Putting the Fun in Funeral Read online

  After that, we went out to dinner, where Jen grilled Damon. I ate my salmon and listened attentively. After Jen covered the basics, she moved on to more details.

  “Who do you work for?”

  “I own my own firm,” he said. He was smiling but the way he tapped his finger against the stem of his wine glass made it clear he wasn’t liking the interrogation.

  “But you said you have an employer,” I said.

  “Perhaps I should have said client.”

  “Who is it?” Jen asked, leaning forward.

  “I’m not permitted to say.” He sounded regretful.

  “Which is totally reassuring and makes me want to meet with him,” I said, rolling my eyes. “Like going into a dark cellar when a serial killer is hanging around. Because that’s always a good idea.”

  “It’s attorney-client privilege. I can’t reveal what I’m not permitted to.”

  “Aaaand back to square one.” I really wished for a shot of something strong. “I’m getting so tired of the runaround.”

  “Maybe we should table that discussion for now,” he said.

  Jen pounced. “Why? So you can corner Beck to browbeat her? Don’t you know that no means no?”

  He sighed and rubbed his eyes with one hand then, ignoring Jen, turned his attention to me. “We need to talk. Alone and soon.”

  I snorted. “Does that mean you’re going to actually say something for once?”

  He didn’t answer.

  “I’ll take that as a no.” He was sitting to my left at the square table and I turned a little in my seat so I didn’t have to look at him. He confused me. He said he wanted to—what? Date? Kiss? Fuck? I had no idea what he really wanted from me, and his unrelenting silence on the subject of his employer wasn’t helping with my trust issues.

  He remained quiet during the rest of our meal while Jen and I ignored him. Instead we talked about her job, her nutty boss, and her insane family. Then we started planning a rafting trip and considering a winter vacation to Cancun. I’d never left the country before. I’d never left the state. The idea of traveling in an actual plane made me almost giddy and made up a little for Damon’s sucking silence.

  Tomorrow I would go running, I decided as we walked to Jen’s car. At least for a couple of miles. My feet were feeling back to normal, and I could use the chance to destress. I climbed in the back seat next to Ajax after letting him out to pee, and Damon sat next to Jen in the front.

  I watched him from the back seat as I scratched Ajax, who was hogging most of the seat with his front paws and head across my thighs. Periodically he licked me and gave me a gleeful wag, squirming so I could reach itchy spots.

  What exactly did Damon want from me? More important, what—if anything—did I want from him? I considered the idea of just jumping into bed with him and having a night of passion and pleasure. My body flamed and told me to go for it. My brain tossed out a giant anchor and said whoa!

  Clearly I needed a therapist and maybe serious medication.

  The trouble was he wasn’t just handsome. Make that gorgeous. He was also funny and smart and, maybe the biggest draw of all, he was interested in me. Dear God, was I that easy? Maybe. He also smelled good and appreciated my cooking, though if he hadn’t, that would have been an obvious sign he was batshit crazy and could be dropkicked off my balcony. If I had one.

  Even the secrecy was kind of a turn-on—which clearly showed I was batshit crazy and that I had far too much in common with cats. It was kind of like being on a roller coaster and not being able to see where or when the next curve or corkscrew was coming. Exciting and scary, stomach dropping and heart pounding.

  Damon also seemed to worry about me and want to take care of me, which also made me get all gooey for him. Basically, he was growing on me like mold on cheese, and I was liking it. I just didn’t know what I wanted to do about it.

  The drive from the restaurant wasn’t long, and soon we turned up the driveway and into the parking lot. Since the place was set back from the road, I’d had flood lights installed up the drive and all around the parking lot and building. Our inventory was expensive, and I didn’t want to give thieves a reason to think Elegant Estates was an easy target. I also had a state-of-the-art security system. If I’d have used magic for security, my mother would have known what I could do, so I stuck with high-end technology.

  It was dusk and the lights should have been on, but everything was ominously dark.

  “That’s odd,” I said.

