by Terri Thayer
“Men,” Lark whispered. “As a race, they’re sure to fall for the toys.”
The seller paused, her intake of breath audible through her headset.
“And what, you ask, is this wondrous tool? A new slow cooker? No, it’s the Cutall rotary-cutting system. Get all the precision-cut pieces you need for your quilt in one-third the time.”
In front of her was a box with a bright orange mat. A cartoon-purple plastic arm swiveled over to keep the fabric in place. Slots kept the ruler straight. She took up a yellow-handled rotary cutter and begin slicing the fabric at a blinding pace, without stopping her chatter.
“Cut a half-yard of fabric into two-inch strips in ten seconds. A perfect cut every time with the Cutall rotary-cutting system.” She held up the pieces like strands of spaghetti. I half expected her to fling the strips on the wall.
“Do you have to buy a new rotary cutter?” a short-haired woman with red glasses asked worriedly. She glanced our way. Her eyes widened as she recognized Lark, but she quickly looked back as the hawker answered her question.
“No, not at all. Use any of your cutters. If you have this style —” she pulled out a straight-handled cutter “—just click it open, the blade is exposed, and you make your multiple cuts.” She ran the blade along the fabric.
“And make sure you close it,” someone yelled from the audience. Others murmured in agreement.
I thought of Claire, lying in her own blood because she’d been careless. I shook my head to rid myself of the picture.
“Or use this type,” the hawker said. She picked one up with a curved handle. “The blade retracts automatically. Your choice.”
“I love that cutter,” a woman with a curtain of long gray hair said to her friend. “Much safer. You can’t accidentally leave the blade exposed.”
“I like the other kind better,” her friend argued. “You just have to make yourself get in the habit of closing the cover each time. It cuts cleaner.”
“Come on, Nancy. It’s the same blade, it can’t cut any dif-
ferently.”
The demonstrator sensed she was losing her audience to a discussion on the relative merits of the rotary cutter. She rapped the side of her system sharply. All eyes turned front, and noise ceased.
“Whichever cutter you use,” she said, “the system works the same, holding your fabric steady and giving accurate cuts every time. Strips, triangles, squares, whatever you need.”
Her spiel was working. Lark pointed at several of the men who were reaching with thumb and forefinger into their back pockets for their wallets.
“Told you. Suckers,” she said, sotto voce.
“You don’t think it’s worth buying?”
She shook her head. “The longer you’re in this business, the more stuff like this you’ll see. Some of it is worthwhile. Not sure about this particular one. It’s been my experience at these shows that men will buy the expensive gadgets the women don’t really want. Or use.”
Heads turned as Lark’s voice rose. The Cutall sales woman looked unhappy that Lark had been recognized. Next to me, I felt Lark’s perfect posture get even straighter, her neck elongating. As more eyes landed on her, she stopped being herself, and became the celebrity.
“Can I have your autograph?” I heard a tiny brunette with helmet-like hair ask Lark. The Cutall spokeswoman frowned as she lost her audience again. She cleared her throat loudly.
“For the next fifteen minutes,” she announced, “the Cutall system is available for $50 less than the show price. $200. That’s a bargain, people!”
Lark signed the brunette’s program. Another hand thrust a program in front of her. After a moment, the crowd split in two, half going to buy the new tool, the other half gathering around Lark. I was pushed out of the way by a woman in a crocheted poncho.
“Dewey Pellicano?”
A fifty-something man was standing at my elbow. He was dressed in a blue button-down shirt and khakis. I didn’t recognize him. He hadn’t been in the line of chanters.
“Yes?”
“I’m Colin Bergstrom. I heard that you’re interested in selling your quilt shop.”
Word was getting around. Probably thanks to Freddy. “That’s true.” I nodded.
“This is my booth.” He pointed across the aisle from where we stood. I followed him, keeping half an eye on Lark. She was surrounded by autograph seekers, looking happy and relaxed in the midst of the admiring fans. She would never miss me.
Colin was showing off his space. “My wife and I sell notions and fabric, mostly on the Internet. We’ve been thinking about getting rid of our online store and opening a real place.”
I peered into his booth. The fabric was displayed nicely, the bolts arrayed in an enticing way. A revolving wooden display rack held notions.
“Did you make this display case? I’ve never seen one like it.” I moved closer to inspect it.
“Yes, I dabble in woodworking. Keeps me busy between shows.”
I turned the display, and the rotary cutters came into view, hanging from pegboard hooks by holes in their packaging.
Colin continued. “My wife and I live in San Jose, not far from your shop. We’ve just had twins, so I want to stay closer to home.”
I let him talk and picked up the curved-type cutter to examine the packaging. The plastic bubble on the cardboard had to accommodate the bend in the rotary cutter. Kym only used the old-fashioned type of rotary cutter, the one with the straight handle.
I glanced at the straight-handled cutter. The two packagings were not the same. The plastic top was different. The curved-handled cutter would not fit in a package meant for the straight kind.
Sanchez was wrong. Kym had given me the packaging from the straight-handled cutter yesterday morning. But the curved-handled cutter had been by Claire’s hand.
