Here Comes the Body. Maria DiRico

      It took Mia half a second to realize the last comment was directed at her. “This way,” she said, motioning for him to follow her. She passed Park Lexington, who had seated herself in one of the chairs decorating the foyer and was checking her cell phone. “You want me to do my thing?” the stripper asked, barely looking up from her phone.

      Mia shook her head. “Keep your clothes on,” she said. “For now.”

      Dianopolis ascended the stairs behind Mia. “So,” he said, “Cammie here tonight?”

      Mia saw right through the detective’s forced attempt at a casual inquiry into his ex-wife’s whereabouts. The detective had a second career—although he was the only one who ever called it that—as mystery author Steve Stianopolis. When he’d self-published his first novel three years prior, he foresaw the career of a Joseph Wambaugh or Michael Connelly for himself. Explaining to Cammie that he needed freedom to enjoy the fame and fans he’d soon garner, Dianopolis asked for a divorce. Cammie gave him one, along with a literal kick out the door. When neither F materialized for “Steve,” he begged Cammie to reconcile. However, it turned out she was the one who needed freedom from her self-centered husband, so the answer was a loud “no,” accompanied by a host of Greek expletives. Three years later, Dianopolis was still trying to woo her back. Convinced that every man found Cammie as alluring as he did, the detective was furious when she accepted a job with “that trolling goombah mobster,” as he called Ravello. While Cammie found this hilarious, Mia feared it put her father in the detective’s jealous crosshairs.

      “Nope,” she said, “Cammie’s not here tonight.”

      “And neither is your father,” Dianopolis said, glowering.

      “Hey, did Cammie tell you Dad has a girlfriend? Someone he met on a cruise. I hear she’s great and he’s nuts about her.” Mia chattered anxiously as she led the man down the hall that connected the Bay Ballroom to a small secondary prep kitchen. “There.”

      She pointed to the pop-out cake, which was already cordoned off by police tape. Dianopolis snapped on latex gloves and ducked under the tape. He climbed onto the first layer, flipped back the lid on top of the cake, and stared inside. Then he hopped down. “While CSI does their job, let’s you and me talk. Somewhere private.”

      “We can go to my office. But I need to talk to my staff. We still have two parties here, which means two very unhappy, trapped groups of guests.”

      Afraid Dianopolis might try and stop her, Mia darted out of the room and down the stairs to the foyer, where she ran into Cody. “The Marina Ballroom guests were asking a lot of questions, ma’am—Mia—so I told them what’s going on is all part of a big murder mystery event courtesy of Belle View Banquet Manor.”

      “Great stall, Cody. I need to meet with everyone in the big kitchen.”

      He responded with a half salute and spoke into his headset. “Ten-hut! All employees to the kitchen, repeat, all employees to the kitchen. Now!”

      Mia dashed down the hall and burst into the kitchen as the banquet hall’s employees streamed in. She took a deep breath and then, trying to reveal as little as possible, she began to speak. “Thanks, everyone. We have a situation that required the help of law enforcement.”

      “The stripper got stabbed dead with a knife and the cops need to find out who murdered her.” Missy, the nineteen-year-old kitchen helper, jumped in.

      “You can relax,” Guadalupe said to Mia. “We all know. Everyone knows. Even the guests.” Evans, her sous chef, nodded.

      Mia released a breath. “Okay then. It looks like we’ll be here a while. The police need to talk to everyone and get contact information. I have no idea how long it’s going to take.”

      Giorgio, the unpleasant new hire, shrugged. “What do we care? We’re being paid by the hour.”

      Mia found herself wishing it was Giorgio at the bottom of the pop-out cake instead of Angie. “Use those hours to give our guests anything they want. This is a crazy situation, but we need everyone to leave happy. Got it?”

      “Got it,” the staff chorused.

      “You’re the best,” she said, finding the restraint not to throw an “except for you” at Giorgio.

      Mia left her employees and made her way back up the stairs and into the Bay Ballroom, where a sea of angry faces greeted her. She grabbed a mic from DJ DJ and plastered on a smile. “Hey, everyone, what a night, huh?” There was dead silence. Perspiration beaded on her forehead. Mia had never given the term flop sweat much thought. Now she was living it. “I’m sorry about everything. But look at it this way. Plenty of guys have bachelor party stripper stories. Boring. But how many guys have bachelor party crime stories?”

      “Did you say bachelor party stripper stories?” chimed in Park Lexington who, unnoticed by Mia, had followed her into the ballroom. “I’ve got those, and then some. I’ll never forget the guy who rented a Ferris wheel . . .”

      Seeing that the stripper had everyone’s attention, Mia handed her the mic and muttered under her breath, “Keep talking.” She slipped away to the back hall, prepared to meet her fate with Dianopolis. He was gone, replaced by a swarm of crime scene technicians. “Where’s Pete?”

      A technician motioned with a gloved hand. “He brought a couple of guys downstairs to talk.”

      This time Mia took the back stairs that connected the first and second floor work areas. If nothing else, she was getting in her steps for the day—and then some, as Park Lexington would say. She dashed through the kitchen and down the hallway that led to her office in time to see Pete Dianopolis escorting the Koller brothers out of it. “Thank you, both,” he said as he walked them toward the manor’s front door. “I doubt we’ll have any other questions, but if we do, I promise we’ll be respectful of your time.”

      The brothers disappeared into the foyer without a backward glance at the detective. “All that sucking up wasted,” Mia said, shaking her head.

      Dianopolis crooked a finger and motioned to her. “Your turn.”

      He stepped into her office and took the seat behind her desk, forcing Mia to take one of the metal chairs. “I wonder if everyone’s getting that ‘respectful of your time’ line from you,” she said. “I hate when people get a pass because they’re rich.”

      “Good-looking rich guys like that don’t need to knock off a stripper.”

      “Seriously?” Mia said, irked. “There are a million books about rich people doing shady stuff like knocking off strippers and getting away with it because people like you let them.”

      “Rich people . . . shady stuff . . . secrets.” Dianopolis scribbled in a notepad.

      “I’m glad you’re at least listening to me.”

      “Oh, that’s not for the investigation. I’m a little stuck on my next Steve Stianopolis mystery and”—he tapped the notebook—“there might be something here.” He stuck the notepad into one jacket pocket and pulled a different pad out of another. “So, tell me about our vic. Did you recognize her?”

      It was the question Mia feared and hoped to dodge. But she knew it wouldn’t help her father if she lied. “Yes,” she said. “Angie showed up here out of nowhere a few days ago.” She filled the detective in on the late call girl’s bizarre accusation, ending with, “but I believed my father a hundred percent when he said he had no idea who she was.”

      “Oh, you believed your father. Well, that does it for me. Moving on to the next suspect. That was sarcasm.”

      “Really?” Mia said, then added, “So was that.”

      Dianopolis ran a hand through a thick thatch of salt-and-pepper hair. He was so vain about this attribute that Cammie told a story about how she once threatened to shave it off during a fight and he retaliated by taking out a restraining order on her,