Most Likely to Die (A Kate Jasper Mystery) (2 page)

“Guilty as charged,” I admitted. “I brought the tofu burgers for the grill.”

“Well bless you,” Aurora said. “I brought Tandoori tofu brochettes.”

“And I brought a pot of chili
sans
carne, thank you very much,” Pam Ortega put in. She kissed her fingertips. “
Mucho
spicy.”

I turned to Pam with pleasure. Pam had been a large and beautiful teenager, and was now a large and beautiful woman, with the curves of an Ingres odalisque under her peasant blouse and jeans. Her heart-shaped face and lustrous eyes had a wry look to them that hadn’t been there before. It looked good. I smiled at her as Sid turned to Jack and began talking again.

“So I got this deal going on this vintage Chevy for you if you want…”

“I believe I’ll help Natalie with the grill,” Aurora said quietly.

“Be glad to help you help her,” Wayne added just as quietly.

Sid was still talking as the odd couple walked away together.

“You could fix up the old clunker, then we could split the cash…”

Pam tugged on my hand, pulling me out of blasting range.

“So, Kate,” she whispered after we’d moved a yard or so away. “What’s the story with you and Wayne?”

Did she want the real story or the easy-listening version? I looked into her eyes and saw real interest there, then took a deep breath. Not just for the air to tell the story, but to ease the tightness in my chest.

“Well, I was married for a long time to this guy named Craig Jasper,” I began. “Fourteen years. We got divorced a few years ago and now—”

“Is this thing safe to play?” Mark Myers yelled out, his hands on the sides of the Hot Flash pinball machine where it sat on the opposite side of the patio.

Pam and I both turned to him.

“Mark looks good, doesn’t he?” Pam said.

And he did. Mark had filled out since high school. His wiry body had some muscle now. His face was still round though, with alert, intense eyes. Even beneath his receding hairline, those eyes set in that face made him look a lot younger than he was. Younger than any of the rest of us.

“Ask Sid!” I yelled back.

“Ready Freddy,” Sid obliged, flashing Mark the go-ahead enthusiastically. “She’s hot to trot like an old whore—”

“Sid!” Elaine objected, cuffing him on the shoulder.

Sid laughed as Mark hit the reset button on Hot Flash. The machine came to electrical life with an audible hum. It was a vintage Friedman machine with a backglass featuring a lone man being struck by lightning as he stared at three scantily clad women. The look on his face was rapturous. Hot Flash had a wooden top bar on the front, and broad metal bands riveted to the sides. And a playfield that had little more to offer than thumper-bumpers and jellyfish roll-overs. Not a lot of action.

I turned back to Pam.

“Sure is hot in here,” came a voice from Mark’s direction. Only it didn’t sound like Mark. I swiveled my head around to look. Actually, it sounded like the words had come from the pinball machine itself.

“Mark’s a vegie too,” Pam told me, and I brought my head back around. “Anyway, go on about you and Wayne.”

I snuck a glance at the man in question. Wayne and Aurora were standing by Natalie, and Aurora was pouring him some of her home-pressed apple juice. Wayne loved apple juice. And Aurora had brought a couple of gallons.

“Well, Wayne and I met a few years ago,” I said, smiling a little at the sight of another glass of juice disappearing down Wayne’s gullet. “And we’ve lived together awhile too. And we’re…well, we’re going to get married.”

“But…” said Pam.

I reached out and squeezed her hand. She was just as perceptive as she’d always been. Maybe she should have become a therapist instead of a librarian.

“But,” I took another deep breath, “I don’t want it to be like my marriage to Craig. I want a simple little wedding and then we’re out of there. Just married, no big deal. But Wayne wants a ‘real’ wedding with family and friends and flowers and a best man and—”

“And all the stuff you had at your first wedding.”

I nodded violently. Pam got it. If only Wayne would.

“And the worst thing is we’re arguing about an event that’s supposed to be about love and commitment.” I lowered my voice. “Wayne used to be too insecure to argue with me. I’m not sure which way I like him better—”

The sound of bells going off interrupted me. Mark had won a game.

