A Poison Manicure & Peach Liqueur

by Traci Andrighetti

  "Sounds like Gunther and me need to go a greetin'," Magnolia said in a spaghetti western–style drawl.

  "And a gunnin'," Gia chimed with a fist pump.

  "There'll be no greeting or gunning." My tone made it clear that if there was to be any violence, it would be against the two of them. "Have you guys forgotten that in this morning's paper Ivy described us as outlaws out for vendetta?"

  "Why do you think I want her shot? She compared this to Scarface." Gia presented her profile and gestured to her bronzer-brushed skin. "The next time I see her, the Great Wall of China won't be able to hold me back."

  Despite her posturing (and posing), my cousin didn't want to hurt Ivy. But just in case, I had to inject some logic into the conversation. "If Ivy is trying to convince the police I'm the killer, the only way to stop her is to beat her—"

  "I'll go cut us a switch," Magnolia said.

  My forehead fell into my hand. Why did I try? "Aunt M, have a seat, and I'll start your hair."

  "Whatever you say, ladybug." She moved the box of liqueurs and removed her towel. "Dadburnit, I forgot my Aqua Net. Be right back."

  "Leaping lasagna." Gia stared transfixed at the back of my aunt's wet, hiveless head. "She looks like the white paper cone after you eat the cotton candy off."

  The salon phone rang.

  I shot Gia a look worthy of Calvin the Cod and rushed to the reception desk, willing it to be a client. "The Clip and Sip," I answered. "How can I help you?"

  "Cassidi, it's Bree." Her tone was low, like she didn't want to be overheard. "Can you meet me at Dangerous Reads in fifteen minutes?"

  Disappointed, I mouthed Bree to Gia. "I'm about to cut my aunt's hair. Can this wait?"

  "It can't. I found an old English grammar book hidden in Jade's room. I told my mom I would take it to the police, but you're going to want to see this first."

  I frowned at the phone. I wasn't sure why she thought I would want to read Jade's grammar book. But then again, I did spend my days subjected to Gia's Italian, Amy's German, and my aunt's Texan. "I appreciate that, but why the urgency?"

  "It has exercises and note pages with personal stuff, and I mean personal," she said in an if-you-get-my-drift tone. "It's like a Vietnamese version of the Kama Sutra."

  The book was starting to sound interesting. "I need any information I can get about Jade. I'm on my way."

  "Wait," Bree whispered. "It's not her book."

  Jade had an English grammar Vietnamese sex book that wasn't hers? "Was she using it as a reference or something?"

  "She certainly could have. It taught me a trick or two." Bree gave a lusty laugh. "Anyway, the name on the inside cover is spelled m-e-i."

  The sexy grammar book suddenly made sense. "That's Jade's grandmother, Mei Liu."

  CHAPTER TEN

  Gia stalked through the shelves at the Dangerous Reads bookstore with me close on her high top heels. "Are you sure Bree didn't say to meet at the B&B?"

  "She's probably running late," I replied, realizing that the cashier, Alicia Holmes, stared at us while she rang up Lucinda Eggers, a devoted and devout member of Charlotte Vickers' Bible study group.

  "Well I hope she hurries because it stinks in here." Gia covered her nose and mouth, fanning red fingernails with giraffe print tips across her face. "What in the name of Chanel is that smell?"

  "Books." My tone was as flat as the printed page.

  The bell on the main door chimed, and Bree entered with her best friend, Cristal. She met my gaze and tilted her head toward a secluded area in a corner.

  I nodded and elbowed my cousin. "They're here."

  Gia saw Bree's bestie slip down the aisle. "Ugh, she brought Miss California?"

  I gripped her sleeve. "My life is literally on the line, so could you please put your East Coast–West Coast rivalry with Cristal aside long enough for us to get this book?"

  She pulled her arm away. "Why are you asking me to call the truce? The Hollywood D-lister over there is the diva."

  This from a woman who once tried to get her hair insured. I headed to the corner for the book hookup.

  Bree and Cristal were browsing some Mathematics titles—or pretending to browse.

  "Hey, y'all," I said. "Thanks so much for doing this."

  Bree patted my hand. "You don't have to thank us, hon. We believe in you."

