To Brie or Not to Brie (19 page)

“I told you, I wasn’t looking in your car.”

“Yeah, and pigs fly,” he hissed. “Were you hoping to find a list of my known associates?”
Though Jordan swore that Vinnie wasn’t Mafia, he sounded like it. “Nice try. Listen
up, blondie. If you keep poking around, you might find your pal Jacky doesn’t feel
so good one day.”

“Did you just threaten my friend’s life?”

“No, I didn’t. Got me?”

“Oh, I got you, all right,” I said, emboldened by the fact
that Tyanne and Rebecca were still keeping watch. “Loud and clear.” As a ruse, I glanced
over Vinnie’s shoulder and hitched my chin as a
hello
at an imaginary person, then I eyeballed Vinnie’s hand clutching my sweater.

Vinnie swiveled his head. His hold on me loosened. I wrested free.

He whirled around, his gaze fierce. “Before you run off, blondie, one last thing.”
He shook the book in his hand, which I realized was an address book, complete with
gold alphabetical tabs. “I haven’t called any of the folks in this little beauty yet,
but I will if I have to. So you tell Jacky that if she wants to stay off the radar
with all the nice folks in New Jersey, she might consider paying me a little cash.
Keeping a person’s whereabouts secret doesn’t come cheap.”

Jordan’s comment about the horse coming to the trough flew into my head. I gritted
my teeth. “Why should she worry about people in New Jersey knowing where she lives?
Her abusive husband is dead.”

“Because money is like a magnet, and she’ll be the one rolling in dough. My brother
had a lot of angry clients.” He held a finger to his mouth and whispered, “Shh.”

The sound sent a shiver through me. “Where should she contact you?” I sputtered.

“I’ll let her know.” He chomped his teeth as if he meant to bite me.

I recoiled.

“Have a good day, blondie.”

As he strutted away with the tails of his terry cloth wrap flapping like angry snakes,
I heard him snickering, and I wondered how my plan to find some tidbit that might
coerce him to leave town had made such a major U-turn.

After closing the shop and taking Rags and Rocket home, I headed to Timothy O’Shea’s
Irish Pub for girls’ night out. The pub was busy; it usually was on Monday nights,
but not because of the music. The musicians were given Mondays off because every television
screen over the old oak bar was tuned to
Monday Night Football
.

As I headed toward the banquette where Meredith, Tyanne, and Rebecca were sitting,
I caught the score. The Cleveland Browns were up by seven.

“You’re late, Charlotte,” my friends said in unison like a Greek chorus. They had
already ordered cocktails, including a glass of sauvignon blanc for me.

I snuggled onto the leather seat beside Meredith and clinked glasses, then said with
the others, “To gossip.” The Musketeers had nothing on our camaraderie.

“Where are Delilah, Jacky, and Freckles?” I asked.

“Can’t make it. Life’s hectic,” Meredith said. “Now,
Charlotte, what’s this I hear about an altercation with Vinnie?” Her mouth turned
down in a frown.

“I didn’t tell her everything,” Rebecca blurted. “Just up to the point where Vinnie
caught you.”

I set down my wineglass and sketched the story in fifty words or less, keeping my
tone light. “There I was.” I shot my hands up and plastered myself against the back
of the banquette. “Vinnie’s nose nearly touching mine. I swear my knees were knocking.
All because these two”—I indicated Tyanne and Rebecca, who both looked chagrined—“prodded
me to action.” I didn’t add the bit about Vinnie’s not-so-subtle request for hush
money. I was still trying to figure out what to do about that.

Meredith poked my ribs. “You take too many risks.”

“It was daylight,” I said. “Besides, I’m tough.”

“And we were ready to defend her,” Rebecca chimed in.

Meredith said, “Oh, yeah, like you could defend her. You’re about as big as a bantam
rooster.” She turned her focus to Tyanne. “And you’re a southern belle. You wouldn’t
hurt a fly.”

“Sugar, you are mightily mistaken,” Tyanne said, chin raised. “My sisters know how
ferocious I am.” She boxed the air with her fists.

“Your husband does, too,” Rebecca said. “That’s why he split town.”

