Terror in Taffeta (14 page)

“Don't worry, I'll talk to her.”

“Well, better make it quick, because we have our final menu tasting tomorrow. I'm about ready to strangle her with her stupid twinkle lights, which, by the way, she thinks aren't quite the right color so I'm having to reorder.”

“Please fight the urge to kill her,” I said, rubbing my temples. “I've already got one murder on my hands.”

“Well, you'd better get back here if you want to keep that number at one, because I'm ready to snap!” She really did sound even more stressed than me, if that was possible.

“Believe me,” I said, “I would much rather be there with you than here dealing with all of this.”

She paused for a second and blew out a breath. “I know. I'm sorry, I'm just venting. You're dealing with much worse things than I am.”

“Don't worry. I totally get it. It's frustrating. But you'll get used to it after a while, and you'll learn to smile and nod and say, ‘Let me look into that.' Even if they say they want a kangaroo for a ring bearer.”

“Unless the wedding's in Australia. Then that makes perfect sense,” she deadpanned.

“Of course,” I said, laughing.

“Oh!” Laurel's voice brightened. “On a slightly more positive note, I've got something for you. It's actually kind of interesting. We got an inquiry through our website from a woman who lives there in San Miguel. She got your name from someone who was at the Abernathy wedding, and she was wondering if you're available.”

“Wow,” I said. “Does she know about the … you know?”

“She didn't say, but maybe you could go meet with her, as long as you're there. Even if you don't end up taking the job, it might be nice to go play wedding planner for a few hours. You know, take a break from crime fighting.”

“Good point. What's her name?”

“Jacinda Rivera. She's actually from Texas—an artist, I think she said. But her family has a home in San Miguel, and she's thinking of having her wedding there.”

“All right. Couldn't hurt. Send me her contact info, and I'll give her a call.”

“Okay, sending now.” I could hear her typing the e-mail over the line.

“Thanks for everything, Laurel. I couldn't do this without you.”

“You're welcome. And you're right: I am pretty awesome.”

“Believe me, I know.” And I did. A million people wanted Laurel's job, but I couldn't imagine having someone better than her around. She was organized, easygoing, and creative. And basically running my business for me while freaking out only a little. “Don't worry, Laurel, this will all be over soon. I'll figure this out, and I'll be back home before you know it.”

I sure hoped I wasn't lying.

 

CHAPTER 14

“Thanks for coming over on such short notice,” said Jacinda Rivera, leading me into her living room. When I'd called to set up a meeting with the bride-to-be, she'd been thrilled that I was available to meet in person and eager to get started right away. “Would you like some refreshments?” she asked, gesturing to a tea tray and plate of cookies she'd set out on the coffee table.

“What I'd like is to move in,” I exclaimed, taking in the large, dramatic space stuffed with Mexican folk art, quirky antiques, and enough paintings on the walls to warrant their own museum exhibit. “This place is amazing.”

“Thanks,” she said, beaming. “It belongs to my parents, but they let me hang out here.”

“Is that a Chagall?”

“One of his lesser works, but yes. Good eye.”

I was struck by an enormous and colorful abstract that hung over the fireplace.

“That's one of mine,” Jacinda said, gesturing at the extra-large canvas.

I did a double take. “Wow, it's beautiful.”

“Thanks,” she said, blushing. “There are plenty of terrible ones where that came from. I'm still learning, but being down here really inspires me.”

The first time I meet with potential clients, I'm interviewing them as much as they're interviewing me, but I had no doubt that I would jump at the chance to plan Jacinda's wedding if asked. An artist? My mind was buzzing with the possibilities. I had a feeling her wedding would be amazing with me or without me, but I certainly hoped it was with. There'd been a time when I would have done it for free just to have the pictures for my portfolio, and it didn't hurt that I'd taken an instant liking to the willowy brunette.

“My fiancé and I live in Austin,” she continued, “but this place has been in the family for decades. I come down here and paint sometimes when I need to get away.”

