Behind the Seams (28 page)

I brought up Miles and the phone message. “I tried to call him this morning but got his voice mail. I’m hoping whatever he remembered is some kind of amazing information that points to Robyn’s killer,” I said. Nell was incredulous that not only did Robyn have a brother, but she seemed to have cared about him.

Bob came over with a tray of drinks just as I told them about the charity event. Nell let out a loud groan.

“I forgot about that. I was supposed to be there,” Nell said, her tone drooping. “It’s supposed to be fabulous. It was going to be my chance to go to Palm Springs. Everyone was getting hotel rooms and everything. I heard from the other production assistants that it’s really an event for the show. Since Barbara Olive Overton is one of the sponsors, she gets to look like a good guy, she gets a big tax write off, and she has a lot of her upcoming guests there and gets clips to use in their background pieces, which again point out what a good guy Barbara is. Everybody is going to be there but me,” she said with a pout.

“Who is everyone?” CeeCee said. “I wasn’t invited.”

“That’s because you already were on the show. They don’t need any film on you.”

“Mason said his law firm was probably buying a block of tickets,” I said.

“Does that mean you’re going?” Dinah said.

“Mason isn’t going, but maybe I can get a couple of tickets,” I said to Dinah. “It would give us a chance to talk to Robyn’s parents.”

“I bet they’re super-VIP tickets,” Adele said. “Like right by the head table where Barbara will be sitting.” I saw Adele’s mind working. “Pink, I have to go, too. It’s my big chance to get her to see the light about crochet. We have to do something before she does the knitting show.”

“I’m not even sure I’m going,” I said by way of an excuse.

Nell sidled close to me. “If I could talk to Barbara herself, I bet I could get my job back. She’s always talking about injustices. How about my getting forced into a leave of absence is really a big one.” She took my arm. “I know you said you don’t have the tickets for sure, but if you do, can I go with?”

I was trying to think of a nice way to tell her it was a bad idea when D. J. came up to the table. He smiled at Nell in a flirty manner and reminded her that they’d met before. “Sorry for eavesdropping,” he said, “but I couldn’t help but overhear. I didn’t realize why I got the invite from Barbara for the golf thing, but I’m sure you’re right. It’s all about getting another clip for my background piece. They said I could bring a guest.” Nell was all set to accept, but CeeCee gave her one of her cease-and-desist shakes of her head.

At the same time, a woman at the counter recognized CeeCee. I’d seen it happen before. People always stared a little too long. A moment later, the woman left her ice tea sitting on the counter and walked over to the table.

“Oh, Ms. Collins, I’ve been watching you since I was a girl,” she said, eyeing her with reverence. CeeCee changed her expression in a split second and smiled sweetly, despite the
since she was a girl
comment. The woman meant well, but it made CeeCee sound older than dust.

“Did you make that?” the woman squealed touching the small purple purse CeeCee was holding. She had just attached a tiny white flower with an iridescent crystal in the middle.

Eduardo came in from the bookstore. “Are we meeting here now?” he said, looking over the overflowing table.

Adele stood up and grabbed her work. “No, c’mon, everyone, let’s go to the yarn department where we have some room.” CeeCee gave her an annoyed flick of her eyes. Even after all this time, Adele was still trying to take charge of the group.

The coffee had done its job and I felt like myself again. Just as I prepared to get up, Mrs. Shedd came in and looked around.

“There she is,” she said as Annie Hoover stepped from behind her. If I had looked awful, the nanny looked worse. The two kids I’d seen her with at the park trailed her.

“It’s Miles,” Annie said. “He’s dead.”

I HADN’T NOTICED AT FIRST THAT ANNIE HAD more with her than the kids. Then I saw the man and woman in dark suits. They flashed badges and I told the rest of the Hookers to go on without me. It turned out to be without Adele as well. The man glommed on to Adele, not that she seemed to mind. I watched as she puffed up with importance and wondered if he knew what he was in for. The woman introduced herself as Detective Henderson and explained she was an investigator with the sheriff’s department. She was all friendly as she led me outside and said she’d like to ask me a few questions to clarify things. She opened the passenger door of her sedan and gestured for me to get in. The door shut almost before I’d cleared it. She got in the driver’s seat and took out her pad. She asked me about the previous day.