  "I'd like to repay you in some way." I noticed a chip in Bree's fingernail. "How about complimentary mani-pedis?"

  "Uh, we were going to do our nails after this." She angled a back-me-up-on-this glance at her BFF. "You know, a girls' pampering night?"

  They might believe in me, but they didn't believe in my nail polish. And who could blame them when it seemed that the Poison Poinsettia had lived up to its name?

  Gia hit Cristal with a haughty stare. "You'll want to catwalk over to the Health & Beauty aisle to read up on manicures."

  "Actually, I know how to do nails." Cristal gave Gia's giraffe talons a wicked once-over. "But you'll want to take your own advice."

  My cousin did a one-handed hair flip. "Could you repeat that? I couldn't hear you over your loud, knockoff Pucci dress."

  Cristal saw her single-handed flip and raised her a double. "Don't blame my designer dress. It was your Jersey accent echoing off your faux cowhide jacket."

  Gia's smoky-shadowed eyes shot flames. Then she clamped her arms to her side and did a full frontal flip. "After you look up manicures, you might want to sashay over to the Education section to catch up on kindergarten because this is faux giraffe."

  "Pardon me, ladies." Meri Sinclair speed-walked down the aisle. "I'm going to have to ask you to lower your voices or take this outside."

  "That won't be necessary, because Miss Cover Girl's sorry." Gia jerked her thumb at Cristal, whose nostrils—and hair—flared.

  Meri licked her lips. "Yes, well, Elizabeth Ashby and Gin Jones are presenting over there." She pointed to the reading-group room to the right of the main door.

  "Gin Jones?" I eyed the closed French doors. "Isn't she Elizabeth's coauthor on that book about the Monograms antique shop murder?"

  "Yes, Four-Patch of Trouble. She and Elizabeth are the first presenters to our mystery book club, Espirit de Corpse." Meri tucked a lock of her chin-length bob behind her ear. "Anyhow, if you'll excuse me, I need to get back to the presentation."

  I gave something like a smile. But after Meri left, that something slipped from my face. I hoped Gin and Elizabeth didn't take an interest in the salon murders—Ivy's or mine—because I definitely didn't want any books about those. Duncan Pickles' articles were already doing enough damage to my business.

  "Now that we're finally alone…" Bree reached into her bag and handed me a tattered grammar book with a blue-cloth cover.

  Cristal struck a pose and shot a stylish smirk at Gia. "These English exercises should help you get rid of that nasty Jersey jargon."

  Gia strained a smile. "Aren't you considerate, Tammy."

  Upon hearing her real name, Cristal locked eyes with Gia. And the East Coast–West Coast stare-off–flip-off resumed.

  "You two." Bree waved a hand at the dueling divas. "Anyway, the juicy parts, besides the sex, obviously, are that Mei worked at the LaSalle's parlor house. And get this—she was carrying on with a local fisherman who liked to dress in her clothes and play a sex game called Uncle Wiggily." She gave a well-themed eyebrow wiggle.

  "That was a family board game from the 1950s," I said, but my mind fixated on the word fisherman.

  "Ewww." She wrinkled her nose. "Well, the even bigger news is that Mei had a baby girl named Annabelle with the fisherman, but he was married with a little son." She looked from side to side and leaned in. "And I think he might be the man she came here to meet."

  I was inclined to agree with her. The fisherman's son would be a half brother to Annabelle, which would make him the likely candidate for Jade's half uncle.

  Bree put her purse on her shoulder. "Makes me so glad my family's not from here."
>
  The minute she mentioned her family, I realized that her uncle, Eddie, wasn't a suspect. Neither was Santiago Beltràn. Neither of the two were from the area, and they were too old to be Jade's half uncle. And, for that matter, Robbie the pool boy was too young.

  But was Clark the killer? Or was it Randall?

  And what did The Reverend's father do?

  * * *

  My cell phone vibrated on my nightstand, and I started in my bed like a teen caught looking at porn. Because Mei Liu's English book was so erotic that it should've been titled 50 Shades of Grammar.