It was ironic. Jacinda considered San Miguel a place to escape to, and here I was wanting to escape
from
it. Of course, having a house like this might make me see things differently. I would move in with her in a heartbeat if she asked, with wedding-planning services thrown in for free.

I did love San Miguel, and now that my relationship with Evan had been rekindled, the thought of living in the same town had flitted across my mind a couple of times. I wouldn't need to work much to afford to live here. Maybe I'd take up painting, too.

But what was I thinking? A couple of nice dates didn't warrant relocation and a change in profession.

Maybe it could just be my winter home.

I shook my head, banishing my spontaneous fantasy life. “So,” I said, “have you picked a venue?” Maybe we could knock out some site visits while I was here. “The Instituto is gorgeous for a reception, and since it used to be a convent, there's actually a chapel right there on-site.”

She nodded enthusiastically. “I agree. In fact, I dropped by the other day to check it out, and they were setting up for the wedding you did. It was beautiful.”

I smiled sheepishly. “I swear I'm not trying to duplicate that wedding. I just love the idea of an artist getting married at the art institute.”

“Of course!” She nodded. “I totally agree.”

“Your event should be all about you, and we could really make it special. Nothing like the Abernathys'. I mean, not that theirs wasn't special, just that yours would be unique.”

Jacinda picked up the teapot and filled two mugs, instantly releasing the fragrance of jasmine into the room. “I heard there was a little … incident.”

I froze, not sure how to respond. What had she heard?

“One of the bridesmaids passed away?” she said, handing me a mug.

Oh, that.

“Yeah,” I said, blowing on the hot liquid while trying to decide what to say. “That was unfortunate. Definitely not something we saw coming.”

“I feel terrible for that poor bride. Do they know what happened?”

“Not yet.” I decided to leave it at that. There was an awkward silence, during which I resisted the urge to give her unsolicited advice about picking bridesmaids who weren't so eminently murderable.

“I'm sorry,” she said, breaking the tension. “It must have been horrible for you. Let's talk about happier things. Like cake!”

“Yes!” I said, relieved. “Cake is important.”

“And dresses, and guest lists.”

“And tequila donkeys!” I exclaimed, caught up in the moment.

She looked at me quizzically, apparently unaware of the tradition. “Tequila donkeys? Is that some sort of a—?”

“Okay, maybe not tequila donkeys,” I quickly interjected. We'd tackle the subject of booze later. “Do you have an officiant yet?”

“We don't have a church here, so that's something we'll need to figure out.”

“I've got the perfect guy,” I said, happy to be able to put my new resource to use.

We talked for another half hour, during which we covered a lot of ground. We made plans to meet the next morning for some site visits, and I promised to take her to meet Father Villarreal. By the time I handed her my empty tea mug and gathered my things to go, I was feeling more optimistic than I had in days. I'd found an important clue, interviewed a suspect, and even worked in a potential client, all before dinnertime. I would have traded it all to sleep in my own bed, but for now, I'd take it.

When I got back to the villa, I found a note stuck to my bedroom door: “Where are you? I may have cracked the case. Love, Nancy Drew.”

I hurried to his room to hear the latest development.

“I'm a genius,” he said as he swung open the door.

“I've always suspected. What'd you find?”

“First, tell me I'm a genius.”

“You're a genius. You wear nice shoes and you're kind to animals. Now spill it.”

“I spent some more quality time on the computer.” He tapped the space bar to wake the laptop. “The first USB was encrypted. Totally unhackable.”

“Duh. Why do you think I dumped it on you?”

“But this USB drive is only password-protected.”

“That's still bad, right? I mean, if you don't have the password.”

“For mere mortals, yes, but I booted it up in target mode. Now, yes, there was a firmware password, but since I was at root level—”

“Boring!” I interrupted. What kind of a geek did he take me for?

“No, but this is really good. I was in at the root-user level so I tried—”

“Will you please cut to the chase, nerd?”

“Fine. Let's just say that because I'm a genius, I was able to unlock some of the files, and guess what I found?”

“Naked pictures!” I squealed.

