Cornwall and Redfern Mysteries 2-Book Bundle (37 page)

“Can you do something
with this?” I pulled the towel off my damp hair and stood in front of Rae in the living room.

She looked up from her anatomy textbook and set aside her pen. “Like what? I don't have time to put another colour in tonight. I have my massage therapy final in less than a month and have to cram like crazy.”

Have I mentioned that Rae is a former hooker? We both used to live in trailers in Hemp Hollow, and I brought her with me when I moved into my parents' empty house. Now, she's a part-time receptionist at the greenhouse, and one day a week she works for me cleaning houses. In her spare time, she's studying to become a registered massage therapist and plans to open her own business. She's too busy to backslide into her old life, even if she's tempted. I make sure of that.

“I don't want another colour.” Even Redfern was beginning to make cracks about my many-shaded tresses. “Can you style it or something so it doesn't look so striped and frizzy?”

“Sure. I'll French braid it. Oh, and then I'll make your eyes look smoky. You won't be able to keep the Chief off you.”

“That's not what I'm after tonight. He's tied up with the OPP investigator, so I'm on my own. I'm going to the Wing Nut for a glass of wine and some company.”

Rae doesn't do things halfway, so by the time I picked my way over the icy driveway to my Matrix — in knee-high, low-heeled boots — my person was not only French-braided and smoky-eyed, but plucked, blushed, and lip-glossed. Somebody better try to pick me up after all that.

The Wing Nut is a restaurant and bar south of the cemetery on Highway 21. In a bygone era, it would have been called a roadhouse. Since it was technically within the town limits, the highway was well-ploughed and sanded. The snow had stopped earlier in the day and if the temperature went up a few degrees more, maybe the accumulation would melt. I hated it when the snow stayed on the ground this early in December. It made a long winter endless.

The neon letters and graphic of somebody's idea of a wing nut illuminated the parking lot, which wasn't as well-sanded as the highway. I really needed to start transporting my own bucket of Ice Melt. My boots skidded on the icy patches, but, lucky for me, about a dozen cars crowded the parking spots closest to the entrance. I used the vehicles for support and made it to within a few yards of the front door before my feet slid out from under me. I gripped the door handle of a nearby pickup truck and held on as the rest of my body disappeared under the vehicle. I looked up and read the sign on its door:
Davidson and Cutler Salvage
.

Good. Fang was here. I could find out what he remembered about grad night. And, if it seemed appropriate, offer my condolences. I released the door handle, rolled over, and crawled out from under the truck. A tarp partially covered a glittery object in the bed of the truck. It beckoned me. I pushed back the tarp: a disco ball! Could this be the disco ball from the high school gym?

I touched the multi-faceted surface. It felt like glass, but was probably hard plastic. Big and shiny and tacky, it would look perfect hanging from the cathedral ceiling of the greenhouse during Glory's food benefit. I had to have it. I would have it.

I made it up the three steps and opened the front door of the Wing. I wasn't a fan of loud country- and-western music, but Monday night in these parts didn't afford much choice if one was looking for food, booze, or company.

Fang slumped against the bar with a younger man yattering in his ear. I slipped out of my faux-fox-fur coat and hoisted myself onto the empty stool on Fang's other side.

I ordered a glass of white wine and prodded Fang in the arm. “Hi.”

He barely looked at me. “How you doing, Bliss?” In addition to other odd jobs, Fang delivered packages to the greenhouse and collected shipments for the Royal Mail and UPS. On Friday, he had been his usual easy-going self. Now, he stared into his beer as though it would really help him forget his problems. If he wanted forgetfulness, he should switch to tequila.

The other man leaned around Fang. “I'm Larry Cutler, Fang's cousin. You alone?”

Well, there it was. Not much of a pickup line, but now I could move on. “Hi, Larry. I'm Bliss. I went to school with Fang.”

He looked disappointed. “Oh, I guess that means you're as old as Fang.”

“Pretty close, Larry.” I was three months older.

Larry went back to eating free peanuts and staring at the female bartender, forty if she was a day. But she did have an impressive rack.

Now that Fang was in my sights, I wasn't sure how to proceed. Did he suspect the skeleton he found was his twin sister? If not, I didn't want to be the one to break the news.

I tried for neutral. “It must have been awful, what you found in the old high school. Quite a shock.”

