Stilettos & Scoundrels (20 page)

“What’s your deal, Dirt? Why were you so rude? You both have the same goal here. In fact, he was close to the Senator. I am sure he could have valuable information for you. Why wouldn’t you want his help?”
I was full of questions and rattled them off in quick succession.

“He has no business interfering in a police investigation, Presley
, and he could be a suspect. He can’t contaminate anything or anyone related to this case
”

“No, I agree that you should be the one to run the investigation, but don’t you think you were a bit over the top?”

“I don’t have time for this, Presley. You don’t know what you are talking about. I need to talk to you about the murder of Senator Daniels.”

“Dirt, I don’t know what you expect me to tell you. I told you everything that happened at La Casa last night.
Tell me, how did this happen?
”

“Well, we need to go over it again, officially. Last night I might have missed something. So start from the beginning
and tell me what happened
when you got there.”
Dirt completely ignored my question too.

I sighed and, as I
s
tarted to retell the events, I
realized that
this was going to be a long day.

******

After what seemed like a never-ending litany of questions,
in which Dirt
ask
ed
the same thing in fifty different ways,
I was
exhaust
ed and
he and Officer Schultz
finally left.
My mother kept them
fed
during the interview
.
I
bet they would never pull
me
over for speeding.

When everyone had left, my parents and I
moved to relax in the
living room.
Who would have thought talking would be so exhausting?
T
he phone had been ringing off the hook
most of the morning
. It had finally subsided a little
,
and
I
leaned back into the couch,
closing
my
eyes and half
paying attention to
my
parents
’
conversation.

“I just can’t believe this would happen to her
,
Clark. Things like that aren’t supposed to happen out here.”

“Sue
,
it’s an isolated incident
,
and I don’t think us regular folk have anything to worry about.”

“Well
,
I won’t feel the same about you being out late. By the way, where did you go last night when you left Bill’s? I called Geanie at nine p.m.
,
and she said you were already gone.”

“I knew you were at your club meeting
,
so I just went to Randy’s for a while. I got home shortly after eleven
,
and you were already asleep.”

This exchange brought
me awake. I
saw him drive by around midnight
,
so he couldn’t have been at Randy’s. Even if he had the times wro
ng, last I
knew Randy lived on the other side of town, which wouldn’t explain what he was doing on Main Street.

“I know, I was exhausted
.
I didn’t even hear you come in
,
but I thought I was still awake at eleven.”

“No
,
darling, you were definitely sleeping like a log when I got home.”

I
was confused
.
Why would Dad lie?
At least I now knew he hadn’t seen me
when he drove by or he wouldn’t be trying to fib about the time.

“Does Randy still liv
e by the Collin’s farm?” I
asked.

“He sure does. That house has been in their family for years.”

He was definitely lying. But why? What was he out doing?

****

I
just had to get out of this house. Feeling restless after the morning’s excitement,
I
originally intended to
go for a random drive, but as I got to thinking, I
remembere
d something Brian had said to me
last night. After gettin
g past the personal feelings, I had filled him in on my
experience interviewing the Senator. He
,
in turn
, told me about
his own interactions with the Senator. Tha
t was what came back to me as I drove. Brian told me
about
the day the Senator came into town
and
stopped by
Brian’s shop
, wanting to discuss some restoration work needing done on one of the classic cars in his collection. The Senator had been feeling melancholy, mentioning to Brian
that
he felt
like the world was closing in and
that he always had people around telling him what to do
. He said that the stuff he had to do
wasn’t always what
he wanted to do. Brian told me
he seemed depressed and not the happy-go-lucky guy he n
ormally was. Brian also told me
he found it very unusual that the Senator would confide these things
to him
over a two-hour time period. He just hung out and watched while Brian worked
—
and talked incessantly. Brian said the most time he had ever spent there previously was a few minutes. He was always
in
a rush to get somewhere. His behavior was strange.

I
thought
that,
in light of what had just happened
,
I
should head over to Brian’s house. He migh
t have more to add. Of course, I
hadn’t told any of this to either
Cooper
or Dirt.
I
had honestly forgotten, and even if
I
had remembered, it was just hearsay.
I felt I
needed to get more information from Brian, and then tell them.
I
didn’t want to start spreading gossip. God knows that happened enough.
But I
felt
a bit
uneasy about this
decision
. Maybe
I
should have told them and let them figu
re out what it meant. However, I convinced my
self
I
would tell them soon enough and
I
hope
d to have
more accurate information.

