One of Those Malibu Nights (22 page)

“Evening, all,” Petra said, floating fast through the room, like a comet with Allie at her sparkling tail. “Jean-Philippe,” she called to the bartender. “Don’t send those boys out of here drunk, okay? We don’t want any accidents.”

“Nobody’s drunk,” grumbled one of the younger customers.

“Fine. Great. Just don’t do it here.” Petra continued on to the kitchen, grinning as she heard him ask aggrievedly why they even bothered coming here when she didn’t want them to drink.

Petra rammed the small bunches of flowers she’d picked from the garden into low glass vases, handed them to Allie and told her to put them on the tables. Then she put her to work brewing up a ratatouille, chopping courgettes and eggplant, onions, garlic and tomatoes, after which she showed her how to make salad dressing, using the good olive oil from Azari in Nice, while she went to start her pastry.

She introduced Allie to Caterine, the teenage girl slowly washing lettuce at the sink, and to her temporary assistant, another Brit, who was preparing chicken for a fricassee, amongst a dozen other things.

All at once Allie found herself doing at least two jobs at once. There was no time to think. Customers were arriving and before she knew it she was discarding her work apron and wrapping herself in a starched white waiter’s one and was out there taking orders.

To her astonishment the first customer was Red Shoup, glamorous in a flowing Pucci shirt.

“Ohh, hi,” Allie said, smiling a welcome, pencil poised over her pad, ready to write their drinks order.

“Well hello! Petra’s put you to work already, has she?” Red laughed. “I should have warned you, she does that to all her B & B guests. Tells them it’s ‘life experience.’”

“And they fall for it every time,” the handsome, silver-haired mustached man with Red said, holding out his hand. “I’m Jerry Shoup. And you must be Mary Raycheck. Red told me all about you.”

“I didn’t know there was that much to tell.”

“Don’t worry,” Red said. “I told him about the dog. And about the haircut.”

“Oh God!” Allie put a worried hand up to her cropped locks. “It was one of those mad moments. My husband had gone off with another woman. It was a kind of retaliatory thing.”

“Well, it kind of ‘retaliated’ on you.” Red laughed. “But no need to worry, our local hairdresser will sort you out.”

“That’s what Petra said. And I can’t thank you enough for sending me to her. The Manoir is wonderful, so full of surprises.”

“Yeah, well, Petra’s known for taking in the waifs and strays,” Jerry said. “Not that you are in that category, Mary.” He too gave her a long considering glance. “In fact, far from it, I suspect.”

Made nervous by his penetrating look, Allie asked about what she could get them to drink, writing their order of a bottle of local red quickly onto her pad.

“I’ll be right back,” she promised, whisking quickly away, starched apron crackling.

“Excuse me?”

She glanced to her left and saw a man sitting with a tall slender blonde at a table on the terrace just outside the French windows.

“Could we get a bottle of Badoit, please, and two vodka tonics?”

“Of course.” Allie made a quick note of their order and the table number, though they were as yet only the second to arrive. “With lemon?”

“Lime, please,” the blonde said. In her little white fitted linen jacket, black tank top and black linen pants, her blond hair pulled back, she looked the epitome of simple elegance.

“Thank you. Yes, of course.” Managing a quick smile, Allie hurried back to the bar, placed her order then dashed into the kitchen to alert Petra that the Shoups were here plus an unidentified dark-haired man with a blonde.

“Oh, that’ll be Robert Montfort, the local squire. Remember I told you he was dishy. And that’s his latest girlfriend, from Paris.” She heaved a sigh. “Somehow they are always from Paris.”

“She’s beautiful,” Allie said, heading back to the bar to pick up her orders.

“So is he.” Petra’s voice floated after her.

Jean-Philippe, the bartender and would-be sommelier, had already set up the bottle of red for the Shoups and when Allie took it out to them the “dishy” squire was standing next to their table, chatting to them.

She hurried past with their vodkas. She placed one carefully in front of the blonde, who was alone at the table. “I’ve brought extra ice and extra lime, just in case,” she said.

The woman nodded.
“Et bien, mademoiselle,”
she said, staring at her. Then switching to English. “Haven’t you and I met before?”

Allie thought nervously the woman did seem vaguely familiar. “Oh, no. No, I don’t think so. I only arrived today. I’m a guest at Petra Devonshire’s B & B.”

