Death of a Bachelorette Read online

  This from a guy who thought Ethel was the pretty one.

  “Yes, indeedie, you are one groovy chick.”

  Groovy chick? Who taught him how to speak English? Austin Powers?

  “So how about it? Will you marry me and become Queen Number Twelve of Paratito?”

  “It’s awfully tempting,” I said, at my diplomatic best, “but I’m afraid not.”

  “Why not?” His belly shook in indignation. “I’ll be a wonderful husband. I’ll feed you good, give you all the coconuts you can eat, and you get to sleep with me every twelve days!”

  “Once again, it’s mighty tempting, but I think I’ll pass.”

  “I understand,” he nodded. “My fault. I’m rushing you. Get to know me, and you will love me. Just wait till we spend some time together. Come. Let me give you a tour of the palace living room.”

  He began leading me around the room, which was curtained off on one end from the room behind it.

  Along with the recliner, there were about a dozen bean bag pillows (seating, I assumed, for his eleven wives) and an étagère full of what my mom likes to call “junque.”

  “You’ve already seen the television. Isn’t it magnificent?”

  Maybe, back in 1979 when it was no doubt originally built.

  “We get all the best shows here on Paratito Island: Hawaii Five-O. Gilligan’s Island. Laugh In. The Golden Girls. And my favorite, The Dean Martin Variety Hour. Love Deano and his buddy Frank. Such cool cats.”

  So that’s where he learned his “groovy” English. From Deano and the rat pack.

  “And look,” he said, pointing proudly to a bunch of knickknacks on a shelf. “The royal collectibles: my dancing Santa, my Veg-O-Matic, my Elvis bobblehead. And my proudest possession—an autographed photo of the Golden Girls. Groovy, no?”

  “A regular treasure trove.”

  “Right on!” he agreed, gracing me with a toothless grin.

  “And now, on to dinner!”

  With that, he pushed open the curtain at the far end of the living room, revealing a dining room with a long wooden table and picnic-like benches. The only actual chair was at the head of the table, a comfy padded affair that I bet my bottom Pop-Tart was reserved for King Konga.

  Seated on both sides of the table were eleven native women, ranging in age from the mid-twenties to one rather large woman about Konga’s age.

  Not one of them looked the least bit happy to see me.

  Indeed, a skilled doctor could have performed Lasik surgery with the dagger glares they were shooting me.

  Konga introduced me to them one by one. To my amazement, he did not refer to them by name, but rather by number. Only did his Number One Wife, the large sixtysomething gal, seem to have a name.

  “And finally,” Konga said, when he got to her (he’d worked his way up from Wife Number Eleven), “I’d like you to meet my Number One Wife, Suma.”

  A boulder-like woman, with cowhide skin and angry slits for eyes, Suma grunted a grudging hello.

  As I’d suspected, Konga took the comfy chair at the head of the table, leaving the hard benches for his beloved wives.

  I was seated at his right, across from Suma.

  At the last minute, Tai and Leilani ambled in to join us, all happy and giggling.

  I felt like strangling them with the WHATEVER HAPPENS IN PARATITO STAYS IN PARATITO scarf draped over Konga’s vinyl recliner.

  Once we were all settled, Konga struck a large gong at his side, and several of the wives scurried to the kitchen and started bringing out food. Apparently, when you married Konga you not only got to be queen of Paratito, you also got to be a part-time waitress.

  If truth be told, though, I was looking forward to the dinner. It had to be better than Manny’s airline food. At least it would be fresh.

  Oh, it was fresh all right.

  Fresh snake fricassee. Fresh octopus glands. And something else fresh from the sea whose glassy eye stared up at me dolefully throughout the meal.

  As I was about to discover, the Paratito Islanders had a penchant for delicacies most Americans dissect in biology class.

  While I industriously shoved food around on my plate, avoiding the death-ray glares from the other wives, Konga kept telling me what a “groovy chick” I was and urging me to eat more. He liked his wives with a little meat on their bones.

  “Don’t forget to eat the eyeball!” he said, eyeing the uneaten fish on my plate. “It’s the best part.”

