Killing Cupid

By Laura Levine

“The multiple suspects keep readers on the edge of their seats” in a hilarious Valentine’s Day mystery from the author of Death of a Neighborhood Witch (RT Book Reviews).
 
Love is in the air as freelance writer Jaine Austen begins a new job at the Dates of Joy matchmaking service . . .
 
When Jaine lands a job writing web copy and brochures for matchmaker Joy Amoroso, she’s excited for a chance to help the lovelorn—until she realizes Joy is a ruthless taskmaster who screams at her employees for the smallest infractions, pads her website with pictures of professional models posing as clients, and offers up convincing but empty promises of love.  So it’s no surprise when the chiseling cupid turns up dead at a Valentine’s Day mixer. Now, finding the culprit may prove harder than spotting that elusive caramel praline in a box of chocolates . . .
 
Praise for the Jaine Austen mysteries
 
“I’m crazy about Laura Levine’s mystery series. Her books are so outrageously funny.” —Joanne Fluke, New York Times bestselling author
 
“Laura Levine’s hilarious debut mystery, This Pen for Hire, is a laugh a page (or two or three) as well as a crafty puzzle. Sleuth Jaine Austen’s amused take on life, love, sex and LA will delight readers. Sheer fun!” —Carolyn Hart, New York Times bestselling author
 
“Jaine can really dish it out.” —The New York Times Book Review
 
“Fun. Jaine’s dogged sleuthing and screwball antics will entertain fans of this fizzy series.” —Publishers Weekly

• Language: English
• Publisher: Kensington Books
• Release date: May 16, 2014
• ISBN: 9781617738647

Laura Levine

Laura Levine is a comedy writer whose television credits include The Bob Newhart Show, Laverne & Shirley, The Love Boat, The Jeffersons, Three's Company, and Mary Hartman, Mary Martman. Her work has been published in The Washington Post and Los Angeles Times. She lives in Los Angeles and is currently working on the next Jaine Austen mystery. For more information, visit www.JaineAustenMysteries.com.

Book preview

you.

Chapter 1

There it was, waiting for me on my bedspread. An early Valentine’s gift from my Significant Other.

Gingerly I picked it up.

A hairball. How very thoughtful.

My cat, Prozac, looked up from where she was lolling on my pillow, beaming with pride.

I left another one for you in your slippers.

At this stage of my life, I was used to crappy Valentine’s gifts. Mainly from my ex-husband, The Blob. I remember the Valentine’s Day he came sauntering through the door with a slightly wilted bouquet of roses.

For you, pickleface, he said.

He liked to call me pickleface. One of the many reasons we are no longer married.

The Blob never brought me gifts, not unless you consider a complimentary toothpick from Hop Li’s Chinese Restaurant a gift. So my heart actually started to melt just a tad. Seeing a small envelope sticking out from the bouquet, I opened it eagerly, only to read the words:

Rest in peace, Esther.

With heartfelt sympathy, the Rosenkrantzes.

Nothing says Happy Valentine’s Day like used funeral flowers.

So like I say, I was used to dreadful Valentine’s gifts. But none as dreadful as the one I was about to get that day when Joy Amoroso called.

I was stretched out on my sofa, scraping Prozac’s hairball out from my slipper, when the phone rang.

Jane Eyre? asked a woman with a decidedly phony British accent.

Austen, I corrected her. Jaine Austen.

Yes, right. Whatever. This is Joy Amoroso calling. You’ve heard of me, of course.

Something in her tone of voice told me to answer in the affirmative.

Um, sure, I lied.

I need someone to write advertising copy, and Marvin Cooper gave me your name.

Marvin Cooper, aka Marvelous Marv, The Mattress King, was one of my biggest clients. What a sweetie, I thought, to have recommended me for a job. If I’d only known what hell was in store for me, I would have smothered him with one of his Comfort Cloud pillows. But at that moment, I was thrilled at the prospect of a paycheck winging its way toward my anemic checking account.

I assume you know all about my business, the phony Brit was saying.

Of course, I lied again.

