Death of a Double Dipper

by Angela Pepper

  Once I did get to sleep, my dreams were as vivid as reality.

  I found myself at Samantha's open house, alone in the tiny upstairs bedroom with Colt Canuso. He took me by the hand and gazed at me with his sensitive, soulful, dark-brown eyes. He told me, “You're too good for Logan. He doesn't appreciate what he's got.”

  And then we kissed.

  We kissed so vividly that when I woke up at five o'clock in the morning in a panic sweat, I had to say to myself, out loud, “It was just a dream.”

  I couldn't get back to sleep. I lay in the dark and listened to the garbage trucks moving up and down the street. And I suddenly remembered I'd forgotten to put out the trash the night before. Should I pull on my housecoat now, and run out? Was that the sound of the garbage truck moving toward my house or away?

  I drifted in and out of consciousness, imagining myself running around in Pam's old housecoat. Running away from her while she fired my father's gun at me.

  More bad dreams and panic sweating.

  The garbage trucks were getting closer, and they were full of dead bodies and secrets. Everyone was angry at me, disappointed in me.

  I woke up with a dry mouth.

  Jeffrey came padding into the bedroom and gave me a chatty meow from the doorway. If you're up already, how about we make it Kitty Play Time? He slipped underneath my bed, swatted something around on the wood floor, and then hopped up next to me with a mouse-shaped toy in his mouth. Even in the darkness, I knew the toy had gotten covered in dust bunnies under my bed. I didn't want him to ingest the fluff, so I flicked on the bedside lamp and picked the mouse clean while Jeffrey tried to wrestle it from my hands. By the time I was done cleaning his mouse, I was fully awake.

  I climbed out of bed and flicked on the overhead light, since the sun wasn't up yet. By the time I'd picked out some clothes to wear to work at the store, Jeffrey had finished swatting the stuffed catnip toy around the bed. He curled up on my pillow, clutching his mouse in his front paws and licking it with his noisy, raspy tongue.

  “Busy day planned?”

  He kept licking the mouse, making the tiny bell on its nose tinkle.

  “Me, too,” I said. “It's Monday, so I'll be putting in the store's orders. I'll get an early start on things.”

  He gave me a dopey look.

  “You're high on catnip,” I said.

  More dopey blinking.

  I carefully pinched his mouse toy by the tail and gave it a few tugs. His eyes widened and he twitched his head from side to side as he extended his claws into the stuffed toy. I curled up next to him and immediately fell asleep again.

  I awoke when my alarm clock went off. I was partly dressed and lying sideways on the bed, with one arm underneath myself and numb. I'd left the lights on, and the room was strangely bright, like a warehouse grocery store.

  So much for getting an early start on my day.

  I was brushing my teeth when the vivid dreams about Colt came back to me.

  By the time I got to Glorious Gifts, I was still thinking about the love triangle between Samantha Sweet, Michael Sweet, and Colt Canuso.

  I meant to get started right away on the store's restock orders but didn't.

  The manager of my gift shop, Brianna Chang, arrived for her shift. She walked into the office at the back of the store and caught me stalking Colt Canuso via his social media accounts.

  “Busted,” Brianna said.

  I wheeled my computer chair around and gave her a guilty look.

  Brianna looked a bit less than her usual perky self that Monday morning. Had she also been plagued by weird dreams and demanding pets?

  Unlike my own fuzzy hair that day, Brianna's hair looked nice. She always wore her thick, dark-brown, pin-straight hair combed forward to hide her ears, which she was self-conscious about sticking out. Her round, makeup-free face looked different that morning. She had a tiny pimple along the edge of her jaw, and her big brown eyes weren't as bright as usual. Her outfit was one of her Librarian Chic looks—pencil skirt, white blouse with rounded collar, and a lightweight red cardigan. The cardigan had one button fastened, but it was a mismatch, paired with the wrong hole.

  She leaned over my shoulder to look at my computer screen, which was showing the photos on Colt's personal social media account.

  She made a tsk-tsk sound. “That sure doesn't look like the candles order.”

