The Smoking Nun Read online

  But Carla shook her head and began to tug me toward a table with an infectious giggle. As we whizzed across the room, I waved to Deacon Delacorte, the newest addition to Our Lady fresh from, of all places, a peace mission in China.

  Deacon Delacorte was a handsome, dark-haired man in his early forties with a frame like a pro wrestler and the face of an angel. I also waved to Deacon Cameron, an older gentleman with a head full of graying hair and an acne-scarred face. Both were still dressed in their afternoon mass attire, enjoying a cup of punch—the punch I should be serving them.

  As we whisked past the punch, I pointed to the refreshment table before we came to a halt.

  “Forget the punch, Trix. People can get their own punch—a monkey could get their own punch. You need a date, young lady. You’re too pretty to be dateless, and after tonight, I bet you won’t be for long.” She patted the table where the index cards to write little notes about each participant sat stacked next to a cup of pencils. “Grab a pencil, honey.”

  I began to heartily protest, pressing my palms against the edge of the table to resist. “But—”

  “But nothing!” she teased breathlessly with a wink of her artfully made-up smoky eye. “You do see there are more men than women, don’t you?”

  My eyes made a cursory sweep around the softly lit room, and I realized she was right. There were indeed more men than women.

  I gulped and blanched at the same time. “But—”

  “The children need you, Trixie! If we don’t have enough women, the men will lose interest. C’mon. How can you say no to the children? If we don’t keep these suckers here for as long as possible, they’ll leave, and then where will the silent auction be? Dead and buried, that’s where. We’ve gotten a lot of donations for the auction. It’s money in the bag as long as we play this right. Now, we’ve got some fish on the line, we just need to reel ’em in!”

  Blinking, I stared up at her. How was I supposed to defend myself against a plea like that? Do it for the kids…

  Panic began to turn in my belly and my hands went cold and clammy. “But I…I don’t know the first thing about dating. I can’t—”

  “But look, you’re to-die-for, want-to-gouge-her-gorgeous-eyes-out friend Coop is helping, and as much as I want to hate her for being so maddeningly stunning, I can’t because if anyone can get the men to stick around, she can.”

  Carla pointed over my shoulder two or three tables behind us where Coop, wide-eyed and flawless, sat like she’d just been dropped in the middle of the twentieth level of Hell.

  Don’t ask. Just know that level truly exists…then let that bit of information simmer on your back burner for a while like it has mine.

  Oh, dear. Poor Coop. I knew Carla had likely bamboozled her. I mean, who could resist her sultry voice and breathy conviction when she wanted something? No one. That’s who. Especially if she’d told her it was for the children, whom Coop absolutely adored.

  And then there was Cal. Coop and Cal, the fellow Higgs had hired at the shelter, were a little bit smitten with one another in the sweetest, most innocent of ways. Over the last few months, they’d had coffee (or orange juice, for my Coop) and lunch together at least once a week.

  There’d been a lot of questions from Coop about the funny feeling in her tummy every time she saw Cal, but we hadn’t had “the talk” as of yet. Heck, I didn’t know if we needed to have the talk. I didn’t even know if I knew enough about the talk to have it in the first place.

  I only knew, Coop didn’t know any more about dating than I did. And I didn’t want Cal to see her at a table and get his feelings hurt because she was caught up in something she didn’t know how to say no to.

  Carla spun me around and patted my shoulder with a wide grin, her white teeth gleaming, leaving me feeling like the prey to her wolf—which is how I imagine Higgs feels.

  “Now, you just sit here and be pretty, Trix. They’ll flock to you like moths to a flame. Trust me. I know men.”

  And believe you me, I believed her.

  As she coaxed me onto a high barstool and planted the cards and a pencil in front of me, I began another weak protest. “But—”

  “But nothing. Just be yourself, Trixie, and enjoy! And thanks for helping an old girl out,” she breathed, tweaking my cheek seconds before I heard Father Rico, our host for tonight, tap the microphone to announce the beginning of the event.

  His words all blended together in one big sound, like the noise the adults make on Charlie Brown. I was about to speed date—and I was terrified.

