Deadly Arrangements

188 Pages·2014·0.89 MB·English

by  Adams Annie

Deadly Arrangements

The Flower Shop Mystery Series

Book Two

By
Annie Adams
Deadly Arrangements © 2014 Annie Adams Book Two in The Flower Shop
Mystery Series All rights reserved
This book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This book may not be re-sold or given away to
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author.
This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer's
imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons,
living or dead, actual events, locales or organizations is entirely coincidental.
Published by Annie Adams Cover Art © 2014 Kelli Ann Morgan / Inspire
Creative Services Formatting by Bob Houston eBook Formatting
Contents
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
CHAPTER NINETEEN
CHAPTER TWENTY
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
EPILOGUE
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
CHAPTER ONE

“Quincy, you look…stunning,” Allie said.
As corny as it was, I couldn't help feeling very much like Cinderella prepping
for the ball as I stepped out of the dressing room of the Beautiful Bride Dress
Shop. My mother and sister had waited patiently in the sitting room as I tried on
dress after dress.
“If you ask me, this is awful soon for a wedding. Of course, no one ever asks
me,” Mom said. I glanced sideways at Allie who rolled her eyes just out of our
mother’s line of sight. I couldn’t help but giggle.
“What’s so funny?” Mom said.
“Oh, nothing,” I said in a sing-song voice as I slipped back into the dressing
room.
“Well, anyway, it’s been what, two months since they met?” My mother
made sure to use a loud enough voice so I could hear inside the dressing room
and probably in Cleveland.
“I think it’s incredibly romantic,” Allie said.
“Oh, puh-lease,” my mother said, the hardened edge to her voice as crusty as
week-old bread. Her tone made my heart ache. She’d become a cynic about
many topics, especially romantic love. Marriage and romance had become
mutually exclusive in her oft-voiced opinion.
Of course, my mother will always nag about her younger daughters' marital
status, whether any romance is involved or not. Once we’re married, she’ll
move on to nagging about getting some grandchildren.
But, she had good reason to feel cynical about love and romance. My father
had left my mother just after I got married—or should I say got married off?
That’s what it felt like, anyway. Nothing like a little societal pressure to make
you feel like an old-maid in your early twenties. But, in Utah’s religiously
influenced culture, that's nothing new. At almost thirty, I felt like I was
practically ready for the glue factory.
My ill-fated marriage had been the biggest mistake of my life. One abusive
husband later, it may seem surprising I wasn’t joining in the chorus with my
well-intentioned mother.
I had escaped the marriage on my own. And I landed on my feet with the
help of my Aunt Rosie, who decided to travel the world and turned her flower
shop over to me. But the escape from the emotional cave I was living in had
been much more difficult to accomplish.
I was out of the cave and seeing the daylight thanks to the beautiful hunk of a
man that was now my…boyfriend?…Alex, with whom I had been spending as
much time as our busy schedules would allow.
My dressing room attendant had disappeared, so I attempted to unfasten the
gown myself as the marriage discussion continued.
"Like K.C. always says, there’s no time like the present," I said. My delivery
driver, Karma Clackerton, has a knack for handing out advice. She’s one tough
grandma who continuously amazes with wacky outfits and new additions to her
weapons arsenal. "Besides, she’s older than you, Mom. At least I think she is,”
I said, and then cringed at venturing into the touchy subject of my mother’s age.
"I think that's the reason she and Fred decided to get married so soon."
“You do have a point there, Quincy.” Did my ears deceive me? Had my
mother actually agreed with me? Would wonders would never cease?
“Neither of us is getting any younger. I suppose she should jump at the
chance she’s been given for happiness.” I could hear the sadness in my mom’s
voice and I felt a tiny bit guilty for the gift of happiness I’d been given with
Alex.
“Was that the last dress, Quincy?” Allie asked.
“Last one. But I might be in here for a while.” The dress wouldn’t be too
hard to tackle, but then there were the undergarments I'd been instructed to wear
by the attendant.
“You’ll thank me later,” she’d said. “Things will be firmed, lifted and
separated in a way that your regular, ahem, delicates will never accomplish.”
My regular delicates usually came with the words Fruit and Loom printed on
them somewhere, so I was pretty sure things would feel different with this fancy
underwear.
And actually, the attendant had been right. I felt incredibly sexy when I
