Suede to Rest (26 page)

Genevieve was a self-professed Francophile, and her shop was a testament to her love of the country. I'd secretly been working on a fabric makeover for her store, including curtains, cushions, aprons, placemats, napkins, and tablecloths from toile, gingham, check, and linen. I even found a bolt of place-printed cotton canvas, too heavy to use for apparel, with images of roosters on it. I planned to stretch the images over wooden frames and suggest she hang them like art. I couldn't wait to share the concept with her, but I wanted to get it all together before it was done, and I wanted to find a way to use the new velvet in the design.

Genevieve was stacking sandwiches wrapped in parchment paper, sealed with stickers that featured the Eiffel Tower on them, into a wooden crate.

“I hope you don't mind that I didn't go fancy. I'm low on a couple of supplies. Jambon sandwiches with Brie and Dijon mustard on crusty French bread, with a side of pommes frites. Is that okay?”

“That's not fancy?” I asked with a smile to my voice. “I think it'll do. What time is Phil expected back?”

“Hopefully this afternoon. He left yesterday so he could avoid traffic and be at the suppliers first thing this morning.”

We loaded jugs of iced tea into a separate crate and packed them into the back seat of my Bug. I returned to the store and parked out front so we could unload. Two men lowered the scaffolding and sign removal ceased while a line formed by Genevieve. I stood behind, assessing the work that was left. In the background, a generic white van turned the corner. It pulled up to the curb behind the flatbed. The logo on the side of the truck, a white rectangle that covered the area to the left of the passenger-side door, said
Special Delivery
. Underneath it said
Have We Got
a
Package for You! Call Us 24 Hours
a
Day
.

The driver of the truck cut the engine and got out. “Is there a Polyester Monroe around here?” he asked.

“I'm Polyester,” I said.

“Rick Penwald. Have I got a package for you. Bunch of fabrics?”

Genevieve approached the truck. “My husband was supposed to pick up her fabrics. Where's Phil?” She looked at the logo on the side of the vehicle. “Where's his truck?”

“He called me this morning, made arrangements for me to make the delivery for him. He said he had some business in Los Angeles and wasn't coming back right away.”

“But that doesn't make any sense,” Genevieve said. “He left yesterday because of this job. Why would he call you to finish it for him?”

“Not sure.” Rick pulled his black mesh hat off his head and wiped his forehead with his palm. “He probably wanted to surprise you with something.”

He held out a clipboard with sheets of paper attached and handed me a pen. “Sign by the
X
s.”

I glanced at the form and then back at Rick. “I already paid for the fabric and I paid Phil for the delivery up front.”

“If I make a delivery, I gotta have proof I made the delivery. Has nothing to do with payment. That's proof of the delivery. The form's in triplicate. You sign the top one and take the pink copy in the middle. Press hard.”

The top copy was white, the middle pink, and the bottom yellow. Along the upper-left side, the logo, website, and phone number for Special Delivery had been rubber-stamped in red. Across the center of the page, written in ballpoint pen in surprisingly neat printing that tipped slightly backward, it said, “12 bolts velvet. Prepaid. Signature for delivery confirmation only.” I zeroed out the totals field and signed my name at the bottom. I tore the pink page from between the white and yellow and set the clipboard inside the open window on the passenger-side seat.

I folded the paper up small enough to fit into my back pocket and followed Rick around to the back of the van. He flipped through a ring of keys and tried three in the padlock before he found one that worked. He took the lock off and hooked it on one of the belt loops of his jeans, and then flung the back doors open.

Sunlight hit twelve large bolts of multicolored velvet, propped along the left-hand side of the truck. On the right were crates of vegetables, spices, and dry goods.

“Where you want it?” he asked.

“Inside the store,” I said. I unlocked the hinged metal gate in the front of the fabric store and propped the entrance open with a small black vintage sewing machine I used as a doorstop. Behind us, the colorful flannel army of construction workers sat alongside of the building watching. Nobody volunteered to help. Rick grabbed a bolt of velvet by the end and yanked on it, then positioned it over his shoulder and carried it inside the store. Behind him, Genevieve screamed. I ran to the back of the truck and looked inside.

Jutting out from under the bolts of fabric was an arm.

I scrambled inside the truck and rolled the bolts of fabric out of their stacked-lumber formation to the side of the truck with the dry goods. The arm belonged to a body that had been hidden under the fabric.

And the body belonged to Genevieve's husband, Phil.