by Mary Bowers
“And you paid her fifty dollars for it?”
“Good grief, of course I didn’t!”
“You took it back as a donation?”
“I gave her five bucks and threw her out. She probably went next door and got a latte with it. But I’m not giving it up again. I do love it,” she said, looking down at it. “I guess Vesta wanted me to have it after all.”
I glanced up at the cat again, but she was looking steadily over my head, avoiding my eyes. In a rush I told Florence, “I think you should wear it every day. Wear it all the time. You know, in memory of Vesta.”
“Don’t worry, I will. If I’d been wearing it yesterday, that burglar would never have come in here.”
The idea startled me, but I could see that she really believed it.
Myrtle suddenly popped her head back into the shop. “Hey, what’s taking you so long, Flo? Shove ‘em up there and let’s get a move on. We’ll never get done at this pace.”
I stepped between them. “We’re never ‘done’ here, Myrtle. Stuff is always coming in and going out. Florence needs to take time to display things attractively or they won’t sell. Five pretty vases arranged on a shelf make a nice display. Twenty vases shoved together on a shelf makes a mess, and nobody even looks. Your sister has been doing this for years and she’s good at it. I want her to continue the way she always has, and if you’re going to lend a hand, you’ll need to do things her way.”
We faced off. During my speech, Myrtle had come all the way into the shop and was standing in the main aisle, arms akimbo.
“Well!” she puffed. “I should hope you treat the rest of your volunteers with more respect than that! After all, I’m not asking to be paid here. I just want to help out, now that I’m retired.”
“And I appreciate it,” I said. “But nobody comes on board and starts running things the very first day. They have to learn our system. For that, you’re going to have to get used to taking orders from your sister. She runs this shop.”
Frankly, I didn’t care if Myrtle left. I had a faint hope that working together all day might bring the sisters closer together, or at least to an understanding of one another, but Florence was going to have to be the boss. If they were going to fight, they weren’t going to do it at Girlfriend’s.
Myrtle began to back down, in body language if not in speech, when the door opened behind me and Tina Armstrong came in. I noticed that Wicked had come fully awake during my face-off with Myrtle, and when Tina came in he started positively grinning, the little stinker.
“Finally!” Tina said.
Myrtle stomped off into the back room.
“Finally what?” I asked, turning around to face Tina.
“Finally, I can go through the Cadbury collection and really pick out what I want. I already know that I want that sweet little vanity and chair. All those curves and scrolls – couldn’t you just eat it? How heavenly to sit down in front of a big oval mirror with all your creams and perfumes and brushes set out, all of them waiting to make you beautiful!”
I was leaning against the check-out counter, working on a smile. Tina’s reality-show concept of heaven didn’t interest me, but she was there as a customer, and no doubt had that same checkbook in her purse from which she’d written the thousand-dollar check. It was too much to hope that we had a thousand-dollar vanity here, but I was sorry Florence had priced it at $150 before we knew that Tina wanted it.
“Yes,” I said. “Heavenly.”
Tina was caressing the marble work surface of the pretty little table. “I know just what I’m going to do with it. I haven’t started looking for a condo yet, so I have no idea what it will look like, but I think I can get started with this piece. I’ll be decorating in coastal casual – light and airy, eclectic and fun – since we’ll be living near the beach. But I’d better make sure the master suite is big enough, because this little darling is going into the master bath.”
“So you really are moving?” I said. Florence turned around and stared, then quickly turned back to the display shelf.
Tina shrugged. “I guess that cat’s out of the bag, so why not admit it? Ronnie was right. In the vernacular of my youth, I’m getting ready to blow this pop stand.”
“Where? And who is ‘we’?”
“Oh, somewhere south; somewhere with an ocean view. Daytona maybe. Miami. Maybe we’ll get right away and head for the Keys. I think I’ll paint the vanity,” she said, becoming coy now that she had my interest. “Something light and clean. White. Maybe cream. French vanilla. I think I can get away with it, with this lovely pink marble. Painted wood is really in just now.” She was running her fingertips across the curving back of the vanity’s upholstered chair. “A restorer should be able to make this chair look fabulous.”
