“Who knew,” I said dryly. We'd gone to high school in Misty Falls with Samantha's husband, and I'd never been a fan.
A blood-curdling howl came from the vicinity of the kitchen.
Jessica shook her head. “Sounds like His Royal Fluffiness is either being murdered or has noticed his kibble bowl is less than 90% full.”
I made a horrified expression. “How could you,” I said breathlessly.
Jessica rolled her eyes and left to fill Jeffrey's bowl. She called back over her shoulder, “Five minutes or I leave without you! And don't forget to use soap, Stinky McStinkerpants.”
It was the last weekend of September, and the weather that Saturday was almost too good to be true. We'd had a cold snap and frost two weeks earlier, but the seasons had changed their minds. Now we were enjoying a hazy, smoky sort of heat in our little slice of Oregon—a true Indian summer. The monotone grayness of a Pacific Northwest winter would be upon us soon, but not yet. I'd worn my strappy summer sandals to give them one last fling before the snow returned.
Jessica and I stood on the sidewalk admiring the work our real estate agent friend, Samantha Sweet, had put into that Saturday's open house.
Since we'd last seen the hundred-year-old home, the porch, gingerbread trim, and even the front door had been painted. The home now had a lime-green door that made the raspberry hue on the wood siding look fresh and vibrant.
“Good colors,” Jessica said. “It's a good thing I don't have any money, or I'd be in danger of buying this place.”
Keeping my voice low, I said, “These heritage houses are a money pit for maintenance. Notice how Samantha has added those boxwood bushes along the front. It's probably to disguise a crumbling foundation.”
“I'd never buy without a full inspection,” Jessica said.
“Even if it is stable, even the cutest paint job can't make the house any bigger on the inside.”
Jessica laughed and punched me on the arm. Hard. As usual. “You don't have to talk me out of buying it. I'm broke, remember?” She looked up and down the sidewalk. “Where's Samantha?”
I looked around. Thanks to Jessica rushing me, we'd arrived a full thirty minutes before the open house was to begin. Samantha's car was parked on the street in front of the house, but there was no sign of the realtor.
“Looks like the house is unlocked.” I pointed to the freshly painted lime-green house door, which was open a crack.
“She must be inside.”
We walked up the steps of the house and across the porch. The paint was not fully cured, and I could feel it threatening to stick to the bottoms of my shoes. If I knew Samantha, she'd been on her hands and knees the night before, finishing the painting herself. For a real estate agent, she really went above and beyond for her clients.
Jessica knocked on the doorframe as she entered. “Samantha? I'm here with Stormy. We're here to talk up the place for you!”
I chimed in, “And eat cupcakes!”
There was no response.
Jessica entered the house hesitantly. “She's probably putting out signs and balloons on the main cross streets.”
I made a straight line for the home's kitchen, following the scent of cupcakes. “Samantha would want us to make ourselves at home.”
Jessica followed me into the kitchen and watched me attack a pink cupcake.
“Easy, killer,” she said.
“This one was asking for it,” I said around a mouthful.
She swished her lips from side to side. “You really have changed, Stormy.”
I swallowed down half a cupcake and gave her a questioning look. “What's that supposed to mean?”
“When you moved back to Misty Falls a year ago, I'd have to twist your arm to get you to eat a cupcake. And you'd freak out if anyone tried to eat in your car.”
I shrugged. “So?”
“I was just in your car, and I found wrappers.” She paused, as though preparing to accuse me of a horrific crime. “Wrappers from gas station hot dogs.”
“Are you saying I've let myself go?” I crammed the rest of the cupcake in my mouth. “Just because I regularly wake up smelling like garbage doesn't mean I'm not a classy”—crumbs of cake and icing sprayed out of my mouth—“sophisticated woman.”
She stared at me. “Gas station hot dogs,” she repeated.
I used a napkin to wipe my mouth daintily. “It's the weird hours. Surveillance can be boring, and when I get bored, I eat.”
She looked at my midsection pointedly. “You're lucky you've always had a good metabolism, but it's going to catch up with you one of these days.”
