Headlines & Deadlines (An Avery Shaw Mystery Book 7) Read online

  We’d see about that. “I know something about Devon’s Valentine’s Day expectations,” I sang, causing Eliot to bite his lip and avert his gaze so he didn’t burst out laughing.

  Derrick shot me a look. “What do you know? Wait, I don’t want to know. You’re trying to manipulate me. It’s not going to work.”

  “If you say so. It’s good, though.”

  Derrick sighed, frustrated. “Fine. What do you know?”

  “What do you know?” I countered.

  “Not much,” Derrick said. “When we have more information, we’ll hold a news conference.”

  “Yeah, that’s not nearly enough for me to spill Devon’s secret,” I said. “Tell me why they’re forming a task force. You have to think something big is going on here.”

  “She’s a college professor married to a business bigwig,” Derrick said. “Do the math. No ransom demand was ever made. The husband offered a $50,000 reward. She was found in the trunk of her car in a seedy area. Multiple jurisdictions are making noise about wanting the case.”

  “And the sheriff’s department wants in because of TOOL,” I said, tilting my head as I considered the whole scenario. “Jake wants to take a strong stance on crime while I’m busy chipping away at Tad’s self-esteem and livelihood. That’s it, isn’t it?”

  “You have a really high opinion of yourself,” Derrick said.

  I folded my arms across my chest and waited.

  “Off the record?”

  “Fine.”

  “That’s exactly it,” Derrick said. “Good job going after Ludington the other night, by the way. I couldn’t stop laughing when I saw it on the evening news. Devon was pissed, but I thought it was hilarious.”

  “I’m nowhere near done,” I said. “Once I get my hands on the county’s documents, I’m going to fry him.”

  “I can’t wait to see that. Now tell me what Devon thinks I’m getting her for Valentine’s Day.”

  “No way,” I said. “I need more information. How did Julia Grisham die?”

  “When are you going to put this story up on the website?”

  “One hour.”

  Derrick shook his head. “I need three before you scoop everyone.”

  “Fine,” I said. “Three. Not one second longer, though.”

  “Deal,” Derrick said. “She was stabbed in the chest and dumped in the trunk for transportation. It’s still early, but the medical examiner has been with the body for hours. He said the knife wound was grave, but not the cause of death. She was strangled.”

  “Are you saying the killer stabbed her someplace else, put her in the trunk, drove the car here and then strangled her?”

  “Yes.”

  “Well … crap,” I said.

  “That’s a lot of overkill,” Eliot mused.

  “I’m not sure it is,” Derrick said. “The knife wound was tentative, as if whoever stabbed her didn’t know what they were doing and found they didn’t like using a knife to end a life. Strangulation might have merely been a less messy alternative.”

  “Do you know that for sure?” I asked.

  “No.”

  Hmm. This story was getting more convoluted with each passing tidbit. “What’s the time of death?”

  “About two hours after she left work on Tuesday,” Derrick said.

  “And we’re sure we don’t know where she was stabbed or how she ended up in this parking lot?”

  “Definitely not,” Derrick said. “That’s our main focus right now.”

  “What about the husband?”

  “What about him?”

  “Is he a suspect?” I asked.

  “Right now he’s a grieving husband,” Derrick said. “You know as well as I do that the husband is always the first place we look, though.”

  “He’s smarmy. I’m betting he has a lot of skeletons in his closet. I need to start uncovering some of them. When are you going to have the news conference?”

  “Probably not until Monday.”

  “What? Why?”

  “Because we don’t have any information that warrants announcing anything yet,” Derrick replied. “Jake wants to be sure he has all his ducks in a row before he makes a media circus out of this.”

  That made sense. There was no way I was waiting until Monday to get rolling on this story, though. “I need you to take me to my car,” I said, tugging on Eliot’s arm. “I need to get to the office. I’ll just meet you at the restaurant for dinner tonight.”

  “Wait a second,” Derrick said, grabbing my arm. “What does Devon think I’m going to get her for Valentine’s Day? I got her a nice necklace. Is that going to disappoint her?”

