Bond, Stephanie - Body Movers 05 (30 page)

everything else going?”

“Fine. I’m going back to finish installing the security system

at the town house later this week.”

“Sounds good. How’s Meg?” she teased.

“I wouldn’t know,” he chirped.

Carlotta smiled. Something was afoot, otherwise the mere

mention of the girl’s name wouldn’t push Wesley’s

buttons. “Have you seen Hannah?”

“Uh…no. What makes you think I would’ve seen Hannah?”

She frowned at the strange tone in his voice. “Wesley, are

you lying? Is Hannah avoiding me?”

“Why would she be avoiding you?” he squeaked. “I gotta

go. Call you later.”

When dead air sounded, Carlotta disconnected the phone

slowly. Something was definitely up with Hannah, but her

friend’s moodiness paled in comparison to what Coop

might be facing.

At the thought of Coop being seriously il , grief engulfed

Carlotta, squeezing the air out of her lungs. The thought of

him suffering…of not being in their lives—in her life—was

unbearable. She ached to reach out to him, but she knew

he wouldn’t want her sympathy.

She wrapped her arms around her middle and tucked into

herself, rocking. The overwhelming pain was savagely

familiar, reminiscent of the helplessness she’d felt when

her parents had abandoned her.

A knock on the door sounded. She wiped at her eyes

hastily and straightened. “Come in.”

Peter stuck his head inside. “How about risotto with our

pork chops?” Then he frowned. “Are you okay?”

She touched her forehead. “A sudden migraine. I’m sorry,

Peter. Is it okay if I skip dinner?”

He nodded, but from his disappointed expression she

knew he realized that skipping dinner also meant skipping

sex. “Get some rest,” he said. “I won’t bother you.”

When the door closed, guilt swamped her. Peter didn’t

deserve her waffling. But she couldn’t ignore how the

thought of losing Coop had affected her. She needed more

time to think.

Miserable and confused, Carlotta pushed to her feet and

headed toward the shower for a good cry.

26

Hope you are feeling better. Love, Peter

Carlotta ran her finger over the note he’d left for her on

the kitchen counter. Unfortunately, she wasn’t feeling

better. After a night of tossing and turning over what

might be wrong with Coop, she had, as her mother used to

say, “worked herself into a state.” Add to that the fact that

Hannah wasn’t returning her calls, Michael Lane was stil

missing and she was stil wrestling with whether or not to

let the police know that her father might’ve had a

romantic relationship with one of the victims of The

Charmed Kil er. She’d come to the conclusion that she

might never sleep again.

Stil wearing cotton pajamas and house shoes, she

stretched, yawning.

Peter’s concern only made her feel worse because while

he’d offered her nothing but love and support, all the

things weighing on her mind were a wedge between her

heart and Peter’s.

She winced every time she thought about their sabotaged

attempt at lovemaking yesterday. The episode had

certainly fallen short of the earth-shattering reunion that

both of them had hoped for.

The Persian paraded into the room, acting as if she owned

the place.

Carlotta frowned down at the cat. “Proud of yourself,

aren’t you? You’ve been nothing but trouble since I got

here.” She sighed. “Did Angela send you to make my life

miserable?”

The cat lifted her head and meowed.

Carlotta shrank back, then she stopped and pinched the

bridge of her nose. She was officially losing her mind if she

thought the blond, green-eyed Persian was channeling

blond, green-eyed Angela.

Feeling flushed and overwhelmed she reached across the

counter to flip on the switch for the ceiling fan. Patricia

Alexander had once offered to share her antianxiety meds,

but maybe she should consider getting some of her own.

She poured a glass of orange juice and carried it to the

table, along with the notebook in which she was keeping

details about The Charmed Kil er case. She had a couple of

hours before she had to be at work, and she wanted to

record the info about the incident in the ladies’ room at

Moody’s before it faded from her memory. The more she

thought about it, the more she was sure the unidentified

person had been Michael. He’d always made it a point to

dress—and smel —as expensive as possible. Even if he

couldn’t afford to.

