Till Beth Do Us Part (A Jamie Bravo Mystery Book 2)

by Layce Gardner

  “Fire? Bomb? Gunshot to the head?”

  “Get another woman. Once she finds out you're seeing somebody else, she'll go away. She won't be able to handle the blow to her fragile ego,” she says.

  She has a point. I chew my bottom lip, thinking it over. She must see my wheels turning because she says, “I'll pick you up Friday at seven.”

  Then she's gone—speeding around the track like the frickin’ Road Runner.

  Big sigh. Now I have two dates to my high school reunion and I'm not even sure I'm going.

  Six

  Sheri Rosetti lives in an imposing white brick house on the lake. The driveway is long and lined with silver maple trees. The gravel in the drive is sparkling white—like it gets cleaned, scrubbed and bleached daily. I almost feel guilty for allowing my dirty tires to roll over it.

  As I drive Silver under the silver maples I think about how this must look spectacular in the fall. Right now the trees provide a canopy of green that makes a tunnel of refreshing shade. I park in the circular driveway and study the six-car garage that is adjacent to the house. Six-car garage? Really? Why does anyone need six cars? Is there a car for every day of the week except Sunday? Is Sunday the day of driving rest?

  Ivan follows me up the steps and to the front door. He sits at attention at my feet. Even he seems to know that his best behavior is called for in the face of such wealth. I ring the doorbell and hear an ominous chime inside. While I wait, I study the porch. It's held up by eight enormous Ionic pillars. I know they're Ionic because I took an art history class in high school. I’d thought they were called bionic pillars and was laughed at by the rest of the students. So, Ionic stuck in my brain even though I don't remember a single other thing from that class.

  The front door is at least ten feet tall and has lead glass windows on either side. The design etched in the glass looks like tiny little bathtubs floating on a sea of bubbles. Maybe Mr. Rosetti owns a plumbing company. All the goombahs own some kind of front business. Jimmy Smith owns a string of bowling alleys. Frankie has diners. Dumbshit is evidently around for stress management.

  The tall door opens without a squeak, revealing a butler dressed in full tails. His beady little eyes peer down over a long nose. His eyes travel up and down the length of me and he says, “Whooo are yooou? Whyyy are yooou here?” He has an annoying way of elongating his vowels like people do when they're trying to sound upper crust.

  “The name's Jamie Bravo. I’m here to sell Girl Scout cookies.” Snotty people turn me into a bit of a smart-ass. Where does he get off anyway, acting like he's all that? He's just a butler.

  “I don’t seeee any coooookies,” he says.

  Okay, he's stupid to boot. Looks like I'm going to have to spell it out for him. “I’m here to see Mrs. Rosetti. She's expecting me.”

  He steps back and motions for me to enter, intoning, “Why didn’t you say so?”

  “Uh, you didn’t give me a chance,” I reply. Snot Face opens the door a tiny bit wider. I have to squeeze through. After I'm inside, he puts his foot out, stopping Ivan from entering.

  “Let him in. He goes where I go.”

  Snot Face shows his displeasure with a scowl, but removes his foot. Ivan prances in, his toenails clicking on the marble floor. I look around. Talk about grand. The foyer is gleaming white. And it's bigger than most apartments. A staircase that's about twenty feet wide ascends to the second floor. Several doors lead off to parts unknown.

  Snot Face waves his skinny arm at a door to our right, saying, “Wait in the library. I will tell Mrs. Rosetti you are here.”

  Ivan and I walk into the library. Snot Face follows us.

  “Would Madam care for anything to drink while she waits?”

  I don't know where he gets the Madam from. I don't look like a Madam. I also think it’s weird he's referring to me in the third person. Maybe that's what rich people do. I answer, “Sure. She will have an iced tea with lemon. If he has it.”

  “Of course we have lemon. We have bushels of lemons,” Snot Face says like he’s offended that I dare reproach his lemon status.

  “I don’t need a bushel. One slice will suffice.” That sounded pretty high-tone of me. Slice. Suffice. I rhymed. I try for another rhyme: “And when you're done, I'd like to see Mrs. Rosetti. . . hon.”

