7 Brides for 7 Bodies (26 page)

“Well, don’t give up hope, Carlotta. Maybe Peter will change his mind.”

Carlotta’s mouth twitched to say she could marry Peter anytime she wanted to...but in hindsight, Peter hadn’t put up much resistance when she’d suggested they not see each other for a while. And what would happen if Randolph was tried and convicted?

“By the way,” Patricia added, “Jarold Jett was here a few minutes ago asking for you or that detective.”

“Did he say what he wanted?”

“No. But he seemed kind of upset.”

“Do you know where I can find him?”

“He said something about the mattress booth. Everything’s fine here if you want to check in with him.” She turned her back as if Carlotta had already left.

Carlotta decided to let the woman stew—she had a feeling she’d touched a nerve earlier.

After consulting the Expo app on her phone to find the mattress booth location, she headed in the general direction. On the way, she spotted Hannah getting a cup of coffee. She was hard to miss, standing over six feet tall in heels and topknot. Carlotta took a moment to marvel over her statuesque beauty...and her dual personality. Carlotta held back to make sure Hannah was alone since her friend had made it clear she didn’t want Carlotta talking to her family members—apparently she didn’t intend for her two worlds to overlap. Carlotta pushed down the resentment and waved to get Hannah’s attention.

“Oh, thank God,” Hannah said. “Someone sane. I feel like I’m in
Groundhog Day
and this show will never end.”

“We’re in the home stretch,” Carlotta said with a laugh.

“Want a coffee?”

“I’m good, thanks.”

Hannah sipped from her cup. “Where are you headed?”

“I have a wedding gown designer in crisis. Want to come with?”

“Will you need some muscle?”

“Maybe.”

“I don’t have anything better to do.”

Carlotta led the way. “When do you move into your new apartment?”

“Not soon enough.”

“Trouble at home?” Carlotta asked sweetly.

“Chance is being a big baby, don’t get me started. So, what did you do with the info we got from Greg Pena’s neighbor?”

“Nothing yet. Everyone thinks I’m being an alarmist. And maybe I am.”

“How are things with Wes?”

“Evolving. We’re both...stressed.”

“No word from your father?”

“No. And honestly, I don’t know what to do.”

“Isn’t the next move up to him?”

“I guess so. I just feel so...powerless.” She blinked back sudden moisture. “I’m just tired of waiting for my father to acknowledge me.”

Hannah looked pained.

Carlotta inhaled to gather herself, then tried to smile. “Sorry—didn’t mean to get all emotional on you.”

“It’s fine,” Hannah murmured, although she looked unnerved, as if she were out of her depth. “So
this
is where the crowd is.”

Carlotta looked ahead to see the sign for a well-known local mattress company. Peachy Mattresses had one of the largest booths in the exhibit, hoping to sell lots of marital beds. “No wonder Jarold is a little freaked out.”

“Hm?”

“The designer—he has a problem with crowds.”

She didn’t see Jarold, but assumed he was inside the booth. As she threaded her way through the throng of people, she noticed a camera crew. When she reached the front, she saw lenses and lights focused on the set of an elaborate bedroom, complete with sparking chandelier overhead. But the feature was a bare white mattress and pillow. Dressed in a black tuxedo, Jarold Jett was evidently filming a commercial.

She saw Edward standing nearby and worked her way over to him. “What’s this?”

He rolled his eyes. “Diva time.”

Indeed, from the body language of the crew, things weren’t going well.

“Quiet please!” a guy yelled in a bored voice. “Commercial for Peachy Mattresses, take seventeen.” He turned back to the set and held up cue cards.

Jarold looked into the camera and gave a watery smile as he walked toward the bed. “When it comes to the mattress I sleep on, I won’t settle for anything less than a ten.”

It was a takeoff of the way he scored aspiring designers on his popular television show—on a scale of one to ten. And the notoriously cranky designer was famous for never awarding a ten.

“He looks tense,” Hannah whispered, and Carlotta agreed. The man’s forehead was shiny with sweat, his movements were stiff, and his voice sounded unnatural.

He sat on the bed awkwardly, then reclined on the pillow and pulled a large placard from his jacket with the number ten written on it. “Peachtree Mattresses gets a perfect score.”

