Page 11 of The Princess and the P.I.

Maurice made Robert’s death sound inevitable—a lightning strike. He was dead, and Fiona had pulled the trigger. She caught a glimpse of herself in an ornate Victorian mirror. Its speckled and tarnished surface only reflected her image back in ghostly fragments. She didn’t recognize herself.

Maurice walked in tense silence with Amelia until they both reached for a vintage ceramic puppy with the number twenty-four on it, Maurice beating her to it. He knew it was what she came for.

“Seven hundred dollars for this?” Maurice tilted the dog and held it by the tail.

She paused for a long time at a nearby shelf, where porcelain dolls with cracked faces and faded dresses stared blankly into the void. Fiona said a quick prayer to keep those little demons from following her home.

“Is that the last one?” Amelia asked.

“Oh, did you want this?” He sounded so innocent. “Please take it.”

He laid it in her hand so gently and gallantly that she and two of Amelia’s sorority sisters sighed.

“You thinking of doing a traditional New Orleans funeral?”

“I tried.” Her voice was getting thick. “But these people…”

Maurice nodded. “Talented tenth–ass negroes.”

She snorted through her tears. “We’re going full AME.”

They all shook hands and sang amen. Another African American insideism she would be expected to know.

Fiona hadn’t even realized it herself, but he had cracked the tension. Amelia’s eyes followed him with warmth and a touch less skepticism.

“The stitching on that purse is pretty unique. There aren’t a lot like it. Did Robert get that for you?”

“One of his guilt gifts,” Amelia answered.

“That Hermès stitch is hard to mistake.”

“And what the hell do you know about an Hermès stitch?” She pushed his shoulder.

She saw Maurice look down to hide a smile. He loved this. “Robert must have loved that bag because he bought two.”

Amelia’s eyes shot to his. Amelia didn’t trust him, but she wanted to.

He had her.

“That was really the last straw, wasn’t it? When you saw the receipt for two of the bags you’d been asking about all season?”

“That bitch can’t even pronounce Hermès,” Amelia spat out. “I wasn’t even mad, Maurice. I wasn’t. I was ready to pack up and go on one of those yearlong cruises, get my girlhood back, you know? But I saw your invoices. And I only see your invoices when he’s trying to weasel out of something.”

Fiona held on to that. Maurice worked for Robert. Maybe even doing weaselly stuff. It never occurred to Fiona that he had done to her in that police station what he was doing so effortlessly to these ladies. They wanted to say yes to him.

“You’re right, Amelia. You’re sharp. That’s why I was so surprised to see you go along with the allegations against Fiona Addai.”

“Who? That thief? She wanted the vest. Maybe she would kill for it.” Amelia walked to the cash register.

“Maybe.” Maurice shrugged. He wasn’t even trying to defend her. “Or maybe the theft and the death aren’t related at all. Did she have any reason to harm your husband?”

Fiona stiffened. What does Amelia know?

“No, she’s a nobody.”

“Sorry for being indelicate. But your husband never quite calmed his appetite for ladies…You don’t think she was…sleeping with Robert?”

Amelia let out a laugh, and it was sharp enough to make Fiona flinch.

Maurice’s response was a soft “ah.”

“No, when Robert was stepping out, it was with someone he could brag about.”

Fiona’s jaw flinched. She wasn’t a vain woman, yet she felt the heat of indignation in her chest.

Maurice was quiet. Fiona didn’t look across the racks for fear he would be nodding along. He and Amelia sharing that look of the perennially desirable.

“Amelia, well, he was seventy-four years old. Black men can’t expect many more years than that. Couldn’t this be too much excitement for the guy?”

“He had the heart of a lion. Are you kidding me? This was the most unnatural death I’ve ever seen. Sara is at the bottom of this. She was telling everyone that would listen that she was writing an exposé. Robert was scared of her. Plain and simple.”

“With all due respect, your judgment of Sara can’t be trusted right now.”

“Like hell it can’t. I know more than you think. How much was Robert paying you to spy on me?”

“Amelia—”

“I can double it—triple it—if you can nail that skinny little bitch to the wall. She has it. She laced it with something. I’m telling you she was giving that poor man so many drugs so he would tell her all these crazy stories.”

“What drugs?” Fiona whispered into the mic. Fiona tripped over a lawn jockey, and she hit the wooden floorboards with a heavy thud. Two or three Diane Keatons looked over to her, but not Amelia.

