Fatally Flaky gbcm-15 Read online

  “Oh, Tom, he just wants to have a relationship with Cecelia and her daughter. And you make it sound so—”

  “You want to do something for a few drunks? Make cookies for the AA meetings we have down at the jail. Trust me, drunks who are drying out love sweets. But do nothing for that SOB Norman O’Neal. You do anything? Visit him, send him flowers? He’ll say in court, ‘See, even the caterer felt remorse over what happened, she brought me roses.’”

  I shook my head. “I married a cynic.”

  “No, you married a realist.” He leaned over and gave me a kiss. “Not meaning to bring up the past. I mean, with the Jerk and all. But you’ve already felt sorry enough for one asshole to last an entire lifetime.”

  “That’s hitting below the belt, Tom.”

  “My dear sweet wife,” Tom said as he gathered me into his arms, “first of all, I would never hit you. Second, there are any number of fun things I would love to do with you that involve activities below the belt.”

  And so we went to bed, although we didn’t actually go to sleep for a while. Tom had a number of those activities in mind, and I was more than willing to try them out.

  As I was drifting off to dreamland, I realized that unlike many of the people I worked for, I hadn’t thought getting married was any big deal. It was being married—to Tom, that is—that, along with having Arch, had been the very biggest deal of my life.

  SATURDAY MORNING DAWNED with weak sunshine and birdsong. I lay in bed thinking how much better the night before, with Tom, had been than the day I was about to have was probably going to be. The prospect of spending my Saturday with Charlotte Attenborough and the dreaded Victor Lane at Gold Gulch Spa did not fill me with joy. Even the leavening presence of my godfather wouldn’t help. I wished fervently for rain, lots of it, and a cancellation of all plans.

  “Come on, Miss G.” Tom leaned over and kissed my cheek. I luxuriated in his scent of aftershave and soap. He placed an iced espresso with cream on the night table. “I have to go meet with the medical examiner.”

  “The medical examiner? Do you really think he’ll get to Doc Finn so soon?”

  “Yup. Our guy was an old friend of Finn’s.”

  “And he wants to perform that procedure on his old friend?” I shivered as I stood up and eased into black pants and a white shirt. “That’s awful.”

  “He called me early on my cell. Said he doesn’t want anybody else to do it, and that he was coming in early and wanted me there. Finn was going to the top of his list.”

  We were interrupted by the sound of Jack’s horn, a custom contraption he’d had installed in the old sedan. Tweep-tweep-twoop-tweep declared his presence out front. I glanced at the clock: not quite 6:30? If the neighbors didn’t love me because of my godfather habitually rolling in noisily after a night of carousing with Doc Finn, they sure as heck didn’t love me now, with him beeping to indicate he was ready to go.

  “Guy lives across the street,” Tom commented, “and he can’t phone or come over when he’s ready to go? He has to honk the horn on that dad-blasted car of his?”

  “He’s from New Jersey. They honk there. And you know how he loves that horn.”

  “It may be after eight o’clock on the East Coast, but it isn’t here. Six months ought to be long enough for someone to get used to changing over from Eastern Standard to Mountain Daylight Time, don’t you think?”

  “Tom.”

  “That secretive slob of a godfather of yours isn’t always as loving as you think he is, that’s all I’m saying. All right. Let me go and talk to him.”

  “Please be nice.”

  “I’m always nice.”

  While Tom went out front, I slipped down to the kitchen and looked around frantically. What did I need for the trip out to Gold Gulch Spa? What ever it was, I needed to gather it up quickly, because Jack was not a patient man. I booted up my kitchen computer, brought up Billie Attenborough’s revised menu, numbers, and table settings, inserted a new flash drive, and backed up the files for Yolanda. Bless Yolanda’s heart, I knew she would be out there this early, as the overnight guests had to have breakfast.

  I also quickly opened a morning e-mail from Charlotte. She said she was bringing extra place cards, linens, candles, centerpieces, china, and flatware to the spa. Maybe she should be leaving all this up to Billie, since Her Flakiness, Bridezilla, was the one screwing up this whole thing.

