Pre-Meditated Murder

by Tracy Weber

  I stared into the mirror, searching Crystal’s eyes for disingenuousness. I didn’t find any. “Do you know anyone else I should talk to?”

  “Like who?”

  “Gabriella’s other friends.”

  She shrugged. “You’re looking at them. Gabby mostly kept to herself. She didn’t know anyone in Cannon Beach until she and Michael got married, and once they hooked up, they didn’t have time for anyone else. Gabby’s English wasn’t that great and she seemed lonely after Michael moved away, so I took her under my wing. Other than me, I don’t think she knew very many people.”

  “How about at work?”

  “At Tuscany? You can go there, I suppose, but I don’t think you’ll learn much. Mona—the old biddy that owns the place—runs a tight ship. All work, all the time. No fraternization between employees. Frankly, I was surprised she hired Gabriella. For a woman whose grandparents immigrated from Italy, she’s mighty bigoted. If she had her way, Trump’s wall wouldn’t stop at the Mexican border. She’d seal up the whole country in a big plastic dome, like in that Stephen King novel.” Crystal examined my hair cut critically in the mirror, then picked up the scissors again for a few final touches.

  “Is there anything else I should know?” I asked. “Anything unusual about Gabriella?”

  “Not really.” Crystal paused, scissors closed and pointing toward the ceiling. “Well, maybe one thing, but I don’t know how important it is. Gabby asked me for a loan.”

  The hair on my arms vibrated. “When? And for how much?”

  “A couple of months ago. I told her I didn’t have anything to give her, so we never got to a specific amount.”

  “Did she say why she needed the money?”

  “To pay off Michael’s debts. Evidently business in Seattle was slower than he’d hoped.” Crystal grimaced. “At least that’s what she told me. I don’t know what to believe anymore. Do you think money’s what got her killed?”

  I didn’t volunteer the complete truth: that Gabriella hadn’t been scaring up money for Michael; she’d been scaring it up from him. Crystal had experienced enough heartbreak for one day. Still, my response wasn’t a lie. “I don’t know.”

  Crystal grasped a large chunk of my hair and prepared to make a few final cuts.

  Everything next seemed to happen at once.

  The door behind me opened and Rene’s voice called, “Aren’t you about done in here? We’re bored.”

  Bella—who stood on leash next to her—spied Mouse; or, more accurately, Mouse spied Bella. The calico kitten arched her back like a Halloween decoration, let out a loud yowl, and dove into the hole behind the shampoo bowl.

  “Oh no, a cat!” Rene screamed. She broke into a sneezing fit and dropped Bella’s leash.

  Bella froze for a moment, torn. On the left was a delectable calico morsel, hers for the eating. On the right, a complete stranger who held a sharp cutting instrument close to her human’s throat. For a self-proclaimed German shepherd guard dog, the decision was obvious.

  Protect the one who feeds you.

  Bella charged at Crystal, growling and snapping her teeth. Crystal screamed. Her hand spasmed. The scissors closed, cutting a three-inch-wide swath from my hair. “Help!” she yelled. “Keep that vicious dog away from me!”

  “Bella, stop,” I yelled in return. “This is our friend!”

  Bella skidded to a stop beside me, then took off after the kitten. She sniffed back and forth between the shampoo bowl and the base cabinet, whining.

  I gasped at my reflection in the mirror. “My hair!”

  The left side of my hair floated down past my shoulders. The right ended at the top of my ear.

  Rene’s mouth dropped open in a wide O. She took three steps back toward the door, still sneezing.

  “For God’s sake, Rene,” I yelled. “What are you doing here?”

  She shrank to half her normal size and stared at me with wide, innocent eyes. “We were getting bored out in the courtyard. Bella saw you through the window and wanted to say hi.”

  Crystal pointed at my right ear and proclaimed, “This isn’t my fault. The dog attacked me!”

  I bared my teeth at Rene. She replied with a submissive grin. “At least asymmetrical haircuts are in style.”

  I pointed to the door. “Get out. Now.”

  Rene grabbed Bella’s leash and scampered down the stairs. The door’s slam echoed behind her.

