Mayhem Takes a Dare: The Second Marisa Adair Mystery Adventure (Marisa Adair Mysteries Book 2) (12 page)

“Get back here, you handsome hunk of maintenance man! It’s time for you to dance with me...first on the dance floor...” Her long gray hair streaming behind her as she teetered across the planked restaurant floor on six-inch spike heels in hot pursuit of her quarry, the woman pulled off her long scarf, held an end in each hand, and threw the loop over the gray head of the portly man scampering ahead of her at top speed. “…and then at my place!” She tugged on the scarf, jerking the man backwards. Adroitly, she moved the scarf lower, pinning him against her front, her bony legs and scrawny body in its short black dress braced for impact.

Marisa transferred her glare from Tara, seated directly across from her under the dim restaurant lights, to the struggling couple. “Is that Carlos, our director of maintenance?”

“And is that Teresa Root, the maintenance secretary who has been on workers compensation for the past three months for back problems?” Tara’s eyes widened. “Wow, she’s pretty feisty for someone who is not able to work!”

Next to Tara, Brandon twisted in his chair. “Feisty is not the word.” He craned his neck. “Oh, look, she’s pursued Carlos from the dance floor to the eating area.”

“Good heavens, he’s escaped!” The black thundercloud, which had settled on Parvis’ face when the others had joined him and Marisa on what had been planned as a romantic date, was chased away by reluctant laughter.

“He’s heading this way!” Alex adroitly scooted his chair out of the way as Carlos veered over and circled their table like a race car driver spying the finish line at the Indy 500.

Shoving his chair back, Brandon stood and placed himself directly in the path of the excited fiftyish female. When she veered, he moved as well, keeping himself in her trajectory. Brandon grunted when she slammed into him. “Ms. Root! What a surprise!”

Teresa started to push him away. As she focused on his face, her spidery fingers clutched his arms. “Brandon Proctor, the guest services director! My, you’re looking handsome in your pink dress shirt and navy trousers!” She leaned over to inspect his behind. “Verrrry nice!” Teresa scanned the room. “As Carlos escapes my scarf, the next prey is captured!” Coyly, she snaked her scarf around his neck. “I ran into your mother. She’s so happy you’ve been dumped by the Widow Cranston. And so am I, since you’re ripe for some rebound...dancing!”

His mouth quirked, Brandon stared down at her, the dim light catching the charcoal stubble which traversed each of his jaw lines and circled up to meet at the center of his full lower lip. “I’m sorry, Teresa, I’m not on your to-do list. You’ve been working your way through the male members of the maintenance staff, and you nearly bagged Carlos, their director.”

Teresa pouted. “I can make an exception for you, Brandon, you young hottie pants!”

Brandon slowly shook his head back and forth. “Better take the time to work on damage control. You’ve been off work for months for an alleged workers compensation injury.”

The pout changed to a frown. “Alleged? I did get hurt at work.”

Brandon pursed his lips. “You and one of the plumbers were in the bathroom of an empty patient room. After flushing his system once with you braced on the toilet, he decided on a change. He tossed you up on the sink. You two were madly alternating between the hot and the cold when the sink broke, and you went crashing to the floor. As a result, you were injured during your work hours and in the workplace.”

Marisa jumped to her feet, her annoyance with Tara and her highhanded interference in her love life temporarily forgotten. “Teresa! Is
that
how you were hurt?”

The older woman whirled. “Marisa Adair, the human resources director! I didn’t see you over there.”

Brandon raised a hand. “No wonder. Marisa is female, Teresa.”

“Owww, my back!” Teresa bent over at the waist, her hand pressed to her back. “It comes and goes, you know, and it’s really in a spasm! I may need an ambulance!”

Brandon shooed her away as if she was a contrary chicken. “Go on home, Teresa. Marisa will deal with you next week.”

Her scarf trailing the floor like a chastened tail, Teresa limped toward the exit.

Marisa smiled at Brandon. “I think you’ve just saved the trauma hospital several thousand dollars in workers compensation expenses!”