  Reaching for the phone, I saw Zac's name on the display, and I was surprised to see that it was seven p.m. The book had been more gripping—or maybe groping—than I'd realized. "Hey, you," I answered. "You're not getting back this late, are you?"

  "Nah, we docked at around four because of a glitch in the detection software." He sounded like he'd been at sea for a week. "It stopped working after lunch, so we lost search time."

  "Don't be too upset. It's only the first day."

  "Yeah, we'll get on track tomorrow," he said with his usual self-confidence. "What have you been up to?"

  "I spent most of the afternoon glued to a grammar book, brushing up on my skills." And that was the truth. Mei's sample sentences, especially those on lie, lay, laid, and lain, had cleared up my confusion not only about aspects of the English language but about body language too.

  "Sounds exciting."

  He had no idea. "Do you have any plans tonight?"

  "Sleep," he replied. "We need to make up the time we lost, so we're leaving at daybreak."

  "That's so early." I was disappointed, but I saw an opening to ask about the employment situation at Pirates' Hook Marine Services. "Why don't you and Clark ask that nice salesman I met today to help with the hunt? Or is the store shorthanded?"

  "We staffed up for the holidays." He yawned. "Sorry. I'm beat. But anyway, we don't want to bring anyone else in on this because we'd have to give them a cut."

  It didn't sound like Clark had been hiring, which meant he'd had Jade investigated for some other reason. But why?

  "In other news," he said, "Randall asked me to meet with him tomorrow night about my yacht design."

  My tummy tightened at the hope in his voice—and at the expectation for me to say something supportive. Because, given what I'd discovered about Mei's fisherman client and his young son, I was too concerned about Zac's association with Clark and Randall to stay silent any longer. "Well, I have some news too, and I need you to consider it even though you're not going to like it."

  "O-ka-y." He pronounced the two-syllable word as three.

  I took a breath and braced myself. "I think Clark or Randall had something to do with Jade Liu's death. But it could've been The Reverend."

  Zac's silence spoke volumes, and I didn't like what it had to say. "Are you still there?"

  "The question is, are you?" His words shot into the receiver like a cannon. "First you back out on the hunt, and now I find out that you've been spying on the two men who are going out of their way to help me?"

  My head snapped back like I'd been struck. "Are you implying that I'm looking into Jade's murder to ruin your chance at success?"

  "No, I am not." His pitch rose like a tidal wave. "But when we were at the Lobster Pot, we agreed that you'd let the police handle this."

  "We didn't agree on anything." I sat up in bed, trying to keep my head above the surge. "You told me what to do, and I decided not to do it. And if you hadn't been so caught up in your treasure hunt, then you'd know that the person who poisoned Jade Liu was actually targeting Gia and me. I've got a threatening note and a patrolman out front to prove it."

  He fell silent again, and I waited for him to absorb the poison darts I'd launched at him.

  "Cass, we're a couple." His anger had crested. "Why didn't you tell me any of this?"

  I looked at my lap, feeling like a bona fide bottom feeder. "Because I know how much finding Sir Francis Drake's loot means to you and your family, and I didn't want to ruin it."

  "So you think I care more about silver pesos than I do about you?" There was an undercurrent to his voice that threatened to drag this conversation—and possibly our relationship—to a watery grave.

  "I wanted to wait and tell you when I had proof."

  "And do you?"

  "No, but—"

  "I don't want to hear accusations against Clark or Randall if you can't back them up with evidence."

  The finality in his tone was infuriating. "Then I'll go and get some. Good night."

  "Cassidi, wait—"

  I didn't. He'd been calling the shots too often for my liking as of late, so I turned off my phone and grabbed Mei's book. If Zac wasn't going to take my word for it, I was going to get him the proof he needed. And when I did, he was going to listen.

  Returning to the note pages in the back, I perused Mei's practice exercises. She'd made word lists related to the provocative parts of human anatomy, conjugated steamy synonyms for the verb to mate, and penned passive constructions that were anything but.

  Despite the chilly temperature in my room, I fanned myself with the book. Between my argument with Zac and Mei's raunchy read, I was on fire.

  I turned the page and discovered that Mei had written an essay on the prompt Introduce yourself and describe what you do. Ripples of excitement rushed through my chest, and I dove in.