  And suddenly, a very tall man with hawkish blue eyes and a tweed blazer over a black T-shirt was in front of me. He had a slope to his shoulders that made him look shorter than he actually was, but his smile reached his eyes well enough. He stuck out his slender, veined hand as I licked my lips in nervous panic.

  “I’m Jason. You are?”

  I’m thinking about killing Carla…

  Shaking off my commandment-breaking thought, I cleared my throat and stuck my hand out, trying to be as confident as Carla. I could do this—for the kids.

  “Trixie. Trixie Lavender. Nice to meet you.”

  He slid into the chair, his long legs encased in trousers with a meticulously sharp pleat down along the thigh, and unbuttoned his jacket.

  “Nice to meet you, too, Trixie.” There was a small, awkward pause as all my people skills flew right out the window, until Jason said, “Before we get started. Do you know where the crab legs are? My friend told me there’d be all-you-can-eat crab legs, but I can’t find them anywhere.”

  “He lied.”

  The words shot from my lips before I could stop them, making me consider clapping my hand over my mouth to keep more from escaping.

  Jason, who, if I’m honest, really did have terrific light brown hair, shiny and thick with these fascinating caramel highlights, made a distasteful face.

  “There’s a sucker born every minute, huh?” he joked with a brief smile.

  “Well, if you believed there’d be crab legs at a speed-dating event, held in a church, of all places, then yes. There’s a sucker born every minute,” I confirmed.

  He threw his head back and laughed, all that shiny hair bouncing with its incredible volume. “You’re a comic.”

  “No. I’m an ex-nun.”

  Jason blinked, the fringe of his lashes sweeping his cheeks. “Really?”

  Oh, heavens. It was as though I couldn’t stop myself from playing the honesty card.

  “I think we’ve established I’m anything but untruthful,” I responded, and then I smiled uneasily, hoping to soften my words.

  The moment I thought we were simply going to sit in awkward silence due to Jason’s shock, the bell rang and he was up and virtually running off to the next table.

  On a sigh, as the participants shuffled, I took a sneak peek behind me to see Coop deeply ensconced in conversation with a very attractive man, then throwing her head back and doing her strange imitation of a laugh à la her idol, Alexis Carrington. All the while, a line of men waited with impatient yet hopeful looks on their faces.

  Maybe I should take a cue from my demon friend and act my way through this.

  “Hello,” whispered a pensive young man, maybe no more than thirty.

  Squaring my shoulders, I smiled at him in his baggy tan shorts, flip-flops and a faded tie-dyed tunic, settling in to act my way out of this.

  “Hi. I’m Trixie. Nice to meet you.”

  “Jeremiah,” was all he offered, before taking his seat and tucking his long, scraggly blond hair behind his ears. Then he placed his elbows on the table, cupped his chin in his hands and stared at me.

  But he didn’t just stare at me, he stared at me with such intensity, squinting his eyes, it was as though he was looking for my soul.

  I fidgeted in my chair, twisting a length of my hair around my finger, which I suppose could have been interpreted as flirty but was really out of nervousness.

  “Um—”

  “S
hhh!” he whisper-yelled, flashing a ruddy, tanned hand up in front of my mouth. “Don’t talk, dude.”

  I leaned back to avoid his touch and cocked my head. “Excuse me?”

  Was dating always this rude, dude?

  Jeremiah shook a calloused finger at me with an intense gaze. “Just stay still. Please. I like to sit for a sec and get a feel for your aura, ya know? Really get into your core and dig around so I can feeeeel your soul. I can’t do that if you’re making noise.”

  I blinked, and as he dug around in my core, I doodled him a note in big block letters on my index card while I patiently waited for him to finish feeeeeling my soul.

  When he finally spoke, his serious gaze turned suddenly fun and friendly as he reached across the table to grab my hand. Apparently, my soul met with his soul’s approval.

  “So, heeey. S’up?” He grinned. A very pleasant grin, I might add.

  But I’d been soured, and no amount of smiling and dude-ing me were going to change that.

  So I looked at him for a long moment before I held up the index card in front of my face and let him read what I’d wrote.

  Not if my soul and your soul were the last souls on Earth, DUDE. And then I tacked on a smiley emoji for good measure.

