by Laura Durham
Kate shrugged and dropped the stun gun flashlight back into her pink purse. “Suit yourself.”
“So what exactly happened?” Reese asked in his detective voice.
Kate let go of the door and walked further into the room, dropping down into an upholstered armchair with a crocheted doily draped across the top. “I was helping Sidney Allen get ready, like you’d asked. He had a special man’s girdle he wanted to try out, so we were trying to fasten him into that when someone knocked on the door.”
I tried not to show my surprise at the mention of a man’s girdle and avoided glancing over at Reese. Had he known about this? He was Sidney Allen’s best man, after all. Had they gone girdle shopping together and he’d never mentioned it?
“I assumed it was Leatrice or you or Fern, so I opened the door.” Kate nodded to the unmoving man on the floor. “But it was him.”
“Did he identify himself?” Reese asked.
Kate shook her head. “He pushed his way past me into the apartment and started calling out for Jimmy. I told him Jimmy wasn’t here and that he had the wrong place, but he told me he knew Jimmy had come here, and he wasn’t leaving without him.”
“So that’s when you stunned him?” I asked.
“I lit him up like a Christmas tree,” Kate said, nibbling her bottom lip. “There’s a possibility I had the settings too high, but he looked like a big guy, and I didn’t want him getting up again.”
“Mission accomplished,” I told her. “Do Leatrice and Jimmy know about this guy showing up?”
“Not unless Sidney Allen called his bride-to-be and spilled the beans,” Kate said, “but I doubt it since I think he’s still in shock. I sent him to the bedroom to calm down.”
I sighed. “This isn’t great.”
“Ya think?” Reese dragged a hand through his hair. “Not only are we harboring a mobster on the run, now more wiseguys are looking for him.”
My stomach clenched at the thought of more men showing up to our apartment building. We couldn’t count on Kate to stun them all.
“Might I remind you that he’s not dead?” Kate said. “I think that’s a win for all of us.”
I didn’t like to admit how glad I was we wouldn’t be adding another number to our overall wedding body count.
“Luckily, this guy is out for a while, and we can charge him with something to hold him.” Reese paced next to the motionless figure. “But I sincerely doubt he’s the only one looking for Jimmy. If his people don’t hear from him, chances are good they’ll send in reinforcements.”
Kate popped up. “Then we need to get Leatrice and Jimmy out of here.” She looked at me, her eyes wide. “We need to get out of here.”
I heard the wail of approaching sirens and knew it would be only minutes before the place was swarmed with paramedics and cops.
“If this guy is with the Mob,” my fiancé said, “the ambulance and squad cars should keep his buddies away for a while.”
I nodded. “We should use this chaos to get Leatrice and Jimmy out. If we don’t, Jimmy the Pencil will lead the Mob straight to Leatrice. We can’t be sure what they’ll do if they discover who she is and that she’s successfully hidden from the old boss for years. If his son is as vindictive as Jimmy says, he may want revenge on Leatrice, even though his father is long gone.”
“Even if they don’t want revenge on her, they probably won’t look too kindly on her trying to help Jimmy go on the lam,” Reese added.
I heard a commotion in the hall, followed by a loud knocking. Reese opened the door and directed the paramedics to the victim, while briefing them on the situation. They were young, broad-shouldered guys in dark-blue uniforms, and I noticed Kate throw her shoulders back at the sight of them.
I tugged her away from the scene. “Don’t even think about it. We’re trying to get out of here, not score you a date.”
She frowned. “You know I’m an excellent multitasker.”
“Not today, you’re not. Today you’re a bridesmaid whose main duty is to make sure the bride doesn’t get bumped off.”
Kate put one hand on her hip. “Since when is that something a bridesmaid is in charge of?”
“Since we became bridesmaids,” I said.
Reese’s slightly doughy partner, Detective Hobbes, followed a pair of uniformed police officers into the apartment as the paramedics began working on Kate’s victim. “What have we got?” he asked, his gaze flitting to me and then Kate.
“Attempted burglary,” Reese told him. “Assault. He forced his way into the apartment. In response, Kate used her stun gun on him. It was self-defense.”