“Who is ‘we’?” I repeated.
She turned as if she’d forgotten about me. “Oh, did I say ‘we’? That was just a figure of speech. I’ve got a lot of friends. You never know.”
She was baiting me. I scowled and went across to help Florence, who was reaching up with a cranberry-glass pitcher in a way that made me nervous. I didn’t believe for a minute that Tina was actually moving.
Trying to get my attention back, Tina said, “Things have a way of getting serious quickly, don’t they? Between men and women? I just have a feeling my world is about to take a wild spin, and I am so ready!”
“That’s nice,” I said with my back turned.
“By the way, have you seen Michael?” she asked, still trying to get a rise out of me.
“Why?”
I turned, and she went back to fawning over the make-up table. “I just wondered. He seems so changed lately, doesn’t he? For the better, I mean. Has a kind of a glow all of a sudden.”
I thought about the way Michael had let Tina play him at the diner on Saturday, and Tina, quick as a cat, read my mind.
“Oh, yes,” she purred. “The diner. Was that the last time you saw him? He’s looking even more scrumptious this morning.”
And with that insinuation of an all-nighter, Tina stabbed me with a victorious smile. Then she cried, “Oh, there he is!”
I looked out the shop’s front window and there he was. Michael Utley, Tropical Breeze’s most eligible widower, walking down Locust Street, looking scrumptious, all right.
“Gotta go!” Tina said, and left the shop, calling over her shoulder, “Put a ‘Sold’ sign on the vanity set. I’ll be back for it later.”
The door closed behind her, and I watched her flying across the street toward Michael. Where’s a garbage truck when you need one, mowing down jaywalkers who don’t look both ways?
She’d never even noticed the thousand-dollar necklace hanging around Florence’s neck.
Anyway, she made it across the street safely and they walked into Don’s Diner together. I couldn’t tell whether or not Michael was surprised to see her, but he didn’t exactly recoil in horror. With one backward glance at Girlfriend’s, he ushered her into the diner and followed her in.
I saw red. Literally. Bloody streaks crossed in front of the diner, dripping and smearing and pulsing in the overheated air. For a moment I thought I was losing my mind. Then I stopped and I pulled myself in. Forcing myself at first, I let my shoulders down and felt the muscles of my face fall as I entered a state of mind that was becoming familiar, even natural. There was such ease in surrender.
I turned like an automaton and gazed up at the goddess, and she came into focus like the center of a bullseye, like the center of the world. My vision cleared and I had that sensation of floating in an aquarium again. An aquarium filled with warm green water.
Within a cocoon of emerald light and scented breezes, my world came back into balance.
Chapter 17
Two hours later I was still in the shop. At around one o’clock I had sent Myrtle over to Perks for sandwiches and drinks, and the sisters and I had had a working lunch in Girlfriend’s, trying to get things in order. I really did want to help Florence with all
the new donations, but I also wanted to make sure that Myrtle didn’t start walking all over her again. But, surprisingly, everybody behaved and we got a lot done.
Just about the time I was looking at my watch and thinking about going over to Orphans of the Storm for a quick check before I went home again, the shop door opened. I had my back to the door, lifting a cut-glass lamp base, but Florence looked up with her usual smile, then looked so surprised I had to turn around.
It was Diana Huntington and a handsome young man who had to be her stepson, Jordan.
He looked very much like his father, but as he came closer I saw that he had striking, light blue eyes below dark, straight eyebrows. He was a couple of inches taller than his six-foot father, and looked as if he’d just showered and thrown on any old clothes. He had that rangy, taut build of a man who could wear anything and look good. Cargo shorts, surfer tee, leather sandals, good to go. His tanned skin was clean and glowing, and his hair was still wet and had been tousled into place. I thought of Sheena’s bitter remarks about him and felt a pang.
