by Elise Sax
“Really? Another one?” I said and put my head under the water so that Spencer couldn’t tell that I was lying.
“I know, right? It’s definitely my last conference. I’ve managed to kill off three top cops. Who would ever want to come to another conference here? Afghanistan is safer. A minefield is safer. But that’s not the weird part.”
Here it comes, I thought. I peeked out from the water. Spencer was eyeing my body with his usual horny toad self, which was good news for me. It meant that weird or not, nothing had changed between us.
“We get to the inn, and sure enough Frank has been murdered,” Spencer explained. “A letter opener through his eye into his brain. Death was probably instantaneous.”
I put more soap on the loofah and gave my body another going over. “I guess that’s good for Frank,” I said.
“But that’s not the weird part. I mean, that was weird, but it gets so much weirder.”
I knew that it got weirder. I was the reason it got weirder. But I couldn’t let Spencer know that. Running out of body to wash, I began to shave my legs.
“Get this,” Spencer continued. “We found Frank naked. He was naked in the bathtub. He had been cleaned from head to toe and left to soak in the tub.”
I shuddered. I was never going to forget washing my blood and Larry’s snot off Frank’s naked, dead body. We had stripped him down and dragged him into the tub. Then, we cleaned the room from top to bottom. Martha Stewart would have been happy to eat off any surface in that room after we were done with it.
“The whole room was scrubbed clean, and his clothes and towels were nowhere to be found,” Spencer continued.
I hated cleaning, but I had done things with hotel soap that no one had done before. Who knew I had that much elbow grease? It wasn’t the first time I had moved a dead body. A couple months before, I had moved a bunch of them, but this time was more up close and personal.
And naked.
“And here’s the thing,” Spencer said. “He was washed after he was killed.”
“Weird,” I said, moving to my other leg.
“Stabbed with a letter opener through the eye, then stripped naked and washed, and get this: he had a washcloth placed over his dick.”
That had been my idea. Frank had an unusually large penis, and it had distracted me while I was washing him down.
Spencer loosened his tie and ran his fingers through his hair. He looked worn out. “And now I’m down another detective. I’m calling Remington to come back early to take up the slack.”
“Wait. What?” I asked. I was still under the shower, but I had run out of things to do, and the water had turned cold.
“Terri Williams is in my holding cell,” Spencer said.
What? Detective Foxy Satan was in the slammer? Was it Christmas already?
I turned off the water, and Spencer wrapped a towel around me, copping a feel while he did. I stepped out of the tub, and Spencer held me close.
“I’m missing something,” I said.
Spencer ground his hard how-do-you-do against me. “You’ve been missing this, but it’s here for you, baby. All twelve inches.”
“You’re four years old.”
“Twelve inches,” he said rubbing himself against me and continuing to cop a feel.
“How can you be aroused right now? You’ve been talking about a man with a letter opener through his eyeball.”
“Say, ‘ball’ again. I’ve got a pair that are yearning for you.”
“Your balls are yearning for me after talking about a murder?”
Spencer flung the towel off me, and then his hands were everywhere. Everywhere. Usually that would turn me into a pile of estrogen jelly, but I was in a post-dead-Frank place, and I just couldn’t drum up any desire.
“I just watched you take a shower for ten minutes, Pinky. I’m not dead, you know. Come on, give a guy a break. Bring on the noogy machine.”
“My noogy machine is on the fritz,” I said.
Spencer took a step back. His face was all concern. “But it’s never been on the fritz before. It takes a lickin’ and keeps on tickin’.”
I picked up the towel and wrapped it around my head. “Smooth talker, Spencer.”
He followed me out of the bathroom and into the bedroom. “Maybe not a smooth talker, but I’m all kinds of smooth in other ways.”
I sat on the bed and put on a pair of Spencer’s socks. “When I said I was missing something, I meant about your detective, Terri Williams. Why did you arrest her?”
“Oh, that. I told you today was weird. Frank’s hotel room had been washed down, like he was the king of OCD patients, but there was one spot that was missed.”
