Maintenance Is Murder Read online

  Maintenance is Murder

  A Damaged Goods Mystery

  Jennifer L. Hart

  Elements Unleashed

  Copyright © 2020 by Elements Unleashed

  Cover image purchased from dreamstime.com

  Jackie Parker image created by Gina Poff and Starry Cosmos Production

  Cover design by Elements Unleashed

  All rights reserved.

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return it and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author. To obtain permission to excerpt portions of the text, please contact the author at [email protected].

  All characters in this book are fiction and figments of the author’s imagination. All rights reserved.

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Created with Vellum

  Contents

  Maintenance is Murder

  Praise for Jackie Parker

  Foreword

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  It’s not my words that count. It’s yours!

  Also by Jennifer L. Hart

  About the Author

  Maintenance is Murder

  A Damaged Goods Mystery

  Maintenance is Murder

  A Damaged Goods Mystery

  Hart, Jennifer L./ Maintenance is Murder

  1.Mystery—Fiction. 2. Women Sleuths—Fiction 3.Property Management—Fiction 4. Miami—Fiction 5.Contemporary Romance—Fiction 6.BBW—Fiction 7.Alpha Male—Fiction 8.Eviction Specialists—Fiction 9. Murder Mystery—Fiction 10. Mystery Romance—Fiction Title.

  Miami’s hottest property management team is back in action in an all-new mystery!

  Certified Process Server Jackie Parker’s life is finally on the right track. Her cozy little bungalow is finished, her business is booming, and her relationship with the Dark Prince is better than she ever could have imagined. So what if she’s still living with her ex and her mother who wants them to buy matching tiny homes? Who cares if Logan is sharing his house with a woman on the run from her abusive husband? No big deal if an onsite manager is stealing rent or tenants are turning tricks on her client’s property. It’s nothing Jackie and the guys haven’t dealt with before.

  Until Logan is arrested for murder.

  Jackie’s all set to do what she does best and find the real killer. But Logan insists she should stay out of the mix and let the professionals handle it. Sure, Logan wouldn’t be the Dark Prince if he didn’t have some shady dealings. But Jackie knows Logan. He’s a tough guy who will do anything to protect the people he loves. He isn’t truly capable of cold-blooded murder.

  Is he?

  Praise for Jackie Parker

  and the Damaged Goods Mysteries:

  "….difficult to put down."

  ~ Kirkus

  "Jennifer L. Hart brings a whole new meaning to family togetherness...."

  ~ Night Owl Reviews

  "...a very likable, sympathetic, savvy and smart heroine."

  ~ Gemma Halliday, New York Times Bestselling Author

  “An addictive mystery that will have you laughing out loud.” ~A. Brantley

  “…a modern mystery with a touch of romance.”

  ~ 2 Indie Girls Book Reviews

  Foreword

  A note to my fabulous readers:

  So much has changed since I wrote Final Notice. I’m a different person than I was in 2014. The world is different. We’re all older, wiser and less tolerant of bullshit. (I like to get the cussing out of the way right upfront so that you know what’s coming.) Social distance has chased social media into our lives and forced us all to slow down, take a look around and readjust our course.

  I started this book well in advance of the Coronavirus pandemic and finished it while my husband was locked in at the Charter data center to keep the internet running here on the East Coast. It’s hard not to feel frivolous when I am sitting here playing with my imaginary friends while other people are sick or risking their lives or worrying about their finances or just in shock because the world that looked so bright on January 1, 2020, feels like it is wreathed in shadows and coated in fear.

  The fact that I can’t fix this, can’t plan around it or bully my way through, is upsetting. But I found an escape hatch. I can roll out Jackie, Luke and Logan and watch them struggle and fight and overcome. I can set them up to fail and watch them grow from it. And there is the magic of what it is I do. Because I can offer you the hatch too, and help you escape all the stress and worry, if only for a little while. And if I’ve done my job right, at the end you’ll feel a little bit better for it if you #stayhomeandread.

  Love and light,

  Jennifer L. Hart

  Dedicated to:

  All the folks who eat cold pizza while standing over the sink.

  Because anything else is too much work.

  You are my tribe.

  1

  Chapter One

  Every Wednesday was the same—get up, take care of my immediate needs and give the bathroom scale the finger.

  Every Wednesday except for this one.

  At first, the tap tap tap sounded like nothing more than a tree branch dragging intimately along a windowpane. One problem—there were no trees outside my bedroom window.

  My eyes popped open and I listened, wondering if it would come again.

  Tap tap tap. Then a dull thump.

