Trouble In Bloom (4 page)

"So?" I said to him.

He knew what I was talking about. "If she won't go to the police, there's nothing much we can do."

"Maybe that's what she's hoping for. If news leaks out to the media, ratings will soar."

"You really think it's for ratings?" my mother asked.

I nodded.

"That's brilliant!"

It really was. However, if anyone found out what Genevieve had done, it could be the end of the network deal.

"What if it's not fake?" Kevin asked.

My mother made the sign of the cross even though she hadn't set foot in a church in over thirty years.

I was saved from answering as the back door swung open and Mr. Cabrera hobbled in, carrying a poker chip carousel. He was still recovering from a recent broken ankle, and despite the chill, he wore a short-sleeved, button-down collared shirt covered in swans that, with beaks together, created a heart shape. His on-off girlfriend, my nemesis, Brickhouse Krauss, had bought it for him. She strode in behind him. Right now they were on again.

"Donatelli! Ursula! Glad you could make it." My mother dished up two more plates. "Where's the cribbage board?"

Mr. Cabrera shook Kevin's and Bobby's hands, kissed my cheek, and sat on a stool at the end of the kitchen island.

"Cribbage is so yesterday," he said, sounding like he'd been hanging out with Riley too much, which was true. Riley adored the old man.

Brickhouse sat down next to him, clucked. She did that a lot—clucked. Like a stout, German, brick-shaped chicken.

"Donatelli's been on a Hold 'em kick for a week now," she said.

"Riley's been teaching me." Mr. Cabrera poured two glasses of white wine.

Wine? There was wine around, and I hadn't self-medicated yet?

"Pass me that, would you?" I said to Mr. Cabrera, not caring if it was on my diet or not. Priorities and all.

"Riley's playing poker?" Kevin asked, sounding worried.

"Mostly on his computer." I filled a wineglass to the rim.

Bobby took the bottle from me and filled himself a glass as well.

Kevin's eyebrows dipped. "Not for money, I hope."

"Nah," Mr. Cabrera said around a mouthful of pasta. "I'd have heard about that."

Brickhouse clucked. "He would. Nosiest man I know."

"Hey!"

She patted his arm. "Said in love, pookie."

I tried not to toss my . . . tomato.

Brickhouse and I had a . . . strained relationship. She'd been my high school English teacher, and we'd hated each other.

I'd done a mini makeover of her landominium's backyard last spring and kinda-sorta set her up with Mr. Cabrera, who kinda-sorta had a way with women.

Meaning he usually killed them.

Not on purpose, of course. He was cursed—his girlfriends all seemed to die while dating him. Usually of natural causes. Most recently from a tragic accident. Only Brickhouse seemed immune to the curse, in fact only becoming sick when she wasn't dating Mr. Cabrera.

Brickhouse had also been helping me out at work, filling in for Tam while she was out on maternity leave. Now that Tam was back at work part-time, Brickhouse worked for me a couple of days a week.

Dare I say I was getting used to having her around?

I daren't. I'd need a few more glasses of wine before I'd lose my mind like that.

"I need to get going." Bobby set his empty glass on the island.

"Me too." Kevin stood.

I kept my glass with me. "I'll walk you out."

"Aww, that's so sweet of you," Kevin said. "And here I thought I might not be welcome anymore."

"Not you," I growled.

He grinned.

"Where's the kid?" Mr. Cabrera said. "Maybe he wants to play some poker with us."

"Upstairs." I headed toward the front door, trying to keep up with Bobby, who suddenly decided he wanted to sprint.

"Tell me the truth," I said, hugging my wineglass. "You moved to Florida to get away from my family."

"Your family's great," he said as Mr. Cabrera's footsteps echoed on the hardwood stairs behind us.

They were pains in my tuchkus, my family, but I loved them. "You can borrow them any time you want."

"I'll trade you for Mac."

"Um, thanks but no thanks." Mac was a geriatric handful.

"That's what I thought." His gaze dropped to my lips, but he didn't lean in. After a second he turned and started down the front steps.

I wasn't disappointed. I wasn't.

Okay, I was.

I watched as he got in his car and drove away.

