Chapter 37
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Harriet
“Well, that was enlightening,” Alexandru says, settling himself into my car. “Whitney was at the curtain fire wedding. And she requested that Sloane’s friend take down the picture from the sparkler wedding. Very suspicious.”
I’m thrilled that he seems to be taking such an interest in the mystery.
“It’s Bo’s word against those firefighters who made that list of who was there at the curtain fire wedding. They are very detail-oriented officials,” I point out. “It’s unlikely they missed getting somebody on there.”
“Did you not hear what Bo said? It is Whitney’s way to sneak into the weddings of her underlings.”
“True. Did he mean it literally, though?”
Alexandru shrugs.
“In any case, it’s enough to put her back in the running.” I make a note on my tablet. “Did you pick up anything else from Bo?”
“Fear. Alarm.”
“Because a killer has been in his midst?”
Alexandru looks like someone parsing out flavors, his striking face unmoving except for his coffee-colored eyes, alive with dark intent. “His fear was the kind that prey would have.”
I put on my seat belt. “Prey for us or prey for the killer?”
“Prey for us. It’s something about the archives.”
“What is up with those archives? It’s the same thing as Valerie’s weirdness about the photo archives.”
“A bit. Perhaps he and Valerie are working together.”
“That can’t be. Neither he nor Valerie was at the sparkler wedding.”
“Maybe we need to talk with Roy and Manny. Perhaps they are involved. Somebody from Richardson Photography was at every wedding.”
“Oh my god, if we’re going to start suspecting a serial killer photography gang, I’m going to need a new spreadsheet. No—scratch that. I’m gonna need a new spreadsheet, three beers, and ten Berky Bombs. And a lobotomy. Because it can’t be a whole group.”
“You’re the one who always says to keep an open mind. To follow the data.”
“All we know is that they’re feeling weird about something in the archives. It could be something that’s not murder. And Bo showed us all of his champagne collapse pictures. Totally forthcoming.”
We head north on Commerce, past the music conservatory and the sprawling grade school playground. You can tell that the tourist trade is ramping up by the length of the line at the ice cream shop across the street.
“It comes from here,” Alexandru suddenly says. “The guilt that you feel.”
“What? What are you talking about?” But I know what he’s talking about.
“The ice cream shop. You hate it. What happened there? What is that place to you?”
James actually disappeared from the school across the street, but the ice cream shop was the scene of my crime—I went there instead of grabbing James and walking him home.
“Maybe I still feel bad about the great butter brickle binge of twenty nineteen,” I say with a lightness I do not feel.
“You will tell me.”
“I’m sorry, are we trying to solve the case of Harriet Morgan’s random life events? ’Cause I thought we were working on the case of ‘let’s find that killer before Alexandru goes monster mash on the town’?”
I can feel his dark gaze on the side of my face. His power fills the small space. He’s relentless. Ancient. And he sees everything.
“What happened?”
“Can you please leave me alone on this one?” I turn to him. “Please?”
Something strange flickers across his face.
“It’s something from a long time ago,” I add softly.
“Pull over,” he says.
“I’m not talking about it.”
“No. Back at the Tres Hermanas restaurant. Whitney was there.”
“You realized that just now?”
“Yes.”
“You picked her out of that crowd?”
“We will question her.”
“I don’t want her to know she’s a suspect,” I say.
“Pull over,” he commands again. “I have a plan.”
I do a U-turn and pull into a space in front of the tea shop. “Let’s hear it.”
“We pretend to dine out there. We strike up a conversation with her and gather impressions.”
“I don’t know if we can do it that naturally, though. If we tip her off that she’s a suspect before we have our ducks in a row, it’ll be harder to bust her.”
“At this rate, we will be getting our ducks in a row forever.”
“You only get one chance to do a thing right,” I say. “We should at least see what’s in the photo that she wanted hidden from the world!”
Alexandru brushes an invisible speck of nothing off his perfectly tailored jacket sleeve. “The last I checked, Ms. Renfield, you are not my overlord, and I tire of your tentative ways.” With that, he opens his door and gets out.
“Oh my god, what?” I grab my bag, lock the door, and catch up to him. “We need to plan our approach.”
“Ten centuries and I’ve never needed a plan to talk to villagers. I don’t feel I need one now.”
He heads for the restaurant. There’s no stopping him.
Also, ten centuries?
The Tres Hermanas front patio is full of diners underneath elegant white lights strung overhead like stars.
