A Dress to Die For (20 page)

“Hello?” Laura called. “Jobeth?”

The closet doors were open, wire hangers left dangling and plastic dry cleaning bags twisted around the poles and bunched on the floors. The kitchen was unchanged, except that every personal artifact had been removed, right down to the garbage pails and drain catch. Ruby called out for Jobeth but received no answer. The place was empty.

“Well,” Ruby said, “this sucks.”

Laura strolled down the hall and found a brown leather shoebox with white topstitching at the bottom of the only hanger-and-plastic-bag-free closet in the apartment. The box sat in the exact center of the doorway, parallel to all sides around it. Not a haphazard placement.

“Ruby!”

Ruby ran around the corner and stopped in front of the closet. “Oh! A vintage Jose Inuego shoebox. Those go for, like, seven hundred dollars on eBay.”

“What if there are shoes in it?”

“No one would leave those behind.”

“I tried on a pair when I was here with her. The princess’s shoes. They were in that box.”

“And you’re staring at it.”

“If there are shoes in there, then she left them for me, which means she expected me. I’m going to feel really toyed with, and it’s going to be very awkward.”

Ruby pushed the box with her toe. It moved. She pushed it again. It moved farther. “I think there are shoes in there.” She flicked her toe upward, and the box lid flopped to the floor. There were most certainly shoes in there—a pair of four-inch Jose Inuego stilettos barely worn by their original owner and worn once in a kitchen.

Laura scooped up the box. The shoes lay inside the linen tissue paper. She searched around the tissue paper and found a fresh round clementine, otherwise known as a Cutie. It could have been one of the little fruits Laura had helped scoop up in the hall, and it was unlikely it had fallen in there by accident.

“If you don’t take them, I will,” Ruby grumbled.

Laura took them. She was, after all, only flesh and blood.

**

According to Jimmy’s voicemail, Mom was going to need breakfast. She was permitted Jell-O and little else. Naturally, the strawberry flavor at the hospital was too tasty for Mom, and Laura and Jimmy had strategized at eleven at night over the phone to mix lemon Jell-O with half-clear gelatin because the woman had to eat. He was a good guy, that Jimmy. It was about time Mom got lucky in love.

At midnight, Laura stood in the middle of Jeremy’s spotless kitchen, trying to figure out if he owned useful things like bowls, mixers, and measuring cups, and if so, where the hell he’d put them. Jeremy wasn’t much of a cook, so his kitchen was always spotless. They made coffee there, drank wine at the table, and stored takeout in the fridge. They’d made love against the counter twice, on the floor once, and started plenty of encounters on the barstools. But the room wasn’t used for much else.

Having located the requisite bowls and spoons, she made the Jell-O without ceremony. No music. No TV. Just her measuring cups, bags of powder, and the faucet.

And of course, a box containing a pair of two thousand dollar shoes lay on the counter. Once the bowl was in the fridge, she took out the shoes. They were every bit as gorgeous as she remembered, and when she slipped them on, she reminded herself that they hadn’t been made for her, nor had they been made for the princess. They were made beautifully, and beautifully made things were made with the illusion that they came off the line for you and you only. The shoes seduced Laura with their touch, their umami smell, and the caress of their curves. The roan color of the leather next to the wood inlay of the soles created a visual, tonal harmony that gave the skin of Laura’s feet a hue that glowed with health. The angle of the heel to the floor elongated her legs, curving her calves in such a way as to fit perfectly in the palm of a man’s hand.

“Nice shoes,” she said as she turned sideways in the mirror. “Really.”

Nice shoes to leave in an empty closet in the hope someone she had met once would stumble upon them. It was something a woman would do if she thought she could buy another pair sometime, because she had so much money she could give such a gift.

Jobeth was set to get the insurance money for the dress, wasn’t she? How many million? On Jeremy’s bond, no less. That was going to hurt him, and he was already stretched thin, with no backing but his own finances.