  Oh, glug.

  Throughout the meal, he regaled me with tales of his favorite hobbies—harpoon fishing, crocodile hunting, flossing his six teeth, and grooming his pet pig, Ava Gardner.

  Finally, our dishes were cleared away—Wife Number Seven happily munching on my fish eyeball as she took my plate—and it was time for dessert.

  Suma stood up to make an announcement:

  “Tonight, in honor of our special guest,” she said, shooting me a filthy look, “we eat monkey chunks for dessert.”

  Omigod. Monkey? This was simply too much.

  I was seriously considering getting up and bolting from the table when one of the wives set down a bowl of ice cream in front of me. And not just any ice cream. Chunky Monkey!

  “Omigosh!” I cried, in my first and only moment of unalloyed joy. “Chunky Monkey. It’s my favorite!”

  “Mine, too,” Konga assured me, love light shining in his eyes. “I have it flown in from Tahiti along with Manny’s pastrami whenever Manny is on the island.

  “See?” he said, with a most unsettling wink. “We have something in common!”

  Actually, he had a point. I had yet to find a man who liked Chunky Monkey quite as much as I did.

  I took another look at him, slurping his ice cream, his three hairs plastered across his scalp, and thought maybe he wasn’t so bad after all. But I quickly came to my senses when he put his hammy hand on my wrist and suggested we go on a moonlight walk together.

  Minutes later we were outside strolling around the dusty fire pit.

  Konga tried to hold my hand, but I quickly yanked it away.

  “Sorry,” I said. “Can’t hold hands. Bad case of eczema. Extremely contagious.”

  “I hope you will change your mind about marrying me,” Konga said, kicking a dead iguana out of our path. “I will make all your dreams come true. I will even let you have an upper bunk in the wives’ dormitory.”

  “How very enticing.” I managed a weak smile.

  “I know what you’re thinking. That our ages are not compatible. That one of us belongs with a much younger partner. But don’t worry, Jaine. For you, I’m prepared to make an exception and marry someone older than twenty-five.”

  I was too old for him?

  Now he was smiling at me, his six teeth glistening in the moonlight, and holy mackerel, he was zeroing in for a kiss!

  No way could this happen.

  “It’s been swell,” I said, breaking away, “but I’ve got to run. Early day tomorrow. Thanks so much for the snake fricassee.”

  With that I sprinted back to the “palace,” Konga huffing in my wake.

  “I like a gal who plays hard to get!” he called out from behind.

  Tai was waiting for us out on the verandah.

  “Take me home,” I snapped.

  “Now? Don’t you want to meet Ava Gardner?”

  “No, I don’t want to meet your father’s pig. Just take me home.”

  “Okay,” he shrugged.

  I scurried back to the Jeep faster than a speeding gecko and practically dived into the car when I got there.

  Tai got in next to me and started the engine.

  The last thing I heard as we drove away was Konga calling out:

  “Ava Gardner, my princess, come give Daddy a kiss!”

  * * *

  The ride back to the mansion was rife with icy silence. On my part, anyway. Tai seemed unaware of the chill in the air.

  “That went great,” he said. “I think Pop really likes you!”
<
br />   “You never told me you wanted to fix me up with your father.”

  “Didn’t I?” He didn’t even have the grace to look embarrassed. “Gee, I thought I had. But it sure went great. Pop said if I found him another wife, he’d buy me a new sound system for the Jeep.”

  “How lucky for you.”

  “Isn’t it?” he said, oblivious to the sarcasm oozing from my every pore.

  At last we arrived back at the mansion.

  By now the gardenia in my hair was as wilted as my dreams of royal glory.

  Without a word, I opened the passenger door and hopped off, not even caring if my tush looked big.

  “See you soon, Mom,” Tai called after me with a moronic grin.

  Oh, man. If only I had Konga’s Dancing Santa with me. I knew exactly where I’d like to shove it.

  Chapter 11

  Stomping up to the mansion, I read myself the riot act. How could I have been such an idiot, thinking Tai wanted to marry me when we hadn’t even gone out on a first date? It had to be a case of temporary insanity, brought on by extreme heat, humidity, and pizza deprivation.