“Okay, those are a lot of allegations,” Maurice said. “What exactly was she giving your husband?”

Fiona saw him pull out a notebook from across the aisle.

“I know for a fact that his autopsy report is going to be lit up like a Christmas tree. Every legal and illegal substance in the book.”

“Why would she do that?”

“She’s been keeping tabs on Robert for three years.

The drugs keep him loose and talking. They offered her a million dollars for that damned manuscript.

And Robert wanted to end it, but he told her…

” Amelia looked around and decided against whatever she was going to say.

“Look, find her. I think the drugs are the reason he fell out on the showroom stage. And they’re going to railroad that other poor girl.

If you do it, I’ll scream to the press about that useless sack of shit Detective Ryan.

I’ll make sure they know who solved the case for me.

He can’t run for sheriff with that stain on his reputation. ”

Maurice straightened his posture. Seeing how the police had treated Maurice at the precinct, Fiona could tell that Amelia had pressed the right button.

He was champing at the bit. Amelia finished checking out and handed Maurice her card.

Fiona ducked behind an armoire and watched them walk out together.

After he finished up with Amelia, Maurice caught up with Fiona walking down the block.

“I know you want to take her case,” Fiona said, not even stopping her stride.

“I was going to do it anyway, for the bit. But this way? It’s efficient. Keeps the lights on while we investigate. Maybe even use some of that money to get you a lawyer. You know, out of the goodness of my heart.”

He tilted his head toward a nearby row of lime-green electric scooters. His eyebrow rose in silent suggestion.

She shook her head, her face twisting in mock horror. “Absolutely not. Scooting must be a recorded sin in some religion. Thou shalt not humiliate thyself in public.”

Maurice’s lips twitched as he walked past the scooters, giving them a wistful look. “Shame. I was curious if that denim frock you have on has any lift.”

Fiona looked down at the dress, so heavy it could have been sewn with lead thread, and surprised herself with a laugh—imagining the ridiculous material flapping in the wind.

He nudged her shoulder lightly, steering the conversation back. “How do you think we did in there? Debrief me. What’s your analysis?”

“Me?” Fiona slowed her pace slightly, caught off guard. “Really?”

“Really you,” Maurice said.

This is a test , Fiona thought. If she didn’t draw the right conclusions, he would say she wasn’t ready.

Fiona hesitated, pulling at her collar. “She…” she began, then halted, gathering her thoughts. “She didn’t kill him.”

Maurice stopped walking, tilting his head as he studied her. “That was quick. How do you know?”

They had reached her father’s car, an aging sedan parked at the curb. Maurice leaned against it, peering into the window as if checking for valuables—or possibly plotting how to break in. Fiona wasn’t entirely sure he hadn’t stolen a car before.

“According to your podcasts, it’s always the spouse,” he said, yanking lightly at the car’s handle.

“I know!” Fiona exclaimed, her voice pitching up. “Which is why I was so surprised when you baited her. And she didn’t take it.”

Maurice raised an eyebrow, but he didn’t contradict her.

“You dangled that excuse,” Fiona continued, gesturing emphatically, “about Robert being old, natural causes and all that. Brilliant! You basically gift wrapped an explanation for his death. A guilty person would’ve snatched it up and run with it.

But she didn’t. She pushed it away. Said, ‘He had the heart of a lion.’?” Fiona was a little out of breath and embarrassed that this all sounded a little fangirly, so she cleared her throat and managed her tone a bit.

“She doesn’t think he died naturally. She thinks he was killed, and she wants revenge on Sara. ”

Maurice’s expression was unreadable. Did he agree? Was she presumptuous?

“But,” Fiona added, holding her finger up, “I don’t think you should take her money. She’s grieving, Maurice. She’s desperate and looking for villains everywhere. It feels…wrong.”

Maurice shrugged, rubbing his hands together like a man about to roll dice. “Maybe, but we work every angle. You can have your morals, but you’ve got eighty-four days until your morals stop mattering. This is what it is, Fi—a gift of access and resources. Are you in?”

She didn’t react to him shortening her name but she would call herself Fi from now on when she’s trying to figure something out. Little shot of confidence. “Okay. What happens when it’s not Sara? Because it is not. It’s Mark.”

“We’ll cross that bridge when it comes.”