  I was saved Jeremiah’s reaction when there was a piercing scream as the crowd rippled and moved, drawing my eye to Deacon Delacorte’s tall figure at the corner of the basement by the exit door.

  And then I heard him yell in his raspy voice, “Someone call 9-1-1! Sister Ophelia needs help!”

  I jumped out of my chair and began elbowing my way through the crowd toward Sister Ophelia, my heart clamoring in my chest.

  My first thought was she’d had a heart attack; she is in her seventies. But after pushing my way through the throngs of people to get to her, I came to a screeching halt at the wide-open exit door, where I saw Deacon Delacorte shaking his head, hair glistening with droplets of water, a deep sorrow in his eyes.

  “She’s…she’s gone!” he wailed mournfully, falling to his knees with Sister Ophelia in his arms. “Gone!”

  Chapter 2

  As I dropped to my knees on the floor beside him, Deacon Delacorte held my favorite nun under her arms, as though he’d dragged her in from outside, and sobbed, letting his chin fall to his chest.

  Her head leaned in crooked fashion to the left side of his wide chest, pressed against his stole, her body crumpled and twisted in an odd position on the floor, and her wimple was missing. She’d had her wimple on when I’d seen her earlier this evening.

  I reached out a shaky hand to circle her wrist, and indeed, Sister Ophelia had no pulse. Her skin was a bit clammy and definitely a little wet, leading me to believe Deacon Delacorte had definitely found her outside.

  And that was when I saw her neck. An ugly blue and purple ring stained her wrinkled skin, and her gray-blue eyes bulged outward, leaving me to fight to keep from hissing my horror.

  My stomach heaved at the ligature mark, but I pressed my trembling fingers to her wrist, closed my eyes and sent out a wish to the universe for her safe passage. I wanted to scoop her up in my arms and cling to her, but I knew in my gut foul play had played a part in this, and I didn’t want to contaminate any possible evidence.

  “Trixie Lavender?” I heard Coop call as she, too, dropped to her knees, placing a hand on my shoulder. “Oh, no, no, no. Not Sister Ophelia,” she said, her voice tight and stiff, which is as close to emotion as she can get.

  But emotion is what got the better of me then, and instead of making sure the police were on their way, I caved, leaning against Coop as my eyes welled with tears and I began to sob.

  She wrapped an arm around me and squeezed but let me go when Higgs approached and asked, “Coop? May I?”

  As I felt Coop leave my side, Higgs wrapped me up in his big arms. I caught a flash of the intricate sleeve tattoos on his forearm before I allowed myself an indulgence. I buried my face in his wide chest and cried—cried so hard with such great, gulping sobs, I thought my throat would surely burst.

  And he let me, running his wide palm over my back. As the initial hush of horror wore off and people milled about and Coop managed to get Deacon Delacorte to let Sister Ophelia’s body go, Higgs rocked back and forth on his feet, solid, steady, and reassuring.

  The scent of him and his cologne filled my nose, woodsy and musky. In that moment, I realized how safe I felt with him. How protected.

  It was only when I heard the police arrive that I knew I had to gather myself for Sister Ophelia’s sake. She wouldn’t want me in hysterics when this was clearly a case of foul play. I didn’t doubt that for a second. The marks around her neck were more than enough proof for me. I didn’t need forensics to confirm that, and as a fellow amateur crime solver and lover of mysteries, Sister Ophelia wouldn’t want me blubbering all over the place. She’d want me to get my head in the game.

  Wiping my eyes with a fist, I leaned back away from Higgs’s tall frame and brushed at his purple shirt, covered in my tears and mascara, which was definitely not waterproof as advertised.

  “I’m sorry,” I whispered, reaching up and cupping his jaw for a brief moment before I muttered my thanks and turned to wipe the remainder of my tears and compose myself as the police rushed in.

  Detective Tansy was the first to find me, reaching out a hand, her sharp blue eyes full of sympathy, her voice cracking. “Oh, Trixie, love. I’m so sorry.”

  Tansy knew how much I liked Sister Ophelia, and she knew how much I’d been enjoying attending services after such a long time away. Since the last case we’d worked on, involving some of the homeless men from Higgs’s shelter, when she’d asked me to be a liaison of sorts for bereaved victims of crime, we’d spent a good deal of time together—both in working and social capacities.

