Acts of Violets (24 page)

“Um, Abby?”

“Hmm?”

“The lasagna?”

“Oh, right,” I murmured into the soft cotton front of his shirt. “I don’t want to hold up your dinner.” I also didn’t want to let him loose.

“I have an idea.”

About time.

He unwrapped my arms, walked to his desk, and picked up his phone. After punching in a number he said, “Ma? Set another place. I’m bringing a guest.”

M
arco opened the door of his office and waited for me to exit, but I couldn’t move because my legs had turned to ice. He wanted me to meet his mother
now
? I glanced down at the jeans and green shirt I’d worn all day, an outfit that had seen me through a visit to a bakery, a lunch at Rosie’s with accompanying onion odors, a shower of ashes, and probably some brightly colored down in my hair. Was that any way to meet the woman who might someday be my mother-in-law?

“Maybe we should do this some other time.”

“No time like the present.” He smiled that little Marco smile that tugged at my heart but did little to settle my nervous stomach. “You’ll be fine. She’ll love you.”

“In this outfit? She’ll think I’m a slob . . . or that you’ve picked up a stray . . . or that you’ve lost your mind.”

He tugged my elbow. “Come on. It’ll be painless. Don’t be one of those flighty females who thinks appearance is everything.”

“What does that mean? Is my appearance that bad?”

I allowed him to coax me out the door and down the hallway toward the bar as doubts crowded my mind. Did I have lip gloss in my purse? A comb? A breath mint? Was my blouse unbuttoned too far? Should I close it up to my neck? Were my feet clean? I hadn’t painted my toe-nails in weeks—no, months. Oh, wait. I had on my Adidas . . . my
scruffy
Adidas with a hole in the sole. How could I possibly meet his mother now?

When we entered the bar area I saw Videt still seated in the second booth with her back to me, but now there was a woman across from her. As we approached, I got a look at her companion’s face and made a quick grab for Marco’s arm, dragging him backward until we were hidden by five guys crowded around one girl on a barstool. (What was that about?)

“Look at the second booth, Marco. See that woman facing us? That’s Lily, a clown in Ryson’s troupe. The woman with her just bought flowers from me, and I think they’re for Lily.”

“So?”

“Just watch for a moment.”

Videt slid the cone-shaped bundle across the table toward Lily, who seemed pleasantly surprised, her mouth forming the words, “You shouldn’t have.” She unwrapped the flowers and lifted a blossom to her nose to inhale its fragrance.

“Why are we watching them?” Marco asked.

“I can’t put my finger on it, but something about those two bothers me. It’s that gut feeling I get. Do you have your little spy camera handy?”

“In my office.”

“Super. Go get it. I’ll chat them up while you take photos.”

I waited until he’d gone for the camera—a sleek, small, high-tech device that produced fast, clear prints on demand. Then, as he positioned himself at the far end of the bar, I made my way toward the front until I was almost past the second booth; then I glanced at them and pretended to be surprised. “Well, hello again.”

Videt tilted her curly head to study me through her thick black lashes, as though trying to place me. “Hello,” she said with an unfriendly sniff.

I ignored the snub and turned toward Lily. “And hello again to you, too, Lily. We met yesterday evening at the funeral home. I’m Abby Knight from Bloomers.”

“Of course Ah remember you, Abby. Always nice to see you.”

“How do you like your flowers?”

“Ah adore them.” She selected one of the long stems, then brushed a velvety rose across her cheek. “Violet is such a sweet thing.”

“They’re roses,” I said.

Lily gazed at me as if I had sprouted some of my mother’s neon feathers. “Yes, darlin’, Ah know it’s a rose.
She’s
Violet.” She pointed to her companion, who batted those lashes again.

Violet? Violet? Well, I’d been close. “Lily and Violet—both flower names. That’s quite a coincidence.”

“Lily is mah clown name,” Lily said. “Ah never cared for mah real name—Gertrude—after mah great aunt of the same name.”

“Horrid,” Violet said to her, wrinkling her nose.