  He raises an eyebrow. The rhyming thing didn't sound as good coming out as it did in my head. I continue, “Frankie sent me. Keeping me waiting is like keeping him waiting. And I know you don't want to do that.”

  That lights a fire under his butt. He scurries off, closing the library door behind him.

  I mosey around the library and notice right off the books are all fakes. They're all the same width and height, all leather bound with gold embossed titles. This is the kind of thing an interior designer does with people who are not readers but want to give the impression of being well-read. It's a picture-perfect library. It looks like its straight out of a nineteenth century English country house. Except for the fake books part.

  I sit on the leather couch. It's a big one. Bigger than my car. If I sit all the way back my feet don't even touch the floor. I scooch forward and sit on the edge of the couch. Ivan prances around, sniffing the chairs and lamps and shelves. “What do you think, boy? Would you like to live in a place like this?”

  Sheri Rosetti and my iced tea arrive at the same time. She reeks of money. Everything about her is big—from her hair to her diamonds. I swear she smells like money. She snags the iced tea off Snot Face's tray and turns her million-dollar smile on me. Her caps blind me with their whiteness.

  I stand and nervously smile back. She hands me the iced tea, but before I can say thank you, she turns to Snot Face and orders, “You may go. And when I say go, I mean go outside and stand in the middle of the lawn. Stay where I can see you from the window.”

  “Madam, it is 100 degrees outside. It is, after all, summer,” Snot Face blubbers.

  “I am well aware that it is summer. But I want you far away so you don't eavesdrop and tell my husband everything I say.”

  “I would never. . .” Snot Face stammers.

  “You would,” she interrupts, “And you have. Now go. Scram. Scat.” She waves her long fingernails at him like she's shooing a pesky fly out the door.

  “But, Madam. . .”

  “Go! Or I'll cut off your other pinky. Do I make myself clear?”

  Snot Face’s Adam’s apple slides up and down his scrawny neck. “Perfectly clear.” He bows and walks backwards all the way out the door.

  “I believe this is yours,” Sheri Rosetti says, leaning forward just enough for me to get a little peepshow. Up close I notice she has a well-placed mole and lips like rose petals. She's Marilyn Monroe personified and teleported into the twenty-first century.

  “Did you really cut off his pinky, Mrs. Rosetti?” I ask, sipping the iced tea. It's good—the right kind of sweet despite containing eleven slices of lemon.

  “Call me, Sheri,” she says, sitting on the couch and crossing her legs. She's wearing a white dress that strains against her thighs and barely hides her panties. If she's wearing panties, that is, which I highly doubt. “And no, I did not cut off Hibbard’s pinky. My husband did. Unfortunately, he got first dibs, but the way I figure it he’s got nine more digits. I don’t like to show up my husband’s work, he’s sensitive that way, so I’d start with Hibbard’s other pinky.”

  “We all have to have goals,” I reply.

  Ivan jumps up on the couch beside Sheri. Her eyes widen with delight. “Oh! A Chinese Crested. I simply adore that breed. They don’t give a rat’s ass what anyone thinks of them. I like that attitude.” Her long nails rake down Ivan's back and he shivers in ecstasy.

  Suddenly, Sheri stands and walks to the long windows that face out onto the front lawn. “Good. Hibbard is just where he’s supposed to be. I hate to disappoint you, but you won’t be witnessing a pinky removal right now,” she says.

  “So is he like a spy or something?”


  “Among other things.” She walks back over and sits on the couch beside me. Close enough so that our thighs touch. “Now, to what do I owe this visit, Miss…”

  I can feel the heat emanating from her leg. It makes me nervous. “Um. . . Bravo. Jamie Bravo. Frankie sent me to talk to you.”

  “Oh?” she says, her lips forming a luscious O. “About what?”

  I tear my eyes away from those lips. “Um. . . about womanly things. I mean, stuff. You know, about all things womanly.” Crap. I need to get hold of my nerves before they run away from me.

  Sheri cocks her head and studies me. She lifts one already-arched eyebrow and it almost disappears into her hairline. She places a warm hand on my leg and squeezes lightly. “I get a good feeling from you, Jamie Bravo.”

