Once Upon A Tiara. Carrie Alexander

a nightmare, blowing his budget right off the start because he’d had to overcompensate for the previous mistake: one tiny scarab stolen from under his nose. Given Simon’s track record, the Grunberg officials had insisted on tripling normal security. Luckily, Corny had hosted a Platinum Patron party and persuaded her wealthy friends to pull out their checkbooks. With the influx of funds, Simon had been able to correct glitches in the system and hire another guard.

      Even so, there were a thousand details to handle before the official grand opening tomorrow afternoon. The last thing Simon needed was to become preoccupied with the visiting princess.

      Yet here he stood, drinking strong tea and popping tiny frosted cakes by the handful, watching as Lili greeted guest after guest after guest. Her smile never wavered. But it was a professional smile. Already he could tell the difference between it and the naughty little twitch of her lips that preceded her mischievous moments. For now, she was on her best behavior.

      Alas.

      Simon scanned the crowd. Socially inept or not, even he recognized that the party could use some livening up. He supposed it was proceeding exactly as the mayor had envisioned. That was the trouble. Corny prided herself on her old-world stodginess.

      Lili’s laughter drew Simon’s attention. Darned if she wasn’t up on her toes, reaching a hand to the top of an overgrown young man’s lofty head. The Tower lowered his chin obediently. Her hand sank into his thick, curly hair. Thick? It was as dense as a jungle. The guy had twice as much hair as he needed. He could donate half of it to Charles Barkley and have enough left over to weave himself a hair shirt.

      Simon edged closer. What was Lili doing?

      “I heard they grew them tall in America,” she said admiringly. “Are you a basketball player, Mr. Stone?”

      Simon missed the man’s response. His voice was a low rumble, an avalanche on a mountain. Figured.

      “Ever since I saw Dallas play in the Super Bowl when I was a little girl, I wanted to be a Dallas Cowboys cheerleader. The boots, the pompons—such fun.” Lili tilted her head back, listening to the Tower. Another peal of delighted laughter. “Oh, that’s football? And what about baseball? How do you keep all your odd sports straight?” She tapped him on the chest. “You Americans are so healthy and vigorous.”

      Simon grabbed the shoulder of Blue Cloud’s solid, tenacious police chief, Henry Russell, as he walked by.

      Henry was also a bachelor, only a few years older than Simon, though he was more of the plainspoken baseball-and-bowling type. They’d become well acquainted while coordinating their efforts to secure the safety of the jewels. Simon admired the man. There would be no screwups if Henry, who was in charge of the town’s small but well-run police department, had anything to say about it.

      “Who’s that guy?” Simon asked. Henry knew every blade of grass and leaf of marijuana in Blue Cloud. You couldn’t filch a plastic jewel from a gum-ball machine without him hot on your trail.

      Henry lifted the brim of his hat as if that would give him a better look. Simon had already seen the man’s blink-of-an-eye assessment.

      “Tourist,” the sheriff said. “We’ve got a lot of them in town this weekend.”

      “Are you sure?”

      “Sure I’m sure.”

      “He doesn’t look suspicious to you?”

      Henry’s eyes narrowed. His lantern jaw bulged. “Everyone looks suspicious to me.”

      “He’s too slick, don’t you think?” The Tower was dressed in Amana or whatever they called that sort of unrumpled designer tailoring. Definitely the dashing playboy type.

      Henry wasn’t perturbed at all. He scanned the crowd swarming in and out of the tent instead of keeping an eye on the suspicious snake who was charming Lili. “The princess seems to approve.”

      Simon scowled. The stranger was holding up the receiving line. As they talked, Lili glancingly touched his arm, his shoulder…hell, she even flipped up the end of the guy’s subdued maroon silk tie and giggled a little.

      The Tower put his hands on her waist, bent down, said something about her being a “tiny little package,” and squeezed. Simon’s face got hot. He wasn’t a violent man, but suddenly he wanted to use his fists like sledgehammers.

      “Stone,” he remembered. “His name’s Stone.”

      “Ah.”

      “Does that mean anything to you?”

      “Nope,” Henry said.

      “Can’t you run the name through your, uh, system? I don’t like him.” He has too much hair. He has too many white teeth. He has too many hands on Lili.

      “I’ll keep an eye on him,” Henry pledged. But his eyes were elsewhere, following a woman’s dark head through the crowd. Simon was too distracted by his own fixation to give more than a fleeting notice to the chief’s.

      Until a sharp cry rose above the babble of the crowd.

      “Pickpocket!”

      3

      EVEN BEFORE Simon turned, Chief Russell was gone, shooting through the crowd toward the disturbance. A woman in a feathered hat warbled like a particularly high-pitched ghost: “Oo-oo-oo-oo-oooh!”

      Her squat husband was the one raising the ruckus. “Pickpocket! Pickpocket! They got into Dora’s purse.” He patted his behind. “Sonovabiscuit. My wallet’s gone, too.”

      A shrill panic overtook the guests, with everyone checking their purses and pockets for missing valuables. A shout went up about another missing wallet. The chief and his force of one officer quickly took control, calming the crowd as they herded them under the tent like cattle.

      Simon looked for Lili. She was fine, attended by the royal bodyguard. Her face was animated, sympathetic in expression, but with lively eyes and a high color in her cheeks. It figured that she’d enjoy the excitement.

      The mayor spread loud platitudes, assuring the attendees that Chief Russell would take care of the “minor disturbance.” Mrs. Grundy and Wilhelm tried to coax the princess into the museum, away from harm. Lili, patting the distraught feather-woman’s hand, refused to go.

      The guests milled around, gabbling and fussing. Despite instructions, a number were slipping away, heading off to the parked cars. Henry left the other officer in charge and went to round up the renegades.

      Out of suspicion—or maybe mere curiosity—Simon looked around for the Tower of Hair who’d charmed Lili. Nowhere in sight. That was interesting…possibly.

      Simon had begun to make his way forward to aid the police officer with crowd control when a plump woman in head-to-toe polka dots let out a squawk. She clutched at her throat. “My pearls,” she said, and fainted dead away—straight into Simon’s arms.

      “Oof,” he said, catching her under the armpits. She was no bantamweight. Nor a middleweight. He nudged a knee into the small of her back to help hold her up.

      “Oh, dear, poor Elspeth,” said a companion, tearing off the collapsed woman’s straw hat to fan her flushed face. “The pearls are a family heirloom,” she told the crowd, flapping. “Worth a pretty penny.”

      “Somebody,” Simon choked out, jostling the woman’s sagging weight. “Help.”

      A man grabbed Elspeth’s ankles and another wrapped his arms around her hips. They lugged her toward the tables. Simon meant to sit her upright in a chair, but the fellows holding the rest of Elspeth heaved her onto one of the abandoned tables. Splat—her polka-dotted rump landed in a plate of petits fours. A plastic cup of punch fell over, staining the paper tablecloth red as the spill crept toward the inert woman.

      Cornelia was frantic. She whipped out a lace-edged handkerchief