Клео Коул - Latte Trouble

“Listen to me, Matt,” I said as I pulled on a pair of panties and hooked on a bra. I told him all about Lottie Harmon’s business arrangement with Tad Benedict and Rena Garcia, and about the intimate moment they’d shared together on the dark deck—a moment I had secretly witnessed from the shadows.

“Sounds like they’re desperate to sell,” said Matt, scratching his chin as he leaned back against the four-poster’s headboard and continued to sip his coffee. “And I doubt Lottie is in a position to buy them out.”

“Yes, but she obviously has no idea they’re selling.”

“It doesn’t matter. Together, Tad and Rena control exactly half the business and they can sell fifty percent of the stock if they want to. It’s their right, Clare.”

“Yes, but I’m sure they were trying to sell even more. Tad didn’t even blink when Madame said she wanted thirty percent. Instead, he pressed me to buy some, too.”

“That doesn’t make sense,” said Matt. “Why sell more stock than you own? You’re bound to get caught.”

I thought it over as I zipped up my jeans. “Selling more stock than you own was a great scam in The Producers . Do you remember that Mel Brooks movie?”

“I thought it was a play.”

“Only lately. It was a movie first—”

“A movie first ?” said Matt. “I thought they made movies out of plays and not the other way around.”

I waved my hand as I jerked open one of the deep drawers of the mahogany dresser and rifled through my sweaters. “You’ve been out of the country too often. With the exception of Chicago and Phantom , it’s often the other way around now, which is why Tucker is always bemoaning the state of the American musical.”

“ Anyway —”

“Sorry. Anyway, in The Producers the two crooks sell shares in a Broadway musical to dozens of investors, figuring on a flop, so they can secretly keep the extra capital. It would have worked, too, except the show was a hit and they get stuck owing lots of people lots of money.”

“That’s a stretch.”

“No. That’s it!” I cried. “And Tad’s plan can only work if Lottie’s line is a flop. With Lottie dead, it’s game over—no wonder he tried to kill her.”

“Clare, you are really getting carried away here,” said Matt, watching me button on a pale yellow sweater, a suggestive little smile on his lips. “You would have to be pretty desperate to do something like that.”

“But that’s what I’m trying to tell you,” I said, striding back to the closet. “They both sounded desperate. Tad and Rena talked like they were in some kind of trouble and needed a lot of money fast.”

“What kind of trouble?”

I shook my head. “No clue.”

“Well, I have a different theory about Ricky Flatt’s poisoned latte—”

I gritted my teeth. “Not that stuff about Tucker being guilty again—”

“It’s Lebreaux.”

“Oh, Matt, come on. You’re just royally pissed at the guy.”

“No, listen. Lebreaux’s idea would be even more lucrative if he served both tea and coffee. And he has a vendetta against us, don’t forget. What if he hired someone to sabotage the Blend’s reputation by making it look as though our coffee was killing people?”

“I suppose you could be on to something,” I conceded. “But who did he hire—” I stopped dead in the middle of pulling on a low-heeled half-boot. “Violet Eyes,” I murmured.

“Who?” asked Matt.

“Violet Eyes,” I repeated. “There was an Asian girl with Lebreaux,” I explained. “She was tall and—”

“Had violet eyes. Long, straight, black hair, down to her hips. Legs that went on forever.”

I raised an eyebrow. Put a gorgeous girl in a room and Matteo Allegro would have her measurements calculated faster than an M.I.T. mathematics professor.

“She was at Lottie’s party,” I informed him as I finished pulling on my boots. “I greeted her at the door myself. And Esther and Moira said they saw her come up to the coffee bar in that critical window of time when Lottie’s latte must have been poisoned.”

“I’d call that pretty incriminating, Clare.”

“Unless it was just a coincidence. I mean…she and Lebreaux could have met for the first time tonight on the Fortune for all we know.”

“No,” said Matt. “She was with him the entire time in the yacht’s ‘backstage’ stateroom where all of us presenters were waiting to go on. She came with Eduardo Lebreaux, Clare. And she never said two words to anyone but him.”

“Okay, but I still say Tad is acting way too suspicious not to question.”

“I think you’re wrong.”

“I think I’m right.”

“So what are you going to do?”

“Not me, Matt. It’s what you’re going to do.”

“Oh, please, Clare, don’t involve me again—”

“I just want you to set up a meeting with Tad downstairs. Invite Rena over for coffee, too.” I checked my watch. “Speaking of which, I have to get my butt down there and open.”

As I grabbed the thick set of keys from the top of the dresser, Matt crossed his arms and narrowed his eyes. “Why?”

“Why? Because we’re in the business of serving coffee and it’s time to open.”

Matt smirked at me. “Clare, why do you want me to set up a meeting with Tad Benedict and Rena Garcia?”

“Because,” I replied with a smirk of my own, “that Detective Starkey isn’t the only broad around here who can weasel a confession out of a suspect.”

As it turned out, Tad was too busy with his second Fortune seminar to meet with Matt any sooner than Friday morning. Consequently, Thursday came and went in a blur. From dawn till dusk I served customers, then spent most of the evening in my office juggling schedules, balancing books, finalizing the payroll—and, frankly, hiding from Matt.

After helping Gardner close, I quickly slipped upstairs to the master bedroom, firmly shut the door, and prayed my ex-husband wouldn’t come barging in. He didn’t. In fact, I didn’t see my ex again until Friday morning.

I was behind the coffee bar, tidying up after the morning rush, when Matt’s strong hands came down on my shoulders and began a slow massage. I jumped under Matt’s touch, not accustomed to—and not wanting—this new round of physical intimacy.

“I looked in on you late last night,” he rasped against my ear, “but you were already sleeping so soundly, I didn’t have the heart to wake you, even though I was tempted…and, honey, was I tempted.”

I closed my eyes and silently cursed. I had no one to blame for this but myself, and it was now up to me to delicately redraw the lines that I never should have allowed to be erased in the first place. I didn’t want to hurt him, or our working partnership, but it was time I gathered my courage and opened my mouth, which I was about to do when Matt added—

“Tad’s here.”

I looked up, spied the paunchy, balding, elfin-faced man at the front door, and knew the subject of my relationship with my ex would have to be put on hold.

“Take him up to the second-floor lounge,” I told Matt. “I’ll be up in a minute with coffee.”

Matt greeted Tad and they shook hands, then my ex led our guest upstairs. I looked for Rena, too, but there was no sign of her. I put a service for four on the tray anyway, added a few muffins, a carafe of freshly brewed Breakfast Blend.

“Back in a little while,” I told Esther.

Her jaw dropped. “It’s just Moira and I as it is,” she complained.

“I’m doing this for Tucker,” I whispered over my shoulder as I hefted the tray and climbed the stairs.