Title: Lane Changes
Author: S.L. Ellis
Date of Publication: December 20th 2014
About LANE CHANGES
CASSIE CRUISE wants her life
back as a kick-ass P. I.
Trouble is, she has zero
credibility since bungling a case on reality TV. After a public tantrum, she
slinks off to bury her head in the sandy beaches of Southwest Florida.
Just as she starts over as the
owner of The Big Prick tattoo shop, a body is discovered in the trunk of her
burning car. Cassie’s aware there are those who’d get in line for their turn to
torch her car. But murder?
You don’t have to like her, but
you damn well better respect her. And get out of her way—this is one case she
intends to solve, with or without an audience.
Buy Links:
About S.L.
Ellis
S.L. Ellis
came from a small town in Michigan, and after a few decades of winter she was
ready for a fresh start. A move to Florida and a few days on the beach improved
her disposition a hundred-fold, and it was here that writing became more than a
thought. Classes were taken, workshops worked, and a few books written.
Ellis's short story "A Brush With Death" was published in Vol. 12 DARK TALES, a UK magazine and reviewed by: Vince A. Liaguno, Dark Scribe Magazine, Anthology Reviews: "A Brush with Death is a solid, at times poignant, chiller in which a dying woman--who knows death well after a lifetime of obsession--makes a deal with the Grim Reaper. Ellis's keen observations on aging and death are spot-on." Her short story "If the Shoe Fits" was accepted for publication in HARDLUCK STORIES for its final issue. She is a member of Sisters in Crime and ITW.
Ellis's short story "A Brush With Death" was published in Vol. 12 DARK TALES, a UK magazine and reviewed by: Vince A. Liaguno, Dark Scribe Magazine, Anthology Reviews: "A Brush with Death is a solid, at times poignant, chiller in which a dying woman--who knows death well after a lifetime of obsession--makes a deal with the Grim Reaper. Ellis's keen observations on aging and death are spot-on." Her short story "If the Shoe Fits" was accepted for publication in HARDLUCK STORIES for its final issue. She is a member of Sisters in Crime and ITW.
Website: http://www.cassiecruise.com/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/slellis1
Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/PICassieCruise/
Excerpts:
Maybe I wasn’t the
best PI around, but none of my cases had been likely to get me killed—until
now…
Lane grabbed my arm, pulled me
in front of her, and shoved me toward the hallway.
“I can walk on my own.” I
shrugged her hand off my shoulder. Everything my eyes landed on I measured for
use as a weapon.
“Go sit.”
I walked to the lanai and
flipped the light on. She flipped the light off and grabbed my hair to steer me
toward the chair. The moon was huge, white, and in position with the tops of
the palm trees. I blinked and slid my eyes toward the closed and barred sliding
doors.
“How’d you get in?” I asked.
“Jimmied your side garage door.
You really need a deadbolt on that if you’re not going to lock the inside
door.”
“Well, shit.” I couldn’t believe
I’d been so concerned with the sliding doors and not the side door. After all,
it’s how I got in to her house.
“I’m sorry to have to do this,”
she said and gave my hair an extra twist. “I just couldn’t think of a cleaner
plan.”
“I could help. There are nicer
plans. Maybe you didn’t give it enough thought?”
“You’re so weird all the time,”
she said.
Moonlight radiated from the
barrel of the revolver, a Ruger Single Six. I hid my panic while Lane backed in
to the chair next to mine. She still had my hair in her hand, pulling out hair
and stretching my scalp with each inch she moved. Tears came to my eyes, and
then she let go of my hair.
“Do you think anyone would be
surprised if you’re found floating in the pool?” Lane asked, once she situated
in the chair and had the revolver aimed at me just so.
CHAPTER 1
Bad things happened in threes. That was the thought that ran
through my mind—right after holy shit.
This was number three.
A scorched breeze moved through
the trio of Queen Palms situated in the side yard. I watched their fronds
whisper and nod as if remarking on the scene in the street beneath them. An
intermittent glow from the fire truck’s lights and the clunk and clang of
firefighters putting away equipment underlined the quietness.
