Blackbird 02 - Dead Girls Don't Wear Diamonds (4 page)

"Coming right up."

Alone for a moment, I gauged the party. All my life I'd been trained to listen to party noise and make instant judgements.

This one felt forced. I could see young men of the cigar and martini set talking football in the middle of the action while a few older gents demonstrated their putting technique in corners. Overdressed young women displayed their toned abs center stage, and the older women . . . were absent. Several Sixers basketball players and their hangers-on sprawled gangsta style on the couches and watched a gargantuan television set.

I knew at once it was the wrong crowd. No old pals had been called to celebrate Oliver's rise to national political stature. Instead, young scavengers seemed to sniff the wind as the old lion prepared to leave his long-held territory. The Old Money crowd, loyal to Oliver's first wife, perhaps, had stayed home.

The Cooper house might have been the Biltmore on the outside, but inside it was another story. Pony-skin upholstery was my first clue that Doe had done the decorating herself instead of hiring someone who would have known how to spend generously but with taste. Saddle blankets adorned the second-floor
railings. A chandelier made of elk antlers shone light onto a Native American-style carpet. Paintings of Appaloosa horses hung over cases of Pueblo Indian pottery and kachina dolls. Nothing was synthetic, yet it looked unnatural in eastern Pennsylvania. It all looked expensive, but trendy and a little tacky. Like Doe.

The place was the kind of playground that might have been built by a college fraternity that had just won the lottery. It was hardly, I thought, the home of an up-and-coming statesman. I wondered if Oliver was relieved to be leaving his shiny new home behind.

Once again I mused that Annabelle Cooper should have been standing proudly beside her husband in his moment of triumph. Instead, Doe seemed to be presiding over a disco for denizens of the Playboy mansion.

In the crowd, I spotted my friend Jill Mascione, whose family owned Main Events, the catering company. Her family had been throwing parties for my family since the two of us were old enough to switch car keys in the pockets of the coats tossed across my bed. Rather than tending the bar in her usual tuxedo, my childhood partner in crime balanced a tray of empty glasses as she wove through the throng in a miniskirt. She grinned as I looked askance at her outfit and raised my brows.

"I borrowed it from my sister. What are you doing here? Hardly your crowd."

"Working, of course. Give me the short version."

"On the party? Well, Yale Bailey wants to know if we have Jell-O shots." Jill rolled her eyes.

"At least the food looks good." I noted that cocktails, canapes and dinner seemed to be circulating at the same time, with the waitstaff encouraging guests
to take small plates to various chairs and small tables around the room.

"Doe's trying to pull off a
dinatoire,"
Jill reported, which I knew was a hostess's tactic to avoid the agony of a seating chart. Especially in a crowd that mixed so many walks of life and levels of the social strata, someone was certain to be offended by the hierarchy of arranged seating. The
dinatoire
should have solved that dilemma, but it also risked irritating even more people if they perceived the social slight of inadequate deference by the hostess.

"But Doe also wanted roasted meats, to make things more difficult," Jill continued. "Ever try to carve a rib roast, standing up?"

Just as the words were out of Jill's mouth, I saw a young waitress bobble a spit of meat as she braced it on a dish she'd set down on a coffee table. The slab of greasy beef slipped and landed in the lap of a very drunk professional basketball player. For an instant I thought he was going to slap her.

Jill sped off in that direction, and I saw her send the waitress back to the kitchen while she devoted herself to apologies.

"Hey, Nora! Lookin' good!"

I turned. "Hello, Yale."

Yale, the general manager of an Atlantic City casino, had one arm draped around a woman I knew from my Junior League days and his other arm around a very young girl I didn't recognize. They roadblocked me, the two women smirking. Yale had a Donald Trump lip curl, too—womanizing and arrogant. He said, "Where's your sister Emma? I haven't laid eyes on her in months."

"Busy," I reported, immediately put off by his implied lust for my sister. "How about you?"

He unwound his arm from the Junior Leaguer and reached for my hand. "Never too busy to party."

His grip was part handshake, part hand kiss, but it hurt me. Men who squeeze a woman's hand until the bones crunch always make my antenna go up. But I was damned if I'd let him see me wince. I said, "Nice to see you," and as soon as he released me, I turned away as if distracted by the rest of the party.

I heard him laugh. "Guess she's got a touch of PMS."

"Someone you know?" Jack asked, reappearing in record time with a glass of wine for me and a bottle of beer for himself, which he used to indicate Yale's departure.

"Mostly by reputation," I replied, glad to distance myself from Yale. "Thank you for the drink."

"That was the casino manager, right? What's his reputation?"

I smiled. "That he gambles with women."

Yale had more fiancees than most men have tennis shoes, but I didn't share the details with Jack.

"Doe says you're a reporter."

"You've been warned about me?"

He managed to smile and look pained at the same time. "I'm sorry Doe couldn't have been a little more subtle."

"So you've been assigned to 'ride herd' on me for the evening, too?"

"Only until I get a handle on what you're going to say about Oliver."

It seemed silly to play games with a man who had such an intelligent gaze. I said, "Let me be honest, too. I'm a society reporter caught between the proverbial rock and the receiving line. If I write rude things about these people, they'll never invite me
back. And how can I do my job if I'm not invited? I'm here only to spread the buzz about Oliver."

"Like we say in Kentucky, just so the buzz isn't a chainsaw."

I laughed. "Only the good stuff, I promise."

"I'm sorry to hear that," Jack replied, broadening his smile. "It means I technically don't have to spend any more time with you."

"On the other hand," I said, charmed by his gentlemanly flirtation, "I suppose I could look around for some dirt."

His turn to laugh. "That's more like it. Shall we find some place quieter to talk? Have you been out to the landing strip yet?"