Josie’s mother, Rita, meets us at the door. I introduce her to Alexandru, who takes her hand with his usual dangerous charm. She seems to be both enchanted and terrified, which I suppose is as rational a response as any.
She congratulates him on how tasteful the Kingston renovation looks from afar and tells him how she used to play there as a child, something he’s definitely been hearing a lot of.
“Could we sit on the porch?” I ask.
“We would like to sit near where Whitney Sternell is sitting,” Alexandru says.
“We met her at the bridal expo, and we wanted to…” I end my sentence in some mumbles with the words “you know” thrown in a few times, all in all doing a poor job of smoothing over the impression that we want to harass Whitney, which is what we want to do, I suppose.
“Yes, I heard about you being at the bridal expo. You’ll be happy to know Josie is in full zipped-lips mode.”
Rita leads us across the dining room and out to the porch, seating us at a lovely table next to the colorful planter boxes that separate the sidewalk from the diners.
“There’s really nothing to report,” I say to her.
“I understand. You and the prince simply want to say hello to the wedding planner that you met.” She winks.
“He’s not really a prince.”
“I am technically a prince,” Alexandru says once she’s gone.
“Prince of Dorkness.”
“She seemed nice,” he says.
“You will never, ever, ever go after her. Do you understand me?”
“The list of people I’m not to go after is getting annoyingly long.”
“I’m not fooling around. I will hunt you to the ends of the earth. I will so kill you.”
He looks amused.
A baby at a nearby table bursts into tears.
“I want you to promise.”
“Fine. Who is she?”
“That’s Josie’s mother. She was like a second mother to me growing up.
I practically lived with them at one point.
” I pick up a menu. “We have to eat inside one day. It’s really retro with awesome art from the 1930s, and sometimes they play Frank Sinatra.
I know that’s probably a little too mod for you. ”
He gives me a dark look.
“Whitney looks like she’s about to get her check. Are you ready?”
Our waitperson comes over, and I order two beers and two crab cakes.
Whitney looks over, and I wave to her excitedly. She smiles and waves and holds up a finger.
“Shall we go over?” Alexandru asks.
“She’ll stop by here on her way out,” I say.
“How do you know she’ll stop?”
“Because I waved energetically, and she held up a finger. She’ll be right over.”
Whitney does indeed stop by right after our beers arrive. She’s got a big to-go box and an even bigger grin. “Harriet and Prince Miramonte, out on the town again.”
Alexandru stands. “Ms. Sternell.”
“Oh, please, don’t get up on my account. How are you settling into Kingston Manor?”
“Very well, thank you,” Alexandru says.
“Yes, it’s all very gloomy and gothic,” I joke.
“Perhaps some decor changes will be in order soon once you’ve completed the mystery,” Whitney says.
“Excuse me?” I say, confused.
She gives me a sly look. “You know, the ‘wedding mystery’ you were investigating at the wedding expo? Though I must warn you, most mystery venues, at least the good ones, book up eighteen months in advance.” She winks.
“We need no venue for our mystery,” Alexandru says.
“She means like wedding venues,” I explain to him. “Like for us.”
“But we are not betrothed,” Alexandru says.
“Don’t worry, I won’t tell.” Whitney leans in. “I know the royals don’t like their people marrying commoners. No offense, Harriet.”
“No, I get it. Some royals would rather be chained to an ocean floor and eaten by eels than marry one such as me!”
I look over at Alexandru. His brown eyes are full of something fierce and tightly caged.
“Oh, well, I’m sure nobody feels like that,” Whitney stammers.
I gather my courage. I’m going to ask her a blunt question, just like Alexandru sometimes does. “What’s your opinion on the Schmidt Mansion as a wedding venue?”
Whitney blinks. “It’s lovely. Full of old-world charm.
It’s the perfect place if you’re envisioning a more intimate ceremony.
Though they do tend to book out.” She pulls out her phone.
“Currently, they’re booking out a year and two months, though I have a line on a November date for this year. Holiday weddings can be magical.”
“And there are shorter days,” Alexandru says.
“Right, yes, of course,” Whitney says, like that’s a big concern for many grooms.
“I’ve heard there’s a lack of upkeep there,” I say, hoping that Alexandru takes note of the way I’m leaping without looking, ducks all out of their rows. His commentary on my tentativeness has really gotten annoying.
Whitney straightens. “There may have been issues in the past, but I highly recommend the venue. I always do.”
“I understand somebody got hurt when some chairs collapsed,” I press.