Red Rum: A Rosie Casket Mystery R.M. Wild (inspirational books .txt) 📖

like him. Or maybe, I was worried I might end up with a pack of steroid-brained toddlers running around the inn, trying to bench press my guests.

“I can’t,” I said.

“Why not?”

“I just remembered something I agreed to do.”

“What?”

“That’s my business.”

“You’re being awfully coy, Casket. If this has anything to do with the case again, I’d advise you to tell me right away, or else you may be obstructing justice.”

“You’re suspended, remember?” I said. “That means I can keep all the secrets from you I want.”

16

He was late.

The next evening, teetering uncomfortably in the only pair of heels I owned, I stepped onto the tiled floor of the high school cafetorenasium—a combined cafeteria, gymnasium, and auditorium in which the Maine state flag and the Star Spangled Banner dangled from poles jutting toward the ceiling at an angle as severe as a fascist salute.

A blast of nostalgia Maced me in the face. The multipurpose room was large and smelled of old lockers and gym shorts, the girders overhead exposed, the basketball nets cranked up to the caged lights, the bleachers retracted into the walls to make room for the dancing and the punchbowls and the glittering banners that said, Welcome Class of Years Gone By.

The generic slogan suggested recycling.

The powerful heating vents kicked in and the stars and stripes and the Maine state flag danced together for a moment and then got all twisted up and intertwined like a pretzel braid or like when Ishmael and Queequeq cuddled and wrapped their legs around each other.

There were lots of faces I recognized, but had forgotten—or buried. Old classmates were mingling, drinking, laughing, and acting like they had all gotten along and were the best of friends in high school, when really, half of these people wouldn’t have hesitated to bare-ass one another’s pillows. After teaching in New York, I was also struck by how ridiculously white the gathering was. The only color in this crowd was after they imbibed too much punch and popped a few blood vessels in their cheeks.

From the cutest little purse I owned, I pulled out a compact to check my make-up. My hand was shaking so badly, my reflection danced in the rattling mirror. If ever there was a time for Bella Donley’s specially tainted product, it was now.

Someone grabbed my arm and I gasped.

“Relax, you look great,” Kendall said.

He was wearing a sharp three-piece suit, his hair in a perfect wave, his chin looking so smooth and plastic, he must have lasered off his stubble. In other words, fantastic, but not much different from his normal workplace attire.

I slid the compact back into my purse. “I thought you were planning to leave me as chum.”

Kendall smiled. “That wouldn’t be very chummy of me, now would it? I totally apologize. I got held up at the office this afternoon. I called you, but you didn’t pick up.”

“I didn’t hear it ring,” I said.

“No matter. It’s water under the keel,” he said and held out an arm. “Shall we try to fit in?”

I took him by the bicep. It was firm, not Mettle-firm, but well-toned for a desk jock. I would need Kendall as a buffer if I was going to survive the night—and I wouldn’t mind if he kept me from falling on my butt in the process.

Ahead, were two married couples, Ashley and Josh Delaney and Michael and Susan Yenaled. Both women had light brown hair and both men had dark brown hair. Both women had been cheerleaders and both men had been football players. Each of them had screwed each other. Literally. Like Ashley and Michael, Josh and Susan had been “items.” Sometime after graduation, they had all swapped partners. Based on how intimately they were chatting and drinking from the communal punchbowl, I assumed they were still playing bury the salami, this time in their neighbor’s backyards.

Every couple we walked past looked us up and down, as if Kendall and I were an unlikely pair of calves headed for the slaughterhouse. I imagined how much worse the scrutiny would have been if I had brought Matt Mettle.

Mettle, by the way, had possessed good enough judgment to ignore the invitation to celebrate the worst years of our lives, frankly a surprising choice given that at the time, he had been considered the king of our high school class and had been voted as such repeatedly. In fact, he had won both homecoming and prom king all four years, a veritable sweep of all that’s sacred. I mean, since when does a lowly freshman win the prom crown? Even the seniors had kissed Mettle’s feet, making his refusal to attend even more suspicious.

Ahead, Katelyn Kennedy, Eldritch’s niece, the girl who had accused me on social media of most likely to finger an old man, and the one whom I believed was still sending me the occasional threat via text, was dipping a giant ladle into the cauldron of red punch and pouring herself a styrofoam cupful.

I ducked and tried to hide behind Kendall.

“What’s the matter?”

“I think she saw me.”

“Who?”

“Katelyn.”

He laughed. “Don’t be silly. She’s harmless.”

“Easy for you to say. She didn’t start a smear campaign against you online.”

“Actually, she did,” Kendall said. “She snapped a picture of me when I was climbing out of the pool in my Speedo and posted it online with the caption: banana or cocktail wiener? You decide.”

Katelyn spotted us, put down her ladle, and came straight in our direction. “I am totally surprised that you came,” she said with a flip of her hair. “And I see you brought the swamp thing.”

“Swamp thing? He’s hardly a beast. Swimmers have to shave all the time,” I said.

Katelyn glared at me. “I was talking to Kyle. Did you see the little signs I made for you on the way in?”

I had. She had hung little handmade signs on the custodian’s broom closet that said No Parking. That means you, Casket.

I wanted to yank off my heels and stab her in the cheek.