“Just what?”
I tried a different tack. “Think of my mother as the little socialite that could. She won’t let up until I’m the ball on someone’s chain.” Preferably, someone with a pedigree dating back to Plymouth Rock or with at least an oil well—or three—in his pocket.
“She wants us to get married?” Did his voice shake, or had I imagined it? “Is that what you’re saying?”
I nervously played with the cord of my old Princess phone. “Hey, it’s not what Cissy wants, anyway, right? It’s what we want. And I don’t plan to be anyone’s ball and chain”—I assured him, lest he started thinking I was implying anything—“not for a while anyway. I like things as they are.”
“Really?”
“Yes.” I did want a ring on my finger someday. I just didn’t want it to be a rush job, even if that would make my mother happy.
“Well, all right, then.” He grunted. “How ’bout I crash the party . . . put on my penguin suit, and pretend I’m with the wait staff?”
“Cissy would kill you.”
“Probably put a Jimmy Choo up my ass.”
“A Ferragamo, at any rate.”
“So the answer is ‘no’?”
“Yes.”
He sighed.
“Look, I’ll do my best to sneak out early, okay? I’m hoping I won’t have to stay any longer than it takes to get a blister from my new shoes.”
“Cissy got you shoes, too?
“And a matching handbag.”
He whistled. “Whoa, Andy. That’s some bribe. Like a Winona Ryder shoplifting spree without the probation.”
What a lawyerly thing to say. “Don’t make me feel any worse,” I grumbled.
“Give me a call if you make a jailbreak.”
“It’s a deal.”
We said our goodbyes, and I hung up, grinning.
There was definitely something to be said for white bread.
In another twenty minutes, I had the sequined Escada zipped and my toes wedged into the pointy pink sling-backs. My minimalist makeup and hair wouldn’t exactly have gotten me far in a pageant—at least not beyond Miss Congeniality—but it felt like plenty for someone not used to wearing much more than Chapstick. As much as I liked to paint, my preference was to put color on canvas, not skin. I’d seen enough women who looked like clowns to realize that less was often more, unless you had your eye on a gig under the tent at Barnum & Bailey.
Actually, I did know a girl who’d gone to Clown College in Sarasota. Last I’d heard, she was wearing a barrel on the rodeo circuit in Lubbock.
So maybe it did pay to overdo the Mary Kay, if you had that kind of aspiration.
My only goal was to get myself to Addison, do what I had to do—for both Marilee and my mother—and then scram at the earliest opportunity.
I teetered out the door of the condo in my high heels, greeting an elderly neighbor who was walking his dog in the still-smothering heat.
“Hello, Mr. Tompkins.”
The poor man did a double take. “Andy, that you?”
“In the flesh.”
“Flesh is right. Woo-doggy.” He nodded and swiped his brow with a kerchief, though I wasn’t sure if I’d inspired the beads of sweat or if the thermometer was strictly to blame. His pot-bellied beagle seemed more interested in the bushes, sniffing like mad and ignoring me entirely before lifting his leg.
Oh, well. Can’t win ’em all.
“You look real spiffy,” he said in his grizzled twang.
“Thank you, kindly.” I lifted my purse in acknowledgment as I scurried down the sidewalk toward my car. I unlocked the door and jerked it open, metal hinges squealing. I tossed my purse across to the passenger seat and pondered for a moment how I was going to climb in gracefully.
“Woo-doggy.” Charlie howled again more loudly.
I tried not to cringe, glad at least that the rest of my neighbors were tucked inside with their conditioned air. Though I caught a glimpse of Penny George in pink sponge rollers peering between her drapes from an upstairs window, the ratfink.
“You have a good evening, Charlie,” I called out and scrambled into my simmering Jeep, settling myself behind the wheel without ripping a seam or having my dress ride so high that I flashed the old guy. A major feat considering my general lack of coordination, and I felt immensely pleased.
I glanced out the windshield as I started the car and saw the beagle wrapping the leash around Charlie’s ankles. As I pulled out of the lot, I caught him in my rearview, still staring.
All that because I’d put on a skirt and lipstick?
