Snoops in the City (A Romantic Comedy)

by Darlene Gardner

  How will you ever be good at anything if you quit when the going gets tough?, a little voice inside her head asked. She shut it out.

  "I'm not quitting," she told the cat. "I'm. . . exercising an option to finish up the job early."

  Any illusions she had about private investigation as the right career for her were gone. She'd cut her losses and try something else.

  As for Grady, he seemed like a good enough guy to her.

  He'd provided all the correct responses to her multiple-choice morality quiz. He also opened doors for women, overprotected his younger sister and had the most delectable mouth God ever gave a man. Most tellingly, he could have pressed her to sleep with him last night but hadn't.

  She still didn't know why Ms. M wanted him investigated. Despite her sense that Grady’s relationship with his parents was strained, she was ready to give him a favorable report and move on. Maybe then she'd be able to get some sleep.

  She pressed her foot down harder on the gas pedal.

  A siren sounded somewhere behind her, and she checked her rear-view mirror. Blue and white lights whirled atop a police cruiser directly behind her.

  She swore, noticed a forty-five miles per hour speed limit sign and glanced down at her speedometer.

  Sixty-seven.

  She pulled over to the shoulder of the road, wondering if she could talk herself out of getting a ticket she could ill afford to pay.

  A tall, well-built cop with mirrored sunglasses appeared beside the car.

  She hit the automatic-power button that lowered the window and tried a smile. “You’re not going to believe this, but I never speed."

  His mouth remained set in a grim line. Okay, bad opening. Obviously he didn’t believe that.

  “I had a lot on my mind.”

  Silence.

  “I know that’s no excuse.”

  Why had she said that? It was her excuse.

  “I’ve never gotten a ticket before.” She grimaced and felt an urge to come clean. “Except when I was eighteen. That doesn’t count because almost everybody drives too fast in their teens."

  No change of expression.

  “So I hoped, maybe, you might, you know, go a little easy on me.”

  Cars whizzed by, some, she was sure, driving faster than she had been. The cop finally spoke, his voice a tough-guy baritone. “Is that a guinea pig on the seat beside you?"

  Gordo didn't take offense, so she did. "It's a cat," she informed him.

  "Ugliest damn cat I've ever seen," he remarked.

  She sighed, removed her license from her wallet, her registration from the glove box and wondered if the cop would have cut her a break had Gordo been a cute puppy.

  He paid particular attention to her driver’s license. She started to suspect she shared the name Tori Sassenbury Whitley with an escaped criminal.

  “Sassenbury. That's a name you don't hear every day. You any relation to the Sassenbury runs a PI office a mile or so from here?” he asked.

  The tension seeped out of her and hope broke free. The cop knew Eddie. Maybe she’d drive away from this without a ticket after all.

  “Yes,” she said eagerly. “Eddie’s my cousin.”

  “He’s also a prick.” The cop got out his pad and took down her information.

  A one-hundred dollar speeding ticket burned a hole in her purse by the time she pulled into the parking lot adjacent to Eddie’s office.

  It amazed her that nothing in Boca Raton was ugly, not even its strip malls. A grocery store for the fruits-and-granola crowd shared space with a gourmet frozen-custard shop, a Radio Shack, a drugstore, a Chinese restaurant and an assortment of small businesses.

  The stores boasted matching exteriors in a pale orange and architecturally interesting rooftops, but Tori was not in the mood to admire the scenery.

  The sooner she discharged her obligation to Eddie, the sooner she could find a job that would enable her to pay for the speeding ticket. She couldn’t in good conscience take the entire amount Eddie had quoted her, not when she’d barely been on the job for a week.

  The words Sassenbury Investigations flowed across the glass window of Eddie’s office in bold black lettering. Tori shook her head at the string of numbers under the name.

  “Why include a phone number,” she muttered as she put Gordo into her canvas bag, “when Eddie never answers the phone?”

  She half expected the office to be locked but the door swung open, and she mentally reviewed her speech as she came through it.