  “Oh, yeah,” I said.

  Derrick’s eyes widened, prodding me.

  “Oh, you want to know exactly what she thinks you’re getting her for Valentine’s Day, don’t you?”

  “Duh!”

  “She thinks you’re going to propose.”

  I left Derrick with an open mouth and bulging eyes as Eliot and I trudged back to his truck. Eliot glanced back at Derrick a few times before settling his attention on me. “Is that true?”

  “Yes.”

  “You know you just freaked him out, right?”

  “Of course.”

  “You’re a mean woman, Avery Shaw,” Eliot said, chuckling. “A very mean woman.”

  “And don’t you forget it.”

  Seven

  “What do you have?” Fish asked, his eyes expectant as I breezed into the newsroom.

  “Hello to you too,” I said, making a face.

  “Don’t even bother acting like your feelings are hurt,” Fish said. “We all know you don’t have feelings.”

  I lifted my mitten-covered hands, contorting the sharks so they looked as if they were having a conversation. “I don’t like the way he’s talking to me, Captain. Do you think he’s treating me like a two-year-old? Yes, I do, Avery. I wouldn’t give him any information until he apologizes.” I turned to the other shark, trying not to laugh at the murderous look on Fish’s face. “What do you think, Crunch? Am I being mistreated even though I’m in charge of two of the hottest stories this paper has seen in months? I think you should be treated like a queen, Avery. People should bow down when you enter a room.”

  “Stop doing that,” Fish hissed. “People are going to think you’re mentally unbalanced.”

  “It’s too late for that,” Duncan said, moving up to the wall of Fish’s cubicle and leaning over so he could whisper conspiratorially. “I think you should transfer this story to me as punishment.”

  “I’m annoyed, not stupid,” Fish shot back, making little shooing motions with his hands. “Don’t crowd me. I don’t like it.”

  “I’m not crowding you,” Duncan protested.

  Here’s a quick refresher: Duncan Marlow is the office tool. I’m convinced he has a small tool and that’s why he insists on acting like the world’s biggest butthead. I know at least four psychiatric professionals who would have a field day with him.

  “You’re a close talker,” I said, fixing Duncan with a condescending smile. “You think it makes you seem intense but it really just makes people want to smack you with breath mints.”

  “Shut up, Avery.”

  I held up my “Crunch” shark mitten. “Methinks he doth protest too much … and too often.”

  “You’re a … .”

  “Don’t finish that sentence,” Fish warned, holding up his hand. “If you call her names I’m going to have to report you to Human Resources.”

  “Why?”

  “Because you report everyone else and I believe in leveling the playing field,” Fish replied, nonplussed.

  “I’m sick of her getting special treatment,” Duncan said.

  “She gets special treatment because she breaks big stories,” Fish said. “When you break a big story you can have special treatment.”

  “Who’s been rounding up background information on Adam Grisham all day? That’s right. Me.”

>   Duncan finally said something I was interested in. It only took six years. “What did you find?”

  “I’m not telling you,” Duncan said, making a face as though he smelled something rotten. “This is my story.”

  “Tell me what you found,” Fish instructed.

  “But … she’s right there.”

  “Tell me now or you’re fired.”

  Duncan blew out a frustrated sigh. “This is so unfair.”

  I held up my “Captain” shark mitten. “Buck up, Buttercup.”

  “I hate you.”

  This time both the sharks chimed in. “Get in line.”

  Duncan turned his full attention to Fish. “Adam Grisham is pretty much what he appears to be,” he said. “I found property deeds on eighteen different parcels. Most of them are apartment buildings, but he seems to own a building in downtown St. Clair Shores, too.”

  “What business?”

  “I have no idea,” Duncan said. “I just got started.”

  “My rear end works faster than you,” I said, snatching the printed sheets he clasped from his hands. I scanned them quickly. “These don’t tell us anything.”

