I’m afraid I couldn’t think of anything terribly cute or charming re titles today. <LOL> Hi. It’s JJ.
Today marks Day 3 of the 99-cent Coco’s Nuts promotion. The second official case of the Triple Threat Investigation Agency has us hopping around Oahu and then some. Exciting and perplexing, we discover that a number of individuals could be a mass murderer . . . including one nutty fellow named Coco Peterson. He’s missing but seems to play a major part in mystery: who set up our client, Buddy Feuer, to take the rap for two murders?
Maybe this excerpt might prompt you to want to check us out . . .
“Of course Buddy Feuer didn’t do it. Who told you she did?” I demanded, already knowing who had tattled to Ricardo Mako Picolo. It could only have been one person: Kent “The Source” Winche.
“Winche,” the health-food freak confirmed, munching noisily, probably a mung-bean, pea-sprout muffin, his favorite according to an article I’d read earlier. “Actually, he said she was a person of interest . . . or did he say suspect? Whatever. He doesn’t believe she did it.”
I paced my kitchen like a tin duck target at a fair ground concession booth. Every time I passed the counter, I poked a trio of bananas perched in a white wicker basket.
It was hard to say why Jimmy Picolo’s slick (as in oil-spill, slippery-slimy) brother proved annoying. Maybe it was the self-satisfied, perpetually tanned face I’d viewed in photos. He sported a nose too perfect to have been born with. Evidently, he and his niece shared the same cosmetic surgeon. He was as handsome as his brother, but more a combination of Bobby Darren of T.J. Hooker fame and Ryo Ishibashi as Detective Toshihuru Kuroda in Suicide Club. Asian-cast root-beer brown eyes seemed to challenge; they, like the thin lips pulled into a smug smile, expressed a sense of superiority. As it had in interviews, the man’s mega ego blazed like a Times Square billboard.
“Thank heavens for the pretty boy’s support,” I responded wryly.
“He’s a big fan of Buddy’s.” Munch, munch. Crunch, crunch. Must be macadamias in that muffin, too. “Winche’ll give his eye teeth—letteralmente—to reinforce that she didn’t do it. He claims she could never kill anyone in a million years. She’s too cute.”
“Too cute?”
“He’s got a real thing for her. Anyway, with you helping, she shouldn’t worry herself none.” I could hear the simper. “I heard you girls did a solid job working the Howell case.”
“Really?” I was nonplussed.
“When I got your message, I had you checked out. I do that with everyone whose call I’m thinking of returning.”
When I didn’t respond, he chuckled and slurped. Was he also indulging in one of his famous wheatgrass-beetroot smoothies? “I got a proposition. You interested?”
“If it will clear our client’s name, of course,” I responded casually. Poke, poke. The bananas were beginning to look as if they’d encountered a frenzied chimp.
“Here’s what we’re going to do.”
We’re?
“We’re going to find the prick that killed my brother. The why would be a bonus, but the who is the important answer.”
I dropped onto counter stool and rested my chin on the granite counter. “What’s in it for you, Mr. Picolo?” Poke, poke. Oh-oh. The bananas lay on the polished hardwood floor like washed-up marine creatures. Button ambled over, pawed them, sniffed, and flopped onto the floor with a loud sigh.
“Like I said, knowing who killed my brother. The other guy who got rubbed out I could care less about . . . but his family would like to know, I’m sure. Anyway, I’ll add some incentives.”
“Incentives?” I asked, puzzled.
Ricardo’s laughter was reminiscent of microwaved popcorn: staccato, abrupt. Heh-heh. Heh-heh-heh. “Yeah, incentives. First one: twenty-five K.”
Nice incentive. “Second?”
“Coco Peterson’s tattoo and jewelry. It wouldn’t do for the cops to find them, would it?”
“What the frig?” flew out of my mouth like a horse embarking on a steeplechase before I could contain it.
“There are a lot of different fingerprints in and around Coco’s stuff. Possibly Buddy’s, too.”
What was he talking about? “I’ll bite. Why wouldn’t it do for the police to find the tattoo and jewelry?”
“Well, let me think on it.” He paused for dramatic effect. Or perhaps to consider his smoothie. Ricardo Picolo, unlike his brother, did not speak with a quasi-Australian accent, but he did have a habit of over-pronouncing certain words. “Well”, for example, sounded like a deep-South twang: “wee-eellll”.
“Mr. Razor may be inclined to talk,” he continued, sounding uncharacteristically flustered, maybe at having found the great cosmos in the foamy drink or a belly-up bug.
I sniffed. “I understand the man has no tongue.”
“I could be inclined to talk.”
If you’re interested, please go to: https://www.amazon.ca/Cocos-Nuts-Tyler-Colins/dp/1078374368.
Aloha!
NOTE: $0.99 promotions are active only in the US and UK stores.
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