looked in the mirror. Almost every dress I tried on fit as if it were designed just
for me, except for the length. No underwear would make a dress fit a 5'9" girl in
the same way it fit a more vertically challenged one, but the curves worked in all
the right places. It was going to be quite a feat removing the lace and mesh body
sculpting device. Where was that attendant, anyway?
For her grand wedding extravaganza, with the help of Danny, my closest
friend and fellow flower shop owner, K.C. had chosen an overall scheme of
harvest colors, such as pumpkin spice, ochre, celadon, and aubergine, but she’d
left the choice of bridesmaid dress style and color up to me. I was partial to a
tea-length number in a burnt orange organza with a shoulder wrap, but I wanted
to check another shop before making my decision.
“Speaking of romance, Quincy,” Allie said, “how are things with Alex?”
Her tone made me blush. I envisioned Alex the way he looked the last time I
saw him. He was on his way to work in a navy fitted suit with a steel gray shirt,
which perfectly accented his brown eyes and light golden brown hair.
“Things are—great. I mean, well yeah, they’re great.” Things were great
when we were together, but he was currently on an undercover operation in the
southern part of the state. That’s all I knew. Alex worked in Internal Affairs for
the Utah State Police, and much of the work he did was undercover. That’s how
we met—he was posing as a patrol officer while investigating the dirty detective
who had framed me for the murder of a competitor.
I really liked Alex.
Okay—so maybe liked is an understatement. My knees turned to Jell-O at
just the sound of his voice on the phone, not to mention all the things that
happened to me when we were in the same room. But like was the only “L”
word I could allow myself to use for a man, given my romantic relationship
history.
I knew we had something together, although I couldn't quite pinpoint exactly
what we had, because every time I thought I had "us" figured out, he would
leave again. He also worked on a gang task force and traveled a lot for that job.
Between dirty cops and gangsters, I was feeling part of a competition for his
attention.
“Is he out of town for long?” Allie asked.
“I’m not sure,” I called out, as I hung the dress on the satin hanger. Now to
remove the figure-enhancing Iron Maiden.
“It must be hard not seeing him for that long,” Allie said. “Heck, I miss
seeing that fine man of yours.”
“Allison!” Our mother had a lack of appreciation for the “color” of our
conversation.
I caught myself smiling in the mirror. The fact hadn’t escaped me that Alex
was, shall we say, appreciated by fellow members of my gender.
Allie kept up the teasing with our mother. “Oh, Mom, admit it now. Alex is
H-O-T, hot! It’s okay to state the obvious. Quincy doesn’t mind if you speak
the truth. Do you, Quincy?”
“Of course not, Mother dear,” I said.
“Well, he does have certain—physical—attributes.” Mom cleared her throat,
“Despite some differences I might have with him, he is quite easy to look at.”
“Easy on the eyes? Is that what you’re trying to say, Mom?” Allie said.
“Quincy, our mother is blushing because she has the hots for your hot
boyfriend.”
Allie giggled again and my mother tsked. It was nice to have fun together
again, even if it was at the expense of my—yes he was—my hot boyfriend.
I struggled with the hooks on the back of the bustier-entrapment device and
realized I wasn’t going to get it unfastened without tearing the delicate-yet iron-
like support fabric. We had the dressing room and sitting area reserved for an
hour, so no one else would be around to see me in my fancy skivvies, including
the attendant, apparently. I unlatched the door and used my backside to push it
open while my hands were occupied with the blasted hooks and eyes fasteners
between my shoulder blades. “I’m going to need some help getting out of this
thing.”
I turned and looked in the direction of Allie and our mother, but my eyes
landed behind them, directly into the dark brown eyes of a man grinning from
ear to ear and casually leaning against the wall, ankles crossed, hand in the hip
pocket of his jeans.
“I’d be happy to fulfill that request,” he said.
“Ohmagosh!” I reflexively crossed my arms over my boosted breasts and
then reached down in an attempt to cover the southern hemisphere with one of
my arms in an awkward dance toward the dressing room.
“Who—wha—what?” I heard my mother exclaim.
“I’m so sorry,” the familiar deep voice said without really sounding sorry at
all. “The woman at the front counter told me I could find Quincy back here.”
He was trying not to laugh—and failing.
“Alex?” Allie said in a high-pitched squeak, “We were just talking about
you.” I was sure her face was as scarlet as the face looking back at me in the
dressing room mirror.
“I know,” he said.
I threw my t-shirt and jeans on over the fancy underwear, which only added