I
pulled in to Brian’s driveway, but the house looked quiet. His truck was gone
, so I
assumed he was gone as well.
Damn
.
Where could he be?
I
had
decided to stop at the local greasy spoon, thinking
that
maybe Brian
had gone
for an early lun
ch, when my
phone rang.
Looking at the caller I.D., I saw it was my
editor.
Crap
. I
hadn’t really thought yet about how th
is would affect the article. I hoped my
career wasn’t over before it started. This is where being friends
with him
might just come in handy.
Maybe he’d give me another chance.

“Hello.”

“Hey, Pres! It’s Trevor! What the hell is going on down there?” he asked excitedly.

“What do you mean?” I
wasn’t int
entionally playing dumb, but I
wasn’t sure how one was supposed to act
when
their
article’s
subject
had been
murdered.

“Presley, the Senator was big news before. Don’t you realize that now he is even bigger? This is better than I could have hoped!”

Better than he could have hoped?
Wow
. I knew I
was self-centered, but being glad
about
someone’s murder
because it
was going to be a better story
—t
hat was out there even for
me
. “I’m glad the Senator
being murdered helps us out,” I
said sarcastically. Good thing Trevor was a friend. This was probably not the best way to act with a new boss.

“Don’t be like that, Pres. Of course we’re sad he was murdered, but this is a great opportunity for us. For you! This is the story of the month right now
,
and our magazines, and you, are right in the middle of things,” Trevor explained. “This is a great break for a new magazine like ours.”

As Trevor outlined the way he wanted her to a
pproach this turn of events, my
mind began to think of the possibilities. Not to feed off the misfortune of others, but Tre
vor was right. This could be my
big break, the magazine
’s big break. Maybe I
could figur
e out who killed the Senator. I was a little glad I
hadn’t told Dirt and
Cooper
about what Brian said. It’s not as
if
they wouldn’t eventually find o
ut anyway, and it would give me
a small chance to get a head start
and a
chance to solve this murder and wr
ite a better story than what I
thought originally.

I
slid into the retro booth at La Casa across from Katy for the second time in two days.
We had forgone our
picnic in light of the Senator’s murder and decided instead that somewhere in town would be much better. That didn’t leave too many choices
,
so La Casa seemed the best
choice again
.

Chris Stone was there and Katy was hanging on every word he was saying.
I noticed Katy had
an extra button undone on her pink Oxford shirt. Yep, she was definitely showing some cleavage, though with her chest it
didn’t take much effort
. Was something going on here between them?
Katy didn’t
usually show that much cleavage for no reason
—e
specially to someone she has known for years. Not that
I
would blame her. Chris was cute, but he sure
was
acting strange yesterday.

“So, what is so important
that
you couldn’t tell me on the phone?” asked Katy playfully
as I settled into the booth
. Since it was mid-afternoon and
Katy
had dinner plans at her dad
’
s, she was sipping a Diet Coke instead of her trademark margarita.
Although,
after a morning like this one, a margarita sure sounded good, even if it was barely lunchtime.

“Hi
,
Chris,”
I
said to him before answering
Katy’s question. He nodded to me
as a response.
I
wondered if he planned to stick around longer than he had last night.
I
took
my
denim jacket off and checked him out. He had light brown hair and blue eyes, set in a face with the best cheekbones
I
had
ever s
een
on a guy without looking feminine. It didn’t hurt either that he was six foot, four inches tall
—
a little on the skinny side but still a good
looking body.
I
noticed the other day
that
he did a nice job filling out his proverbial Calvin Kleins.
I
knew a man’s ass wasn’t the first thing
I
should be checking out
, but as a red-blooded female, I
was entitled
to take a peek
. It was an important piece of the male anatomy and one that
could be easily checked out anytime
. In fact, a man’s backside was usually much more attractive in the jeans than out.

“Have you been on another planet this morning
?
Y
ou didn’t hear? Senator Daniels was found dead earlier
,
”
I
said, rummaging for
my
favorite lip gloss in
my
brown Coach purse. The purse, a bucket style, was one of
my
favorites, even if it was a present from Rick. One
of the few pleasant memories I
still had of him
was
he didn’t mind spending money.
Of course, he was still such
an asshole.
I
almost felt
I
should have been greedier so at least the relationship wouldn’t have been a total waste.