“Just take a look around,” Diana was saying. “Her things are probably everywhere in the shop. I had no idea you were sentimental, Jordan. If I’d realized, of course I would’ve given you a chance to take a few mementoes. But just look around and take whatever you want.” She looked at her wristwatch, then gazed out the front window. “I’ll wait.”
Jordan looked at me and said, “Of course, I’ll pay for what I want.”
“Of course you won’t!” Diana snapped. “It’s our stuff anyway.” She proceeded to walk over to the little vanity and chair that Tina had put dibs on. “This piece is charming, now that I see it without a lot of crusty old jars on it. I want it. Have it delivered to Cadbury House, please.”
“That piece is sold,” I said calmly.
“I don’t see a sold sign on it,” she said, turning on me.
“Tina Armstrong just purchased it. My bad. I’ll put a sold sign on it now.”
“Tina?” she spat. “Then it’s definitely mine. Have it delivered today.”
“Diana,” Jordan said quietly. “You gave it away. It is not our stuff anymore.”
Diana turned her head menacingly and glared at me. “Have it delivered today. And Jordan will take whatever he wants, right?”
I took a deep breath and turned to Jordan. “Of course. I’m sure your grandmother would’ve wanted it that way.”
“I think Grandma would’ve wanted me to pay,” he said, giving me a small, devastating grin. “She loved your organization.”
I melted. “Thank you.”
Diana bristled and came between us on the sales floor. “I said he could take whatever he wanted, and he’s going to! What the hell do you think you’re doing, making him pay for his own things?”
“Diana,” Jordan said, but she backed him off with a move of her hand.
“Who the hell do you think you are?” she demanded of me. She turned to Jordan. “Just get what you want and let’s get out of here. I’ll expect the make-up table this afternoon.”
Myrtle had looked into the shop, then quickly pulled her head back out of sight like a frightened turtle. Florence had somehow contrived to make herself invisible and continued arranging glassware that didn’t need arranging, and I stood in the middle of the shop trying not to attract Diana’s attention in any way. Jordan circled the shop, stopping to touch an item, pick it up, put it down, then move on.
At one point he came close to me and muttered, “She’s just had her afternoon swim,” as if that explained something.
I looked at him questioningly.
“She likes to have a little refreshment while she’s in the pool,” he said. Then he made a pantomime of bringing a glass to his lips. “Don’t worry about the table. She won’t remember later, and if she does, I’ll handle it.” Nonchalantly, he moved on.
I stood there immobile, putting two and two together. When I had gone to Cadbury House with the volunteers to get Vesta’s things, Diana had just gotten out of the pool. And, apparently, by the time she got done swimming and lounging by the pool, Diana was usually plastered. It explained a lot.
I went into the back room and cornered Myrtle.
“You know what went on at Cadbury House,” I said quietly.
She snapped her head around and stared at me, indignant, as if I were out of line.
“Does Diana drink?” I asked.
“Cadbury House is not an alcoholic household. No hard liquor. The family only drinks wine, not to excess, and only at meals.” She thought for a moment, then added, “Young Jordan seems to have developed a taste for beer while living away. He’ll outgrow it.”
“I’m not asking about ‘the family’,” I said, knowing darn well that Myrtle only thought of Vesta, Graeme and Jordan as “the family.” “I’m asking about Diana.”
She held my gaze a moment, then solemnly nodded as if she had to force her muscles to move.
“At lot?”
Shrug. “Sometimes.”
“Is that what the afternoon ‘swim’ is all about? She’s really just drinking by the pool when nobody else is around?”
“Vodka,” she said, as if the word tasted bad in her mouth. “It’s no reflection on the family, of course. The Cadburys have never been a drinking family. The first Mrs. Graeme never had a drop of hard liquor in her life.” She said it with a sense of personal pride.
I looked away from her and was thoughtful. I was remembering what Officer Peterson had told me about the break-in at Cadbury House. It seemed plausible now that Diana had just been imagining things were moved, or that she was forgetting to lock the doors herself. Nodding to Myrtle, I headed back to the shop.