  Jen pulled up outside. “The front door is ajar,” she said, the headlights illuminating the entrance. “Oh my God, Beck! The windows are all broken out. You’ve been vandalized!”

  “You two stay here,” Damon said tightly and got out. Every line of him radiated threat. He didn’t seem remotely lawyerly. Maybe he’d been a soldier or cop in another life. Blue magic wreathed his hands up to his elbows.

  Deciding I’d burn in hell before I got left behind, I followed him, making Ajax stay in the car. I didn’t want him cutting his feet on the glass. Jen hopped out with me.

  Damon reached the door first and bent to look at the lock before pushing it open. He reached around to flip on the lights, but they didn’t come on.

  I couldn’t wait. I flicked bubbles of light from my fingertips. They rose up to hover just over our heads and revealed ... destruction.

  As far as I could see, nothing was intact. No display shelves, not the counter, nor the registers. Every piece of furniture was broken and splashed with something that resembled black ink. Even the wood floor was wrecked.

  The breath went out of me, and the world stopped. I couldn’t make sense of what I was seeing. This—this was me. My heart and soul and sweat and tears filled this place. Not even my mother had made me feel as violated as I did at that moment.

  I walked forward and my feet crunched over glass and splintered wood. Vaguely I heard Jen on the phone calling the police. Damon stopped me with a hand on my shoulder before I could go inside

  “The bastards could still be here,” he growled, his voice deep with anger.

  I barely heard him. “Why would anyone do this?” My voice sounded thready.

  He pulled me against him, turning me into his chest and rubbing up and down my back. “I don’t know. But I sure as hell am going to find out.”

  Anger came to my rescue, stiffening the wilt in my bones. I sniffed and pushed away. “Thanks, but this is my shop. I can handle it.”

  His hands tightened on my arms. He waited until I looked up at him. His eyes were ferocious and burning with unrestrained fury and something else. Guilt? Did he know something about this?

  “Stay here while I make sure it’s clear.”

  My hackles went up. I did not take orders well. Damon seemed to realize his mistake almost instantly.

  “Please, Beck.” His grip on me softened. “You’ve already been through hell this week.”

  “I’m fine and I can handle myself, thank you very much.” I glared, my body practically vibrating with rage. I didn’t know if I was more pissed at him or the vandals. “I don’t need anybody running interference for me.”

  “He’s right,” Jen said, grabbing my hand. “What if whoever did this is still inside?”

  “Then I’ll kill them,” I snarled.

  “Oh good, because the cops don’t already suspect you of murdering your mom. Now they can get you for a different one.”

  “Not if the fucker is on my property and clearly violent. It’s perfectly justifiable.”

  Jen changed tack. “All right. How about you let Damon go in and get himself killed and that way Ajax won’t be without a mom?”

  Damn it. She had me there. “Fine.”

  Damon didn’t wait to see if I’d change my mind. He slipped inside. I’m not sure how long he was gone. I gripped Jen’s hand and fumed. Who would do this? And why? Was it personal? This time it couldn’t have been my mother, unless she were reaching out from the grave. Or to be more exact, urn.

&nb
sp; Damon came back in a couple minutes. “They’ve cleared out.”

  “I want to see.”

  He gave me a heavy look. “It’s bad.”

  I already knew that. Or I thought I did. Turns out I didn’t know shit. We picked our way through the devastation. Everything had been torn apart. The back warehouse was as bad as the front. My office was worse, if anything. At least they hadn’t found the vault. Thank goodness for small favors. And my loft? I started for the stairs and stopped when Jen caught my arm.

  “Let me look,” she said, her voice soft with sympathy and sorrow.

  “I’ll go,” Damon said. He sounded hard, dangerous, like he wanted to hurt somebody. More than hurt. Eviscerate.

  I nodded. My stomach and chest were so tight, I couldn’t breathe. I sank down against the wall and pressed my head against my knees. What was I going to tell my clients? My employees? Jen bent down and hugged me.

