Death Before Decaf (10 page)

Brianna was completely shaken when she finished, and she came straight to me after talking to the detective. “I'm going to quit. I don't think I can do this anymore,” she wailed, tears spilling down her cheeks.

I took her by the shoulders and guided her out the back door, which in hindsight might not have been the best choice, since I was still freaked out by the sight of the dumpster. I steered her to the other side of the big tree, facing the alley.

“Look, Brianna, we're all upset by what happened. I completely understand your feelings, but you're good at your job.” Sort of. “We don't want you to leave.” Mostly because it would be a pain to find a replacement on such short notice. “We have the place under control tonight. Why don't you go home and get some rest? Things will be better tomorrow.” Probably not, but she didn't know that.

She sniffed. “Are you sure?”

“They had better be, or I'm going to lose it.” I smiled at her. “Go blow off some steam. Have a beer. Eat a whole pizza or a tub of ice cream. You'll feel better.”

She laughed. “I'm not twenty-one yet, and I'm a vegan.”

Buzzkill. “A salad, then?”

“Right. Thanks, Juliet. You're not so bad after all.”

No shit.

Detective Cromwell finished grilling my staff and left without saying goodbye to me. Shocker. The crowd finally started thinning out after seven. I headed straight for Pete, who was leaning on the counter, chatting with an older guy.

When I got within earshot, Pete sang, “ ‘Nobody does it like Juliet. Juliet, what you do to me.' ”

“Ooh, good one. I heard that song somewhere not too long ago. Anyway, what would you say to going with me to talk to Dave's sister? Like now?”

Glancing around the coffeehouse, he said, “We could probably swing that.”

“I'm going to take her a couple of quarts of soup and a pie, too.”

“Ah, bribery. That always loosens the lips.”

“Yeah. Like when you gave Charlene that money and bought her a drink, her lips got so loose she nearly—”

He frowned. “I thought we agreed to never speak of that.”

I bit the inside of my cheek to keep from laughing. “Right. Sorry.”

Dave's sister, Gina, lived in the same general area that Dave had, so it didn't take too long to get to her place. When we knocked on the door, she greeted us fairly happily despite having recently lost her brother.

“Hey, Gina. Remember me? Pete Bennett, Dave's boss?”

“Oh, yeah,” she said uncertainly.

“This is Juliet. We came by to bring you some food and to let you know how sorry we are about Dave's passing. We miss him.”

Her face fell. “Thank you. I miss him, too.”

A voice yelled from inside the house, “Hey, baby, who's at the door?”

Gina turned around and called, “Dave's old boss. He brought us dinner.”

A man appeared behind Gina and put his arms around her, smiling. “Wow. Thanks, guys. That's nice of you.” That was fast. No wonder Gina wanted Billy out of the house—she already had a replacement waiting. He stuck his hand out to Pete. “I'm Billy.”

He
was Billy? Gina took the loser back after he had threatened her brother and slashed his tires? That was sad. I wasn't complaining, though. Now I didn't have to go to the trouble of tracking him down.

Pete squinted at him and chuckled uncomfortably. “I…thought Dave said you two were going through a rough patch.”

Gina sighed. “We were. But then the baby got sick on Monday night. I had to take him to the hospital. He had RSV. He's doing better now, though.”

“That was my wake-up call,” Billy said, looking down lovingly at Gina. “I realized what a fool I'd been. Nothing else matters except my son and my Gina.”

Really? We were supposed to believe that someone who had been cheating on his baby mama and being a total psycho last week became a changed man overnight because his kid got sick? I wasn't buying it.

“Good for you, man. Glad to know you guys are doing okay,” Pete said sincerely. Evidently
Pete
was buying it. We needed to have a talk about his blind optimism. “Out of curiosity, do either of you know Dave's bookie, Ron Hatcher? Bald, long beard, sleeve tattoos?”

They both shook their heads.

Pete replied, “Okay, thanks. We'll get out of your hair. Let me know when the funeral arrangements have been made.”

Starting to tear up, Gina said, “I will. The police said it might be a while before we can lay him to rest since it was a…murder.”

Pete nodded. “Take care.”

I tried to interject, but everyone was done talking. Gina and Billy closed the door, Pete headed for the car, and I stood there for a moment, dumbfounded.

Turning around, Pete asked, “Are you coming, Jules?”

“Yeah. But you didn't ask Billy about Tuesday night.”

