Stilettos & Scoundrels (54 page)

Brian at least had the decency to look a little sheepish at this. “She’s visiting her mothe
r in southern Illinois.” I
looked at him questioningly. “Everything is fine between us,” he continued. “Her sister is having a baby and she went down to help out. Thanks for not saying anything the other night,” he added.

“It’s nothing, Brian. She seems like a great
girl
, so I don’t know why you were willing to screw that up.”

“I don’t know, Pres. I guess I just thought…”

I held up my
hand to stop him from saying any
more. “You know what, Brian? Let’s just drop it. Just be smart and don’t do it again.”

“Thanks, Pres.” I knew I
needed to tell
Cooper
and Dirt about
the latest development, but I
also needed to wait here long enough to make sure
the mystery car was gone. As I began to think about my
next move, a plan began
to formulate in my
head.

Chapter
22

Driving back home from Brian’s
, I listened to my
voicemail.
There were t
wo more messages from Trevor
. The first was just
wanting to know how long it really took to write an article that was only
supposed
to be about twenty
-
five
hundred words. The second, also from Trevor, was much the same content
,
just not nearly as nice
, mainly because I
had be
en ignoring him. Good thing we were friends. I
needed to figure out what to tell him and
to
call him back. Rick also
had called and I
just hit delete without listening to what he had to s
ay. There was a message from my
friend Jared w
ho had been out of town when I
left and wanted to know what the hell
was
going on. Jared was one of
my
best friends
. I
really neede
d to call him. He would help me
figure out what to say to Trevor. Plus
, I
wanted to tell him about
Cooper, and there were several messages from Cooper too
.
He wasn’t happy I had taken his car. I had left it at Brian’s and had Brian take me back to my car , and then he picked up Cooper. Brian had called me later to say that maybe I  should keep away from Cooper for a while. At least I got him his car back. I felt my stomach rumble from hunger. I looked at the clock on my
car radio and saw
that
it was almost five o’clock.
Time had gotten away from me
.

I
pulled in
to
the La Casa parking
lot.
I
had done some conniving
earlier in the day
and was meeting Dirt and
Cooper
here
. But that had taken place before I had taken Cooper’s car, so hopefully he would still show. Neither man knew the other would also be showing up. I thought I
might as well pick up so
me cheesy garlic fries while I was here. My
parents were still in the city
, and I couldn’t count on my
mother
’s cooking tonight. Since my
diet we
nt out the window the minute I
got
into town, I thought I might as well enjoy my
self.
I was already due for a lot of gym time when I
got back.

I
turned and
saw Katy and Chris in the parking lot, getting
out of Chris’s red Impala. I
had been trying to track down Katy all day and was disappointed she was with Chris. What was she thinking? Wou
ld that girl never learn? As I
parked
, I
noticed
Cooper
getting out of his car and walking up to them.
This should be interesting
.
He gave me what had to be the dirtiest look anyone had ever given me. I was glad he had other things to worry about right now.

Chris and Katy were walking up to the door of the diner.

“Chris! Wait up
,
man,”
Cooper
yelled out.

Katy looked up
,
but Chris
pretended to ignore him. I
saw him say something sharply to Katy
,
an
d she recoiled a little. I
was livid at the way Chris
felt he could walk all over my
friend, but was even angrier with Katy for allowing it to happen.

“Chris!”
Cooper
shouted again. Chris must have decided he coul
dn’t escape and stopped. I
left my car and
walked up to stand next to
Cooper.
G
etting closer to Chris
, I
could see he was already on the defensive.

“What the fuck do you want?” Chris demanded hotly. He looked ready for a fight
. If he was worried we
might now know about h
is affair with
Helen that seemed
a
rather stupid
way to play it
.

“Listen
,
man,
I
need to talk to you. But maybe you’d rather not do it in front of her,”
Cooper
said, nodding in Katy’s direction.

“You can ask me whatever you want right here. We don’t have any
secrets,” Chris replied. I
gave him a dirty look
,
and he at least had the decency to blush a little. Until the other night, he
’d
had secrets.

“Fine, have it your way. What’s this about you and Helen Daniels?”
Cooper
said.

“I was sleeping with her. So what?”

“You didn’t feel that you should have told me about this? It doesn’t make you look good, man.”

“Why would anyone care if I was screwing Helen
?
It’s not anyone’s business but ours.”