Brandon flopped into his seat. “All in a day’s work for a student of human nature!”

Marisa leaned across the table. “Brandon, you’re an excellent judge of character. You generally avoid the missteps most of us can’t seem to avoid. So why are you dating Taylor from Tara’s online group?”

Tara put her arm along Brandon’s chair. “Yeah, Brandon, I don’t think she’s right for you. What happened to your romance with Amelia Cranston?”

The waiter circled the table with drink refills.

Surreptitiously, Marisa carefully used her thumbs on her cell phone. She texted to Tara:
Why are you here?

When her pocket beeped, Tara pulled out her phone. Her thumbs flew.
went by ur hse after shooting at gym on TV verna said u and Parvis going to steak hse

Marisa growled.
That does not explain why you are here or why you dragged Brandon and Alex along with you! This is supposed to be my first real date with Parvis!

Tara’s brows rose as she met Marisa’s angry eyes across the table. She bent to her phone.
ur a smart woman cant u c im the virus blocker

When she finally deciphered the cryptic message, Marisa’s mouth fell open and she nearly dropped her phone. Her phone beeped again.

parvo-virus not right 4 u tryin to protect u and keep u from havin regrets

Marisa sputtered. She wondered if she could land a kick on Tara’s shins.

Tara’s full mouth curved into a smile, her cascading curls tumbling across her shoulders like gold coins in free fall as she nodded across the table. She bowed her head over the phone.
u dont have 2 thank me what R friends 4

As the waiter walked away, Brandon frowned. “Amelia kept coming up with obstacles to a long-term relationship. I might want children, and she can’t have any. She might get sick, and I’m not a nursemaid. She’s too old for me, and she won’t let me throw away my youth on her.” Unshed tears glittered in his eyes. “I had heard about Tara’s online group, and I decided to check it out. Online, Taylor came across as smart and intuitive. The woman at the gym today didn’t seem at all like the emails.”

Marisa tamped down her anger at Tara. “I don’t want to see you get hurt.”

Brandon’s chin firmed. “I am not going to get hurt, Marisa. I am going to figure out why there’s a disconnect between Taylor’s online persona and her real life.”

“Take my advice, Brandon, and just let her go. As your friend, I don’t want you hurt.” Tara’s smile was nearly blinding in its innocence. “I know Marisa agrees with me.”

Pushing her chair back, Marisa slung her purse over her shoulder. “Let’s go powder our noses, Tara.” She circled the table to stand at Tara’s shoulder.

“Oh, I don’t need to—”

“Your nose is so shiny, it’s blinding the waiters.” Marisa ruthlessly dug her fingers into Tara’s shoulder. “Let’s go.”

As Marisa and Tara entered the restroom, a figure followed them inside.

“Parvis! You can’t be in the ladies’ room!”

His face impassive, Parvis planted himself at the door. “Tara, you dragged your entourage to this restaurant and insisted upon joining Marisa and me. You ignored our polite demur and plopped yourselves down with us. Explain yourself.”

Tara crossed her arms. “You should ask that old hen Verna to partner up with you on your investigative reporting. When it comes to digging up dirt, she’s not a shovel...she’s a freaking one-woman excavator. She told me where you and Marisa went.”

“Marisa’s neighbor has superhuman hearing and she loves to tell what she knows. But that doesn’t explain why you’re here, Tara.”

“I’m protecting Marisa from making the mistake of trusting you. Parvis, you pretended to be someone else. You lied to Marisa. You used her to get information for your stories.”

Marisa opened her mouth. Parvis raised one hand to stop her. “Tara, you may not know, but Marisa’s addiction support group kidnapped me. They wanted to make me understand I had betrayed them when I wrote a story about the support group, its activities, and its members. I spent some time with them after that, and something happened to me. I had an epiphany, a light bulb went on over my head, or it was a pivotal moment. Whatever you want to call the realization, it was a turning point in my life. I could choose to stay the person I was, or I could choose to change.”

Tara narrowed her eyes. “Wow, Parvis. I am speechless.”

