Jaine Austen Mystery: Killing Cupid Part 3

Subject: The Death of Me Yet

I swear, honey, your father will be the death of me yet. He thinks Lester Pinkus and I were holding hands in the clubhouse dining room! Of all the absurd ideas! It turns out Lester studied palm reading in Nepal (such a multi-talented man!) and was giving us all palm readings. He told Edna she had an extra-long life line, and saw wonderful things in her future. She was so excited, she almost forgot to go back for seconds at the buffet. Anyhow, just as it was my turn to get my palm read, Daddy showed up. He claims he just happened to be walking by. Oh, puh-leese. I know your Daddy, and he was spying on us! Now he thinks Lester Pinkus was holding my hand!

I can't write any more now, darling. I'm way too upset.

Yours, desperately in need of Oreos-

Mom

To: Jausten

From: DaddyO

Subject: Sadly Mistaken

If Lester Pinkus thinks he can woo your mother away from me, he's sadly mistaken. I still haven't gotten around to making those reservations at Le Chateaubriand, but when I do, I'm going to get the best table in the house and show your mom what a true Romeo is made of.

x.x.x,.

Daddy

P.S. Did I tell you my Belgian Army Knife comes with built-in nose hair trimmers? Cool, huh?

Chapter 3.

The Case of the Missing G.o.diva was just a taste of things to come. Life with Joy, as I was about to discover, was one constant hissy fit.

Over the next few days I watched in dismay as she ran roughshod over her staff, screeching at Ca.s.sie for not answering the phone fast enough and bringing her Sweet'n Low instead of Splenda for her coffee. Afraid of ident.i.ty theft, she was constantly changing her AOL pa.s.sword, and then screaming at Travis when she couldn't remember it.

But the minute a client walked through the door, she was sweet as pie, Mother Teresa in Manolos.

My second day on the job, I got to see her in action with a new client.

I was in Joy's office, listening to her ramble on about her matchmaking triumphs and, not incidentally, thinking about the e-mails I'd received from my parents that morning.

For those of you who haven't already met them, you should know that my parents are disaster magnets of the highest order. Wherever they go, catastrophe seems to follow. Although Mom, a confirmed TV shopaholic, is not without her quirks, Daddy is the family's designated crazymaker. I swear, he can take an ordinary day and turn it into a headline on the evening news. Poor Mom deserves a Congressional Medal of Honor for putting up with him all these years. I sincerely doubted Lester Pinkus had a crush on Mom. Just another case of Daddy's imagination running wild.

I was sitting there, hoping Daddy would come to his senses without too much collateral damage, when Ca.s.sie poked her head in the door.

"Someone to see you, Joy. He says he's interested in joining the club."

Immediately Joy morphed into Queen Mum mode.

"How teddibly nice to meet you," she said as Ca.s.sie ushered in a short, pasty-faced gnome of a guy, all spiffed up in brown shoes, white socks, and his Sunday best pocket protector.

His name, embroidered on his company work shirt, was Barry.

Joy sat him down in one of her fussy Marie Antoinette chairs.

"So how can I help you ... Barry?" she asked, reading his name off his chest.

Barry smiled shyly, revealing a most disconcerting gap between his two front teeth, then launched into a heartrending tale of his non-existent love life.

"I haven't had a date since high school," he confessed, "when my mother made me take my cousin to the senior prom."

"You poor darling," Joy tsked, fake empathy oozing from every pore.

"I've tried all the online dating services, and never got chosen once, except by a woman named Brandy, who said she charged a hundred dollars an hour. But for me, two hundred."

"Why, that's disgraceful!" The Queen Mum was outraged. "These online dating services are nothing but a waste of money. You don't want a silly computer trying to find you a date. You need the personalized services of an expert matchmaker." At which point she launched into her spiel about coming from a long line of matchmakers dating back to Charlemagne. (When last I'd heard that whopper, it was Henry VIII. Somehow she'd managed to add a few extra limbs to her family tree.) Barry sat there with his mouth open, entranced by her every word.

"When you sign up with Dates of Joy, I personally hand pick the woman of your dreams."

"Gosh," he said, eyes wide with wonder.

"Here. Let me show you some of your potential dates."

And then she laid it on him. The coup de grace. The Date Book. Larded with photos of unavailable models and actresses.

He blinked in amazement as she turned the pages.

"These girls are members of your club?"