  No, there weren’t any trees outside of my craftsmen bungalow, but there were plenty of thick bushes. Perfect concealment for a would-be evildoer. And while Coral Gate was one of the safest neighborhoods in Miami, that didn’t mean we didn’t have our share of crime.

  My heart pounded and I looked over to my sleeping companion. “Hey, wake up, you useless pain in the butt.”

  Nothing.

  Why hadn’t I brought Sasquatch into the bedroom? Nothing like a ninety-pound dog of undetermined breed to scare off an intruder. She was scarier than my bunk buddy anyway.

  But Sasquatch was out in the living room, curled up on the new shag rug.

  “Hey,” I nudged the form on the pillow again, but he rolled over with a snore. Little beast slept like he’d done something more exhausting than stuff his gob and watch television all day.

  I could call out. My ex-husband, Luke Parker, was camped out on the living room sofa. He’d run in, probably with the dog hot on his heels. And my mother, Celeste Drummond, was right down the hall.

  But what if it was only my overactive imagination? I’d been having panic attacks lately and both Luke and Celeste had witnessed me coming unhinged over the last six weeks. Luke would understand. He was the most understanding guy on the face of the planet, part of the reason we could still work and live
together.

  But I had my pride, damn it. I was used to taking care of myself.

  "Think, Jackie," I said out loud. Just because I'd had people try to kill me before, didn't mean there really was a prowler in my shrubs.

  My shoulder bag was on the floor between the bed and the window. In it I had a nonlethal arsenal—Taser, pepper spray, stun gun as well as a mini Maglite. My cellphone was charging on my nightstand. So, I’d dial 91 and then shine the light in the bushes. If there was a prowler, I’d dial the other 1, spritz the creep and scream my head off.

  As plans went, it was decidedly half-assed, but what more could I expect from my pre-coffee brain?

  TAP TAP TAP. That was the horror movie soundtrack if I’d ever heard it.

  I slunk out of bed, trying not to make noise as my feet hit the new bamboo flooring Luke had finished installing last week. My foot got tangled up in the strap of my shoulder bag and I stumbled, banging my shin on the nightstand. The phone charger was new and didn’t want to release its intimate hold on my smartphone. I struggled and cussed until finally, I was armed and ready.

  In the bed, my companion didn’t so much as twitch. Jerk.

  I put the flashlight in my mouth and punched in the first two digits. I shook the pepper spray to make sure it was active and then crept in my baby doll nighty over to the window.

  One problem, no free hand to flick the light switch to the on position.

  Was I a crime-fighting mastermind or what?

  I studied the phone and then the pepper spray. Something was going to have to get put down. After a minute’s indecision, I settled on the phone and laid it gently on the freshly stained windowsill. The device was too wide and overbalanced, clattering to the floor.

  If there was a prowler out there and he had night-vision goggles he was probably dying of laughter at my antics.

  Pissed off that I’d been so rudely awakened and had cracked yet another smartphone screen, I took the mini flashlight out of my mouth and flipped the switch.

  Eyes stared back at me. Human eyes.

  I gave a yell, and stepped back, only to tangle my foot again in the strap of my shoulder bag. I dropped the canister of pepper spray to catch myself before I went down. My backside hit the bamboo, proving that it was indeed harder than hardwood—the floor, not my ass. The commotion woke the beast in the bed who let out a startled chirp then scrambled to the windowsill where the fiend’s eyes were now lit with amusement as well as with his flashlight.

  “Asshole,” I seethed at the Dark Prince through the glass. “You are such an asshole, Logan Parker.”

  The skin around those baby blue eyes crinkled with amusement.

  “And you,” I cast a withering glare at my spider monkey who was hopping up and down on top of the headboard. “Way to have my back, Abu.”

  Logan, grin still in place, tapped against the glass again and mouthed a few words.

  Bruised and embarrassed, I crawled over to the window, unlocked it and slid the double-hung sucker up. "We have this newfangled thing called a door. About ten feet thattaway. Try it next time.”

  “Didn’t want to wake the household.” Logan popped the screen out from the sill and then used his upper body strength to pull himself through the window and in beside me.

  “Just me,” I grumped.

  “Just you.” He grinned and then leaned forward to press his lips to mine and the heat from the scorching contact melted my ire.

  “You’re lucky you didn’t get a snoot full of pepper spray.” I paused and then emphasized the last word. “Again.”

  Logan had a particularly nasty reaction to pepper spray, a fact I had learned the last time I had accidentally dosed him. His fault getting between me and the maniac who’d gone for my throat.

  “The window was still shut. Didn’t you get my text?”

  “What text?” I shook my head, a little dazed. Kissing the Dark Prince should come with a side effects warning label. Caution. May cause dizziness and loss of panties.