I wracked my brain, trying to think of where I could have missed. I had even cleaned the backs of the paintings and under the mattress. What had I missed?
“Where?” I asked.
“Pinky, you have great lips. Have I ever told you that?” he asked, staring at my breasts.
“Twice. Come on, tell me and then I’ll let you feel a boob before we eat. I’m starved. I want macaroni cheese and meatloaf.” I needed comfort food. Murder did that to me.
Spencer smirked. “Best lips I’ve ever known.”
“You know, you’re not twelve inches. Twelve inches would reach my belly button.”
“Pinky, let a guy have his fantasies.”
“Okay fair enough,” I said. “But tell me what was missed in the clean-up.”
“The letter opener handle.”
I blinked. “Excuse me?”
“A fresh set of prints, snab dab on the letter opener handle. Terri’s. She killed him. Obviously, she’s been on a rampage. I’m sort of doubting my hiring abilities now, but she had stellar recommendations. Meatloaf sounds good.”
I had forgotten to clean the letter opener handle. That made sense in a way, because I didn’t want to touch it. But I wasn’t entirely certain that I hadn’t cleaned it. Damn Frank’s penis for distracting me. Now I didn’t know if her prints had been on it before or after we finished our clean-up.
“Did Terri confess?” I asked Spencer.
“No. She said she found him, didn’t realize she had touched the letter opener, and then went to the bank. Dumbest story I’ve ever heard.”
“Yeah, dumb,” I said, but I thought if she had been guilty, she would have thought up a smarter story. A little voice inside me was telling me that Detective Devil Stacked was innocent.
And I was going to have to prove it.
Damn it.
The next morning, I left the house bright and early. I had called Larry on the sly and asked him if we had cleaned the letter opener handle, but he couldn’t remember if we had or not. He told me that he had decided to stay inside until he could find another goat, and I was supportive of his decision.
Across the street from my grandmother’s house, a large truck with a crane on it was pulling the plane out of the house it had crashed into. There was a crowd on the sidewalk watching the progress, along with a camera crew from San Diego, filming it for the news. I joined the crowd. It wasn’t every day that one could see a plane getting lifted out of a house.
“Powerful shame,” one of the spectators said to me.
“Yes,” I replied.
“Two innocents off to meet their makers. Well, one of them wasn’t so innocent. Johnnie Brinkhammer probably deserved to meet his maker.”
“Johnnie Brinkhammer? Did you know him? I’m sorry for your loss.”
“Not my loss,” he said. “I just know him through the news and the Real Court show I watch every night before Jeopardy. Didn’t you hear about that case? Brinkhammer was up on a murder charge in a small town up north. He was about to go to trial. He had tried to kill his wife, but the hit man killed the wrong woman. Then, Johnnie tried to get away, I guess, but the Lord took him home, instead.”
A whole symphony of bells went off in my head.
“Thank you,” I said, and kissed him on the cheek.
I
t took a lot of convincing to get Leah Wilder to open her hotel room door to let me in. When she finally opened, she made me stay an arm’s length away from her. She was packing her bags.
“You’re leaving?” I asked.
“I haven’t eaten in forty-eight hours because I didn’t want to be poisoned, and now I have to worry about getting stabbed through my eye,” she said by way of explanation.
She wasn’t wrong.
“I don’t know what the hell is going on here,” she continued.
Leah didn’t sound like she was the killer, and she was way too nice to stab Frank through the eyeball.
“Leah, you have no clue who’s killing everyone?”
“They arrested the detective with the attitude problem and no body fat,” Leah said, dumping her clothes into her suitcase without folding them.
“And yet, you’re scared about being murdered. You don’t think she did it?”
Leah zipped her suitcase closed and gave me a pointed look. “I don’t know who did it. I just know I’m getting out of here. Mike, Joyce, and Frank were all jerks, but I’m not sticking around to find out if the murderer wants to kill nice people, too.”
I didn’t blame her. I wouldn’t have wanted to be in her shoes.