Come to my offices tomorrow at ten a.m., and I’ll decide if you’re good enough to work for me.

What nerve! I felt like telling her to take her silly job and shove it. She may not have realized it, but she happened to be talking to the woman who won the Golden Plunger Award from the Los Angeles Plumbers Association for the immortal slogan In a Rush to Flush? Call Toiletmasters!

Yes, I would have dearly liked to flip her a verbal finger, but Okay, sure, were the lily-livered words I actually uttered.

Good. See you tomorrow. Ten a.m. sharp.

And before even giving me her address, she’d hung up.

Who on earth was this presumptuous woman?

I was just about to head over to my computer to check her out online when there was a knock on my door.

I opened it to find my neighbor, Lance Venable.

A normally bubbly fellow with bright blue eyes and a headful of tight blond curls, Lance looked distinctly bubble-free as he trudged into my apartment.

Oh, Jaine! he sighed, summoning his inner Sarah Bernhardt, I don’t think I can face another Valentine’s Day without a date. With that, he plopped down on my sofa, his arm slung dramatically across his forehead, very Marcel Proust Yearning for a Madeleine.

"Cheer up, Lance. We’ll stay home, order a pizza, and watch Fatal Attraction like we always do."

No, I’m afraid not even the thought of Glenn Close with a butcher knife is going to cheer me up this year. In fact, I was thinking of going to a weekend retreat at a monastery.

A monastery? But you’re not even Catholic.

That’s not the point. I need to meditate, to contemplate, to see how I look in one of those cowl neck robes. And besides, who knows? I just might meet somebody.

Lance, you can’t go to a monastery to pick up guys! They’re celibate.

So? I like a challenge.

The scary thing is, he wasn’t kidding.

But enough about my pathetic life. What’s going on in your pathetic life?

For your information, I said, scraping the last of Prozac’s hairball from my slipper, my life does not happen to be the least bit pathetic. But now that you asked, the most maddening thing just happened. I got a phone call from a mystery woman named Joy Amoroso, telling me to come in for a job interview without even giving me her address or the name of her company."

Joy Amoroso! Lance’s eyes lit up. I know all about her. She owns Dates of Joy, Beverly Hills’s premier matchmaking service!

He sprang up from the sofa, his lethargy a thing of the past.

Be right back! he cried, dashing out the door. Seconds later he was back, as promised, waving a glossy news sheet.

"The Beverly Hills Social Pictorial, he said, leafing through it. I subscribe to keep track of my customers."

The customers to whom Lance referred were the wealthy dames who shopped at Neiman Marcus’s shoe department, where Lance toils as a salesman, fondling billion-dollar bunions for a living.

Aha! he cried, finding the page he’d been searching for. Here she is.

He handed me the magazine, pointing to an ad for the Dates of Joy matchmaking service.

There in the middle of the ad was Joy Amoroso, an attractive blonde sitting behind a desk, a statue of Cupid slinging his arrow in the background. At least, I assumed Joy was attractive. The picture itself was extremely hazy, as if it had been shot through a lens liberally lathered with Vaseline.

When you get the job, Lance was saying, you’ve got to promise you’ll get me a date.

I thought you were going to a monastery.

A monastery? Why on earth would I go to a monastery when I could be going on a Date of Joy? I hear she’s got a client list filled with gazillionaires.

Don’t get your hopes up. I haven’t got the job yet.

Oh, but you will.

And as very bad luck would have it, he was right.

Little did I know it then, but my Valentine’s Day was about to go from Fatal Attraction to just plain fatal.

Chapter 2

I found Beverly Hills’s premier matchmaker several miles outside Beverly Hills, in the perfectly pleasant but distinctly less prestigious town of Mar Vista.

Housed in a three-story stucco office building between Ellman’s Upholsterers and Jerry’s Discount Flowers, Dates of Joy was a far cry from the swellegant mecca of matchmaking I’d imagined.

Nabbing a spot in front of Jerry’s Discount Flowers, I made my way past buckets of drooping carnations into Joy’s office building. There I stepped onto a musty elevator, where some industrious hoodlums had etched the walls with an impressive display of male genitalia.