Just a few people continued to
hang around and gawk. I searched the gawkers for familiar faces, wanting Vince,
my fiancé, to appear, or if not him, then Janice, my friend and neighbor, would
do.
No such luck. Instead, the only
recognizable face was a neighbor, Sammy Porter and, when he walked up, he aimed
a flashlight over and around the car. I watched with an anger I thought I had
left back on the decaying streets of Detroit.
I’d moved here because I thought
I could safely hide in this neighborhood of retirees, trimmed palm trees,
screened-in swimming pools, and manicured St. Augustine grass. I’d done my
homework, but it seemed pointless now. People were supposed to be safe here of
all places. Wrong and wrong again. Apparently, it didn’t matter how aware you
were, or where you lived, violence could creep up on you anytime and anywhere.
Sammy bent down near the trunk.
“Hey, it’s still on fire back here, still got a fire here.” With the help of
his flashlight, I saw a meandering spiral of black smoke escaping between the
cracks of the trunk lid.
A sudden anxiety raced through
my veins and, as if dipped in cement, heaviness weighed down my legs and arms.
I wanted Sammy to go home and mind his own business. In fact, everyone should
leave. It was my car someone had torched, my business, my loss.
“Get away from my car!” I
yelled.
Sammy ignored me, but my yelling
did get a firefighter’s attention. He grabbed a pry bar, elbowed Sammy aside,
and popped open the trunk.
Sammy swallowed and then looked
over at me. “Oh, my.”
The firefighters bent to get a
closer look and, lured by the looks of horror on their faces, I went to the
car.
Bile rose in my throat. Inside
the trunk was a charred and still-smoldering body.
Oh my God.
The nose was completely gone and
overall there wasn’t much flesh remaining on the face.
Oh. God.
Sucking in my breath, I turned
away from the face, only to catch a view of the relatively undamaged organs
behind the ribs and the incinerated flesh of the chest. Dizziness hit and I
grabbed the outside edge of the blackened trunk to keep from falling face first
into the charred body.
“Back away from the car.”
Turning toward the voice, I felt
vindicated, thinking he was speaking to nosy Sammy, but no one else was near
the car. Just me, bending over the trunk of a car—my car, as I had so recently
and loudly reminded all—ogling, with no outward signs of repulsion at a
barbequed human corpse. I shoved down the trunk hood, straightened up, and took
a step back.
It began as a typical
interrogation.
“Your full name, please?”
“Cassandra Leah Cruise. You can
call me Cassie.”
“Would you go over what happened
tonight, Ms. Cruise?”
I knew this was the part where
they were supposed to get a feel for whether I was guilty or innocent based on
my behavior during questioning. Also, they would be aware of where I looked as
they question me. My sister, Rachel—Sergeant Rachel Cruise—had told me all
about interrogations before she was killed in the line of duty eighteen months
ago.
“I don’t know what happened,” I
said.
Looking at the paint-covered
cement block walls of the interview room, I thought they were probably cool to
the touch, and I wondered how odd it would seem if I stood and laid my forehead
against the wall to soothe the ache radiating from behind my eyes. I decided on
somewhere between odd and extremely odd.
Looking away from the block wall, I gave my attention to the detectives in the
room.
They both wore button-down
shirts and khaki slacks, but that’s where the likeness ended. I zeroed in on
the older detective. He was close to my forty-nine years and handsome in a
rough kind of way. The tiredness of his eyes, the wrinkles in his shirt, and
his old-style slicked back hair reminded me of the Detroit Homicide Bureau
detectives I knew from a previous career. He caught me looking and returned my
stare. Suddenly, I felt both homesick and needy and I shivered with another
emotion I didn’t want to put a name to.
Running my hand through my
purposely-shaggy auburn hair, I looked at the younger of the two. He appeared
to be in his late twenties or early thirties. His slacks had a nice crease. He
was well groomed, clean-shaven. He even had a style to his military-short hair.
“What’s your name?” I asked the
young detective.
