Read Weddings Can Be Murder Online

Authors: Connie Shelton

Tags: #romantic suspense, #christmas, #amateur sleuth, #female sleuth, #wedding, #series books, #mystery series, #connie shelton, #charlie parker series, #wedding mysteries

Weddings Can Be Murder (8 page)

BOOK: Weddings Can Be Murder
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“How about getting into her house? I just
feel like … I don’t know … there might be something a family member
would recognize as being of value. If nothing else, I should clean
up the mess before she gets home.”

His expression was momentarily unguarded.
Clearly, he believed there was a good chance Victoria would never
come home. I swallowed hard. He turned and punched the elevator
button. On the far side of the lobby I saw Ron and Ben Ortiz
standing near a side entrance. I caught up with them and we walked
to the lawyer’s office in silence.

The news conference was the hour’s top story
on the radio as I started the truck.

“I can’t think straight,” Ron said.

“You need some rest.”

“I need to get busy. Let’s go to the
office.”

“Ron—”

He shushed me and I drove. Luckily, it
didn’t appear the media people had discovered our offices yet. The
gray and white Victorian sat dark and quiet in weekend mode so I
pulled down the side driveway and parked behind. I started coffee
brewing, wishing we’d at least pulled through some drive-up and
brought food with us.

Upstairs, I could hear Ron clumping around
in his office, then the sound of canned laughter. As I approached,
a commercial for laundry detergent blared, then the familiar voice
of the noon newsman who promised an update on the sensational story
of the missing bride. Great, Ron. Can’t we stay away from the
damned television? I started to voice my opinion but the
introductory music was already on and there was my brother’s face
on the screen in his office.

“Our lead story this weekend, the
frightening events surrounding a bride who never made it to her
wedding, and the groom who wants the whole thing to go away.”

“What!” I stormed into the room and reached
for the remote.

“Charlie, we have to know what’s being
said.”

My gut churned as we watched. The edited
film showed Ron stammering—his one hesitation—during the interview.
His past-tense reference to Victoria was quoted intact. His
expression seemed uncertain, his face haggard and unflattering in
contrast to Ben Ortiz’s. The lawyer’s use of makeup made him look
smooth and camera-ready. When the talking heads came on to opine on
the subject, of course it was Ortiz’s past defenses of
guilty-looking defendants which was brought up first. I thought I
would throw up.

Chapter 8

 

November, 1978

 

Juliette took the cassette from the
dictation machine and put in a fresh one, ready and waiting for
Al’s next batch of letters. A month into her new job and she was
beginning to feel more confident. She’d bought a plant for her
desk, taken all the tags off the new clothes, and had even gone out
to lunch with Sheila a couple of times. She knew how Al took his
coffee and which files he preferred to keep in his own office,
although she still hadn’t a clue why some were different than
others.

“Juliette, I need five copies of this bid.”
Al Proletti walked through the connecting door from his office,
wearing a long-sleeved dress shirt for the first time with today’s
cooler weather.

“Certainly, Al. Right away.” She reached for
the sheaf of pages, which he shifted slightly so their fingers
touched as she took them.

She blushed and pretended she hadn’t
noticed.

“Put those on my desk when you’re done,” he
said. “I’ll be at the Bingham site for an hour or so, then I want
you to go with me out to the Rossmoor job.”

He turned away, plucking his jacket from the
back of his desk chair before walking out the other door into the
lobby. She could hear him giving instructions to Sheila, then the
outer door opened and closed. Juliette headed for the copy machine
which sat in an alcove off the hallway, placed the bid sheets on
the paper feed and set the controls.

While paper hummed through the machine she
went back to the boss’s office where she picked up his sticky
coffee cup and stuck three stray paperclips into the little
magnetic holder where they belonged. Sheila spotted her through the
open doorway.

“You know where the Rossmoor job is, don’t
you?” the older woman said with a sideways grin.

Juliette shrugged.

“Out near Al’s house.” Sheila glanced toward
the closed door of Marion Flightly’s office and lowered her voice.
“All the new girls eventually get a tour of Al’s house.”

“What are you saying?” Juliette carried the
dirty coffee cup and detoured to stand in front of Sheila’s desk.
“That he’s coming on to me?”