  “What do you suggest we do?” Duncan asked. “Are you going to take your shark mittens to his house and have an interview? He’ll laugh you out of his house.”

  “I’m not going to his house today,” I said. “There’s no way he’s going to talk right now. He’s going to send out a news release. Wait and see. He’s going to pull the ‘my family needs time to grieve’ crap and that’s going to get him through the weekend before the media descends on his house.”

  “How do you know that?” Duncan asked.

  “Because I’ve done this before,” I said. “I do have some interesting information.” I told Fish about the task force.

  “That’s definitely interesting,” Fish said, rubbing his chin. I often think Fish dresses like Burt Reynolds in the 1970s. He wears way too much jewelry for a straight man – and it’s all gold-plated and tacky. “What do you think Ludington is going to do about this?”

  Now that was an interesting question. I hadn’t given Tad’s reaction any thought. “I don’t know,” I said. “After his failed news conference, he’s going to be licking his wounds. I would be surprised if he called a second conference before the weekend is up. He needs a plan before he jumps on this.”

  “And you said the sheriff’s department isn’t going into any detail until Monday,” Fish said. “Do you have enough to put together a story for tomorrow and Sunday?”

  That was an iffy proposition. “I’d like a little more to punch up a Sunday showcase,” I said. “I’m not sure what I can come up with in four hours.”

  “I’ll authorize overtime if you need it,” Fish said.

  “Sure,” I said. “You just need to call my mother and tell her I’ll miss family dinner.”

  Fish involuntarily shuddered. He once told me that talking to my mother was akin to serving in Vietnam. I thought he was underselling my mother’s ferocity. “No, no. You leave on time. Just get what you can get.”

  “We need someone who knows Grisham on a personal level,” I said. “Do we know any real estate types with loose lips?”

  “The advertising sales people might,” Fish said. “I’m not sure they’ll help you, though. They all hate you.”

  “Who doesn’t?” Duncan challenged.

  “I don’t,” Marvin said, moving from the center aisle of reporters’ row and taking a position to my right.

  Marvin Potts is many things. He’s a dynamic reporter. He’s a ladies’ man – or at least he thinks he is. He’s often an idiot who sticks his foot in his mouth at the most inopportune times. Oh, and he’s a fount of information that other people have no idea how to get. I hoped he would come through for me now.

  “You don’t happen to know Adam Grisham, do you?”

  I expected Marvin to shake his head. When he grinned at me, hope clawed at the walls of my chest.

  “Seriously? I love you,” I said. “How do you know him?”

  “Well, that’s a … long story.”

  Uh-oh. Marvin’s stories were always long … and convoluted … and often unbelievable. Sadly, they were almost all true. I don’t care what he says, I don’t think he turned down a super model when she tried to molest him at a Detroit Tigers game. I’m chalking that one up in the “not in this lifetime” column and moving on. “Tell me.”

  “Well, I happen to know what business Grisham owns that is not related to apartment complexes,” Marvin said, relishing his role as the center of attention. In typical fashion, he was going to get to the meat of his story via the longest route possible. “It’s at the corner of Eight Mile and Harper. Does anyone know what businesses are there?”

  “I’m going to guess a strip club,” I said. With Marvin, that’s a safe guess seventy-five percent of the time. He loves women in the service industry – and that’s a service he can’t ignore.

  “Close,” Marvin said. “I was looking for a strip club when I stumbled upon the bar.”

  I furrowed my brow. “He owns a bar?” That wasn’t nearly as titillating as I hoped.

  “It’s a … theme bar.”

  What does that mean? “Is it a gay bar?” Marvin fears homosexuals. He thinks they’re always going to hit on him. He doesn’t even like lipstick lesbians, because he’s convinced they have gay friends who want to ogle him while he’s naked in the gym locker room. I’ve tried explaining that gay men like hot men who wear good clothes, but Marvin doesn’t understand the concept.

  “You know very well I wouldn’t hang out at a gay bar,” Marvin snapped. “I have a reputation to uphold.”