I wasn't good at diplomacy, and Fang cut through my pitiful attempt. “It was Faith, you know.”

I put my hand on his arm. “I guess you knew all along that something bad had happened to her.”

“All this time, we thought she disappeared off the bus in Toronto. Turns out, whatever happened, happened right here in this sleepy little town.”

“I know.” For the life of me, I couldn't think of anything to say that wasn't a platitude, or just plain dumb. Time to move on.

“Um, I see you have the old high school disco ball in the back of your truck. I could use it, you know, a kind of nostalgia thing. I'll give you twenty bucks for it.”

“Nah.”

“It's part of my personal history. How about thirty?”

“Nope.”

Playing hardball, was he? “Okay. Forty. And that's my final offer.” I could buy a new ball from an online party store for less. I wanted this one.

Fang sighed and ordered another beer. I didn't want to hassle him under the sad circumstances and decided to leave it for a while, then come back at him with an offer of forty-five dollars.

At the other end of the bar, a couple of familiar faces pressed together in a private conversation: Thea Vanderbloom and Dwayne Rundell. They weren't any more welcoming than Fang when I hopped up beside Thea. Good thing I wasn't sensitive.

I sipped my wine and beamed at them. Thea had on a long-sleeved black T-shirt and a silver lariat necklace. Dwayne wore a black western-style shirt. “Are you guys taking line-dancing lessons here? Are we going to see a demonstration by the fab duo of Dwayne and Thea?” I checked their boots for spurs.

“Hi, Moonbeam.” Thea sat up straighter on her stool. A glass of icy pop snapped and crackled in front of her. Guess she was the designated driver tonight.

Dwayne looked over her head. “Well, look at you, all dressed up. She almost looks like a real girl, Thea.”

“Oh, aren't you a clever boy?” I stuck three fingers into his beer and chucked him under the chin.

He grabbed a napkin and wiped his neck. “Thea!”

“Go to the restroom and wash your face, hon. I'll get you another beer.” Thea shooed him off in the direction of the Gents, then shook her head at me. “I don't know why you can't be a bit more respectful.”

“Me? He took the first shot.”

“You call him
Duh
-wayne. That's not nice.”

“Do I?” I was honestly surprised. “Sorry. I'll try to do better.”

Thea threw me a suspicious look before taking the last mini-pretzel from the bowl in front of her and signalling the bartender to bring more.

I addressed Constable Crybaby when he returned. “I'll buy you another beer, Dwayne.” There, that should make Thea happy.

It didn't. “Now you're saying
Dwa
-aayne.”

“Maybe I have a speech impediment. Did you ever consider that?” I slid off my stool and looked around the room. In a far, dim corner I spotted the faint gleam of blond spikes. Redfern. The uniformed OPP officer must be the investigator. Both sat with their backs to the wall, cop-style. A third man with a thinning spot on the top of his head faced them.

Wineglass in hand, I sauntered over to their table. Redfern saw me coming but didn't give me a welcoming smile or wave me to come on over, dash it, and meet the boys.

Coffee cups and an empty carafe shared the tabletop with a basket of chicken bones.

Standing beside the balding man, I realized it was the doctor from the emergency room. My nose throbbed at the memory and I felt my lips. They were still swollen and I had used a lot of cover-up to hide the scratches on my face. But Dr. Doom was wrong about my eyes turning black without an immediate application of ice.

A folder lay open in front of the doctor. Redfern reached across the table and closed it, but not before I caught a glimpse of the photo.

I was tempted to go back to the bar and pick Larry up. Not for the night, but just to see Redfern's reaction. “Hi, Chief. How about introducing me to your friends?”

“This is Dr. Ed Reiner, our coroner.”

“I met him this afternoon.”

Dr. Reiner nodded and kept his hands pressed against the folder in case I ripped it away and ran out into the night with it.

“He's also a gynecologist,” Redfern added. Maybe it was the light from the smudged overhead chandelier, but I'm sure I noticed a malicious gleam in his eye. Note to self: never tell your personal fears to your boyfriend. He may forget your birthday but never that you have an aversion to examining tables and stirrups.

