The Bride Wore Size 12 (Heather Wells 5)

So while the addition of a cool punk medical examiner and her mom at my wedding is definitely a plus, I’d still like to know how it happened. Did Cooper add Eva and her plus one because he felt sorry for me, as there are so many more people (at least three hundred) on his side?

It’s all very baffling, but again, not something I have time to figure out just now.

“And there’s no sign of, um, vomit in her toilet or trash can,” I volunteer. “So I don’t think she had that stomach flu so many people have.”

Eva looks at me like I’m nuts. “What stomach flu?”

“You know,” I say. I’m still sitting on Jasmine’s visitors’ bed, looking at the posters she’d hung on her walls. “That stomach flu that’s going around.” Then I gasp. “Oh God! Casino Night . . . if there’s a virus or whatever going around, won’t they all get it if they’re confined to a small space, like on a boat? I saw on Voyage to Death that that happened on the Queen Mary 2. The entire ship got the norovirus, a thousand passengers or something, even crew members. The toilets got clogged from everyone’s vomit.”

Eva glances at me in amusement. “If I understand it correctly, this cruise your residents are going on is only around the island of Manhattan, not the Caribbean. They’ll be home in a few hours, so I think they’ll be all right. And anyway, I haven’t heard of any stomach flu going around.” She looks over at Special Agent Lancaster. “Have you heard about any stomach flu going around?”

Special Agent Lancaster shakes his head. “None of my people have it.” Then he touches his earpiece. “My people are asking, by the way, how much longer you’re going to be.”

“As long as it takes, 007,” Eva says. “Why, do you have a train to catch and then derail for Her Majesty?”

“I’m not MI6,” Special Agent Lancaster says, flushing a little. “I thought I explained. I’m Diplomatic Security, with the—”

“State Department, yes, yes,” Eva says, impatiently. “So you said. So is that a passport in your pocket, or are you just glad to see me?”

Special Agent Lancaster frowns and turns away, but I see the back of his neck turning red.

“No one has a sense of humor anymore,” Eva mutters. I’m not sure she notices that the agent is blushing.

There’s a loud rattle from the hallway as the doors to the service elevator open.

“Finally,” Eva says. “It’s Ramon.”

Ramon is Eva’s partner from the OCME, finally arriving with the body bag and gurney.

“Hey, Ramon,” Eva calls out as Special Agent Lancaster stops him and demands to see ID. “Check out the guy in the hallway. He’s a real-life James Bond.”

Ramon looks perplexed, but shows his ID. “How are you doing, sir?” he asks Special Agent Lancaster.

“Peachy,” says the agent, and waves Ramon into the room.

“Have you heard about some flu that’s going around?” Eva asks him.

“It’s too early in the fall for the flu,” Ramon says matter-of-factly. He has a white paper sack balanced on top of the gurney. An extremely pleasant—and familiar—odor enters the room along with him. “Hey, Heather,” he says to me. “Sorry about your loss.” To Eva, he says, “Hey, boss, guess what I stopped for since I had to drive around for so long looking for a parking space, and we got stuck with that crispy critter over on the West Side Highway and didn’t have time for lunch today?”

Eva’s expression brightens as she recognizes the logo on the sack. “Murray’s? Oh, Ramon, you’re too good to me.”

“You know it’s policy never to stop in this neighborhood without getting sandwiches from Murray’s.”

Eva leaps up to look inside the sack while Ramon wheels the gurney to the side of Jasmine’s bed, then goes to look down at the body. I rise to join him.

“So young,” he says sadly, crossing himself. “My wife and I have a girl her age. Seems like such a waste.”

“Yeah.” There doesn’t seem to be much else to say.

“At least there’s no blood this time,” he points out. “You had it bad last year. Remember the girl in the pot?”

“I try not to,” I say.

“Sorry. What’s with the suit?” Ramon whispers, nodding at Special Agent Lancaster.

“VIR,” I say, glancing back down at Jasmine. “Very Important Resident.”

“Her?” he asks, sounding surprised.

“No,” I say. “Upstairs. Son of someone important. There’ve been death threats.”

“She looks like she died in her sleep,” Ramon says. “Not like anyone killed her.”

“I know,” I say. “I guess it’s protocol, or something.”

“Oh,” he says. “Well, I wanted to tell you, thank you very much for the wedding invitation. My wife and I will be very honored to attend.”

I look back at him. I didn’t send Ramon an invitation to my wedding. “Great,” I say. “See you there.”

He nods somberly. “Well. Guess I better get to it. Hey, boss,” he calls to Eva. “Time to tag and bag.”

Eva, who was unable to resist taking a bite of Smokey Joe—I recognize the scent, as I’ve had it many times myself: smoked mozzarella, marinated sun-dried tomatoes, and balsamic vinaigrette and basil on crisply baked focaccia—looks up guiltily.

“Sorry,” she mumbles with her mouth full, then wipes her lips with practiced skill so that the crumbs fall directly into the Murray’s bag and not onto Jasmine’s floor. “Just a sec.”

In the hallway, Special Agent Lancaster rolls his eyes, but otherwise chooses to pretend he hasn’t noticed anything amiss.

I move out of the way so that Eva and Ramon can get to work, admiring as always the tender movements with which they prepare the deceased for transport.

It’s only when they have Jasmine zipped up and on the gurney and I go to her bed to straighten her sheets—even though we’re not supposed to, but it can’t matter anymore; I want her room to look nice for her parents when they come—that I realize that Cooper was right all along:

Jasmine’s smartphone is missing.

8

All Pain and No Gain for the President of the Pansies