Jack had been skeptical, but promised to research recent

purchases of the cologne citywide.

Carlotta sipped the orange juice and considered Jack. She

hadn’t answered his phone call last night because she

hadn’t decided whether to share Wesley’s suspicions

about Coop’s recent uncharacteristic behavior. Besides,

she was half-afraid Jack would be able to tel from her

voice that she and Peter had…petered out.

If she kept this up, she was going to have to keep a list of

the secrets she was keeping.

The cat sprang up onto the table, walked over to the

cloisonné Oriental vase and rubbed against the textured

metal surface, her contented purr sounding like the coo of

a homing pigeon.

Irrational anger toward the cat seized her. “Get down!”

Carlotta said, waving her arms. Startled, the cat hissed at

her, jumping back and bumping the vase. Carlotta lunged

for the container, but it was top-heavy and it slammed

down on the table. The lid flew off and a powdery

substance spil ed all over the wood surface, then was

sucked up in the draft created by the overhead ceiling fan

and scattered all over the room…and all over her.

Carlotta pushed to her feet, blinking and sputtering, her

arms raised in futility. “Ew, what is this stuff?”

As if there was someone to hear her. The cat had high-

tailed it out of the room.

She hurried to turn off the ceiling fan, but accidentally

increased the speed, creating a sandstorm. Finally, she

managed to switch off the fan. When the dust settled, a

film of white coated everything in sight like a fine layer of

snow.

Peter was obviously more of a smoker than he let on if he

kept a container of sand on hand. She didn’t see any

cigarette butts, but what else could it be?

Then a horrific alternative slid into her mind: Angela had

been cremated. Had Peter replaced the silk flower

arrangement on the table with an urn containing his wife’s

ashes?

It made perfect, awful sense.

Carlotta swallowed hard at the revelation, then gagged at

the bitter taste of something foreign in the back of her

throat. In fact, her mouth was ful of grit. Ew.

In ful -panic mode, she scrambled for her cel phone and

called the only person she could count on to help in a

situation like this one. “Hannah,” she shouted into the

phone when her friend’s voice mail kicked in, “you have to

come help me. I think I accidental y scattered Peter’s wife

all over the house.”

Hannah called back in less than a minute. “I thought

Peter’s wife was dead.”

“She is,” Carlotta said. “And I think she was sitting on the

kitchen table—‘was’ being the operative word.”

“I’l bring my Shop-Vac.”

Carlotta disconnected the call and counted her blessings.

When a person offered to come and help you clean up

someone’s cremated remains, it had to be genuine

friendship.

She debated taking a shower in the interim to wash Angela

off of her, but reasoned it was better to wait until they got

the rest of Angela cleaned up. She stood at the counter,

alternately fighting tears and bouts of hysterical laughter

as she surveyed the damage she’d unleashed. She hadn’t

thought she could top totaling Peter’s Porsche.

Minus one hundred.

True to her word, a few minutes later, the phone rang and

Hannah was at the entrance gate, waiting for Carlotta to

buzz her in with Peter’s code. On the verge of a nervous

breakdown, Carlotta told Hannah to come around to the

right side of the house, through the pool area, to the

sliding glass door.

“I’m afraid to come to the front door,” she said into the

phone, looking down at her dusty house shoes. “I don’t

want to track Angela all over the place.”

Soon she heard Hannah’s van pul in to the driveway, then

the heavy clomping of boots on the walkway leading

around to the side of the house. Carlotta deactivated the

door and window alarms, then opened the sliding glass

door to admit her friend, who was holding a smal -canister

Shop-Vac.

“Wow,” Hannah said, looking her up and down. “This is

fucked up, even for you.”

“Thanks,” Carlotta said, brushing powdery stuff off her

shoulder. “It was an accident.”

Hannah glanced over the white-coated great room. A hazy

film stil hung in the air. “What the hel happened?”

