her head out the door, glancing at the cushy seats to the right. Sure enough, three oldsters had been parked with shopping bags and handbags.

  The oldest was wearing lime green Bermuda shorts with black socks and loafers. No, Joyce would run for plastic surgery if he told her she looked good. The one in the middle had a waxy sheen to his complexion and was pulling at his ear hairs. No. The third one had thick white hair, sparkling blue eyes, and was dressed in perfectly creased khakis and a Polo golf shirt. Perfect.

  Mel sidled up to him. “Hi,” she said.

  “Hello,” he replied.

  “Nice day, isn’t it?”

  “Sure is,” he said.

  “Mel? Mel, where are you?” her mother called from the dressing room.

  So much for the lame cocktail party-type chitchat. Mel needed to get this guy up to speed fast if she ever hoped to see the inside of her bakery again.

  “I need a favor,” she whispered. “My mother, an older version of me, is about to walk through that door. Please, I beg of you, tell her she is the most beautiful woman you’ve ever seen.”

  The man’s eyes widened as if he thought Mel was deranged, or maybe his pupils were dilating in reaction to the fog bank of perfume Mel was wearing. Either way, before he could answer, Joyce came strolling out of the dressing room wearing a royal blue designer dress with bolero-style shoulders and three-quarter-length sleeves. Even with mussed hair and chewed-off lipstick, she looked amazing.

  “Melanie, I was looking for you,” she said.

  “Oh, my dear lady,” said the man beside Mel as he rose out of his seat and reached for Joyce’s hand. “You are a vision.”

  Joyce’s face turned bright pink, and she did a demure half twirl as she put her hand in his. “Do you think so?”

  He kissed the back of her hand and leaned back to study her. “You are exquisite.”

  “Why, thank you,” she said.

  Suddenly the man reared back and dropped Joyce’s hand. One of his hands clutched at his chest while the other fumbled in his pocket.

  “Sir?” Mel asked. “Are you all right?”

  “My angina,” he grunted. “In . . . my . . . pocket . . . my . . . pills.”

  “Mom, go get help!” Mel said.

  Joyce dashed away while Mel helped the man sit down and fished the pills out of his pocket. She unscrewed the top off the prescription bottle and shook a few out with shaky fingers.

  “Do you need water?” she asked. He shook his head and opened his mouth. Mel tucked one inside, and he closed his eyes as if waiting for the pill to kick in.

  The men in the chairs beside him leaned away as if cardiac arrest might be contagious.

  “Henry!” an older woman shrieked from behind Mel. “Henry? Are you all right?”

  He patted his chest and gave a nod. Joyce and a clerk came racing back.

  “We’ve called 9-1-1,” the clerk said.

  The older lady muscled them all out of the way, and as they stood waiting for the paramedic, Mel whispered to her mother, “I suppose you want to get a different dress now?”

  “Why would I want to do that?” Joyce asked.

  “I don’t know, bad juju?”

  “Are you kidding me?” she asked. “I gave a man a heart attack in this dress. I’m going to buy one in every color.”

  “What are we watching?” Mel asked as she strode into Tate’s penthouse, shed her jacket, and grabbed a bag of popcorn and a frosty milkshake off the counter.

  She plopped down in her usual seat, a recliner to the left of the gigantic flat-screen television he’d had custom built into the wall. It was the first piece of furniture he’d installed in his condominium and vital for their weekly showings of classic movies.

  Tate and Angie sat on opposite ends of the big leather couch in the middle. The movie screen was blue, as if they’d been waiting for her to appear before they started, which they probably had, since she had finally finished prepping Joyce for her date and was running a bit late.

  “I’ll give you a hint,” Angie said. “ ‘Story of my life. I always get the fuzzy end of the lollipop.’ ”

  “Some Like It Hot,” Mel said. “Excellent. I could use a screwball comedy.”

  “What, no Joe tonight?” Tate asked.

  “Serial shooter case,” Mel said. “I heard the word depositions and bailed. He’s on his own.”

  “Too bad,” Tate said. “Curtis and Lemmon in drag is a beautiful thing.”

  Mel noticed Angie watching Tate watching her. Angie suffered from the misguided belief that Tate had a thing for Mel, and Mel had had no luck convincing her otherwise. Now that she was dating Joe, she thought Angie might let go of that whacky notion, but no; Angie was convinced that Tate was jealous of Mel’s relationship with Joe.