Tyanne grinned. “Better believe it.”

Meredith shook her head. “Charlotte, did you at least call Urso and tell him Vinnie
threatened you?”

“I left a message and gave him the basics.” Not that Urso had returned the call. After
the face-off on the sidewalk, I hadn’t expected him to. He was never happy when I
was a snoop.

“Here we are.” Our waitress set a combo platter filled with mini goat cheese pizzas,
tamale cakes with salsa verde, and Parmesan-and-rosemary-stuffed potatoes in the center
of the table.

Rebecca said, “We ordered for you. Hope you don’t mind.”

What was to mind? I was salivating. When had I eaten last? I dove into the stuffed
potatoes first. The crispy crust popped as I bit into it; the rest melted in my mouth.

As the waitress sashayed away and Tyanne and Rebecca struck up a conversation about
the football game, Meredith elbowed me. “Psst. Look who walked in.”

Iris and Prudence entered the pub, followed by Stratton and his history teacher buddy.
Prudence wore a boxy suit and clutched a purse under her arm. Everything about her,
from her tight jaw to tense shoulders, screamed:
Keep away.
Iris, on the other hand, radiated confidence. She had blown her shaggy hair smooth;
her tawny brown silk sweater and trousers were stylish and formfitting.

Meredith elbowed me again.

“Cut that out,” I said. My ribs were starting to ache.

“Didn’t you just say you were tough?” she teased.

I glowered at her.

She chortled and made a
gotcha
face. We had been friends since elementary school. Some childish behavior never died.
“What did you poke me for this time?” I said.

“Anabelle is sitting at the bar talking to Tim.”

The owner of the pub was one of the friendliest people on earth. Whenever he was bartending,
he would let any patron bend his ear for a minimum of five minutes.

“So?” I said. “She has every right to be here.”

“She’s checking her watch.”

“I repeat, so?”

Meredith leaned forward. “I think she’s waiting for Vinnie to show up.”

“Oh, yeah, without a doubt.” Rebecca dragged her gaze from the TVs and back to us,
her fervor matching Meredith’s. “Frilly blouse, full makeup. Yep, she’s on a date.”

“Do you think he stood her up?” Meredith asked. “She looks forlorn.”

I said, “She’ll be forlorn when she discovers what the inside of his car looks like.
It’s a rat’s nest.”

“Charlotte, twelve o’clock,” Meredith said, gesturing toward the front door again.
At least she hadn’t poked me this time. “Mr. Handsome just walked in with his sis
and her boyfriend.”

Jacky, Jordan, and Hugo approached the attractive hostess, who held up a hand and
mouthed:
five minutes.

As Jordan continued to chat with the hostess, Jacky and Hugo headed to the bar. Each
sat on a stool. With sleight of hand, Hugo pulled something shiny from behind Jacky’s
ear. It shimmered in the glow of the pendant lights hanging over the bar. Jacky laughed.
In all the time I had known her, I had never seen her so at ease. She seemed totally
into Hugo and not at all anxious that he might have killed her husband. I felt the
urge to ask her whether Hugo had regular conversations with his mother in the “wee
hours of the night,” as Rebecca had noted, or whether he had fabricated his alibi,
but how could I question his character without driving a wedge into Jacky’s relationship
either with him or with me?

Let it go, Charlotte,
I told myself. Jacky had good instincts, other than having married her abusive-now-dead
husband. She could tell if Hugo was a nice guy or not. At least I hoped she could.

Jordan joined them but remained standing and surveyed the pub. When he caught me looking
his way, he crooked a finger. A flutter of desire bubbled inside me, and I wondered
if I would ever grow tired of his come-hither gestures.

“What do you think?” Tyanne said, drawing me back to the conversation at the table.

“About what?” I said.

“Where did you go?” Meredith teased in a singsong voice while toying with her hair.
“Is someone having a crush moment?”

It was my turn to elbow her. “It’s not a crush. It’s full-on love.”

Meredith fanned herself. “Heart be still.”

“You’re a fine one to talk,” I said. “You soon-to-be-brides can’t keep your feet on
the ground, either.”

“Can, too.” Meredith stamped her feet beneath the table.

