Her Billionaire's Murder Mystery - Stephanie Fowers Page 0,25
she left for the restaurant on the same floor, lecturing herself on self-control. Aaron wasn’t a free man, and she wasn’t the kind of girl to break up anyone’s relationship, no matter how blue his eyes were. She headed down the old creaking hallway and entered the restaurant. Her heart dropped when she saw Darcy lounging against the bar. She tried to sneak past, but the horrible woman twisted around and lifted her pointed chin. “Oh? You’re not planning on being Aaron’s shadow tonight?”
“Only if it’s make believe,” Charlize kept walking. “Other than that, I’m not interested.”
“He doesn’t fall in love,” Darcy purred in her softest voice. “I just thought you should know. That doesn’t stop him from playing around, of course. So if you’re here to have a good time, then by all means. But don’t delude yourself into thinking that you’re going to live happily ever after in his mansion at his Mountain Cove retreat. Understand, Sweetie?”
Did she really just say that? Charly stopped short at the balcony door. Rage coursed through her veins as this horrid woman assigned the worst possible motivations to her. Yes, Charly wanted nothing more than to find love, but she refused to go after a guy who was taken, and she didn’t want his fortune either. Turning, Charly clapped. “Bravo. I assume these are your lines, because no one could possibly be as rude as you are in real life.”
Darcy glared. “Fine. Ignore my advice. Just don’t expect your flirtations to get that far.”
“My flirtations?” Charlize asked. Now Darcy was sounding like a jealous ex. Aaron must’ve dropped her on her head for Veronica. “Get this through your skull—I am not interested in Aaron Mills.”
Veronica snorted as she came up behind them, her knee slipping through the slit of her dress as she edged up to the bar next to Darcy. “Are we seriously talking about this?”
Ugh. She’d overheard? Charlize tried to throw Veronica an apologetic glance, but it was imperiously ignored. Veronica sighed, looking put upon. “What are we all doing here? Please tell me that all the women in the cast aren’t supposed to meet in one place to show we have girl power or something.”
Veronica didn’t seem bothered that she’d caught them talking about her boyfriend. Charly’s hands tightened over her paper. “I’m supposed to go outside.”
Veronica brushed her off with a flippant toss of her hand. “Then go. Whatever disagreement you and Darcy have, take care of it on your own time. I don’t care if one of you has a thing for Aaron and the other one denies it, but I swear if either of you ruin this Murder Mystery for Mikey, I’ll take it out on all of you.” She seemed more protective of Mikey than her boyfriend. Veronica didn’t have something going on with Mikey, too, did she? It was hard to miss the tender looks between the two of them earlier.
Darcy pointed her pert nose up in the air. “Watch what you say to me. I’m doing this whole Murder Mystery as a favor to Aaron.”
“Sure you are,” Veronica muttered.
Darcy pursed her full lips angrily, but stayed quiet. Charly, on the other hand, was humiliated. “Don’t worry,” Charly said. “You won’t have any trouble from me.” She ducked outside to the balcony. The cool night air embraced her in a welcome breeze. She ran her hands down the sudden goosebumps over her bare arms. Her eyes focused on a silent silhouette at the table. She prayed it wasn’t Aaron and that he hadn’t overhead the conversation in the pub.
“I guesss that makes thiss our sscene.”
She recognized the low, slurred voice coming from Dominic, and her heart sank even further. The cast was all getting paired off for the game for some reason, even if there were no cameras. She tried to play along. “So what are we supposed to do now?”
“Practiss liness? Gotta be sssomething in sscript between politician and—and pretty girlss.”
Usually, Charlize would laugh at this back and forth, but Dominic had had too much to drink and there was something off about him that screamed ‘snake.’ His fingers slid over an envelope on the table and he ripped it clumsily, pulling out a sheet of paper.
“Is that a clue?” she asked.
He treated her to a long mocking glare before he read through it. “You and Charlizz,” he stumbled over her name, “are consspiratorss.”
“In what?” she asked. “Murder or something else?”
He held the sheet of paper out to her, turning it menacingly through