One Spoonful of Trouble (Felicity Bell Book 1) (15 page)

“Good for him,” muttered Falcone, still thinking dark thoughts about Rick. Though he was probably exaggerating things, he personally blamed his son for ruining Charlene’s upcoming nuptials. What did he have to go and lend Bomer his apartment for? That was simply asking for trouble.

“So I asked him to look into the matter and he has agreed to do just that one thing. He’ll talk to both parties, and see if he can’t make Charlene see the light.”

“Did he now?” Just in that moment the front doorbell jangled, and he remembered he’d arranged to meet Jerry Vale and Johnny Carew. “I’ve got a meeting, Grover, but keep me informed, will you?”

“Will do. Oh, and Chazz?”

“What?”

“I asked Rick to drop that piece on you. Again.”

“And?”

“No dice. He’s still as pissed off as ever, I’m afraid.”

“Thanks, Grover,” he grumbled before disconnecting.

As he walked to the door, his mood hit the depths. It wouldn’t be long now before Rick published that silly exposé of his and spread it all over the internet. And even though Falcone had his finger in a lot of pies, he didn’t have the power to stop a story from going viral.

CHAPTER 32

Bomer was glad when the tense conversation with his dad was finally over. It was as if Dad couldn’t understand a simple thing: Charlene had ended the engagement, not Bomer. And yet it was as if Dad was blaming him. But hadn’t it always been this way with the author of his being? Whatever happened, Dad just naturally assumed Bomer was to blame.

But this time it definitely wasn’t, and he’d said so as forcibly as he dared.

Over the course of the past few hours, he’d gone from incredulity to confusion to the realization that he was well out of it.

It was something his friends had told him over and over again: that he was making the mistake of a lifetime by getting hitched up with Charlene. He hadn’t listened. Too infatuated for his own good. Too much under that formidable girl’s spell. But now that the spell had been lifted, he saw that they were right all along.

For the first few months of their engagement they’d never been apart for more than a few hours, and even then Charlene had kept in touch via a constant monitoring system of hourly phone calls, Facebook messages and a never-ending stream of updates. Only when his father had put his foot down and had issued his ultimatum and he’d gone into hiding, had he slowly emerged from her spell. And he’d understood that the Bomer Calypso the world had known and loved had morphed into the man Charlene and his father thought he should be.

As he sped his Porsche along the Long Island Expressway, he began to see that by breaking off the engagement Charlene had actually done him a good turn, and gradually, like a tortoise emerging from its shell, he felt life start to course through his veins again. The top down and the wind in his butter-colored hair, he took a whiff of the ocean air, and finally felt he could breathe again.

He flicked a button on his steering wheel, pressed his phone’s bud into his ear, and soon found himself listening to the familiar voice of Rick Dawson.

“Brother Rick! Prepare yourself for a great feast, my friend.”

“Feast? What feast?” asked Rick, sounding a little alarmed.

“The eye of the hurricane is about to strike fear into the hearts and minds of
Casa di Amore
with a feast of revelries!”

Neglecting to correct his friend’s mixed metaphors, Rick cut to the chase. “You’re not thinking of joining me, are you?”

“That’s exactly what I’m thinking. Now that I have finally been released, we need to celebrate, brother Rick.”

“Could you please…stop calling me that.”

“You sound ill pleased, bro—I mean Rick. I thought you would be ecstatic.”

“Well, the last time you phoned you were about to jump out the window of my apartment on the sixteenth floor. I practically had to talk you off the ledge. So I’m just wondering what happened to turn you from a suicidal wreck into this…whatever this is.”

“It just dawned on me that I had a very narrow escape. I was a slave and now I’m free. I was a prisoner and now I’ve been released.”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“The engagement. It got me into all sorts of trouble, you see. Because of my promise to marry your sister—”

“Stepsister.”

“Whatever. Because I promised to marry Charlene, I had to accept Dad’s proposal. Without money, Charlene would have dropped me like a dead fish.”

“I see that you’ve got her number.”

“I did, and do. Without the family fortune Charlene would have never given me the time of day. And now that she’s kicked me to the curb, I’m finally free!”

“What about your dad’s project?”

“Hang Dad
and
his stupid project! Bomer Calypso is nobody’s slave!”

