It was no doubt they assumed Alma had joined the deceased by the point they had discovered her deep-toned slender body sprawled across the smooth floor, brown eyes seemingly lifeless though shut. Crimson blood stained the ivory hand-stitched Versace dress, pooling around her head and torso. She felt the warmth of the liquid until her bare chest, which sent a cold feeling to her bones initially, but resided over time. The string of white pearls had snapped in the process, and the exquisite beads had bounced wildly, landing all over, finding their way into every corner. A single-sided heel of her saltbox beige Givenchy stilettos was broken off, leaving her in a state of utter distress considering how dainty it was.
A cataclysmic scene, truly, and even more once you took into consideration the location of the crime, and who she was as a personality in general.
Of course they had recognised her face. She'd have been truly confused if they hadn't. What did truly confuse her however, was their superior, extravagantly blissful ignorance.
Check her pulse, said the same husky voice that later intoned, Stevie, let's just walk away. They'll think we did it if we report anything.
Bloody idiots, both of them. Stevie was too, for agreeing with the first idiot. She'd have actually been mad if she was really dead.
She wasn't really dead, obviously.
A staged murder, it was to be, and a rather lame attempt at it too. Probably arguably brilliant under the most conventional of circumstances - but these circumstances were mere miles from being anywhere near classified as simply conventional.
And of course, Alma knew she was to be murdered tonight, at the Art Museum, in conjunction with the Gala. The squash ball under her armpit was proof of her - their - acknowledgement of a somewhat obvious threat to her living state. Thye'd staged it so well, the entire set. Blood, makeup and all.
So well even so-called adequate professionals would have iterated her dead once taken a bare glance at her.
Felt lovely, truly.
In all honesty, lying in the pool of warm, ruby red blood on the cold, smooth birch-resembling cement sounded generally unwelcoming, but seemed not too despicable, to her personally. At least her legs were getting the quality rest they so longed and devastatingly deserved.
She only actually begun to feel a little wither of fear somewhere within her when she heard a terribly familiar voice. Low and smooth, gentle and inviting. Her body proceeded to relax once again as she realised who it was.
"What smells like ro-, oh my good God," he muttered, lower was his voice than its usual. His rhythmic footsteps stopped abruptly, and the sound of the wine glass shattering on impact almost made her wince.
Almost forgot she was dead, for a bit there. Whoops.
"Alma?" His voice was swollen with terror, and Alma could almost hear the tears collecting in his eyes. She held back a snicker from escaping her mouth.
"Drop the act, Tom," she muttered. Her eyelids opened smooth, the makeup Jonah applied before they arrived still without a flaw. "We're alone," Alma reminded him, an edge to her voice.
His broad shoulders dropped, and his body visibly slackened. "Hey, babe," he greeted, and it took a lot in her to suppress the heavenward form her lips so desired to take. "Fancy being dead?"
"I am quite liking it, yes," Alma admitted with a pang of guilt and an off to the left stare, using only bare-minimal movements. "Rather challenging considering we're off set - yet a wonderful experience altogether."
"Truly," he said with a twinkle in his eye, and stuck his now empty palms into the pockets of his indigo satin-rimmed blazer of the same velvety colour since the glass figure filled with grape was done with. "Now look alive, we've got a plane to catch."
