Dead and Breakfast (The New Orleans Go Cup Chronicles Book 2) by Colleen Mooney Page B

rotten, like I was cheating with her boyfriend out to dinner.
    “I don’t know what you heard about the two of us, but whatever it is, it’s probably not true,” Dante answered me and squeezed my hands. “Don’t worry about that.”
    Great, for years I couldn’t get one guy to commit to me about anything and now I had two men who were professing their undying love.
    Well, sort of.
    We talked over the rest of the meal, about our families—who was doing what—he had more to tell me with all his brothers and their antics. He said his mother asked about me all the time. I asked him which one of the twins wanted to date my sister and he said, “They both do.” We laughed.
    When I looked at my watch it was almost ten o’clock. Wow, we’d been talking for almost four hours. “I really enjoyed this but I have an early meeting tomorrow morning,” I said. I wanted to split the check. He insisted on paying it.
    “Wait, I’ll walk you to your car.” He got up and pulled my chair out for me, left money for the bill on the table as we left.
    We passed the bar and Dante asked the bartender if he needed to settle up when I noticed the bartender’s nametag said Andy.
    “Andy, you’re friends with Julia, right? I’m her friend Brandy.”
    “Hey…yeah. Nice to meet you,” Andy said. He stopped drying a glass and extended his hand across the bar to shake mine, then Dante’s. “She can use all the friends she can get right now after this mess she’s in.”
    “No kidding. She said she came here that night with the guy. I don’t believe she did it. Do you remember anything about them that night?” I asked. Dante’s ears perked up.
    “Well, the only thing sort of off was a girl came in and sat over there.” He pointed to the corner table that was partially obstructed from the bar by a wall. “I think she could see the bar but they couldn’t see her or they didn’t pay attention to her. She came in through the open doors that lead out to the street over there, not through the bar door. Julia and the guy were already here. I didn’t think much of it until she got up and left right after they did. That made me think she was following them.”
    Dante showed Andy his shield and said he would try to come back with some photos to see if Andy could ID her.
    “Sure, just call first and make sure I’m here. I work all kinds of crazy hours. I hope I can help,” Andy said.
    Dante walked me to my car and I was excited, thinking of the hallway encounter, expecting him to kiss me. Instead, he took my keys, opened the door for me, thanked me for having dinner with him and said good night. As I drove home, I felt emotionally out of whack. At Julia’s I didn’t expect him to kiss me, and he did. Tonight, I wanted him to kiss me without all the family expectations dumped on us, and he didn’t. Then, I saw headlights pull out behind me when I left the parking lot and figured, he was going to follow me and make sure I got home safely. Maybe he’d walk me to my door and kiss me good night then.

 
     
     
     
     
     
    Chapter Eleven
     
     
    I was back in my office setting up appointments with clients to review their communication firewalls when Jiff’s number rang on my cell phone.
    “Julia is going to be arrested and taken downtown for arraignment,” he said before I could even say hello.
    “What? What’s going on?”
    “I really wish I didn’t have to tell you this. The police found a bloody dress they believe Julia wore the night they went out and a bronze statute exactly like the ones she has in the other guest rooms with the victim’s bloody head matter all over it in a dumpster at the end of her street. They are sending both to forensics to run DNA and the prints,” he said.
    “Oh my God. What can I do to help?”
    “I’ll call you back when I get more info.” He hung up and I sat there holding the phone.
    This didn’t make sense. I had to get to Julia and find out what happened. I called the bed and