Debbie Johnson - The Mysterious Case of Cupid and the Drag Queen - A Love…Maybe Valentine eShort

Avon

An imprint of HarperCollins Publishers Ltd

1 London Bridge Street

London SE1 9GF

www.harpercollins.co.uk

First published in Great Britain by HarperCollins 2015

Copyright © Debbie Johnson 2015

Debbie Johnson asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

Ebook Edition © February 2015 ISBN: 9780008135058

Version: 2015–01–23

Table of Contents

Cover

Title Page DEBBIE JOHNSON The Mysterious Case of Cupid and the Drag Queen Part of the Love…Maybe Eshort Collection: The Suspicious One

Copyright Copyright Copyright Chapter One Chapter Two Chapter Three Chapter Four Chapter Five Chapter Six Chapter Seven Chapter Eight Chapter Nine Chapter Ten Chapter Eleven Keep Reading About the Author Also by the Author About the Publisher Avon An imprint of HarperCollins Publishers Ltd 1 London Bridge Street London SE1 9GF www.harpercollins.co.uk First published in Great Britain by HarperCollins 2015 Copyright © Debbie Johnson 2015 Debbie Johnson asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work. A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library. This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins. Ebook Edition © February 2015 ISBN: 9780008135058 Version: 2015–01–23

Chapter One Chapter One Now My name’s Jayne McCartney. No relation, despite the accent. In case you were wondering. Which you might not have been, but most people do. I’m a private investigator, and I work from an office on the fifth floor of a once-grand building on a once-grand-and-getting-there-again city’s waterfront. The windows are crusted with dust and grime from the small continents of traffic that flow past every day, and I can tell the time by the chimes of the Liver Building clock. Right now, for example, I know it’s after 10 p.m. The big bass drum sound of the hour turning woke me up. Not that being unconscious qualifies as being asleep, I suppose. It might have looked the same, except on this occasion it came with a whacking great lump on the back of my head and a matting of blood in my hair. A good look for a chick in her thirties. I might go clubbing. First, though, I have to master standing up. And finding my phone. And dialling the number of DCI Ken McGowan at Ball Street CID. Despite having a concussion and approximately seventeen fingers on one hand, I manage. Voicemail. Of course. It is after 10 p.m., after all. He’s probably out clubbing. ‘Call me,’ I say. ‘I know where the Chihuahua is.’

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Keep Reading

About the Author

Also by the Author

About the Publisher

Now

My name’s Jayne McCartney. No relation, despite the accent. In case you were wondering. Which you might not have been, but most people do.

I’m a private investigator, and I work from an office on the fifth floor of a once-grand building on a once-grand-and-getting-there-again city’s waterfront. The windows are crusted with dust and grime from the small continents of traffic that flow past every day, and I can tell the time by the chimes of the Liver Building clock.

Right now, for example, I know it’s after 10 p.m. The big bass drum sound of the hour turning woke me up. Not that being unconscious qualifies as being asleep, I suppose. It might have looked the same, except on this occasion it came with a whacking great lump on the back of my head and a matting of blood in my hair. A good look for a chick in her thirties. I might go clubbing.

First, though, I have to master standing up. And finding my phone. And dialling the number of DCI Ken McGowan at Ball Street CID. Despite having a concussion and approximately seventeen fingers on one hand, I manage. Voicemail. Of course. It is after 10 p.m., after all. He’s probably out clubbing.

‘Call me,’ I say. ‘I know where the Chihuahua is.’

One day earlier

‘His name’s Cupid,’ said Harley Golightly, as he handed me what I could only describe as a soft porn photo of a very small, very ugly dog. The lighting was soft focus; the background a bed of black satin, and the pooch was wearing a tiara and a diamond encrusted collar. Apart from that it was naked, the slut. Which was better than a pearl necklace, I suppose.

Harley Golightly was sitting with his partner, Dorothy Glamore. I don’t know why, but I had a sneaking suspicion that they may not have been using their real names. And they definitely weren’t using their real hair colours. They were both men, and both wearing uncomfortably tight leather trousers. At least they were uncomfortable for me – their boy bits were so obvious I didn’t know quite where to put my eyes.

‘He’s … lovely,’ I said, imagining for the tenth time that day that I’d won the Lottery and was on a Caribbean cruise with a flotilla of Calvin Klein underwear models.

Instead, I was in the admittedly fragrant back room of a bar in Liverpool’s pink district. Investigating the case of a missing Chihuahua. Such is life. I used to be a detective sergeant, a babe in blue, and I never got sent to check out Chihuahuas then.

I suspected the law had more important things on its collective mind these days. A copy of the Gazette lay open on the smoky glass-topped coffee table between us. The front page was a report on the abduction of Coco Doyle, the seven-year-old daughter of a local businessman. In this case, the business was drugs – but let’s face it, that wasn’t Coco’s fault. Neither was her name.