  Oh, well. At least my dinner from hell was over. I’d never have to go back to that stupid tribal village ever again.

  I was just about to let myself into the mansion when I heard voices coming from the side of the house.

  One of them was raised in anger. Snoop that I am, I couldn’t resist a bit of eavesdropping. So I tiptoed over and peeked around the corner of the house, where I saw Kirk and Hope standing near some hibiscus bushes.

  Kirk raked his fingers through his hair, distraught.

  “I can’t believe you’re dumping me for that British dope! I was the one who got you a part on the show in the first place. You promised me you had no intention of going after Spencer, that you only signed on to the project to be near me while we were shooting.”

  If he expected any contrition, he was in for a disappointment.

  Hope, a porcelain doll in a white eyelet sundress, barely blinked an eye.

  “You should know me by now, Kirk,” she said. “We’ve been dating for two years. I’m nothing if not practical. We’ve had some good times together, but you can’t expect me to pass up British royalty. With Spencer’s name, and my smarts, we’ll be unstoppable.”

  She smiled at the thought of her future as a British royal.

  “But how can you be so sure Spencer will choose you over Dallas?”

  “I just know he will,” Hope replied, her pointy chin thrust out with confidence.

  Frankly, I thought she was being a tad delusional, but there wasn’t an iota of doubt in her voice.

  “You mustn’t be a poor sport, Kirk. If you were in my shoes, you’d do the same thing.”

  “No, I wouldn’t,” Kirk said, blinking back what looked like tears. “I love you.”

  “Oh, sweetheart.” Hope shook her head sadly. “That’s where you made your big mistake.”

  Wow. Talk about cold. Why did I get the feeling that Freon ran in her veins?

  And with the precision of a military drill sergeant, she turned abruptly toward the mansion.

  Oops. My cue to skedaddle.

  I raced into the house, taking the stairs two at a time.

  When I finally made it up to the top floor, I groaned to see Prozac perched on the landing.

  She glared at me with an impatient thump of her tail.

  What took you so long? You haven’t scratched my belly in over an hour!

  What with all the hooha of my almost becoming King Konga’s Wife Number Twelve, I’d forgotten about my feline Houdini.

  Once again, she’d escaped from Sauna Central!

  I really had to put a stop to it. But until I figured out how she was making her daring escapes, I did the only sensible thing possible:

  I let myself into my room, lay naked on my bed, and polished off the Dove Bar I’d nabbed from Manny’s mini-fridge on a tiny detour I’d taken on my way up the stairs.

  Chapter 12

  As it turned out, I stumbled onto Prozac’s escape route the very next morning.

  I was standing at my bathroom sink, washing a snake fricassee stain from my capris, when I happened to glance over at my tiny bathroom window. And suddenly it occurred to me: I’d secured the window in the bedroom but had forgotten all about the one in the bathroom. What if Prozac had been using it to stage her Great Escapes?

  I peered closely at the screen. Was that a rip along the bottom? Running my finger along the base of the screen, I realized that indeed it was. What’s more, when I looked out the window, I saw a narrow ledge running under the window to the room next door.

  Wasting no time, I dashed out of Sauna Central and burst into the room next to mine. As far as I knew, no one was using it. And I was right. When I opened the door, I saw no furniture except for a stripped bed. Racing into the room’s en suite bathroom, I checked the bathroom window and discovered it was wide open—with no screen!

  So that’s how Prozac had been escaping! From my bathroom window, across the ledge, and in through this window.

  I shuddered to think of my precious princess risking her life navigating that narrow ledge.

  Immediately, I locked the window and returned to my room, where I did the same in my own bathroom.

  Then I marched out to the bedroom where Prozac was sprawled out on the bed.

  “I’m on to you, Pro,” I said with an authoritative wag of my finger. “I’ve figured out how you’ve been breaking loose. No more roaming around the mansion getting into trouble, young lady. You have been outwitted by my superior brainpower once and for all!”

