Red Carpet Christmas Read online

  “Don’t get any ideas, Simone,” Teresa said without looking up. “The plant is mine.”

  “Yes. Of course it is.”

  “As is everything you see here. The house. The furnishings. Everything.”

  Thinking the new widow must be grieving in her own way, and therefore not in her right mind, Simone fell silent. Teresa set down the hose, picked up a set of hand shears and started trimming back the plant. She eyed Gideon between snips.

  “And who might this be?”

  He started, “The name’s Gideon—”

  “Your new lover, Simone?” Teresa asked, cutting him off. “My, you are a fast worker, I’ll give you that.”

  Simone was speechless for the moment.

  “You flatter me,” Gideon said, but Teresa wasn’t being charmed.

  “Slut!” the woman said vehemently.

  “E-excuse me?”

  “There is no excuse for your poor taste, Simone. David is only dead what? Six months?”

  A strangled “Eight” came out of Simone. Was her attraction to Gideon so very apparent?

  “And already you’re on your second replacement.”

  “Second?” Gideon murmured.

  Confused, Simone said, “Look, Teresa, I don’t know what you’re implying—”

  “You think I’m deaf, dumb and blind? I know what was going on between you and my Albert.”

  Remembering that Al had said Teresa was delusional, that his wife had thought he was having an affair, Simone protested, “Nothing was going on. At least not with me!”

  “I know about all those long lunches.”

  “Business lunches. We were talking about money.”

  “I’ll just bet you were,” Teresa said, stepping out from her work table, shears still in hand. “How much did Albert give you? Were you worth it?”

  Simone gasped. “If you’re implying Al and I were intimate, you’re mistaken—”

  “I know my Albert was irresistible.”

  “Trust me, I could resist him.” She hadn’t even liked him. “I loved David and still mourn him.” She was aware of Gideon shifting beside her as if he were suddenly uncomfortable.

  “I know your type,” Teresa continued. “You can’t be without a man, so you went after my husband.”

  “You couldn’t be more wrong. I was simply trying to get Al to turn over David’s share of the profits so I could support my son.”

  “A likely story!”

  “The truth! Look, Teresa, don’t let your imagination run away with you. All I was looking for was money that David brought in—”

  “You won’t be getting anything from me!”

  Teresa was waving the sharp shears wildly now, and Simone thought the little woman was dangerous. She stepped back and smacked into Gideon, who put hands on her shoulders to steady her.

  “I think you need to put down the shears,” Gideon said. “You might hurt yourself.”

  A threatening expression wreathed Teresa’s face as she glared at Simone, but eventually, she set the shears down on the workbench.

  “You’ve given me your condolences,” the widow said, her voice stiff. “Fine. So if that is all, I shall have Hannah see you to the door.”

  “It isn’t all,” Gideon said. “We need to talk about who might possibly have killed your husband.”

  “How do I know she didn’t? Besides, Albert’s death is none of your business!”

  “You’re mistaken. I own Club Undercover where he was murdered.”

  Teresa shrugged indifferently. “I’ve already spoken to the authorities.”

  “We were hoping you would speak to us, as well,” Simone said.

  “Why should I?”

  “You want your husband’s murderer caught, right?” Gideon asked.

  Simone watched Teresa carefully, but the widow’s face was expressionless.

  “Of course,” she finally said, turning her gaze to Simone once more. “Albert was my husband.”

  “And I didn’t have an affair with him or kill him, no matter what Nikki Albright said. So please, Teresa, talk to us.”

  The widow seemed to think it over. Simone could tell she wanted them out of her home, but something stopped her from insisting.

  “All right.” Teresa marched over to a side door and opened it. “In here. I need a drink.”

  By the time Simone and Gideon had followed her into a small den—consisting of a fireplace, book-lined walls, a leather love seat and chair and a couple of small tables—Teresa Cecchi already had a drink in her hand. Without offering one to Simone or Gideon, she crossed to the chair, leaving the love seat for them. Hoping that Gideon would stand, Simone sat gingerly to one side, but he immediately took the other, crowding her with his closeness.

