A Bad Day for Scandal

by Sophie Littlefield

  “Oh. Right.” Stella blushed. Texting was something she hadn’t quite mastered yet; when Todd occasionally sent her a few misspelled lines, generally if he was too bored to think of anything else to do, she always just called him back rather than try to pick out those tiny little buttons with her thumb.

  Judging from their subject’s look of concentration, he didn’t have the same problem.

  “Now or never,” Chrissy said, and went for the gate’s latch.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Before Stella had a chance to hiss at Chrissy to get her ass back to the bush, she was in—and Stella gave the man in the car only a cursory glance before following.

  Once through the gate, she closed it carefully and leaned against the building’s stucco wall, heart pounding. “He could have seen us!”

  Chrissy shrugged and unzipped the backpack. “Yeah, so, we’d figure something out. We always do.”

  Stella started to reply, and then gave up. So what if the gal was a little trigger happy, a little free and loose with their safety—that was part of the reason Stella kept Chrissy around: She didn’t scare easy. In fact, she barely scared at all. The only time Stella had seen terror in her eyes was when Tucker was kidnapped; now, with her son safe and sound in a house full of drunken revelers, Chrissy was cool as a cucumber.

  Stella watched as her assistant set up the Bionic Ear that she’d found online. The thing was supposed to amplify sounds forty times and block out background noise, and it had come with lots of boldfaced warnings about how it was illegal to use it to intercept oral communication.

  “Ain’t we lucky,” Chrissy continued as she took out the parabolic dish component and set it up to point through the window. “No curtains, and I can see right into the living room. Our girl’s doing something … with some sort a implement and a—a—could that be a onion? Oh, this must be that cooking everyone’s always talking about. Quick, Stella, check it out, you might learn something.”

  “Ha, ha,” Stella grumbled. “I wouldn’t be bustin’ on my cooking, considering I fed you a home-cooked meal just last week.”

  “You did no such thing. I happen to know you didn’t make that chicken parmesan you tried to pass off as homemade—you drove your bad self over to Casey and picked it up at Handy Sam’s restaurant and stuck it in your own pan so’s everyone would think you made it yourself.”

  Stella’s mouth fell open. She was so sure she’d gotten away with it. But before she could demand how Chrissy had figured it out, the girl held up her palm to shush her.

  “Our man’s in,” she whispered excitedly. “Judge Marilu’s meeting him at the door. Oh, and don’t she look special.”

  Stella pushed through the scratchy shrubs, getting up on her toes to look through the window. The floor of the condo was raised above ground level, and she had to peer through the legs of a side table, but she could make out a brunette woman’s petite, slender figure, dressed in a flowing sapphire blue pantsuit.

  But what really caught her eye was the gentleman she was kissing on both cheeks. Oooh—sizzling.

  He was at least a decade and a half younger than Marilu, who Stella guessed to be around her own age. Not that there was necessarily anything wrong with that, of course. It would take a heck of a lot of cradle robbing for women to catch up with all the May–Decembering that men had been practicing for centuries.

  But this man was more than simply young. He was smooth and muscled and had a full head of thick inky hair and wore a black silk shirt that slid provocatively over his generous shoulders and tucked into his expensive-looking trousers. When he slid his hands down Marilu’s back to cup her ass against him, and took the kiss past anything that might be mistaken for friendly straight into R-rated territory, Stella whistled softly.

  “And at this hour of the morning, too,” she said, impressed.

  “You gonna get all pissed off at me if I wonder if he’s after her money?” Chrissy asked.

  Stella thought it over. “I don’t know. I should. But I’m kinda thinking the same thing.”

  They were silent for a few more moments of the show, as Marilu got herself backed up against the pantry door and one of her high-heeled shoes ended up falling off her foot as the pair wrestled and writhed. To Stella’s surprise, their breathing and exclamations of unbearable pleasure came through loud and clear on Chrissy’s listening device.

  “That’s some sound quality,” Stella finally said as Marilu’s mewling little murmurs gave way to smacking wet suctiony hickey noises.

  As though they’d heard, the judge and her boy toy finally pulled apart.