Had Jobeth heard Laura was trying to find the dress? Had Cangemi mentioned it, maybe? Had Jobeth called the detective about the woman who came by uninvited and asking questions? Was Jobeth trying to buy her silence with a pair of nice shoes? Oh, no. That would not do, not at all.

At the very thought, Laura felt a stickiness of sweat underfoot, and a pinch where leather met toe. The ball of her foot was hot from friction, and she needed nothing more than to kick off the shoes and stuff them back in the box.

**

Laura wore a yellow damask blouse with a mandarin collar and a new closure she and Ruby had developed that zipped up in pure supple silence. The closure tape was forty dollars an inch.

They’d needed Jeremy’s permission to put it on, and when he saw the shirt on Kelly, he touched it and said, “I’d get slaughtered if I put this on my line.”

Laura felt Ruby stiffen at the suggestion that he’d use their development.

He had stepped away and addressed them. “Do this. You have to. Add a short sleeve in this fabric to get you some wiggle room on the price of this one, but do it.”

So Laura wore the yellow short-sleeved sample because he’d recognize it.

She made up her face with utmost care. An infectious smile became mandatory throughout the morning. Jeremy was coming home, and though the circumstances around his early return were less than optimal, he was still going to be back in a matter of hours.

“Don’t you look nice,” Mom said, her head propped on a pillow. “Hot date?”

“Thank you, and yes.”

Laura put a cloth napkin under Mom’s chin and spooned breakfast into her mouth. The gelatin had come out perfect, light yellow enough to be considered white and borderline tasteless. Laura had brought it to the hospital in a little porcelain cup she’d found in the back of Jeremy’s bottom cabinet, and she was feeding it to Mom with a stainless spoon from his drawer. Her mother seemed worse, weaker.

“What are they giving you for the pain?” Laura asked.

“Oh, I don’t want that stuff. It gives me a headache.”

“Mom, really?”

Mom patted her hand. “When it’s too much, I’ll take it. I can manage this.”

“Barney’s sister disappeared,” Laura said. “I mean, I’m sure she’ll turn up when the insurance company needs to write her a check, but I went there last night and poof. Gone.”

“Ruby said you found a bead?” Mom said around the spoon.

“Teardrop cabochon.”

Mom nodded. She’d been intimate with the beads.

Laura asked, “Did you hear what happened to Barney and Henrietta?”

Mom shook her head.

“I’ll tell you, but it’s ugly.”

“I just had my heart cut open.”

“Barney shot Henrietta fifteen years ago, about when Soso came, then killed himself. I’m not trying to dump it on you, but I thought you’d have some insight.”

“Nothing. I feel sorry. That’s all.”

“How do you like your breakfast?”

“Delicious.”

Laura scraped the bottom of the cup. “Aren’t you glad you stopped hanging out with those people? I mean, imagine, you run back to Brunico with Samuel, bringing Ruby and me along, and you might have gone crazy, too. Or be dead. And then what?”

Mom leaned back. She looked tired.

Laura fluffed her pillow and helped her get the bed down.

“Go to work,” Mom said. “You’re making me crazy.”

CHAPTER 14

The email situation was horrendous. Jeremy must have worked through the night to make up for what Laura had missed while Mom was hospitalized because he’d looked at every one and answered where appropriate. Patterns and orders were shifting over to New Sunny Garments, and there were glitches, delays, and misunderstandings. A typo on an elastic code was going to cost them, as was an Italian interfacing where the EU duty to China hadn’t been calculated. Federated wanted chargebacks on stuff they put on sale a week earlier than they’d been contracted, and there was a delay getting the origin labels into the back necks of blouses.

But Laura’s mood would not be soured. She did what she could and walked to her ten-thirty fitting as if she wore cloud-soled shoes. Her phone rang on the way. “Hi, Barry. I’m walking into a fitting.”

“You want me,” he said. “Let me take you out tonight, and I can give you more reasons why.”

“Dean’s going to get jealous.”