  “So what is it you think I can tell you?” Teresa asked.

  “The obvious,” Gideon stated. “Did your husband have any enemies? Anyone you might have forgotten to mention to the police?”

  “He was a criminal lawyer who represented the scum of the earth. What do you think?”

  “Anyone who actually threatened him?”

  “You mean seriously? Not that I’m aware of. Then, again, Albert was good at keeping things from me,” Teresa muttered, downing half of her drink in one gulp.

  “That’s why you put his desk up for auction.”

  “Exactly. The worm deserved to suffer.” Teresa side-swiped Simone with an accusatory stare.

  “Again, if he was having an affair, it wasn’t with me.” Simone wondered if the woman really was insane. “How can you be so sure Al was unfaithful?”

  “Oh, please, give me some credit, Simone. A man doesn’t make late night calls for no reason.”

  “They could have been calls to a client.”

  “More than once when he realized I was nearby, he hung up fast.”

  “That’s it?”

  “He’d been staying out late, telling me he was working, but he wasn’t at the office. I checked. Then there was the money. It was disappearing from our accounts on a regular basis, but not to pay our bills. And of course, the perfume on his jacket wasn’t something he was buying for me. I’ve always preferred a light floral scent, and this was heavy and exotic. And it wasn’t the first time he wore her stink home,” Teresa said, her distaste obvious. “But it was the last.”

  Finally, a crack in Teresa’s armor. Her eyes appeared watery and she seemed to be making a great effort to keep herself under control.

  “That’s it.” Teresa abruptly got to her feet. “You’ll both have to leave now.”

  Simone sensed Teresa’s patience was at an end, no doubt because she’d let her emotions show for a moment. “Thank you, Teresa. If you think of anything else…”

  “I’ll certainly inform the police.”

  Hannah appeared out of nowhere and escorted them to the front door, sliding a dead bolt into place behind them.

  They were barely down the steps when, sarcasm rich in his voice, Gideon said, “That went well.”

  “Right. We know exactly what we knew before going to see her.”

  “Not exactly.”

  “What do you mean?” she asked, as Gideon opened the passenger door for her.

  “She doesn’t seem to be the grieving widow.”

  “I disagree.”

  Teresa had put up an I-don’t-care-because-he-betrayed-me front, but there’d been that one moment when the other woman had opened herself to feelings deeper than anger. Simone saw Teresa as a woman who was trying to hide the fact that she still loved her faithless—and now dead—husband.

  The phrase crime of passion came to mind—perhaps Teresa killed Al out of jealousy—but she brushed it aside.

  As they pulled away from the curb and headed for the main street, she said, “I mean, I would have agreed with you first—Teresa didn’t seem properly distraught—but she was off guard there at the end.”

  “I didn’t notice.”

  Thinking of how she’d reacted when David had died, Simone said, �
��Perhaps you’ve never really grieved for the loss of someone you loved,” before remembering his father had been murdered.

  Gideon’s hands tightened on the steering wheel, but he didn’t comment. Simone shifted uncomfortably in her seat anyway.

  He turned at the corner, saying, “Maybe the widow Cecchi was trying to cover up the fact that she killed her husband. She was really angry with him. She was angry with you tonight, thinking you were Cecchi’s mistress. Are you going to tell me you didn’t feel threatened when she wielded those shears in your direction?”

  “Only for a moment.”

  “A moment is all it takes to kill someone. You never know what one will do in the heat of passion.”

  Gideon slid a look her way, and Simone suddenly felt uneasy at the mention of passion. She forced herself to concentrate on their investigation.

  “There was something else the widow said,” Gideon mused. “In defending her mistress theory, she let it slip that money had disappeared and not toward paying their bills.”

  “Obviously she figured he was lavishing it on this other woman.”