He scrunched his face and
cleared his throat before answering. “Stephan. It’s Detective Lieutenant Craig
Stephan,” he said.
I shot him a smile. “I’m
Cassie.”
Stephan ignored the smile. “You
have a charred body in the trunk of your car, and you don’t know what
happened?”
“I don’t know how a body ended
up in the trunk of my car.” I looked to the right. Per Rachel, when a person is
remembering, they tend to look to the right. That’s because the right side of
the brain is the memory area. If they look to the left, they’re lying. Or
did I have it backward?
“It’s your car, isn’t it?”
Detective Stephan asked, interrupting my thoughts.
“It is my car, but it’s not my
body. I mean, I don’t know who the body is or how it got in the trunk.”
“We think you know,” Stephen
insisted.
“I’ve told you I don’t know,” I
said, again looking to the right.
The older detective put out his
hand. “Detective Brick Winslow, County Sheriff’s Office.”
He shook my hand as a man should
shake a woman’s hand. Warm and firm.
“For real? Your name is Brick?”
I asked.
“You have to know my parents to
understand,” he said.
I nodded. “I only know what I
saw.”
“Okay. Tell us what you saw,”
Detective Winslow said after releasing my hand.
“I was outside watching the
firefighters with a few of the neighbors who were still hanging around.”
North Harbor’s Detective Stephan
grimaced and rubbed his hand over the short, bristly hair on his head. “What’s
that got to do with the body?”
Winslow held his hand up in
Detective Stephan’s direction. “Just let her talk,” he said and then turned to
me.
I again saw a tired, work worn,
big city detective. Someone who seemed as out of place as I felt in this small
Florida town. And I also saw a person who would likely understand parts of me
that not many others could.
“Go ahead, Ms. Cruise.”
I nodded my appreciation to
Detective Winslow before continuing, “So I decided I’d had enough and yelled,
‘Get away from my car!’”
“Having someone near your car
bothered you?” Stephan asked.
“Yes.”
“And?” he said.
“One of the firefighters popped
open the trunk.” I folded my hands on the table in front of me and tried to
find a way to describe a horribly burned body without having actually to see it
in my mind’s eye.
Detective Stephan slumped down
in his chair, letting his arms hang slackly alongside. “Ms. Cruise, come on,
just tell us what happened.”
What a freaking whiner, I thought
before responding. “Look, I’m trying, but I want you to understand this first
because I think I know how it looked to others. It took me a few seconds to
catch on to what I was seeing, and when it registered, I instinctively slammed
the trunk. I wasn’t trying to hide anything.”
“The body…”
I took a deep gulp of air and
looked longingly at the cement wall. “That body, what I saw, I’m not so sure
I’ll ever stop seeing it.” Keeping my eyes fixed on the wall, I described in
detail the charred corpse.
They were both quiet for a few
seconds, but eventually they worked into the confrontation part of the
interrogation. That was where they made accusatory statements regarding the
suspect’s involvement and tried to raise the stress level.
“Come on. You know more than
you’re saying. In fact, I personally think you skipped an important piece of
the story,” Detective Stephan said.
“What piece? I didn’t skip
anything,” I said.
“What about how and why you
killed the person found in your trunk? How about that part of the story?” he
asked.
“I’d like you to think about
that. Why would anyone kill a person, put the body into the trunk of their car,
and then light it on fire on their own street, in their own neighborhood? Bring
all that attention to the body they’re supposedly trying to hide? Does that
really make sense to you?” I asked.
“It’d make sense to a certain
washed-up P.I. who made a fool of themselves on T.V. I mean maybe that washed
up P.I. wanted to bring some attention back to themselves and—”
I cut him off with a sugary
voice and fake smile. “You’ve just made it abundantly clear you’re a fucking
moron.” The last thing I wanted to think about or hear about was the television
show debacle.
“Why did you park the car on the
street?” Detective Winslow asked, diverting the moron from saying anything in
return.
“I fell asleep watching a movie
and didn’t move it into my garage,” I said. This question raised my stress
level, and I couldn’t stop myself from looking to the right three or four times
in a row.