  “It’s going to be okay,” she said. “You have insurance. We’ll make this okay.”

  I didn’t know how. Given time, I could restore the business and keep going. But how was I going to fix the sense of violation I felt? The vandals had stolen my security, my feeling that I could retreat to this place and nobody and nothing could touch me here. This was a hundred times worse than losing my river sanctuary.

  I looked at Jen. “Can you get my purse? I want to call my insurance agent. Leave a message.”

  She nodded and left. Damon came down the stairs. At the look on his face, I sucked in a sharp breath, a knife driving through my heart. My eyes burned but I couldn’t cry. I couldn’t think. He stopped in front of me.

  “We’ll fix this,” he said, his voice stone.

  “Sure.” I didn’t believe it.

  He squatted down and caught my chin in his hand, turning my face to look at him. “We will fix this. I promise.”

  “How did they get in? I have an alarm system. Why didn’t it summon the police?”

  “The intruders melted the locks. I don’t know about the alarm.”

  “Melted the locks?”

  Jen returned at that moment, and I stood and took my purse. I dug inside it and found my cell and Detective Ballard’s card. I looked at it. Homicide. There wasn’t anything she could do. I put it back into my purse and dug for my wallet and my agent’s contact info. My hands were shaking, and I could feel myself starting to lose it.

  “I don’t— I can’t—”

  My dinner lurched in my gut, and I ran for the back door. I reached it barely in time to spatter my stomach contents on the ground outside. I heaved long past the point I had anything left to throw up. Jen stroked my back and held my hair out of my face, all the while crooning soothingly.

  Finally I straightened. I couldn’t go back inside. Instead I walked around to the front, my hand tight in Jen’s.

  Out front, I sat in the back seat of Jen’s car with the door open, hugging Ajax as we waited for the cops. I could hear sirens. It wouldn’t be long.

  “Where’s Damon?” I asked.

  “He’s looking for some clue as to who did this.”

  I nodded. I doubted the perpetrators had left anything. They were professional enough to melt the door locks, put out all the lights, and cut the alarm system. They wouldn’t be careless to leave anything that would point to their identities. “It should have worked, even with no power,” I said. “It has its own generator backup and another backup for that.”

  “What does?”

  “The alarm system.”

  Light suddenly erupted all around us, making me squint.

  “Must have been the breakers,” Jen said.

  “A power outage wouldn’t have hit the alarm either,” I said. “It’s on an entirely separate circuit, and it’s got a backup battery. But if they were professionals, why did they destroy everything? They could have stolen a small fortune. This is malicious. It makes no sense.”

  In another few minutes, a dozen cops arrived. More, probably, because of my mother’s connections than had anything to do with me, but I was grateful to see them all the same. Twenty minutes into giving my statement, I saw Detectives Ballard and Jeffers drive in through the mass of reporters who’d come running again like sharks after blood.

  “What happened?” Ballard asked as they strolled up.

  I waved wearily toward the building. “See for yourself.”

  They left. Damon and Jen were each giving their statements. I stared off into nothing, too shaken to think clearly.

  “I’m sorry,” Ballard said, returning. Jeffers did not.

  I shrugged. “It’s fine.” It wasn’t and never would be, but what else was I supposed to say?

  “You’ve got insurance?”

  I nodded then looked at her. “The alarm didn’t go off. Why didn’t it?”

  She shook her head. “We’ll make sure to look at it carefully. This level of destruction seems personal. Do you know of anybody who might have a grudge against you?”

  I almost laughed. She’d asked the same about my mother. “No. The only one is dead.”

  She made a notation in her ever-present notebook. “Have you considered this might be connected to your mother’s murder?”

  I blinked. “No. I mean, no. How would it? Why?”

  My confusion and distress must have seemed as legitimate as it was. Her expression softened into sympathy.

  “It’s a coincidence and in my line of work, that’s a red flag and a reason to be suspicious,” she said. “How are you doing? Physically, I mean. After your fall into the river.” The slight emphasis on fall indicated she still didn’t believe my story. She was a smart detective, after all.