  “I am not a bimbo.”

  That wasn’t Tori’s opening line.

  “I am not a woman to be trifled with.”

  That wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t part of Tori’s speech either.

  “And I demand to know where Eddie Sassenbury is this instant.”

  Tori screwed up her forehead. Eddie, in all his rumpled glory, sat behind what looked to be a secretary’s desk. Stubble blackened his jaw, dark smudges shadowed his eyes and he looked like he’d slept in his clothes, which wasn't unusual.

  “Afraid I can’t tell you that, lady,” Eddie said. “I only work for the man.”

  The non-bimbo was a beauty. She had long, straight hair in a lustrous ebony that was a striking contrast to her alabaster complexion. A wraparound summer dress that was surely a designer original showcased her tall, willowy figure. It was lilac, the perfect shade for her.

  “Don’t you dare underestimate me." The beauty shook an index finger at Eddie. “I can tell when somebody’s lying. You know where he is.”

  Eddie pasted on the I’m-innocent look Tori knew well. Her cousin used to call upon it at family gatherings when somebody asked who put the Tabasco sauce in the fruit punch.

  “Can I help with something?” Tori asked loudly.

  Both Eddie and the beauty seemed surprised to see her, probably because the decibel level of the woman’s screed had masked the sound of Tori’s arrival.

  “Who are you?” the beauty demanded.

  “Tori Whitley,” she said.

  “Hey, don’t you work for the guy?” Eddie piped up. “Maybe you can help this lady out.”

  Tori shot an optical dagger at Eddie. The beauty advanced on her sling-back sandals. Her face was white with anger, revealing that her raspberry rouge and lipstick were blue-based, the perfect choices for a woman with her coloring.

  “Where can I find the snake?” she demanded.

  “I haven’t seen him slithering around recently. I’m looking for him myself." Tori sent Eddie a pointed glare over the woman’s shoulder. “I need to talk to him, too.”

  The beauty’s raspberry lips twisted. “If you work for him, maybe it’s you I need to talk to. Maybe you’re the one who took those photos of me and Brock.”

  From the set of her mouth, Tori deduced Brock wasn’t the woman’s husband. “I’m not much of a photographer,” Tori said.

  “Whoever took the photos wasn’t, either. He didn’t get my face. Only these babies.” She pointed to her chest. Thirty-eight Double-Ds, Tori guessed. “Jefferson said he’d know them anywhere.”

  “Jefferson?”

  “My husband. And now he’s threatening to divorce me!” She stomped one high-heeled foot. “All because of that yellow-bellied snake Eddie Sassenbury.”

  The pitch of the woman’s voice rose even higher. Behind them, Eddie interjected, “It’s a little harsh calling a guy who’s only doing his job a snake.”

  Both women ignored him.

  “It doesn’t sound to me like it was the snake’s fault,” Tori said. “It sounds like this happened because you were cheating on Jefferson.”

  “Like that’s not justifiable. My husband’s seventy-three years old and wrinkled as a prune.”

  “Is he rich?”

  “Of course he’s rich,” she snapped.

  “He was probably trying to find out if you married him for his money.”

  “Of course I did,” she retorted.

  “Then why are you so angry at Eddie? If you b
lame anybody, it should be your husband.”

  “Because?”

  “Jefferson’s the one who didn’t trust you,” Tori finished.

  Some of the defiance left the beauty’s face. The space between her lovely blue eyes grew closer as she thought. "You're right," she said.

  “You should give him a piece of your mind.”

  “I should,” the beauty agreed, nodding vigorously. She strode from the office without another word.

  Tori moved toward Eddie with the same sense of purpose.

  “That was brilliant.” He clapped his hands in applause.

  “It wasn’t that brilliant,” Tori hissed. “By the time she gets home, she’ll realize her husband was right not to trust her. Then she’ll come looking for you again."

  “Hopefully I’ll have a secretary by then." Eddie sounded spectacularly unconcerned by the prospect of the beauty's return. “Then my secretary can tell her she doesn’t know where I am.”