Kate bobbed her head up and down. “I was afraid for my life. Look how big he is.”
Hobbes looked down at the thick-necked man, then turned to his partner. “I can file charges after he’s released from the hospital.”
Reese clapped a hand on the man’s back. “Thanks, man. We don’t want this to impact the wedding if we can help it.”
The detective swept a hand across his thinning hair and appeared to be trying to suppress a smile. “Understood. I’m supposed to meet Alexandra there in a couple of hours.”
Hobbes’s mention of the cake baker made me think of the setup at Dumbarton House. I needed to call Richard and explain why Reese and I had torn out of there without an explanation. I did not want to deal with him giving me the cold shoulder for the rest of the evening. Or the rest of the summer.
The paramedics raised the gurney and began wheeling the man out of the room. I caught a glimpse of his face for the first time, and it didn’t do anything to calm my panic. He had slicked back, jet-black hair and sunken eyes, with a bulbous nose that was turning purple. It looked like it had been broken a few times, and I suspected the most recent time was when Kate stunned him and he’d hit the floor. He looked like he’d stepped right out of a gangster movie.
My fiancé pulled me away by the hand as Hobbes walked around the apartment taking notes. “We need to focus on keeping Leatrice, and the rest of us, safe.”
“Which means we get Jimmy, and the potential danger, away from here,” I said, feeling myself calm as I focused on the goal.
“I have an idea.”
We all turned to see who’d spoken. Sidney Allen stood in the hallway in nothing but a shiny, black, one-piece man girdle that stretched from his upper thighs to mid-chest. His significant girth had been compressed so that it all spilled out the top of the contraption, giving the tiny man an enviable amount of cleavage. The room went silent as even the cops turned to stare at him.
Hobbes looked at Sidney Allen and then at Reese, his pen hovering over his notepad. “I’m going to do us all a favor and leave this out of the report.”
Chapter 8
“I don’t understand,” Fern said, his brush still in Hermès’s fur.
The tiny dog perched on Leatrice’s lap, and the pair sat on the stool by the window. The Yorkie’s usually straight black-and-brown fur had been curled into ringlets that made me think of Shirley Temple—if Shirley Temple had also had a shiny, black nose and liked to breathe with her tongue hanging out of her mouth.
Hermès had turned his head as Kate, Sidney Allen, and I burst into the room, and the corkscrew curls were still bouncing around his face. I stifled a groan. Richard was going to have a fit.
“We need to leave,” I repeated. “Now.”
Leatrice slid off the stool and tucked Hermès under her arm. “What’s happened?”
“Yes,” Fern said, his gaze shifting to Sidney Allen who’d put on his tuxedo for the wedding but left on the man shaper, so that he now appeared to have a barrel chest and a cinched waist beneath his white dinner jacket. “What on earth is going on there, sweetie?”
Leatrice glanced at her fiancé and did a double take but didn’t comment.
“Another one of your old friends showed up downstairs.” Kate came in behind me and closed the door, muffling the sounds of the cops still processing the scene on the first floor. “Although this
one wasn’t so old.”
Jimmy stood from where he’d been lounging on my yellow twill couch. “They found me already?”
“Looks like it,” I said, hurrying down the hall and snatching the two garment bags hanging from the top of the bathroom door. I hoisted my black nylon tote over my shoulder, glad I’d already packed all my wedding day essentials in it, including my own secret wedding day timeline and copies of all the vendor contracts. “I’ve got the bridesmaids’ dresses. Sidney Allen has your dress, Leatrice.”
I poked my head back into the living room and saw Fern sweeping all his supplies into a Prada duffel bag.
“Where are we going?” Leatrice asked, tightening the belt of her Wonder Woman robe. “I thought you said one of Jimmy’s guys is downstairs.”
“Was downstairs,” Kate said, pulling the double-duty flashlight out of her purse. “I used my stun gun on him. Now he’s on his way to the hospital and then the police station.”
Leatrice smiled at her. “Good for you, dear. I had no idea you were packing.”
“You know what they say, shoot first, ask questions later.” Kate tucked the stun gun back into her purse.