  There hadn’t been a murder since the last maniac, Detective Griswald, had been on the loose and selling the organs of the homeless on the black market, but we’d ventured into several domestic disputes and the like together with great success.

  My capacity as liaison was nothing official. I didn’t receive a paycheck nor was I privy to many details in some cases, but it was my way of giving back to the community, and as hard as it was to find the right words of comfort for the family of someone with a gunshot wound or the victim of domestic violence, I never said no when Tansy called.

  Thus far, I’d had no reason to poke my nose in where it didn’t belong due to the nature of the cases we’d worked together. Since Detective Griswald’s case, they’d all been pretty cut and dried.

  Yet, this time was different. Sister Ophelia was my friend and a confidant in some respects, and someone had hurt my friend. Seeing her so broken made every square inch of me ache not just with sadness, but the need to find who’d done this.

  Still, I squeezed Tansy’s hand in return and shook my head, inhaling deeply. “Thanks, Tans.”

  “Do we know anything? Did you see anything, Trixie?”

  “I didn’t see anything and I don’t know anything other than I’m certain she was murdered. Certain.”

  Tansy’s sympathy-filled eyes went from soft to hard in seconds. She pushed a hand through her short blonde hair and cocked her head. “Say again?”

  “I know she was murdered, Tansy. You’ll see when you get a glimpse of the bruises on her neck. It looks like she was strangled, but I got…too caught up in the emotion of it all when I saw her, and I…”

  Tansy looked down at me, her eyes soft once more. She tucked my hair behind my ear and murmured, “Aw, Trixie, love. This one’s too close, eh? How about you sit this one out?”

  But I shook my head again, squaring my shoulders. “No. I can’t. I think you know why I can’t. Please, if nothing else, just let me shadow you, okay? Maybe I’ll hear something or see something that can be helpful. I’ll feel helpless if I don’t do something.”

  She winked and nodded with a resigned sigh as she pulled her trusty notepad from the pocket of her navy blazer. “All righ
t, but you remember our deal, Miss Marple. No interference with the crime scene. You may observe only. I speak to everyone first. Period.” Then she pointed her finger over my shoulder at Higgs. “Bring the big galoot with you for support. This one won’t be easy.”

  Higgs was behind me in a second, his warm hands resting on my shoulders. “Tansy’s right. Let her do the work. You’re too close to this one, Trixie.”

  I could only nod as the forensics team began to cordon off the area with yellow crime scene tape and Tansy talked with Deacon Delacorte, who was beside himself.

  Goose and Knuckles found their way through the crowd and when they reached me, Knuckles held out his brawny arms. “Trixie girl. I’m sorry. Dang, I’m so sorry.”

  I flew into his warm embrace, pressing my face to his burly shoulder for only a second before I leaned back and couldn’t help but ask, “Did you see anything, Knuckles?”

  Goose put his thin hand on Knuckles’s shoulder and shook his bandana-covered head. “We were over by the mini quiches when it went down, kiddo. We didn’t see anything.” He chucked me under the chin. “You okay? Want me to grab you something to wet your whistle?”

  Sighing, I gave him a watery smile. “Thanks, Goose, but I’m okay. I’m more interested in what Deacon Delacorte saw. I mean, who would do such a thing? Who would hurt someone as kind and as funny as Sister Ophelia?”

  “So you’re sure someone hurt her? What makes you say that?” Knuckles asked with a frown, an eyebrow topped with three silver studs rising in question.

  Shivering, I wrapped my arms around my waist, but my conviction hadn’t wavered. “I have no doubt she was strangled. There were horrible bruise marks on her neck. It was…it was dreadful.”

  Goose whistled, driving his finger into the pockets of his best pair of jeans. “What a shame. I liked her a lot. She was a firecracker, that one. Always findin’ a way to quote scripture to me. Even made a deal with me. She said if I came to one Sunday sermon, she’d get a tattoo. Can ya believe a nun with a tattoo?” He cackled at the memory. “She was a fine woman, Trixie. I’m sure sorry she’s gone.”