Midsummer Night's Mischief by Jennifer David Hesse

Author:Jennifer David Hesse [Jennifer David Hesse]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781496704924
Publisher: Kensington
Published: 2016-07-26T04:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 15

“What does one wear to a casino?” I stood before my closet, at a loss.

“You see everything,” said Farrah from her perch on the edge of my bed. “For fun, we should go the LBD route. All the better to blend in with the cocktail crowd.”

“LBD?”

“You know, little black dress. Come on. Pick one and let’s go. We’ve got to stop by my place yet, and the clock’s a-tickin’. Your boy’s calendar said six thirty, right?”

“Yeah, yeah, okay.” I grabbed a little satin number and matching strappy black heels and dressed quickly.

Farrah had stopped over this afternoon to coax me into watching a Thin Man marathon on the old movie channel. I was okay with her popping in—I always kept my bedroom door closed. But between the old movies and our usual gabbing, we had let the time slip away. So, when Farrah had stood up and said, “Come on. Let’s find you an outfit for tonight,” I couldn’t argue with her. But I had insisted that she wait in the living room while I “made my bed.”

“Oh, don’t be silly,” she had said. “I don’t care if your bed is made.”

“Just humor me,” I’d said hastily. “I’ve got a thing. A hang-up. Just give me a sec.” Then I’d dashed into my room to hide away several incriminating items. I’d had to make my altar look more like a decorative bedroom table and less like a Wiccan shrine.

Now, as I took a few essentials from my everyday purse and tossed them into my little black purse, I said to Farrah, “I hope we’re not overdressed.”

Forty-five minutes later, having left Farrah’s car in the marina parking lot and having picked our way up the long gangway to board the triple-decker River Queen, we stood at the entryway, gazing into the main game room. Then we looked at one other.

“We are so overdressed,” I said.

Everywhere we looked, at the flashing slot machines along the walls, around the poker tables, the blackjack tables, and the roulette wheels, were middle-aged folks clad mostly in jeans and shirtsleeves. The dressier ones, men and women, wore golf shirts and slacks. A few older ladies wore flowery prints. One such lovely, four feet tall and carrying a purse that must have weighed as much as she did, tapped Farrah on the elbow.

“This TITO over here took my ticket and didn’t give me credit.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“My ticket got stuck in the TITO machine. You need to come get it out. I had fourteen dollars on that ticket!”

“Um, I don’t work here,” said Farrah, furrowing her eyebrows. “Sorry.”

The woman looked taken aback and turned to me next. Before she could get a word out, I pointed to a uniformed security guard. “Ask him,” I said, steering Farrah toward the door.

“Why did she think I work here?” asked Farrah, still perplexed as we made our way to the promenade.

“Probably ’cause you look like you know what’s what,” I said. “Now, what say we take a tour of

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