We headed through one of the arches and passed down a cavernous hall where a bar had been set up. Around it, a crowd jostled for drinks and advantageous conversation partners. I recognized a Delaware congressman as he spoke with a very pretty local interior designer, and a mayoral staffer chatting up a fickle campaign contributor.

Jack and I passed the bar and wound our way along a corridor to stained-glass French doors that opened onto the terraced patio. Outside, it was quiet. The summer awning had been removed for the season, but the framework remained overhead. Teak armchairs were still grouped around a handsome matching table with lighted candles flickering inside glass chimneys. Wide stone steps led down to the airstrip, and we strolled down to the planes parked along the grass. Another plane was coming in for a landing. We watched it touch down in the gathering dusk.

I said, "More guests arriving the Cooper way. Did you fly up from Washington?"

Jack strolled beside me. "Yes, I came with Oliver after his meeting with the president."

"Are you one of the Red Barons?"

He looked politely curious. "Who?"

"With your own plane. The Red Baron Supper Club—well, it's not really a club. Just friends of the Cooper boys, all private pilots. They meet for dinner one night a month."

"Ah, yes." He nodded. "I have heard about those guys. They fly their own planes to airport restaurants for dinner, right? I just didn't know they had a name."

"Last month I believe they all flew to a restaurant at an airport near Memphis. Nothing fancy. They say flying is the fun part."

"I believe Yale Bailey, the casino manager, is a member."

"Yes, I think so."

The roar of the taxiing plane cut off our conversation, so Jack pointed at one of the parked jets ahead of us. We could see the logo of Yale's casino painted on the tail. We walked over to it together. The narrow gangway had been left down, and the plane's interior lights were turned on.

Jack raised his voice over the engine noise of the plane that taxied closer. "We can't seem to get away from the noise. Want to take a look inside?"

"Think Yale would mind?"

Jack grinned. "He left it open. Let's go."

I climbed up the steps and ducked my head to enter the corporate plane. It was smaller than the charter jets I had flown in when invited on vacations with some of my old friends. I expected the usual in aircraft luxury—lacquered paneling, plush upholstery and all the amenities of a sumptuous hotel
suite. I'd endured endless discussions on the subject of private jet decor and knew interior decoration was part of the cache.

But Yale Bailey's jet looked like none other I'd ever seen. Poisonous green shag carpet was underfoot, and a full bar glittered with glassware and bottles. One of the luxurious couches was opened into a bed as if ready for Agent 007 to seduce the latest Bond girl. The sheets were black satin and untidy. An airborne bachelor pad.

"Who is he kidding?" I asked.

Jack glanced around the cabin. "Looks like the Red Barons know how to enjoy themselves."

"Trust me. This isn't what the other planes look like."

He tried out one of the armchairs, politely putting his back to the unmade bed. "You've attended their dinners?"

"I was someone's date a few times."

"Flan's?"

I shouldn't have been surprised. No doubt Jack Priestly had done a lot of research on Oliver and his family. I sat down opposite him in another armchair. "No. Flan and I haven't been an item for many years. It was a friend of his—Jamie Scaithe. We dated after I was with Flan but before I was married."

"Jamie Scaithe . . ." Jack said, frowning.

It was a prompt for me to say more, and I noted again how sneaky he was at prying information from me. I changed the subject by saying, "Tell me why you're here instead of enjoying the bright lights of Washington this evening. Or is that top secret?"

"The lights aren't very bright these days because everybody goes to bed before ten." He crossed one leg over the other and glanced out the cabin window as the other plane shut down its engines. "I'm here
to prep Oliver for the hearings. And to meet his friends, get to know his family a little better."

" 'Fess up," I teased. "You've read background checks on all of us, haven't you?"

He turned away from the window and looked at me with a smile. "I read a few reports on the plane coming up, yes. It's not the most interesting way to meet people. I'd much rather have a native guide. If you're an old friend of the family, for instance, I suppose you already know everybody."

"You make me feel like Pocahontas."

"So tell me." He nodded in the direction of the new plane. "Is that Cher climbing down from that private jet? Or a drag queen?"

It didn't take even a glance for me to understand whom he was asking about. Stepping out of her plane was a tall, gaunt woman elaborately swathed in several Hermes scarves. She lugged an expensive cosmetics case and wore very large sunglasses.

I said, "That's Tempeste, Oliver's half sister—or maybe a cousin. I'm not sure. Tempeste Juarez is her name. Pretty terrifying, don't you think?"

The daunting woman in question finished her cigarette with one sucking pull and flicked away the butt with her long fingernails as she descended the gangway steps. Tempeste's long, youthful legs were encased in tight black trousers, her upper body enfolded in a black-and-white zebra-print scarf. She had wrapped another flowing scarf around her neck, perhaps to hide a few wrinkles but also to give the impression of a dashing aviatrix dropping in for cocktails with Denys Finch-Hatten. As far as I knew, however, Tempeste never went closer to a cockpit than first-class seating. Her black hair, worn Veronica Lake style, screened half her pale, hatchet-shaped face. Her mouth, stained Jungle Red, was going a mile a minute as she lectured her pilot.

"She's a world traveler," I told Jack. "She's lived in Paris, Istanbul, Argentina, Johannesburg—and she's had at least one husband in every port. Last I heard she was marrying a Portuguese polo team. See that red Vuitton cosmetics case?"

"Yes."

"That's not makeup she's carrying. She never travels without the ashes of her first husband, Benito Juarez, the famous stunt pilot."

"That's some ring she's wearing, too," Jack observed. "I can see it from here."

Even at our distance, we could see the flash of diamonds on her skinny fingers.

"Tempeste loves jewels. She collects all kinds. And because she's nearsighted, they have to be big enough for her to see."