“I didn't have to.”

I approached Pete, shaking my head. “I don't get it.”

“Didn't you see? Billy's head over heels for Gina. He wouldn't kill her brother.”

“You don't know that!” I exclaimed exasperatedly. “What if Dave was against them getting back together? I'd think that would be grounds for Billy to want Dave out of the picture.”

He shrugged and got into his car. “I didn't get that vibe.”

Wrenching the door open and flopping down onto the seat, I said, “Oh, so you're getting vibes now?
Vibes
are not going to keep me out of jail, Miss Cleo. Facts are. We need to find out what he was doing on Tuesday night.”

“Damn, Jules, crabby much? We can't go back and ask them now.”

“Why not?”

“It would be rude.”

“Screw rude! Rude is not going to matter when I'm someone's bitch in prison!”

He rolled his eyes. “Chill out, Langley.” He glanced in the backseat of his car. “Aw, crap. We forgot the pie.”

“Good. That's the perfect excuse to go back and talk to them some more,” I said, reaching for the pie.

He grabbed the pie before I could get to it. “You're a little out of sorts. I'll go back and ask them about Tuesday night.”

“Oh, so you'll actually ask some questions this time? Or are you going to try to read their auras?”

“You're not funny,” he said testily. “I'm only doing it to prove you wrong.”

I didn't care about the reason. All I wanted was my information. I waited impatiently in the car while Pete went back and talked to Gina again.

After a few minutes, he got back in.

“Well?” I asked.

“They were both at the hospital with their baby all day Tuesday and all of Tuesday night.”

“Oh,” I said dejectedly. That lead was toast.

Pete was smiling at me and chuckling.

“What?” I snapped.

“Oh, nothing. Just…I told you so.”

“Shut up and drive.”

Customers were still piling in when we got back, and the baristas hadn't had a break in hours, so Pete and I took over behind the counter. It was just like old times, the two of us working the front together, perfectly in sync. I missed those days, when the most difficult thing was deciding whether or not to skip class. I thought back to a particular evening ten years ago.

It was a slow night. Pete and I were out front, and George was covering the kitchen by himself. During one of the many lulls, Pete looked into the pass-through to make sure his dad wasn't listening.

“Jules,” he whispered, pulling me aside. “Play hooky with me tomorrow.”

“What? Perfect Pete is asking me to cut class? You know I'm down with that, but are you feeling okay?” I put my hand mockingly on his forehead.

He swatted my hand away. “Very funny. There's a new R&B exhibit that just opened at the Country Music Hall of Fame. I want to go. Come with me so I don't feel so bad about ditching school.”

I laughed. “Only you would ditch school to do something educational like go to a museum. Boring.” Pete lived and breathed music. It was his life.

“Please?”

“Why not go Saturday?”

“Too many tourists.”

To be honest, I didn't want to go. Going to class sounded more interesting. “I don't know, Pete.”

“What's your problem? You cut class all the time.”

“Yeah, but it's for fun stuff, like sleeping or catching a matinee or…sleeping.”

“When have you ever
not
had fun when you're with me?”

He had me there. “Okay, fine. But you're paying my way in.”

Pete reached into his pocket and produced two tickets. “Already done.”

“How did you know I would say yes?”

“You're easy.”

“What?” I cried, slapping him on the arm.

Turning red, he backpedaled. “I didn't mean it like that…really.”

I couldn't resist needling him. “If you're going to call me names, I'm not going. You'll have to take someone else. How about Cecilia? She's always hanging around you. Plus, she's boring, so I bet she likes museums.”

“Come on, Langley, quit busting my balls.”

“But it's fun.”

“And why would you think I'd want to go out with Cecilia?” He made a face. “I don't date boring chicks. She has absolutely no sense of humor at all.”

Funny how sometimes we ended up eating our words.

Jamie and Cole came back from their break, so I took a turn again at collecting the trash. I was getting a little better about dealing with the dumpster, and the sooner I could get past it, the better. The trash receptacle by the front door had overflowed a little, so I had to crush down the trash to get the extra cups left on the top of the container into the already full bag. The sleeve fell down off one of the cups when I picked it up, and some writing in black Sharpie caught my attention. Under the sleeve it said,
Garage next door 7:15
. Huh? Had Brianna's juvenile love notes turned into cryptic messages for meet-ups? That was way over the line. It was a good thing she wasn't here, because I was pissed.