Tyanne giggled. “C’mon, you two. What I was asking was, what do you think about Anabelle
and Vinnie dating? My sister said Anabelle was in the Tip to Toe Salon on Saturday,
and she couldn’t stop talking about the new man in her life.”

“Uh-oh.” Rebecca aimed a finger at me. “You should call Octavia.”

“Why?”

“She’ll get Anabelle in line. She’s like a mother hen to her. She’ll warn her that
Vinnie could be a murderer.”

I wondered whether I, at Anabelle’s age, would have wanted all these people butting
into my personal affairs. Of course I wouldn’t have, and yet people had talked. After
all, a good-for-nothing crêpe chef had dumped me.

I caught Jordan looking my way. He hooked a finger at me again, his face grim. So
much for a come-hither glance. I excused myself from my friends.

Tyanne said, “You tell her, sugar,” obviously thinking I was heading to Anabelle to
set her straight.

I drew near to Jordan.

“Hello, gorgeous,” he said.

“Hey.” I stroked his arm, then slipped my hand into his. “You didn’t call me Saturday
night after visiting Jacky.”

“We had a crisis at the farm Sunday and today. A couple of cows got sick.”

“I’m so sorry. How’s Jacky?”

“She’s hanging in. I was at her place until after midnight.” With his free hand, he
ran a finger across my cheek and tucked a hair behind my ear. I shivered with desire.
Sotto voce, he said, “Now what’s this I heard about your confrontation with Vinnie?”

I gulped. How had he heard? Trying to play dumb, I said, “What confrontation?”

“Outside the Country Kitchen.”

I pulled my hand free. “How—?”

“Tim told me. He heard it from Anabelle.”

I shot a look at Anabelle, who waved a pinky greeting. How had she known about my
mini-clash? Had she been keeping an eye on me? Why? Now that she no longer ran the
bookshop, was that how she stayed tuned in to local gossip? I turned my gaze back
to my fiancé. “It was…” I was about to say nothing, but thought better of it. Honesty
was the best policy where Jordan was concerned. “He demanded hush money.”

“For what?”

“To keep quiet about where Jacky is. He intimated that there are others in New Jersey
who might want to harm her.”

“He’s full of beans.”

“He has an address book. He said he would contact all those people and tell them where
to find Jacky unless she paid him to keep quiet.”

Jordan sighed. “He must really be hurting for instant cash.”

The notion made me wonder again what had happened to his brother’s wad of cash. I
assumed Vinnie had stolen it, but if he hadn’t, who had?

“I’m worried about you, Charlotte. You’re a little too eager and a little too inquisitive.”
Jordan cupped my neck, his hand warm and comforting. “I need you to stand down.”

My insides tensed. There were those words again. Less than a year ago, I thought I
had learned everything about Jordan’s past, but there was something hanging in the
wind. Something intangible. I loved him and wanted to trust
everything he told me about his past, but he needed to explain the language he used
and those dog tags hidden in the hutch in his living room.

“What’s wrong?” he said. “You shivered.”

Keeping my voice as steady as possible, I said, “You use those phrases that make me
suspect that at one time you were more than a restaurateur in upstate New York.”

He dropped his hand to his side. His lips drew thin.

“What is the rest of your backstory?” I said. “There’s something…I don’t think it’s
dangerous, but it’s private and almost sad. The other night—”

Jordan held up a palm. “Let’s not talk here.”

“Then when? Where?” I rarely picked a battle, but I needed answers.

“Come with me.” He gripped my elbow and steered me out of the restaurant.

The evening breeze was cool and stimulating. The scent of smoke from fires in chimneys
permeated the air. Children’s happy screaming voices resounded from the Village Square
as the children enjoyed their final moments of play before dinner and bedtime.

Jordan pressed me up against the wood siding—not to kiss me, but to speak quietly.
The exterior lights on the pub cast a golden glow on his face, but they didn’t soften
his intense gaze. “What do you want to know?”

My breathing grew short, peppery. I didn’t fear for my life. I feared the truth. Would
my world fall down around me with whatever Jordan was about to reveal? It was serious,
that much was certain. But I had to know. “Were you a cop?”