I realized my neighbor was used to seeing me dressed-down, not dolled-up, so I wasn’t surprised that he had trouble believing I was the same person. I liked to tell myself it really didn’t make much difference what I looked like, but maybe I was a fool for assuming other people felt the same.
Beauty didn’t go much beyond skin-deep in the heart of Texas. It was practically a state law that women look good enough to eat. As mouth-watering as chicken-fried steak smothered in cream gravy. Statuesque, big-haired blondes were as much a part of the landscape as longhorns and bluebonnets. Not surprisingly, pageants—and, consequently, plastic surgery—were a huge industry. If Miss Texas didn’t take the Miss USA crown every year, the whole state was affronted. Correct me if I’m wrong, but I’m fairly certain that butt and boob tape—particularly important in the bathing suit competition—were homegrown inventions.
A fair number of the population—the prettiest of the pretty—were groomed to be beauty queens from infancy. Mothers didn’t sing lullabies to lure these wee girls to sleep, they sang, “There she is, Miss America.”
I remember a classmate by the name of Clancy Lee Carlyle who’d won the title of “Little Miss Lone Star” by the time she was seven. When our second-grade teacher had asked us what we wanted for Christmas, she’d blurted out, “World peace and nuclear disarmament!”
Okay, she’d actually said, “Whirled peas and new-cooler dismemberment.” But Mrs. Overby had explained what she’d meant, making all the rest of us feel like dolts for wanting simple material things.
Silly old me. I’d craved an easel and a new set of finger paints.
Hardly things that would’ve scored points on the pageant circuit.
My daddy, bless his soul, had always tried to convince me that “beauty is in the eye of the beholder,” and I’d wanted to buy the line. Badly. But I knew better because of people like Clancy Lee Carlyle.
And Cissy.
My mother had never met a can of AquaNet she didn’t like.
I sighed and changed lanes, deciding it was the unfortunate but deep-seated wish of every woman to be the cheerleader or homecoming queen, even when well past promage.
Okay, almost every woman.
Cissy was the one who’d had those dreams for me. My role, it seemed, was to dash them. Though every time I let her con me into wearing haute couture, like tonight, I gave her hope.
False hope, but hope just the same.
The Jeep’s engine rumbled beneath my pink shoes as I slowed at a stoplight at Preston and Belt Line. The sky was still mostly blue overhead, though I could detect the vague tinge of dusk descending as the sun began its slow slide from twelve o’clock high. The glass of surrounding buildings reflected clouds softening to pink.
Still, it wouldn’t be dark for an hour, at least. The days were definitely getting shorter, but not short enough to suit me. When summer got a hold of Dallas, it didn’t let go easily.
I fiddled with the vents, adjusting the AC to blow on my face. A quick check in the rearview mirror showed the sheen of perspiration on my forehead. My eyeliner already looked smudged. Another reason I didn’t like makeup. Sweat could too quickly turn me into Tammy Faye.
The light turned green, and I surged forward with the rest of the herd of four-wheeled cattle, catching the tail end of rush hour traffic. My gaze skimmed the lanes around me, finding Cadillacs aplenty. A swarm of white Sevilles surrounde
d me. Sitting high up in my Wrangler, I felt the urge to sing the theme from Rawhide.
My daddy used to drive a Caddy. A Brougham d’Elegance that he’d often bragged was inches longer than the Lincoln Town Car. It was definitely the biggest sedan I’d ever seen. Through my little girl eyes, it had seemed the size of a cruise ship. All it had needed was Gopher and Julie McCoy, and it could’ve been The Love Boat on wheels. I’d hated that car as much as my father had adored it. Though it was one of the few things he’d splurged on for himself. Nothing was too good for Mother or me, but Daddy didn’t indulge himself, not often. Certainly not the way he could have (that so many of his friends did).
Case in point: he hadn’t worn a Rolex like so many of his contemporaries (like so many of my contemporaries). He’d never seen the need. He’d told me once that “a watch is a watch is a watch,” and, to prove it, he’d had the same stainless-steel Omega strapped around his wrist for as long as I could remember. He’d been wearing it when he’d died.
