A First Date with Death (Love or Money Mystery, 1, Band 1) - Softcover

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Diana Orgain is the author of the Maternal Instincts Mysteries and coauthor of Gilt Trip with Laura Childs in the New York Times bestselling Scrapbooking Mysteries. She holds an MFA and BA in Creative Writing from San Francisco State University with a minor in Acting. Diana’s plays have been produced at San Francisco State University, GreenHouses Productions, and PlayGround in San Francisco. She lives in the city with her husband and their children.

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Maternal Instincts Mysteries

Love or Money Mysteries

Acknowledgments

One

The bungee-jumping harness bit into my shoulders and legs as I looked over the railing of the Golden Gate Bridge. To say the water looked frigid was an understatement. The whitecaps of the bay screamed out glacier and hypothermia.

“You’re not in position,” Cheryl, the producer, yelled.

I felt the camera zoom in on me. They needed an extreme close-up of my every facial expression so they could broadcast my terror to the world. Magnify my embarrassment and mortification.

One of the techs said something to Cheryl and she shouted, “Cut!”

The cameraman lost interest in me.

“Why am I doing this?” I asked Becca, my best friend and the assistant producer on this godawful reality TV show, Love or Money.

“To find your dream man,” Becca answered.

“I found him already, remember? Then he left me at the altar.”

A makeup artist appeared at my elbow and applied powder to my nose.

“Dream men do not leave their brides at the altar,” Becca said. “Clearly, he was not the one.”

I studied the woman brushing powder on my face. She had beautiful chocolate-colored skin, a straight nose, and eyes so dark and intense they looked like pools of india ink. She looked familiar, but before I could place her, she turned and walked away.

“I thought you always liked Paul,” I said to Becca.

“I did until he left me at the altar,” Becca replied.

“He left me.”

“Me, too. I was standing right next to you in a stupid tulle and taffeta dress. Anyway, enough about your horrible fashion sense—”

I laughed.

“Even if you don’t find your dream man here,” Becca continued, “focus on the cash prize. You need it.”

She was kind enough not to add “since you were fired,” but I felt the sting anyway. If anyone had told me, six months before, that I’d be on a reality TV show looking for love and/or money, I’d have called them 5150, a.k.a. clinically insane. But here I was, ex-cop, ex-bride-to-be—with a broken heart and broken career—looking to start over.

Ty, one of my “dates,” sauntered over. He was wearing jeans and boots and his trademark cowboy hat. A bungee harness crisscrossed through his legs. Despite the harness, or perhaps because of it, he looked hot. Although I was hard-pressed to think of any outfit that he wouldn’t look hot in.

“Are you nervous, Miss Georgia?” he asked.

I found myself absently wondering if he’d wear his hat while bungee jumping.

He reached out tentatively and touched the back of my hand with a single finger. “Miss Georgia?” he repeated.

I suddenly became aware of the camera rolling again and snapped to attention. “Yes. I’m nervous. I thought I’d get to pick the dates, but I didn’t. I would have never picked this. Only a lunatic—”

I heard the producer, Cheryl, grumble.

I wasn’t supposed to say anything negative about the dates, of course. They were supposed to look authentic, so that the audience wouldn’t know that I had absolutely zero control over anything. The crew would have to edit out my last comment.

Ty seemed to notice the same thing because he replied smoothly, “I’ve always wanted to bungee jump.” His lips quirked up in an irresistible manner. “And now we get to do it off this beautiful bridge.”

Cheryl, who was standing behind him, smiled. He’d just saved the scene. She liked him.

Well, in those tight jeans and boots, and with the cute southern drawl—who could blame her?

I glanced around at the others. They seemed ready to go and had started heading my way. It was inevitable, once someone started showing interest in me, that the others would follow—like a pack of dogs fighting over a lone piece of meat.

Bungee jumping off the bridge was my first date, and I’d selected five of the ten eligible bachelors—or not so eligible. The gist of the show was for me to pick a guy who was emotionally available for a relationship, someone who was on the show for love.

During casting, each guy had given a heart-to-heart interview with the producer, Cheryl Dennison. They’d confessed whether they were ready to be in a relationship. Five guys were searching for love; five guys weren’t. Because I’d worked for SFPD, somehow Hollywood thought I’d be able to figure out everyone’s motives.

I had my doubts.

If I picked the right guy, we’d split $250,000. If I picked a guy who was emotionally unavailable he’d walk off with the cash prize on his own and, maybe worse, a piece of my heart.

America would be privy to the interviews. I’m sure those clips would expose me as a fool along the way.

I pictured Cheryl’s editing staff. As soon as I said someone was cute or hot or sweet, she’d revel in playing a clip of the heart-to-heart where he told America all the reasons he couldn’t fall in love. That kind of thing would be great for ratings.

The guys I’d asked on this date were the ones I suspected might be on the show for the cash. Best to eliminate the fakes ASAP.

I’d selected Ty, the cowboy, because at the first night’s cocktail party I couldn’t actually get him to tell me what he did for a living.

Edward, the hot doctor—tall, with dark hair, a great smile, and a wonderful gentleness about him—had to have student loans from med school up the wazoo.

Scott, the brooding writer, wrote horror stories—I’d been meaning to read some to get an idea about him. He was mysterious and supersexy, with a tight body and a bit of a swagger, and he had a shaved head and dark, piercing eyes.

But who made any money as a writer?

Aaron, the investment banker, looked like the boy next door. Clean-cut, respectable, and polite.

I wouldn’t typically peg investment bankers as needing money, but something about Aaron was unsettling, as though he had some desperation vibe wafting off him.

And then there was Pietro, the Italian hunk with an accent that drove me wild.

I’d invited him because I had a weakness for accents, and weakness must be sought out and destroyed at any cost.

Everyone was suited up and ready to go. My harness felt so tight I thought I might explode out of it. It was cutting into my shoulders and crotch—certainly not a woman-friendly look. But I didn’t complain for fear they would make it too loose and I’d slip out of it at exactly the wrong moment.

Was there no happy medium for me?

The crew was urging us toward the edge of the bridge. We didn’t have time to dillydally, as the show had been granted special access for the shoot. Bungee jumping was not ordinarily allowed off the Golden Gate Bridge due to boat traffic, but the producers had been able to close down the shipping lanes for one hour. Everything is for sale in San Francisco.

Car traffic, on the other hand, was still open on the bridge. Everything may be for sale, but even Hollywood has a budget. It was nerve-wracking and noisy to have the cars whizzing by.

“If you’re nervous, maybe someone else can go first,” Ty offered.

Cheryl said, “Someone needs to go, for God’s sake. We need to get the show on the road. Aaron, want to go?”

Aaron looked surprised and Ty seemed relieved.

“Uh, yeah, certainly. Love to,” Aaron said, although he looked...