"Trouble?" Kevin asked from behind me.

Turning, I glared at him. I was a good glarer-er—I'd learned it from my mother. "Don't start."

Mr. Cabrera came downstairs. Riley came down behind him wearing a plastic red visor and enormous dark sunglasses.

He grinned bigger than my mother every Bastille Day and shuffled cards between his hands like he'd been born at the MGM Grand. "Let's shuffle up and deal!" He strolled into the kitchen.

I looked at Kevin. He looked at me. I think we were both seeing Riley in prison stripes playing a peanut game with a cellmate named Rosie.

"You were saying something about trouble?" I asked.

Kevin rolled his eyes but couldn't stop the grin. "Don't start."

"Did you sleep with him yet?"

Leave it to my cousin Ana, who also happened to be my best friend, to get straight to the point. I sat at my desk, played Spider Solitaire with one hand and held the phone with the other. "No."

"Wow. You've lasted longer than I thought you would."

"Thanks for the vote of support."

"Look, Nina, I love you to pieces, but depriving yourself of a man, and not just any man, but Bobby 'Hubba Hubba' MacKenna? That's just crazy."

I couldn't help but smile. "How's Dr. Feelgood?"

My gaze wandered over to the twosome sitting across from me. Watching. Filming. It was unnerving to say the least. I was supposed to pretend they weren't there, to speak only when spoken to. I had to wonder what they were thinking, and if anyone cared about this phone call or whether I won a computer game.

Nelson Kunkle was the name of my cameraman, Roxie Lewis my field producer. Roxie looked to be in her midtwenties. She was a bit on the chubby side, had her red hair cut Peter Pan style, and wore blue framed glasses that accentuated her bright blue eyes. Nelson, "Call me Nels," reminded me of the candlestick from
Beauty and the Beast
. Tall, skinny, big lips, big eyebrows, and close-set eyes.

I fought off a yawn. I'd been up late watching Carson Keyes's report on Genevieve's death threat and how he was the only reporter behind the scenes, so stay tuned all week.

Then I'd lain in my sofa bed, pondering (a) when I was going to get my bedroom back; (b) whether Genevieve's death threat was real; (c) if it was a valid threat, then who had sent it; and (d) if I was strong enough to keep my hands off Bobby this week. I'd barely gotten any sleep.

"I wish you'd stop calling him that," Ana said. "His name is Johan."

I knew his name. He'd treated Riley's sprained wrist over the summer and had been permanently attached to Ana ever since.

It was time for an amputation, in my opinion. He was much too needy. I'd barely spent any time with my cousin at all lately.

Talk about needy.

This is what self-discovery had come to.

"Well?" I said.

She sighed. I could hear noise in the background—Ana was a probation officer and had a tiny cubicle in a small office at the courthouse. Things could get pretty rowdy once in a while. "We broke up."

"Really?"

"You don't have to sound so excited by it."

"Me? Excited? Nev—"

"I know you didn't like him."

"Like, shmike. It's not my place—"

"You're such a crappy liar." I heard the smile in her voice.

"I know. What happened?"

Her long drawn-out sigh came across the line. "Whenever I was naked I felt like he was examining me with his eyes. You know, checking my moles and stuff like that."

"So he definitely had to go."

"Definitely. If he's looking at moles instead of other things, it wasn't going to work."

I could see how that would irritate.

"How about a movie tonight?" she asked.

"Can't. I'll be down at the HoD studio."

"That's right! You're a stahh! Are the camera people there?"

"Sitting right across from me." I lost my hand of Spider Solitaire. I cursed under my breath and clicked out of it.

"How weird is that?"

"Weird. Want to come tonight?" I asked.

"And meet Thad Cochran! Yes!"

I'd have to warn her about Thad. "Better yet, you'll meet Carson Keyes."

Roxie perked up, took notes. I could imagine the editing needing to happen before tonight's eleven o'clock airing of the show.

When Ana didn't say anything, I started to worry we'd been cut off. "Ana? You there?"

She sighed heavily. "Carson Keyes? Seriously?"

"Yep. He's doing a week-long piece on the show."