  She gets up again and walks back to the windows. Hibbard has moved. Sheri throws open the sash and aims a handgun out the window. Where did that gun come from? Did she have it hidden somewhere on her body? But where? I decide I'd rather not know. She fires and I hear a high-pitched scream.

  Sheri yells, “Next time, Bozo, I won't aim for your ass! Move again and it'll be your balls!”

  I see Hibbard high-step back to his position in the middle of the yard. He's holding his backside and moaning.

  Sheri turns back around and faces me. Her smile is back in place and the gun is nowhere to be seen. Where did the gun go? She's like a magician pulling a rabbit out of a hat.

  “Why don’t you want him to hear us?” I ask.

  Sheri sits next to me on the couch. This time she's even closer. Our shoulders and the entire length of our legs are touching.

  “Because if Frankie sent you, it only means one thing—we’re going to talk about my husband’s shortcomings. Am I wrong?”

  “Uh, no. You're not wrong.”

  “Do you watch Orange is the New Black?” Sheri asks. She reaches behind us to the drinks cart. To reach the Cutty Sark scotch and a glass, she's forced to lean in even closer to me. Her breasts graze my ear. It makes me a little dizzy.

  Sheri pours three fingers of scotch into a crystal glass and replaces the bottle on the cart.

  “Do you?”

  “Do I what?”

  “Watch Orange is the New Black?”

  “Sure. I binged on it a whole weekend.” I sip the iced tea, almost spilling it on myself because a lemon wedge bursts out of the pack. I peel the lemon wedge off my chin and dump it back into the glass. I lick my chin.

  Sheri swirls the scotch around in her glass studying it like she's reading tea leaves. “I find that program very interesting,” she says. “Is the world of women as tight as all that?”

  “If the women are in prison, sure. They’re pretty much stuck with each other,” I say.

  “In other words, women are finding solace where they can.” She says the word solace like she's actually saying the word sex.

  I can feel that I have a lemon seed stuck in my front teeth. I don't dare open my lips. I don't want her to see the seed. I nod instead.

  Sheri sips her scotch—two quick sips in succession like it only counts as one sip if she does that. “Hmmm. . . Most women don’t like me—they feel threatened, I guess. Do you feel threatened by me?”

  I answer, making sure to keep my lip over my upper teeth. “Not unless you’re going to shoot me. Are you sure we shouldn’t go check on Hibbard, make sure he’s not bleeding to death?”

  Sheri laughs. “It’s only a pellet gun. Ronny won’t let me have a real one. I suppose he fears for his life, with me at least. I’m surprised he doesn’t frisk me every night before bed. Come to think of it, if he did, I might overlook his dick and not divorce him.”

  “So the divorce is more than just the unfortunate shape of Mr. Rosetti’s…penis,” I say. I've always had trouble saying the word penis.

  “Jamie, if I may call you that,” she says, tracing one fingernail in little circles on top of my leg, “Have you ever been sexually dissatisfied?”

  I suck on my front teeth, trying to dislodge the lemon seed and think about her question. Dissatisfied covers a lot of ground. I think harder.

  “I’m guessing not,” Sheri says before I can form an answer. “I have lived my entire life having horrible lovers, and believe me, I’ve had more than one love affair. Italian men don't go down. Did you know that?”

  I shake my head.

  “They think it makes them less of a man.”

  “Hmmm. . .” I say. This conversation is veering off into unchartered territory. And I don't think I like where it's headed.

  “I’d kill for a decent lick job,” Sheri says with an exaggerated sigh. She looks right into my eyes and asks, “What about you? How do you feel about lick jobs?”

  I gulp.

  Sheri continues, “See, what I’m saying. . . I could deal with a pancake dick if he’d make me come first.”

  I have absolutely no earthly idea how to sort this out. This is Oprah's territory, not mine. “Can I ask you a personal question?”

  “At this point I don’t think we can get much more personal.” Sheri looks over at the window. “That asshole!” She runs to the open window. She whips the gun out of—somewhere—and fires it.

  I hear another high-pitched scream. This time I see Hibbard running in circles and cupping his privates. She must've made good on her word and nailed him in the ball zone. He finally collapses on his knees in the middle of the yard, rocking back and forth and keening.