“Hey, Natalie!” he shouted. “Want a shot at Hot Flash?”

Natalie just shook her head. As stiff and dry as ever. That’s why I’d never believed her sexual reputation.

Mark yelled at Becky next.

“My turn, my turn!” Becky squealed like a kid and went running over, her pale legs flashing beneath short-shorts. Now with Becky, I’d believed all the rumors.

“It’s hard to picture Becky as an attorney,” Pam said as if she’d heard my thought.

“And a mother,” I whispered back.

We both looked at Becky’s fifteen-year-old son, D.V. He had his mother’s delicate facial structure, but the inherited blue eyes were pinched and glaring. He wore his blond hair slicked down under a backwards baseball cap, and his jeans were so baggy they looked like they’d slide off at any moment as he stalked after his mother.

“Why do you think Becky brought him—” Pam began.

“So what are you two girls whispering about?” came Sid’s voice, closer than it had been a moment before.

“Vegetarian food,” answered Pam, managing to plaster a serious look on her face.

I stifled a giggle. Especially when Sid’s broad face fell.

“Chard,” she added soberly.

But Sid was irrepressible.

“The only thing I like charred is my steak,” he told us and slapped his leg.

He was still laughing when Lillian walked up. Sid snaked his arm around her.

“You remind me of a chick I knew in ‘Nam—” he began, but Lillian circled out from beneath his arm before he’d even finished speaking. I took a quick glance at Jack, who was now gazing out above us, humming a song I didn’t recognize.

“It sure is hot in here,” came a voice from the direction of Hot Flash. I swung around in time to see Becky jump back from the machine. “I must be having a hot flash,” the voice went on. Becky squealed.

I’d been right the first time. The machine was talking. And it certainly hadn’t been talking when it had left home on the truck. I turned back to Sid. He was grinning, one hand in his pocket. Sid Semling, master prankster. He must have done something to the machine.

He turned away from my stare to Charlie Hirsch, standing behind him.

“Hey, Charlie,” he prompted. “You were in ‘Nam too, right?”

I had almost forgotten Charlie was there. Charlie was a big, shambling man with a long face and wide, dreamy eyes that didn’t seem to focus very well on the person talking to him. Especially now.

Charlie nodded without answering Sid, his eyes somewhere else. On Pam, I realized. Of course. How could I have forgotten that Pam and Charlie had been married (for however short a time). And me and my big mouth going on about marrying Wayne. My eyes followed Charlie’s to Pam’s. She was watching him intently, her lush Ingres body leaning toward him.

“That all you got to say about it, buddy?” Sid demanded.

Charlie nodded again. God, even Wayne was more talkative. Even Jack.

Sid turned back to Jack.

“So how the hell’d
you
beat the draft?” he demanded.

Jack opened his mouth, but before he could answer Lillian interjected, “Bad eyesight.”

“Lucky stiff,” Sid grumped and then circled in on Pam, his arm around her shoulders in an instant.

“Hey!” Pam said as she pushed his arm away. “What’s with the arm bit? Do you get a hundred points every time you put it around someone female?”

Sid just grinned and put his hand back in his pocket.

“It sure is hot in here,” the machine across the patio said. “This must be menopause.”

Becky shrieked. I didn’t blame her. She was my age. Not quite old enough for menopause. Just old enough to start worrying about it. And now I was sure it was Sid’s prank. Who else would be tacky enough to make menopause jokes in the first place?

Becky abandoned Hot Flash and came running over to our little group. “Did you hear that?” she wanted to know. “Did you hear that? The machine talked to me!”

Sid didn’t surprise us. He put his arm around Becky.

“Did you make it do that, Sid?” she demanded, the lilt in her voice making the demand a flirtation.

“Would it make you happy if I did?” he flirted back.

“Get your arm off my mother,” D.V. growled.

I jumped in place. I hadn’t seen him follow his mother back. Damn. The kid was scary. And I wasn’t the only one who thought so. Sid dropped his arm before D.V. even finished his sentence.

