by Lee Hollis
“If it wasn’t her husband, then who on earth did kill her?” Violet asked.
Poppy began pacing back and forth around the office. “It might have been a robbery gone bad. Maybe thieves somehow broke in and didn’t know she was home at the time and panicked—”
“It’s a gated community. How did they get onto the property?” Violet asked.
Poppy stopped and thought about it. “Perhaps they were disguised as air-conditioner repairmen, or gardeners, or plumbers. Home owners in gated communities give out gate codes all the time to service people.”
“Or maybe Tony Molina gave them the code so they could get in there and kill his wife!” Violet said matter-of-factly.
“All I’m saying, Violet, is my gut is telling me Tony didn’t kill his wife based on what we just watched on television. However, I do not have the same feeling about Alden Kenny, who we now know was having an affair with his wife.”
Violet marched over to Poppy, waving her hands. “Poppy, the truth is right in front of you. Tony found out about the affair and had them both taken out! Everyone knows he has mafia connections!”
Iris pouted, not wanting to believe the worst about her beloved Tony Molina.
“Yes, Violet, I suppose that’s possible! But your new friend Lydia told you Tony already knew about the affair long before Alden was killed! There is a lot more to the story, in my opinion,” Poppy said. “And I look forward to finding out what the whole story is!”
“You mean when the police find out!” Violet said.
Poppy offered a halfhearted nod.
“Because that’s their job. We, on the other hand, should focus on finding new clients with actual cases and the means to pay us! Don’t you agree, Iris?” Violet turned to Iris, fully expecting her to support her since she had been the one pounding that point home for days. But Iris stayed mum, wavering.
Violet’s eyes widened. “Iris?”
“My Tony is innocent. I would not mind helping prove it,” Iris mumbled.
“You used to be on my side!” Violet protested.
“That was when we were just looking for some spoiled rich girl, but this is the Tony Molina we are talking about. A superstar! My superstar!” Iris said.
“Well, I guess that’s it then. I’m officially outvoted,” Violet said with a sigh. “We’re now investigating two murder cases and not getting paid for either one of them!”
Chapter 33
Poppy, who held her mug of peppermint latte to her lips ready to take a sip, had to set it back down on the table to take in what she had just heard. “I’m sorry?”
“I’m thinking of moving to Palm Springs permanently,” Rod said, an expectant smile on his face.
“Why?” she found herself saying although she wasn’t sure she really wanted to hear the answer.
Rod shrugged as he stirred some cream into his cup of coffee. “I don’t know. It just feels right. Now that Lara’s back from Nepal, I’m hoping we can forge some kind of new relationship without butting heads all the time. She seemed more relaxed and mature when we spoke on the phone. She’s been talking about visiting me out in the desert. I’m hoping she might stay a while.”
Poppy debated whether she should bring up the credit card receipts again to Rod. The case was over. He was satisfied with just having his daughter back in his life. But she just couldn’t help herself. Her curiosity got the best of her. “Rod, did you ever ask Lara about the charges on the credit card?”
Rod nodded. “Yes. She said she had lost the card before she left the country and never cancelled it. She suspects it was a guy she met in a bar in LA who was a little sketchy and had been eyeing her purse that night. Lara didn’t think much of it until she finally noticed the card was gone. But by then she was in Nepal and living in a commune and focused on her meditation and spiritual seeking and she just forgot about it and never cancelled it.”
Poppy tried hard not to raise an eyebrow but couldn’t help it.
Rod instantly noticed. “You don’t believe her?”
Poppy leaned forward and spoke gently. “It’s just that Matt and I went to a guitar shop where the card was used and we showed the clerk a picture of Lara and he thought it might be her.”
“Was he one hundred percent certain?” Rod challenged.
“No, but it could have been her.”
“Maybe this guy, the one who lifted Lara’s card, has a very specific type, and his latest girlfriend just looked like her. And she could have been the one forging Lara’s name. That’s possible, right?”
“Yes, I suppose so.”
They sat silently in the coffee shop located on a side street off Palm Canyon for a few moments before Rod spoke again. “Lara isn’t the only reason I’ve been thinking about living out here in the desert full-time. . . .”
Poppy had feared she might be a factor in this hasty decision and she definitely knew she was not ready for that. She took a breath and whispered, “Rod . . .”
“Hello,” a man said, interrupting her.
Poppy looked up to see Sam Emerson standing next to their table with a relaxed smile.
“Sam, good to see you,” Rod said, jumping up to his feet and pumping Sam’s hand. “Pull up a chair and join us.”
Sam turned and grabbed a wooden chair and slid it over to their table. Poppy was too taken aback to say much of anything as Sam sat down with them.
“Sam had to come down from the mountain for more business so I invited him to join us for coffee,” Rod said casually.
Poppy was stunned but took a stab at covering, probably to no avail. “Oh . . . I didn’t know you two were talking so regularly. . . .”
Rod nodded. “We might be working together.”
Once again, Poppy, who had just raised her mug to her lips, had to set it back down on the table. “What?”
