Mistletoe and Murder in Las Vegas Read Free Page B

from underneath her, she forced herself to stand.
    “Joanne? You okay?”
    She lurched forward like some kind of robot and jerkily plucked the almond up. Leaning against the desk for support, she stared at the demon nut, the killer piece of evidence, for several long, excruciating seconds.
    “What are you doing?” Roger whispered.
    Fighting the urge to shove it up your nose. But with her luck, Eddie the Incompetent would defend her on the attempted murder charge, and she’d end up rearranging books in the prison library for the next twenty years.
    So instead of giving into her homicidal desires, she held the almond aloft as if it were Queen Amanda’s miniature sword while she rasped Tiffany’s name, unintelligible as she was gasping for breath while trying to speak…
    Overcome by a sudden desire to retch, she swiveled and walked a few steps, grabbed her purse and briefcase and marched out the door.
    Minutes later, as she stumbled through the building lobby and felt the cold linoleum through the bottom of her stockinged feet, she realized she had forgotten to put on her shoes.
    Pushing open the glass door of the building, she sucked in the brisk November air, determined to make it to her car before she had a massive breakdown.
    Walking down the sidewalk, the world blurry through her tears, she held her head high. A five-two woman who didn’t need any damn heels to walk tall.

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Chapter 2
    “ H ey , girl, it’s your taxi driver calling.” Gloria was talking fast and loud, which she did whenever she was overly enthusiastic. “I’m picking you up to take you to meet... your new landlords !”
    Joanne took another bite of yesterday’s Thanksgiving pecan pie topped with chocolate ice cream, wishing she’d let the call roll over to voice mail. Since moving into her parents’ guest room three weeks and one day ago, her eleven-year-old Dodge’s transmission had gone south, so Gloria announced she would be Joanne’s taxi-driver, which she appreciated. Problem was, her friend decided her new role included making life decisions for Joanne, too.
    Of course, she could have avoided the whole taxi-driver-life-decision-maker muddle if she hadn’t lied to her parents about her car problems. But after it sat out front leaking transmission fluid for weeks, they would realize she was too broke to get it fixed. Which would open the dialogue where she tearfully admitted blowing her savings on that vacation to Costa Rica which she paid for entirely because Roger had blown his savings on a flashy red 1957 Porsche with “whisky tan” leather interior.
    At which point her parents would insist on paying the estimated two to three thousand Neon repair, which she could not let them do. Since her dad’s minor stroke five years ago, he had cut back his class load at the university and her mom’s party-event business was barely in the red. Joanne worried they would dip into money they were saving for a device to strengthen her dad’s weakened left arm. Things like dictation software and audio books replaced typing and propping open physical books, but no gadget could replace his hands cooking or holding his wife.
    So Joanne had made up a story about loaning her car to Selena, a lawyer pal with two small children. Meanwhile, her Neon sat in a guest parking spot at Gloria’s apartment building.
    “Jo, did you hear me?” In Gloria’s Brooklyn accent it sounded like Jo-di’ja-heah-me ?
    “You’re my best friend...” How to politely say but not my zookeeper ?
    “We’re practically goombare .”
    Goombare— pronounced goom-barr-eh—meant family, so to be practically goombare was a heartfelt compliment, one her friend had given before. Joanne’s current irritation aside, the feeling was mutual. She felt closer to Gloria than she did to her own sister, the perfectly perfect Shannon who had married the rich doctor husband, a fact her mother repeated a lot lately. Subtext: You should get Roger back because he could be rich