That packaging meant Sanchez was wrong, wrong, wrong. I wanted to sing it.
Colin laid a hand on my arm. I was surprised he was still there. I’d nearly forgotten him. His interest in my shop was apparent, but I was torn between talking to him more or finding Buster to tell him about the cutters. I needed to sell the shop but this difference in the rotary cutters was really important.
“So, Ms. Pellicano, when can we discuss this? I’m free now …”
His insistent tone brought me back. I hesitated. This earnest man with his beautifully constructed displays and his twins might be the one. The perfect new owner of Quilter Paradiso.
“I recently came into an inheritance,” he said.
I shut my eyes against his perfectness.
I had to call Buster and tell him.
But what if Colin was the perfect buyer for my shop?
Buster was the winner. “Colin, I can’t do this right now.”
He frowned. “I won’t be able to get away again for the rest of the day. Not until after the show closes.”
“Perfect. I’ll meet you in the bar at five.”
Then I remembered the fashion show rehearsal and the Freitas sisters. “Make it six. Thank you.”
I shook his hand quickly, ignoring his baleful expression and glanced over at Lark. She was still surrounded by quilters. I gestured to her that I was going to leave and hurried outside to call Buster. I held my breath as I passed through the cluster of smokers outside the door.
“Hi Dewey,” said a tall woman with large brown doe eyes surrounded by deep wrinkles. I recognized her from the bar last night. If I remembered correctly, she was from New Jersey and had a long-arm quilting business.
I said hi and kept moving, but I was stopped by another smoker.
“Dewey, huh? Do you work for Kym? She’s out here with us three times a day.”
“Wrong Kym, I’d say,” I said, chuckling. I wouldn’t be surprised if Kym did tell people that I
worked for her, but I knew she didn’t smoke.
I got out of the cigarette smoke and called Buster. He picked up on the first ring. I suddenly felt shy, realizing that with all the phone stuff between us, this was the first call I’d initiated. I didn’t find my voice until after the second time he said, “Healy.”
“Buster, it’s me. Dewey. Got a minute?”
“I’m just wrapping up. Meet me in front?”
I positioned myself along the edge of the fountain in the middle of the drive. The gentle noise of the water falling was a stark contrast to the chatter in my brain. Had I just walked away from the best buyer for QP? I breathed in the moist air, remembering how my brother Sean claimed that positive ions in the air promoted good thinking. Sean lived in San Francisco and had a lot of strange views on the natural world. At the time, one of those late nights after a Scattergories game and plenty of Corona, I’d argued that if that were true, then people who lived near Niagara Falls would have the clearest heads ever. And a person in a positive headspace generally didn’t throw himself over a huge waterfall in a barrel. Kevin had finally intervened, distracting us with his Madonna imitation.
I missed those carefree nights when we were all gathered around the big oak dining-room table, joking and playing games. I couldn’t remember the last time we’d done that. Before my mother died, for sure.
I turned my face away from the mist and picked up a daisy. A display to honor Claire had sprung up since this morning, with stuffed animals, flowers, and notes covering one side of the fountain’s wall. Several sprays of flowers had fallen into the water, their multicolored blooms scattered on the surface.
A similar display had sprung up on the store’s doorstep after my mother’s death. I took to entering by the back door so I wouldn’t have to see them every day. Kym had been sad when they stopped coming. I was relieved.
A memory of my mother came to me. I was thirteen. My mother had taken me on a trip to the corporate headquarters of Esprit de Corps in San Francisco. I was only becoming aware of clothes beyond sport shorts and tees, and Esprit was the only brand name I knew. I figured I would get a cute sweater. Instead, we took a tour of their collection of Amish quilts that hung on the brick walls throughout the offices. The huge, somber-colored quilts covered with an elaborate quilted feather pattern were of no interest to me. My mother told me that I was in the presence of greatness, but I was unbelievably disappointed. When she told me the quilts were made from the same fabric that the Amish used for clothing, my only reaction had been pity for the poor girls my age who had to go to school without the benefit of jeans. The further information that the Amish didn’t go to school past eighth grade only deepened my inability to relate. My mother had gotten disgusted with me and we’d left, distant as only a teenage girl and her mother could be.
After that, by mutual agreement, I’d stayed away from quilt shows and she’d given up trying to teach me how to look at quilts. A year ago, the Seventeenth Annual Northern California Quilt Extravaganza was the last place I would have expected to be.
Buster pulled up in a bright blue pickup truck with tinted windows, riding high on huge wheels that came nearly to my waist. I hadn’t realized what he’d parked outside my house last night. And left there until early this morning. Not very discreet. My neighbor Alice would have something to say next time I saw her. She kept better track of my visitors than I did.
He jumped down, leaving his door open, and met me on the sidewalk.
“Kym cut you loose?” he said.
“I’m sorry about this morning.”
“No apologies necessary. It just took me a while to catch on that Kym was playing her usual games. Okay if we take a drive?” he said, nodding toward the truck. “I need to gas it up, and I could use a little lost time. Budget restraints. Got to watch the overtime.”
My stomach growled so loudly we both heard it. Buster grinned. “And we could get some lunch.”