“It’s all very preliminary, nothing concrete, but I’ve been offered a pilot, another procedural. They want me to play a police commissioner, and I thought, wouldn’t it be nice to get Sam on as consultant? It would be like getting the old band back together for one more tour.”
Poppy looked to Sam, mouth agape. “I thought you loved your life up in Big Bear and didn’t miss the TV grind.”
Sam couldn’t help but laugh at her confounded expression. “Everyone says that until they’re offered real TV money. I’d be a fool not to seriously consider it.”
Poppy was hardly in a position to argue his point. After all, if a studio came calling for her to play a juicy role again, which was highly unlikely, she wasn’t sure she could so easily say no. And Sam was very good at consulting, always sweating the smallest of details, making sure to get everything right and factual. He would be the perfect choice to help out on a new cop show given his breadth of experience and vast knowledge of law enforcement.
She turned back to Rod. “I don’t understand. If you’re doing a pilot in LA, then why are you talking about moving out here on a permanent basis?”
“It’s not going to be shot in LA. It’s filming in New York.”
Poppy sat back in her chair. “New York?”
“But it’s just a pilot and we all know the odds of getting an actual series pickup. We’ll probably be back east for a total of two, three weeks max,” Rod said.
“I see,” Poppy said, finally managing to take a sip of her peppermint latte.
“And who knows?” Rod said, folding his arms and staring at Poppy. “If the series does go, then we could all end up living back in New York. Wouldn’t that be fun?”
“Me? What on earth would I do in New York?” Poppy asked, dumbfounded.
“I don’t know,” Rod said playfully. “There’s still a decent-size part in the pilot that hasn’t been cast yet, my character’s wife, Karen. . . .”
“I don’t act anymore, Rod,” Poppy said emphatically.
Rod didn’t seem to care. “Like Sam said, we always say we’re out of the business until the business comes calling again.”
It was like he was r
eading her mind just a few seconds earlier.
But Poppy wasn’t going to give him the satisfaction. “I have my business here. . . .”
Rod nodded, not believing for a second that she wouldn’t seize such an opportunity if given half a chance.
That bothered Poppy because she was happy here, working with her two best friends, and even Matt, running a business she had built up from scratch.
“And if they did end up casting someone else, you could just come and be with me,” Rod said, letting it hang there. It was as if he was somehow reminding Sam that Poppy belonged to him and not the cool, detached cowboy with the romantic hillside cabin up in the mountains.
Poppy was having none of it and blustered, “That’s ridiculous, Rod. I have no intention of moving to New York to . . . hang out with you. I’m sixty-two, not some nineteen-year-old groupie.”
“We can discuss it later,” he said with a wink.
He was right about that. Poppy had every intention of talking to him later. She had to nip this in the bud. Yes, she still found him attractive, and she did allow for the possibility that at some point she would be willing to consider a relationship, but right now it was entirely too premature.
As for Sam, as usual, he gave nothing away. He just sat in between them, almost enjoying Poppy acting so flustered and indignant, like she was putting on a show just for him. He was quiet, laid back, and infuriatingly poker faced.
Rod finally took the hint and changed the subject. He began peppering Sam with questions about his current business investments.
Poppy sat quietly, trying to calm down until the hotness in her face subsided. As she was about ready to rejoin the conversation, her cell phone buzzed. It wasn’t a call but rather a news notification. She gasped as she read it.
“Something wrong?” Sam asked, concerned.
Poppy looked up, dismayed. “There’s been an arrest in the murder of Tony Molina’s wife, Tofu.”
Rod leaned forward. “Who?”
“Her stepson . . . Dominick, Tony’s boy from his first marriage,” Poppy said glumly.
Chapter 34
As they left the coffee shop, Poppy walked ahead of the two men and Rod slid in behind her and placed a hand on the small of her back. Poppy wondered if he was just being a gentleman or if this was yet another overt gesture to signal to Sam again that she somehow belonged to him. If it was the latter, then Poppy considered the play completely inappropriate. She turned away, forcing him to pull his hand away.
Outside on the sidewalk, she finally had the opportunity to turn around and face the two men. Rod’s cell phone was ringing and he already had it clamped to his ear.
“Hi, Lanny,” Rod said, a finger pressed into his other ear to quiet the usual street noises. “Yes, I can talk. . . .”
Poppy and Sam faced each other with patient smiles on their faces.
Rod lowered the phone just a bit and said apologetically, “It’s my agent. I’m going to have to take this.”
“Of course,” Poppy said.
Rod hustled away from them, down the street toward the corner for a little privacy. She turned back to Sam. “So are you really considering going to New York?”
Sam shrugged. “I’m thinking about it. Like Rod said, it’s just a pilot. A few weeks tops.”
“But what if it does go to series? Are you prepared to leave your life in Big Bear for nine months out of the year?”
Another shrug from Sam. “Maybe. I spend a lot of time these days alone in the wild, with just the thoughts in my head, very few responsibilities. It might be healthy for me to come down the mountain and rejoin society for a while, work hard, take a break from my completely unencumbered life.”
“Well, living in New York would certainly be a dramatic change from the squirrels and raccoons and mountain lions you usually interact with.”