“Everything in moderation.” I waved my hand past the cupcakes and over to the platter of vegetables. I chose a handful of baby carrots and swirled one through the dip, followed by another. “I think this is hummus,” I said around my mouthful.
Jessica's bright blue eyes widened. “Double Dipper,” she gasped. “I saw what you did. You double dipped your carrot. Now your spit's all mixed into the hummus.”
“I'm not a double dipper. I took three baby carrots and dipped them separately. You can't even double dip a baby carrot. It's too small.”
She made a tsk-tsk sound. “Dirty Double Dipper.”
We stared at each other in silence. I couldn't tell if she was teasing me or if she genuinely believed I was a filthy Double Dipper who'd completely let herself go.
In the silence, the old house squeaked. I knew instantly the sound was coming from upstairs.
We weren't alone.
My heart pounded, and the skin on the back of my neck prickled.
With another creak of the home's old wood, I was transported back in time, to the first day of January that year. I'd entered the too-quiet house of a fortune-teller, expecting nothing more than an afternoon's harmless entertainment. Instead, I'd found the poor woman upstairs in a pool of blood. And the killer who'd shot her might have still been there in the house, hiding in a gap between rooms, watching me make the grisly discovery.
My mind made a horrible leap. I pictured Samantha Sweet lying upstairs in a pool of blood, her pretty blond hair turning red and her bright green eyes staring vacantly at the ceiling.
Jessica furrowed her brow and asked, “Did you hear that? Like someone's upstairs?” She turned to go up the stairs. “Samantha?”
I ran after her and passed Jessica halfway up the creaking stairs.
I had to lead the way. If something had happened to Samantha, I would protect Jessica. Thanks to me, my best friend had already been exposed to too many horrible things that year. She'd seen Logan get stabbed in the stomach, and then she'd climbed a tree while hallucinating after an accidental poisoning. Plus there was our adventure getting snowed in at the Flying Squirrel Lodge, trapped with a zombie-like victim and his killer, whom she'd inadvertently flirted with. Poor Jessica.
Recent events hadn't been good for her nerves. She was sensitive. She hadn't grown up the way I had, hearing stories from my father the cop.
Upstairs, I held up my arm to block her from passing me. She stayed behind, albeit with an impatient sigh.
One of the bedroom doors was closed. As I lifted my knuckles to knock on the door, I heard voices inside.
A man was saying, “Mikey doesn't deserve a fine woman like you.”
A female responded with a flirtatious laugh.
I yanked my hand back and used it to cover my mouth. I turned to Jessica, who was doing the exact same thing, her blue eyes wide with surprise.
Samantha's husband was named Michael Sweet. Back when Jessica and I went to high school with him, he'd been known as Mikey. Whoever was in this room, he wasn't wrong. Mikey was a bully, and he didn't deserve a woman as fine as Samantha. But he was the man she'd married, and the two had kids together. From the outside, their marriage was picture perfect—the sort of attractive family you see in the sample picture for photo frames. At the gift shop I owned, Glorious Gifts, I had a whole assortment of families who resembled the Sweets.
Behind the closed door, Samantha said something softly. I couldn't make out her words through the door. Unfortunately, getting my private investigator's license didn't magically give me superhuman hearing.
The man in the room said, “How about next Monday? I've got the whole day off. No responsibilities. Let me take you out for lunch. I've got a few things to discuss with you.”
“Not about Michael, I hope. Honestly, I don't want to know what he's been up to.”
“So, you've heard the rumors?”
She paused before replying, “I'm not a fool. Plus I have an excellent sense of smell.”
“You've smelled other women on him?”
“I... I don't know what it is. Maybe it's just paranoia.”
“How could a man do that to you?” His voice got low and husky. “Those green eyes. Those beautiful lips. Kissing you must feel like falling into heaven.”
She didn't say anything.
There was the sound of furniture creaking.
I turned to Jessica, who was silently mouthing what looked like holy crap.