I decided not to debate her interpretation of the phrase at the moment. “The ambulance and police cars should create enough of a distraction for us to get out the back way.”
Fern swung his head toward the end of my hallway. “The back way? You mean that rickety old fire escape?”
“It’ll be fine,” I said with more confidence than I felt. I almost never set foot on the fire escape and hadn’t even opened the back door in at least a year. After having my apartment broken into the first time I was involved in a murder investigation, I’d replaced all the door locks with heavy-duty dead bolts. The fire escape was a feature of my building I rarely thought of, but I hoped it would finally come in handy now.
I waved for everyone to follow me down the hall, then stopped when I saw their hesitation. “Would you rather wait for the next Mafia hitter to show up?”
Fern hiked his designer duffel onto his shoulder and bustled forward. “I have no desire to sleep with the fishes, thank you very much.” He hooked his arm through Leatrice’s and pulled her along with him. “I’ve never lost a bride to a Mob hit before, and I’m not starting today.”
“That’s the spirit,” Kate said.
I flipped back the dead bolt and opened the door out onto the steel platform that rose four stories over the back alley of my building. I peered down and saw nothing but a garbage dumpster and a dingy paved path leading to the street in two directions. The back of the building didn’t smell so great, no doubt thanks to the dumpster combined with the summer heat. Sirens sounded from the front of the building, even though the distance dampened the noise. Reese had stayed behind to give his statement and make sure he didn’t spot any other suspicious characters near the building, but I knew we didn’t have long until the commotion, and our decoy, would be gone.
“You lead the way and I’ll bring up the rear,” I told Kate when everyone had assembled outside.
Kate nodded and began backing down the metal stairs. Jimmy moved to go next to Leatrice, but Sidney Allen cut him off. I hoped the two men wouldn’t get in a dustup before we could make our escape. The last thing I needed was our groom challenging Jimmy the Pencil to a duel.
“I’ll go in front of you, Love Muffin, so I can help you down,” Sidney Allen said, patting his fianceé’s hand.
Leatrice beamed at him and turned to me. “Can you carry Hermès in your bag? I’m afraid I need both hands to get down.”
I took the tiny dog and tucked him into my tote, nestling him between my makeup bag and a three-ring binder. I noticed him trembling and rubbed his head, guessing he felt the same way I did about heights.
When our slow procession had reached the next level down—Kate in her short shorts, Sidney Allen moving stiffly in his white dinner jacket and black tuxedo pants, Leatrice in her superhero bathrobe, Fern doing his take on Mr. Rogers, and Jimmy the Pencil looking every bit the wiseguy—I began backing down with Hermès. The metal creaked, and I clutched the railing tightly, not letting out a breath until I’d reached the bottom.
“Good job, everyone,” I said, patting Hermès on the head again and noticing that Sidney Allen looked a little green around the gills. “Now follow me.”
I realized just what an odd group we made after we wound our way through the back alley and came out onto the street. Maybe in some areas of DC a tiny old lady in a superhero robe with a bird’s nest on her head wouldn’t be noticeable, but chic Georgetown was not one of those places. I only hoped anyone looking for Jimmy would be so distracted by Leatrice’s getup or Kate’s Daisy Dukes that they’d miss him.
I shot a few furtive looks behind me as we hurried through the historic neighborhood lined with brick row houses and shaded with tall trees. Although cars were definitely slowing down to stare at us, none of the occupants looked more than curious or amused.
“How much longer?” Fern said, his voice breathy. “This humidity is ruining all of my hard work. Just look at poor Hermès.”
I glanced down and saw that the Yorkie’s curls had frizzed so that he looked more like Little Orphan Annie than Shirley Temple. “Almost there.”
“Are we going to a safe house?” Leatrice asked as Sidney Allen held her by the elbow and waddled along beside her, his gait jerky from the obviously too-tight man girdle. His face was flushed red, and I hoped he wouldn’t pass out on me.
“Sort of,” I said. “It should be the safest place for us thanks to Sidney Allen’s quick thinking.”
Leatrice smiled up at her honey bun, and his puffed-out chest became even more so.