“Are you feeling okay?”
Detective Winslow asked.
I nodded, filled my lungs with
stale air, and let it out while trying to rid my mind of illogical feelings of
guilt. So much for Rachel’s stupid interrogation tidbits.
Detective Winslow stared at me
for a few seconds. “Okay, so normally you park in the garage? This time, just
by coincidence you left it on the street.”
“Yes, that’s what happened.”
Winslow looked down at his pad
of paper. “Tell me about the vehicle.”
“Like I said, it was my
sister’s. It’s a 1997 Mercedes Benz 500SL Roadster, in great condition. I mean
it was in great condition. I don’t know what else to tell you.”
“Okay. Go over again why you
parked your car on the street and not in your garage.”
“Again?”
He nodded.
“Laziness, I guess.”
“That it?” he asked.
“Okay. No, that’s not it. Not
all anyway. I mean, I had to pee.” I was suddenly embarrassed over the fact
that I was embarrassed to talk about a normal body function.
“What the hell?” Detective
Stephan said.
Turning toward Detective
Winslow, I explained. “I gulped down a huge amount of iced tea while working at
the shop and left in a cranky hurry. I ran some errands, and once I turned onto
my street, I felt an overwhelming urgency. So I parked the car on the street,
hopped around while trying to concentrate enough to get the bags of landscape
rock I’d bought at Home Depot out of the trunk. I gave up halfway through and
ran inside, barely making it to the bathroom in time. As I said earlier, I then
grabbed an old movie from my collection and popped it in the player. Dead
Ringer starring Bette Davis.”
“Who?” Detective Stephen asked.
Ignoring him, I said to
Detective Winslow, “It’s what I do to relax. Anyway, about half way through I
fell asleep on the couch. Not the fault of the movie, mind you. I was exhausted
from the day. I never went out to move the car into the garage. I forgot about
moving the car.”
Rachel would understand,
wouldn’t she?
“No idea why someone would do
this to your vehicle?”
“Nope, can’t think of one.”
Big. Fat. Lie. Probably many
people would have stood in line for their turn to torch my car. I was not the
world’s most careful driver, but more to the point I was not what you’d call a
people person. I couldn’t play the games required to enjoy popularity. I didn’t
like fluff. I didn’t like false emotions. I didn’t know how to change my
so-called snotty, sarcastic ways. Therefore, people didn’t really like me. Most
times I was okay with it.
“No idea who the dead person
is?”
“No idea.”
Rachel’s description of the next
step in an interrogation didn’t hold up either. Supposedly, it was something
called theme development. They made up a story about why the suspect did the
crime, hoping he would start filling in the missing spots, give reasons of his
own, or blame the victim. Instead, it seemed both of the Detectives floundered
and became stuck. They never got to the point where they were supposed to speak
in soothing voices in hopes of lulling the suspect into a sense of false
security, thus allowing them to confess. Eventually, I tired and asked to leave
and, surprisingly, they let me go.
Detective Winslow asked if I
wanted to call someone for a ride home. I said no, I could get myself home,
even though I desperately wanted to call Vince. It was called biting off your
nose to spite your face. I walked the mile home in the dark and the ninety-four
degree heat and humidity as a personalized form of self-flagellation.
Inside the house, I tripped over
my purse and key ring lying in the entryway, picked them up, tossed them on the
dining table, and then phoned Vince. After allowing him the privilege of
soothing me, I gained his promise to come over and comfort me.
I looked out my window at the
now quiet neighborhood and felt a tenseness building between my shoulder
blades. Turning away from the window, I picked up a magazine from a nearby pile
and flung it across the room. And another. And another. Not stopping until I
hit a framed painting on the far wall, knocking it to the floor with a crash.
Why?
Who was the poor victim? Who did this? Why my car?
Rubbing the tears off my face, I
returned to the window and watched as a dark sedan, lights off, crawled towards
my house, almost coming to a stop in front of the new neighbor Lane’s house.
The driver—from my window just a dark faceless shape—turned in my direction and
then sped up, popped on the lights, and went on down the street out of the
neighborhood.