  Crystal chewed on her bottom lip, wincing. “What do you want me to do now?”

  Twenty minutes later, Crystal and I joined Rene in the courtyard. Autumn’s midmorning breeze felt uncomfortably cool against my bare neck. Rene sat at a table with Von, chatting. She looked up and flashed a smile so fake, it could have been carved out of wood. “You look adorable! You’ll love how fast that cut dries.”

  We both knew she was lying. I looked like a boy. An unattractive boy. An unattractive boy about to strangle his best friend.

  Crystal edged around the table, clearly trying to stay out of Bella’s striking range. Rene kept talking, faster now. “Bella was just re-introducing herself to Von. He thinks he might be able to find me a second set of those shoes. Isn’t that fabulous?” She lifted her eyebrows, clearly asking me to play along. “I told him that the twins are with the nanny.”

  If Crystal noticed Rene’s awkwardness, she didn’t mention it. “I didn’t realize you’d already met Von. You two should talk. He might be able to help.”

  “Help with what?” Von asked.

  I knew what was about to happen, but I was powerless to stop it.

  “Kate is a—” Crystal paused. “A friend of Michael Massey. She’s also a private investigator. She’s helping Michael’s lawyer investigate Gabby’s murder.”

  Von’s face split into a grin. “You didn’t tell me that you knew Michael. How—” He stopped, midsentence, and scowled. “Wait a minute …” He clenched his fists and spit out the same words, this time as an accusation. “You didn’t tell me that you knew Michael. What in the hell is going on here?”

  “I’m sorry, Von,” Crystal replied. “It was confusing for me at first, too. Kate isn’t just Michael’s friend, she’s his girlfriend.”

  Cha cha cha.

  “His girlfriend?” Von glared from Rene to me and then back to Rene again. “You told me you were gay. Are you two playing me for a fool?”

  I didn’t have a chance to explain. Von slammed his fist against the table, swept Rene’s coffee to the pavement, and stomped away.

  thirteen

  Rene begged for forgiveness all the way back to the rental house. “Seriously, Kate, you were taking forever. How was I supposed to know that Bella would react like that? And that scene with Von is one hundred percent on you. We had a plan. A plan that did not include you pretending to be a private investigator.”

  I ignored her, but not because I was angry. Rene was right, actually. I was as much to blame for the morning’s fiasco as anybody. I ignored her because I was using each and every one of my brain cells to mentally debrief my conversation with Crystal. While Rene continued apologizing, I created a mental list of new information and the additional questions it created.

  To my surprise, I’d learned quite a lot.

  One: Gabriella had asked more people than Michael for money, which meant that demanding money in exchange for the divorce hadn’t been solely a crime of opportunity. Why did she suddenly need money? She’d told Crystal that it was to help Michael, but that was an obvious fabrication. Was the real reason somehow related to her death?

  Two: Gabriella and Crystal had probably not been lovers, at least not if Crystal had told me the truth. Frankly, Gabriella hadn’t been much of a friend to Crystal, either. She’d asked her for money and lied to her about her fake marriage.

  Three: Crystal thought Shannon could be the killer. Shannon had never occurred to me as a
suspect, but it made a weird kind of sense. She’d threatened to “squash Gabriella like a cockroach” the night of her death. The comment had seemed like a poor attempt at gallows humor at the time, but what if it was more than that?

  As far as I knew, Shannon didn’t have an alibi for the night Gabriella was killed either, and she’d missed her meeting the next morning—supposedly because she’d had a “long night.” A long night doing what? Stewing over her fight with Michael, or eliminating the source of their disagreement? She loved her brother, maybe a little too much. Would she have killed to protect him?

  Four: I had a new person to question: Mona, Gabriella’s boss at Tuscany. No-fraternization policies notwithstanding, Gabriella might have opened up to someone at the restaurant. If she—

  Rene poked my arm, making me jump. “For goodness sake, Kate. Have you been listening to me at all?”

  I gaped through the windshield. I’d obviously been driving on autopilot. When had I pulled into the beach house’s driveway?