“But if you don’t do that project Grover is going to cut off your allowance.”

“So?”

“Which means you’ll have to find a job. You know—work for a living?”

Bomer thought about this for a moment. It was an aspect of the matter he hadn’t given his full attention yet. “Mmmm yes. I see what you mean.” Then he hitched up his shoulders. “Let’s not dwell on that for the present. I’m so glad I’m a free man again that I want to share my joy with all the world.”

“By posting a message on Facebook?”

“By throwing the party to end all parties!”

“Well, as long as you exclude me, whoop it up as much as you want.”

“Spoilsport.”

“I’ve got my article to finish and I intend to do it without being interrupted by a bunch of crazy partygoers.”

“Not crazy, my friend, simply merry and bright. And you can always take refuge in the old fishing lodge. I’m sure no one will disturb you there.” And before ‘brother Rick’ could lodge a formal complaint, he disconnected the phone and got in touch with some of his best and oldest friends, directing their attention to the fact that tonight the party to end all parties was taking place at that old shack
Casa di Amore
, and urging them to invite whomever they could think of.

These old friends, the same ones who had warned him not to get engaged to Charlene Calypso, were a lot more supportive than Rick, and promised Bomer they’d show up in droves.

By the time he rolled up the driveway to
Casa di Amore
, the twinge of doubt that had entered his mind when Rick had pointed out he’d have to join the army of worker bees if he kept up this party spirit, had all but disappeared, washed away by the prospect that he was about to stage a comeback that would have the paparazzi buzzing like in the old days.

Bomer Calypso was back, and this time he was here to stay. And if Charlene Falcone didn’t like it, she could lump it.

CHAPTER 33

Scottie, Bianca Bell’s faithful collie, lifted a drooping eyelid, then closed it again. The dog was as much a fixture of Bell’s Bakery & Tea Room as the Bell family themselves. Even though he wasn’t strictly allowed, he enjoyed gamboling about the place, collecting here a scrap of cake, there a cut of cheese, and sometimes even a sliver of bacon, if a customer couldn’t resist the pleading look in Scottie’s soft brown eyes.

This morning however, Scottie seemed out of sorts, for he merely lay beneath the counter at Bianca’s feet in his basket—the place from where he coordinated his forages—and didn’t stir.

All morning he’d laid there and hadn’t even lifted his head.

Bianca was starting to get worried. The dog had an uncanny knack for detecting trouble, and usually when he acted like this, it was because something terrible was about to happen. One time, when Felicity had been hit by a bus on her way home from school, Scottie had acted just like this. The moment Felicity was on her feet again, the dog had rebounded. It was almost as if the two shared a mystical bond of some kind, an area Bianca’s sister was more familiar with.

Bettina enjoyed dabbling in the occult, and had frequently explained that animals such as Scottie live in the fifth dimension, where they can observe things that are unknowable to us poor humans, who inhabit the first dimension. Usually Bianca simply let Bettina ramble on about her spiritual observations, but today she was wondering if there really was something to them.

For one thing, Felicity herself had also seemed out of sorts today, and it all had to do with this man Rick Dawson she’d met the day before. What little Bianca knew about him was that the two had had some sort of run-in, and things had quickly spiraled out of control. She didn’t usually give in to worrying and fretting, but when the news broke that Felicity had posted a video on the interwebs revealing some very personal details about herself, Bianca’s agitation had jumped off the charts.

Felicity was always so careful how she presented herself, knowing full well that in a small town like Happy Bays rumors tend to spread like wildfire and when you run a business like Bell’s, you need to be extra careful what you put out there for people to gossip about.

She’d always known that when the day came that Felicity would bring home a boyfriend, it would be a very special person, for her daughter was notoriously picky when it came to men.

Now this Rick had entered the picture, and she knew there was more to him than Felicity let on.

She wasn’t the kind of mother who butted into her daughter’s private affairs, but what with Scottie acting up, and men approaching her on the street asking all sorts of questions about Felicity’s reluctance to date, and even her sex life—the horror!—she began to see that a mother’s firm hand was what was needed in this affair, and she pondered about the best way to approach the matter.

