Dead by Midnight - Beverly Barton [41]
“Behave yourself,” Shontee scolded him.
“Aren’t you going to wear a veil?” he asked.
“I don’t want a veil,” she said. “I want to wear a tiara. Diamonds and pearls. Something glittery and classy at the same time.”
“Diamonds and pearls! Woman, do you think I’m made of money?” he teased.
“We have some lovely rhinestone and freshwater pearl tiaras,” the saleslady informed them.
Tony chuckled as he walked across the room and held open his arms. Shontee didn’t hesitate to sail off the podium and straight into his arms. He caught her around the waist, his big hands clasping her securely, and then set her on her feet. After he kissed her soundly, he glanced at the saleslady, a wide, toothy smile spreading from ear to ear.
“If my fiancée wants diamonds and pearls, that’s what she’ll get. The genuine articles. No fake stuff for her.”
“Yes, sir. Of course, Mr. Johnson.”
Everybody knew who Anthony Trice Johnson was and showed him the proper respect, always calling him Mr. Johnson. Tony was a fucking multimillionaire, that’s who he was. A guy who had grown up in the projects and made something of himself. He owned a string of nightclubs in six major cities: Atlanta, Nashville, Memphis, Louisville, Birmingham, and Tallahassee. And little Shontee Rachelle Thomas from Greenville, South Carolina, a bastard child born to a fourteen-year-old girl who had been raped by her own cousin, was going to be Mrs. Somebody Important.
It doesn’t matter where you came from or who your mama was or how you got born. All that matters is who you are now. Tony Johnson’s fiancée, soon to be his wife and the mother of his children.
Shontee’s hand instinctively went to her belly at the thought of one day giving Tony a son. Thank God, those two abortions she’d had more than ten years ago and that bout with gonorrhea hadn’t screwed up anything inside her. She’d talked to her doctor right after Tony proposed, just to make sure her body was functioning like it should, that there was no reason why she couldn’t get pregnant.
Thank you, Sweet Jesus, thank you. I might not deserve so much happiness, but I sure do thank you for it.
Lorie knew the moment Maleah walked into Treasures that something was wrong. She wasn’t due to relieve Derek for another hour.
Doing her best to concentrate on ringing up Mrs. Hightower’s order, Lorie tried to dismiss the thought that there might have been another murder. “Will there be anything else? You know we’ve marked all our Easter items twenty percent off this weekend.”
“Nothing else today. But I’ll be back next weekend when you mark the Easter stuff down a little more.”
Lorie forced a smile. Eloise Hightower was one of her best customers, a lady who loved to decorate and to collect. Lowering her voice to a whisper, Lorie leaned toward Mrs. Hightower and said, “Next weekend, we’ll mark down to twenty-five percent off, but that’s as low as it will go until after Easter, then we’ll have a fifty-percent-off sale.”
Eloise grinned as if she’d just been awarded a prize. She whispered, “I won’t tell a soul.”
Lorie hurriedly wrapped the breakable items and placed them carefully in three separate small plastic sacks before putting all of Eloise’s purchases in a large heavyweight paper bag with handles.
Glancing across the room, she watched while Maleah approached Derek, who had been sitting at an antique writing desk working crossword puzzles in a puzzle book he’d brought with him. Lorie’s heartbeat accelerated.
It’s bad news. I know it is.
After handing the bag to Eloise and thanking her for her business, Lorie slipped from behind the counter. The chime over the front door jangled as Eloise left, and less than a minute later, it jangled again, alerting her that a new customer had just entered the store. Pausing for a second, she glanced toward the entrance. Mike Birkett, wearing jeans, sneakers, and a seen-better-days Roll Tide sweatshirt, looked right at her.
Butterflies danced in her stomach.
Would the day ever come when she could look at him and not want him?
Mike had always been good-looking.