Free Murder: The Musical (A Smith and Wetzon Mystery, #5) by Annette Meyers

there’s no pleasing you, Wetzon. Did you or did you not tell me that this musical Mort Hornberg and Your Gay Person are working on was going to make theatre history?”
    Smith had stopped referring to Carlos as the Degenerate after he became a celebrity choreographer. “Your Gay Person” was his new designation. And never to be outdone, Carlos loathed Smith. He blamed Smith for luring Wetzon from the Theatre and for trying to impose her values on Wetzon. That his darling Birdie should be partners with someone so bigoted and greedy was a constant source of irritation. Carlos and Smith fought out their battle, around and through Wetzon, usually leaving her quivering in the middle.
    This was one of those times. “‘My Gay Person’ has a name, Smith. Read my lips. Carlos Prince.” She found herself stamping her foot on the sidewalk to punctuate her words, to the great entertainment of a multilayered bag lady whose top layer was a moth-eaten mouton coat.
    The woman cackled and seemed about to join in the fray when Smith snarled at her. “On your way, or I’ll have you put in a shelter.”
    The woman froze. Her face showed abject terror, as if Smith had condemned her to death.
    “I mean it.” Smith shook a leather-clad finger at her.
    “You are an evil person!” the bag lady shouted. “I put a curse on you.” She pointed two fingers at Smith, spitting at them, then, muttering under her breath, grabbed her shopping cart loaded with bursting plastic garbage bags and a dilapidated broom, whiskered ends up, and pushed off up Lexington.
    “Oh, my God.” Smith clutched Wetzon’s arm. “Did you hear her? She put a curse on me.” Her face had a yellowish tinge.
    “Don’t be ridiculous. She’s disturbed, and you shouldn’t have gotten into it with her. It didn’t mean anything.”
    Smith looked slightly relieved, but still seemed to be rattled. She shuddered. “Let’s get out of here.”
    Wetzon locked arms with her. “You’ve been hanging around with these psychics too long. Come on, she was just blathering.” Wetzon would have loved to recapture her anger, but, alas, most of it had dissipated. “Of course, I did see a broom in her shopping cart....”
    “No!” Smith turned miserable eyes back to look for the bag lady, but she had disappeared up the avenue.
    Wetzon groaned. “I was kidding!”
    “You were?”
    “Cross my heart.” She made the motion. “Can we get back to Hotshot?”
    “You are the limit,” Smith said, recovering. “Well, did you or did you not say this would be a landmark musical?”
    “I did, but—” Wetzon shoved her gloved hands into her pockets and grouched all the way to Third Avenue.
    “Well, then.” Smith had entirely retrieved her equilibrium. “It was a business decision. Last year was the best year we’ve ever had. We have to diversify where we put our money.”
    “But fifty thousand? Jesus, Smith, no one makes money investing in the Theatre anymore.”
    ‘We will. The Tarot says turmoil, then buckets of money, and the Tarot never lies.”
    “I might have guessed.” Wetzon stretched the s’s out into a hiss.
    “Trust me.”
    Wetzon would have felt a shade better if Smith had not said those last two words. Years earlier a broker had warned Wetzon that trust me is code for fuck you. “Oh, hell,” she muttered.
    “Angels!” Smith said with relish. “We’re angels. Isn’t that wonderful?”
    The question was rhetorical. Smith had never before expressed any interest in the Theatre, only went to mega hit shows like Miss Saigon and Phantom because one did, and the last thing she would ever have done was invest money in it. And she would have been right. Investment in the Theatre was notoriously risky. Wetzon came to a stop in front of Steve Sondheim’s house.
    “What are you doing?”
    “Paying homage.” She tipped her beret to Sondheim and then did the same to Kate Hepburn, whose house was next door, and who had, it was said, complained vigorously about