  Mel didn’t get that. Tate had sworn off women since his last train wreck of a relationship, and who could blame him? If she’d dated a nut like Christie Stevens, she’d swear off the opposite sex, too.

  “And rolling,” Tate said as he pressed play.

  Mel had finished off her popcorn and was halfway through her box of Whoppers when her phone chimed. Both Angie and Tate gave her dark looks.

  “Doesn’t Joe know it’s movie night?” Angie asked.

  Mel glanced at her phone. “It’s not Joe. It’s my mom.”

  “Maybe it’s a date report,” Tate said as he paused the movie. “That guy better be treating her right, or I’ll squash him.”

  Mel flipped open her phone. “Hello?”

  “Oh, thank God, you answered,” Joyce said breathlessly. “My dress did it again.”

  “What? What do you mean?”

  “My dress,” Joyce said. “It caused another heart attack, and this time I think I killed him.”

  Four

  “What?”

  “Baxter,” Joyce said. “He’s dead.”

  “Where are you?” Mel demanded as she sprang to her feet. Tate and Angie watched her, wide-eyed, obviously picking up from her tone that all was not well.

  “At his house,” she said.

  “His house? On a first date?” Mel asked.

  Tate jumped up, looking like he was ready to pound someone. Angie was right behind him, looking equally ferocious.

  “It’s not like it sounds,” Joyce said. “The ambulance is here. I have to go.”

  “Address, Mom. Give me the address,” Mel said.

  “Oh, I’m not sure, it’s the big house on Saguaro Road, just past Forty-second Street,” she said.

  “I’ll be there in ten minutes, and I’m calling Uncle Stan,” Mel said.

  “What’s going on?” Angie asked as they followed Mel to the elevator.

  “Mom’s date is dead,” she said.

  “Holy . . .” Tate began.

  “Crap,” Angie finished.

  “My car is faster. I’ll drive,” Tate said.

  Mel looked at her hands. They were shaking.

  “Good idea.”

  Tate jetted his silver Lexus across town. They peeled up a winding hill, rolled through three stop signs, and came to a screeching halt in front of a mansion that was nestled on the north side of Camelback Mountain. The estates were many here in Paradise Valley, but it was easy to pick out the one they were looking for, as three police cars and an ambulance were parked out front with lights flashing. Not exactly balloons signaling a kid’s birthday party, but it would do.

  Mel shoved open her door and started to run. Several uniformed officers were standing in her way, but she raced around them, frantically searching the sparse crowd for signs of her mother’s blonde bob.

  “Mom!” she called. “Mom!”

  The large double doors to the glass-and-stone mansion stood wide open, so Mel charged through the entrance with Tate and Angie on her heels.

  She ignored the black tile and glass furniture and the precisely lit objets d’art. All she wanted was to find J
oyce safe and sound.

  She noticed that a crowd had gathered on the back patio by the pool. She made a beeline. As soon as she stepped through the glass doors at the back, however, a hand grabbed her elbow and brought her up short.

  “Authorized personnel only,” the officer said.

  Mel yanked her elbow out of his hand. “I am authorized. I’m with the DA’s office. These are my assistants.”

  Okay, technically she was sleeping, literally, with a person in the DA’s office, so it wasn’t a total lie, or so she told herself. The officer released her elbow and stepped back. Well, hello. It worked.

  She strode forward, past the outdoor fireplace, the granite cooking area, the barbeque pit, and the built-in lounge. She circled the dark blue-tile swimming pool, which with its interior lighting cast the area in an eerie blue glow.

  A short stairway led up to a sunken hot tub. And there, in the middle of a knot of uniforms, huddled in a patio chair, sat Joyce. She was bundled in a standard-issue gray police blanket. Her hair looked wet and her makeup streaked. Even from twenty feet away, Mel could see her shivering.

  The minute she saw Mel, Joyce rose to her feet, looking ready to sob with relief. Mel folded her mother in her arms and held her tight.

  “Are you all right?” she asked.

  “I’m fine,” Joyce said, although her teeth were chattering, and she felt icy cold to the touch.

  “Excuse me, ma’am,” a man said. “We have some more questions.”

  Mel clamped her mother to her side and spun to face the officer. He was several inches taller than her, wearing khakis and a dress shirt, the uniform of a detective. She could see the badge clipped at his waist and the shoulder holster that housed his gun. His short brown hair was combed back from his face, giving him a stern demeanor. Mel didn’t care.

  “My mother is standing here shivering. She is going to warm up and dry off and then she’ll be happy to answer your questions,” she said.