Page 35 of Dead & Breakfast
“I didn’t—”
“We had pancakes in the shape of hearts.” Sal pushed his pointer fingers and thumbs together to make a heart in the air.
“Oh, that’s actually quite nice—”
“Anatomically correct hearts.”
“O…kay…”
A grin spread across Sal’s face, mischief in his eyes. “I put strawberry jam underneath so when we cut into them it looked like real blood was gushing out.”
Arthur groaned and collapsed onto the counter, elbows sliding out from under him. “You didn’t.”
“I didn’t.” Sal patted him on the shoulder. “I promise I was every bit the picture of a modern major humanoid. Normalest normaler to ever normal about these parts.”
Arthur peered at his husband through a gap in his fingers. “Why don’t I believe you?”
“Because you’re a very sharp detective, of both mind and fang, my love.”
“Speaking of which…” Arthur pulled out his notebook. “I’ve got a lead we can track down. If you still want to help.”
“Of course I’m going to help! What’s Shuttlecock without his Wattpad, after all.”
“You’re doing that on purpose.”
“Doing what?” Sal’s smile was completely guileless. “I’ll be ready to go in just a moment.”
Arthur selected a new umbrella for the day—black with glow-in-the-dark bats on it, the least ostentatious one he owned, but he needn’t have bothered. When Sal returned with Rumble in the cat backpack, he was sporting a pair of aviator sunglasses and holding a deerstalker cap in his hand.
“What’s that for?” Arthur asked, against his better judgment.
“The vibes, my dear.” Sal deposited the hat on Arthur’s head and handed over a folded pair of aviators to match his own. “Now, where to?”
Chapter 10
Arthur wasn’t surehow he’d go about finding Quinn at city hall—and he was putting an awful lot of faith in the notion that she’d be working on the weekend as well as Nora—but for once, fortune favored him.
Quinn sat on a bench outside city hall, eating a bagel, a drink carrier in her lap with four coffees sporting the logo of the Big Bad Brew. Her posture was ramrod straight, her business attire crisp and pristine. Not even the breeze seemed to dare to ruffle her tidy bun. The only crease on her was between her eyebrows as Arthur and Sal rode up on their tandem bicycle.
“Good morning,” she said in a manner that assigned absolutely no goodness to that particular morning. Though Nora wasn’t around, Quinn’s tone remained icy. Perhaps that was simply her default state.
“And what a lovely morning it is,” Salvatore replied far more convincingly. He left the shade of Arthur’s umbrella and sat on the bench beside her.
Arthur kept his distance, not wanting her to feel trapped. “I was hoping to ask you a few questions, Ms.Clark.”
“I can give you the number to our PR person,” she said. “They’ll answer all your questions about the mayor’s death. I can’t make any statements to journalists.”
“Oh, journalists! Can you imagine?” Sal chuckled. “Though I will admit to having published some of my youthful journals in a rather scandalous periodical as well as some more recent pieces collected in the Archive of Our Own—”
“We aren’t journalists is what he means. You know we own the Iris Inn. I’m investigating the mayor’s death.” Arthur stood tall as he said it, bracing for her ridicule. He wondered at what point he should remove his aviators for full dramatic effect.
“I don’t know anything about it. Or at least no more than anyone else. Really, it’s none of my business.” Quinn shifted away from Sal and stood. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to get back to work.”
“Actually, we have a source that tells us you wanted the mayor’s job. So, a bit your business, as it turns out,” Arthur said in a rush, moving to block her path. “And also you were likely the last one to see him alive.”
She gave him a puzzled look, eyes narrowed. “Let me guess. Your source is Nora Anderson?”
“We may not be journalists, Ms.Clark, but even we know better than to reveal our sources.” Sal rose to his feet as well with a flourish that quite knocked the deerstalker cap from Arthur’s head.