  Except for the crab cakes, at least dear Julian was making all the extra food. Bless his heart.

  I pressed the button on my espresso maker to make myself another Summertime Special. When I’d poured the espresso and cream into a thermal mug with a lid and showered it with ice, I grabbed my purse, the flash drive, and a raincoat, and raced out the door.

  Tom and Jack were engaged in amicable conversation as they leaned against Jack’s shiny red Mercedes. How someone could keep his house such a mess and be so careful to keep his classic car so meticulously clean was one of the mysteries of the universe, at least to my way of thinking.

  Jack, looking dapper in a white Brooks Brothers shirt, navy blazer, and navy trousers, held the passenger door open for me. “Gertie Girl! Tom says you weren’t quite ready to go. Sorry if I bothered you.”

  I shook my head at Tom, who was grinning widely. “I’m ready, Jack. I just don’t understand why we have to leave so early. The spa’s only twenty, twenty-five minutes away, and I don’t think they serve breakfast to the overnight guests until seven or so.”

  “We have to get Charlotte. She called me at six and asked if we would pick her up. I felt bad for…not doing better with her last night.”

  “But your best friend had died!”

  He gave me a sidelong glance. “My little Gertie Girl. Always making excuses for me. Well, let me warn you. Trying to pry Charlotte out of that house of hers is like trying to chip cement off a brick. Plus, you probably want to talk to Billie, don’t you?”

  “Not particularly,” I replied.

  Jack folded himself into the driver’s seat and gave me a devilish grin. “If you don’t want to talk to Billie, then that’s why we have to get there early. That lazy, unemployed thirty-six-year-old wouldn’t get out of bed before nine o’clock if her life depended on it.”

  Jack fishtailed away from the curb.

  “Jack!”

  “Oops, sorry. Buckle up, would ya? Tom’s watching.”

  I wrenched on my seat belt and checked the rearview mirror. Tom was indeed eyeing our departure…but he was grinning and shaking his head.

  I glanced around the interior of the Mercedes. It was black leather accented with wood grain, not the easiest color combination to keep clean in the mountains, where the summer weather was often dry, dusty, and windy…unless you’d had a ton of rain, which we had. But then you’d expect mud on the outside and inside of a vehicle. I was always struggling with either dust or mud in the van. But Jack’s car was impeccable, as usual.

  “Jack, I don’t understand why your house is…the way it is, and your car is, uh, the way it is.”

  “I’m a study in contrasts.” He checked his Rolex. “What do you bet Charlotte will be completely dressed this early?”

  “She’s already sent me an e-mail. I thought you said it would be harder to pry her out of her place than chipping cement off…what did you say?”

  Jack chuckled. “Drink your coffee so you can wake up.” Jack pulled the Mercedes onto Main Street. “I didn’t say Charlotte wouldn’t be dressed, I said she wouldn’t be ready to leave.”

  “Maybe she’s used to you showing up early.”

  Jack shrugged. “That woman doesn’t like to be surprised. She is utterly predictable.”

  “Not a study in contrasts, then.”

  Jack laughed all the way to the Attenboroughs’ big place in Flicker Ridge.

  “AH, JACK,” SAID Charlotte. “Thank you for coming.” She’d opened the door before we’d even mounted the steps. She wore a loosely draped pantsuit of an undoubtedly expensive silvery ma
terial, and matching silver-gray heels. She looked Jack over approvingly, and smiled at me.

  Jack, though, pulled his face into a pained expression. I couldn’t read whether it was genuine or not. “Charlotte, dear. It’s my plea sure.”

  Charlotte arched an eyebrow, as if she didn’t believe him. “Well, thank you. Would either of you like a cup of coffee? I still have a few things to pull together here.”

  “No thanks,” said Jack.

  “Thank you,” I said. “I’d love some.”

  Charlotte turned her attention back to Jack. “I have some pictures to show you of how you could decorate your living room. I think they’re wonderful, and would really tie the whole Victorian scheme together for you.”

  “Thanks,” said Jack, “I like things untied.”

  Charlotte drew her perfectly colored brown-pink lips together in a frown. “It will just take a minute.”