“It’s not Dean you’re worried about, darling.” He changed his tone. “Let’s stop joking. I have to set this thing up. If I’m totally out, just say it. I need to get moving on the IPO.”

Laura stopped outside the fit room door. “No. You’re not out. But Jeremy’s coming back in a few hours, so I can’t meet tonight. Tomorrow. Lunch?”

“Oh, sweet darling, that is just—”

“I haven’t decided, Barry. So don’t get your bra in a bunch. It’s just not a definite no.”

“I like a challenge.”

**

By afternoon, her excitement at Jeremy’s return had abated completely. She sat in the conference room overlooking Broadway, the perfect shine of the table reflecting the dim day outside. Iggy from Theosophy Studio stood on the other side of the twenty-foot long table, showing her geometric prints for next year’s Winter deliveries. Print studios hired artists to come up with patterns based on certain trends or their own inspiration. The hundreds of prints were stacked and placed into a suitcase, and a salesman brought them around town. One print could cost between seven hundred and two thousand dollars. She wanted to see the stacks first, because if she got to the bottom of the pile, she was looking at a bunch of industry rejects. Iggy, who had known Ruby through a mutual friend, always came to Jeremy first. He moved the sixteen-by-twenty sheets like a slideshow on the table as Laura stood over them. One print became another and another; piles became stacks. Laura pulled out the things she liked for either Jeremy or Ruby to sort through and edit. She sipped coffee, chatting about this model and that designer, who was selling and who was selling out.

When the door opened, an ocean breeze seemed to blow in.

“Afternoon,” Jeremy said.

“Hi,” she said.

He moved like the breeze, too, shaking hands with Iggy and stepping forward to stand over the prints, perfect in his shawl-collar sweater over a shirt and tie.

She inched toward him, leaning in a way that she hoped was imperceptible, and she felt him inch in her direction. They were like boats keening on complementary tides.

“You missed the florals,” Iggy said. “Should I start over?”

Jeremy turned to Laura. “Did you find anything?”

She did. She found the curve of his jaw stunning and the heat of his brown eyes overwhelming, and she missed him ten times more with him beside her again. “I put some things to the side for Saint JJ. Nothing for JSJ. And you can’t even look at what I took for Sartorial, or Ruby’s going to kill you.”

Iggy laughed, but Jeremy reached for her stack. He did it on purpose, so they could be close for that one second.

She scooped up her Sartorial prints and held them to her chest. “Back off.”

Iggy took out his last stack of prints, pushing one to the side to show the one underneath, then the next and the next. Jeremy spoke about his trip and the flight home, pulling a couple of things. While they stood side by side with their hands on the table, his pinky found hers, and she almost forgot to look at the art in front of her. When the deal was done, they had Tracy show Iggy out.

“How’s your mother?” Jeremy asked when they were alone in the conference room, door closed and locked. He stood six feet from her, jetlagged and unshaven.

“Sick, weak, and in pain.” She hated herself for being drawn to him, for wanting his hands on her, for imagining only the body under his clothes when she was talking about her mother’s discomfort.

He stepped forward. “Do you need to go see her? I can take care of things here.”

“Ruby’s there.” She moved toward him, holding out her hand.

He slid his hand into hers and pulled her a step closer. His palm was warm, and it slid out of her hand and to her cheek. He kissed her, the hair on his upper lip dragging against hers hard enough to make her wince. He pushed her against the table.

“No, you don’t,” she gasped. “It’s the middle of the day. Everyone’s here.”

“I missed you.”

“I didn’t think about you once.” But his face was in her neck, and between the pleasure of his lips and pain of the hair on his chin, she didn’t know whether to push him away or pull him closer.

“You need to see these factories,” he whispered. “Fortieth Street’s a sample room for these people. Their operation’s so clean, it’s scary.”

“Jeremy...”

He pulled away. “I’m sorry.” But his smile told her he wasn’t. Not really.

“We have a lot to talk about,” she said, brushing her fingertips against his cheek.