Buried In Buttercream

ice cream.”
    “How quaint.”
    “Well, we’re just quaint sorta folks.”
    Madeline snapped her notebook closed. “Frankly, Ms. Reid, I’m not sure why you hired me. It appears to me that you’ve already made up your mind about every aspect of your ... um ... affair, so ...”
    “Actually, Ms. Aberson, I didn’t hire you. Two people whom I happen to adore hired you, as a loving gift to me and my groom-to-be. And that’s why we’re sitting here in this”—she glanced around, taking in the tearoom’s gaudy, cherubim murals, bright pink chandeliers, clusters of fake grapes hanging from the ceiling, and overstuffed, diamond-tucked, brocade booths—“lovely establishment, eating this expensive rolled marmalade.”
    “Roulade.”
    “Whatever.” Savannah reached for her purse. “And for my friends’ sakes, I’m going to tell them that this meeting went beautifully, that you and I love each other, and that your services are going to make all the difference in the world to me. Because, loving me as they do, that’s what they’ll want to hear.”
    To Savannah’s surprise, Madeline ripped off her sunglasses and tossed them onto the table. This gave Savannah her first real look at the woman’s face, and she could instantly see the reason for the oversized shades.
    Madeline had, apparently, had some “work done.” And it hadn’t gone well. One eye seemed unnaturally wide open while the lid of the other drooped badly. And no amount of concealer could cover the prominent scars or diminish the heavy bags under the right eye or the sunken, dark area below the left.
    Savannah felt a wave of sympathy for the woman, who had tried to improve her appearance, only to have to hide behind sunglasses for the rest of her years.
    Madeline couldn’t be more than forty-five years old. How bad could her natural aging have been that she would feel the need for surgery?
    “Savannah,” she said, suddenly dropping the whole hoity-toity persona and looking far more like a simple woman in need of a job. “I’m sorry we’re getting off on the wrong foot here. I really do want to help you.”
    Savannah thought it over for a moment, then said, “Okay. Let’s try again.”
    “I have connections,” Madeline said, toying with her sunglasses. “I know people. I can get things done quickly when my client needs it. And Ryan and John said that you need a location right away. Let me arrange that for you.”
    “I have to be able to afford it.”
    “Of course.” She opened her notebook again and flipped through the pages. “How many guests are you expecting?”
    “We had about fifty coming ... to the other one, that is. I reckon most of them could make it to the next one.”
    “Okay. Maybe I could get you a nice room at the country club. You could have the ceremony there by the lake, the reception inside, and you two could spend the night in the bridal suite. It’s lovely since the redecoration.”
    “Nice, but too expensive.”
    “How about the Stardust Pavilion down in McGivney Canyon? They have a large reception room and—”
    “I tried to book it this morning, and the gal in charge said they had a fierce mudslide after last night’s rain. Most of it’s got a foot of mud in it.”
    “Hmm. Natural catastrophes just seem to be following you everywhere.”
    “Story of my life. I hear tell I was born on a dark and stormy night. Then my high school prom was canceled when a twister took out the gym. And I made sergeant on the police force the day of the Northridge quake.”
    “Yeah, well, my birthday is April fifteenth. Income tax day. The day the Titanic sank. The day Lincoln died.”
    “It’s a wonder we’re still alive and kickin’!”
    Savannah laughed, noticing that when Madeline smiled, only one side of her face went up. Apparently, that surgery hadn’t gone well either.
    And that was a crying shame, because—when she wasn’t being a bossy, snooty, pushy, pain in the hind end—she didn’t seem like such a bad sort. Savannah almost liked her.
    “Thank you for your help, Madeline,” she said, taking a sip of her lukewarm tea. “Let’s grab something chocolate off that tray over there and get down to the nitty-gritty with this wedding malarkey. Good Lord, girl ... how do you do this stuff for a living?”

    When Savannah came to and went from the police station, she always used the back door, rather than the front. Although the rear entrance was more convenient to the parking lot, the chief of