  “You do have a talent, Beau,” Marilu said with admiration as she went to the fridge and poured herself a glass of water from the tap in the door, without offering anything to her guest.

  “Only because you inspire me,” the young lothario said in a throaty voice, as though he were auditioning for One Life to Live. Stella was amused and a little disappointed to hear a flat Arkansas twang in his voice. She never could abide an Arkansas accent—especially since Beau, if that was really his name, looked like he ought to be named something exotic like Antonio or Stavros or Dmitri.

  “Come now, dear boy, let’s both just admit that what inspires you is all the zeroes on the checks I write. Yes?”

  Beau ducked his head and fluttered his eyelids as coyly as any blushing young virgin maiden. If you insist, the gesture seemed to say, while keeping alive the fantasy that he had landed in her kitchen by the unknowable forces and tides of pure lust.

  “Speaking of which, here’s for today,” she added, taking a white envelope off the kitchen countertop and handing it to him. He slid it into a pocket without giving it a second glance. “I trust that now we can focus on just having a nice time?”

  “I’m always up for that kind of nice time,” Beau murmured, aiming his full lips and sculpted nose and cheekbones in for a nuzzle to Marilu’s neck, but she ducked neatly out of the way, laughing.

  “Hey, precious, keep a little in reserve, there,” she said, picking up a sheaf of papers that was lying under the envelope. “Besides, you need to study up while I finish getting ready.”

  “Oh, all right,” Beau groaned as though he’d been barely able to contain his man-lust for her quivering body, but Stella couldn’t help noticing that as soon as Marilu padded out of sight down the hallway, he quickly straightened up out of his sexy slouch and took a seat at the kitchenette table, and began going over the papers.

  “What do you suppose—?” Chrissy murmured.

  “Well, see, I think that boy is the type of date a lady pays for,” Stella said carefully. “I mean, for special services that go above and beyond the keepin’ company area of the date.”

  “I know that,” Chrissy snapped. “You think I growed up under a rock or somethin’? I was just wondering what-all it’s costing her.”

  “You mean, per hour?”

  Chrissy cut her off with a guffaw. “Stella, that ain’t how it’s done. There’s like special charges for every little thing. You get pure and simple company included in the price, and plus they throw in a little messin’ around no-charge. Like maybe he’ll stick his tongue in your mouth and run his hand up your nylons, you know, like that. But it’s mostly to get your motor running so you’ll spring for the other stuff.”

  “Chrissy Shaw,” Stella exclaimed, startled, “however do you know this?”

  Chrissy shrugged. “One a my brothers? Mac, the one with the mustache? It was, like, his dream job in high school. Only he didn’t pass the entrance exam.”

  “What—?”

  “Too short,” Chrissy said matter-of-factly. “Ain’t no cure for it, lots of ladies want a tall fellow, and no amount of offering up creative business proposals was about to change their minds, unfortunately for Mac. Which is I think the cause of the start of his troubles, gettin’ his feelings hurt that way.”

  Stella knew that Mac had done a stint up in Fayette at the county jail for robbery. Somehow she doubted that being tur
ned down by an escort service ought to qualify for a personal devastation, but then again, she’d never entered what was clearly a competitive industry, if their current mark’s Academy-worthy performance was any indication.

  “So that thing he’s reading, is that like a takeout menu for what-all she’s plannin’ on getting up to with him?” Stella asked. “Like in the hospital when you got to circle what you want off the menu they send around?”

  Chrissy inclined her head thoughtfully. “Could be. You know, we ought to get one a them special scopes, I could read that thing from here.”

  Stella snorted. “Yeah, well, and I surely would like to go on a pleasure cruise to Aruba, but if you ain’t heard, the economy’s kinda in the toilet, so I don’t suppose that’s in the cards.”

  “Hey,” Chrissy said, giving Stella a quick jab in the shoulder. “Don’t be talkin’ that way. It’s practically spring already. Season of renewal and hope and all. Why, even that painted Jezebel in there’s got more Suzy Sunshine goin’ on than you.”