  I gave my employee a sheepish one-shoulder shrug.

  “Sorry, boss.” I snapped my fingers. “Oh, wait. You're not my boss.” I pointed at myself slowly and then at her. “I think maybe I'm your boss. Could it be? Could someone as smart and sophisticated as myself actually pay someone else to boss her around about candle orders?”

  “We need those candles,” Brianna said tersely. “Her Royal Highness put in a special order for three dozen of the lavender ones.”

  “The Countess?”

  “No, the Queen of England,” Brianna snapped. “She shops here regularly. With all her corgis and everything. You haven't noticed?”

  “Your sarcasm is bordering on actual nastiness today, Brianna. Did Evil Chad make your mocha decaf for some wicked reason?”

  “I wish.” She wrinkled her nose. “I didn't stop at the coffee shop. Before I left home, I had an herbal cleansing tea that's supposed to get rid of my toxins.”

  I snorted. “Without your toxins, what would be left?”

  She blinked at me with a faux-murderous expression.

  “Go,” I said, waving her away. “Go get yourself a full-caff mocha, and pick me up a you-know-what.”

  “What about my cleanse? I have a pimple. From toxins.” She pointed to her chin and the teeny tiny bump.

  “Brianna, everyone knows you don't have to drink herbal cleansing tea until you have three pimples.” The key to lying is to make it broad yet also specific.

  She bought it. “Oh. Cool.”

  Brianna left me to my cyberstalking, which I picked up right where I'd left off.

  I read the newest post on the casino's website. After the public altercation between Michael Sweet and casino staff on Saturday, the casino's publicist had issued a statement of apology for an unspecified event. We regret any negative impact this unfortunate event may have had for families attending the festivities, it read, and so forth.

  Michael and Samantha Sweet had posted their own vague regrets as well. Their real estate office had issued a statement of apology that didn't quite apologize so much as spread the blame over a wide range of factors including hot weather, a crowd-induced panic attack, and even the side-effects of medication for a lingering ear infection. I rolled my eyes. Their publicist was certainly creative.

  On the positive side, nobody had been seriously injured during the ruckus. Jessica had talked to Samantha over the weekend and gotten more details. Young Sophie had been happily occupied with her best friend Q, chaperoned by both Chip and Quinn McCabe. During the “regrettable incident,” the four of them had been in another part of the resort, getting butterflies painted on all of their faces.

  What I couldn't figure out from the social media posts, though, was the exact cause of the argument between Colt and Michael.

  A few anonymous commenters had cited an incident that day at the casino, between Michael and an employee who was a niece of his. According to internet user Rainbow733, Colt had witnessed Michael playing fast and loose with the rules at the Roulette table where his niece was the dealer. He'd issued a warning through his staff, and when Michael had turned belligerent, the staff had started escorting him out. Michael had been on his way out when the kerfuffle in the atrium happened.

  I'd heard Michael yell at Colt, “Isn't it enough that you and your family don't pay your fair share of taxes? You need to stay out of my business.” That didn't sound to me like a man telling off his niece's boss. But then again, Michael had never been one for words when he could use his fists.

  The front door chimed. A minute later, Brianna appeared in the back office holding both the coffee
she needed to deal with me plus the one I needed to deal with her.

  We still had ten minutes of quiet before we opened for business. We slurped our caffeinated beverages in easy silence, as was our Monday morning ritual.

  Most other weekdays, Brianna opened the store on her own. On Mondays, I came in early to deal with paperwork and put in restock orders. If I got straight to work without delay, I could be done by three o'clock. And I should have started already, not reading gossip on the internet. Our candle order truly was overdue.

  I would get to it immediately... right after I finished looking at the last five years' of Colt's posts and photos. As research.

  “Hey, I know that guy,” Brianna said, taking a seat to get a better view of my computer screen. I scrolled past a picture of Colt at a dressy event, wearing his usual suit and bolo tie.

  “You know Colt Canuso?”