“Are you both clowns, then?” I asked.

Violet slipped on her sunglasses just so she could push them down her nose and peer haughtily over the rims. “As I said before, I’m an
actress
. I do the clown gigs only on occasion.”

“Sorry. My mistake. You’re with Clowns-on-Call?”

“Yes, we are,” Lily said with a smile. “A clown for any occasion, as the ad goes.”

“Then you must have known Dennis Ryson, too,” I said to Violet.

“Yes,” Lily said with a sad sigh. “Wasn’t that a shame about his death?”

She was studying her purple fingernails as though the subject bored her. “
Some
people might say he
deserved
it,” she sang under her breath.

“Violet, hush now,” Lily said quietly. “You shouldn’t speak ill of the dead.”

They exchanged a quick glance, but I couldn’t tell what it meant. Did they know something more about Ryson’s death, or was it simply that Violet had disliked him? I had to get her to say more.

“Were you in the parade Saturday, too, Violet?”

She gave a sharp huff. “I
believe
I was one of the
stilt
walkers.”

A stilt walker. Hmm. Wasn’t that interesting? Stilts were made from long pieces of wood. What a handy weapon.

I thought back to what she’d written to Lily on her card, thanking her for
“sitting up with me all night Sunday and holding my hand, for helping me work through my shame, for putting up with my temper tantrums, and my ravings . . .”

A remorseful, bad-tempered, raving stilt walker. Was there any worse kind? Well, yes, there was, because apparently
this
one had to be consoled all Sunday night, conveniently just after Ryson’s murder. Was it a coincidence?

I suddenly remembered that Marco was supposed to be taking photos. I darted a quick glance over my shoulder and saw him standing behind the bar. He made a circling motion with his hand, then pointed to Violet. Ah. He needed her to turn toward him. How could I get her to do that?

I focused on an unsuspecting male seated on a far stool, then pointed to myself as if he were flirting with me. “Me? Now?” Both women craned their necks for a look, providing a perfect, full-faced mug shot.

When they turned back, I shrugged. “I guess he wasn’t interested after all.”

“What a surprise,” Violet muttered.

My thoughts exactly, only for a different reason. It seemed that Violet’s swiveling had caused her sweater to gape open half an inch, revealing a patch of dark curly hair. She saw my gaze and, with a look of horror, quickly adjusted the sweater, cinching the belt tighter at the waist.

Chest hair?

Her eyes narrowed, as though daring me to mention it. And now that I took a closer look at her, was that stubble showing through her makeup? And weren’t her curly tresses a bit too glossy to be real? Okay, then. Violet was a man.

“Was there anything else?” she said with obvious contempt.

I glanced back at Marco and he gave me a victory sign. Mission accomplished. “No, I think that will do it,” I said to them. “Nice chatting with you, um, girls. Enjoy your evening.”

As though I didn’t have a care in the world I strolled casually outside and started up the block. In a few moments, Marco came striding up behind me. He took my hand and placed the photos on my palm. “I don’t know if your gut feeling is right or not, but that was quick thinking on your part. I got four solid shots.”

I couldn’t help but beam. I loved hearing his praise, and there sure had been a lack of it lately. I shuffled through the stack, pleased to see that he’d managed to capture clear images of Violet and Lily. I wasn’t too pleased that I was in two of them, with my mouth open, but then my mouth was usually open.

I showed Marco one of the photos. “Take a closer look at this woman.”

“What am I looking for?”

“Try a wig and a five-o’clock shadow. Violet is a
man
, Marco. She—or he—is in the same clown troupe that Ryson was in—
and
she’s a stilt walker. A stilt walker!” I glanced at the cars parked along the street. “And just maybe she owns the white Mustang, too.”

“Where are you going with this?”

Boy, was he slow today. “Stilts are made from pieces of wood, right? Going by what Greg Morgan told me at lunch—”

“You had lunch with Motormouth?”