Could be nothing, just a
forgetful driver. The streetlights were in good repair and spaced evenly enough
along the street. But now, everyone and everything came under suspicion. It was
weird how something was inconsequential one day and then important and
suspicious the next.
Damn, I’ll never have a car like
that again.
As on almost any other day, I
then heard the voice of my long-dead sister. “Uh-huh, tell me about it,” she
said.
My failure to protect her now
crispy and blackened Mercedes-Benz convertible overcame me. Another failure.
Another public failure. I grabbed the partial pack of cigarettes I’d thrown in
the trashcan under the kitchen sink earlier and lit one up with shaking hands.
This was a murder. Someone
placed a body in my trunk, torched my car, and walked away as if the body was
never a person, as if they hadn’t ever meant anything to anyone.
No one should walk away without
paying for this.
One, two, three. Bad things
always happened in threes.
The temperature inched up by a degree a minute. Lord have
mercy, it’s summer in paradise. I sat and thought about the
weeks and days before the incident, trying to figure out what, if anything,
stood out. My conclusion was meeting the new neighbor, Lane Somers. That one
typically normal thing stood out from all of the other mundane happenings.
I noticed her the moment she
stepped out of her front door. From across the street, I could see she didn’t
fit the neighborhood. I guessed her to be under thirty, which is about a
forty-five-year gap from the fossilized fussbudgets making up eighty percent of
the subdivision. She was tall and lissome with an unaffected elegance in her
walk—a woman with an assured style.
She stood out in other ways, not
only because she didn’t automatically reach for the handrail when she moved
along her porch. Prior to her moving in, at forty-nine years, I was the
youngest chick on the block. After much thought and planning, I purposely chose
to live amongst a gaggle of WOOPs—well off older people—because I knew,
statistically, only about one percent of persons aged sixty-five and older
would be involved in violent crime. The stats were much different in my old
neighborhood. Living here, statistically, I would be safe. I would be
anonymous.
Safety and anonymity. Those were
my reasons for moving here.
After hopping off the lawnmower,
I bent down to brush off pieces of grass and dirt from my legs. As I
straightened, I took in the whole picture. She looked like a young Grace Kelly.
A shot of envy coursed through me and I had to remind myself that beauty was
not a reason to be jealous. By my age, you should realize it was just an
occurrence. An act of nature. That was what I told myself anyway.
“Cassie Cruise,” I said and put
my hand out.
“Lane Somers.” She moved her
hand to take mine and sent a light vanilla-citrus fragrance my way.
“Well, I’m here. Finally.” She
sighed and leaned back on her heels. “It’s so exciting.”
“To move here?” I asked, at that
time thinking, first glance should have showed her nothing exciting ever
happened in this neighborhood. Unless she counted the occasional lawn watering
schedule violation.
Her eyes flitted from the
hibiscus bushes and day lilies growing along my walkway to the baskets of
spider plants hanging between each columned section of the porch and back to
me.
“It’s more than that,” she said.
“Oh, really? Why’s that?”
She tossed her head back and
crossed her arms.
Something in her demeanor gave
me pause. I tried concentrating on her face, hoping to discover some smidgen of
her story.
“Do you have something in your
eye?” she asked.
Embarrassed, I shook my head no
and thought about explaining my theory of a person’s life story showing on
their face, but she beat me to the punch.
“Think you can judge a book by
its cover?” she asked.
“Somewhat. First impressions are
telling, you know.”
“You have a point.” She looked
me over, starting with my feet and ending at my face.
I’d felt as if I’d been busted
and didn’t know what else to say. We both became silent, not looking each other
in the eye.
The temperature inched up by a
degree a minute. Lord have mercy, it’s summer in paradise.
The screwed up beginning of the screwed up investigation. . .
Janice let me off at my house. I
stood outside and watched her until she disappeared inside her garage. I then
walked over to Sammy Porter’s house.
He opened the door an inch and
mushed his face into the opening. I could only see one of his eyes and half of
his lips as he spoke. “I’m not sure you should be here, Miss Cassie.”
