Snoops in the City (A Romantic Comedy) (9 page)

She hesitated in giving her answer. "I sort of have plans tomorrow night."

Grady swallowed his disappointment. "Don't tell me you're going to another play.”

Her auburn hair swayed when she shook her head, catching the fluorescent lights overhead so that it shone. "I promised my neighbor I'd stop by her church carnival. It's for charity." She paused, then seemed to fight an internal battle before she added, "I don't suppose you'd like to go with me?"

"I'd love to," Grady said quickly even as the irony of the setting registered upon him.

A carnival, bound to be full of wide-eyed, excited children, represented innocence. The term didn't apply to Tori, no matter how angelic she looked.

"Good," she said, but her smile wavered.

"I'll look forward to it," he said.

Much later, after he called the FBI agent working on Operation Citygate and asked him to run a background check on one Victoria Whitley, Grady realized at least part of his conversation with Tori had been truthful.

He did look forward to their date.

He didn't intend to probe his subconscious to discover the truth of why that was. He had a feeling he wouldn't like the answer.

CH
A
PTER TEN

 

The bundle in the oversized, canvas bag she passed off as a purse squirmed, diverting Tori's anxiety over her imminent return to the Roseate Spoonbill.

Careful to support the bottom of the bag with the flat of her palm, she opened the drawstring top and peered inside.

"Shhh," she told the scrawny white cat that stared back at her. "I was already fired once. I don't want to get kicked out a second time."

The cat — she hadn't named it yet — gave her the same plaintive look that had wormed its way into Tori's heart at the pound.

She'd been all set to take home a plump feline named Big Bertha when the white cat, which she'd been trying to ignore, let loose with a pitiful meow that seemed to say, "Pick me."

She'd met those sad, blue eyes and reluctantly given up on her quest for a fat cat. Adopting her hadn't been easy, either, not when the county pound required apartment dwellers to provide a copy of a lease showing their place of residence had no pet restrictions.

Since Tori was relatively sure Seahaven Shores had a no-pets clause, she'd given her cousin Eddie's address as her own. He deserved nothing less for convincing her that investigating Grady would be a cinch. Ha!

"You better not cry. You need to remember I wasn't heartless enough to leave you home alone on your first night with me," she told the cat in the bag before she pulled the drawstring loosely closed.

The bartending job she'd lost at the Roseate Spoonbill hadn't been her first as a Seahaven resident. After striking out as a bank teller and a waitress, she'd taken a six-week course in mixing drinks.

She'd applied at the Spoonbill, an establishment a few miles south of Seahaven, because the logo on the front of the building amused her. A rose-colored cartoon bird lilted drunkenly to one side, a whiskey bottle dangling from its spoon-shaped beak.

Now she saw the bird as an adequate metaphor for her professional life. Tori drank only moderately. But if she didn't get help soon, she was in danger of falling flat on her face. Again.

"Here goes," she said under her breath and walked into the bar. Joey Girdano, the bar manager, noticed her immediately.

“Hey, Whitley. Didn't I fire you?” He chewed energetically on a wad of gum. A small man with coarse, wavy hair and a thick untrimmed mustache, Joey was a recovering alcoholic whose jaws never stopped moving. He claimed the gum helped him keep from reaching for whiskey.

"Don’t worry," Tori said, "I’m not here to ask for my job back."

“You wouldn't get it back," Joey said.

The cat in her bag made a loud noise, causing the assortment of men and women bellying up to the bar to stare at her. Tori duplicated the noise the best she could, which hurt her throat.

"You don't have to get hissy about it," Joey said. "You were a lousy bartender, not to mention gullible as hell. Those people you let run up tabs still haven’t paid.”

“You’re joking."

“I never joke about money." He blew a bubble, popped it. "As long as you spend yours, you’re welcome here any time.”

“Crystal's working tonight, right?"

“Station three,” Joey said. “If you buy a drink, I won’t even hassle her about talking to you."

“She's your best waitress. You won't hassle her even if I don't buy a drink."

Joey laughed, showing off crooked teeth. “You might be right, but I will hassle
you
.”

Five minutes later, Tori sipped a glass of Chablis at a back table while she waited for her red-haired, freckled friend to finish serving a nearby table.

"No more noises out of you," she whispered to the cat, soothingly stroking the outside of the bag.

She used the down time to pat herself on the back for finishing another chapter of
So, You Want to be a PI
. The book had given her the idea for an internet search of local newspaper archives that had paid off handsomely.

Palmer Construction had been mentioned repeatedly, mostly in conjunction with city construction projects. In the past nine months, the city had awarded Grady's company contracts to build an addition to the city police station and to renovate the main library branch.

Those black-and-white facts on a page still told her little about the man himself. For that, she needed a different strategy, which was where Crystal came in.

"Hey, girlfriend, I've missed having you around." Crystal sat down across from her, radiating the energy and life that earned her more tips than better-looking waitresses. "I. . . Did you know your purse is moving?"

The bag on Tori’s lap wiggled furiously, its contents refusing to be ignored.

"I think she needs air.” Tori frantically loosened the drawstring at the top. The cat stuck out its miniature white head and breathed.

Crystal recoiled. "What are you doing carrying around an ugly white rat?"

"It's a cat, not a rat. I agree she's undersized, but she's not ugly."

"She's more than undersized. She's a runt. And she is too ugly," Crystal said.

Tori might have protested further if not for the cat's not-quite-white hair, close-set blue eyes and weird pink area around the eyes.