  Stella followed Chrissy’s gaze to the other side of the room, where an enormous bowl painted to resemble a head of cabbage held a clutch of fake peonies from which a plastic bunny peeked coquettishly.

  “Well hold your horses, I ain’t even put away the shamrock salt and pepper shakers yet.”

  “If I don’t git on you, it won’t get done,” Chrissy scolded. “Tell you what, I’m coming over there next weekend, whether you like it or not. I ain’t lettin’ Tucker wake up Easter morning without all the decorations and shit.”

  “Well, if you don’t like the way I do things, you could just wake up at your own damn house,” Stella said, secretly pleased.

  “I’ll bring Tucker’s basket and some eggs, but you got to get all them boxes out of the attic,” Chrissy continued, unruffled. “Whyn’t you git the sheriff to help you?”

  Stella grumbled, but the idea wasn’t half bad. After all, wasn’t that the kind of job men had programmed into their DNA? Fussing with ladders and toting heavy objects—and all the while she could be whipping up Irish coffee and wearing that cute little sweater with the fuzzy trim around the neckline, the one that dipped far enough down to show that she meant business. Maybe she ought to look into that bra her friend Dotty kept going on about—the one Oprah liked so well.

  A low growl got her attention trained back inside the house. Young Beau had got himself out of the chair, and Marilu had changed into a neat little pink suit, the fabric of which must be awfully fascinating, since Beau was running his hands all over it.

  “You sure we need to get to that brunch already?” he murmured, speaking directly to her collarbones, brushing them with his lips.

  Marilu ran her manicured fingernails through his perfectly cut hair.

  “I’m afraid so,” she said. “My cousin Dorcas’s bastard grandbaby’s only getting christened once, and she’ll never forgive me if I don’t show up. Besides, that side of the family barely lets you get out of the room before they start talking about you behind your back.”

  “We can’t have that,” Beau murmured, nuzzling his way down. Either that, or he was being shoved—Stella couldn’t help admire the take-charge attitude Marilu seemed to have adopted concerning getting her needs met.

  “On the contrary, we most certainly can have that,” she laughed. “That’s what I’m paying you for, remember? To give them something to talk about, so I don’t have to spend one more family gathering with every nosy maiden aunt asking me when I’m going to meet some man.”

  Marilu spat the word man as though it were a cat turd she’d accidentally discovered in her mouth, but Beau didn’t appear to be the least bit offended on behalf of his gender. “I’ll give ’em a show,” he promised.

  She disentangled herself gently from Beau’s roving fingers and face, and he held her fingertips in a courtly gesture, as though he were about to take her for a waltz around the dining room. Damn, but the man was smooth. Stella had the unkindly thought that it wasn’t only height holding back the Lardner boys—that kind of suave probably had to get started in the home, when a boy was just a wee thing; once he got to the man stage, it was probably too late.

  “I’ll just get my things,” Marilu murmured, crossing the floor on her high-heeled black alligator pumps and fetching a long black wool coat from the closet. Beau rushed to help her into it.

  “She sure has got him trained,” Chrissy marveled. “So you want to sneak in there and wait for her to come back?”

  Stella considered. Breaking in and waiting was probably the most sensible course of action, especially since the judge was bound to have better snacks than Priss. But Stella didn’t think she could stomach watching Marilu and her rent-boy groping each other in the foyer again. The way they carried on, he was likely to have her dress ripped off before Stella could properly intimidate them. “I think we better follow them and see where they go.”

  Inside, Marilu was buttoning her coat while her lover boy fussed with a silk scarf around her shoulders. “Now did you have a chance to go over everything?” she asked.

  “Yes, ma’am. Cousin Dorcas Severance, fifty-nine. Her husband is Jim Senior, of Belk, Glazkov, and Severance. Two daughters, Minette and Ashleigh. Ashleigh’s the homely one, and the mother of little Tremayne.”

  “What a dreadful name for a child,” Marilu said, shuddering, as she buttoned her coat.

  “It didn’t say if Tremayne was a boy or a girl,” Beau said, slipping his folded cheat sheet into the same pocket that held the check the judge had given him.