“I get it,” I said. “Johnnie Brinkhammer.”
“Excuse me?”
“Johnnie Brinkhammer. Have you heard of him?”
“No. Is that a suspect.”
“No,” I said. “He died in a plane crash here. He was supposed to go to trial for murder.”
“Sounds familiar, but I don’t know him.” She closed her suitcase, put it on the floor and wheeled past me. “Good luck,” she said and stopped at the door, turning around. “You like to solve mysteries, right?”
“Me? Not really,” I lied.
“Since you’re one of the last alive, I’ll give you some information. The autopsy showed that Mike’s stomach had the same thing in it that we all ate at the lunch. But he also had oatmeal cookies in his stomach. He had eaten those, too. But I spent the whole day with him on the day he was killed, and I didn’t see any cookies. There. Knock yourself out, and be careful.”
It was the first morning in forever that I had forgotten to drink coffee, and now that I had remembered, I was jonesing. Luckily, I wasn’t going far from Tea Time. Morris lived close by, and I wanted to see him and ask him a few questions.
It wasn’t the best time to visit him. It was the day of the daffodil show, and his house was bedlam, because it was the show’s headquarters. I knocked on his door. One of the daffodil ladies answered, and I walked in.
Morris was in the kitchen, holding a clipboard. Daffodil Committee members were walking in and out, and they were all dressed in yellow jumpsuits. “Are you here to volunteer?” he asked me. “We’re going to have a wonderful show this year. Wonderful! I’ve knocked out the white flower people, and it’s going to be yellow, yellow, yellow. We’re about to deck out Main Street.”
The daffodil show was located on Main Street in the Historic District. They flower bombed the whole street, and the show went on all day and evening.
“I’m sorry. I’m not volunteering, but I’ll be at the show later. I wanted to talk to you again about the daffodil poisonings.”
“That, again?” he asked. “Listen, I’ve been thinking about it. Daffodils are poisonous, but it’s rare that one would kill a man. Usually it just makes them sick. No, it would have to be a powerful dose.”
“You mean a person would have to eat a lot of daffodils?”
“That or a distilled essence of the flower’s bulb. A concentrated form.”
“How would someone get a concentrated form?” I asked.
“A botanist could have that or an enthusiast. I have a big vial of it.”
“May I see it?”
Morris was busy, but he was thrilled to have someone so interested in daffodils that they wanted to see his vial of concentrated daffodil liquid. His garage was filled with everything that had to do with daffodils, from the dirt to the flowers to the pots. He opened a cupboard and sifted through a mess of bottles, cans, and bags.
“It was here, but I can’t find it. Maybe I put it somewhere else?” he asked himself out loud.
My Miss Marple ears pricked up. “So, it’s missing?” I asked.
“No, not missing,” he said, touching his chin and looking around the garage. “Misplaced, I guess. Anyway, I have to get back to the show. It can’t go on without my leadership.”
We walked back into the kitchen. My stomach growled. I hadn’t eaten breakfast, or even had a cup of coffee. The kitchen counter was covered in assorted snacks for the volunteers, and one plate caught my attention.
“Morris, I hate to bother you, but are those oatmeal cookies?” I asked.
“Yep. Good ones, too. Help yourself. My tenant made them.”
“Who’s your tenant?” I asked and crossed my fingers.
“Arthur Fox. The guy who crashed into the house across the street from yours.”
CHAPTER 14
I’m old! I’m fat! I have corns! I have credit card debt! I have sleep apnea! I spit when I talk! My vagina is falling out! Dolly, I’ve heard it all. Everyone has an excuse about why they can’t find love. An excuse about why they need to wait until they date. They want to wait until they’re younger, thinner, get foot surgery, make more money, get one of those fakakta sleep machines, and braces. In other words, they’re never going to date again. It’s your job to explain to them that there’s a sock for every shoe, a tuchus for every seat, a finger for every nose. Life is not Photoshop. It’s not flawless. Life is horseshoes and hand grenades. You understand me, bubbeleh? What I’m saying is that nobody’s perfect, that almosts and close enoughs are good enough to find love. So, tell your would-be matches that they need to start from the here and now. Don’t wait. Do it, now.