“Of course you are.” The squire was back, looking at her with dark blue eyes under lowering brows. His black hair was brushed back from a widow’s peak and his lean face had the hard tanned look of an outdoorsman. “Petra always takes in the attractive ones,” he said, making Allie blush. “Despite the hair,” he added, and he and the blonde burst into laughter.

Allie hurried back to the kitchen and told Petra what they had said.

“Robert’s like that.” Petra wrapped a fillet of beef, swathed in pâté, inside a lump of pastry. “There, let’s hope the bloody thing doesn’t come out looking like an underdone sausage or an overcooked rattlesnake,” she said, cutting a
series of little V-shaped slits in the pastry then brushing it with a beaten egg mixture. “To add a nice brown glaze,” she informed Allie, who was watching interestedly.

“Anyhow, you be careful with her. She’s something to do with TV. A journalist. One of those nosey parkers who likes to dig up scandal and gossip about celebrities for the delectation of we plebeian folk with nothing better to do than watch her. Not that she would find anyone to talk about here. Unless it’s Robert, of course. Red told me she’d ‘set her cap’ at him, as the saying goes.”

She wiped her hands on a kitchen towel and surveyed her kitchen. “Okay, love, better get out there and start taking orders. The tables are already filling up. Tell them the night’s special is the beef Wellington and that it’s very good. And remember to keep your fingers crossed behind your back as you say it.”

Back outside Allie cast a wary eye at the blond TV journalist. She was leaning across the table, deep in conversation with Petra’s “dishy” squire. They looked as though they didn’t need to be disturbed by a waitress asking for their order, and still nervous of the woman’s probing question, she decided to ask Jean-Philippe if he would take it instead, since she now had to run around catching up with six more tables that had suddenly filled up.

“That’s the way it is, everybody always comes at once,” Jean-Philippe told her. “Better get used to it.”

Allie rushed from one table to the next, distributing
menus, mentioning the night’s special, taking drinks orders, then hurrying to the bar to get them filled.

Too soon, Petra was poking her head out of the kitchen and yelling, “Chef here. Or have you all forgotten? The first orders are bloody well ready so get a move on, Mary.”

Allie had not worked so hard since the last week of her filming, when she’d had to be dragged by a runaway horse. She’d insisted on doing her own stunts and her body had ached for weeks after, but it had given her the same kind of personal satisfaction she felt now.

By ten-thirty most diners were finished and already drifting away, while others were on to dessert. The squire and his girlfriend were still ensconced beneath the wisteria bower and looked ready to spend the night there, when Petra emerged from the kitchen, wiping her hands on her apron, her perky chef’s hat pushed to the back of her fluffy blond head.

“Is that you over there in that dark corner, Robert Montfort?” she demanded loudly, stalking toward him and pulling up a chair.

“It is,” Allie heard him say in a resigned tone. “You know Félice de Courcy?”

“I know
of
you, of course.” Petra shook Félice’s hand. “I’ve watched your program. I don’t think you’ll find much scandal and mystery around here, though. But then, you’re probably not here for that,” she added, with a meaningful smirk at Robert.

Allie hurried back into the kitchen where she began rinsing off plates and stacking them in the dishwashers. She left the roasting tins to soak, wiped down the countertops and put ingredients back in the pantry. The assistant had left long ago and she was alone.

She stepped outside to check on Dearie. He was sitting on the grass. As soon as he saw her he came running and she gave him the big bone from the lamb roast.

Walking back into the kitchen, she poured herself a glass of wine, picking at the leftover Wellington and mulling over her first night as a waitress. All in all, with the exception of the too-perceptive TV woman, it had been a success. She hadn’t once thought of Ron or of her world as a movie star. Or of Mac Reilly. She couldn’t wait to do it again tomorrow.

Life was pretty good, here in Paradise.

Mac was back in Malibu, having just flown in from Paris. He’d told Sunny he’d gotten exactly nowhere in France.

“I don’t believe Allie has come to any harm, though,” he said. “My guess is she’s temporarily had enough of it all. I think she’s gone looking for something better.”

“Good,” Sunny said, but not as though she meant it.

“Anyhow, the letters have stopped, and the stalker has disappeared into thin air. And so, by coincidence, have Jessie Whitworth and the blond Queen of England.”