He rolled his eyes. “Why do I find that hard to believe?” He advanced, and stop inches from Tara. “Do you believe people can change, Tara?”

Tara leaned against the counter. “I think the concept of being able to make positive changes in our life must be the backbone of counseling. If there was no chance of success, would people go to therapists and psychiatrists? And none of the twelve-step programs out there, for alcoholism, drug addiction, overeating, you name it, would be around if people thought there was no hope for change. Long answer to your question, Parvis, yes, I believe people can change.” She smiled slightly. “I just don’t believe
you
can change. Your ruthlessness makes you a ton of money. It’s too lucrative for you to change.”

* * * * *

Parvis tugged his keys from his pocket as he and Marisa left the restaurant in the falling dusk. “How am I going win over Tara?”

“Considering how well it worked with Verna, perhaps Tara will remember your bumbling, shy alter ego, Russell Meeks. How can that ruthlessly short hair and those huge, chunky glasses, along with the baggy clothes and fake pot belly, fail to have gone straight to her heart?”

Parvis covered her hand where it lay loosely on her lap with his. “Do you like Parvis or Russell better, Marisa?”

“I think you’re a blend of both, and I like you just as you are!”

Laughing at the look of consternation on his face, Marisa slid her hand out from under his.

Although it was late in the evening, a dusky gloom allowed her to see the other cars. The summer breeze catching the tendrils falling loose from her brown ponytail, she craned her neck, peering around the parking lot.

“Are you looking for our friend in the white Camry? I see plenty of white cars, but I don’t see a Toyota Camry. What did you say Dreamus said her name was...Anna Pikestaff. Are you sure you don’t know anyone with that name? You are a human resources director. Could she be someone you fired?”

“I can’t think of anyone, Parvis. I don’t see the car either. Let’s head to the strip club. It’s about time for Sarah to hit the stage.” Marisa shook her head as Parvis accelerated out of the parking lot. “By the way, thank you for dinner. It was great, and even though we had gate crashers, nobody shot at us.”

* * * * *

As they approached her stage, Diana smiled as she recognized Marisa. When Marisa and Parvis scooted into two empty chairs at the edge, Diana twisted her body in a graceful wave.

As a compulsive body builder, Diana had a strong, muscular body. Daily weightlifting and constant exercise kept her fit, and her long black hair and beautiful face kept her from appearing too masculine for the taste of the primarily male customers.

“Diana appears to be somewhat older than the other ladies but holds her own with them,” Parvis said as Marisa set up her stack of dollar bills in front of her.

On their way to the strip club, Marisa had wondered if she’d be embarrassed by naked bodies and Parvis in the same room. Carefully, she tested her emotions.
Nope, not a hint of mental squirming.
Perhaps the time she’d spent here over the years had rendered her immune to discomfort. She smiled slightly as she crossed her legs and her denim skirt hitched up her thighs. “You’re being kind with the ‘somewhat’.”

Parvis carefully mirrored Marisa’s movements to build his own stack of dollars. “Kind?”

“Diana is at least twenty years older than the majority of the dancers. You may remember the game she plays with her customers. She gets them to ball up their currency and throw it into her g-string. She needed to differentiate herself from this herd of late-teens and twenty-something strippers, and the game helps her stand out.” While the dim lights helped disguise the laugh lines at Diana’s eyes and mouth and her muscular body was in better shape than the majority of women her age, it was impossible to hide the effects of gravity with a g-string.

Diana laughed as she caught the eyes of the men sitting at the stage, and those crowded behind them. “Come on, guys! Whoever throws their balled-up bill in my g-string first gets the first dance!”

As the men around the stage enthusiastically balled up their bills, comprehension dawned in Parvis face. “Oh, I noticed it when we were here months ago! It’s ingenuous!”

“It’s the perfect way to capture the attention-challenged strip joint customers. Well aware of the competitive nature of males, Diana makes the first dance of her set into a game. It’s always a huge hit, both with the older men and the younger guys.”

“Trinity!” Diana turned to Marisa and Parvis. “How are you, sweetheart?”