We had to do something. We certainly couldn't stand outside the door and listen to some guy kissing our married friend.
Before I could interrupt, someone at the front of the house stomped noisily across the porch and rang the doorbell.
DING DONG!
At the sound of the loud chimes, Jessica made a startled noise beside me. By the look on her face, you would have thought she'd been busted kissing a married person.
Downstairs, a woman called out in a singsong voice, “Hello? Are we too early? We're here for the open house!” There was the sound of shoes on the hardwood floors. “Larry, take off your shoes,” she instructed someone. Larry grumbled in response, and she hissed, “She's going to know we're lookie-loos if you don't take off your shoes.” He grumbled some more.
Jessica and I had barely taken a few steps back from the bedroom door when it swung open.
Samantha Sweet met our eyes and made a strangled noise even squeakier than the one Jessica had made.
“You two,” she wheezed. “I didn't hear you come in.” Her hands fluttered up around the fringe of her blond hair and then down the front of her crisp white blazer.
Behind her stood a man who was very clearly not her husband. He was using the back of his hand to rub his lower lip.
“Stormy Day,” the man said, grinning right at me. “I was just talking about you. What's that saying? Speak of the devil, and she appears?”
Chapter 3
“If it isn't the industrious Mr. Colt Canuso,” I replied to the handsome, broad-shouldered, black-haired man.
Colt grinned and adjusted the strings of his bolo tie. He was sporting his usual look, a dark gray suit with a bolo tie, and western-style boots with pointed toes. As I looked down at his footwear, he shifted his feet so the toes pointed directly at me.
“That's my name,” he said. “Don't wear it out.” His deep voice squeaked up at the end, reminding me of the younger, skinnier version of Colt Canuso I'd known in high school. He'd been shy and reserved as a junior, but by the time we graduated, he was the class clown who'd do anything to make girls laugh. He and I hadn't stayed in touch after graduation, but I'd been seeing him around town in the last year since I'd come back to Misty Falls. He'd even helped me with a case during the summer, supplying me with eye-in-the-sky surveillance video from the casino his family owned, out on Canuso Lake. Who needs a warrant when you've got old friends?
I was glad to see his friendly face that day despite my concerns about how close his face had been to my married friend's face.
The room we'd caught him in was a child's bedroom with a narrow bed. The bed had been neatly made, but the duvet was rumpled with two butt imprints, right next to each other.
I lifted my chin and fixed Colt Canuso with a businesslike stare. “And what brings you here today, to Mrs. Sweet's open house?” I put a strong emphasis on the word Mrs., for all the good it would do. By the two butt imprints on the bed plus the guilty look on Samantha's face, the horses had left the stables already.
“Same as you, I imagine.” He flashed me a luminous grin. He'd always had big, naturally straight teeth. They'd been too big for his face when he was a skinny kid, but he'd grown into them perfectly.
I blinked at him and licked some icing from the corner of my mouth. “Oh? Same as me? You came to taste Samantha's sweet little cupcakes?”
Beside me, Jessica made a horrified squeak.
Colt's lips twitched as his smile broadened. A dimple appeared in one bronze cheek. “Stormy, I never realized you were so funny.”
“I'm no class clown, but some people find my directness amusing.”
His dimple deepened. “I am, indeed, amused by your directness.”
Samantha Sweet hadn't said anything. She was looking down at her white blazer, flicking away imaginary spots of lint.
Jessica cleared her throat.
The four of us surveyed each other in uncomfortable silence. The doorbell sounded again. Jessica broke away to go downstairs and greet the visitors who were muttering to each other in the entryway. Larry was still grumbling about having to take off his shoes.
Samantha Sweet finally looked up at me, her lower lip trembling and her sparkling emerald-green eyes filling with water.
Not again, I thought. Please don't cry on me, Sam.
I gave the real estate agent what I hoped was a friendly, supportive look.
Samantha took in a sharp gasp of air. She darted out of the bedroom in a bright flash of blond hair and white blazer, heading for the stairs.