to the extreme discomfort of the situation. I admit it was thrilling to see Alex’s
face when he saw me in my sculpted and shaped glory. It was the closest to
naked he’d ever seen me…on the other hand, my mother just had to be there for
the big event. Ick. Blegh. Eew.
I escaped the dressing room as fast as I could to do some damage control.
My mother’s face was not red as a poppy, as I had suspected it would be. It
was, in fact, extremely pale.
“Alex,” she said. “Hhh—how long have you been here?”
“Only a minute…or ten,” he said, through perfect white teeth, which he was
having an awfully hard time covering up because his smile was reaching epic
proportions.
“We’ll meet you up front, Quincy,” Allie said. She and our mother slipped
past Alex while twittering like a couple of thirteen-year-old girls who had just
seen their latest movie star crush.
I bit my bottom lip when I finally approached Alex. He had an almost full
beard of golden blond hair.
“What’s this?” I asked as I reached up and stroked the furry side of his jaw.
“Ah, you like it? It’s been part of my persona for the last little while.”
Truthfully, I hated it, but it didn’t matter. He could have been wearing a dress
and he still would have been the hottest cop on the planet.
He wrapped his strong arms around my waist and bent down to kiss me. I
put my arms around his neck and held tight. His fingers wandered and fussed
along my back where the tenacious hooks were still fastened under my t-shirt.
He broke the kiss and leaned back just a centimeter. His warm breath passed
across my lips, teasing.
“This little item is…inspiring.”
He arched one eyebrow.
“Yeah, about that. How much did you actually see?”
What a dumb question. He wasn’t blind.
“Just exactly enough, babe.” The words slid out of his mouth in that deep
voice, slow and deliberate. I swallowed and forced myself to start breathing
again.
“Oh.” A flutter started in my chest. I cleared my throat in anticipation of
finding something to say. Things were getting warm in that little parlor.
Actually, the warmth mostly seemed to be twirling around me. Why was my
throat so dry?
“So, how much of our silly conversation did you hear?” I said, trying to
appear nonchalant while my fingers toyed with the new curls at the back of his
neck which had developed along with the beard during his absence.
“Um, probably just…all of it.”
“Huh,” is all that would come out, and that was followed by an
excruciatingly long pause. I came up with a weak laugh, “Well, at least you
know how everyone feels," I said and shrugged. He just stood there and grinned
at me.
"What did I miss while I was gone?" he said, finally.
"Where to start?" I said. "I'll tell you what I missed…"
His eyes crinkled around the edges and he bent down and nuzzled my neck.
"What's that?"
"Let me just show you." I kissed him, then he took over and kissed me back,
long and slow. Electricity seemed to spark between our bodies.
He came up for breath. “Mmm, I like show better than tell. Seems like
you’ve put some thought into what we talked about before I left.”
Oh boy, had I ever. We had discussed the next step. Theee next step with a
capital “T,” if you know what I mean. Taking our physical relationship to the
next level had been the topic after the hottest, handsiest, gropingest, make-out
session two adults could have without moving on to more adult activities.
I had hesitated a nano-second when he asked about going further. I mean,
who hasn’t taken a pause before speaking once in a while? When someone asks
you a question, isn’t it polite to give a thoughtful response? So I hesitated. So
what? Not that big a deal.
He took that hesitation to mean an absolute no. Despite my protests, he
thought we should cool things down and wait until I was ready. I thought I was
ready. My body was certain it was ready, and I was all set to prove it the next
time we were together. But then he was called out of town for the job.
And now he was back from the job.
“Absolutely,” I said. I looked into his brown eyes, “I’m ready.”
“Are you sure?” He pulled away, which wasn’t exactly the response I was
hoping for. But then, we were in a public place.
“I’m sure.” Wasn’t I? Why wasn’t he convinced? Was I sending out a vibe
that I wasn’t aware of? Like a dog whistle, the pitch only matching Alex’s
ears? “You just say the word—or make the move—or whatever else, and I am
there.”
He furrowed his brows and leaned back some more. Oh no. My inner dork
had just taken over again.
I was ready. I had no reservations, no hesitations, no…no idea why I would
have any reason to not feel ready.
"Quincy, hey, there's no pressure here. I understand." He completely let go
of me. "Let's just keep things slow. I want you to feel comfortable with
everything. You'll be ready when you're ready. And I'll be ready then too.
Okay?" Then, horror of horrors, he chucked my chin like he was giving