“Huh?”
“Well, I’m probably considered a
witness. You know, because of last night, an’ all,” he said.
I forced myself to look away
from his moving lips. Watching half of a mouth speak through a crack felt
freakishly hypnotic. “That’s what I’m here to talk about, Sammy. The fire and
the body. Can I come in so we can talk?”
“Oh, no. Talking to you would
most likely taint my testimony, an’ all,” he said.
“Testimony? Are you kidding me?”
I asked.
“Discovering a dead body is no
joking matter, Ms. Cruise,” Sammy said.
And then I understood. I was
making light of his five minutes of glory.
“Sammy, testimony can’t be
tainted if there’s no apprehended perpetrator. If there’s no perpetrator,
there’s no case, thus, no testimony is tainted.” I deliberately combined
nonsense and pseudo cop-speak in hopes it would either reassure or confuse him
and get him talking to me. “I’m a P.I. anyway, so it’s okay. Please open your
door,” I turned away again from the door crack before he answered.
“Ever heard of fruit of the
poisonous tree?” he asked.
“Of course. I told you I’m a
licensed private investigator.” I sort of knew what he was talking about.
Regardless, it would take two minutes to look it up.
“I’m not so easily fooled. I
know what you really do to earn a living these days,” Sammy said.
“Um, yes. Because I just told
you,” I said, looking at the eye and lips in confusion.
“No. I’m talking about that
immoral tattoo parlor, an’ all. Now, you need to go on home.” The lips had
begun to take on their own personality.
“But, Sammy, I’m just trying to
find out who put a body in my car and set it on fire.”
The lips disappeared and the
door smacked shut.
As I turned to step down from
his porch, I heard the door creak and before I could look back, I heard Sammy’s
lips whisper, “Hussy.”
There was something about both men that made me wobbly-knee
weak.
“It’s not about the number of
friends. It’s about how guarded and afraid you’ve become.”
“I’m not afraid.”
“Yes, you are. You’re afraid of
looking soft, or weak. I guess weak is a better word. But mostly you’re afraid
to care about people.”
“I care, but caring doesn’t
change the way people behave. And, as you said, it’s not about the number.
Quality, not quantity, right?”
“Right. But there’s more to it.
You don’t engage people in conversation. You interrogate them. You want them to
answer all of your questions—they have to pass your test.”
“I don’t know any other way,” I
said.
“You can keep a relationship
casual and light for business purposes. You are a business owner now, you know.
In my line of work, I have to do it every day. It’s all in the mindset. Keep it
at surface level by engaging in easy going conversation and don’t invest
yourself every time you meet someone new.”
“If what you’re telling me is
some people are worth taking the time to get to know, then that means there are
people who aren’t worth getting to know. I just shorten the process. If a
person seems offended by my questions and has something to hide, then they
avoid me. So instead of finding out the hard way, I find out right away. I
haven’t wasted any of my time.”
“You can’t just force them to
tell you everything all at once,” Vince said.
“I just want enough to figure
out if they’re what they seem to be.”
“You didn’t behave that way when
we met way back when.”
“I know, but I thought you were
rich so it didn’t matter,” I said.
“I am rich.”
“Guess I know what I’m doing
then, don’t I?”
“So you’re just after my money?”
“That’s something you should’ve
asked yourself a long time ago, back before being with me became so addictive.”
“Uh-huh, Cassie, you think
you’ve just proven a point, don’t you?”
“Yep.”
“Well, you did. You’ve proven
mine,” he said.
“Do you know you have gorgeous
eyes? Then there’s your perfectly hairy chest. It’s yummy. Oh, and your feet.
Did anyone ever tell you, you have the feet of a twenty year old?”
“It’s an old trick, but feel
free to go on distracting me. That way you won’t have to tell me I’m right.
Anyway, I’m asking you to lighten up on Lane, okay?”
His request seemed so unfair I
could barely catch my breath. I felt surrounded by a gray cloud of failure. Had
we changed so much that we no longer understood each other?
“What is it you want from me
Vince? What do you want from life?” I asked.