  “You are a snake,” Tori said.

  Eddie’s features contorted in mock pain. “How can you say that about your own cousin? I gave you a job when nobody else would.”

  “You talked me into taking a job I wasn’t suited for when I was desperate!”

  Eddie put his hands behind his neck and his feet up on his desk. His white tennis shoes didn’t fit with his rumpled image. They were always immaculate, as though he bought a new pair every few weeks. “Same thing."

  Gordo meowed loudly, as if in protest. Why was Tori hiding her anyway? What did she care if Eddie saw her? She put the bag on the table, opened it and took out the cat.

  Eddie visibly recoiled. "What the hell is that?"

  "It's my cat," Tori said. "And you better not say anything disparaging about her because I am not in a good mood."

  "So the job's not going so great?"

  Tori rolled her eyes, then figured she could make better use of her time than arguing with him. “The job's not going. It already went."

  His dark eyebrows rose. “What do you mean, went?”

  “I found out what the client wants to know,” Tori said. “Grady Palmer is a good guy. End of story.”

  Cradling Gordo in one hand, she used the other to thrust at Eddie the few pages of the report she’d composed after she got home the night before. He took them, his brows drawing together as he read.

  “Good stuff, Tor, but premature. The client’s paying major bucks to have this guy investigated. We’ve got to give it more time.”

  “How much more time?”

  “Three weeks,” he said. “I told the client we needed a month to do a thorough job.”

  “You didn’t tell me!”

  “Like that would have been smart."

  Eddie swung his legs down from the desk and tossed Tori’s report on the surface. He stood up, trying to smooth the wrinkles from his pants. It didn’t work. He withdrew a card from his wallet and scribbled something on the back.

  "Here's my cell number. If you need me, call. Now if we're done, I got a workman’s comp case needs my attention. Bus driver claims back problems but he's putting an addition on his house.”

  “We’re not done,” Tori said. “You didn’t listen to me."

  "Sure did," Eddie said. “You said you’d take the job. I gave it to you. You got a problem making decisions, but you never go back on your word once you do."

  Tori paced from one side of the office to the other. Eddie was right. She fulfilled her commitments. If she said she'd do something, she did it.

  She expected Eddie to walk out of the office, leaving her alone to stew. And possibly to lock up. But when she pivoted to start another round of pacing, she nearly bumped into him, which would have squashed Gordo for sure.

  “You okay?” he asked.

  She was about to nod. He gently rubbed her shoulders and she couldn’t be anything but honest.

  “No, I’m not okay,” she said. “There’s more to this than I’m telling you. Grady noticed me following him and confronted me. So I told him I was attracted to him and he asked me to the mayor’s party.”

  Eddie’s tired eyes lit up like a flashlight.

  “You made contact? That's great. Much better than following him around and compiling information."

  “It doesn’t feel great to me. It feels. . . sneaky. “

  “PI’s are supposed to be sneaky.”

  "What if Grady doesn’t deserve to have somebody snooping around in his business? What if he really is a good guy?”

  “Then you’ll prove it.” Eddie scratched his chin. “Look at it this way. You’ll be doing him a favor. Proving he’s a good guy.”

  She sighed, knowing she couldn’t tell her cousin everything. “Why do I get the feeling you know exactly what to say to get me to do what you want?”

  “Because I do. And because you’re way too good a person to leave me in the lurch.”

  “You don’t understand, Eddie.” Tears welled in her eyes and she wiped one away. “I’m afraid I’ll make a mess of this.”

  “Hey, I just watched you get rid of a client so you could have it out with me yourself. I know what you can do.”

  She sniffed. “What’s that?”

  “Anything you put your mind to.” He kissed her on the forehead. “All you've got to decide is what to put it to."

  CHAPT ER THIRTEEN

  The ladies’ room on the first floor of Seahaven City Hall smelled of antiseptic cleaner and hand soap.

  Lorelei wrinkled her nose and sprayed a cloud of perfume into the air, then walked with her arms outstretched through the fragrant mist.