I stomped over to the counter and said, “Guys, I found this cup by the trash. Do either of you know anything about this message?” I held up the cup for them to see.

Cole chuckled. “Wow. I've never got an invite for a hookup on a coffee cup before. Most slutty baristas only give out their phone numbers.”

Jamie rolled her eyes. “Brianna's losing it. Seriously.”

“What's going on?” asked Pete.

“Walk with me,” I said. I grabbed the trash and dragged Pete out to the dumpster with me. “These kids. Well, Brianna, actually. She's writing love notes on customers' coffee cups, and I told her to cut it out this afternoon, but this last cup I found crossed the line. It was an invitation for a hookup, I assume. I'm going to need to talk to her tomorrow.”

“Please do. Pop would roll over in his grave if he knew about it. That's not acceptable here. A couple of weeks ago, some barista at Starbucks wrote her number on my cup. Trust me, I didn't ask for it. She was not an attractive woman.”

Chuckling, I said, “Poor Pete. You have to beat women off with a stick, don't you?”

He sighed. “That's what I get for being handsome and irresistible.”

“Wait. You own a coffeehouse. Why the hell were you at a Starbucks?”

“What? I like their coffee!”

“You're cheating on us, Pete. Not cool,” I said.

He rolled his eyes, and I looked past him to the garage next door. The property was vacant at the moment. The garage butted up against Java Jive's property line, right behind the dumpsters. Curious why Brianna would ask someone to meet her in an abandoned garage, I walked over for a closer look.

“Where are you going?” Pete asked.

“The cup said, ‘Garage next door 7:15.' I wonder why she would want to meet anyone here.” I peered in through a grimy window. It was dark and I couldn't see anything. I walked around to the door, and Pete followed me. The lock on the door was broken, so it opened easily. We stepped inside.

Pete turned his phone on for a little bit of light. “It's all kinds of nasty in here. Not really the best spot for a romantic interlude.” He stepped around a puddle of goo and kicked some trash aside. Picking up a rusty set of hedge clippers from the workbench, he said, “This place is a serious boner-killer.”

“Pete, gross.”

“You were thinking it, too,” he muttered.

“No, I'm thinking if you're flirting with someone at work and asking to meet somewhere, why not grab a table inside on your break and talk? Why be all secretive and come out to this shed of horrors?” I nudged an overturned wicker chair, and a rat skittered out and ran between our feet.

Pete and I both screamed like little girls and hightailed it out of the shed, slamming the door behind us. Once we caught our breath, we looked at each other and burst out laughing.

He said, “That was kinda pathetic, wasn't it? We're adults, and a little rat nearly gave us both heart attacks.”

I agreed. “Yeah, that was pretty lame. It's not like we found a dead body or anything.” He gave me a look. I asked apologetically, “Too soon?”

By closing time, only a handful of people were left, and unfortunately one of them was Seth the Liar. I hadn't had the time to think about my Seth problem, so I wasn't thrilled that I literally bumped into him in the hallway.

As we disentangled ourselves, he laughed. “Sorry about that. I think I'm in the wrong hallway,” he said, sliding his hand down my arm to take hold of my hand.

Ooh, his hands. Even though I was somewhat angry with him, I still couldn't shake the desire to feel those hands all over me. Using all of my self-control, I squeezed his hand and let it go. “Yeah. It's employees only back here. If you're looking for the restroom, it's over there.” I nodded toward the far wall. Being a regular, he should have known where the restroom was.

“Thanks. I'll remember that. Busy day?”

“Yeah,” I said, walking to the front of the house, trying to get him out of the back area.

“That sucks. Need me to take you out for a drink?”

Yes. But something in my mind kept nagging me. I smiled sweetly. “No, I'm beat. I've been here since before seven this morning. Thanks, though.”

“I understand. Your feet must be killing you. Can you sit with me for a minute?” He led me over to his table and gestured to the chair across from him.

I hesitated. Liar or not, I guessed it wouldn't hurt anything to sit for a moment and talk to the guy. Maybe it was a misunderstanding, and we'd laugh about it later. Warily, I sat down.

He smiled. I wished he would quit doing that! I couldn't think straight when he smiled. “Have any more trouble with nosy reporters?”

Grimacing, I said, “No, just with my detective friend.”

“Did you get questioned again about finding the body?” He looked concerned.