  “Got my stitches out today.”

  “Already?”

  “I guess I heal fast.”

  “I guess so. That’s good. Maybe you can do that walkthrough of your mother’s place with us. The sooner the better if these two cases are connected.”

  “That’s why you’re here,” I said as my brain cells started to move again.

  “We heard the call, and like I said, there’s not usually a lot that’s coincidental about coincidences when it comes to murder. What do you say? Walk us through your mother’s place?”

  “Now?”

  “In the morning.”

  I looked at my store, and my throat knotted so tight, I thought I might choke. Nothing in there needed my immediate attention. I nodded. “Sure. For a couple hours anyway.”

  She smiled and shut her notebook. “Good. We’ll pick you up here at eight. If you don’t mind, I’ll go inside and have a look. See if I can spot anything.”

  “Sure.” Not like I could stop her, even if I wanted to.

  The next hours passed in a haze. Questions upon questions and Jen and Damon offering me coffee and snacks. I took the coffee, but I couldn’t eat. Lorraine and Stacey showed up and we stood together. They talked and I just stared blankly at the building, my brain running in circles chasing the who and the why.

  It was four in the morning before they were done with us. I still couldn’t go inside. At the same time, I couldn’t bring myself to leave, though Stacey, Jen, and Lorraine all offered to put me and Ajax up for as long as we needed.

  “Beck?” Stacey said, putting her arm around my shoulders. “You can’t stand out here all night.”

  She was right but I couldn’t move either.

  “What about my car?” I asked. I hadn’t looked in the garage. Hope that it had survived died with Damon’s next words.

  “It can be fixed,” he said.

  I swallowed the ball of rock in my throat. There didn’t seem to be an end to the bad news. “I’m going to stay here. It’s home,” I said and started to go inside.

  This time it was Damon who stopped me with a hand on my arm. “You don’t want to see.”

  I hadn’t been back inside since we came home. “Of course I don’t. But I have to sooner or later. No point waiting.”

  “Give me a chance to clean it up first.”

 
“That’s really nice, but I’m not made of glass. I’ll deal with it.”

  Lorraine made a frustrated sound, and Jen started swearing. Stacey came around to stand in front of me.

  “You don’t always have to do things the hard way,” she said, her crystal blue eyes shining with unshed tears. “Let us help you.”

  I smiled but inside I was numb. Well, part of me was. Underneath were feelings I couldn’t let myself feel. If I did, I’d shatter. “I’m okay. Really. I can handle this.”

  I held the smile, which felt awkward and stretched, as if I’d hooked fingers into the corners of my mouth and pulled them upward. I didn’t fool anybody.

  Jen heaved a sigh. “All right. Let’s go. But I’m going on the record that this is stupid and unnecessary and masochistic.”

  At the door of the shop, I turned around. “I’d like to go alone.”

  “No way,” Lorraine said.

  “There’s only so much stupid we’ll let you get away with tonight,” was Jen’s response.

  “If that’s what you need.” That came last from Stacey. She looked at the others. “We need to respect her wishes.” She looked back at me. “I get it. You don’t want an audience for this.”

  I squeezed her hand. “Thanks.”

  If anything, my loft was worse than the store. Like below, everything was broken or ripped or spilled, and graffiti covered every surface. But that hadn’t been enough. The windows were broken, and the walls looked like they’d been hit with a battering ram. Much of the exposed brick was cracked and powdered. My refrigerator had been dragged out and all the wires pulled out of it. It looked as though a jackhammer had pounded on it. The stove and oven were the same.

  The only sounds that left me as I went through were little animal sounds of agony. The destruction was thorough. Even my clothes were shredded and my bed had actually had a fire built in the center. It had smoldered but luckily hadn’t caught. It had been thoroughly doused with a fire extinguisher or two. The acrid stench of it was enough to make my eyes water and my throat hurt.