Private Investigator Ginny Greaves, a lipstick lesbian who never mixes business and pleasure
The Brotherly Love Band
It was ten past gin o’clock on a Thursday and I was two bills behind rent when trouble swanned into my office in designer heels and a moral compass that pointed directly to the gutter.
She had diamonds on her ears, guilt in her eyes, and the kind of pout that suggested she kissed too much or too often, or probably both.
“You’re Ginny Greaves,” she said, like she wasn’t impressed but was willing to pretend if I solved the case.
“That’s what the door says, unless someone’s replaced the lettering with ‘Ask Me About My Childhood Trauma.’” I leaned back in my chair and gestured to the seat opposite. “What’s missing, sweetheart? Husband? Poodle? Self-respect?”
I watched her hips as they tried to hypnotise me, but I wasn'e falling for this broad. Those hips were a warning.
She sat. Crossed her legs like a lethal weapon. Lowered her voice to a scandalous whisper.
“My ring. My wedding ring. A five-carat vintage Asscher cut with a platinum band and a tendency to reflect poor decisions.”
“And I’m guessing this poor decision had biceps and the finest member in Brooklyn when viewed through a scotch glass?”
She winced, "a surname matching my own."
I looked confused, she noticed. She looked at my hob nails and looked confused again.
"Alistair. My husband’s brother. It was a moment of weakness. A spiritual lapse. A massage with benefits. I should never drink at lunchtime.”
“Spare me the gospel according to Chardonnay,” I said, stubbing out a cigarette I hadn’t lit. “Where was the last known sighting of the matrimonial ice?”
“Alistair’s flat. I think it… slipped off. During... proceedings.”
“Slipped off landing gently on the bedclothes, or flung across the room in a frenzy of Roman shame?”
She gave me the look of a woman who had indeed flung, and not just this one time.
“I need it back now,” she said. “He’s already asking why I’m wearing gloves indoors.”
“And the rate?”
“Double.”
I raised an eyebrow. “Double rate, double speed. I assume you’re paying in cash and discretion.”
She tossed a wad of notes on my desk like a woman throwing booties at a baby shower.
“Find the ring. Before Henry finds Alistair, I beg you.”
Alistair answered the door wearing a robe and holding a glass of moonshine that was 80% proof and 20% hope.
He lived in a flat that screamed divorced and delusional. Black leather couch, mood lighting, mirrored ceiling and a jacuzzi.
“Well, if it isn’t the famous Miss Greaves,” he said, smiling like a man with far too many secrets and not enough throw pillows.
“Cut the charm, lover boy. I’m here on behalf of your sister-in-law.”
“Which one?”
“The one you defiled during Tuesday brunch.”
He gestured me in. “We may have been a little… enthusiastic. Things were flung. Garments. Morals. Possibly jewellery.”
I surveyed the place like a truffle pig with boundary issues.
There. Glinting beneath the glass coffee table. Wedged between a dog-eared Kama Sutra and a coaster shaped like a pineapple.
I retrieved it with my pen. Five carats of sexual curiosity, still gleaming with the faint aura of doggy style.
“You’re lucky I’m not the judging type,” I said.
“I’m lucky you’re not armed.”
“I am,” I muttered. "In several places."
I met the client at the usual place — the alley behind a vegan café where good food goes to die.
She clutched the ring like it was a baby and she’d just remembered the custody hearing.
“Oh thank God,” she said. “You’ve saved me. My marriage. Possibly my villa in Tuscany.”
I took the rest of my fee, lit a fresh cigarette, and watched her teeter off into the mist like a Chanel-scented war criminal.
Back in my office, I poured myself something brown and unforgiving and added another file to the cabinet marked Infidelity & Idiots.Some days you chase down murderers.
Other days, you fish wedding rings out from under furniture that still smells of elderflower lubricant and inherited trauma.
But a win’s a win.
And Ginny Greaves, Private Eye, always gets her woman.
Unless, of course, she’s already married to someone else.
© 2025 Sarnia de la Mare
www.sarniadelamare.com