  “That explains why you’re not dressed.” His look seared me as though the thin cotton nightdress had gone up in a puff of smoke.

  My teeth sank into my lower lip. Even though Logan and I were together now, we hadn’t gotten physical. Well, not very physical. While we'd had plenty of heated make-out sessions, his recovery from a gunshot wound through the thigh and my insecurity about dating one Parker brother while living with the other and working with both of them had kept my libido in check.

  Barely.

  “It’s five in the morning. Why would I be dressed? Tell me it’s not the Sunnyvale complex.”

  Logan, Luke and I ran a property management team. Property owners hired us to help deal with unruly tenants and when necessary, streamline the eviction process. We were partway through an apartment complex’s yearly inspection and it had been dragging like a government job.

  Logan plucked my phone up off the floor and handed it to me. “It’s not the Sunnyvale complex.”

  I checked my messages and sure enough, Logan had sent me one the night before, sometime after I had collapsed from sheer exhaustion. I read it out loud. “Gonna take you out for a breakfast burrito.”

  “See,” he said as if that vague text excused scaring the everlovin’ crap out of me.

  “Why couldn’t you have just told me last night?” I’d seen him less than six hours ago, as I’d dragged my exhausted carcass from the Big Black Truck.

  “Separate work and home life, right?" His grin turned wicked. "You made the rules, hot stuff."

  I had, back when I’d still been married to Luke. At the time it had seemed like the best way to keep our personal drama from contaminating our professional lives but both the Parker brothers were way too literal.

  Feeling like an idiot, I pushed myself up off the floor. “Logan, there’s early and then there’s plumber’s ass crack of dawn. Three guesses which one this is.”

  Leather creaked as the Dark Prince rose to his full height of six foot three. “I thought we’d catch the sunrise.”

  Though the tone was nonchalant, I heard the note of wariness that had crept in. Damn it, he’d been trying to do something thoughtful. And in classic Jackie style, I’d had a spaz attack and ruined it.

  Logan and I were in love but our relationship was far from perfect. There had been a lot of rough years where we barely spoke, rougher months when it seemed like all we did was fight. I’d vowed that if we ever got the chance to be together, I wouldn’t squander it. Easier said than done. At times it felt like the two of us were waltzing on a field of glass shards and one wrong step would see us skewered.

  My teeth sank into my lower lip. Time to pull out the big guns—raw honesty. I stepped closer to him until my almost naked body pressed into his. "It sounds wonderful. I'd love to watch the sunrise with you.”

  His hands cupped my backside and pulled me flush against him. When he spoke his voice was ragged. “On second thought, maybe we could stay here….”

  As one, we turned to face the unmade bed.

  My heart rate picked up to a pace even more frantic than when I'd believed he was a burglar. One more searing kiss and the sun would be rising without us. Because what Logan Parker really wanted for breakfast was me.

  And it scared me to death.

  I stepped out of his hold and made my way to the bathroom. “Let me just get changed and we can go.”

  “Jackie?”

  “Yeah?” I paused and shut my eyes, sending up a silent prayer. Please don’t ask me what’s wrong. I refused to lie to Logan but I didn’t want to tell him either. We were doing okay with things the way they were, at least for now. Life was too complicated and I didn’t want to rush past the courtship phase.

  But all he said was, "Wear jeans. We're taking the bike."

  “The bike,” was Logan’s brand spanking new 2020 Indian Roadmaster. I shivered as he offered me the passenger’s helmet. “I’ve never been on a motorcycle before.”

  “All you gotta do is hold on to m
e.” he turned to look at me but with the visor down I couldn’t see his eyes. “Think you can manage that?”

  I eyed the cozy bungalow where my warm bed and lazy monkey awaited, then the motorcycle. I wanted to be with Logan and riding was a big part of his life. I knew that if I refused, he wouldn’t force my hand, but he’d already made so many compromises for me. This didn’t seem like a very big ask.

  “I’m going to have helmet hair,” I grumbled and took the stupid thing.

  Logan helped me secure it, then slung one of his long, lean legs over the bike. He fussed with the kickstand and then it was held up only by two wheels with his feet balanced on the ground.

  I took a tentative step and he pointed. “Put your foot there and then sling your leg over.”

  “Easy for you to say.” He had me by almost a foot and the difference was all leg.

  “Come on, Jackie. You know you want to.” The Dark Prince beckoned and as always, I was helpless to resist. To sweeten his sinful deal, he started the bike and then did a couple of twists with his hands so the engine growled in a rising and falling brrraaattt brrraaattt brrraaattt. His hand reached out for me again.

  I’d already promised him my soul. What was a little bodily peril?