  Jack ground his teeth, then said that of course he’d look at some pictures. He stepped across the threshold into the cavernous house and gestured for me to follow him, which I did.

  Charlotte had done a spectacular job on her own place, I would give her that. It was one of those mountain homes that have been filled with lots of expensive furniture made out of elaborate handmade configurations of…twigs. I knew the sofas, tables, and chairs-from-twigs were extremely pricey, because I’d catered the opening of the twig-furniture shop. Oversize crimson and green cushions, table lamps made from iron-in-the-shape-of-twigs, and patterned green-and-red rugs and quilts completed the effect.

  “Here you go,” said Charlotte, handing my godfather a folder marked jack. It was neatly stuffed with photographs cut from magazines. Jack gave me a knowing wink while Charlotte disappeared around a corner.

  “She’s gone to check her makeup,” Jack said. “Now watch this.”

  I followed him into the kitchen, a vision in periwinkle-blue-glazed tiles and pale hickory cabinets, complete with matching blue-glazed drawer and cabinet pulls. Jack pulled out a drawer beneath the counter, and pointed inside. It was not a drawer but a new-fangled, miniature trash compactor. In went the file marked jack. My godfather flipped a switch, and a terrifying grinding noise filled the kitchen.

  “Jack!” I whispered. “She’ll hear you.”

  “No, she won’t. It’s a big house, completely soundproofed, so neither Charlotte nor Billie can hear the elk bugling in mating season. It drives them nuts.”

  Soundproofing or no soundproofing, I tiptoed back to the living room anyway. I hadn’t felt this guilty since I’d substituted homemade fudge sauce for some horrid low-calorie stuff a hostess had insisted I use at her daughter’s engagement party.

  “God, I need a cigarette,” Jack said. “I think I’m going to step outside and have one. If she comes back, tell her I went to put the decorating file in my trunk, God forbid.”

  “Better hurry up,” I warned.

  “Will you calm down?” Jack winked again, and was gone.

  I eyed a neat display of home-decorating magazines, afraid of mussing them up. Suddenly, I felt overwhelmingly tired. Where was the caffeine-delivery machine in that kitchen? I wondered. Charlotte had offered me some coffee, after all. Did I dare sneak back and look for it?

  I did. A moment later I was frowning at an expensive wall-mounted unit with a computer and digital readout. After staring at it for a few moments, in which I was becoming increasingly nervous that Charlotte might reappear, I figured out that the thing ground the beans, then dripped the goods into a thermos. Damn, I thought. I didn’t dare mess with it without having a look at the manual.

  The phone rang, and I looked around for it. Another wall-mounted unit held both the apparatus and a blackboard. The phone rang and rang. It wasn’t even seven o’clock in the morning. Should I answer the thing, I wondered, and take a message for Charlotte? I moved over to the blackboard just as someone picked up the phone—either a person or voice mail. I stared at the board, with its chalk hanging on a string. Then for some reason—probably lack of caffeine—I got the giggles. Did I dare write “Goldy was here” on the board? I did not.

  There was a name that had been written in chalk, then erased. O’Neal. I wasn’t aware that the Attenboroughs knew the O’Neals. In fact, I couldn’t imagine them moving in the same, as the phrase went, social circles.

  I looked over longingly at the coffee machine, but when I heard Charlotte’s heels clicking along the hardwood floor, I raced back into the living room and flopped onto the uncomfortable sofa.

  When Charlotte reappeared, she looked as lovely as she had when she left.

  “Where’s Jack?” she demanded.

  “Outside.”

  “Doing what, may I ask?” When I shrugged, she said, “Oh, for God’s sake, let’s hurry up. I don’t want to keep Victor waiting.”

  What ever, I thought, we’re still an hour early. But I didn’t want to point this out to the client.

  Out on the porch, Charlotte sniffed the air suspiciously, then squinted at Jack.

  “You’ve been smoking.”

  “Last time I checked, that wasn’t a crime.”

  Charlotte turned to me. “Could you work on your godfather, try to get him to stop his unhealthy habit?”