“The cat jumped up on the table and knocked over the

urn.”

“What cat?”

“A stray Persian that just might be Angela Ashford

reincarnated.”

Hannah squinted. “Are you high?”

Carlotta sighed. “No, but I wish I was. I didn’t even know

Angela’s ashes were sitting on the table. I thought it was

just a vase.”

“Setting them on the kitchen table is just plain tacky,”

Hannah said. “And weird, even for the South.”

“What am I going to do?”

“Uh…don’t sneeze?”

“Helpful,” Carlotta said sarcastically. “Seriously, should I

call Peter and confess, or do you think we can salvage

this…er, her…before the housekeeper gets here?”

Hannah reached forward and swiped her finger across

Carlotta’s nose, then winced at the pale gritty residue.

“How much time do we have?”

“About two hours.”

“I’l start vacuuming, you get the broom and dustpan.”

Remarkably, within an hour the room started to look

familiar again. Carlotta walked to the urn to transfer the

contents of the dustpan into it for the umpteenth time.

Hannah turned off the Shop-Vac and came to empty the

machine’s dust bucket into the urn, as wel .

“We’re probably contaminating her ashes,” Carlotta

murmured.

“How do you contaminate ashes? It’s not like someone’s

going to eat them.”

“Stil , you know what I mean.” Carlotta studied her friend,

then pursed her mouth. “You didn’t say anything about

Peter’s house.”

Hannah glanced around and nodded. “Nice place.”

“You’ve been avoiding me.”

“No, I haven’t,” Hannah said, but she didn’t make eye

contact.

“You’re not mad at me over getting fired?”

“It wasn’t your fault. Besides, I’l find something else.

Thank goodness the one thing Atlantans have in common

is eating.”

“Have you seen Wesley lately?”

Hannah’s back stiffened. “Wesley? What makes you think

I’ve seen Wesley?”

“Maybe because he said the same thing, in the same fake

tone, when I asked him if he’d seen you.”

Hannah shrugged. “I don’t know what you’re talking

about.” She flipped on the Shop-Vac and went back to

work.

Carlotta scratched her nose with her knuckle. Something

was up with those two.

After two more passes with the broom and the vacuum,

Carlotta and Hannah admitted they’d recovered all of

Angela they possibly could.

“So this is what’s left after they cremate you,” Carlotta

said, peering into the urn.

“I read somewhere they have to sift out bone chips and

teeth.”

Carlotta made a face. “It doesn’t look like much. What if

Peter notices some of the ashes are gone?”

“If you’re worried about it, we could add fil er.”

“We’re not going to add fil er!” Then Carlotta narrowed

her eyes. “What kind of fil er?”

“You said something about a cat. Do you have kitty litter?”

Carlotta gasped in horror.

Hannah scoffed. “Spare me the self-righteous outrage. You

blew the man’s wife onto the chandelier.”

She glanced up at the dusty light fixture they hadn’t been

able to reach. “Okay…maybe just a little fil er.”

She went into the mudroom and pul ed out the bag of kitty

litter they’d had to buy for the Persian. When she held a

scoop of the sandy gray mixture next to the ashes in the

urn, she frowned. “The kitty litter is coarser and darker.”

Hannah headed toward the kitchen. “There’s gotta be

cornstarch here somewhere…or flour.”

“Christ, this is turning into a science experiment.”

Hannah was opening and closing cabinets. “Where’s your

blender?”

“It’s Peter’s blender,” Carlotta murmured, then walked to

the cabinet where it was stored and pul ed it out.

“So,” Hannah said casually, emerging with a canister of

flour, “have you two had sex yet?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

Carlotta sighed. “We tried.”

“Don’t tel me Richie Rich couldn’t get it up.”

“He got it up fine. But…he was nervous, and…”

“He shot the pearl jam before he put it in the ma’am?”

Carlotta frowned. “I hadn’t heard that particular medical