Half-Price Homicide (31 page)

Helen looked surprised. “No. We don’t want to leave. The Coronado is our home. The tax lawyer says we shouldn’t change our standard of living until my IRS problem is fixed, but we may not want to move away even then. We’d like to keep renting the way we always have, if that’s okay with you.”

“How are you going to pay the rent on two apartments?” Margery asked. “Phil’s quit work and you’re not sure you’re going back to Snapdragon’s. This is a bad time to be looking for one job, much less two.”

“I don’t want another job,” Phil said. “I want to start my own detective agency. Helen can be my partner at the agency. Or she can type, file and answer phones.”

“You want me to be your secretary?” Helen said. She managed to muster some outrage.

“You’ve got great legs,” Phil said innocently.

Helen stared at him. “I was joking,” he said. “Except about the legs.

“Margery, Helen and I talked about this. She hasn’t made up her mind yet. She can work with me. Or for me. She can keep on working dead-end jobs. She can get a job as a CPA again. It’s up to her. She can be anything she wants. Our legal problems are nearly solved. Rob is no longer a threat.”

“I’ve made up my mind about one thing,” Helen said. “I will never work as a corporate number cruncher again.”

“You don’t have to, sweetheart,” Phil said. He kissed her. “Margery, we’re not making any major decisions until after the honeymoon.” “And when is that?” Margery asked.

“It starts today,” he said. “We’ll be gone for a week. We’d like to leave for the Keys. Sorry for the short notice.”

“Does that mean I’ll have to watch that damned cat while you’re gone?” Margery blew an angry cloud of smoke.

“Just for a week,” Helen said. “Please?”

“I hate cats, but I’ll do it. Where are you going for your honeymoon?”

“We want to go back to Key Largo,” Phil said. “We got married on the spur of the moment and we need a little time before we have to make serious choices. Thanks to Danny the developer, we have a little money.”

“We want to spend half of Danny’s ten thousand on the honeymoon, and the rest on starting up Phil’s detective agency,” Helen said. She thought it fair to pay for their honeymoon, since Phil had paid for her mother’s return home.

“Since I quit work and the agency didn’t give me any separation money,” Phil said, “I don’t have to worry about a no-compete clause.”

“Where are you going to have your office?” Margery asked.

“Fort Lauderdale,” Phil said.

“Rent’s expensive,” Margery said. “Even in an economic downturn.”

“I’ve got a little saved,” Phil said.

“Apartment 2C is empty,” Margery said. “You could rent it for your office.”

“Could I afford the rent on a third apartment here?” Phil said. “I don’t know,” Margery said. “Can you come up with a dollar a month?”

Phil was shocked into silence.

“You’d be doing me a favor if you rented 2C for your office,” Margery said. “But that one-dollar rent is not forever. Once you start making money, you can expect a substantial increase.”

“That’s very generous,” Phil said. “I can’t guarantee I’ll make a go of the agency.”

“You’ll be helping me, whether your business succeeds or not,” Margery said. “I’ll have a hard time renting that apartment now. By rights, I have to tell the next tenant what happened to Mark and Jordan and it’s not a pretty story: A young woman was murdered there and a man went to prison for killing his lover.”

Helen sat up, startled. Margery had finally accepted that Mark was guilty. The landlady’s recovery was complete.

Margery was still talking about Phil’s new office. “If I can say my last tenant was a detective agency—even a failed detective agency— well, that puts a different spin on things. So will you do it?”

“Are you kidding?” Phil said.

“You don’t like the deal?” Margery said.

“No, no, it’s a great apartment,” Phil said. “It’s very romantic-looking. I mean, despite what happened there. Apartment 2C has style. I can see Bogie sitting there in a sleeveless shirt, drinking bourbon out of a water glass, killing the big hurt.”

“You got your movies mixed, sweetheart,” Margery said. “But I get the picture. Do you want the deal or not?”

“Yes, yes. Of course.” Phil pulled three dollars out of his wallet and slapped them on the table. “Here’s your first and last month’s rent, plus another month for a security deposit.”

Margery raised her coffee cup. “To the new 2C. May this new venture break the curse.”

They clinked coffee cups.

While Helen and Phil were on their honeymoon, Vera Salinda reopened Snapdragon’s Second Thoughts. Now that Christine Martlet’s murder was solved and the killer was caught, the store was flooded with people. Some were curious, but many were customers. Business was brisk. Vera asked her sister in Plantation to work there full-time.

Vera sent Helen and Phil a wedding present: a lamp with a tur-baned monkey holding a pineapple.

Peggy sold all her rejected aprons at Vera’s store and earned $250. That was one-quarter of what she’d spent on her ill-fated work-at-home venture. Vera asked Peggy to make more aprons, but Peggy politely refused. She was busy with her full-time job. She spent the $250 on lottery tickets.

Loretta Stranahan was forced to resign from the Broward County Board of County Commissioners. The other commissioners competed for media time to denounce Danny Martlet’s behind-the-scenes manipulation of the Orchid House project. They unanimously voted down the Orchid House project. Martlet was forced to declare bankruptcy. The Fort Lauderdale beach was safe. Until the next developer came along.

The trial of former commissioner Loretta Stranahan was a Court TV sensation. One commentator praised the defendant’s suits as “sincere,” but they failed to impress the judge or the jury. Nobody believed her lawyer’s argument that some unknown person, for reasons unknown, slipped in and hanged Chrissy Martlet. Too much evidence said Loretta did it.

Loretta Stranahan was convicted of second-degree murder in the death of Christine Martlet. Under the tough Florida sentencing laws, she will serve at least twenty years in prison. She appealed the verdict, but her funds were limited after Palm Beach County seized her rental property and razed it.

But that was months in the future.

For the rest of August, Helen and Phil stayed in an ocean-view suite in a Key Largo hotel. The weather was unusually stormy, but the newlyweds didn’t care. They lived off room service, made love and watched the black clouds rushing over the water. Lightning flashed and thunder rattled the windows. Helen and Phil thought the storms were created for their entertainment.

Some nights, the black clouds cleared and the moonglow lit the dark water. Then Helen would wake up, walk alone on the hotel balcony and try to believe in that silver lining.