“Al comes on to all women. Surely you’ve
already noticed. He means nothin’ by it. It’s just his way.”

“Have you been to his house?”

“Sure.” Sheila took a long drag on her
current cigarette then tapped the ash into the ashtray that already
held four butts. “Once on a private tour, four times for the
company Christmas parties. It’s quite a place.”

Juliette carried the cup to the little
kitchenette, last door at the end of the hall, where she rinsed it
and placed it on the drying rack before going back to check on her
copies. As she collated and stapled the bid pages she wondered what
Sheila had meant by ‘tour.’ She’d watched, in the early days of the
new job, assessing the office relationships, speculating on whether
Sheila and Al might have had something going. She’d pretty much
come to the conclusion they didn’t—Sheila was a few years older
than the boss, and she was married—until the remark about getting
the tour. Then again, she’d said Al didn’t mean anything by it.
Juliette shrugged it off and returned to the pile of files on her
own desk.

It was after eleven when Al breezed in,
picked up the bids Juliette had stacked on his desk, and peeked
into her office. She shut off the dictation machine and removed her
earphones.

“Ready for the Rossmoor job?” he asked.
“Bring a note pad.”

Well, that sounded safe enough, she decided
as she neatened her desk and picked up her steno pad and sweater.
Outside, the day had warmed a bit and she ended up draping the
sweater over her shoulders. Al led the way to the back lot where he
bypassed the company pickup trucks and ushered her to the passenger
side of his Porsche. Her heart did a little flutter.

Back in Texas muscle cars were the dream of
every boy in high school but none of them dared set their sights on
a car this magnificent. Bobby Ray Jackman’s Competition Yellow Boss
302 Mustang was the coolest car she’d ever set foot in, going to
the Cree-Mee Drive In for a burger. She touched the door of the
sleek black Porsche and settled into her seat. It smelled like
expensive leather and the tinted windows sealed her into a private
little world.

Al slid into his seat, turned the key and
put the car in gear, almost in a single movement. A second later
they were making the right turn onto Greenlee Boulevard. He whipped
through the lane changes with a swiftness that nearly took
Juliette’s breath away. When he pulled into the fast lane of the
Interstate, Juliette let herself slip into a little fantasy where
the Porsche flew past the yellow Mustang, with Billy Ray gaping at
her in astonishment. She smiled through the side window as if he
were really there.

“Nice, huh?” Al Proletti said, catching her
in mid-smile.

She flushed. A glance at the speedometer
told her they were at least thirty miles per hour over the speed
limit. Proletti shot a glance toward his side mirror and zipped
across three lanes of traffic to take the next exit. Ten minutes
later they pulled to the curb in front of a chain link-fenced job
site. A sign showing an architect’s rendering of a huge
Spanish-style building announced that Pro-Builder Construction was
general contractor on the new Rossmoor Golf and Country Club.

Juliette knew bits and scraps of information
about the job, the pieces she gleaned from letters she typed and
documents she copied. The fifteen million dollar bid was only the
beginning, enough to cover earth-moving to form the curving
fairways and greens of the golf course. The clubhouse/restaurant
pictured on the sign would be added separately. For a girl who’d
been living on a little over five hundred dollars a month until
recently, those kinds of numbers were surreal.

Al got out of the car and came around to her
side. She picked up her notepad and swung her legs around. She
struggled a moment to get out of the low car. He didn’t say
anything but she hadn’t imagined where his attention went as her
skirt slid upward. She smoothed it down and squared her shoulders,
standing beside the car and staring out at the massive earth-movers
and trucks in the distance.

While the machines crawled over the pale
dirt hills, Al had already headed toward the cluster of metal
trailers at the front of the property and Juliette followed,
tottering on her high heels over the uneven graveled drive. He
climbed four steps at the front of the first trailer, opened the
door and held it for her. She clutched her steno pad and entered a
room with linoleum flooring and walls covered with tacked-up
notices and permits. A desk, its surface strewn with papers, sat at
one end of the room, but the largest feature was a long worktable
where rolled blueprints were unfurled and held in place with two
staplers, a metal tape measure and several rocks. A stocky man sat
behind the desk, phone to his ear, leaning so far back in his
swivel chair that Juliette was surprised it didn’t take off beneath
him. He gave her the once-over as she stepped into the room, before
he noticed Al behind her.