“Motormouth. Good one. Yes, I did have lunch with him. It was on my list of things to tell you. Anyway, Morgan said there were wood fibers in Ryson’s head wound, so as soon as Violet said she was a stilt walker, I made the connection. One of her stilts could have been the murder weapon. Think about it, Marco. She could be the mystery girl in the Mustang.”

“Way too many leaps there, Sunshine. First of all, does she have a motive? Second, even if she owns the Mustang, none of Ryson’s neighbors reported seeing it there Sunday. And third, Violet is a male, and I don’t think Ryson swung that way.”

Three valid points. But I had one of my own. “What if Violet came on to Ryson and he rebuffed her? Wouldn’t that be a motive? You know Grace’s saying: ‘Hell hath no fury like a woman—or guy in drag—scorned.’ It could be purely coincidental, but it’s worth investigating. What do we have to lose?” (Precious time, if I was wrong.) “Sometimes you have to think outside the box, Marco.”

“
I
have to think outside the box?”

I tucked the photos in my purse. “Tomorrow I’ll show these snapshots to Ryson’s neighbors to see if anyone recognizes either woman. I’d bet good money that Violet is the mystery girlfriend.” I craned my neck for another look at the cars. “I don’t see a Mustang here, but it could be in one of the public lots.”

All at once, I saw my excuse for missing his mother’s dinner. “You know what I should do? I should drive through all the parking lots around the square to see if the Mustang is there. Even better, I can do a stakeout of the bar and follow both women when they leave. So you go on home and I’ll hang out on the bench across the street.”

“Nice try, Sunshine, but you’re not getting out of dinner that easily. My mother is expecting a guest. You don’t want to disappoint her, do you?”

“I think your mother would understand that finding a killer to save your backside is a little more important than her lasagna.”

“You don’t know my mother.”

He also didn’t know how sexy his backside was. “I can’t just leave Violet and Lily here, Marco. Who knows when this opportunity will come up again?”

He pulled out his cell phone and made a call. “Chris? Hey, man, do you see the two women in booth two? I need to know what make of vehicles they’re driving. Will you take care of it? Great.”

He shut his phone and looked at me. “
Now
are you ready?”

Would I ever be ready to meet his mother?

With his hand on the small of my back, Marco guided me toward Lincoln. We had just rounded the corner and were ready to step off the curb when Marco tugged me to a quick stop and pointed up the block. “There’s your white Mustang.”

I followed the direction of his index finger. Pay dirt! Quickly, I took off toward the rusty Ford, with Marco right behind. While he walked around to the rear of the car to get the license plate number, I peered through a dirty glass window on the passenger’s side, glimpsing about a week’s worth of fast-food containers, disposable cups, and crumpled napkins. And was that the end of a stilt poking through the litter in the backseat?

“Marco, take a look inside. Do you see a piece of wood with a metal foot plate on the end? That has to be one of Violet’s stilts.”

He cupped his hands around his eyes for a better view through the window. “I see it. It looks broken.”

I wiped the grimy glass with my hand, then took another peek. Sure enough, the wood appeared to have splintered about two feet up from the foot plate. But what caused the break? Had it been used on Ryson’s head? I yanked on the door handle but it didn’t budge. “Can you pop the lock?”

“Forget it. Just my luck a cop would see me.”

“But I need to have the wood tested. Wait. I know. I’ll call Reilly and have him get a search warrant.” I started to dig in my purse, but Marco stopped me.

“On what grounds?”

“Suspicion of murder.”

“How do you know Violet didn’t fall during a performance and damage the stilt?”

He took the wind so far out of my sails that my boat sank. But he was right. I should have known better. Then again, there was a reason I’d flunked those law classes.

Marco tore a piece of paper off his notepad and handed it to me. “Here’s the license plate number. Have Eileen trace it. Then call Dave to see if he’s heard anything more about the cause of that blow to Ryson’s head. The crime scene team should be able to determine if the coffee table was the culprit.
Then
we’ll know if you should investigate Violet. And
now
we’ll go to dinner.”