Becky just giggled. “Now, D.V.,” she cajoled. “No harm done.”

D.V. turned on his heel and stalked back to the pinball machine.

“D.V. is growing up,” Becky told us, her blue eyes wide with what looked like affection. “Used to be ‘Davie’ but now it’s ‘D.V.’ He’s a good kid.”

We all nodded, even Sid. No one was about to argue the point. Aloud, anyway.

D.V. set up a game on Hot Flash and began whacking the flipper buttons.

“It’s hot as a coven’s oven in here,” the machine said after a few seconds had passed. “Hot as a wizard’s pizard. Hot as…”

But D.V. went on playing as if Hot Flash were just humming and chiming like any old pinball machine.

This time when I looked at Sid, he pulled something out of his pocket and flashed it at me, something resembling a garage door opener. A remote control?

Then he shoved it back in his pocket and came toward me with his arms extended.

“Oh no you don’t,” I told him, raising my own arms defensively. “Don’t even think about it.”

But Aurora got physical before 1 had to. She walked up to Sid and put her own thin arm around his wide shoulders. Sid jumped and let out a little yip of surprise.

“I’ve always wanted a boy-toy,” Aurora cooed. “Will you be mine?”

Laughter roared over the patio from all directions.

Mark walked up on Sid’s other flank.

“Me next,” he purred, extending his muscular arm.

“Not without an HIV test,” Sid protested. “A squirrelly guy like you.”

I laughed again. And was immediately sorry I had.

“I’m HIV negative,” Mark said, his intense eyes flashing. “But I’ve known better men than you who’ve died of AIDS.”

The patio went silent. Aurora lifted her arm from Sid’s shoulder. Mark had already told us he was gay. And he’d probably hoped for acceptance of that fact by the very people that might have turned on him if he had come out twenty-five years ago. I tried to think of something to say. But Sid beat me to it.

“Hey, sorry, old buddy,” he muttered and gingerly patted Mark’s back.

Mark gave him a quick grin of forgiveness, the anger gone from his eyes. “As for being squirrelly,” he said lightly. “As a veterinarian, I’ll take that as a compliment.”

Sid laughed loud and hearty. Too loud and hearty. But it was better than nothing. I could feel the collective sigh of relief as the moment passed.

“Hey, you’re an almost doctor. Maybe you can tell me how to lose flab,” Sid rambled on. “I’m supposed to take off fifty pounds. I’m forty-three, and I’ve got a heart condition. Do you believe it?”

Mark tugged at a nonexistent beard on his chin and then answered, “No more canned dog food for you!”

We all laughed at that one.

“At least I’ve got a job with health insurance,” Sid said. “Sales for Natalie’s computer firm—”

“I work for a computer firm in Santa Rosa too,” Elaine interrupted. “Even if I’m just the head secretary and Natalie owns her own company. But our firm is growing. Natalie’s is stagnating—”

“Well, at least she’s good to her employees,” Sid argued without apparent rancor. “They like her. She’s a good boss, a dynamite programmer—”

But Elaine didn’t want to hear anything more about Natalie Nusser.

“So, Charlie, what are you doing these days?” she asked instead.

I’d almost forgotten Charlie Hirsch again. In his khaki shirt and pants, he seemed to blend into the sheltering oak trees.

“Writing children’s books,” he told her. His deep voice was gruff.

“That’s it?” Sid demanded.

Charlie shrugged. “I do some gardening too. And I’m a handyman.”

“A handyman, for God’s sake,” Sid objected. “Wasn’t your old man a doctor? What does he think of you gardening for doctors instead of being one?”

“He’s dead,” Charlie answered.

“Hey, sorry, man,” Sid said for the fourteenth time that afternoon.

“Well, Gravendale’s seen better times,” Elaine opined. At least it was a change of subject.

“Yeah,” agreed Sid. “I can’t believe all those Mexicans downtown, pissing on the street like pigs—”