Lesson 120, Matchmaking advice from your
Grandma Zelda
Arthur Fox lived in a two-bedroom apartment above a store, a few blocks away from Morris in the Historic District. I was developing a crazy-ass theory regarding him that I was very excited about. If I had been smart, I would have waited for back-up before going to his place to confront him.
But Lucy was getting her roots done, and Bridget was struggling to deduct a veterinarian’s collection of porcelain corgis. So, it was just me. Besides, I was antsy to test my theory about Arthur.
He answered his door before I had a chance to knock, which made me wonder if he had been looking through the peephole. “Hi, there,” he said. “Gladys, right?”
“Gladie.”
“How can I help you?”
He was a short man, probably a couple inches shorter than I. His hair was cut neat and short, and he was wearing a blue chef’s uniform, which made sense, since he was holding a large knife in one hand.
“I was wondering if I could talk to you about your catering services for my grandmother’s matchmaking business,” I said. “We host a lot of events at her house.”
Slowly, a smile grew on his face. “Certainly. You want to come in? I’m doing food prep.”
Yes, I wanted to come in. I wanted to spy on him, search every nook and cranny of his apartment, and grill him like a rack of ribs.
Inside, the apartment was nothing like I expected. There was a small living room attached to the kitchen, and the only furniture were stainless steel tables, ovens, and the accoutrements of a professional caterer.
Arthur went back to his cutting and chopping. “When do you need me?” he asked.
“Oh, not for a couple months,” I lied. My grandmother was a strictly potluck sort of hostess. I couldn’t see her paying for salmon and rice. “It’s the house across the street from where you crashed.”
“I know,” he said, looking up at me for a second before returning to his cutting board. “What kind of menu and how many guests?”
“Do you do fried chicken? That would be a big hit. And anything with potatoes. There will probab
ly be about forty people.” I was starting to believe my story about needing a caterer, probably because I was starving. I hadn’t eaten, yet.
“Fried chicken is easy. Mashed potatoes, too?”
My stomach growled. “That sounds perfect.”
“You hungry?” He put a plate of oatmeal cookies in front of me. “Help yourself. I made an extra batch.”
I took a step backward, away from the oatmeal cookies. It was doubtful that he had made a batch of poisonous cookies and was trying to kill me, but you can never be too careful. “Thank you, but I’m meeting friends for lunch, and I don’t want to ruin my appetite.”
It was a terrible lie. Nothing ruined my appetite. I could have eaten the twelve cookies, a rack of lamb, and a side of bacon, and it wouldn’t have ruined my appetite. But I had gotten used to being alive, and I didn’t want to give that up for an oatmeal cookie.
Not that I thought Arthur Fox was a killer. There were still Cynthia and Sidney out in the wind, and Detective Bitch McBoobface was in prison, and her fingerprints were all over the murder weapon. And Arthur Fox didn’t have a motive, as far as I could tell, unless he was a psychotic serial killer.
A bug flew over our heads, and Arthur dropped the knife and caught the bug. “Moth,” he explained. “I breed them.”
“You mean like Silence of the Lambs?” I croaked.
“Exactly like that,” he said, walking to one of the bedrooms with his moth. “Except for the skin suit. I haven’t made one of those, yet.” He turned and winked at me to show me that he was kidding. Still, bugs were a weird hobby, especially for a cook.
I followed him to the other room, which was dark with a wooden cage for his moths. I was getting the creeps, big time, from his place. He returned the one moth in his hand to the cage and turned toward me. “I get the impression that you want to ask me something,” he said, his voice low, like the arch villain in a comic book movie.
“I was wondering how you were getting along since you arrived in Cannes. You must be missing your family.”
“I love it here. Everyone’s been very welcoming. And I don’t have any family. It’s just me. Why? Do you want to match me?”