Page 107 of A Dead End Wedding

"Well, hello there! Are you a friend of DeeDee? Or Max's?" she said, suddenly all smiles again.

Oh, no. She smells fresh prey in the "let's get Max and December married off" sweepstakes.

Jake turned on the full-wattage smile, and one of the blue-haired ladies nearest to him nearly swooned. Not that I'veever seen anybody swoon, or even ever used the word "swoon" before, but, trust me, that was a swoon.

Not that I blamed her.

"Dee Dee?" he asked.

"No, he's not. Well, yes, he is, in the 'I just met him, but he helped me out in a crisis' sense, but not in a 'put your periscope up' kind of sense, Aunt Celia," I said, exasperated. "Jake likes to share private jokes about me with my opposing counsel, in fact."

Jake gave me a funny look. "I have never discussed you with Addison Langley, other than to tell him I couldn't go out of town today for him, since I had to do a job for you."

Then he held out his hand. "Jake Brody, at your service, Mrs. . . . ?"

I sighed. "Celia Judson, meet Jake Brody. Jake is a private investigator in town. Jake, this is my Aunt Celia. My Uncle Nathan is around here somewhere."

He shook her hand gently. "Mrs. Judson, I'm so pleased to meet you."

She nearly giggled. Boy, he was really turning on the charm. "Oh, please, Mr. Brody, call me Celia."

"Thank you, Celia. And call me Jake, please."

They stood there smiling at each other until I couldn't take any more, so I went to help set up casseroles. As I stalked off, I heard Jake's voice, pitched low. "Celia? Put your periscope up."

19

"You know I love you, but it's almost eight o'clock, and if I don't get out of here, I'm going to lose it," Max said, rubbing her eyes and yawning.

I looked up from the rough outline of the timeline I'd been sketching out, and immediately my jaw cracked open in a matching yawn. "You know, some of these entries are just not adding up for me. I mean, the — wow. How did it get so late?"

She stood up on the other side of my desk and stretched. "Gee, I don't know. Time flies when you're hiding from Jake and eating tuna casserole, I guess," she said drily.

"Hey! I wasn't hiding in the bathroom, I was having intestinal . . . issues. Each one of those women made me try some of her casserole. How could I be rude after they were kind enough to drop everything and rush down here on a Saturday?" I groaned and rubbed my still-distended stomach. "I never should have gone back for that second plate of dessert."

She laughed and shook her head. "Lessons learned. And yes, it was very nice of them, but I doubt they had a lot on their agendas to 'drop.'"

"Well, anyway. What time did Jake finally leave?"

"Around fifteen minutes after you disappeared with your intestines. He said he had stuff to do, but he'd be back with your car this afternoon," she said. Then she scrunched up her forehead. "Hey, where is he? It's way past afternoon, already."

I stood up and stretched, too, not thrilled with the creaky noises in my back. I was only thirty-two, not eighty-two, for Pete's sake. "Hey, speaking of eighty-two, what happened to Mr. Ellison?"

Max rolled her eyes. "He left around four with Stella. That man is a player, if you ask me. I wonder if Mrs. Z knows about Stella?"

"Or any of the other ones. Did you see the way they fluttered around him?" I laughed. "'Do you want some more casserole, Henry?' 'Can I get you something to drink, Henry?' It was disgusting."

"Yep. He was eating it up, and I'm not talking about the casserole, either," she said.

"On the bright side, though, we finally know what his first name is," I said, perking up.

"We knew his name," she said.

"We did?"

Max tilted her head and stared at me. "You know, D, for a genius, you sure can be a little slow. We have his full name on his employment forms."

"Oh. Right. Of course, I knew that. I was just testing you."

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