Now I kept it in a carved wooden box—one that used to hold Daddy’s cigars—on the shelf of my nightstand, along with the paper strip from a fortune cookie I’d gotten from the Chinese take-out the evening after Daddy’s funeral. The message: ALL IS NOT LOST.
At the time, I’d surely felt like I’d lost everything. It had taken me a while to realize it wasn’t true.
My father had left me with so much. More than he would ever know.
Busy with my thoughts, I’d hardly noticed the countless restaurants on Belt Line that I’d bypassed, though the neon lights flashed in my rearview mirror. The colors set off nicely by the faded gray of the evening sky.
At the Midway intersection, I slipped the Jeep into the right-hand-turn lane and followed a slew of cars heading deeper into Addison. I glimpsed the antiques mall to my left, a big old box of a structure that housed aisle after aisle of treasures.
Marilee’s studio wasn’t much farther up, and it would’ve been hard to miss even if I hadn’t known where I was going.
Though dusk had yet to bury the setting sun, the place glowed like a house afire. The tiny trees lining the front parking lot sparkled with a million tiny lights. Garlands of flowers entwined with more of the glittering bulbs gracefully draped the deep green awning stretching forth from the front doors.
I swung the car around, looking for an empty space, as a young man in white shirt, black vest, and bow tie ran out to greet me. Marilee even had nattily garbed valets for early birds, I mused, what with the party thirty minutes away. I was running a little later than I’d hoped, but there was still plenty of time to make sure the web cams were properly placed.
I slowed to a stop as the fellow approached my window and motioned for me to roll it down. Perspiration clung to his freckled skin, and I smiled at him. It was Dewey, an intern from UT-Dallas who was spending the summer earning college credits as one of Marilee’s assistants. In other words, he was slave labor.
“Hey, Andy. I’ll be happy to take care of this for ya,” he said, looking eagerly at my dusty Wrangler.
And who was I to deny him his fun?
Or his tip?
“Thanks, Dew.” I put the car in Park and unbelted myself as it idled, rumbling familiarly. As he popped open the door for me, I grabbed my purse and began my less than graceful slide out, accepting his proffered arm gratefully.
“You be careful in there,” he advised, wiping sweat from his brow with a sleeve. “It’s even stickier inside than out.”
“Marilee’s in a foul mood again?” I dared to ask him as I tugged down the hem of my dress so it covered my thighs or a small portion thereof.
“Let’s say, I’d rather be out here sweating.”
“That bad?” I grimaced.
“She already made someone cry.”
“Who was it this time?”
“Her daughter.” He sighed. “They had another fight. God knows what this one was about.”
Kendall?
The girl could be a bitch and a half, but she was still no match for Marilee.
Poor thing.
I swallowed hard.
“Hope you have your thick skin on under that cute little number. Try to have a nice evening, ya hear?” Dewey said and grinned, looking pleased as punch not to be in my pretty pink shoes.
He hopped into the Jeep quickly, and I almost dove in after him. I kept my eyes on the taillights until I saw it round the nearest bend, no doubt aiming for a bank of empty spaces around back.
Didn’t take me but another moment of standing on asphalt, breathing the remnants of exhaust, before I sucked in my gut, gritted my teeth, and told myself that, if Marilee made anyone cry, I was leaving.
Especially if it were me.
Chapter 6
A couple of Marilee’s regular security guys in blue suits and watch caps were taking a lap around the building when I crossed to the front doors. A tuxedoed man I didn’t recognize stood inside, whisking the glass portals open for me as I approached. He checked my name off on his clipboard before letting me pass with a hesitant, “Um, good, um, evening.”
As if even he didn’t believe it.
“Lord help me,” I said under my breath as I proceeded up the wide hallway toward the soundstage, the sage green walls on either side of me filled with framed poster-sized photographs of Marilee doing various things domestic: baking, gardening, scrapbooking, decorating, and stenciling.
There was even a shot of her in a yoga pose that had me wondering if someone hadn’t done a bit of airbrushing to get that foot behind her head. Or else she was double-jointed. I marveled at the gorgeous lighting that made Marilee look amazingly ethereal, so calm and sweet, hardly resembling the demanding diva for whom I’d been working these past two weeks.