“What do you mean? I want to
succeed. Retire early and live the good life. I thought we wanted the same
things. That's why we're a couple, right?” Vince said.
I did my best to hide my
disappointment, knowing I needed time to figure out its cause. “Right.”
Looking out the window the last
few minutes before reaching the restaurant, I thought about the meaning of
success. Perhaps that's where our problems began. We both wanted to succeed,
but hadn't really discussed our definition of success.
At the restaurant, we sat at our
usual table overlooking the beach during the time the movie-making industry
calls magic hour, which really doesn’t last an hour. Nothing beautiful lasts
forever and magic hour is no different. This is the time the sun sets, the
light is perfect, the sky is reddish pink, and for approximately thirty
minutes, everything looks amazing.
I decided to let go of the anger
I’d felt about Vince and his request regarding Lane. I didn’t want anything
between the evening and us.
We held hands across the table while
staring out at the waves and sky. The sun was huge and red and, for a brief bit
of time, I thought of the body in my car and the red paint splashed on the
window of The Big Prick. They were both things an enraged person would do, and
it felt very personal. Who would do that to me?
“Drinks anyone?” Amy, our usual
server, asked. She had dark spiky hair with pink edges and a diamond stud in
her right nostril. Nonetheless, her petite shape and perky attitude reminded me
of Audrey Hepburn in Roman Holiday.
“It’s so good to see a happy
couple,” she said.
I looked over at Vince and stuck
out my tongue. He crossed his eyes. Amy groaned and held up her hand in an
effort to stop us.
Vince gave his winning smile to
Amy and caused her to blush.
“Seriously, you two are a great
couple,” she said. “You wouldn’t believe the stuff we overhear. Sometimes the
whole restaurant gets to hear, like a few days ago when this ‘Barbie’ and ‘Ken’
look-alike couple got into it. They came in all happy, looking and behaving as
if their perfectly planned lives were just that. Perfect. And then we all got
to see they’re just like everyone else.”
Amy shook her head and waved her
hand in the air as if to rid herself of the memory. “Working here, I’ve figured
out the people who try to appear perfect have the bigger problems out of the
public eye.” She looked at Vince. “You know what I’m talking about, don’t you?”
She looked at Vince.
“Yes, I know what you mean.” He
crossed his arms over his chest and turned his head to look out the window.
For a guy who’d just lectured me
about engaging in light conversation and not investing emotions, his body
language was telling a different story. Although, I did appreciate how crossing
his arms like that highlighted his tanned muscular biceps.
“Anyway, my bet is you two—” She
pointed at Vince and me. “—will be hanging out ten years from now. I’ll be
right back with your drinks.”
Something about the Barbie and
Ken story had me thinking about Lane and her boyfriend Del. “Wait, Amy, I want
to ask you—”
“Cassie, come on now. Let’s have
a nice romantic dinner, okay?”
He used his smile on me. As much
as I should be able to ignore it after all this time, I couldn’t.
I crossed my fingers. “Just
wanted to know the dinner special, that’s all.”
“Oh, right.” He made a face at
me and turned to Amy who waited quietly. “Just the drinks for now.”
I let it go when I looked across
the room and noticed RJ sitting at a corner table, fiddling with his phone. He
saw me looking and nodded. I looked around for the camera person. When I didn’t
see him, I gave all my attention to Vince. I was determined to have an
unstressed evening.
We did have a nice romantic
dinner and the mood continued well into the night. To my relief the image of
Detective Winslow only flashed briefly during the midst of it all. There was something about both men that
made me wobbly-knee weak.
Sadly, history had proven, when
it came to maintaining relationships, I was not to be trusted.
Q/A with S.L. Ellis
How did you come up with the idea for this story? When we moved to Florida, we stayed for a time in a subdivision full
of retirees. The neighbor across the
way, however, was in her 30’s, blond, slim, and attractive. She just didn’t
fit, which got me thinking about why she would move to a neighborhood of older
people. Was she hiding from something or someone? And, well, you get the picture…
Where do you find your inspiration? I am inspired to
write when I read. The better the book, the more I’m inspired and eager to
write.