“Cut!” the man in the crew yelled, obviously the director. He looked heavenward as if he were summoning patience from a higher source. “Mr. Jett, it’s
Peachy
Mattresses. Peachy as in peachy keen, got it?”

Jarold set up, glowering. “How am I supposed to work with all these people around?”

“I can’t watch this,” Edward said. “See you later.”

Jarold spotted Carlotta and waved frantically. “Carlotta, come here, please.”

“Take five, everyone,” the director yelled.

Nia, Jarold’s personal assistant, her brown ponytail sagging, was standing guard at the booth entrance. She pivoted to allow Carlotta inside.

Jarold pushed himself up from the bed, and strode over to meet her. “Where is that detective?”

“You mean Jack Terry?”

“I suppose,” the man said with a dismissive wave. “I’ve called him numerous times.”

“It’s not like Jack to be late.”

He mopped a handkerchief across his brow. “My idiot assistant forgot to put this commercial shoot on my schedule.” He shot lasers at Nia, who shrunk from his gaze. “I didn’t know about it myself until an hour ago.”

“Oh. Well, Jack must’ve had another commitment. Can I help with something?”

“Can you get rid of some of these people? I’m feeling quite anxious today.”

“I’ll see what I can do.”

“You can leave, too,” he barked in Nia’s direction.

Carlotta gave the girl a sympathetic look when she reached her. “He must be a handful.”

She gave a curt nod. “I’ll help you try to disperse the crowd.”

“Maybe if we just ask everyone to move back a few feet, he won’t feel so claustrophobic.” She recruited Hannah’s help and soon they established a wider boundary around the booth.

The director resumed his place by the camera. “Quiet, please! Commercial for Peachy Mattresses, take eighteen.”

Jarold smiled into the camera and walked toward the bed. “When it comes to the mattress I sleep on, I won’t settle for anything less than a ten.”

He sat on the bed, then reclined on the pillow and pulled the card from his jacket. “Peachy Keen Mattresses gets a perfect score.”

“Cut!” the director yelled. “It’s not Peachy Keen Mattresses—it’s Peachy, by itself. Peachy Mattresses!”

Jarold sprang up from the bed. “This is absurd!”

A whooshing noise sounded, then a terrific crash of glass. The crowd gasped, including Carlotta, who wasn’t sure what had happened.

Jarold Jett had scrambled from the set, away from the noise. Carlotta rushed forward to see the chandelier hanging over the bed had plummeted straight down. And from the splintered glass and how deeply it had imbedded in the mattress where Jarold had been lying only seconds earlier, it was clear he had escaped serious physical harm.

“Jesus,” Hannah muttered to Carlotta. “He was almost human hamburger.”

The director took control of the situation, clearing the set area. “Watch the glass, everyone, watch the glass.”

Jarold Jett was reduced to wide-eyed silence as he stared at the impaled mattress. Carlotta touched his arm and guided him away from the scene. “Are you okay, sir?”

He nodded, shaking shards from his clothing. He searched the crowd. “Nia?”

“I’m here,” the woman said, emerging to take over. “Let’s get you to a chair.”

Carlotta and Hannah helped to wave back the growing swarm of people trying to get a look. When security officers and Melissa Friedman arrived, they slipped away, but instead of heading back to their booths, Carlotta jerked her thumb toward the back of the booth. “Let’s go this way.”

“Why?”

“Humor me.”

They walked around the outside perimeter of the booth built from sturdy walls that were ten feet tall. Because it was so large, the structure was free-standing, with no other booths adjacent to it. Situated in the area behind the booth was a series of wedge-shaped supports to shore up the walls, and multiple outlet boxes to supply electricity to lights and displays. Carlotta picked her way over the hardware until she estimated they were standing behind the commercial set. A large square weight sat on the floor, and from the closed metal loop on top dangled the end of a thick rope that had been secured with a complicated series of knots.

“This must be where the chandelier was attached,” Carlotta said, then pointed up. “The rope was looped over those two bars to allow it to hang down into the set.”

Hannah picked up the end of the rope. “A lot of good these knots did. Looks like the rope frayed here, past the knots.”

Carlotta brought the rope closer for a better look.

“And what do you think you’re doing?”

