Bury Me With Barbie (27 page)

She grabbed one more set of drawers and went into the house just as Darby arrived and parked around the corner. Heading across the street to a fenced yard, he ducked behind a gnarled tree and looked toward P.J.’s home. The Sunbeam and Miata were parked in the open garage, but Heath’s Sunbeam was covered, which meant he was out of town. Knowing P.J. would never be gone long with her dolls in plain sight, he gathered she was moving them into the house. Quickly, he dashed across the street and into the open garage. The garage door opener lay on a shelf near the garbage cans, next to the Sunbeam. He grabbed it and darted back across the street, returning to his post behind the tree.

P.J. came down the path from the house, sipping a glass of iced lemonade. She was dressed for the chore of moving storage bins, and Darby knew he couldn’t have picked a better time or place. Her assistant, chef, and maid would have parked on the street in front of the house, but their cars were gone. Darby guessed she had let them go home so she could move her dolls into the house without being questioned.

He waited for her to lift a storage bin and stand up before he stepped out from behind the tree and clicked the garage door opener.

Before she could react, the garage door descended.

P.J. was trapped inside.

Caresse regretted that she hadn’t found time to talk to Anthony on Friday before he left work for the day. She had seen Nibbles, Bree, and Rhea packing up their desks, so she knew big changes were at hand, but when she tried to talk to the trio, Nibbles gave her the finger and Rhea told her to fuck off.

Now it was Saturday, and her mind wandered to Monya and how she’d told her that her sister Sophie had started a Barbie magazine before Sierra had. If Sierra was the killer and she was taken out of the picture, Sophie might consider filling the void left by Sierra’s absence by getting back into the Barbie magazine scene. At the very least, she might take malicious delight in the fact that the woman who had trumped her in business so long ago was headed for a fall.

P.J. stood in the dark garage, holding the set of storage drawers in her chilly hands.

She didn’t understand why the garage door had closed by itself. Had it malfunctioned? She put down the storage unit and stepped sideways, sending her glass of lemonade crashing down from where she’d set it.

“Damn it!”

Slowly, she picked her way through the shadows, up to the front of the garage where the opener would be. She felt around on the shelf. It was bare.

She had a garage door opener on her key chain, but she’d left her keys on the kitchen counter, next to the juicer and five squeezed lemons.

Kneeling down on the cold concrete, she searched the floor beneath the shelf. Nothing.

She moved the garbage cans and searched behind them.

The flap-style lids on the garbage cans were snapped shut, but she lifted the lids anyway and searched through the trash to see if the opener might be there.

Dumbfounded, she sat down on the garage floor.

Darby.

* * *

Across the street, Darby waited ten minutes, listening to the quiet neighborhood. The birds weren’t singing. No dogs barked. The children all played elsewhere.

Nice to live in an exclusive neighborhood where the homes are an acre apart
, Darby thought as he walked back to his car.
There’s no one to bother you in your own precious, perfect world. But no one sticking his or her nose in your business might be a bad thing at this particular moment, at least for one deeply troubled blonde
.

He had it all worked out.

Since P.J. relied on him for computer assistance, he had access to all her logins and passwords. He had contact information for everyone she worked with, the staff—everyone she knew. He would call everyone scheduled to be there in the coming days and relay the message that she had decided to go out of town and that they would not be needed until she told them to come in and that she would get in touch when she returned. Darby would also check to see how long Heath would be gone. It was not uncommon for him to be away for weeks at a time.

There would be no one to check on P.J., no one would worry about her.

She had a glass of lemonade, so that would hold her for a day or two. But if a week to ten days passed and no one came to rescue her, she would expire from lack of food and water.

And he would be free.

On Monday at 8:10 a.m., the newsroom was empty. A note on Caresse’s desk told her to come to the cafeteria for a staff meeting. She headed down the hallway, through the kitchen where everyone made their coffee, and into the cafeteria, where the staff had assembled.

Everyone she worked with every day was there, with the exception of Bree, Rhea, and Nibbles. Anthony Price stood near the glass wall that overlooked the patio. Seth and Ann sat at a lunchroom table in the center of the room. Marilyn from Classified sat beside Lobby Laura and Pressroom Skip at a table in the far right corner of the room.

It seemed Caresse was late, or at least the last one there. Ducking her head slightly, she made her way to Marilyn’s table.

Seth stood up and moved to the window. He stood next to Anthony. His round-lensed glasses picked up reflections from the patio, which sparkled in the almost-springtime sunlight.

“Glad you all could make it,” Seth said dryly.

Everyone turned in Caresse’s direction and laughed.

“This meeting is being held to issue one award, one announcement, and two interoffice promotions. So we’ll start with the award.”

He cleared his throat and shuffled his feet. “The best feature award for February goes to someone who seldom gets the opportunity to express herself. Her days are typically spent dealing with funeral directors, brides-to-be, event planners, and church officials. She answers the phone—even though she hates to—” Seth paused and got the laugh he expected. “And she takes care of all of us, every day. Luckily for us, she also just happened to write the best dating story this newspaper has ever printed. By now I imagine you all know I’m talking about Caresse, so without further ado, the best feature award for February goes to Ms. Redd for her personal ads dating story. Caresse, come on up.”

She stood up and headed toward the windowed wall, where Seth gave her a quick handshake. Outdoing him, Anthony stepped forward and embraced her, refusing to let go, causing the room to erupt into gales of laughter. Finally, Anthony released her and they stood together, side by side, waiting for order to be restored. Nervous but exhilarated, Caresse’s hands began to tremble.