I got off at the second floor and found Joy’s office at the end of a dank hallway. In contrast to the oatmeal walls surrounding it, Joy’s door was painted a bilious Pepto-Bismol pink, the words

DATES OF JOY

etched in flowery calligraphy.

I headed inside to find the walls painted the same Pepto-Bismol pink and lined with large framed blowups of happy couples gazing at each other, gooey-eyed with love.

At the time, I assumed that they were all Joy’s satisfied customers.

Seated at a receptionist’s desk was a goth pixie clad in black leather and a tasteful assortment of body piercings, her spiky hair a blazing shade of purple. And hunched over a computer behind her was a skinny guy in black horn-rimmed glasses held together at the hinges with duct tape. In his white short-sleeved shirt and yellow bow tie, cowlicks running riot in his hair, the guy had Computer Nerd written all over him.

May I help you? the goth pixie asked, looking up from her computer, a steel stud glinting merrily in her nose.

I’m Jaine Austen. I’m here to see Joy Amoroso.

Oh, right.

Was it my imagination, or was that a look of pity I’d just seen flit across her face?

Joy will be right with you, she said. Won’t you have a seat?

She gestured to a row of plastic chairs lined up against the wall. I plopped down into one and checked out the reading matter on a tiny coffee table in front of me. Along with the usual dog-eared issues of People was a thick loose-leaf binder.

That’s our Date Book, with pictures of our clients, said the pixie, whose name, according to the ID bracelet tattooed on her wrist, was Cassie.

I opened the book, expecting to find a bunch of bald heads and stomach paunches, but the book was stuffed with stunners. One good looking prospect after the next. Joy certainly had a lot of hotties on tap.

Just as I was ogling a particularly adorable tousle-haired studmuffin, the door to Joy’s office opened and out walked the date-meister herself.

The woman in front of me bore little resemblance to the photo in her ad. That picture had been taken at least ten years and fifty pounds ago. Joy Amoroso was still an attractive woman with deceptively angelic features. Button nose, big blue eyes, and a fabulous head of streaked blond hair. But that pretty face of hers came with an impressive set of chins, and she was clearly packing quite a few pounds under her flowy A-line dress. Only her feet were tiny—slender little things encased in what looked like nosebleed expensive designer shoes.

Jaine! she cried with the same phony British accent she’d used on the phone. So teddibly sorry to keep you waiting.

She looked me up and down with all the subtlety of a New York City construction worker. I guess I must have passed muster, because she then asked: Won’t you step into my office, hon?

Tearing myself away from my tousle-haired dreamboat, I grabbed my book of writing samples and followed her into her inner sanctum.

Like the reception area, Joy’s office was filled with framed photos of happy couples. But unlike the no-frills furniture in the reception area, Joy’s decor ran to the antique and ornate. A Marie Antoinette-ish desk and chair dominated the room, along with an étagère crammed with fussy knickknacks. Over in a corner lurked the same statue of Cupid I’d seen in Joy’s ad, now shooting his arrow up at what looked like a water stain on the ceiling.

But what caught my eye most of all was an open box of Godiva chocolates on Joy’s desk, chock full of creamy dark chocolate truffles.

My taste buds, napping after the cinnamon raisin bagel I’d had for breakfast, suddenly jolted awake. A truffle sure would’ve hit the spot right about then. Of course, a truffle would hit the spot with me just about any time. But those velvety Godivas looked particularly mouthwatering.

Taking a seat behind her desk, Joy popped one in her mouth. My taste buds and I waited for her to offer me one, but alas, we waited in vain.

Obviously Joy was not a sharer.

She gestured for me to sit in one of the froufrou chairs facing her desk, and as I did, I felt a broken spring poke me in the fanny.

Comfy? she asked.

Very, I lied, still hoping for one of those Godivas.

So, she said, sucking chocolate from her fingertips, Marvin Cooper tells me you’re a wonderful writer.

I blushed modestly.

But I’ll be the judge of that, she added with a grim smile.

