“Come with me as a friend. It will disarm her."
Hollis didn't say no immediately, which was surprising.
While I waited for him to come to his Hollis senses and say no, I pulled my phone out of my pocket.
I needed to text the server, Patrick, back. I couldn’t just leave a good-looking server on read because I was inserting myself into a murder investigation.
Hey, sorry this is so late, been meaning to write back since the gala. Thanks for the heads up.
He answered right away.
No worries. You doing okay?
I'm okay. Can I ask you something about Friday night?
Sure. What's up?
I chewed my lip, glanced at Hollis, who was eating but also watching me. Why did I feel guilty texting a guy? Hollis and I weren’t a thing and neither were me and Patrick. I was just being polite.
While simultaneously pumping him for information.
Did you see or hear anything weird before Evelyn collapsed? Anyone arguing, anything off?
Three dots appeared. Disappeared. Appeared again, which meant he was drafting and redrafting, which meant whatever was coming had some weight to it.
Or he was going to tell me he wasn’t into talking murder.
Actually yeah. I was resetting the bar cart maybe twenty minutes before the toast and Mrs. Carrington and some woman were right on the other side of it. The woman said something like you can't keep doing this to me and Mrs. C said something about the arrangement and how she had known the terms. I wasn't trying to eavesdrop, but it was tense. Mrs. C walked off first. The other chick looked like she'd been crying.
I wasn’t a fan of guys referring to women as “chicks” but that was a footnote to worry about later if we kept texting.
What did the crier look like?
Idk. Brunette. Our age.
I had to assume that was Hyacinth.
I read it twice. Then I turned the phone around and held it up for Hollis, who leaned in and read it.
"Who is Patrick?”
“Server from the gala.”
“Why does he have your number?”
My eyebrows shot up. “That’s what you got out of this? Not that Hyacinth and Evelyn argued?”
“We don’t know that it was Hyacinth.”
"Arrangement. That's basically a receipt."
"It’s a server who saw two women fighting about money twenty minutes before one of them died," Hollis said. "It's not a confession. It's not proof anybody brought a weapon. But it's not nothing.”
“Thank you.”
“Screenshot that and send it to me. And share your new boyfriend’s contact info with me so I can let the detectives know.”
New boyfriend? Was Hollis jealous?