The first couple who'd come in were still bickering over the removal of shoes. And even more people were arriving and ringing the doorbell.
Over the din, I heard a shriek behind me. I twisted around in time to see Samantha's arms flail into the air as she stumbled down the stairs. Jessica, who was partway down the stairs, calling out a greeting to the open house visitors, wheeled around in the nick of time and caught Samantha in her arms.
Colt and I dashed to the top of the stairs to make sure everyone was okay.
Jessica's elaborate hairstyle had come partly undone, and her cheeks were pink, but she'd caught Samantha. Jessica was the hero of the day.
“I'm okay,” Samantha huffed and puffed. “This stupid cheap shoe tried to kill me.” She leaned over and pulled off her shoe to show everyone the snapped heel that had caused her fall.
Jessica quickly took off her own shoes and handed them to Samantha. The blond real estate agent thanked her, donned the borrowed shoes, and continued on her way to greet the visitors with a cheerful ring to her voice. That was Samantha Sweet. She wasn't the most confident person or even the brightest penny in the jar, but she was a hard worker, and she did everything wholeheartedly. I'd never gotten a text message from Samantha that didn't contain enough exclamation points to warm up my mood a few degrees.
As Samantha got to work greeting the visitors, Jessica followed behind, barefoot, stuffing Samantha's broken shoes into her purse.
Colt and I still stood at the top of the stairs. As I turned to him, he followed Samantha with his gaze and quipped, “Samantha keeps saying this house will be the death of her, but I didn't believe her until today.”
“Was it really the house, or the shoe?”
He turned his dark brown eyes toward me and quirked an eyebrow. “You should launch a private investigation into that suspicious accident,” he said. “Someone looking to sabotage this open house must have loosened the heel on Mrs. Sweet's shoe.” He also put a strong emphasis on the word Mrs.
I snorted. Ever since word had gotten around Misty Falls about me being a licensed private investigator, people had been making lame jokes about me looking into not-so-suspicious events.
“She's lucky Jessica was there,” I said. “Back when we were in the cheerleader squad, Jessica was the one person you could count on to never, ever drop a girl.”
Colt leaned toward me and tipped his head forward.
A section of raven-black hair crossed his raised eyebrow. “I try to live my life with no regrets, but I do regret never trying out for the cheerleader team.”
I tilted my chin up. “Colt Canuso, you would have been a great cheerleader, except for one thing. You were so scrawny back then. No hips at all. Even the smallest skirt would have fallen right off you.”
He chuckled. “I'm not so scrawny anymore, but you're as mean as ever.”
“Mean?” My jaw dropped. “I was never mean to you in school.”
“You were downright cruel. You wouldn't let me buy you a root beer.”
I rolled my eyes. “Colt, you never offered. You'd buy yourself a root beer and try to get girls to share your drink, with all your spitty backwash.”
“Backwash?” He pretended to be horrified. “I'm a careful sipper. I never backwash.”
He hadn't made a move down the stairs yet. We were alone on the upper floor, listening to Samantha giving the early bird open house visitors a tour of the downstairs. She expertly listed off the home's unique features: original stained-glass windows, pocket doors, wood wainscoting. Her pitch was almost good enough to take my mind off what I'd witnessed in the small bedroom. Almost.
I cleared my throat. “Speaking of other people's spit, how long have you been conducting business with Samantha? You two seemed to be having a very friendly meeting in here.”
Colt didn't blink. “Stormy, you know I'm a big flirt. That's just how I am. I'm generous with my compliments and attention.” His brown eyes remained fixed on mine, unwavering. A little too fixed. Liars always overcompensated with too much eye contact.
“You weren't trying to taste Samantha's sweet little cupcakes?”
He looked me steadily in the eye and swore, “There's nothing inappropriate going on.”
I grabbed his hand and held it tenderly.
He blinked three times in a row. He hadn't been expecting physical contact.
I brought his hand up to my mouth and whispered, “It's good to know you're still available.”
Stormy Day Mysteries 5-Book Cozy Murder Mystery Series Bundle Page 95