All Rise

by Rosemarie Aquilina

  Fully aproned, masked, and gloved, Margo slipped around the room with an industrial garbage bag and tossed everything that couldn’t be laundered. She passed out smocks to replace tossed-off clothing, zipped one sample bottle into a Ziploc bag for police and prepared a duplicate for Hunter.

  She gathered the remaining bottles and double-tied them into a separate garbage bag for police. With both arms straight out, away from her body, she set the police stuff aside and walked the rest out, I guessed to the ugly dumpster that rested under a gnarly cherry tree in the corner of the parking lot.

  Even with a mask, Margo couldn’t hide her grin.

  Carlye, who’d tossed her bra and her blouse into the garbage bag, bounced up to Margo, arms firmly crossed over her smock-covered free-floating cleavage.

  I waved Trisha home and Margo toward airing the salon. After that, she’d help out at the café.

  Dinkie-Do pushed out his quivering bottom lip. “I need a ride home.” He was near tears.

  Carlye interrupted. “Oh, no you do not. I’m not going anywhere dressed like this alone. I dub us bookends.” She pushed her elbows into her sides and clasped her palms together. “You’re with me and Shazam. I’ll take you wherever you needs to go.”

  “Thank you, Miss Carlye.” Dinkie-Do sounded sincere.

  She said, “Grab some garbage bags and towels because no vermin stench is touching my sweet car.”

  I shooed them out. “Vamoose.”

  Wide-eyed and pale, Dinkie-Do followed Carlye. Within three minutes the salon was quiet.

  “You men have to withstand my reek, and I don’t care how raunchy I get as it ages on me. I fear prison stench will be worse.”

  Their joint eyes danced in sync as they mutely undressed my smocked body, and I got uncomfortable. It reminded me of the mini-dresses I used to wear and tried to ignore just how much of me was showing. I pondered why, as competing male predators, they didn’t spar over the single girl carcass. Women would simply tear each other’s hair out.

  “Your work calls,” I said. But they couldn’t take a serious order from a smocked skunk. And the irritation heat from my body caused a rise in potency. Okay, I’d find the funny later, much, much, later.

  Sebastian scratched his chin. “Shall we meet in the woods, where you aren’t sooky?”

  “You think you smell great all the time?” He did, but I wasn’t going to admit that after he just told me I stunk like a wild animal. Sooky—my ass!

  Skunk smelled sweeter than whatever was looming inside the Courthouse, and it was safer in the woods than whatever was looming here. “Another clue.” I showed the men the red envelope.

  Ripping open the evil envelope, I found a newspaper cartoon—main attraction: a guillotine. The note that came with it said:

  THIS IS THE LAST TIME WE ASK NICELY. KEEP YOUR MOUTH SHUT.

  Deep calm—bordering on catatonia—spread through me, and it seemed someone had turned down the volume on my life. I saw people moving, but the room was silent.

  Sebastian took me home.

  Chapter Forty-Two

  Late that afternoon—soaking in my third hot scented bath—my skin was scrubbed raw, my rear was slightly numb, and my right foot was less than comfortable sticking out of the water to avoid short-circuiting the tether. It was supposed to be waterproof, but at this point there was little I trusted. If I was going to get electrified, it would be by Sebastian.

  My brain surged through the competing teams of haters aimed at Donnettelli, but I kept coming back to Peter. The challenge had become how to get him to admit he’d shot Donnettelli.

  My emerging defense was convoluted. But my reputation needed a solution, not a defense.

  I submerged my thoughts and my body, sans right foot. Despite the hot water, a cold chill ran through me, and I pulled the plug. I raised and dried my pruny hide. It was time to sift fact from fiction and map out a plan to get Peter to come clean.

  My phone vibrated on the countertop. Barely towel-headed I growled at the phone and tapped speaker.

  Sebastian. “Before my meeting, I dropped off the phony perfume bottles to Hollywood, and I filed your report.”

  “And?” I wanted to click off.

  “Bloke didn’t think it was much of a corker. Needs your statement. He questioned the integrity of your business circles and scoffed it off as a competitor’s prank.”

