Death by Sarcasm - By Dani Amore Page 0,1

still, despite his many faults, an overly developed sensitivity chief among them, Mary didn’t mind knowing someone like Jake. So good. So nice. So friggin’ cute.

“I’m not sure why you’re focusing on me, instead of my dead uncle lying over there in repose,” Mary said. “But since you’re questioning me, I ought to remind you that he was a comedian, Jake,” she said. “Believe me, if the roles were reversed, he’d be standing right here saying, “What’s the big deal? I’ve died hundreds of times at comedy clubs – but it was always on stage.” She pantomimed a rim shot. “Boom ch,” she said.

One of the crime scene technicians looked up from his notepad at Mary. She caught his gaze and held it until he looked back down. Jake pulled out a notepad and tried to hide the guilty look on his face.

“Come on,” she said to him. They walked to the end of the alley and Mary looked east, toward the ocean. She couldn’t see anything. Just a vast darkness. She turned and caught her reflection in the store window. Did she look like a woman who’d just identified the corpse of a family member? She studied herself, saw a lean woman with a strong face wearing an expression that was open to interpretation. Just the way Mary liked it.

Jake broke into her thoughts. “A waitress on her smoke break found him,” he said, still speaking softly. “She ran back in and…”

“Was he already dead?”

Jake hesitated, then said, “She thinks he may have been…twitching a little.”

Mary nodded. Her hands involuntarily formed themselves into fists. She forced them back open, willed them to relax.

“So she runs in, calls 911, then finds the manager and they go out together,” Jake continued. “By then, he’s definitely dead.”

“Had they seen him inside? Before?”

“We’re talking to everyone now,” he said. “A few people thought they saw him at the bar, having a drink. A couple others thought he might have done a couple minutes on stage. But, initially, no one knows if he left with someone or by himself.”

“Who was on stage when he was there? Who was performing?”

Jake looked at her, his face blank. “Umm...I’ll have someone check on that.”

“Might be worth looking into,” Mary said. “Maybe he came specifically for the show. He’d been around comedy clubs for a long time. Maybe he knew the headliner-”

“Oh, shit,” Jake said, his breath going out of him with a rush. The pen froze above his notepad. He was looking directly behind Mary, over her shoulder.

“I’m sorry to hear about your loss,” a voice said. Mary felt the chill of recognition and her stomach turned sour. She turned and came face to face with Jacob Cornell’s superior. Mary should have known the woman would show up. She felt herself reeling.

“Sergeant Davies,” Mary said, her voice calmer and more in control than she would have thought possible. “I almost didn’t recognize you with your clothes on.”

Arianna Davies was tall, thin and pale. Her black hair was cut short. Mary knew that her nickname around the squadroom was The Shark. Davies had a well-earned reputation as an apex predator. Now, Mary’s comment hadn’t even caused her to dilate a pupil. Mary noticed, however, that Detective Cornell looked like he wished he could liquefy himself and slide down the storm drain. It was the exact same expression he’d had on when Mary let herself into his apartment only to find The Shark literally eating him alive.

“Ah, I see the that at least the Cooper wit still lives on,” Davies said.

Mary felt a spark of anger flash inside her, but she held her face still.

“And speaking of unwanted interruptions,” the Shark said to Jake. “I assume you were interviewing Ms. Cooper.” The way Davies raised her voice at the end made the statement both a question and an indictment.

“Actually, we were just finishing up-” Jake said.

“Good.” Davies turned to Mary and spoke in a flat monotone. “You have our deepest sympathies. We will keep you up to date with the progress of the investigation. You will not do any investigating of your own. If you are observed anywhere near this case, you will be arrested and your private investigator’s license revoked. Is that understood?”

Mary seemed to absorb Davies’ speech with thoughtful concentration. Then she turned to Jake and gestured with her thumb back toward Davies.

“I thought these new robots were equipped with better voice modulators,” she said.

Mary wound up at a dive bar on Ocean Boulevard that had been