I edged away from Dr. Reiner. The OPP investigator looked familiar but I couldn't place him at first. He was good-looking in an exotic, Mediterranean sort of way, with olive skin, black hair and eyes, and the longest lashes I'd ever seen. Well, except once on a camel at the Toronto Zoo. I knew him from somewhere. I usually let my subconscious do the memory work, and now it set to covering the face with stubble, growing the hair into long, greasy strands, dressing the body in dusty leathers …

I had it. “Sn—”

“Tony!” Redfern snapped at me. “This is Sergeant Tony Pinato. He's an OPP investigator and will be working on the case with me.”

In a lower voice, he added, “Forget what you think you know, Cornwall. This is Tony.”

Tony chuckled, a raspy, damaged sound I had grown so used to hearing last summer when I lived in fear for my life in Hemp Hollow. Tony had been an undercover cop but I didn't find that out until later. At the time, I thought he was a real biker, dangerous yet strangely attractive.

“You're looking good, Miss Bliss. I hope we'll have time to sit down and have a drink together before I leave town.”

A long, thin scar ran up the side of his throat, ending somewhere under his chin. Now, I realized that gravelly voice was actually caused by an injury, maybe from a knife wound, rather than from years of smoking, as I had thought.

“That would be lovely, Tony.” I aimed my best smile at him and ignored Redfern. Dr. Reiner's intense scrutiny made me squirm. I wondered if he was measuring me for a speculum. I pulled my pink sweatshirt firmly over the rump of my new, tight jeans and moved closer to Tony.

“Well, we won't keep you, Cornwall. I'm sure you have other friends at the bar to visit.” Redfern sent me a wintry smile, one that didn't reach his eyes.

I pointed at the basket of bones. “What, you boys didn't have salad? Good nutrition helps the little grey cells work, you know.” At least three chickens had given their lives for this meal.

Tony laughed and Redfern smouldered. What?

I yanked the folder out from under the doctor's hands. Before anyone could stop me, I opened it and tapped the top photo. Two cone-shaped objects with a numbered identification tag lay against a white background, a ruler beside them. They were six inches high. “I guess you boys know what these are?”

Nobody spoke.

I slapped the folder closed and slid it back to the doctor. Picking up my wine, I turned to leave, tossing my braid and throwing two words over my shoulder. “I do.”

My faux fur looked like
a mangy groundhog had crawled up onto the stool to die. I don't know what I had been thinking when I bought it. Fang slouched lower on the bar with half a glass of beer in front of him. I considered buying another white wine, but Dwayne's and Thea's presence convinced me one was enough. They were off-duty, but Dwayne undoubtedly carried a Breathalyzer
and
a radar gun in his private vehicle. Unless doing so would be
against regulations
, in which case he wouldn't dream of it.

The door opened and a couple swept in and paused for a moment on the threshold. When no one clapped or cheered, they let the door close and waited for the waitress to seat them at a table for two in the middle of the floor, where the overhead light shone the brightest. The Weasels visited local establishments once or twice a week. They liked to be seen spending money and enjoying the fine cuisine. The first Monday of the month must be Wing Nut night.

The waitress returned with glasses of red wine, took their orders, and bustled away. I picked up my almost-empty glass and moved in. On the way, I snagged an empty chair from a nearby table.

I plunked my glass on the table and sat down. “Good evening.” I smiled pleasantly at one face, then the other.

They reared back. Andrea's throat made a strange clicking noise while the Weasel eyed me like I had a wart on the end of my nose. God, what was wrong with everyone tonight?

Andrea recovered first. “What do you want, Bliss?” She picked up her wine and sipped.

The Weasel's hard eyes narrowed and he swirled the wine in his glass like it was a rare vintage rather than the house plonk. I looked at his hand clenched around the stem. Geez, overreaction or what?

“I just wanted to say hello.” I turned sideways at the little table and crossed my legs.

Andrea looked at my boots. “Prada?” Little lines appeared between her eyes. The last botox injection had worn off.

I turned my foot so she could see the gold-coloured, double-buckled skulls at the ankle. “Alexander McQueen.”

She sucked in some more air. “That's … they cost …”

I waited, but Andrea went mute, so I volunteered. “About fifteen hundred.” I looked at her black shearling-lined boots with the adjustable side straps. “Jimmy Choo.” It was a statement, not a question. I know my boots.

She nodded, and I confided to the Weasel, “A bargain at only twelve hundred. Or thereabouts.”

He paled. “For one pair of boots?”