Seth pulled an envelope from his suit pocket and handed it to her, pretending not to notice her nerves. She knew what it was—a check for one hundred dollars, the standard compensation for best feature of the month. She thanked him and began to head back to her seat, but Anthony stopped her.

“If you could stay up here for a moment,” he said, “And Marilyn, if you could come up and join us.”

Marilyn looked flustered. She hadn’t expected to be called upon. She rose and made her way up front to stand beside Caresse, impulsively grabbing her hand and not letting go.

“Marilyn, you’ve been doing such a great job in Classified, and we know you have a degree in English, which we think could be put to better use. We think you’d be having a lot more fun if you actually got a chance to write obituaries and datebook items, so we’re moving you into Caresse’s position.”

The color in Marilyn’s face rose and her smile grew as wide as Seth’s outdated tie.

Anthony stepped forward a pace. “For those who don’t know, we’ve been asked to ‘trim the fat’ around here, so I let my staff go Friday—for good.”

People throughout the cafeteria were nodding. There weren’t many who would miss Nibbles and her gal pals.

“So that leaves me in need of someone to help me put together the entertainment supplement every week, and my choice for that is Ms. Redd.”

Caresse gasped, and Anthony enveloped her in another hug. This time he released her, but he kept his arm around her shoulder as he continued. “I’ve been told she’s been doing the work of three people around here anyway, so it looks like I’ve got an instant replacement for the three dearly departed ladies. And, my dear, Ann has something to present to you, since we’ll need to be in touch constantly.”

A trickle of cold raced down Caresse’s spine. She reminded herself that while surprises weren’t always good, they weren’t always bad, either. Ann stood up, grinning, and approached her with a small, wrapped box. Considering Ann was typically the bearer of small gifts for Chaz, Caresse unwrapped the box expecting to find a set of Legos.

It wasn’t. It was a sleek black cell phone of her very own.

“We expect you to never turn it off and to always answer it,” Anthony warned. “In fact, your first assignment is to call every single person in the newsroom and give them your cell phone number. If your call goes to voicemail, you’ll need to leave a message that you called and that you want them to call you back. I’ll be getting reports from everyone to find out how it’s going.”

Everyone laughed. Caresse’s phone avoidance was legendary.

“Thank you, all,” she said. “I don’t know what to say.”

But she did know what she wanted to say. In fact, she knew what she wanted to scream.
I may have solved the Barbie murders! I may have played an instrumental role in the capture of one of FBI’s most wanted!

It was the biggest story ever; the story of a lifetime.

Going on dates for the newspaper and writing a story about it paled by comparison.

No story ever, anywhere, would eclipse her love for Barbie, and if she had helped solve the most notorious case ever connected to the doll, she would feel endlessly satisfied.

Ince Rowell and his sidekick August Carter arrived at P.J.’s home bright and early Monday morning.

P.J. had passed out in the driver’s seat of her Miata, but when she heard the noises outdoors, she scrambled out of the car and made her way to the garage door. She raised her fists and was ready to pound on the galvanized steel when she heard indistinct chatter filtering over a police radio. Lowering her arms, she listened.

Rowell came up to the garage door and bent down. He tried to lift the door, giving it two swift tugs. P.J. jumped away from it as though she had been scalded.

“Locked tight,” she heard him say.

The men walked up the path toward the home, only to find the front door wide open and the screen door slightly ajar. Chao, who had been in the backyard since Saturday, began to bark.

“It’s open,” Carter said, smoothing back his blond hair and straightening his collar.

The detectives went inside.

Locked inside the garage, P.J. began to pace the aisle between the Miata and the remaining storage bins. The broken shards from her glass of lemonade had been kicked out of the way, beneath her car. In a desperate attempt to have something to drink, she had fumbled around on the garage floor until she found a few melting ice cubes no bigger than croutons. Blowing on them in case they were tainted with dirt or glass, she popped them in her mouth and savored them. Faster than LifeSavers, they melted into slivers and were gone.

She felt around in the remaining storage bins, trying to identify her dolls and their outfits by touch. In the dimness of the garage, she could almost make out if they were blondes or brunettes. She could almost discern what they were wearing. Then she dropped one of their shoes and quit, frustrated by how long it might take to find it.

The police were there, but why?

She touched the storage bins of stolen dolls and broke out in a cold sweat. Anxiety began to wash over her in waves, followed by a tidal wave of panic. She couldn’t call out to the police; for all she knew, they were there to arrest her. And if Darby had orchestrated things so that no one would come to her rescue, she was be trapped here for good and would die with her dolls. She stifled a scream of anguish and collapsed, weeping, her eyes raised to the dark rafters, until she was spent. Feeling dizzy, she bent forward, resting her head on her knees. She heard voices again. At first, she was certain she was delirious, but she struggled to get up and made her way to the garage door.

With their search warrant, Carter and Rowell had it all: computer files, paperwork, dolls, hair samples, receipts, the white vinyl boots, the red wig, Dormicum tablets and vials, the Makarov pistol, empty Army duffel bags, and the customized bling that had belonged to Rick Uzamba.

“You got that bin, Carter?” Rowell asked.

P.J. heard shuffling feet before one of her bins was dropped onto the driveway, and she shuddered.

“I think we’ve got enough,” Carter said.

“More than enough,” Rowell said, “to put her away for life.”

“I wonder where she is?” Carter asked.

Rowell shrugged. “I don’t know,” he said, “but she can’t hide forever.”