“I, uh, I’ll call you back, Mr. Sciatone,”
he said, snapping upright in his seat, dropping the phone to its
cradle. “Mr. Proletti. Didn’t know you was stopping by today.”

“I know,” said Al. His eyes traveled the
width of the desk before he turned toward the worktable. He stared
at the blueprints, smoothing the top sheet with his hand. “Why
aren’t we in phase three yet?”

The man edged his way past the cluttered
desk, giving a nod toward Juliette as he passed.

“Sorry. Where are my manners?” Al said.
“Juliette, this is Ernie Batista, job foreman.”

Ernie gave her a tentative smile. She never
recalled making a man nervous before, but this one was walking on
eggshells.

“So?” Al’s question was more pointed this
time. “Phase three, Ernie. Talk to me.”

“Well, Mr. Proletti, there was that delay
with the concrete delivery …”

“Old news. We got that straightened out
three days ago. Why am I not seeing a foundation out there
yet?”

“The trench is there, sir, it’s just we had
all that rain. An alligator came onto the site and got itself stuck
in the trench and none of those bas— uh, guys on the crew would go
anywhere close. Finally, Tommy the Shark shot the thing … but they
didn’t make such good progress this week.”

Al gave the man a silent stare with his
intense blue eyes. “Next guy shirks his duty around here, the
gator’s gonna get him.” A long, silent beat went by before Al
laughed. “Can you see it now? Some guy shows up to put forms in
that trench and there’s this big old gator?”

Ernie’s laugh started as a shaky chuckle but
soon he was roaring. Juliette put on a polite smile, not quite sure
whether she was meant to be in on this conversation. All at once,
Al’s laugh went dead silent.

“Wait outside,” he said to Juliette.

The humor had drained out of the room as if
there were a whirlpool in the floor. She dipped her head in a
slight nod and did as he ordered. Three seconds later she heard a
crash from inside the trailer. She hustled toward the car as
quickly as her high heels allowed.

Al’s face was serious when he came out of
the trailer but at the car he turned to all smiles. She took her
seat and tucked the unused steno pad beside the console.

“Okay,” he announced. “Business done. We’re
gonna have some lunch. I got a little something to show you.”

It was as if there had never been a tense
moment in the man’s life. She decided whatever had passed between
Al and Ernie back there was something purely between them,
something that was none of her business. Maybe the men had been
friends forever, maybe they joked around like this all the time.
She put the whole thing out of her mind as the Porsche roared onto
the freeway once again. With her head back against the headrest and
the cool breeze from the sunroof, she felt there wasn’t a care in
the world she couldn’t handle.

They drove to a part of the city she’d never
seen, crossed a bridge and entered a drive where a guard saluted Al
and a gate swung silently open revealing large lots with mansions
set well back from the streets. He took the turns confidently.
Juliette watched for a restaurant, wondering if her simple black
skirt and purple blouse would be elegant enough for any place
around here.

“Don’t worry about it,” he said, his
fingertips light on her forearm. “You look beautiful.”

She gave a hesitant smile but felt the
tingle of the touch long after he’d returned his hand to the wheel.
Now he could read her mind?

The sleek car turned right at a narrow drive
where straight rows of royal palms formed a colonnade with a tall
fountain sparkling in the distance. Al took the lane slowly and
swung around the circular drive at the end. A fawn colored building
with red tile roof spread out in two wings with a central portico
held by tall pillars. Juliette looked for a placard with the name
of the place but saw none.

“Home, sweet home,” he said, pocketing the
car key and coming around to her side.

This is a house?

She allowed him to take her hand, assisting
her out of the car. He let go, shut the car door, and they walked
together up a set of stone steps. The massive wooden door led to a
foyer larger than her entire apartment. Overhead, a rib-vaulted
ceiling showcased painted scenes, like something from the medieval
cathedrals she’d read about in novels. Double staircases rose on
each side of the entry, with carved pillars and white stonework
forming arches that framed a view through two-story-high windows at
the back. She could see a shady veranda and gardens that stretched
out of sight and had to remind herself not to gape.

BOOK: Weddings Can Be Murder
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