  She continued chiding me. “Are you going to stay out here and give me the silent treatment all day, or are you coming inside?”

  “Sorry, I wasn’t ignoring you. I was thinking. Are you hungry?”

  Rene looked at me askance. “What kind of question is that? I’m always hungry.”

  “Great. Let’s go to lunch. We’re having Italian.”

  I knew Dale and Michael would never approve of my plan, but I tried to call them anyway. Not to ask for permission to question Mona, but to beg them to level with me first. As far as I knew, Michael still hadn’t found his cell phone, but I tried it anyway. Straight to voicemail, which was now full. No answer on Shannon or Dale’s phones, either.

  Tuscany was normally only open for dinner, but they served lunch during Sandcastle Week. Sam looked up the restaurant’s address online while Rene bundled up the twins in matching teddy bear onesies. I incarcerated the puppies inside their crate in the living room and secured it with a Bella-proof carabiner. Bella had figured out how to break the puppies out of their crate when they lived with Michael and me. Fortunately, she couldn’t open the carabiner. Yet.

  I hated leaving Bella behind at the beach house. She still suffered from significant separation anxiety, and although the anxiety part of her neuroses was lessened when she had the puppies for company, their howling drove her stark raving mad. I wasn’t sure I’d be able to find shade parking near Tuscany, though, and I didn’t want to risk leaving her in the car in the noon-hour sun.

  So I compromised by scratching behind her ears and giving her an extra-large ostrich tendon. “Sorry to leave you alone with the monsters, but we won’t be gone long. If they bug you, go upstairs and hide in one of the bedrooms. It’ll be less noisy up there.” Bella—who understood a remarkable amount of English—snatched the tendon from my hand and trotted up the stairway.

  Puppies incarcerated and Bella mollified, Rene, Sam, and I headed to Tuscany in a two-car caravan. Taking both cars wasn’t the most ecologically sensitive option, but it was the most flexible. I needed my own wheels to join Dale and Michael should either of them ever return my phone calls.

  Tuscany was housed in a tiny, pink stucco structure that had once been somebody’s home. Nestled between multi-story hotels, the restaurant’s energy was both charming and incongruous. The roof was missing a fair number of shingles, and the trim was faded and peeling. But well-kept rosebushes bloomed along the cement walkway, and pristine stained-glass windows sparkled with color. The entrance was crowded with people waiting for a table.

  Sorry, Bella. We may be longer than I thought.

  A half hour later, Rene, Sam, the twins, and I were shown to a table covered by a bright white tablecloth and decorated by a three-stem bouquet of fragrant, deep red roses. Pavarotti’s honeyed voice dampened nearby conversations.

  The delicious aromas of tomatoes and roasted garlic would normally have made my mouth water, but stress had quashed my appetite. Which was probably a good thing, since Rene appeared to be eating for four. She reached across the table, grabbed the last chunk of hot, fresh, rosemary sourdough, and lathered it with butter. She waved at an overweight, exhausted-looking waitress across the room. “Can you bring us more bread please?”

  The woman nodded a single yes and shuffled into the kitchen.

  Sam peered at me across the table. “Wow, Kate. I can’t get over that haircut. It’s short. I mean really short.”

  Rene wrinkled her lips and gave him a look. A look that indicated he’d better stop talking—and soon—or his twin-making privileges would be permanently suspended.

  He winced. “I mean, your hair looks great and all, it’s just different.” He cocked his head to the side. “Maybe it takes a while to get used to.” He jumped. “Ouch! Rene, stop kicking me!”

  “Blame your wife,” I said ruefully. “It was either this or a mullet.”

  “That haircut was Rene’s idea?” He turned to his wife. “You’re not planning to cut yours like that, are you?” This time Rene stomped on his foot.

  The waitress reappeared, thumped a second basket of bread on the table, and handed us each a menu. “Sorry about the wait.” She flashed a tired smile at the twins. “Well, aren’t you a couple of cutie-pies.” Amelia gurgled in reply, still deeply asleep. The waitress grinned. “Bet they keep you on your toes.”