“I went to the halfway house with Annie to help teach a certain crochet technique,” I said. “What happened to Miles?” She ignored my question. Not a surprise, I knew by now that the law enforcement people tried to keep all the questioning in their hands.

“Ms. Hoover said you were interested in talking to Miles. Why is that?”

I dreaded telling her I was investigating Robyn’s death. Along with not wanting to answer questions, law enforcement people weren’t all that fond of amateur investigators. The detective just stared at me, waiting for an answer. Finally I just told her the truth. It didn’t go over very well, particularly when it was obvious I was investigating to try to prove the cops were wrong.

She had her notebook open and was scribbling down notes. I asked again what had happened to Miles. She was getting impatient and must have realized she might have to give some information to get some.

“He ODed,” she said curtly. “We’re trying to find out how he got the drugs. Ms. Hoover mentioned that you’d given him a crocheted doll. We found it in his room. The back was cut open as if something had been stashed inside.”

“What?” I said in an incredulous tone. This wasn’t good. I suddenly felt vulnerable. Had I been set up? “I don’t know anything about anything,” I said. The detective gave me a disbelieving look and said nothing, and I knew she was using the dead-air technique. But two could play that game. I just sat there and let the silence hang like a stone in the air. She finally cracked.

“Where’d you get the doll? Why did you give it to him? When did you put the drugs in?”

“I don’t have anything else to say,” I said.

“I’m just trying to clear things up,” she said in a friendly voice. When I held my ground, she excused herself and went back into the café. Through the window, I watched as she waved to the detective who was questioning Adele to confer with her.

She doesn’t know who she’s dealing with, I thought. This was all a ploy and I knew exactly what she was going to say when she came back. She didn’t let me down, either. “You might as well just tell me the whole story. Your friend just gave you up,” she said with a triumphant air.

For a split second, I wondered if it was true. But then when the detective claimed that Adele had said I’d put drugs in the doll and given Robyn the poisoned sweetener, I knew it was just a detective’s trick. Her partner probably said something similar to Adele. There was something wrong about them being able to lie like that, but I knew they did it.

“You’re not going to deny that you were present when the victim’s sister was poisoned are you?” she said. I admitted to being there, but that was all. She tried to work me some more, but I just stonewalled her. I’d learned enough about how cops worked from Barry to know that saying nothing was my best defense, but I also knew that this wasn’t going to be the end of it.

Finally Detective Henderson left. Annie was sitting in the café with her charges. She looked worried. Adele was sitting with her and gave me a suspicious look as I sat down.

“Pink, I can’t believe you fingered me,” she said.

“I didn’t. That’s just a detective’s trick to try to get confessions. I didn’t finger you any more than you fingered me,” I said. Adele suddenly avoided my eye and looked down at the table. “You did finger me, didn’t you?” I said incredulous.

“I’m sorry, Pink, that detective got me in the corner. I might have mentioned that you were there when Robyn died. He said they were going to arrest me and there’d be no judge to set bail and I’d be stuck in a cell for days.”

“Arrest you for what?” I threw up my hands. “Nobody gets it, the cops don’t have to tell the truth.”

Adele threw herself across the table and almost tackled me with her hug. “Can you forgive me, Pink?” When I took a moment to answer, she got hysterical. “You have to, we’re like sisters.”

Finally I let her off the hook and she left the café to go back to the yarn department. Annie said she had to get the two kids to some kind of event and gathered them up, along with their chocolate milk. I watched them go out the door as I pulled out my BlackBerry

“Sunshine,” Mason said in a happy voice when he picked up the call. No delay this time, as soon as his assistant heard it was me, he put me through. “How are you doing? Do you need some consoling?” he said.

“Not exactly, more like legal help.” I told him about Miles and my visit from the sheriff’s investigator. I could practically hear Mason sitting taller on the phone as he told me what to do. Basically, if the sheriff’s people came back, I was to say nothing and call him. I knew it wasn’t a matter
if
, it was more like
when
. Before he signed off, he suggested we get together to talk strategy, maybe over dinner.