  Sheri shouts, “If you breathe a word about any of this I will cut off your dick instead of your pinky.”

  Hibbard falls facedown in the lush, manicured grass.

  “I don’t think he’ll bother us anymore.” She turns from the window. The gun has disappeared.

  “If you don't mind me asking, why’d you marry your husband?”

  “I married him because he was rich and he had six cars—five of which are now mine.”

  “What about his. . .” I pointed at my lap, “little problem?”

  “I let money blind me. I was a cocktail waitress and he had a crush on me. I figured I could work with it. I can’t anymore. You know how you get all you dreamed of and then you find out that you need more?”

  Not really. “I don’t have five cars.”

  “Well, if you ever do, you’ll understand.”

  I doubt that. I sip the last of my iced tea. When the ice clanks against my teeth, I figure it's time to vamoose on out of here. This problem is a little more than I bargained for. It requires a Yoo-hoo and some Travis advice. “Well, I better go.”

  “What about my problem?” Sheri says, walking toward me with all the sensuousness that the white dress can handle.

  “Uh, I need to think on it—you know put on my womanly-skills thinking cap. I’ll get back to you.”

  Before I can stand, Sheri slides onto my lap. She rubs my nose with her nose—like I'm a cute little puppy. Or an Eskimo. She says, “I have a better idea. I want your womanly skills right now.”

  That's when she lip locks me. Before I know it, her tongue is wrestling with my tongue. I hear a moan and think maybe Hibbard's in the room then I realize the moan actually came from me. God, this woman can kiss. She can do things with her tongue that I didn't even think were humanly possible.

  Sheri slips her hand inside my shirt and teases my nipple. She says, “Yes, that’s the ticket.”

  “What ticket?” I squeak.

  She pulls her hand out of my shirt and whispers in my ear. “The ticket where you find me a rich Italian lesbian to marry.” She pulls back and says plainly, “One that has mob ties. That way Frankie won't have to worry about me divorcing Ronny because I'll still be family. Only I'll be satisfied.”

  She rises to her feet. “I'd marry you, but you don’t have five cars.”

  I run my tongue over my front teeth. The lemon seed is gone. Sheri smiles wickedly, holds out her palm and spits the lemon seed into it. She drops the seed into my empty glass, turns, and sashays out of the room. Her beautiful hips swing f
rom side from side, leaving behind a wake of desire.

  Ivan and I both stare after her with our mouths hanging open. “Whoa,” I say to the empty room. No wonder her husband doesn't want to divorce her.

  Seven

  Next stop: Burt's Burlesque. Travis tends bar there and keeps a supply of my favorite drink on hand. I need to think and sort out what just happened with Sheri Rosetti.

  Ivan and I walk in the back door and squint into the darkness. The bar is open now, but the burlesque show part doesn't start until night. The place looks depressing in the daytime. I sidle up to the bar and plop down on the stool. Burt is scrubbing the bar top with a damp cloth.

  Burt is a big queen. He looks tough on the outside—he's the spitting image of Mr. Clean. But the moment he opens his mouth, he sounds like the queen he is. It's the lisp. I don't understand why gay men lisp. Is it an undercover signal designed to attract other men? Like how a duck call attracts ducks?

  “Why, hello there, Jamie. What's your poison?” Burt asks.

  “Yoo-hoo. Chocolate. Shaken, not stirred.”

  “Of course, dearie. Don't want to bruise the Hershey,” he says.

  I have no idea what that means and I'm too afraid to ask. I turn on my stool and look around the place. There are pink vinyl booths lining the walls and tables with white linen tablecloths in front of the stage—it resembles a 1930’s-style entertainment club. When there isn’t a cabaret show, Burt uses the stage as a dance floor.

  Camille, one of the burlesque dancers, is on the stage practicing some interesting moves involving a chair. She waves at me, the wiggly kind of wave using all five fingers and both breasts.

  I smile back at Camille. Despite being straight, she's had designs on me for a long time. So far, I've avoided sleeping with her. I'm in the market for true love and trying like hell to convince my libido of that fact.

  Ivan, however, has no such qualms. He runs onto the stage and leaps into Camille's arms. He nestles between her ample breasts. Dogs have all the luck.