She held out her hand for my sample book. I only hoped she didn’t smear chocolate all over my Toiletmasters campaign.

As she leafed through my ads, I whiled away the minutes looking at pictures of the happy couples on the wall and trying to ignore the spring poking me in my fanny.

Not bad, she said when she was finally through.

Then she got up and began pacing the room in her teeny designer-clad tootsies, launching into what had all the earmarks of a well-rehearsed campaign speech.

As you well know, she began, Dates of Joy is the preeminent dating service in Beverly Hills.

I wisely refrained from pointing out that we were a good three and a half miles from Beverly Hills.

I handle only the crème de la crème of the L.A. dating scene. Movers and shakers. And all sorts of celebrities. My fees start at ten thousand dollars a year. And go up. Way up.

Wow. And I thought my Fudge of the Month Club was expensive.

And I’m worth it, she said, her chins quivering with pride. I’m the best there is. That’s because I’ve got matchmaking in my blood. My mother was a matchmaker, and her mother before her.

Not only that, according to Joy, one of her royal ancestors back in jolly old England was the one who fixed up Anne Boleyn with Henry VIII.

I nodded as if I actually believed her.

If this woman was English royalty, I was a Tibetan monk.

Although I abhor the idea of self promotion, she was saying, I have to keep up with the times. So I’m looking for someone to write copy for a sales brochure. So whaddaya think? she asked, dumping her royal accent. You interested?"

Sounds very intriguing.

Time to see how much gold was at the end of this particular rainbow.

And the pay? I asked.

I was thinking somewhere in the neighborhood of three grand.

Someone call the movers! That’s my kind of neighborhood.

And yet, a little voice inside me was telling me to run for the hills. I knew trouble when I saw it coming down the pike, and I could tell Joy Amoroso was trouble with a capital OMG! That bossy manner, that insane Queen Mum accent that seemed to come and go like an overbooked call girl on New Year’s Eve. The woman would drive me up a wall in no time.

Why not save myself the aggravation and just say no?

So what if I owed a few bucks to MasterCard? And Macy’s? And the Fudge of the Month Club? So what if the Fudge of the Month Club cut off my membership and I never got another box of fudge ever again—not even the white chocolate macadamia nut fudge I’m particularly fond of?

Surely I could live without white chocolate macadamia nut fudge.

Couldn’t I?

Oh, please. We all know the answer to that one.

So, Joy asked, popping another chocolate in her mouth. Is it a deal?

It’s a deal.

And that, in a macadamia nutshell, was how I came to sell my soul to the Matchmaker from Hell.

You’ll start tomorrow at nine, Joy commanded. I want you to hang out at the office for a few days to get the picture of how I work.

I’d get the picture, all right.

And trust me, it was not a pretty one.

Riding up the elevator in Joy’s office building the next morning, I found myself elbow to elbow with a gal who looked like she just stepped out of a Victoria’s Secret catalog. Pouty lips. Eensy waist. And boobs that made it onto the elevator a good thirty seconds before she did. Surely she wasn’t going to see Joy. A woman like that needed help finding a date like I needed help finding the cookie aisle in the supermarket.

But much to my surprise, when she got out of the elevator, she trotted straight to Joy’s Pepto-Bismol door.

I followed her inside and blinked in surprise to see the reception area was crammed with stunning guys and gals.

I’m here for the casting session, Ms. Secret told Cassie, who was seated at her desk, a skull and crossbones barrette adorning her bright purple hair.

A casting session, huh? I figured Joy was looking for models to use in her new brochure.

Take a seat in the photo studio, Cassie told Ms. Secret, pointing to a large room adjacent to the reception area. I peeked inside and saw about a dozen other Beautiful People sitting around, chatting among themselves and gazing at their own head shots with unabashed admiration.

Hi, Jaine, Cassie said, catching sight of me. Joy will be tied up for a while. Until she’s free, she wants you to work with Travis.

She pointed to the bow-tied geek I’d noticed yesterday.

I’m supposed to show you our Web site, he said, pulling up a chair for me next to his computer.