  I moaned—not the kind of moan Sebastian preferred. “Let me guess. Big fun at my expense.” I heard silence.

  “We’ll have a ripper when this is over.”

  “Palene dropped off verification from Shayla that Donnettelli didn’t inherit much from his parents.”

  “Good oil.” Sebastian whistled. “Get some clothes on.”

  Phone silence.

  My cheeks burned. Damn man could sense my bare flesh. I double-checked my phone to ensure FaceTime was off. I needed serious playtime in an evidence-free playground. I wiggled my ring finger. It was bare. Still my decision to remain single. I couldn’t hairspray myself to one man just yet, not even Sebastian.

  I needed some serious me-time to contemplate everything that had happened with everything we’d compiled. Now was the perfect time. I double-checked the lock on my bedroom door. It would stay that way until I smelled dinner fumes that called me downstairs.

  My hunger pangs timely merged with the stack of material I’d compared without success and the scent of a warm meal. Was that apple pie in the mix? I tumbled down the stairs and happily took my place at the table. I was getting accustomed to three-male pampering. That was probably not in my best interests, but I decided I had more immediate problems to address.

  After dinner, Dexter, Hunter, Sebastian, and I talked about everything but the immediate problem. We cleared the kitchen table and were reseated enjoying warm apple crisp and ice cream with the late-arriving Dinkie-Do. We were enjoying second helpings when the front doorbell chimed. “I’ll get it,” Dinkie-Do offered—only to shortly return, flanked by Team Hollywood—again.

  “Sorry,” Dinkie-Do said.

  “It’s okay. Care to join us, boys?” I pointed to the empty chairs and the sweet cuisine. Tweedle-Dee and Tweedle-Peach clambered in and joined us.

  Grayson focused across the room on the island. “Are Barbie and company joining us, or are they waiting for Ken and Allen?”

  The fact he knew Ken’s friend’s name was disturbing. I clasped my hands in front of me Godfather-like with matching voice tone. “Unless you depose me, I’m not answering.” Damn it. I needed answers.

  Grayson sat between Sebastian and Dexter. Fredericks sat between Hunter and Sebastian. A full house. One, I hoped, that wasn’t near collapse.

  “Search warrant, Detectives?” Sebastian asked.

  Grayson pulled up a leather portfolio and unzipped it flat on the table. He took a file folder and handed a report to each of us. “A fresh release from the Prosecutor’s Office.”

  Sebastian squinted. “Without your yabber. Tell us.”

  Grayson began. “The ME completed Judge Donnettelli’s full autopsy. Ballistics and toxicology reports are attached.” Grayson flipped pages. “Page three, no toxins found. Page four, two different bullets. Two shooters. One when he was alive, and one—when he was dead.”

  “Hot damn.” Amazement struck me. “An enemy invasion against Donnettelli.”

  Sebastian cleared his throat. I understood and stopped speaking. I wanted to happy dance, remove the tether, and oust my tenants, but, I knew anything I said and did could be used against me.

  I also understood Grayson intended to stay a while. He poured himself a cup of coffee, stirred in cream, and slurped.

  “So, were you Shooter One or Shooter Two?” Fredericks snapped a large grape from its branch and rolled it between his fingers. “One is guilty of murder.” He popped the grape into his mouth and chewed. “Two, likel
y guilty of nothing.” He broke two more grapes free and popped them into his mouth. Then two more. Slow, methodical. Like he was the frog crushing a fly; like I was the fly.

  “Charging on the second bullet is the Prosecutor’s call,” Grayson said.

  “We’re focused on bringing this first bullet to conclusion.” Fredericks shot me a cold look.

  “Conduct a real investigation, and arrest the real culprits,” Sebastian said.

  “Like the Ouija board, we go where the letters direct,” Fredericks said. “Letters spelled your client’s name.”

  The coffee, like my mood, had cooled.

  Hunter shook the paper. “Wrong game, Vanna—these letters spell autopsy. Try Game Changer for a thousand. Who’s the second suspect?” Hunter pointed his fork at Fredericks and then Grayson. “Wrong category, wrong answer. Nicoletta’s not either shooter.”