I
turned to
Katy as this exchange happened
.
Katy looked to be on the verge of tears
.
This angered me, but I kept quiet.

“Normally you would be right
,
but
,
Chris, there’s been a murder here and the Senator wasn’t some regular person. The police and the FBI are all over this
,
and there is a ton of interest from the media. You and Helen hiding this does not look good. That Lisa Simmons from D
.
C
.
is going to get wind of this at some point
,
and it’s going to be bad for you and really bad for Helen.”

“That’s bullshit,” Chris said, but he wavered a little. Some
thing was bothering him. I
wondered if he was in love with Helen
,
and it wasn’t just for the sex. But then why
was he still with Katy? I
looked at
Cooper and our eyes met. I
could tell he also thought Chris knew something he wasn’t saying
in front of Katy
.

“I don’t know why you guys are bugging me. You know I didn’t kill the Senator and neither did Helen, for that matter. She might have been sleeping around on Tom, but she’s not a killer. She is a good person.”

At that, Katy couldn’t hold back the tears. Chris glanced at her and final
ly showed some remorse. I
felt bad for her and couldn’t wait to talk to her later.

”Chris, you need to tell Dirt about this. Avoiding this issue won’t make it go away. It will just make it worse.”

“I know.” Chris look
ed
depressed,
like he was
wondering how he got himself in
to
this mess. “C’mon
,
Katy, I don’t feel much like eating right now.” Katy just looked at
me,
shrugged in an embarrassed way
,
and followed Chris back to his car.

“Call me later
,
Katy,”
I
said to Katy’s back.

“He knows more than he’s letting on,
Cooper
,”
I
said quietly.

“I know and it worries me. It can’t just be the affair with Helen. I’m afraid he might be involved in something bigger.”

“Look who’s here,”
Cooper
said
,
looking at the parking lot entrance. It was Dirt’s county
-
issue Tahoe.
I
began to get a little nervous. This had seemed like such a good idea at the time
, but now I
wasn’t so sure how this would work out. Dirt stepped out of the truck and walked angrily over
to Cooper and I
.

“What is going on
,
Pres? What is he doing here?”

“You two need to
grow up and work as a team,” I
said to both of them angrily.
“
The past is long gone. Move on.”

After talking to
Cooper
at lunch and seeing
how much this bothered him, I
was determined to get to the bottom of things. Even though there were still so many secrets
, I
thought if they could
set aside
their differences,
just for now, it might lead to something they could work out later.

N
ow they were both staring at me
and
looking angry. It was making me
a little uncomfortable.
They were
smart guys
, so I
knew they immediately figured out
that I had
engineered the whole thing to get them tog
ether. They looked madder at me
than
at
each other. That was a good start
,
wasn’t it?

“So where did this Hummer start following you
,
Pres?” Dirt asks.

“Oh
,
no you don’t. If either of you want any information from me, and believe me I have plenty, then I suggest you s
tart talking to each other,” I
sa
id with as much authority as I could muster. I
had gotten them together on a pretense, but could blackmail with the best of them. Either they worked this out
,
or they would get nothing from
me
.

“Presley, stop the games. We need to figure out who was following you,”
Cooper
said
,

“My lips are sealed,”
I said
primly. “You might think this is none of my business, but I care about both of you. This…this…whatever this is
n
eeds to stop.”

“You know what? We can talk about all this later. It’s more important we find out who is bothering Presley,”
Cooper
said to Dirt
.
Dirt nodded in agreement.

Cooper
and Dirt were smart enough to realize they needed to put their differences aside for now and work together on this to find the Senator’s killer. Dirt was all but shut out from the FBI
,
and
Cooper
didn’t have any actual authority
. I
t made them a good team
, e
ven if it was temporary.

I
waited throughout dinner
for the right moment to
fill
Dirt in about seeing Bobby with Garrison Pala
zzo. They had already grilled me
about the Hummer incident
while we ate
. At this point,
I
felt it was important to get all facts on the table
.

“I know that people were always try
i
ng to get the Senator to take up their cause so he could influence certain bills that were going to pass through the Senate. Maybe the Palazzo family wanted to use his influence,”
Cooper said as we
hashed
out theories.
He was still pissed at her about taking his car and had his own idea of how she would have to make it up to him. That thought is all that kept him from throttling her.