So what’s going on? I asked with a nod to the beautiful people. Is Joy casting models for the brochure?

Not exactly.

He glanced at Joy’s door, as if to make sure she wasn’t listening.

Remember the date book you saw yesterday? With pictures of Joy’s clients? Well, hardly any of the people in that book are actual clients. Most of them are models or actors. Every once in a while Joy holds a phony casting session, pretending she’s going to shoot a TV commercial. All the models and actors leave their headshots, and then Joy puts them into her date book.

No way!

That’s how she reels in the new clients, he nodded.

What about all her movers and shakers? And her celebrity clients?

Cassie, who had been listening in, now turned around, guffawing. "Are you kidding? The closest we ever got to a celebrity was when Reese Witherspoon’s maid came

Reviews for Killing Cupid

[staliaoftheknife · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

It's almost Valentine's Day and the only date on Jaine's horizon appears to be her cat, Prozac. However things start looking up when she's asked to write a brochure for a dating agency, Dates of Joy. However Joy Amoroso is the latest thing from joy, instead she's a cruel woman that is intend on taking money from people and not finding them their true loves, as she promised. Jaine wants to write her brochure, earn her money and get as far away from her as she can. Unfortunately Joy also promises to set Jaine up with someone. However her intended date is the last person Jaine would want to date, a rich, old guy that seems obsessed with her cat. Jaine isn't surprised when Joy drops dead from a poisoned chocolate, as there seems to be a lot of people that wanted her dead - herself included. With Prozac's, her cat, help she will have to untangle this mystery before she ends up behind bars.I've read all of the mysteries in this series, starting with This Pen For Hire. I like the zany antics of Jaine and her gay shoe-salesman neighbour, Lance, and her kooky parents that live in a retirement village in Florida, and have a addiction to buying unnecessary items on late night tv. Together they make for a fun mystery series and I've been hooked from the start.I was thrilled to discover that Killing Cupid would be available as an audiobook as I've previously read all the books in this series and I wanted to experience Jaine in audio format. While the narrator, Brittany Pressley, wasn't the voice I had thought of in my mind, from reading the previous eleven novels, I quickly adapted and grew to enjoy her impressions of Jaine, Lance, Prozac and all the oddballs at the dating agency.The mystery itself was fun. I love discovering that the murder victim wasn't well liked because there is always a great variety of murder suspects. In this case, there was a long line of disgruntled dating customers and even Joy's own Aunt, who she stole the business from. It was certainly difficult trying to figure out who the killer was.Killing Cupid was another fun, zany instalment in the Jaine Austen mysteries. If you're looking for a mystery series with a lot of laughs, then I suggest trying out these mysteries. They are best read in order, so start with A Pen For Hire. For me, I'm now patiently waiting as I look forward to discovering what Jaine gets up to next and I'm hoping that there might be some romance in store for Jaine too!

[booksgaloreca · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

This was my first book by this author. It was a fun cozy mystery. A light entertaining read. I would definitely read more by this author.I received this book in exchange for an unbiased review.

[rhonda1111 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

4 STARSThis is book 12 in the Jaine Austen Mystery but the first one I have read. I hope not the last. It is a fun wacky story. Her parents are full of laughs with the emails they send her. I like Jaine and her cat too. Though if someone offered me twentyfive thousand dollars for my cat I would say sold. My dogs would be a harder sell.I liked the plot. It was fun to read. The body was found at a party for Dates of Joy clients and Jaine has sneaked into her bosses office to delete a email she had sent by mistake. So she is a suspect in the murder so she wants to find out who the real killer is to clear herself.No one likes the person killed so their are plenty of suspects and motives. I was kept guessing and never got it right. Jaine is even a suspect herself.Jaine is hired to make a advertising brochure for Dates of Joy. That is not all she ends up doing for them. She finds herself writing online bios to go along with headshots of models. She even ends up going on a date with quite a character himself.But be careful you might find yourself wanting to eat chocolate while reading about it. I did.The pacing was good and kept me reading till the end to find out who the killer was.Based on this story I would read more of Jaine Austen Mysteries series.I was given this ebook to read and in return asked to give honest review of it by Netgalley.publication: December 31st 2013 by Kensington 272 pages ISBN9780758285034