  Brianna bounced on the second not-so-good office chair, making it squeak. “Not personally, but I thought he looked familiar. I just saw this guy in the coffee shop. Like five minutes ago.” She pointed at the screen excitedly. “This guy. With the bolo tie and everything.”

  “He was at House of Bean?” I hadn't seen him there before, or around the downtown core for that matter.

  “This guy was totally in the line in front of me,” Brianna said. “His hair's long in the back, and he had it tied with a leather strap. He was wearing a suit like that, with a bolo tie. What a character! I actually snapped a reference photo when he wasn't looking, because as soon as I saw his look, I knew I had to put him in my web comic.” She pulled out her phone and showed me a blurry picture of Colt Canuso in profile.

  “Brianna, you shouldn't put real people in your comic. If your website gets popular—I mean when it gets popular—people will try to sue you. It doesn't seem like a big deal now, but you need to think about your future.” I shook my finger at her. In an exaggerated parental tone, I said, “You must think about your future, young lady. The internet is forever!”

  “Whatever,” she said, just like the bratty kid she was.

  Brianna had recently turned twenty-two, but in many ways she resembled a teenager. She'd never lived on her own or had a serious relationship. She even looked like a kid, with her round face and big eyes. I had “acquired” Brianna along with my purchase of the gift shop. To my relief, she was an ideal store manager. Behind that cute face was a sharp mind. Not only was she quick enough to keep up with my witty banter, but the cash drawer always balanced to the penny whenever she was on the register. I couldn't say the same for our other casual and part-time help.

  Brianna leaned over and clicked the arrows on the computer keyboard to scroll through Colt's posts. Her glossy dark-brown hair swung back and forth energetically.

  “What exactly are we looking for, boss?” She scrolled the page down, all the way to pictures from five years ago. “Isn't that the gymnasium at the high school?”

  “Those must be pictures from my ten-year reunion. Don't get too excited about seeing me with bad hair. I wasn't there. I didn't make it home for that one.”

  “I know a lot of these people,” she said. “There's my second-cousin, Chip, and his wife, Quinn. Oh, and there's the real estate lady. Samantha. Did I ever tell you about the time Gloria made her cry?”

  I turned my chair around so I could face Brianna. Gloria was the original owner of Glorious Gifts. She'd listed the business for sale through Samantha Sweet's real estate office, which was how we'd originally met.

  “Gloria made Samantha cry?” And here I thought I was the only difficult client who brought the nervous realtor to tears.

  Brianna made a flat line with her mouth. “I shouldn't talk trash about my old boss, but Gloria could be mean.”

  Mean. I frowned. Jessica had called me mean on Saturday. Was it just a word people used without considering how it might hurt someone's feelings? Or was it inevitable that any woman would get one label or the other, either nice or mean, with no middle ground?

  The door chimed to let us know someone was opening the front door. We weren't supposed to be open for a few more minutes, but apparently Brianna hadn't turned the latch on her way back with our beverages.

  Brianna groaned. “Someone has made it through our defenses.”

  “That's what happens when you don't lock the door behind you.”

  She grabbed her takeout cup of mocha and headed toward the front to greet our first customer of the day. She might groan to me in private, but she was always polite and sincere with our customers.

  A minute later, I heard a man's voice. “Is the owner here? I need to speak to the store's owner. She's in big trouble.”

  Chapter 11

  I came out front to find a dark-haired man leaning casually against the store's front counter.

  “There's that manager,” he said, smiling.

  It was none other than the man I'd been cyberstalking all morning—Colt Canuso.

  I let out a chortle of relief. “You had me worried for a minute,” I said. “I was about to call in my big, tough security guards to kick you out on your tush.”

  Brianna, who stood behind the counter, struck a pose, flexing her biceps. “Boss, do you want me to toss this fella out?” She looked extra comical with her red Librarian Chic cardigan still buttoned crookedly.

  “I'll deal with this surly customer personally,” I told her. “Go finish drinking your mocha and open all that mail on my desk. You can even use the pointy mail opener.”