If only real life could be so picture-perfect.
But even supermodels had cellulite (seriously, I read it in Cosmo).
If Marilee had any cottage cheese on her thighs it would soon be public knowledge, according to the rumor mill. I’d heard the buzz around the office that an unauthorized biography was in the works, supposedly being written by a thus-far anonymous reporter who was well acquainted with her subject. If any dirt were unearthed, it would surely be gobbled up by the masses.
Thus far, Marilee had managed to stay under the radar. The National Enquirer still seemed unaware of her existence. But that surely wouldn’t last long, not once The Sweet Life debuted on television sets across the nation.
I’d dug up articles and interviews online, mostly back issues from D Magazine and Texas Monthly, that didn’t reveal much about my new client except that she’d built her business from scratch after a divorce had left her a penniless single mom. There was barely a mention of her life before that, except to say she came from a hole in the wall called Stybr, Texas, and had attended Texas Christian briefly before dropping out to marry her college sweetheart.
Still, I couldn’t help but wonder if there wasn’t more to it than that.
Because I’d come to realize that the image Marilee had created was based more on fantasy than reality. She peddled an illusion of herself as Earth Mother cum Household Whiz, and people seemed to eat it up. Everything she touched suddenly seemed in great demand. Her books and audiotapes sold like hotcakes. There were whispers that she was about to embark on a joint venture with a large retail chain—linens, cookware, furnishings, and paint, all bearing “The Sweet Life” brand—that would net her millions. Well, even more millions, considering her syndication deal was worth a bundle. She wasn’t quite in Oprah’s territory yet, but she was hell-bent in that direction.
Though all the money in the world couldn’t buy friends.
Okay, real friends.
From what I’d seen, Marilee had very few people she trusted, besides her daughter Kendall (and even that seemed iffy).
And, of course, Marilee’s staunchest supporter: Her Highness of Highland Park. The venerable Cissy Blevins Kendricks.
Now, there was a story to make an unauthorized biographe
r drool.
Mother had met Mari while volunteering at a food bank half a dozen years ago, shortly after Marilee’s divorce. Marilee’s finances had been tight, and she’d been fighting to stay off welfare. While my mother had filled up the food pantry bags, Marilee had started talking. She’d been working at the cleaners by day and writing at night. She’d even sent in samples of her proposed column to the Morning News without luck. To make a long story short, Cissy had stepped in and changed the course of Marilee’s life forever. Though my mother didn’t generally brag about her good deeds (to anyone but me), I never doubted she’d had a hand in Marilee’s swift rise in Big D. Cissy knew all the right people, and Marilee hadn’t known a soul, not then.
Now Marilee had the world knocking down her door.
My mother never publicly—or even privately—took credit for her involvement. It was just one of the many “projects” she’d thrown herself into after Daddy died.
When I’d asked Cissy what else she knew of Marilee’s background, she’d fed me the “you know I don’t like to gossip, darlin’” line before she’d spilled a few measly beans.
She told me that Marilee used to run around barefoot on a chicken ranch, hardly the Beaver Cleaver upbringing that Marilee alluded to in those interviews where she mentioned her childhood at all.
The “barefoot” part was tough to imagine.
The hard-edged businesswoman on display at the office would never run around without shoes much less without full makeup. I’d never even seen her wearing jeans, except on her show’s gardening segment. Otherwise, it was most often twin-sets and trousers or Chanel suits, much like my mother.
In fact, I often wondered if Marilee hadn’t mimicked Cissy’s style on purpose in order to land on the annual “Best Dressed List” alongside my mother in the Park Cities Press.
Though I guess that wasn’t a crime. You couldn’t be tossed in jail for nicking another woman’s fashion sense.
Cissy also confessed that Dallas’s “diva of domesticity” had lost her mother when she was very young, which is why she was so intent on creating the perfect nest, for herself and for everyone else on the planet. Though the few times I’d seen Marilee with her daughter, they’d been bickering.
The Good Girl's Guide to Murder: A Debutante Dropout Mystery Page 6