  “Maybe he was. Maybe that’s why he’d been putting you off about making a cash settlement.”

  “That’s an awful lot of money to waste on a mistress.”

  “Maybe he didn’t consider it wasted.”

  “Or maybe something else was going on.”

  They fell silent for a moment before Gideon said, “See, you can do it, after all.”

  “Do what?”

  “Speculate. Take things you heard a what-if step closer to the truth.”

  “Maybe I should become a private investigator.”

  “A career option.”

  For a tiny second, Simone wondered what it would take to get licensed before shaking away the silly idea. She needed a job, one she was qualified to do. “What next? How do we find a potential murderer?”

  “It might help to get a look at Cecchi’s files. If any client threatened him, surely he would have made a note of it. Logan said the detectives are working on a court order to search the office.”

  “I don’t need a court order. I have keys.”

  “Then let’s go. What’s the address?”

  “I don’t have the office key ring on me.” Simone checked her watch and realized that Drew would be home by now. “I need some time at my place anyway. But I can meet you later.”

  “How much later?”

  “What are you doing at midnight?”

  WHEN SIMONE arrived home in a taxi she didn’t expect to see her brother’s vehicle parked in front of the house. Tonight of all nights…

  Thank goodness she’d refused to let Gideon bring her all the way home. She hadn’t wanted a chance meeting between him and Drew, so she’d insisted he let her off at North and Clark, near the zoo. She’d figured he could go straight west to the club from there. She could tell he’d wanted to argue with her, but he’d restrained himself.

  A good thing, or he might have run into Michael.

  She realized with a start that this was the second time she thought of protecting Gideon from her brother. She was going to have to deal with her unresolved feelings for Gideon sometime. Just not now or anytime soon, she decided, heading down the gangway to the rear of the house and the kitchen entrance.

  Circling the back porch, she noted a bulky silhouette leaning against a rail. “Ulf,” she murmured, acknowledging Michael’s bodyguard.

  Blond hair fell over his pale eyes as he bobbed his head toward her. “Ma’am.”

  Simone sighed. Ma’am was right up there with maven. Not that she was obsessed with perpetual youth, but she was far from middle-aged and was beginning to wonder if worry was taking its harsh toll on her.

  “Don’t you ever get tired of waiting on my brother.”

  “It beats a lot of jobs,” Ulf said. “And I don’t intend to do it forever.”

  “Of course you don’t.”

  But he probably would. Michael’s employees seemed to be inexplicably tied to him. He’d once laughingly said that when he hired someone, it was “until death do us part.” Unfortunately, Simone didn’t think he’d been joking.

  When Ulf opened the kitchen door for her, male laughter spilled out into the night. Simone smiled, pleased that her son was laughing again.

  “Hey, did someone tell a good joke?”

  “I did,” Michael said, “but it’s a guy thing.”

  “A guy thing, huh?”

  Sighing, she looked from the nearly empty pizza box sitting on the coffee table to her son.

  Drew wasn’t smiling.

  “Why didn’t you tell me, Mom?” he demanded.

  “Tell you what?” Simone tensed at her son’s serious expression.

  “That Al Cecchi was murdered last night and you might be arrested for murdering him. I’m not a kid anymore,” he said in a sullen tone. “Why were you trying to hide that from me?”

  “Have some respect for your mother,” Michael admonished him. “She didn’t kill anyone.”

  “Some people think she did.”

  “What people?” Simone asked, wondering if her own son could be one of them. Drew looked angry. Her stomach knotted with guilt. “Is my name in the papers?”

  “No,” Michael assured her. “That would spell a lawsuit. You haven’t been arrested.”

  Yet, Simone thought.

  “The word’s going around, Mom. My friends all know Nikki Albright thinks you did it. Why would she accuse you?”

  “I don’t know!” Simone snapped, upset enough to cry. “Maybe she’s trying to cover up for herself?” The words were out of her mouth before she realized what she was saying. She hadn’t meant to accuse anyone else of the crime.