  She saluted me and went back to the office. We had several running jokes at the store, and one of them was about the hierarchy of staff members and which ones were allowed to use the pointy mail opener and the good scissors.

  After she'd left, Colt asked, “Has she been working for you long? And by working for you, I mean spying on people.”

  “She's my manager here at the store, but she doesn't work for the investigation agency. Any spying Brianna does is strictly personal.”

  He raised his dark eyebrows and fixed me with his deep-brown eyes, just like he had in my dreams.

  “Come on, Stormy. It's just us.” We were alone in the store. Monday mornings weren't usually busy, which made it a good day to do orders and take deliveries. But after the dreams I'd had, I found myself hoping for an interruption.

  “You sent your employee to do surveillance on me,” Colt said. “She's not very subtle. I heard her phone click when she took my picture.” His forehead wrinkled with worry. “What's going on? Has Michael hired your boyfriend the lawyer to sue me for giving him what he deserves? We carry insurance, but you should know, we've got some real tough-as-nails lawyers of our own.”

  I smiled to set him at ease. “Colt, I swear Brianna wasn't acting on my orders. You're not being sued—as far as I know. Brianna was taking your picture for her own nefarious purposes.”

  “Nefarious? You and your big words.”

  “You'll see what I mean when a dark-haired man with a bolo tie suddenly shows up in her web comic.”

  “Oh? That girl is Brie the Distractor? She works for you?” He blinked rapidly. “If that girl in the red sweater is Brie the Distractor, and you're her boss, that means you're... her.” He laughed. “You're Whirlwind. I can't believe I didn't put that together before now. Stormy is Whirlwind.”

  I shook my head. “I'm not Whirlwind, trust me. Any resemblance to real people in her web comic is strictly coincidental.” I tried to strike a casual, non-Whirlwind-like pose with my elbows resting on the counter. “And since when did Brianna's web comic get so popular?”

  “I've been reading it for a few years now.”

  “Great,” I said. “I'll get you an autographed calendar for Christmas.”

  He stared at me and sent me a warm feeling without saying a word.

  I felt the urge to rearrange the stapler and other items on the counter. “So, what brings you here, anyway? Can I help you pick out a gift for someone?”

  “I was just running some errands in town when I noticed your la
ckey taking my picture, so I thought I'd pop in and say hello.” He cleared his throat. “Stormy, I'd like to apologize for my behavior on Saturday.”

  “Which part? Kissing a married lady? Flirting with me? Or punching a guy in the stomach, right in front of a whole bunch of families?”

  “I'm a lover, not a fighter, so I'm only apologizing for the last one.”

  “I read the press release. It was pretty vague.”

  His dark-brown eyes glistened. “I'm a pacifist. It was wrong of me to punch Michael Sweet. Even if he did deserve it.”

  “What was he even doing? Did he confront you about”—I lowered my voice to a whisper—“kissing his wife?”

  Colt's head jerked up, and he gave me a startled look. “Did you tell him about that?”

  “No. I believed you that it was a one-time thing. But you promised me you were going to back off.” I poked my finger at him. “But you did the opposite of backing off. So, if it wasn't Samantha that you two were fighting over, what was it?”

  Colt rubbed his temples. “This and that. Did you know he used to date my sister, Trigger?”

  “Ew.”

  “Mikey's not that well-liked by my family, but I don't think his own family likes him much better.”

  “Is it true his niece works at the casino?”

  “Apparently. I didn't know, until I caught him pushing the rules at the roulette table. Plus he was soliciting. He's been asked repeatedly to stop hustling my customers, but we still catch him handing out business cards for his real estate business. I always tell him, people come to the casino to relax, not get a sales pitch.”

  “That's all there was to it? You wanted him to stop placing late bets and handing out business cards?”

  “That's all, I swear. Stormy, I'd never lie to you.” He bit his lower lip suggestively. “I admire you way too much.” He lifted his chin and looked down at me with interest. I didn't need to have read three books on body language to understand what he was thinking about, much less admiring.

  I checked the top buttons on my blouse and took a step back. The previous night's dreams had been vivid, but reality was even more intense.