Sunday, May 23, 2021
Sunday's Short Stack: The Case of the Boy in Blue by Amanda Meuwissen
Leonard Quill, private investigator, never expected a case to walk through his door quite like this one, complete with murder, a frame job, blackmail, and powerful players, especially coming from a man with bright blue eyes behind his glasses, a crooked bow tie, and an impossible smile.
The Case of the Boy in Blue is a wonderfully told film noir setting, has a very 40s feel though I don't recall reading an actual date. Okay, so there's no femme fatale that most feel is necessary for actual noir but I never felt it had to have that character for the genre. Leonard and Westley play off each other in a spectacular fashion that is perfect for the setting and mystery. Combine their connection with the world building and you have a read that borders on remarkable for a short story.
I've never read Amanda Meuwissen before but this won't be the last, I look forward to checking out her backlist and any future stories. If you are like me and Amanda Meuwissen is a new-to-you author, The Case of the Boy in Blue is a perfect piece to introduce yourself, the balance of mystery, humor, attraction, and world building(the "remarkable" element I mentioned above) creates a memorable, fun, entertaining gem.
RATING:
Chapter 1
“Whadda ya mean, there’s already somebody waiting? It’s seven in the morning.”
“Been waiting since six, apparently.” Roxanne shrugs. She wears a little smirk that tells me I have a surprise waiting on the other side of that door that she finds extremely amusing.
Never a good sign.
Seven in the morning is early for most anyone in this town—save maybe me. And Roxanne. Been opening my door by seven sharp since I started this place two years ago, but Roxanne always manages to clock in first. Mark of a good bodyguard, I guess.
Oh, she looks like a dream, like some hot little number secretary too good for a dive like this—an old office building renting out to a dentist down one hall and an ambulance chasing lawyer down the other—but anyone who thinks Roxanne Shaeffer is a common dame is in for a rude awakening.
She just plays the part of secretary, makes people think I have to fend for myself, but I’m not dumb. Anyone working cases on the sly from the crooked cops in this town is bound to grab the attention of the families—and not the ‘home for dinner and have a cocktail’ sort of families. I need protection; Roxanne is it.
Spent five years overseas killing for a cause she doesn’t like to talk about, but she’s willing to kill if she has to in order to protect me for the right fee. She also answers the phones and puts most of the young women and old folks who come to my door at ease with her soft smile and pretty blond hair. It works.
She’s also loyal and a good friend, which means I know there isn’t some hitman with a grudge on the other side of that door, but her smirk could mean far more dangerous things.
“What is it this time?” I ask, ready to pluck the hat from my head but thinking better of it and simply taking off my coat to hang next to Roxanne’s white fur. She always does look good in white. In everything really, like a rose with poisonous thorns.
“Don’t know the case yet, but you’ll like the client. Just your type.” She grins like a shark with an unknowing meal in front of its teeth. Her dress is cinched at the waist today, cap sleeves, low cut, her hair curled perfectly around her face like a Hollywood starlet.
Sometimes my type is what I’m looking at right there in the twist of her red lips, but it isn’t in the cards for us. Besides, she has a lady friend whose company she prefers to any man who tries calling her ‘doll’, just as sultry as she is and twice as deadly. No one sane would ever get in the middle of that.
Unless they are very lucky.
But Roxanne doesn’t mean some knockout is in my office, not this time. “I’ll take your word for it,” I say and eye my door in suspicion before I reach for the knob.
My suit is gray today, vest included, red and silver tie, white shirt, but the hat is black, wrapped in red to match the tie, though a darker contrast. Some would say too dark, with my black trench instead of something tan, like the fashion calls for, but I prefer to blend into the shadows when I can.
The second I walk through the door to my office, I know this ‘client’ is worlds away from me, because he is all light.
“Mr. Quill?” A kid not much older than twenty-five turns around from being seated in the chair facing my desk. He stands with a clumsy scramble, pushing the rounded, gold-framed glasses he wears up the bridge of his nose and smiling in relief to see me.
That smile. It’s dimpled and crinkles his eyes—bright blue—in the most endearing way.
His bowtie is also blue with white polka dots, white crisp shirt, checkered sweater vest, with a uniquely shaped tweed jacket sporting larger, checkered lines like this kid is bisected every which way—and that seems to be the truth when I see the pain pushing through his smile.
He reaches for my hand before I’ve finished entering, before I can remove my hat like I should have outside. I accept it. His hand is warm, and I’d swear a shock shoots up my arm.
“Mr.…?”
“Valentine. Westley Valentine.” He smiles a little wider, shaking my hand with both of his, eager and a little too firm. Then he lets go and rubs both hands together like he’s itching to move, or maybe had a few too many cups of coffee. He didn’t get any here, that’s for sure. Roxanne doesn’t do coffee. Says I make it better. Maybe she’s right. I could certainly use some now.
Westley Valentine. Ginger-haired. Too young. Too wide-eyed. Too hunched and trying to make himself small, maybe because he feels small, but I know he’d be as tall as me if he stood up straight. This bundle of nerves and energy has his full attention on me.
I glance at his hands, which is easy enough since he won’t stop playing with them. No wedding band. How young is he, I wonder? How has this kid survived in a city like ours? Place is vicious, part of why I love it. But a kid like him should have been eaten alive years ago. Yet somehow I can tell he’s local.
“I need your help,” he says, because of course he does, that’s how this worked, and yet, he might as well have said, “I need you,” with the way his chest heaves and he stares at me like I’m his last possible savior.
Finally, I pluck the hat from my short black hair while crossing the room and toss it onto my desk. Young Mr. Valentine follows my movements with more precision than I would have given him credit for—a calculating, analytical mind, like mine. Interesting.
He also flushes bright scarlet when he gets a better look at my face that had been hidden beneath the hat and our eyes meet.
This kid was going to be trouble, I just knew it. “Have a seat, Mr. Valentine. What can I do for you?”
Amanda Meuwissen is a bisexual and happily married geek. Primarily an M/M romance author with a focus on urban fantasy, she has a Bachelor of Arts in a personally designed Creative Writing major from St. Olaf College and is an avid consumer of fiction through film, prose, and video games. Amanda lives in Minneapolis, MN, with her husband, John, and their cat, Helga.
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