  And I’m sure she would have felt the sharp sting of my words if she hadn’t been so busy snoring at the time.

  * * *

  Flush from my bathroom window victory, I joined Polly for breakfast on the patio, both of us feasting on rubberized eggs and granite muffins.

  Meanwhile, down at the other end of the table, Manny was scarfing down what looked like a fabulous fluffy omelet and a giant bagel smeared with cream cheese.

  How very aggravating. I only hope he choked on his cream cheese.

  Sitting next to Manny were Hope and Spencer, Spencer having a go at a muffin, while Hope sipped at some orange juice.

  Justin, our disgruntled director, was at the “B” table with his crew—as far away from Manny as possible—yakking into his cell phone, presumably trashing Manny to everyone on his contact list.

  “So,” Polly said, hacking at her eggs, “how was your date with Tai?”

  I started to tell her about my date from hell, but I soon saw her eyes wander over to the buffet table, where Kirk had shown up, looking like death warmed over. Unwashed and unshaven, a thick layer of stubble on his face, his hands trembled as he poured himself some coffee.

  “Poor Kirk!” Polly said. “He looks terrible.”

  Not for the first time, I noticed a moony, lovestruck look in her eyes.

  “Did you know that he and Hope were an item?” I asked.

  “No!” she said, gulping back her disappointment. “I had no idea.”

  “Apparently they’ve been dating for two years, and last night I overheard her dump him for Spencer.”

  Polly tsked in pity. “Men are such idiots, aren’t they?”

  She wasn’t going to get an argument from me on that one.

  “Imagine a sweet guy like Kirk falling for an opportunistic twit like Hope. Oh, well. He’s better off without her.”

  “He sure doesn’t seem to think so,” I said as Kirk staggered over to the pool and collapsed onto one of the chaises.

  Down at the end of the table, Manny glared at Kirk in disgust.

  “I swear,” he said, “that’s the last time I hire that alkie on one of my shows.”

  To which I heard Justin mutter, “Lucky Kirk.”

  But Kirk was upstaged just then when Brianna came sauntering onto the patio in micro-mini hot pants and an X-rated halter top.

  All eyes followed her
as she sashayed past Spencer on her way to the buffet table.

  “See what you’re missing?” she said, with a wink, wagging her tush.

  Spencer blushed a deep crimson, while at his side Hope sat gritting her teeth.

  Brianna grabbed a petrified Danish and headed over to the pool, the guys in the crew gawking at her every step of the way.

  When breakfast was over, the crew started setting up for the first shoot of the day, a scene in the pool where Hope and Dallas would discuss Brianna’s departure from the show.

  Thank goodness, I didn’t have to write dialogue for Spencer for that one.

  Polly and I lingered over the sludge posing as our coffee, while down at the other end of the table Manny lit up one of his fifty-dollar cigars.

  For fifty bucks, you’d think they could invent a cigar that didn’t smell like the inside of an outhouse.

  I was in the middle of telling Polly about King Konga’s snake fricassee, when suddenly all hell broke loose.

  Like a perfumed tornado, Dallas came stomping out of the mansion, making a beeline for Spencer.

  “Look what I just found in Manny’s office,” she cried, eyes blazing, flushed with anger. She waved a piece of paper in Spencer’s face. “A breakdown of the scenes for the rest of the show.

  “What’s this supposed to mean?” she asked Spencer. “Spencer’s Proposal to Hope”?

  Spencer squirmed in his seat and began stammering. But before he could fumpher a reply, Manny whipped the paper from Dallas’s hand.

  “What the hell were you doing in my office?”

  “Looking for something decent to eat. You keep all the good food for yourself in your mini-fridge, you selfish bastard.”

  Then, whirling back to Spencer, she continued, “You’re not really going to ask Hope to marry you, are you?”

  And with that gift of gab he was so famous for, Spencer stammered:

  “Well, um, er . . . that is to say, uh, yes.”

  “But how could you? You promised you’d marry me!”

  A royal deer caught in the headlights, Spencer mumbled something about how he’d thought it over and decided he really liked Hope best, after all.