Jordan happened to be at a table display facing me. He was looking at a bust of Nefertiti, running a finger along its cheek. His face was tragically sad. Something about that figure must have brought Vesta back to him almost bodily. Then, though I couldn’t be sure, I thought I saw him mouthing the words, “I’m sorry.”
Suddenly Diana, who had been impatiently looking out the window, snapped around and said, “Come on, Jordan. I’ve got to get over to the gourmet store and I’ve got a million other things to do.”
“You don’t have to wait for me,” he said without turning to face her. “Go ahead. I’ll hitch a ride back home with somebody.”
“You’ll come with me now,” she said flatly. “You need to go to the gourmet store with me, remember? I can’t carry the new food processer and everything else I need by myself, and you said you’d help.”
He closed his eyes and lifted his head. “Right. Yeah. Well, I’ve found what I came after, so let me pay for it and we can go.”
Diana snapped. “I said you were not going to pay for anything!” she shouted, wild with the anger she’d been holding in.
“Really, Jordan,” I said, “just take it.” It seemed all he wanted was the Nefertiti bust, and that was fine with me. It was a bad copy, and I was pretty sure it would never sell anyway.
Diana rounded on me and went off her head. “I’ve had about enough of you, you stupid bitch! There are a dozen charities I could’ve contributed this crap to, but Michael mentioned you, so I thought, what the hell. I’ll be looking around for a new family attorney after this; Michael’s past his game. Why he wants to get it on with you I can’t imagine. Even he could do better. And your attitude has been uncalled for throughout this whole thing. Who do you think you are?”
Bewildered, I said, “Diana . . . ?”
“I know about it,” she said, blazing. “I know about the money you were getting from her. She thought nobody in the family knew, but Graeme found her notes.”
“Her notes?” For a moment, I was confused. Then I remembered the jumble of little papers she’d been pulling out of her purse during our conference at Michael’s home office. She must have dropped one at home, I told myself stoutly, refusing (for the moment) to believe he’d go through her purse.
Diana gestured wildly, her hands raddled wi
th tremors. “A hundred thousand to you, a hundred thousand to that idiot Myrtle, another hundred thou here, there and everywhere. You must have been working on her for years, but too bad for you – she waited too long to put it in writing and now you get nothing. The woman was senile! She didn’t know what she was doing. And you were so ready to take advantage of her. Well thank God she died before she could do any of that shit.”
Aghast, we all went rigid. Even Diana seemed to realize she had gone too far. I heard something gently fall in the back room, but Myrtle stayed where she was.
“What are you talking about?” Jordan said.
“What the hell do you care?” Diana spat at him. Her voice was lower and calmer, but she wasn’t backing down. “You’ve got your stinking trust fund, don’t you? She couldn’t touch that, thank God. Did you want all her money? Well to hell with that. I told your father you’re not getting another freakin’ penny, and you won’t. Now get over here. We are leaving.”
Jordan was holding the bust in both his hands, almost cradling it. He gazed at nothing for a moment, then looked at his stepmother.
“She was worth a million of you. What Dad ever saw in you I’ll never know, and the sooner he dumps you, the better. I wish you had died instead of Grandma.” He said it without rancor, but he said it like he meant it.
She turned white. Then, stiffly, as if she were about to crack, she walked to the door and opened it.
Just as we were all heaving a sigh of relief, she turned back and looked me in the eye.
“I want it all back.”
I did a double take. “What?”
“Pack it up. I want it all back, and I want it today, even that stupid pendant you’re wearing. Don’t try to lie to me – it was Vesta’s. She wore the damn thing all the time. Crappy little eyesore. You will bring everything back and put it in the old servants’ quarters, right where you found it, and you will not break anything. And I specifically want that vanity.”
Jordan stepped between us so that I could no longer see Diana. “Grandma would’ve wanted you to have it,” he told me. “Keep it. Here.” He was handing me a twenty-dollar bill, the price Florence had set for the bust. His eyes began to shine. “She used to have it on the mantle in her bedroom. It wasn’t a good copy, but she loved it.”