“They're Jimmy Choo, Mike,” I told him, then turned back to Andrea. “I have a pair of Jimmy Choos, too. Last summer when I was knocked off my bike into a ditch full of water, my boots were ruined. So when you two kind people revisited my divorce settlement and came to the right decision, I bought a pair of Jimmy Choo biker boots. Just a little personal treat, you know, after living in a trailer park and almost starving for two years.” Andrea had knocked me into that ditch, but her legal training prevented her from throwing herself at my feet and begging forgiveness.

Mike had gone ominously quiet and, to keep the conversation going — a conversation that had taken a different turn from what I had intended — I told him, “The biker boots are about twelve hundred as well. I really wanted the perforated suede pair, but I didn't think they would be practical for riding a motorcycle.”

It seemed he didn't care about my boots. He couldn't take his eyes off his wife's pair. Just wait until he got her home. Andrea would feel the end of the cheapskate's tongue.

The waitress interrupted to lay a couple of salads on the table. Boring. I was a bit peckish myself, but figured I had mere minutes before one of the Weasels hailed the cops in the corner to throw me out.

“Is there something you wanted, Bliss?” Andrea sprinkled a few drops of dressing onto her salad and moved the lettuce around with her fork.

“Not really. I just wanted to get Mike's take on the murders. He was part of the graduating class. Did you know that?”

“Of course I know. But that has nothing to do with Mike, with us. That happened a long time ago. You certainly live up to your own advertising, Bliss.” She pointed to the words emblazoned in sequins on the front of my sweatshirt:
Pissing Off the Whole Planet, One Person At A Time
.

“I do my best.” I turned my back on her and addressed a future Prime Minister of this country, if you believed his publicity. “I guess you hope the murderer is found soon. The longer this drags on, the more likely it is that the media will find out about your involvement.”

The Weasel slapped his fork onto the table. “Get one thing straight, Bliss. We are not having a repeat of last summer. You got your settlement and nothing you do or say will get you more. So, get lost!”

“Come, now. Take it easy. This has nothing to do with the settlement, although I think you got off easy. The point is, you had a fling with Sophie during senior year. Now, Sophie is dead.”

He grabbed my wrist and squeezed. “That has nothing to do with me. Everybody had a crack at Sophie.”

“Mike,” Andrea warned.

I ignored her and let my wrist go limp. “So, what were you doing Saturday night? Can anyone verify your whereabouts? Except for your wife, I mean?”

“I don't answer to you.” His hand tightened around my wrist.

“There are four cops in this room. Let go or I'll call for help.” When his grip loosened, I pulled free and stood up. “I didn't mean to disturb your meal. Carry on.”

My heart was thumping as I left the table, only partly from the adrenaline of battle. Mike was ambitious and had a ruthless streak, a bad combination. I believed he would commit a crime to bolster his political career — if he thought he could get away with it. Question: had he been this way in high school? I hadn't been on his radar back then, and didn't know the answer.

Outside, the glitter ball in Fang's truck refused to let me pass. I twitched the tarp aside and the ball sparkled under the neon lights, almost begging me not to leave it in the back of the dirty truck bed.

I opened the passenger door and laid two twenty dollar bills on the seat. After a moment's thought, I added another twenty, just in case Fang felt inclined to whine about the price. He was a businessman, of sorts. When he sobered up, he would be thrilled with the exchange.

The ball was lightweight, but too big to fit in my vehicle, even if the hatchback wasn't still crammed full of Christmas crap. Fortunately, the rolls of duct tape I had picked up at the checkout counter spilled out the top of the nearest bag. I ran back to borrow Fang's tarp.

By the time I had that sucker wrapped and taped to the top of my car, I was sweating buckets inside my furry coat. The temperature was definitely rising. I had to crawl through the front seat with the tape, throw the roll over the top of the ball, grab it, and crawl through the seat again. Multiple times. But my prize was secure.

It was nine o'clock when I finished. Closing time at the Wing Nut. The Weasels dribbled out, looked my way, then quickly got into their car and drove off. Next, Fang staggered down the steps, supported by cousin Larry. Redfern and his posse, including Thea and Dwayne, exited right behind them. I saw a Breathalyzer in Larry's near future.

As I pulled onto the highway, I looked in my rear-view mirror. Fang stumbled after me, arms waving, legs buckling. He fell to his knees, leaned forward and puked on the ice-covered parking lot.

Maybe Fang was more attached to the glitter ball than I realized.