When I agreed, he opened the door, then turned and put his hands on my waist, as though to give me a boost into the passenger seat. I waved him off. I liked the feel of his strong fingers on my waist, but I hadn’t been picked up since I was two.
“That’s okay, I can manage.” I scooted away from him and climbed into the seat. Once inside, I felt silly, like a kid in a chair too big for her. I looked down to make sure my feet were touching the floor. Just barely. I tucked one leg under me to regain some sense of control over my lower limbs.
“Sorry, force of habit,” he said as he closed the door. “The only person who usually rides over there is Mom, and she’s so tiny I have to pick her up and set her on the bench.”
“Nice view,” I said. “A Mini Cooper must look like a Matchbox car from up here.” Now I just sounded like a dork. I took a deep breath.
He stopped to take off his jacket and lay it carefully behind the driver’s seat. He climbed in his side and we both buckled up. Buster’s wide shoulders filled the truck nicely. He didn’t diminish like some men do in a large truck. The Hummer effect, Vangie and I called it. The larger the car, the smaller the male driver appeared.
Glancing in his side mirror, he pulled out.
As we waited at the first red light, he massaged the back of his neck. “Kevin’s told me over the years that these quilt shows are a big deal, but I had no idea how many people attend.”
“I know what you mean. I hadn’t been to this show in more than ten years. It’s huge.”
“I’ll tell you one thing, these quilting women love to talk. About everything except what I need to hear,” he said.
“Couldn’t you break them down, sweat the truth out of them?” I asked. “Isn’t that what you homicide dicks do?”
He raised an eyebrow and laughed. It was fun to make him laugh. His whole face lit up. “Since the Governator,” he said, “our rubber hose budget ain’t what it used to be.”
“Give me a break. You’re talking to a bunch of middle-aged women. Turn on the charm.”
“Oh, does that work?” He smiled a sexy, slow-forming grin that seeped across his face and set up a tap dance in my stomach. This time it wasn’t hunger.
“Don’t look at me. I’m immune,” I said.
“So I noticed last night.”
“It wasn’t your charms I was after.”
He wisely changed the subject. “Here’s what I learned this morning. Claire was the sweetest, most caring quilter in America, no, on the planet. Evidently, she was the patron saint of quilting.” He stopped a beat and grinned again. “And many of these women have single granddaughters of marrying age.”
“Really, you’ve got these little old ladies pimping for you?” I joked to cover the fear that one of them might be perfect for him.
“How about a little sympathy? I’m just trying to find out about Claire, and I’m not getting anywhere. However, if I was looking for a great home-cooked meatloaf, I’d know right where to go.”
I laughed. Buster was the kind of guy you took home to Mother. My problem had never been bringing a boy home to my mother—it had been my brothers who scared away all but the most intrepid.
“No one thinks Claire was murdered?” I asked.
“Not unless you count the redhead who thought she’d been killed by terrorists trying to upset the American public by murdering a quilting icon.”
“Seriously?”
“I swear. I thought I was doing a service to the community putting away murderers. According to some of the women I met this morning, I really should have been arresting longarm quilters.”
“Do you have any idea what you’re talking about?”
“Don’t even get me started on the danger of raw-edge appliqué,” he said.
“Now I know you have no clue what you’re saying.”
He threw up his hands comically. I grabbed the wheel, then saw he was steering with h
is knees. I brushed his thigh as I pulled back, felt the electricity. My mind went to places it shouldn’t. I tore my gaze out of his lap. Sex in this truck was not an option.
I stole a glance at his face to see if he felt the sexual tension in the air. I’d thought acting on my impulses last night would have dissipated the chemistry between us, but I was wrong. Instead, the attraction thrummed between us like a guitar string recently struck. After the string stops, the air is full of promise.
Buster peered up at the red light. His forehead was wide, maybe even a little wider since his hair seemed to be moving back. Deep lines on either side of his mouth and around his eyes only added interest, like beads on a quilt. I remembered a much younger man, all soft cheeks and smooth skin. I preferred the hard planes. His face held all the experiences of the last dozen years—good, bad, pretty, and ugly. I wanted to find out the stories behind the wrinkles.
He pushed his glasses up on his head and scrubbed his eyes. I felt a moment of guilt for keeping him up most of the night and giving him scratchy eyes.
“Been a tough morning?” I asked
He squinted. “I’m kind of fascinated by the rotary cutter. I think Claire cut herself accidentally, but if someone did commit murder with one of them, it would be hard to trace. You were right about how ubiquitous they are,” he said. “There are five hundred quilters registered at that hotel and at least that many rotary cutters. If this were a murder, that would be a helluva lot of trouble for the investigators.”
I tried to interrupt. “Listen, that’s what I found out.”
As he reached to shift, our fingers touched and we both blushed at the sparks that resulted. I snatched my hand back.
“The problem with the rotary cutter,” he continued, talking quickly as his cheeks reddened, “is that the slash is not unique. Any cutter could have made the cut. With a stab wound, you can identify the knife. I can pretty much prove that a bullet came from a specific gun barrel. But the rotary cutter—hundreds of them all alike. It’s crazy.”