  “The little bastard better be a boy,” Marilu exclaimed. “I got the blue rattle from Tiffany’s.”

  Beau chuckled as though she were a great wit. Well, money probably made anyone a little more amusing.

  “Let’s go, precious,” Marilu said, picking up a pink calfskin handbag and a little beribboned box. “We can go over the rest of the names on the way. The sooner we get to that brunch, the earlier we can leave.”

  “And the sooner we can get back home and get busy,” Beau purred, allowing himself to be led to the door like a prize pony.

  Chapter Seventeen

  It wasn’t too much of a surprise that Beau drove, though it was Marilu’s big, solid Acura RL they followed through the streets of Kansas City rather than his tidy little compact. Stella figured it wouldn’t do to show up for a fancy party in a car like that.

  “Too bad we cain’t hear what-all they’re saying,” Chrissy observed as Stella dodged in and out of traffic, trying to stay with the Acura. She’d suggested she take the wheel, having spent some time a couple of years ago learning a variety of tricks for following folks who you’d just as soon didn’t know you were doing it, but she’d never had a chance to try them out in heavy traffic. Traffic around Prosper generally kept to a leisurely pace.

  She was finding that the additional lanes of traffic had advantages and disadvantages. On the one hand, all those cars made for excellent cover; her pretty little Jeep Liberty had a dusting of road grime that went back a couple of snowstorms, since Stella hadn’t had time to run it through the car wash all month. On the other hand, her usual driving practices, while not exactly tame, lent themselves to the pedal-to-the-floor-on-a-straightaway-type thrills rather than the dodge-and-feint variety that city folk seemed to favor.

  After nearly clipping a slow-moving minivan, and getting stuck in the blind spot of a flatbed truck stacked with crates, Stella almost lost their quarry several times in the fifteen-minute drive into Kansas City’s downtown. It was with great relief that she spotted them in the right-hand lane in front of an imposing old redbrick high-rise hotel. She followed as they rolled into the circular drive and up under the fancy covered valet station, and then braked hard.

  “What the hell’re you doing?” Chrissy demanded, jolted forward against her seat belt.

  “I don’t want them to see us,” Stella said, glancing in the rearview mirror for traffic as she tried to figure out what to do.

  “Well, if y
ou get folks honking behind you, they’re gonna notice for sure,” Chrissy said. “Keep driving. You know where they’re at now.”

  Stella eased past, keeping to the outside of the overhang, as a uniformed valet leapt to attention and practically fell over himself helping Marilu out of the car. Thankfully, neither she nor Beau looked their way. Out the other side of the circular drive, she found herself back in traffic. “Now what?”

  “Find a spot,” Chrissy said, “and make it quick.”

  Dang the insanity of the city pace, Stella thought as she dodged a pedestrian darting across the street. Up ahead, she noted a spot opening up as an old Cadillac pulled out, and turned on her signal just as a sleek BMW shot past her and nearly caused a head-on collision when it stopped abruptly.

  All set to steal her space.

  Uh-uh. Not happening.

  Stella’s temper, on a hair trigger already due to the stressful traffic, ratcheted up toward the atmosphere. The Cadillac, which they now saw was being piloted by a tiny little man about 150 years old, was moving at a glacial pace, the driver backing up a matter of inches and turning the wheel with a mighty effort before reversing forward a paltry bit and repeating the process.

  Stella jammed the Jeep into Park and got out. She stalked the ten feet to the would-be spot-stealer’s driver’s-side door and rapped on the darkened window, which glided soundlessly down. She found herself staring at a florid man in a starched shirt and tie, a little headset corkscrewed into his ear, talking a mile a minute.

  “—have her shoot me those financials,” he barked, holding up a finger and glaring at her.

  “That’s my spot,” Stella said, raising her voice. “I had the blinkers on.”

  He raised one eyebrow, his expression of irritation taking on a quizzical cast.

  “You might hear me better like this,” Stella said, reaching out and giving the earpiece a yank. It came out of his ear with a jerk, and she tossed it over to the passenger seat.

  “What the hell!” His cheeks flushed an even deeper shade of red.