Sam nodded with a wry smile. “There are plenty of wild animals in the Big Apple, just most of them are on two feet.”
Poppy laughed. “I suppose that’s true.”
“You look awfully pretty today, I must say,” Sam said, eyeing her from head to toe.
She shifted uncomfortably but was flattered by the remark. “Thank you. . . .” She then mustered the courage and continued, “Sam, I don’t want you to get the wrong impression. . . .”
“About what?” he asked with a curious look.
“Rod and me. We’re not a couple . . . not right now. . . .”
Sam looked down at his boots. “But you’re thinking about it?”
“We reconnected because he brought us a case, and I have tried to keep our relationship strictly professional, at least . . .”
“Until the case is closed?”
“It is closed.”
“I see.”
Poppy didn’t think she was doing a very good job at all of explaining her position. “Rod has been a little overzealous in showing me where he stands, but I have yet to decide anything. In fact, I think he may have the wrong idea about my true feelings for him because I haven’t been up front with him about my own feelings for—”
Sam smiled, anxious to hear more.
“Sorry about that,” Rod said, stuffing his phone into the pocket of his pants as he walked back over to them. “Money issues. The network’s lowballing so don’t pack for NYC just yet, Sam.”
“It’s all good,” Sam said. “Whatever happens, happens.”
Poppy wanted to kick herself. She finally had had the opportunity to tell Sam how she felt about him, and she had blown it. She had hemmed and hawed and waited too long, and now the moment was gone. It was not that she feared Sam didn’t already know she had an affection for him, that the more time she spent with him had just deepened her feelings and desire for something more, but she had yet to formally communicate any of that to him. And now Rod was in the picture, a big ball of unbridled energy, the direct opposite of Sam’s laid-back, man-of-few-words style, and that, she had to admit, was attractive as well. It took her late husband, Chester, two years of dating before he had finally told Poppy he loved her. Rod had declared his love in less than a week after their initial reunion. Sam had never even come close, in her mind, to revealing how he truly felt about her, which made her think that maybe she was the one with the wrong impression.
“I’d better get going to my meeting,” Sam said. “You both have a great day.”
“I’ll keep you posted on the pilot, Sam!” Rod called after him as Sam turned and walked away.
“Good-bye, Sam,” Poppy said, almost too quietly for him to hear.
But he glanced back and gave her a wink before he rounded the corner and disappeared.
“Can I give you a lift somewhere?” Rod asked.
“No, my car’s just around the corner. I need to get to the office.”
She was still reeling from the news about Tony Molina’s son, Dominick.
“Okay, I’ll be in touch,” he said, reaching in for a kiss.
She didn’t pull away like she wanted to, but she did turn her head to the right so his lips landed on her left cheek.
He backed away, slightly hurt. “Is everything all right, Poppy?”
“Yes, but, Rod, we need to talk. . . .”
“If I’m going too fast, I can dial it back. I’m just the kind of guy who can’t help but go full gusto when he knows what he wants.”
“Yes, I’ve known that about you for a long time and it can be heady and intoxicating, but I’m not that way, I can’t rush into things—”
He felt a vibration in his pocket, grabbed his phone, and glanced at the screen. “It’s my agent again. I’m sorry, Poppy, we’re in negotiations and it’s a very critical time.”
“I used to be in the business—I completely understand. Go, take it,” Poppy said, waving him away.
“You’re a doll,” he said. “I’ll call you tonight.”
He bounded away.
She hadn’t lied to him. She found his enthusiasm and passion for her exciting, if not a bit overwhelming
. Especially compared to Sam, who held his cards so frustratingly close to his vest, and was a much harder read.
Poppy had absolutely no idea what she was going to do.
Chapter 35
When Poppy returned home to the apartment, she found Heather sitting on the couch with Matt. They appeared to be in the middle of a deep conversation and she hated to interrupt them.
Matt noticed her first and shot up to his feet abruptly. “Did you hear the news?”
Poppy nodded. “Yes. It’s such a shock. It’s hard to fathom that boy killed his own stepmother. . . .”
Matt scrunched up his face, confused. “What are you talking about?”
“Tofu’s murder . . . They’ve arrested Dominick Molina, Tony’s son,” Poppy said, now wondering about Matt’s news.
“I hadn’t heard that. I’m talking about Heather,” Matt said, reaching down and taking her hand as she stood up. “She got a job!”
“Oh, darling, that’s wonderful!” Poppy cried.
Heather tried to shrug it off. “It’s nothing, really. Just a hostess job at a Mexican restaurant in town, but I figure I can start saving my money to go back to school.”
“Well, you can be sure I will help, too,” Poppy promised.
But inside she was saddened by the fact that she wasn’t in a better financial position to cover all of the expenses for her struggling daughter. She once had been. Until she woke up one day to discover that her late husband, Chester, had lost all of their savings. But that was in the past, and she had chosen to just look ahead.
Matt put an arm around Heather. “I’m so proud of you!”
“Please, both of you, stop fawning over me. It’s just a part-time job handing out menus and booking reservations,” Heather demurred.
“It’s a start,” Poppy declared. “Think of it as the first step toward becoming a lawyer.”