“No kidding?” Sunny’s brows rose in surprise but still, she didn’t ask what he meant by that. She was too preoccupied with her own guilt.

They were sitting on the sofa at Mac’s place, eating takeout sushi and drinking a Gewürztraminer. It probably
wasn’t the appropriate wine to accompany spicy tuna hand rolls and yellowtail sashimi, but Mac thought it sure tasted good. Anyhow, he was glad to be home, with his boy, Pirate, lying at his feet gazing adoringly at him. Which was more than Sunny was doing. In fact, she wasn’t looking at him at all. He might even have said she looked distinctly nervous.

“So what’s up?” he asked, slipping an arm around her shoulders.

She looked sideways at him from under her eyelashes. “I have a confession to make.”

He grinned. “Don’t tell me you’ve bought another Chihuahua!”

“I wish …”

She seemed distinctly put out. Serious now, he said, “Okay, so let’s have it.”

“I found Ron Perrin.”

He stared at her. “Go on.”

Sunny told him the whole story, from finding the tax receipt in the pocket of her shorts to her talk with Perrin in the Bar Marinera, and the fact that she had let him get away.

Mac heaved a regretful sigh. There was no point in telling her she should have waited, what was done was done. And besides she was obviously upset.

“Hey, maybe you’re just not cut out for this detecting business.” He squeezed her shoulder sympathetically. “So the man got away. At least now we know he’s alive and kicking. Anyhow, we’ll be on his trail, don’t you worry.”

“What do we do next?” she asked, looking hopefully at him, wishing he would say let’s forget all this and go to Vegas and get married.

“We’ll go pay Demarco a visit in his fancy new desert mansion,” Mac said. “Find out what he’s all about.”

“Be glad to see you,” Demarco boomed when Mac gave him a call and told him they would be in the desert that weekend. “I’m having a party Saturday night. Why don’t you join us?”

Perfect, Mac thought. It would give him the opportunity to observe the lion in his natural habitat.

“By the way, it’s a costume party,” Demarco added. “Come as the person you wish you were, is the theme.”

With her confession off her conscience, Sunny was looking forward to getting away, just the two of them, no dogs allowed this time. Driving through the Coachella Valley, she was thrilled by the unexpected beauty of the desert, ringed by mountains that turned pink at sunset and fringed with groves of fluffy palm trees, like a storybook oasis. Flowers bloomed everywhere and the many golf courses were dotted with glamorous Mediterranean-style houses.

They checked in to the old La Quinta Resort, which had started as a small adobe getaway for Hollywood’s famous in the late twenties. Now it was a wonderful sprawl of coral-roofed buildings surrounded by turquoise blue pools, grassy
lawns and sparkling fountains. They had just enough time to get into their costumes for the party.

Demarco’s house was in an expensive gated community. The guard took a long look at them in their vampire costumes, then, with a smirk on his face, waved them through.

What’s wrong with him? Sunny tugged nervously at her blouse. “Do I look okay?”

“You look fantastic,” Mac said. “I’ll bet you win first prize.”

“I didn’t know there was to be a prize,” she said, pleased.

“I was speaking figuratively.”

“Oh!” She gave him a glare, but they were already pulling up in front of a massive single-story mansion, complete with marble steps and valet parkers standing to attention.

To Sunny, a party implied some kind of jolly revelry, but here there were just rich older folk in a large overdecorated room, knocking back hefty martinis and making polite conversation. Music droned in the background and a few of the women were in discreet costumes of the twenties flapper era but most looked as though they were wearing Bill Blass or St. John, and all the men, including Demarco, wore black tie.

All eyes turned to look when Sunny made an entrance in her Vampira outfit, flounced peasant blouse hanging off one shoulder, skirt a short sliver of artistically ripped and tattered leather. She wore her tall red Versace boots with
the seriously high heels and pointy toes, and a ferocious set of fangs that glittered in the candlelight. Mac was looking pretty outrageous too, in his black leather Lestat outfit with fangs that were a match for Sunny’s.

Sunny took in the sedate party group and grabbed Mac’s hand for moral support, sucking in her stomach and looking as haughty as a girl could, wearing fangs.

A tall, silver-haired man detached himself from the crowd. “Good to see you, Reilly.” Demarco held out his hand. “Though I almost didn’t recognize you in that getup.”