  Mei explained that she'd been one of a handful of Vietnamese students given grants to attend university in Canada in the early 1950s. The problem was that she'd paid an English teacher to write her application, so she flunked out her first semester. Desperate to avoid deportation, she snuck across the border and took the highest paying job available to a woman with no documentation, i.e., prostitution.

  In the pages that followed—twenty-seven brow-raising, jaw-dropping, and pulse-spiking pages—she described her "job duties" at the LaSalle's parlor house. When words failed Mei, her (porno)graphic illustrations didn't. And if what I saw was any indication, she could've earned a biology degree and one in kinesiology too had it not been for her English.

  I flipped to the last page, and the chest ripples became waves. There was another writing prompt, Describe the most important person in your life. But this time the response was short and discreet.

  Most important person is faithfull customer. He is fisher man. He come to parlor house evry day. He tell happy stories. We laugh. He dress in neglijay. We play Uncle Wiggily. He bring Sugar Daddy candy. He have wife and todler boy. We have baby Anabell. One day I marry j.

  Although I already knew most of the information in the paragraph, two things jumped out at me. The first was that 1950s candy was no better than the board games when it came to names.

  And the other was that j.

  It could've stood for "john," as in a client, but I knew it didn't. Mei would've had no reason to abbreviate a generic term.

  The j was the initial of the killer's father's first name. All I had to do was figure out who j was.

  And I had at least two j's to choose from, John and Jim.

  * * *

  A boom jarred me awake.

  I shot up in bed and checked myself. I was still wearing my oversized sweater and leggings, and Mei's book was in my lap. My eyes darted to the alarm clock. It was only ten p.m.

  Had I been dreaming?

  A blast went off in back of the house, and a woman screamed.

  Nope.

  Adrenaline took control of my limbs. I threw off my throw and dashed to Gia's doorway.

  She wasn't in her bottle.

  "Aunt Magnolia?" The question came out a cry.

  I raced to the end of the hall, and her bedroom was empty too.

  Oh no.

  No no no no.

  Had the killer shot my cousin and my aunt?

  A charge coursed through my body, as though electrons flowed in my veins instead of blood. I ran to the bathroom and grabbed the first weapon that came
to mind—Gia's curling iron.

  On second thought, I sprinted to her bottle and got a bat she kept behind her nightstand.

  I descended the stairs in twos and entered the break room.

  The back door burst open.

  Gritting my teeth, I planted my feet and prepared to swing.

  Gia stormed in dressed like a contemporary Cruella De Vil. "Give. Me. That." She wrenched the bat from my grip. "Did the sheriff organize a posse or something?"

  "What are you talking about?" I shouted. "What's happening?"

  She dropped the bat. "Uh, you were about to hit a home run with my head, and Annie Oakley out there tried to gun me and Donatello down."

  It took a moment for my brain to process that my aunt had shot at my cousin—and that my cousin was wearing a faux Dalmatian coat. That was taking animal print to a whole new level, even for her. "But why? And where is she?"

  "Relax. She's fine." Gia dropped into a chair and unzipped a red thigh-high boot. "Apparently, she heard the lid to her grill slam and thought it was Ivy or the killer, so she fired off a warning. When Donatello and I came around back, she shot another round. He's calling the station now."

  My hands flew to my mouth. "He's having her arrested?"

  "If it were up to me, he'd have her sent to the psych ward." She massaged her foot. "But he's letting dispatch know he's on the scene because Mr. Filipuzzi's still at the fish shop, and he called the cops."

  "The one night Mr. Filipuzzi works late, my aunt goes on a shooting spree." I shoved my feet into the snow boots I kept by the door. "Where was the patrol officer during all of this?"

  "He hadn't taken his dinner break, so Donatello relieved him."

  Based on her lipstickless lips, I didn't have to ask what her boyfriend was doing while my aunt was on the hunt. "I've got to do damage control."

  Donatello was beside the garage emptying ammunition from the shotgun while my aunt looked on. Her beehive was bent, and judging from the way she was buzzing around him, she was as mad as a hornet.

  "You break Gunner, and I'll introduce you to Gunther," she yelled.