"Absolutely," Joy lied, smooth as velvet.

"But they'd never go out with someone like me."

So Barry was not quite as clueless as he looked.

"Oh, you'd be surprised," Joy said. "So many of my lady clients are fed up with the shallow men they meet here in Los Angeles. They don't care about superficial things like looks and income. They're searching for deeper qualities in a man, like warmth and sensitivity, qualities I sense you possess in spades."

"Ya think?" Barry asked, scratching some wax out of his ear.

"Absolutely!"

"Okay, I want Albany!" Barry pointed at a picture of a spectacular redhead, the kind of vixen you see tossing her hair in a shampoo commercial. "When can I go out with her?"

"Soon, very soon," Joy a.s.sured him. "But first," she added, flashing him a deceptively angelic smile, "there's a little matter of finances. Here at Dates of Joy, our fees start at ten thousand dollars a year."

"Ten thousand dollars?" He gulped.

"It's normally twenty-five thousand, but I'm giving you a discounted rate because I sense you're a quality person."

If she told one more lie, she'd turn into a congressman.

Poor Barry's face blanched at the news of Joy's outrageous fees, and I breathed a sigh of relief. Surely it would be a matter of milliseconds before he was bounding out the door and hurrying back to the friendly folks at Match.com.

But no, much to my consternation, he scratched some more wax out of his ear, musing, "I have a ten-thousand-dollar CD that's coming due. It's my entire life savings. I was going to roll it over, but maybe I could cash it in."

"Don't!" I wanted to cry.

"You won't regret it," Joy said, giving Satan a run for his money in the dirty tricks department.

"I guess I'll just run over to the bank and get the money."

"Why go to all the bother?" Joy cooed. "Just call them up and transfer the money to your checking account, and you can write me a check here and now."

I could see the wheels in her devious little brain spinning. She was not about to take a chance that he'd walk out the door and change his mind on his way to the bank.

And like a dope, Barry got on the phone and closed down his CD, giving the banker at the other end of the line his Social Security number and mother's maiden name, all of which I feared Joy was memorizing for future use.

Minutes later he was writing Joy a check for ten grand.

Tucking his check in her bosom, Joy ushered Barry out of her office with a royal "ta ta," a.s.suring him he'd soon be tripping the light fantastic with the woman of his dreams.

"Where the h.e.l.l am I ever going to find a woman desperate enough to go out with that bozo?" she muttered the minute he was gone.

As I listened to him out in the reception area setting up an appointment with Ca.s.sie to have his picture taken for the date book, I was overcome by a sense of dread. This poor man was about to step in a bog of fiscal quicksand, and I was just sitting there doing nothing. I couldn't let him go through with it!

When I heard him leave the office, I jumped up from my chair.

"Excuse me," I said to Joy, who was treating herself to a G.o.diva. "Be right back. I've got to use the ladies' room."

Without waiting for a reply, I scooted out of the office and went racing down the corridor. Thank heavens Barry was still there, waiting for the elevator.

"Barry!" I called out.

"Yes?" He turned to look at me, beaming, no doubt, at the thought of his future date with Albany.

"If you know what's good for you," I whispered, "you'll stop payment on your check."

He blinked in confusion.

"Why would I do that?"

I wanted to tell him the truth, that Joy was a lying, cheating, amoral chocoholic whose date book was a total sham. But I had to be careful. The last thing I wanted was a slander lawsuit on my hands.

"Let's just say it might not work out as well as you think," I offered lamely.

"Don't be silly. Joy said I'd meet the woman of my dreams. And Joy would never let me down. She's great."

"Really," I called after him as he stepped in the elevator. "Give it some thought."

Poor innocent lamb, I thought as the elevator door closed and he began his descent. Little did he know how far he was about to fall.

I hurried back to Joy's office, where I found her chomping down on another G.o.diva.

I wondered what she'd do if I reached over and plucked one from the box.

Scenes from Apocalypse Now immediately sprang to mind.

Instead I took some Tic Tacs from my purse.

"Care for a Tic Tac?" I asked pointedly, hoping she'd get the message that sharing was a Good Thing.

"Yuck, no," she replied, totally oblivious, and picked up where she'd left off on her ramble about her lifetime achievements.

I took out my steno pad and took desultory notes, inwardly rolling my eyes at each outrageous bit of puffery. She actually expected me to believe that she had fixed up Nelson Mandela on one of his first dates out of prison.