She knelt down to pat Scottie’s head. The dog didn’t even bother to acknowledge the gesture of affection and Bianca’s lips tightened. Yes, something was definitely going on with Felicity, and she was going to make certain she didn’t end up under the bus again, this time figuratively.

She quickly made her way to the kitchen, where her cousins Busby and Bancroft were busy stuffing their faces with leftovers. “Boys, could you mind the store for an hour? I have to go out.”

Reluctantly, Busby tore himself away from the bodybuilding magazine he was perusing, and Bancroft from Kim Kardashian’s latest bestseller
The Selfiest Woman on the Planet
, and both young men slouched out of the kitchen.

She placed her apron on the peg by the door, fixed her hair, and checked in the mirror to see if the last remnants of flour were removed from her face. Within minutes, she was in her Mini Cooper en route to
Casa di Amore
, where she knew Rick Dawson was staying. She wanted to know what his intentions were with her daughter. Mabel, who’d heard it from her sister-in-law Francine, who worked for the Calypsos as a housekeeper, had told her Rick had arrived there in Felicity’s van that morning. And she thought she’d even seen them kiss!

With pursed lips, Bianca buzzed through town, and decided that if this Rick thought he was going to take advantage of a woman who’d never been in a serious relationship before, he had another thing coming.

CHAPTER 34

As Felicity stepped inside Charlie’s Funeral Delight she thought not for the first time how ill-advised Alice’s uncle had been in choosing this name for his establishment. Soft Muzak played in the showroom, and she let her eyes wander over the rows of gleaming caskets on display, discretely backlit and every single one looking more resplendent than the next.

Her gaze was drawn to a sign that announced the mahogany caskets were twenty-five percent off this week, in a super ‘afterlife deal.’

Uncle Charlie clearly didn’t believe in subtlety when hawking his wares.

Heading straight for the back, she swung through the double doors that led into the bowels of the mortuary.

She almost bumped into Alice, who was wiping her hands and chewing down the last remnants of a muffin, on her way to the casket room to assist this new customer.

“Oh, it’s you,” she said a little annoyed. Instantly she did an about-face and headed back to her uncle’s office, where she spent most of her time when not waiting on customers.

“I need your advice, Alice.”

“Oh? Don’t tell me you’re in the market for a casket?”

Felicity shivered slightly. The air in this part of the mortuary was frigid.

“Rick has asked me to dinner, and I need to make myself presentable.”

She plunked herself down on Uncle Charlie’s swivel chair. Like the rest of the office furniture, he’d snapped it up at the army surplus store, which made the cramped space look as if it belonged in the seventies. The Whitehouses clearly believed in frugality.

Alice’s eyes widened. “A date! Fe, that’s great!”

“Yeah, I gave him a lift to
Casa di Amore
and we got to talking.” She blushed, remembering the pleasant time they’d spent. “He’s actually a nice guy, you know.”

“What about those charges you wanted to press against him?”

“That’s all off. He invited me to dinner at the Calypso place, and now I don’t know what to wear.” Or how to make herself presentable. She’d let her appearance slide lately. Her legs needed waxing, her pits were a mess and her eyebrows were a relic from the eighties, when hairy had been considered sexy.

Alice eyed her critically. “Mh. You could use some work.”

“
Some
work? I need so much work I probably won’t be ready for a week!”

“What time is this date?”

“Eight—ish.”

Alice pursed her lips. “That doesn’t give us a lot of time. And I have to work until six.”

Felicity placed her hands together in a pleading gesture. “Pretty please?”

Alice shrugged. “What the hell. It’s been quiet all day. Let’s do it now.”

“Here?”

“Sure. Why not? Uncle Charlie’s in Miami for the annual funeral directors’ congress.”

“I didn’t even know there was a funeral directors’ congress.”

“Honey, this is a democracy. There’s a congress for everybody.” She rose from the chair and curled her finger. “Come on. Let’s get this show on the road.”

Felicity followed her friend and her heart dropped when she realized she was heading into the prep room. She’d never liked that particular part of the mortuary. It reminded her of old horror movies. Though Alice’s uncle liked to keep the place squeaky clean and looking like a hospital operating room, it smelled funny and she was always afraid to find herself in the company of one of the recently departed.