Scottsdale Squeeze: a romantic light-hearted murder mystery (Laura Black Mysteries Book 2) (28 page)

Everyone in the room clapped and shouted as Lenny held out the document to Jackie. She took it with a trembling hand. She then looked down at it with an odd look of wonder and anger, probably thinking of all of the problems and damage it had caused. She closed her eyes and slowly tore the document in half.

There was a loud cheer from everyone in the room and Jackie collapsed in Sophie’s chair. There was a look of relief on her face and I knew in my heart she was going to be OK.

Lenny popped the corks on several bottles of Crystal champagne while Annie and Sophie walked around the room, filling everyone’s glass. Lenny then held up his glass for a toast.

“To Jackie Wade. You are now the sole and permanent owner of the Scottsdale Saguaro Sky resort. This is in addition to the partial ownership of five other Scottsdale resorts and several undeveloped Scottsdale properties going to you fully, once the estate clears. This makes you one of the largest land and resort owners in the state of Arizona. Congratulations.”

We all clapped and cheered and then everybody drained their glass. I saw both Elle and Pam were smiling and crying over the good fortune of their friend.

Seeing Annie standing with the cougars gave me an idea. I called Sophie and Gina over and we had a conference. We came to a quick agreement and elected Gina to be our spokeswoman. We then motioned Annie over.

“Come with us,” I said.

We all walked over as a group and stood in front of Lenny. He was seated in one of the red leather chairs, still sipping his champagne.

“Lenny,” Gina said. “Annie will be graduating in two months with an associate’s degree in business. We’d like you to take her on as the new admin.”

Annie broke out in a huge smile then looked expectantly at Lenny. He thought about it for a moment.

“Actually, that’s not a bad idea,” he said. “We still need an extra pair of hands and she doesn’t seem insane like Amber.” He looked over at Annie, who was closely following the conversation. “Well, what do you think? I should warn you, I’ve often been told I can sometimes be, umm, difficult.”

Sophie barked out a sharp laugh. She realized what she had done and quickly covered her mouth with embarrassment. I noticed her face had turned bright red.

Lenny looked over at Sophie, a little annoyed. “OK,” he said. “I’ll be honest. I’m a pain in the ass. But, what do you say? Would you like the job? You can work part-time until you graduate then switch over to full-time. We’ll negotiate your salary, but I think you’ll be happy with it.”

Annie squealed with happiness and started jumping up and down. She spread her arms and hugged Gina, Sophie, and me. We all took this as a yes.

We all had another glass of champagne and everyone was starting to get a little giggly. As we were celebrating, Pam came over and gave me a nudge. She motioned to have me look over at Lenny. He was now standing with his mouth open, staring across the room. When I saw what was going on, I laughed and nudged Gina, who laughed and nudged Sophie. We all looked and saw Lenny was staring at Elle. What was funny was the look she was giving him back. She looked like she was hungry.

Champagne glass in hand, Elle slowly walked toward Lenny, like a lioness walking toward a wounded gazelle. She swung her long dark hair and licked her lips as she slowly closed in on her prey. She got to Lenny and stood close to him. In her heels, she was several inches taller than he was and Lenny was having a hard time deciding where to look at her. We saw him nervously start to fidget. I couldn’t help but think “Beauty and the Beast.”

“As you know, I usually don’t date guys my age,” Elle softly said as she lightly brushed her fingertips across Lenny’s cheek. “But there’s something about you. I like the way you took control and handled the situation for my friend. After this is over, why don’t we go out on the town and make a night of it. Can you cook? I have a big kitchen. You can make me breakfast.”

“Ahhh, ummm, sure,” Lenny stammered out. His face had turned bright red.

At this, we all held up our champagne glasses in a salute and everybody was laughing. Lenny was never very good at talking to women in social situations, especially beautiful women. But, I got the feeling Lenny wasn’t going to need to do a lot of talking with Elle tonight.

Jackie walked over to me. She paused for a moment, took off her thick diamond and ruby bracelet, and handed it to me.

“Roger gave this to me when we built our first resort together and I’ve worn it ever since. Even after we separated, I’ve worn it to remind me of the good times we had together. But, after everything that’s happened, I think it’s time for me to let him go and to say good-bye. I know this doesn’t nearly make up for everything you’ve done for me but I wish you’d take it. Think of me when you wear it. I think it will look great with your diamond pendant.

“It’s not real!” Sophie and Gina said together.

I took the bracelet from Jackie and then I burst into tears. I couldn’t stop them and I didn’t even want to try. It had been a long two weeks and I was happy everything had worked out so well. It could have easily gone horribly wrong. I gave Jackie a long hug and I knew I had made a lifelong friend.

After they all had another glass of champagne, the girls were ready to hit the town. Taking Lenny in tow, they took off through the front door and we heard them singing and laughing as they walked down the street to one of the nearby clubs.

Gina had stopped drinking after the first glass of champagne and was giving Jackie a ride home. Before she left, Sophie and I hugged her again. We extracted a promise she would send out daily status reports on her mood for at least the next week. We then made plans to all go out together as soon as she was up for it.