“Close. I found
this
.” He opened up a document that had a lot of numbers.

I stared at the screen and then up at him. “How is that close to naked pictures?”

“Let's just say it was very
revealing
.”

Groan.
“Okay, how? All I see is a lot of numbers.”

“I found out what this stuff is. It's financial data.”

“Okay?” I was trying to stay interested, but he'd oversold the naked-pictures comparison.

“I found out whose it is. Does the name LionFish mean anything to you?”

I paused while I searched my memory. “Oh, you mean LionFish, as in…?” I was bluffing. “No, sorry, I have no idea.”

“I didn't either, at first. But I did a little research, using the magic of the Internet. It's a start-up company. I did some digging, and guess what I found out? One of the founders is Ryan McGuire.”

I instantly recognized the name, and my heart sped up a little. “Ryan McGuire as in the best man Ryan McGuire?”

“Bingo. I can't even really tell what they do. Website is all blah, blah, blah, end-to-end-solutions blah.”

“Why would Dana have his company's financial information?” I asked, perching myself on the edge of his desk. “She didn't work for them.”

“I don't know, but apparently LionFish was in a lot of trouble,” he said, gesturing to a bunch of numbers in red that kept getting ominously larger.

I watched as the figures scrolled by, wondering how Dana had come to have this information and what she'd intended to do with it. “Could she have been blackmailing someone?”

“That's kind of what I was wondering,” Brody said.

“So what do we do with this? I would say we should go talk to him, but he flew out the day after the wedding.”

“Take it to the police,” Brody said. “They can look into it.”

“Officer Ortiz?” I laughed. “All he'd do is stick it in a drawer. They're so convinced that Zoe is their killer that it's going to take a lot more than this to get their attention.”

“Well, there are still more files. I'll see if I can find a bombshell in here somewhere.”

Brody's discovery gave me new hope that we'd be on our way home soon. But either way, time was ticking on our stay at Casa de Muerte. Some group of happy vacationers was going to be arriving soon and wouldn't be expecting to find another family lounging in their courtyard. If they were lucky, no one in their party would die. They'd probably even be allowed to come and go as they pleased.

They didn't know how good they had it.

Frankly, I'd been in denial and hadn't really started looking, because if we moved to another rental house, that meant we weren't going home anytime soon. But if we did have to move, I didn't mind being the one making the reservations. That way, I could find Mrs. Abernathy a nice place somewhere far, far away from wherever Brody and I would be staying.

Which reminded me: when we left, we'd have to take everything with us. And that included Dana's stuff, which was still strewn about her room. I'd felt so helpless when I'd had to call and break the news to Dana's parents, I'd found myself promising them that I'd take care of things till they could get here. It was the only consolation I could give them, short of offering to plan her funeral—a task Mrs. Abernathy would certainly have volunteered me for, had she been within earshot.

I'd even been cleared by Officer Ortiz to box up her things. They hadn't found anything useful when they'd searched the room, and they didn't consider it a crime scene—or at least not
the
crime scene. The ransacking had to be connected to the murder, but since they had “solved” the latter, they weren't concerned with the former.

Figuring I had a little time to kill before dinner, I decided to go ahead and tackle the job. At least I'd get to cross one thing off my list.

Dana's room didn't look that different from how Brody and I had first found it the morning after the wedding, which is to say it looked like a disaster area. If only the detectives had taken a moment to tidy up as they went, it would have made my job a lot easier.

I dragged her luggage out from the closet and started filling it with her clothes. It felt strange to be going through her things, but I really didn't have a choice. I folded her clothes neatly, clean and dirty alike, and put them into the suitcase. Did they really want her personal belongings, too? I mean, of course her jewelry and her watch, but should I send along the leftover energy bars she hadn't gotten around to eating, or the in-flight magazine she'd crammed into her carry-on? What about her colorful collection of thong underwear? It wasn't my place to decide what they'd want and what they wouldn't; I decided to pack everything that didn't come with the room. Until I found a box of condoms in her bedside table. Those I would spare them from, I decided, as I tossed them in the trash.