  There. Now all she needed was for the perfume to live up to its name.

  Eau de Vixen.

  Just in case perfume alone wouldn’t do the trick, she crossed to the mirror above the sink, puckered her lips and applied another layer of hot-pink gloss.

  She ran a brush through her professionally tinted blond hair, pinched her cheeks and powdered her nose. Next she inched down her already low-cut blouse.

  The mirror didn’t provide a view of the lower half of her body but she already knew she had exceptional legs. Long and lean with good calf definition. She’d showcased them by wearing a bright pink miniskirt.

  She smacked her shimmering pink lips together and grinned at her reflection.

  “You better be ready, Wade Morrison, because here I come,” she said aloud.

  A few minutes later, finding the Tax Assessor Clerk’s desk vacant, she sashayed through the open door of his office.

  Wade Morrison sat slumped over his desk, so engrossed in his paperwork that he didn’t look up. He held up a finger to indicate he’d be with her in a minute, and a corner of Lorelei’s mouth twitched with amusement.

  His pale-yellow dress shirt wasn’t so much ugly this time as boring. She couldn’t say the same for his tie, a yellow-and-blue abomination that he wore loose around his neck.

  With his glasses perched on his nose and his dark-brown hair a disheveled mess, he looked like a first-class nerd. Especially because the calculator at his fingertips and those creases in his forehead probably meant he was puzzling over some math problem.

  She shuddered at the very thought. Thank goodness high school graduation had delivered her from the evil of math.

  Wade didn’t seem to feel the same. His complete and unwavering concentration made her wonder what it would be like to be the recipient of his full attention.

  She vowed to find out.

  Before she could do that, she needed him to notice her. Especially since he seemed to have forgotten he’d heard somebody arrive.

  “Hey, there, handsome,” she said into the silence.

  His head jerked up, causing his glasses to slip even farther down his nose. She read slack-jawed shock on his face and had to clamp her lips to keep from laughing. He was too cute.

  “Remember me? Lorelei Palmer from the mayor’s party?”

  “I thought. . .” He pushed his glasses up his nose, cleared his throat and tried again. “
I thought you were my clerk."

  “Do I look like your clerk?”

  He cleared his throat again. “Not hardly.”

  He folded his hands on his desk and clenched them, seeming to strive to get himself under control. “What can I do for you?”

  She thought about using a throaty voice to answer that she surely could think of something except feared he might go into apoplexy.

  "I was in the vicinity and thought you could take me to lunch," she said, which was true only because she'd made it her point to be in the vicinity. She put some oomph into her steps as she moved toward him, enjoying the way his jaw loosened even more. “I’ll let you pick the place.”

  He started shaking his head before she finished speaking. “I can’t.”

  “Don’t tell me you’re one of those guys who eats lunch at his desk.”

  He hesitated, causing her to peer at him more closely. Behind his glasses, his right eye looked red and watery. Moisture glistened on his cheek.

  “What happened to your eye?”

  “Nothing,” he said, shaking his head.

  “Something happened.”

  “I got poked, that’s all. It’s not a big deal.”

  “It is, too, a big deal.” She came around the desk, not stopping until she could reach out and touch him. “Take off your glasses,” she ordered.

  “That’s not necessary.”

  “I say it is. Now take them off so I can see what you did.”

  “It was only a finger—”

  “Take them off,” she repeated with even more authority. This time, he complied.

  He squinted, obviously sensitive to the overhead florescent light. She leaned close. She loved a man who wore cologne but couldn’t smell any on his skin, which had a clean, appealing scent nevertheless. Breathing it in, she gently pried his eye open with her thumb and forefinger.

  The color of his iris reminded her of the cherrywood dining-room furniture at her parents’ house. The white of his eye, however, was red and inflamed.

  Excessive tearing made it difficult for her to get a good look at the injury.

  “I think your cornea is scratched,” she said. “You need to see an eye doctor. He’ll give you some medicated drops and it’ll heal in a couple of days.”