Sophie had a date arranged with Milo for after the party. They had planned on meeting up at a club but she called him and told him to pick her up at the office instead. From tone of her voice on the phone and the soft pink glow that was starting on her cheeks, I doubted if she and Milo would make it any further tonight than the bedroom in her apartment. After all, Sophie is a woman of many needs. Somehow, I got the feeling Milo wouldn’t mind the change in plans.

~~~~

Reno and I had planned on meeting at Frankie Z’s for a late dinner. So far, he hadn’t called it off and Lenny hadn’t come up with any new assignments for me. I took both as good signs. After the first glass of champagne, I had switched to Diet Pepsi in anticipation of actually being able to see Reno.

As I drove to the restaurant, the thought of being with Reno was giving me a wonderful case of the butterflies. I was starting to have hopes that maybe Reno and I could be together tonight for more than a dinner and a quickie in the parking lot. Maybe we could even have a real date like normal people. Maybe even a date lasting until Monday morning.

A girl can always dream.

As I walked into the restaurant, Frankie greeted me and walked me into the lounge. As usual, Little Zappy was mixing drinks behind the bar. As usual, he waved when he saw me. The place was full of people, all laughing and talking at once. Reno had a table in the corner of the lounge and I sat close to him. After a minute, Dominick came to our table and we each ordered a scotch.

We slowly sipped scotch and talked. Every few minutes, Dominick, or one of the other waiters, would bring out a tray of food from the kitchen. As they walked past us, we would catch the wonderful smell of the dinners.

We each ordered a dinner then had a few minutes to talk before the food would start to arrive. I knew discussing the rescue was probably a bad idea. I also knew Reno was still upset about finding me in the warehouse. But, I still had questions. Plus, the champagne and the scotch were making it hard for me to keep my mouth shut.

“What happened the other day?” I asked. “How did you find us?”

At first, he looked at me, as if he wasn’t going to say anything or maybe start to get angry. Instead, I saw him hang his head in defeat. After a moment, he lifted up his head, lowered his voice, and started talking.

“We’d been getting indications for weeks there was a truck coming up from Mexico with a shipment of heroin. By late last week, we had the date narrowed down to last Tuesday. Unfortunately, we didn’t know where it was headed. Border patrol let it through on Tuesday morning, but only after they’d put a tracking device underneath the trailer. The truck had passed through Tucson when we got a tip the drugs were going to an abandon warehouse on Mary Street in south Scottsdale. The tipper also said the drugs were being transported by a group called the Muerte Negra cartel and it was possible Jacquelyn Wade was being held as a hostage there.

“So you got a lucky break, having a tipper call it in?”

“Yup, we caught a break. It gave us enough time to set up a plan on how we were going to make the arrests. Unfortunately, we didn’t have a lot of information on the group. They apparently haven’t been operating in the area for long. We made some phone calls to the DEA and found out this group is headed in Arizona by a man called Carlos the Butcher. But other than his name, that’s about all of the information they had on him or the group. Since you had already said someone called Carlos the Butcher was holding Jackie Wade as a hostage, we took the tippers information as credible. So, in addition to our drug intervention team, we also called in the hostage rescue team. We were looking for Jackie Wade. We weren’t looking for you. I had to look twice when I saw you there. I’m still not sure why you’re always in the middle of everything.

“I found Jackie, but then we couldn’t get back out. Thank the guys for rescuing me.”

That made the second time I was rescued that day.

“I’m just glad we were there. Those drug dealers didn’t look like nice people.”

“How is the murder investigation going? Howard Spencer said Carlos was the one who shot Roger Wade.”

“He told the same story to the detectives, plus we found the gun that shot Roger at the warehouse. It appears Jackie had nothing to do with the murder. It looks like Lenny’s string of getting people off of murder charges will remain intact.”

“That’s great. This way he’ll get his fee and I’ll get paid. Seems like everyone wins.”

“Well, we confiscated a lot of drugs and the department will use that for all they can. There is nothing like pictures of a truckload of heroin coming into the city to keep our funding levels high. We arrested several people at the scene, but Carlos the Butcher got away. Apparently, his group has been doing a lot of things under the radar we’ve been missing. The captain’s already told us we’re going to form a team to go after Carlos and his organization. The drug war never stops.”

Dominick brought out our diners. We spent a long time eating and enjoying each other’s company. As always, I felt totally comfortable being with Reno and I love the way I can talk to him about anything.

Dominick brought out coffee and gelato for dessert. When we finished, Reno looked at me.

“You’re phone hasn’t rang all night. I take it you aren’t working this weekend?”

“Lenny gave me a few days off. I’m hoping to stretch that into Wednesday or Thursday next week, but realistically, if I’m off until Tuesday it will be great. I’ve got a ton of shopping to do.”

“Good to know.”

He reached over and took my phone. He then hit the off button and powered it down.

“Hey, what gives?” I asked.

“You won’t need it tonight. Actually, I’m thinking you won’t need it until Monday morning.”

“Oh really? Why’s that?”

“Cream-puff,” he said, “I have two days off, you owe me big time, and I’m going to collect. You and I are about to have a weekend you won’t soon forget.”

“Oh yeah?”

“Oh yeah.”

Yes!