  “Your client had an ongoing feud with the victim, and that’s motive. Your client is caught on Courthouse security footage having what look to be arguments with the victim on more than one occasion, evidence of that motive. Your client knew her way around the Courthouse, that Donnettelli had a gun, how to gain access to the gun, knowledge of his schedule—all of which enabled her to plan, scheme, and perfect her design to murder her adversary,” Fredericks said.

  Grayson picked up a cannoli and used it like a cream-filled pointer. “And surveillance footage shows you and Judge Donnettelli getting into the judicial elevator together and not leaving for several minutes,” Grayson added. “A rather long time for two enemies to spend together.”

  “Just when did you determine my client knew his schedule or wanted to be trapped in the elevator with him?” Sebastian asked.

  “We checked the elevator records. There was nothing wrong with it. Somebody pushed the stop button. You two stayed inside, doing what?” Grayson let the question roll off his tongue smooth as cannoli filling.

  “Wasn’t my doing—” I began and Lawyer Sebastian cut in.

  “I want to see those records and footage,” Sebastian said. “My client has nothing to tell you except go find the real killer.”

  “We’ve conducted interviews at the Courthouse. Seems the Circuit Court Judges maintained similar schedules and could watch each other on the Courthouse security cameras,” Fredericks said. “She knew exactly when to corner him off-screen in the elevator. She knew exactly when and where to shoot.”

  I’d heard similar arguments by the People during criminal trials. I barely heard Sebastian ask the Hollywood team to leave and sank into my chair.

  “Wrong information,” I sighed. “I steered clear of him and his schedule. I didn’t press the elevator stop button; he did.”

  Chapter Forty-Three

  When the Detectives were safely outside, I tossed the Autopsy Report onto the counter. “Let’s divide our work to cover more ground more quickly. I’m their bull’s-eye; I not only want them to step in bull crap, I want them to eat bull crap.”

  The men guffawed, but there was no comfort in that. I felt like bull crap.

  Hunter winked at me. “Let’s begin with the suits who’ve been hanging in your café. They’re not SEC.”

  “How sure are you?” I asked.

  “My guys got DNA from your café, and we ran checks. The suits work in the movie industry. They’re bonded, so their DNA is on file.” Hunter pushed away from the table, walked to the kitchen desk, and reached into a soft, fat briefcase I hadn’t noticed.

  Despite the heat outside, I felt like flakes of Christmas-tree snow just whirled down my spine and left a nagging pinecone needle in my throat.

  “The suits are diverse,” Hunter said. “Everything from making movies to alleged money laundering. But no criminal records I can find.”

  “Maybe not those two, but some of the people they work for sound like nasty whackers.” Sebastian pretend-played the table as if it were his personal piano. “Money laundering is not a clean business.” His Australian accent stroked another chord with me, and I shifted.

  Hunter returned with a red file folder. “Money is in the forefront of everyone’s mind, not murder.” He opened the folder and pulled out two pictures. “I got LEIN information—you know, like when a cop runs your license—”

  “Law school, professor,” Sebastian said. “Get on.”

  “The suits fund legit movies, fine restaurants, and fine jewelry stores. But with their success travels rumors of ties to illegal gaming and low and high-rise housing scams. Rumors aren’t unusual when people have a lot of money.” Hunter folded his arms.

  “We’re losing focus.” I wasn’t sure how this news fit, how the money tied in, or how these men had done anything wrong. And I was still tethered. “We have to solve Donnettelli’s murder. Someone wants to push a quick trial and conviction.” I sat back. “We need to follow the money, not let it lead us around by our noses.”

  They needed to hear me. “I found an odd asbestos case, and I need copies of the file, but the Register of Actions indicates it’s at the Court of Appeals.”

  “Odd how?” Sebastian asked.

  “I know at least one bank in a building filled with asbestos. That lawsuit ended in a settlement. And the insurance company paid big. Employees got sick, and some have died.”