She started coughing. Wheezing.

"You okay?"

"Just . . . an asthma . . . attack."

"You don't have asthma."

In a stage whisper she said, "I've got to get my hair done. Carson Keyes. Whoo-eee."

So much for any heartbreak over Dr. Feelgood.

"Oh!" Ana added, "make sure they don't air you saying that asthma part, okay? I could get fired."

I looked at Roxie. "Ana asks that you don't use that last part, my asthma comment."

Roxie gave me a thumbs-up.

"I'll pick you up at five," I told Ana.

"I can drive."

"No!"

"Fine. Oh!" She coughed. "I'm sending someone over later on today. Sweet kid."

"I don't need anyone, Ana. It's almost winter—"

"Just humor me," she said, and clicked off.

All but three of my employees had been "sent over" by Ana. They were a great group, criminal backgrounds and all. Honestly, I don't know what I'd do without them.

There had been some changes at TBS in the last month. I'd cut back on the workload, sticking solely to one major makeover a week and one mini per week. Business had picked up so fast over the last year I found I couldn't keep up. It was too much. Everyone had been overworked and overextended. Rather than expanding the company, I'd opted to cut back on my projects, though I did have a side project in mind for Deanna Parks, a high-energy, up-andcoming designer who had worked for me a couple of years now. Overall, I wanted to keep my small business small.

The new schedule had been working out great. I'd hired two new part-time contractors to help out Kit Pipe, my overworked head foreman. He'd been enjoying having his own little crew. And of course, I still occasionally hired out, mostly to Ignacio Martinez, a fl oating contractor who provided a team of manual laborers when the going got tough.

Unfortunately, business was going to drop off soon due to the weather. I had outdoor projects lined up through the middle of November, and several indoor designs planned throughout the colder months. My full-timers would stay on, but my part-timers would only work on an as-needed basis.

Until winter kicked in, I'd keep everyone around. There was always a lot of preparation to do for spring—maintenance on the tools, the equipment, things of that nature.

"When do people start coming in?" Roxie asked.

"On Mondays? Around nine or so."

"Is it true all your employees are ex-cons?"

"Not all." I opened the bottom drawer of my desk in need of a chocolate fix, despite my diet. Or maybe because of it.

I stared into the empty drawer.

No Almond Joys.

Ever since I'd met Bobby last spring, he'd been send ing me my favorite candy bar. Right up until he left for Florida.

Breaking up sucked.

"Harvey and Shay have clean records, and as far as I know Ursula Krauss hasn't been arrested for anything. Yet." Shay Oshwalter and Harvey Goosey were the new hires. They'd fast become Kit groupies. It was hard not to—Kit had a way about him.

"Ursula Krauss?"

"To know her is to love her," I said. "You'll meet her on Wednesday. She works for me part-time, two days a week."

"But everyone else?" Roxie said.

I shrugged.

"That's seven people out of ten."

"I believe in second chances."

"Oh, that's good. That last part will be a good sound bite." She jotted something in a small spiral bound notebook. "You got that, right?" she asked Nels.

"Right." Nels dropped the camera from his eye. "Is it always this boring around here?"

I smiled. "No. Enjoy it while it lasts."

He looked like he didn't believe me. Poor guy.

I double-checked my schedule for the day. Office meeting at nine-thirty, then a finalization meeting with Pippi Lowther at eleven-thirty. The rest of the afternoon was fairly free, though I hoped to have a much needed conversation with Deanna.

The chimes on the front door rang out. "Hello! Anyone here? Well, of course there's someone here, the door's unlocked, and the lights are on! Nina?"

Speak of the devil. I looked at the camera. "Deanna Parks."

Deanna appeared in the doorway, looking young and fresh, with her blonde hair loosely pulled back, full makeup, and a cute little knee-length pencil skirt and beautiful cashmere wrap sweater.

"Oh!" she said. "I forgot about the filming."

My foot.

"I brought doughnuts!"

I noticed Nels sat a little straighter. I hoped because Deanna was adorable, and not for the doughnuts.

Though
I'd
perked right up at the smell. My stomach growled. Maybe I could self-discover without being on a diet.