  He did. He was the flattest doormat in the Midwest. “Either get to the point of your story or I’m going to tell all the nurses who eat lunch at that sandwich shop you like that you have herpes,” I threatened.

  “You wouldn’t dare!”

  “Did you just meet me?”

  Marvin considered the threat. We were tight. He was one of my best friends. I was vindictive, though, and my need to win is often overwhelming. “Fine,” he said. “The bar there is called The Black Hole.”

  Huh. That definitely sounded like a strip club … or a gay bar, for that matter. “What kind of bar is it?”

  “You’re going to love this,” Marvin said, rubbing his hands together. “It’s a dungeon.”

  “Like geeks go there to play Dungeons & Dragons?” I still wasn’t getting it.

  “You’re so … unhip,” Marvin said.

  “A guy dressed like that and using the word ‘hip’ shouldn’t cast stones.”

  “A dungeon is the term for a BDSM club,” Marvin explained. “BDSM means bondage and submission.”

  “I know what it means,” I said. “You forgot the masochism.”

  “I did not,” Marvin said. “You didn’t give me a chance to finish.”

  “I didn’t know there were clubs like that in the area,” Fish said, his interest piqued. “What goes on there?”

  “Lots of stuff,” Marvin said. “Men go to the clubs to find women who liked to be bossed around. Women go there, too, although I haven’t found any good ones yet.”

  Ah, well, that explained that. Marvin likes a woman who takes control in the bedroom mostly because, by his own admission, he has no idea what to do when he gets there. “Have you dated any of these women?”

  “I just go for the amaretto and latex,” Marvin replied. “I do like to watch everyone else interact, though.”

  I was intrigued. I couldn’t help myself. “So this club is full of men who want to dominate and other men who want to be dominated? How does that work?”

  “People have collars.”

  “Like dog collars?”

  “Kind of. They’re prettier, though.”

  I was going to have to take his word for it. The idea of a man slipping a collar on me gave me the heebie-jeebies. “What happens when someone puts a collar on someone else?”

&nb
sp; “Then they go to a private room and … you know … spank each other,” Marvin said, his eyes sparkling.

  “You have no idea what goes on in those rooms, do you?”

  Marvin scowled. “I do, too. You didn’t even know what a dungeon was.”

  “You go because you think it makes you badass,” I said. “Don’t lie to me. If someone tried to be your dominant you’d pee in your pants.”

  “You don’t know that.”

  “I do, too.”

  “Knock it off,” Fish ordered. “We could all be called down to Human Resources for having this conversation.”

  “Who’s going to tell?” Marvin asked.

  Fish and I rolled our eyes in unison until they landed on Duncan. “Who do you think?” I asked.

  “I am not a snitch,” Duncan said.

  We ignored him.

  “Do we think Adam Grisham goes to the club?”

  “I’ve seen him there,” Marvin said. “I didn’t realize who he was until I saw him on the news last night. I knew I recognized him, but it took me a while to remember from where.”

  “Does he … dress in an outfit when he’s there?” That was a visual that would haunt me for days.

  “I’ve never seen him in an outfit,” Marvin cautioned. “I have seen him go into the private rooms, though.”

  “With a woman?”

  Marvin shrugged. “I’m not interested in the women who want to be dominated. I like the bossy ones.”

  I shuddered. “You’re banned from that club,” I said, wagging my finger in his face. “Someone could use and abuse you.”

  “That’s what I keep hoping for,” Marvin said, a faraway look on his face.

  I really needed a shower. I glanced at Fish. “What do you think?”

  “I don’t think we can run a story on Marvin’s word alone,” Fish said. “What do you think?”

  “I think I need to check out this club,” I said.

  “Don’t go alone,” Fish said. “It could be dangerous.”

  “Not for me. We all know I’d be the dominant,” I said.

  “Not if you want to get close to the people Grisham hangs out with,” Marvin argued.

  He had a point. Son of a … . An idea formed. “I know just who to take with me when I go to the club tomorrow night.”