  Simone checked her watch. “It’s getting late.”

  Drew stared at her with slitted eyes, the same way Gideon used to. The resemblance took her breath away.

  “Sorry, Uncle Mike,” he said, “but I get up at the crack of dawn for work tomorrow.”

  “You don’t have to do that, you know.” Michael threw an arm around the teenager’s shoulders and squeezed affectionately. “I can get you a cushy job—”

  “Michael!” Simone glared at her brother.

  “It’s okay, Uncle Mike. I like my job.”

  “If you change your mind…”

  Drew gave him a crooked grin and took the stairs two at a time. He didn’t so much as look back at her.

  Taking a deep breath to ease the knot in her middle, Simone said, “I wish you wouldn’t do that.”

  “Do what? Bring pizza? It’s good. Try it.”

  “You’re not going to distract me. Drew has good values, and I would like to see him keep them.”

  Michael’s visage darkened. “You’re saying I have bad values?”

  For a moment, Simone couldn’t look at her brother. He knew how she felt about his business, no matter that he’d reassured her he’d gone straight when he took over from Papa. For a moment, she thought about bringing the subject into the open again. But they’d lived so long not talking directly about what he did for a living.

  Michael had protected and taken care of her ever since they had been kids. And he’d been so good to her, Drew and David. She loved him unconditionally, and she didn’t want to put an end to their relationship. And so once more she danced around the truth.

  “Offering your nephew a cushy job so he doesn’t have to work hard? Yes, I would say that’s not what I want my son to learn from you.”

  “All right. I get the picture. You and David never would let me spoil my nephew.”

  “He’s a good kid, Michael. I want him to stay that way. I don’t want him taking the easy way.”

  “About last night,” he said, suddenly changing the subject. “Sorry I wasn’t there to help you out.”

  Part of Simone was sorry, the other part glad. If her brother had stuck around, for sure he and Gideon would have come face-to-face.

  “What happened to you, anyway?”

 
Michael grinned. “I met someone…um…interesting.”

  “Bared midriff, purple-streaked hair?”

  “That would be the one. The party wasn’t really her kind of scene. Not mine, either. So we took it elsewhere.” His smile suddenly faded. “Good thing we weren’t at the club or I would’ve had the police breath ing down my neck just for being there. You weren’t thinking I had anything to do with Cecchi’s murder?”

  Simone tried to cover the guilt she felt for initially suspecting Michael. “I was just wondering where you were, is all. I guess it’s a good thing you weren’t there.”

  “So you didn’t tell anyone that I’d offered to take care of Cecchi for you?”

  “Of course not.”

  Still appearing unsettled, Michael nodded. “Trouble never leaves us DeNalis alone.”

  Simone didn’t want her son getting into trouble. Some would say that was the fate of a DeNali, even if he carried a different last name. But she was determined to do whatever it took to keep Drew safe.

  How, when she herself might be in hot water? an internal voice taunted.

  What if determination wasn’t enough?

  “SO WHAT IS IT between you and Simone?” Cass asked Gideon when she caught him at the upstairs bar nursing a shot of hundred-dollar-a-bottle tequila. “The problem, I mean.”

  Gideon let the liquor roll over his tongue and down his throat. “Who said there was a problem?”

  When Cass raised her eyebrows and stared at the glass in his hand, Gideon grunted. Of course Cass knew, even if she didn’t know the specifics.

  “It was a long time ago.”

  He finished the shot and signaled Blade for another, silently willing Cass to take the hint and do a disappear ing act. The club was in full swing, couples dancing in each others arms on the floor below to a slow tune that dripped with sensuality and made him think of Simone.

  “First love?” Cass asked, leaning in close and keeping her voice low.

  “Why the interest?”

  “Because I care about you, Gideon, and I want to see you happy. You’re lonely and—”

  He barked a laugh. “How could I be lonely running this club, and with a certain person choosing to stick her nose in my business.”

  “But you have no one to go home to at night.”