  I swallowed. Wasn’t there some law in this country called “I’m not in charge of what he does”? Jack shot me an apologetic glance. Just for good measure, he hit the doorbell. It donged mercilessly in the interior.

  “Jack, what in the world are you doing?” Charlotte demanded.

  “Trying to wake up that daughter of yours.” He hit the bell again.

  “She’s getting married tomorrow! She needs her beauty sleep!” Charlotte protested.

  “She needs something,” Jack admitted before opening the sedan’s back door so I could climb in.

  Maybe I shouldn’t have agreed to let Jack drive the two of us out to Gold Gulch Spa. Jack was teasing Charlotte, and it wasn’t going well. As Tom had pointed out, men teased each other and they thought it was fine. When men teased women, though, we took it as pure cruel aggression.

  Well, anyway, while dealing with Charlotte and Jack, I was beginning to feel like one of those spots on the globe that’s set between warring factions. Alsace-Lorraine. Kuwait. Somebody always wants it, and the place ends up getting smashed in every conflict. I took a deep breath and closed my eyes, trying to visualize myself as Switzerland.

  In the front seat, I could hear Charlotte Attenborough asking again about Finn. Was she trying to find out what had happened, or was she pumping Jack for information? I didn’t know, but it made me uncomfortable. Tom said my paranoia antennae were the best functioning he’d ever encountered.

  “I am not controlling,” Charlotte was insisting now. “If anything, I’m too accommodating. I put up with that pigpen you call a house—”

  “It’s being renovated,” Jack said calmly. “And no one is forcing you to come over. In fact, if you would call before you showed up one of these times, I’d have a chance to clean it up.”

  Charlotte tsked. “I dial your number, but you don’t answer. And anyway, the only person I should be phoning is the county health inspector.”

  “That’s going a bit far,” Jack murmured as he turned out of Flicker Ridge and headed back toward the lake. An icy silence descended in Jack’s Mercedes. When he turned, to head west on Upper Cottonwood Creek Road toward Gold Gulch Spa, Charlotte reopened…well, what were they? Negotiations? Hostilities?

  “You know, Jack,” she said, “I’m acquainted with any number of contractors who could have had that place of yours completely done, cleaned up, and ready to be lived in a month ago.”

  “I like to do things my own way,” Jack replied, his tone stubborn.

  “And now who’s being controlling?” Charlotte retorted sharply. “If you just didn’t spend so much time with—” But here she stopped short, and what felt like the refrain of a practiced argument was left dangling. Jack’s face in the rearview mirror turned an ashen gray, and I
realized Charlotte had finally gotten to him. Charlotte had meant to say, I was willing to bet, that Jack was spending too much time with Doc Finn. That’s why the house wasn’t getting renovated fast enough; why Jack didn’t answer when Charlotte called—he was fishing with Doc Finn; that’s why Charlotte felt she had to show up at Jack’s house unannounced, and I was willing to bet it was why there was this undercurrent of rancor in their relationship. Charlotte, I was also willing to bet, had only at the last moment remembered that Doc Finn was dead.

  At the right-hand turnoff to the spa, I noticed on the left side of the street the forlorn-looking building that had formerly housed Spruce Medical Group. Most of the tenants had long since abandoned these digs for the posh new medical building on the north side of Aspen Meadow. But still. In a raging snowstorm, Doc Finn had set out from here, from this spot, when I’d called about Arch’s fever. He’d overlooked his own peril to bring kindness and healing into our house. I’d be forever grateful to him for it.

  But Doc Finn was gone, the victim of foul play. My heart twisted in my chest.

  9

  Ah, the prodigal mother of the bride!” Victor Lane cried when we pulled up and disembarked. “I’m so happy to see you, Charlotte dearest!”

  While Victor Lane ostentatiously kissed Charlotte Attenborough on both cheeks, Jack inverted his eyebrows, pointed to Victor with his thumb, and gave me his patented Who-the-hell-is-this-guy look. I shrugged and shook my head. Let Charlotte introduce them to each other; I knew I was invisible to Victor Lane, too. He just wanted to show me how unimportant I was.