One Foot In The Gravy by Delia Rosen Read Free Book Online Page A

wanted to know what the autopsy—
    My phone buzzed. It was Grant. Well, howdie-do.
    “Danny Boy,” I said.
    “Kazakhstan,” he replied.
    Yeah, those were the names. I admit mine wasn’t very inspired, while his had kind of hot, geopolitical appeal.
    “How’ve you been?” I asked.
    “Busy,” he said, which was an explanation and a false-front apology all in one neat word. “You?”
    “Busy,” I replied in kind. “Lolo?” I asked.
    “Lolo,” he replied.
    “What’s your involvement?” I asked.
    “Local swells are involved, so the mayor asked me to stay in the loop.”
    “‘Involved’ as in suspects?”
    “I didn’t say that.”
    “You didn’t say they’re not.”
    “You were there,” Grant said. “Any impressions?”
    “You read my report?”
    “Oh yeah. ‘Hoppy tried to shnorr, ’” Grant quoted. “‘I think he was a shnorrer.’ Christ, Kaz. What does that even mean?”
    “Officer Jed Clampett didn’t seem to have a problem with my report.”
    “He didn’t realize this was his first murder.”
    That sat me upright and caused the chair to squeak. “You got the autopsy report?”
    “Right here on my laptop,” Grant said. “Want to tell me about last night?”
    Well played, thought I. “No, but I’ll tell you about this morning.”
    “What happened this morning?”
    I told him about my return trip to Belle Meade and my observations about the hole in the floor, Hoppy’s visit to the media room, and the parts that didn’t sit right.
    “His leaving just then doesn’t make sense,” Grant agreed.
    Something in his voice made me ask, “Why do you say ‘just then’?”
    “Rhonda Shays had just arrived,” he said.
    Once again my back straightened and the chair made like Mickey Mouse. “Rhonda Shays? Royce’s ex?”
    “They were reportedly an item,” Grant told me.
    That was a kick in the kishkes . I must have missed her in the crowd, and then when I was in the kitchen. Or maybe my block-wealthy-snobs program was running. Royce Sinclair is a wealthy real estate developer who had visions of turning our block into an entertainment complex. His only impediment : the deli. He tried to buy it, wooed me, won me, lost me, tried to steal it—it was a mess. Especially for Mrs. Sinclair, who accused me of being all kinds of slut even though she was rumored to be having multiple affairs herself. Not that she’d ever said that to my face. We moved in different social circles; all my intel was secondhand. Of course, she had breeding and I had none. Rhonda’s world was like a Thoroughbred stud farm where that kind of behavior was tragic in its absence. She was entitled to roam. Her husband was supposed to be jealous and fight for her, not wander off himself. She divorced him and pulled a “me,” taking back her distinguished maiden name.
    “How did you find that out?” I asked.
    “Lolo.”
    “Makes sense,” I said. “Rhonda isn’t a member of her literary group, the Cozy Foxes.”
    “I don’t follow. Why does that make sense?”
    “If you’re not there, everyone guns for you.”
    “I see.”
    “But Rhonda’s a little younger than his usual consort.”
    “How do you know that ?” Grant asked.
    “Thom.”
    “How does she know that?”
    “Restaurant workers are invisible,” I told him. “People talk. Then Thom talks, sometimes to herself, but I overhear.”
    “Well, I hear Hoppy was creative with melted chocolate—”
    “Shays fondue? I’m shocked.”
    “—or so his saleswoman Victoria Bundy told us. Seems he used to practice on little white chocolate women in the kitchen.”
    I told him I got the picture. I did, though it occurred to me that white chocolate women would melt under heated chocolate. Maybe that was all a metaphor for how he saw himself. Men approaching fifty have weird issues.
    “So he was killed and he was seeing Rhonda,” I said. “ How was he killed?”
    “Someone drilled him.”
    “Really? Wouldn’t we have heard a shot?”
    “No,