  “Don’t you know it,” Sam said. “I wish we could get them to sleep like this at night.”

  I gestured toward the half-dozen people still waiting near the entrance. “You guys are busy today,” I said.

  “Sandcastle Festival,” she replied. “Busiest weekend of the year. We’re not this backed up normally. Doesn’t help that one of my waitresses has the flu and the other one quit two days ago without notice. That leaves me, my chef, and my broken-down dishwasher to deal with this mess. I’ve been running my feet off.”

  Her waitresses? She must be the owner.

  “Are you Mona?” I asked.

  She stepped back and appraised me with cautious curiosity. “I am. Who’s asking?”

  “My name is Kate Davidson.” I reached out my hand. Mona shook it without enthusiasm. “I’m here on behalf of a friend. I was actually hoping to ask you a few questions about one of your waitresses.”

  Curiosity changed to suspicion. “Which one?”

  “Gabriella Massey.”

  Mona scowled. “Sorry, I don’t have time to talk.”

  An elderly woman a few tables away waved her fingers in the air. “Ma’am, we’ve been waiting for over twenty minutes. I’ve got low blood sugar.”

  Mona nodded. “I’ll be right there.” Under her breath, she muttered, “Eat some bread, you old crone.” She pulled out her order pad and turned to leave.

  “Please,” I said. “It’s important.”

  “Like I already told you, today’s not a good day.” She showed me her backside and started walking away.

  Sam stood and spoke. “We can make it worth your time.”

  Mona froze. Then again, so did I. What on earth was he talking about?

  He gave Mona an engaging smile. The kind you see in toothpaste commercials. For a second, I would have sworn he was channeling Rene. “This is a gorgeous restaurant. I can see that you’ve poured your heart into it. Your website doesn’t do it justice.” He reached into his billfold, pulled out a business card, and handed it to Mona. “It’s not mobile friendly, either.”

  She grimaced. “I don’t have the time, the money, or the energy to work on a website. I have customers to feed. Which is what I should be doing right now.”

  Sam didn’t give her a chance to leave. “You may not have time, but I do. As you can see on my card, I own a software company.”

  Sam owned a software company, all right. One that was about to go public. One that had no reason to scavenge for work on small business websites. What was he up to?


  Mona glanced at the card and started to hand it back. “Sorry, like I said. No money either.”

  “I don’t want money. All I’m asking for is ten minutes of your time to answer Kate’s questions.” Mona frowned at him skeptically. “I’m serious. Give her ten minutes, and I’ll provide you with a new, mobile-friendly website. I’ll even throw in an online ordering app.”

  Her shrewd eyes pinned Sam to the table. “Are you serious?”

  He pointed his thumb at Rene. “As serious as the heart attack this one’s going to get from eating all of those carbohydrates.”

  The elderly woman at the other table waved her hand furiously. “Excuse me, ma’am? We’re still waiting.”

  Mona ignored her. She flicked Sam’s business card with her thumbnail, then tucked it into her pocket. “It’s one o’clock. We close for dinner prep at two. I can give you fifteen minutes then. In the meantime, take a look at the menu. I’ll be back to take your order as soon as I can.” She shuffled hurriedly to the other table.

  The right edge of Sam’s mustache lifted in a caterpillar-like grin.

  “Did you mean that?” I asked. “Are you really going to redo her website?”

  He shrugged. “I don’t see why not. The one she has now is terrible. I can do it myself if she doesn’t want anything too fancy. If she does, I have three floors filled with web developers. If I provide enough pizza and beer, one of them will have it done in an evening.”

  “I don’t know what to say,” I replied.

  “You don’t have to say anything. I used to work with small business owners like Mona all the time. They’re stressed and cash poor. They barely have time to brush their teeth.”

  That certainly described Michael and me.

  “She’ll be more cooperative if we make it worth her while. Besides, I’m sick of sitting around while you and Rene get to have all of the fun. Michael’s my friend, too.”

  I wrapped him in a huge hug, not even cringing when his mustache brushed my cheek. “I owe you. Michael and I both do.” I leaned back and grinned. “I might even forgive you for that comment about my hair.”