"Since when do you have a cat, anyway?" Crystal asked.

"Since a couple hours ago." Tori stroked the pitiful little thing's head. "I was in the market for something bigger but she kind of picked me."

"Good thing for the cat, because nobody was going to pick her.” Crystal cast a glance over her shoulder. "It doesn't look like Joey's seen her yet. Don't bet against him. Usually rats can sniff out cats."

"Joey's not a rat," Tori said.

"That's what I love about you, Tor. You're always ready to give people the benefit of the doubt, even the guy who fired you."

Tori saw her opening and took it. "That's sort of why I'm here. I've been thinking lately that I might be too gullible."

"Ya think?"

"I need some tips on how to take a man's measure. You know, find out what kind of person he is."

Crystal snorted. "You think
I
know?"

"You're surrounded by men, Crystal. Three brothers. A husband. Two little boys. If you don't know men, who does?"

"Maybe nobody."

"You must have learned something from hanging out with all those guys."

"Does checking to see if the toilet seat's up before sitting down count?"

Tori made a face, and Crystal rolled her eyes. "Okay, okay. Let me think about it. Are you talking about any man in particular?"

"Nobody you know. Just this guy I'm going out with tomorrow night."

Crystal put her elbows on the table and leaned forward. "Where's this coming from, Tor? Why are you going out with this guy if you're not sure about him? It's not like you to have doubts about people."

She wouldn't have doubts about Grady, either, if Ms. M hadn't put them there with her comment about dirt digging.

"Like I said, I figure it's time I stopped being gullible, is all," she said. "So do you have any tips?"

"Yeah," Crystal said. "Date him for a year or two, paying particular attention to how he acts around old people and kids. That should do it."

"I don't have a year or two," Tori complained.

Crystal rubbed the back of her neck. "The only way you'll get instant answers is if you give him a pop quiz. Like one of those personality tests that run in
Cosmo
."

"That's an idea," Tori said thoughtfully. "A morality quiz would be even better."

"Oh, honey. That was a joke."

"Still, it could work. I've taken a couple of those quizzes, and they're pretty revealing."

Crystal shook her head. "What are you gonna do, whip out the magazine and a pen and have him fill in his answers?"

"No," Tori said. "That would be too strange."

"Now you're talking."

"I'll have a bunch of questions in mind that I can tailor to a particular situation. Then I'll wait for opportunities to work them into conversation."

"And now you're talking crazy again. Listen to me, there's a far better way to figure out what kind of guy he is."

Tori put her elbows on the table. "I'll all ears."

"Listen to your gut."

Tori bit her bottom lip, turning that piece of advice over in her mind. She intended to follow it, just not exclusively.

While they were talking, the cat had worked the drawstring loose. By the time Tori noticed, she'd squiggled out of the bag onto Tori’s lap. Then she perched her tiny paws on the table and peered at Crystal.

"Are you gonna keep that thing?" Crystal asked.

Tori looked down at the helpless, previously unloved creature. A wave of unexpected tenderness hit her. She guessed she'd have to give her a name. "Yeah, I am."

"If you do go through with the quizzing,” Crystal said wryly, "you should ask this guy how he feels about cats disguising themselves as scrawny, white rats."

CHA
P
T
ER ELEVEN

 

The smell of French fries mingled in the heavy night air with the sweet scent of cotton candy, filling Grady's lungs with nostalgia.

He'd forgotten how much he loved carnivals until Tori had brought him here to the western outreaches of Seahaven where a small parcel of land had temporarily been transformed into a playground.

Walking the midway, with loud-mouthed carnies urging them to try their luck at carnival games, Operation Citygate and Pete Aiken's claim that somebody else wanted in on the action seemed far away.

In jeans, tennis shoes and a rust-colored shirt that made her hair look even more burnished, Tori Whitley didn't seem like she had an ulterior motive for being with him.

If she'd acted this way at the party, he wouldn't have had his FBI contact run the background check. The agent wouldn't have the results for a few days, but at the moment Grady was in no hurry.

Tori hadn't done a single suspicious thing since they'd arrived at the carnival although her conversation had been a bit strange.

She nodded toward a skinny man with a mallet who was poised to test his strength on the high striker.

"If that guy dropped a hundred dollar bill, would you pocket it, give it back to him or donate it to the church, which probably needs it more than he does?" she asked.

He grinned down at her, wondering how she came up with these questions. On the drive to the carnival, she'd asked if he’d contest a traffic ticket if he knew he were guilty. When they'd passed a pair of nuns, she'd wanted to know what he'd do if he saw one of them pocketing money from the collection plate. Always, she gave him three or four answers from which to choose.

"If that guy dropped a hundred, you'd better believe one of the kids around here would get to it before I did," he said.

"Then would you turn the other way, follow the kid and convince him to return the money or tell the skinny guy what happened and let him handle it by himself?"

He laughed, not sure he could keep the choices straight. "What's with all these questions?"

"Nothing," she said quickly, then expanded on her answer before he could press. "I guess I'm trying to get to know you better."

Her eyes radiated sincerity as she gazed up at him, and he realized he believed her. He'd been inspired by that old saying about keeping your friends close and your enemies closer when he asked her out. Right now she didn't seem like an enemy.

"Hey, buddy, come over here and impress your lady," called a man from a nearby ring-toss booth. "Two out of three wins a prize."

The prize was a giant stuffed replica of SpongeBob SquarePants.

"If you win me one of those things," Tori told him, "I might have to hurt you."

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