At the sound of a man’s voice, Carlotta turned, half-pleased, half-irritated to see Jack making his way toward them. Their last conversation was still stuck in her mind, like a thorn.

“Exploring,” she said innocently. “When did you get here?”

“Just now. Jett told me what happened. Were you there?”

“Yes. He was almost killed.”

“I kind of got that from seeing the mutilated bed.” He stopped next to them, then looked at Hannah. “Sorry—do I know you?”

Carlotta bit back a smile.

“It’s me, Detective Dickhead.”

His eyebrows spiked. “Hannah?”

“You seriously need to brush up on your observation skills.”

He frowned, then indicated the bulky weight at their feet. “I
observe
this is where the chandelier was tied off.”

“Looks like it,” Carlotta said, handing the end of the rope to Jack. “But that’s a pretty clean break for wear and tear, don’t you think?”

He studied the broken strands. “Did you see anyone back here?”

“No. But we weren’t exactly paying attention.”

“That girl,” Hannah said. “The one who works for Mr. Fancy Pants—she disappeared for a while.”

“Nia,” Carlotta confirmed to Jack. “Jarold yelled at her to leave.”

“She was with Jett when I got here,” Jack said.

“She came back after the incident.” Carlotta snapped her fingers. “And Jarold said she forgot to put the commercial shoot on his schedule. Is that why you weren’t here?”

He nodded.

“Maybe she left it off the schedule on purpose so you wouldn’t be here.”

“So she could drop a chandelier on Jett?” Jack scoffed. “I can see why she’d want to, but that’s reaching, even for you.”

“There’s another possibility.”

Jack sighed the sigh of a long-suffering man. “I’m going to hate myself for asking, but what is it?”

“Jarold Jett is engaged...maybe he’s being targeted by the Groom Slayer.”

“Did you just make that up?” Hannah asked.

“I did.”

“Not bad. Kind of catchy.”

Jack pinched the bridge of his nose. “I was right...I hate myself.”

“Jack—”

“Carlotta, stop this nonsense! This was just what it looks like—a freak accident.” He put his hands on his hips. “Now, don’t you ladies have somewhere to be?”

Carlotta frowned. “Come on, Hannah.”

Hannah grumbled as they stepped over and around obstacles to get out. “I think you were brilliant. He’s such an asshole, I don’t know what you see in him. He must be hung like an elephant.”

Carlotta let her friend rant, nursing her own bruises over Jack’s dismissive behavior. After all they’d been through, he continued to regard her as a nuisance.

But when she reached the end of the wall and looked back, the vexing man was using his phone to take a picture of the end of the rope. Carlotta smiled to herself.

Plus ten points, Jack.

Chapter Twenty-six

TRAFFIC WAS MORE BRISK at the Wedding World Expo on Tuesday thanks to charter busloads of brides streaming in from Birmingham, Charlotte, and Nashville. Savvy trip guides had packaged a two-day experience called Wedding & Whales. For one price, women received admission to the Expo and the Georgia Aquarium.

It appeared most of the bride tourists were saving the belugas for tomorrow.

Carlotta was glad for the increased business because it kept her and Patricia from stepping on each other’s toes. She didn’t see Jack all day, and resisted the urge to call him and ask about yesterday’s chandelier incident. Likewise, he obviously didn’t feel the need to call and give her an update.

Peter had called a couple of times with news about Walt Tully, whose condition continued to slowly improve. And to suggest they sneak away Friday night to have dinner outside of town where they would be less likely to run into anyone who knew them. She had agreed, and conceded to herself that she was looking forward to seeing him.

She was lonely.

Wes didn’t seem to be angry with her anymore, but he had become so withdrawn, she was seriously worried about him. When she’d asked if he’d talked to Meg since her return, he had looked as if he were going to cry and retreated to his room. Her heart ached for him—in love with one woman, and having a baby with another. But she also wanted to shake him for being so careless. One dumb decision would affect a lot of people’s lives.

At the end of the day she walked out with Hannah, who was also growing wedding-weary. “One more day of this crapfest and I get my life back.”

“If that’s what you want.”

Hannah stopped. “Don’t tell me you like me better like this.”

“Of course not. I like you whichever way you want to be. I just don’t understand the extremes...and the secrecy.”