  “If Donnettelli messed with these cases,” Hunter said, “someone might have decided to knock him off.”

  I picked up a table knife and held it like a gavel. Props were good. My knife extension became an immediate focal point—one I might need to use more often. “I need a copy of the witness lists. One of those names may be useful. And a list of all court personnel who touched that file. I want to see if there’s any overlap.”

  “Let’s get in there and get copies.” Sebastian pulled out his phone and typed a note to himself.

  “While we flounder about, someone in the Courthouse knows something and may be manipulating files.” I pounded the table with the butt of my knife prop. “The case I just mentioned links all our issues. I hope it’ll clear up some of the damned confusion.”

  “What’s clear is that you’re targeted. I don’t want that bull’s-eye on you,” Dex said. “Death will not become you.”

  “In prison or dead, there’s no difference.” I thought back to the snake note. “Someone wants me to stop complaining about Donnettelli changing my Order.”

  “Hollywood and Company need to investigate Donnettelli’s enemies, including his staff,” Sebastian said.

  “What do you think about Peter Dune?” Hunter asked.

  Funny you should ask. “One. I saw him—at the end of the hall—the last time I saw Donnettelli alive—same day I walked out. Dune had just handed an envelope to Judge Jurisa Haddes and shot me a snide look I can still feel. It was weird. Two—the day I snuck into the Courthouse dressed as a pregnant hippie, that day—he gave me a long look.”

  “He could just have a thing for women with big bellies,” Hunter said.

  Sebastian ignored Hunter. “Another reason for you to stay away from the Courthouse.”

  I tried to remember I was feeling empowered and hoped it would last. “Three. Peter didn’t tell cops he’d heard a woman in Donnettelli’s chambers when he phoned Peter at two in the morning. Four. He was photo-spying on Laurel and me at Starbucks, knew I’d caught him, and came in with a sob story about needing money. Five. He hates Donnettelli for demeaning him, for not paying his debt, and for forcing him to host the poker parties.”

  Dexter looked frustrated. “What does all that add up to in evidence terms?”

  “No evidence Peter has any special skill with video or computers,” Hunter said.

  Sebastian suddenly looked more lawyerly. “How this is handled is key. Privately. Quietly. Between us. No accusations should be verbalized to anyone until there’s hard evidence.”

  Hunter was already nodding. “Yeah. Make Peter mad, and
he’s liable to remember to tell the Detectives about the woman he heard in Donnettelli’s chambers.”

  “We need a plan. Let’s meet in forty-eight hours to compare and trade information.” I stabbed a strawberry, and we watched it ooze. There was a metaphor in there somewhere, but I didn’t want to think about it.

  When we left the table, I headed toward the stairs and my bedroom, but Sebastian stopped me. He stood silently next to me until Hunter and Dex walked out together. They had business to talk about.

  When we heard a car start, Sebastian leaned in and kissed my forehead, then took my hand and led me up the back stairs.

  Chapter Forty-Four

  In less than a minute, we were in the bedroom.

  I toe-kicked the door shut.

  When Sebastian wrapped his arms around me, I nestled into his chest and let the lump in my throat and the day’s frustrations leak all over his shirt.

  After a few minutes, I looked into his eyes. “What’s that look for?”

  “I’m gobsmacked I haven’t been sent packing.” Sebastian squeezed his arms around my waist and held me tighter. I heard his heart pulse quicken.

  I found his hands and led him to the bed. “If you’re complaining, find the door, and lock it behind you,” I said while I unbuttoned my shirt. I kicked off my boots and tossed open the bed covers.

  Sebastian swiftly dropped his clothes on mine and sent exploring fingers down my shoulders toward my waist. “I intend to hold you till you sleep, and I’ll be grinning like a shot fox every second.”

  How did I deserve such a wonderful boyfriend? I recalled kissing him, and the next time my eyes opened, my body announced the need for caffeine. Strong espresso was needed for me to face lack of sleep and the early morning. Damn, for having so little sleep, I felt rejuvenated. I grabbed the remote and flicked on the news.

  Sebastian kissed the top of my head. “Sleep.”