[jiraiya_5 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

I thought that, in the past, I had underestimated past books by otherwise favorite authors. I also thought that this book would turn out to be very enjoyable, even if the climax would be inferior. But the opposite happened. This book proves that I didn't underscore the underwhelming books in this series. I was dying to read Killing Cupid. The facts must be faced though. It's a weak effort by Laura Levine and it's clearly apparent she was just going through the motions. I'm glad she found a cash cow and I'm sad she no longer has her muse. I will keep on reading her future offerings. I dearly wish she has a good novel inside her.

[sable677 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Killing Cupid is the first full length Jaine Austen adventure that I have read having just read two short novellas previously, and I found that I really, really enjoyed the book. It has been a long time since I have found a new series that had me laughing out loud as much as this one has done. I just love how Levine combines humor with her mystery which made Killing Cupid such a fun read. Levine has created some very memorable and funny characters in Jaine, Prozac, Lance, Jaine's parents, and the wonderful host of characters connected to the book's mystery. Jaine is a very relatable character which made her so enjoyable, and I liked how Levine added in the antics of Jaine's parents as well. The book was full of many twists and turns as well as a number of suspects to keep the mystery lover happy, and the book had plenty of humor as well. I definitely plan on checking out more books in this series. If you are looking for a great Valentine's Day mystery, then Killing Cupid is definitely the book for you.Received a copy of Killing Cupid through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

[lhaines56 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Jaine is laugh out loud normal, funny, and always dealing with the next disaster, all the while running into a murder in the course of her bizarre copyrighting gigs. I love the attitude she proclaims on her cat Prozac.

[murderbydeath · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I'd read the first few books in this series years ago, when they were first published, but the series fell off my radar. A lot of my cozy book friends have been talking about how much they love Jaine Austen and her cat, Prozac and I've been meaning to pick up another of the books and get reacquainted. Jaine is a freelance copy writer and is hired on to write profiles for an on-line dating service. The owner Joy, is less than scrupulous and ends up dead at a dating mixer. Jaine is considered one of the suspects so she goes about asking questions and trying to clear her name. Hilarious adventures follow. While this is a very well-written book, with a solid mystery plot and laugh out loud humour, it didn't actually do it for me. When I read books I like to lose myself in the story, become attached to the characters; I like to feel like I'm a fly on the wall in this little world the author has created. Killing Cupid was absolutely entertaining, but it just wasn't my type of story. Jaine is likeable, witty, and loaded with self-depracating humour. Her voice is the inner voice of smart-alecks everywhere. After 12 books she's still sworn off relationships, and none of the books I've read in the series include any romance for Jaine. Lance is her so-self-absorbed-it's-almost-endearing neighbour. He's constantly looking for love and always ready to jump into the next relationship. But the star of the show is Prozac, Jaine's cat. He's got all the best lines in this book. The author plays up his Machiavellian antics and commentary (not real commentary, just what Jaine imagines him saying) for maximum laughs and succeeds. Finally, while you never meet them, and they don't play any part in the mystery itself, Jaine's parents are main characters throughout the book, via he-said/she-said emails from their retirement community. Pure slapstick comedy, and probably the parts of the book I found the funniest. The murder plot was nicely done. The murderer was never obvious and the suspects each had legitimate motives. Jaine only had one really TSTL moment that comes to mind, so not too bad for an amateur sleuth. I didn't figure out the murderer until Jaine did, and enjoyed being surprised by the end. I'm a big believer in reading a series in order, from the beginning, but I was able to pick up this 12th book after years away from the series and jump right in, so I think it works just fine as a stand-alone for those that just want to give the series a try. I'd recommend this book and series to any reader who is looking for very light-hearted, often slapstick humour with a well-plotted mystery. If you're looking to become invested in a series, this probably isn't the one to try, but if you're looking to be entertained by likeable characters, you're in for some laughs. (I received this as an ARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.)