Is there anything you find particularly challenging in your
writing? I am easily distracted. Any shiny thing will get me
going into another direction and I have to dig deep to find the will power to
keep going and finish the story before beginning another.
What are your current projects? I am working on the next in the Cassie
Cruise, Private Investigator series, and I’m 30,000 words into a historical
(late 1880’s – early 1900’s) novel with a strong, female protagonist. She has
visions of gloom and doom and, as you might imagine, isn’t the most popular
person in the village when her visions come true.
Is there a message in your novel that you want readers to
grasp? Just
that people aren’t always what they seem to be.
They aren’t always what they present to the world.
Does music play any type of role in your writing? Music is an important part of my writing. I like to remind myself
how few words make up the lyrics to most of the songs that I love. They tell a
story and convey emotion in under 200 words. I strive to keep my writing tight
while still telling the story.
Are experiences based on someone you know, or events in your
life? Experiences
are things (conversations, emotions, adventures, work) you’ve participated in
and felt internally.
What books have influenced your life most? I loved and learned so much from a handful of biographies found in
school libraries, but beyond those, any book written by Catherine Cookson,
Victoria Holt, Phyllis Whitney, and Mary Stewart began my love of reading genre
fiction.
Are there any new authors that have grabbed your interest? It’s best to say “newly discovered authors” because my TBR pile/list
is huge and an author may have been published for years before I get around to
reading them. Authors who’ve recently
caught my interest and have become an obsession are Gillian Flynn, Elizabeth
Hand, Ariana Franklin, Gil Adamson, and William Gay.
Can you share a little of your current work with us?
Do you have anything specific that you want to say to your
readers? I
welcome all reviews. How else will I
learn and grow as a writer if I don’t listen to my readers? I say all, but there is the one I’m not
looking forward to reading. I recently
gave a memoir writer (who I’ll not name), an honest two star review and she
wrote a response comment blaming it on a “tussle” we had in a forum. I’m not looking forward to her “revenge”
review only because I won’t allow myself to respond to it. I have so many clever and snarky things to
say to her, but won’t give her any more of my time and attention.
How can readers discover more about you and your work? I have an author page on Facebook
(facebook.com/slelliscassiecruise) and my website is www.cassiecruise.com. The blog posts on the website are written in
Cassie Cruise’s voice, but I write the book reviews that you’ll see on that
site.
Do you have a special time to write? How is your day structured
writing-wise? I write wherever and whenever I get a chance. Sometimes it’s only a sentence or two, so my
progress on most projects is at a snail’s pace.
Why did you choose to write [genre] stories? Genre stories are
typically about characters and their actions, reactions, thoughts and
behaviors. That’s what interests me and
that’s what I write.
What is for you the perfect book hero? A flawed, tough-minded,
person who’ll always stand on their own, but isn’t afraid to show their loyalty
to their loved ones.
When you start a book, do you already have the whole story in
your head or is it built progressively? I’m not a
plotter. I have key points written, but
everything else occurs organically during the writing.
When and why did you begin
writing? In
1996, I began my attempts at writing as a way to understand everything I was
feeling when a family member was convicted of a very serious crime. The story was a failure as far as the
writing, but I did come to terms with my feelings regarding the conviction.
When did you first consider yourself a writer? I needed (and still need) validation, so I didn’t really believe in
my writing until I won a contest for a short story and it was published in an
anthology.
List three books you have recently read and would recommend.
1. Two Guys Detective Agency, Stephanie Bond
2. Burial
Rites, Hannah Kent
3. The Impossible Wish, Christine Nolfi
Tell us something that people would be surprised you know how to
do. Most people would be
surprised to know I was afraid of driving an automobile and avoided getting a
license for a long time, but purchased and taught myself to drive a motorcycle
in a matter of days.
Will you write more about these characters? Lane Changes is the first in the Cassie Cruise, Private Investigator
series. My hope is to write about Cassie, Janice, RJ, and Brick for a long
time.
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