I led the way down Q Street and then up the steps of the house, throwing open the front door as everyone filed in.
Leatrice swiveled her head to take in the high-ceilinged foyer. “It’s our wedding venue.”
“Exactly,” I said. “Not only are Buster and Mack here, your fiancé made a few calls so that Jimmy will be easier to hide at the wedding.”
A short, stocky man in a black suit with a thick white pinstripe and a matching fedora pulled down low over his eyes walked in from the door at the end of the hall. A slender woman in a lavender flapper dress followed, the glittering bugle beads covering the dress clicking against each other as she waved her long white cigarette holder at us. “Hey, dolls.”
Richard stepped out of the parlor directly off the foyer, and his gaze scanned our motley group. He lingered for a moment on Hermès, his face twitching. Folding his arms across his chest, he narrowed his eyes at me. “Boy, do I have a bone to pick with you, Annabelle.”
Chapter 9
“I thought you promised me there would be no costumed performers,” Richard said, dodging a cigarette girl with a tray hanging from her neck.
“I’m sorry,” I said, as Richard led us into a room adjoining the foyer. “It’s part of the plan.”
Richard swung his gaze to Sidney Allen. “I suppose this was all your idea in an attempt to sneak your performers into the wedding day somehow.”
Sidney Allen walked jerkily to the white plaster fireplace, his footfall echoing off the wooden plank floor, and leaned one hand against the mantle as he caught his breath. “I beg your pardon. I’m only doing this to help my cupcake.”
“How does this help Leatrice?” Richard asked.
I darted a glance out the front window. “Sidney Allen thought that Jimmy the Pencil wouldn’t stick out so much if there were a bunch of people dressed like they’d stepped out of the forties.”
Richard’s gaze swiveled to the stocky man in the dark suit and fedora, and his pupils widened slightly. “I see.” He gave the aged gangster a simpering smile before taking me by the elbow and propelling me back into the foyer. “Are you out of your mind?”
I pulled my arm from his. “What? As far as harebrained schemes go, I thought this was one of the better ones. It’s better than the time you put on a tasting to smoke ou
t a killer.”
“That was your idea!”
A passing flapper jumped in surprise, and Richard mumbled an apology.
“I know,” I said, “but this one is better. We’re only doing it to keep Jimmy hidden and Leatrice from being discovered. It’s more of a diversion than anything.”
Richard sniffed, looking slightly mollified. “I suppose I don’t want the bride being tracked down by the Mafia on her wedding day.”
“You’re such a softie,” I said, winking at him.
“Yes, well. Do you care to explain this fiasco?” Richard waved a hand at Hermès, who was still tucked in my bag, his frizzy head straining to reach Richard’s flapping fingers.
I rubbed the dog’s head. “Humidity?”
Richard lowered his voice to a whisper as he let the Yorkie lick his fingers. “He looks R-I-D-I-C-U-L-O-U-S.”
“Did you just spell in front of the dog?”
Richard arched an eyebrow at me as he lifted Hermès out of my bag. “He’s very clever, Annabelle. I don’t want to hurt his feelings.”
“You make comments about my hair and clothes all the time,” I said. “You aren’t worried about hurting my feelings?”
He gave my jeans and T-shirt a quick once-over. “I’m hoping one day you’ll listen to me, darling. You know when I talk about fashion travesties, it’s expressly for your benefit. I already know how to accessorize.” He started to go back into the room and looked back. “So does the dog.”
I followed him, telling myself to forget being compared to a dog and coming up short. I needed to focus on the current wedding day problem.
Leatrice stood at the fireplace with her arms wrapped around her fiancé’s unnaturally small waist, the bird’s nest on her head reaching his chin. “If you should be upset at anyone, dear, it should be me,” she told Richard. “My Sweetie Pie is only trying to help me return a favor for an old friend.”
“Anything for my Sugar Muffin,” Sidney Allen said, peering down at her.
Richard flinched at the pet names, sighing as he spun to face me. “How am I going to feed all these people, Annabelle? I don’t have enough vendor meals for two dozen extra gangsters, molls, and showgirls.”