When I finally got back to the yarn department, the group had scattered and only Dinah was still there. “What happened?” she said, reading my expression.

If only I’d been able to take Miles’ call. A thought went through my mind. What if somebody didn’t want me to hear what he had to say?

AFTER THE WHOLE THING WITH BARRY AND NOW being almost accused of providing drugs to Miles, I did the only thing I could do, which was totally put it out of my mind and focus on work. I stayed late at the bookstore to make up for all the lost time. There was plenty to do. We were still cleaning up from Salute to Chocolate. The vanillites had turned out to be peaceful enough, but after they left, I’d begun to notice they’d left bits of vanilla beans everywhere. It was both good and bad. The good part was the bits of bean smelled better than any air freshener you could buy and added a gentle fragrance to the whole place, but the bad part was people had started complaining about being startled when they came across some little brown things they thought were bug parts.

There were books to be put back as well. At least the evening had been a success. Mrs. Shedd and Mr. Royal were both still smiling about the money the store had taken in. If we kept these events happening, maybe we could pull the bookstore back from the brink of disaster. I was running on autopilot by then and was relieved when I got home.

When I walked in, Samuel was in the kitchen grilling a cheese sandwich for himself. The scent of browning butter reminded me that I had forgotten all about eating again. Spatula in hand, he turned toward me.

“I’m not planning on staying here forever,” he said.

“I know,” I said. I wanted to give his sandy hair a reassuring ruffle, but he was too big for that. “There’s no reason to move out until you find the right situation.”

He flipped his sandwich on a plate and offered to make me a cup of coffee. He didn’t have to say it, but I knew what the offer meant—that I looked like a zombie. He was a professional barista, and making a cup of coffee was an art for him.

I might have been coffeed out from the black-eye and subsequent red-eyes I’d had at work, but I knew if I said no, it would hurt his feelings. I sat down at the kitchen table and watched as he set up a cone filter over a mug and poured in freshly ground coffee and boiling water. The fragrance of the brewing drink overrode the buttery smell of his sandwich.

“Barry came by,” he said. I could hear Samuel swallow from across the room, a sure sign he was uncomfortable about the subject. “He said he’d forgotten some stuff.” Samuel left the statement hanging as if to ask if it was okay that he’d let Barry go through the house. I told him it was fine. “He left that,” Samuel said when he brought the cup of coffee to me. I hadn’t noticed the key sitting on the table until Samuel pointed it out. It was all alone, no note. Somehow more than anything else, seeing the key meant
the end
. Tears clouded my vision.

“I’m sorry,” Samuel said in a low voice, seeing how I was staring at the key. It was an odd feeling having him trying to console me. I’d always been the one offering sympathy when he’d had a setback.

The doorbell interrupted us. Samuel went to answer it, and a moment later, he returned with Mason. He took one look at me and appeared concerned.

“Don’t even say it. I know how bad I look.”

Mason had a supportive smile. “You look fine, just a little tired. No worries. I’m here to take care of everything.” He appeared too refreshed, too happy. He eyed my coffee and Samuel offered to make him a cup. There was definitely something different in Mason’s vibe. He hugged me in greeting and then joined me at the table and started talking about dinner.

I saw Samuel glance over from his coffee preparations. There was disapproval in his expression. I suppose it did look like one guy out and another one already taking his place. Samuel brought over Mason’s coffee and sat down with us. He began to eat his sandwich while Mason launched into how to handle the sheriff’s detective.

“What happened now?” Samuel asked, clearly distressed. Mason answered for me and told Samuel what he needed to know—that there was nothing to worry about. “They’re just rattling cages, looking for someone to blame. I don’t know how that halfway house is run, but I’m pretty sure if he was a counselor, he wasn’t a prisoner of the place. If they were going to try to pin it on anybody, I’d think it would be the nanny.” He told me again that if they contacted me to refuse to say anything until I talked to him.