“Was there anyone else out here with you? Did anyone else see what happened?” I looked out into the dark street. Dim lamps illuminated the sidewalk as the rain pelted against the colorful awning we stood under.
“Just me and that girl who looks like a movie star,” he said, pointing at Coop who stood rooted to Knuckles’s and Goose’s sides.
I stuck my hand out to him and smiled when he took it. “Thank you, Mr. Lapowski. Let me give you my card so you have my name if you remember anything else. I own a tattoo shop right here in Cobbler Cove, so I’m not very far. The police should be here any second now. Please make sure you tell them exactly what you told me. They’ll want to talk to you for an official statement. Will you be all right until then? Can I get you anything in the interim?”
He shook his dark head with a confused frown. “Nah. I’m fine. I think I just want to get on a plane and go home to my wife and grandkids. This has been a really weird trip,” he grumbled, sticking his hands into the pockets of his dress slacks and driving his double chin into his buffalo plaid checked jacket, his small eyes full of worry.
“I understand. But please wait for the officers before you do anything else. You don’t want to have to come all the way back from Idaho just to give a statement.”
He gave me a curt nod as I left him, his face distorted with worry. That was when I saw the top of Tansy’s head, pushing her way through the crowd.
Aw, man. I was going to get into trouble for sure.
As she approached, I stepped around a group of people who’d gathered, hoping to avoid her.
But she ended up cutting me off at the pass with a quick movement. “Evening, Trixie,” she said amicably.
I smiled and waved, but I didn’t offer up anything about what Mr. Lapowski told me. There wasn’t really anything to offer anyway.
“Evening, Tansy. I’m on my way in to eat my dinner. Nice to see you.”
“Hold it right there, Angela Lansbury,” she warned with an inquiring eyebrow. “What are you doing here of all the places in Cobbler Cove?”
I pointed to the inside of the hotel. “I’m on my way inside to have my dinner. Higgs is waiting on me.”
Which wasn’t really a lie, was it?
Tansy gave me a skeptical look, her eyes critical. “Coincidence that you’re here in the middle of a hit-and-run where all these makeup people have gathered?”
“Totally,” I responded, giving her my best innocent glance. “Coop was out here, catching a breath of fresh air before our dinner arrived, and she saw the hit-and-run. She came and got me after she called 9-1-1. I’m sure she’ll give you a statement. And that’s it. I was here with Higgs and Coop inside the restaurant before it happened. You can ask our waiter, Gary.”
That was true, too. Coop had been out here when Ames was hit, and I had been inside. No lies detected today.
Tansy’s face softened for a minute, her lips curling into a smile. “You’re still angry about earlier today.”
Shaking my head, I looked her right in the eye as I drove my hands into the pockets of my puffy vest. “I’m not going to tell you I’m not disappointed—because I am. But angry? No, ma’am. I’m not angry. I know you’re just looking out for me, and I don’t want to be the cause of any stress. Now, I’m going to have to gnaw your arm off if I don’t get something to eat soon. So please have someone question Coop and take her statement so I don’t die of starvation.”
Lifting her chin, she gave me a curt nod with suspicious eyes. “Far be it from me to keep a lady from her supper. As you were, Miss Marple.”
She stepped back out of the way and I blew out a breath I didn’t even know I was holding as I made my way toward Coop, who was giving her statement to Oz.
Look, I don’t want to lie to Tansy, but I’d like to think my conversation with Susie was organic and private, and I didn’t want to say anything about her pregnancy and Luca unless it became absolutely necessary because this wasn’t a murder investigation yet, right?
The trouble was, no one would tell me if it was necessary.
As it turned out, it wasn’t necessary. I didn’t have to tell Tansy anything because a drama vlogger from Dish and Makeup took care of it for me. The guilt that ate at me all night long about whether I should take what I’d learned from Susie to Tansy, keeping me from sleep, was for naught. The bags under my eyes for having such a sensitive secret under my belt all for nothing.
Because Coop sat next to me at our dining room table, her mouth a thin line as she played a video on her laptop, uploaded in the wee hours of the morning, and when I caught my first glimpse of the vlogger, I gasped.
“Isn’t that the girl I saw in the restaurant with the makeup gurus? She was the one with her leg on the table, right?”
A tiny sprite of a girl with a dark auburn pixie haircut and full red lips looked back at me from her hotel room as she recapped the rehashed tea from Susie-Susie and her breakup with Luca at gory length.
I blanched at Coop’s next words. ”Yes. That’s her, all right. Her name is Corinne, and she’s probably the meanest of
