Corpse Suzette

and
Sergio strolled her way, she decided to take her glass of iced tea and move to
a table inside. No point in letting him know that she knew about Devon. What he
didn’t know wouldn’t hurt him... or, more importantly, cause her any grief.
    He came swaggering into the
room a couple of minutes later, looking like he had just stepped off a yacht,
wearing crisp white slacks, a navy blue blazer, and a red mock turtleneck. The
smile he flashed her way told her that he was most impressed with himself and
expected her to be, too.
    She smiled back and lifted
her glass in salute. If he had only known what she was thinking: that she
should get one of those outfits and ship it back to her brother, Macon, in
Georgia. He needed a git-up like that to wear when he was changing
transmissions on trucks there in his garage.
    “Ms. Reid... the private
investigator,” he said as he pulled out the chair across from her, unbuttoned
his jacket, and sat down. “Or is it Ms. McGill, reporter at large?”
    Savannah chuckled. “Well, I
guess I’m just plain ol’ Savannah right now, until you tell me what you want
from me.”
    He motioned to the waitress
and ordered a vodka martini on the rocks. Then he looked around the restaurant
and waved a hand, indicating the giant palms, the tropical ceiling fans that
swirled overhead, the heavy wicker furniture, and the expansive view of the
marina. “You like?”
    She nodded. “I like. Nice
choice.”
    His eyes skimmed over her
outfit, taking in the simple Aran sweater and beige twill slacks. Her only
adornment was a pair of plain gold hoop earrings that Granny Reid had given her
for her twenty-first birthday.
    She could tell he wasn’t
impressed, and that was just fine with her. Occasionally, her private
detective’s income allowed her to splurge on something nice from the Victoria’s
Secret catalogue, but she wasn’t about to tell ol’ Sergio that she was wearing
a rather daring silk teddy under that tame exterior. Her bloomers weren’t—and never
would be—any concern of a guy who dyed his hair “Midnight Black” at the age of
fifty-something.
    “I checked up on you, bella ”
he said, his Italian accent thick as Georgia sorghum and about as sickeningly
sick. “You’re quite a detective. You’ve solved some rather important cases here
in San Carmelita over the years... you and that friend of yours, Sergeant
Coulter.”
    “One or two, here and
there,” she replied.
    She said nothing as the
waitress gave him his martini, but as soon as she walked away, Savannah fixed
him with a mischievous grin and said, “I’ve done some checking on you, too,
since you called this morning.”
    He froze, his martini
halfway to his lips, and said, “Oh? And what did you find out?”
    She glanced around, but no
one was seated near them. She lowered her voice anyway. “Oh, a couple of
things. First of all, you’re from a little-known area of Italy....”
    He took a sip of martini
and gulped it down. “Yes...?”
    “A little-known, western
part of Italy, called Bakersfield, California. Name on birth certificate:
Leonard Roy Hoffman. Graduated from Thurston High School, class of ’71.
Finished number 273 out of 275 students. You’ve had a number of aliases over
the years: Mario Barbarino, Stephano Gucci, Salvador Donatello. Served time in
Lompoc for embezzlement of company funds from a designer in the LA garment
district.” She paused for a breath. “How am I doing so far?”
    He found his voice and
croaked out a simple. “Fine. And...?”
    “You and Suzette Du Bois
weren’t actually married. You had a church wedding, close friends and all that,
about five years ago, but nobody bothered to fill out the proper forms and get
them to the county courthouse, so it wasn’t really legal. Which was handy
because you didn’t actually have to go to the trouble of getting a divorce about
a year later when she kicked you out... for fooling around with other women.”
    He nearly choked on his
olive. “How did you know that!?”
    She resisted the urge to
laugh. Although she and Tammy had verified all the rest on the computer an hour
before she had left the house to join him at the restaurant, she had just
guessed at the reason for the split-up. Sergió-Leonard wasn’t a difficult book
to read.
    “I’m good,” she said.
“Don’t you think?”
    “Maybe a little too good,”
he replied. “I wasn’t hiring you to check up on me. I know more than I
need to know about myself.”
    “And now,