Diane Vallere - Style & Error 02 - Buyer, Beware

by Diane Vallere

“Is it the fact that the cops figured it out without you that’s keeping you up at night?”

  “How do you know I’m up at night?”

  “It’s just an expression. You’re up at night?”

  “No, not really,”

  “You just said you were.”

  “Okay, so I am.”

  “Kidd, what’s going on?”

  The doorbell rang. “Nick, I gotta go.”

  I opened the door for Dante. He pushed past me and strode into the kitchen. “I’m putting on a pot of coffee. Start talking.”

  I followed Dante into the kitchen, where he was scooping teaspoons of coffee into my machine. I didn’t bother asking how he knew where everything was. Probably wouldn’t have been satisfied with the answer. He poured water into the chamber and punched the on button before turning back to face me.

  “That Simms guy was right about one thing.”

  “Oh yeah? What’s that?”

  “You possess a unique skill set.”

  “He was talking about my background as a buyer at Bentley’s.”

  “Sit down, Samantha,” he ordered.

  I noticed the brown nylon duffle bag that sat on one of my chairs.

  “I agree with him. You do possess a unique skill set.” The pot of coffee was only half-full, but Dante pulled it out and filled two mugs. He pushed the pot back into the machine and carried the mugs to the table.

  He set one of the mugs in front of me, and moved the duffle bag from the chair and sat down. The bag landed by his feet.

  “You’re not planning on staying over, are you?” I asked.

  “We’ll get to the bag in a second.” He drank from his mug. “I’m going to tell you a couple of things tonight, and I don’t want to hear that you repeated them. Got me?”

  “I, um, I don’t want to agree to anything until I know what I’m agreeing to,” I stated in a sentence that started rather tentatively but ended with a verbal jab.

  “You still don’t trust me, do you?”

  “You’re Cat’s brother, so yes, technically, I trust you. Only I don’t completely trust you for other reasons.”

  He raised an eyebrow.

  “But we’re not getting into those reasons tonight. In fact,” I stated, gaining spitfire momentum, “I don’t think we should be getting into anything tonight. In fact,” I repeated, because it seemed as though my little speech was as much for me as it was for him, “I think after this cup of coffee you should be going. Because I have a very nice man in Italy, and just because he’s not here is no reason I should entertain you in his absence.”

  “Entertain?” He started to smile.

  “You know what I mean.”

  “Samantha, I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t jealous of your very nice man in Italy, but that’s not why I’m here.”

  “It’s not?”

  He reached down to the duffle bag and unzipped it. I tried to look inside but didn’t recognize anything. He pulled out a square metal object with wires sticking out of the top.

  “Did you take that thing from my car again?”

  He set the contraption on the table. “This didn’t come from your car.”

  “Whose car did it come from?”

  “One at the junk yard.”

  “What are you saying?”

  “There was nothing wrong with your car the morning I showed up here.”

  “You tricked me?”

  “I knew you were up to something. So yes, technically I tricked you, so I could see where you were going and what you were up to. Once I got you to Heist, I figured you’d either come out with files or paperwork that I could read, or the sugar cube would pick up something you did. And it did. You got very excited about a couple of papers, only I don’t know what you did with them.”

  “Those were the letters I mailed to my cat.”

  “Why?”

  “I didn’t know why I had them, but I thought they were important. Kyle was going to give the recap to Emily but she was murdered. He gave it to me because he thought it was suspicious.”

  “Why’d you mail them?”

  “Heist might not have liked it if they saw me taking recaps on their own profit margin, and by that time I was pretty sure Vongole was at the middle of the whole thing. I thought about putting it in my shoe or my bra, but I was too scared they would fall out or somehow someone would find them.”

  “Who exactly did you think was going to go looking in your bra?”

  Considering Nick was in Italy, it was a good question. Considering I was talking to the only other person I found myself inappropriately flirting with, I chose not to answer.

  “So your instincts told you to mail them to yourself—your cat.”

  “Yes, and I mailed two other envelopes at the same time so security wouldn’t be suspicious when I waved a stack of hand-addressed envelopes in front of them. And I ran them out to the mailbox on the corner of the parking lot so they wouldn’t be sitting around in the store. They were delivered a couple of days ago.”

  “Addressed to your cat.”

  “That’s because I was afraid of addressing them to myself.”

  “I know a lot of women, and I know how a lot of women think. And I don’t know a single other woman who would do what you did in that situation.”

  “What can I say? I’m special,” I said, not entirely sure he’d intended what he said as a compliment.

  “Remember I told you I used to do a little PI work?”

  “Yes.”

  “I learned stuff. How to get information, how to trip people up, how to hide things. I have a knack for it.”

  “I’m sure you do.”

  “You have a knack for it too, only the opposite. People thing you’re going to zig, you zag. You’re unexpected.”

  I looked up from the coffee that had the appearance of being cool enough to drink.

  “Only, when you get down to it, you have no idea what you’re doing.”

  I set the full cup back on the table with a bang, letting the brown liquid splash out of the mug and onto the placemat. “I got this far, didn’t I?” I asked.

  “And some people might say it’s a wonder, but I won’t, because, like I said, I agree with Tony Simms. You possess a unique skill set.”

  “Dante, if there’s something you’re trying to say, just come out and say it already. It’s getting late.”

  “For all I know, Kyle did kill those people, and everything you tried to convince us of two days ago is purely in your imagination.”

  “That’s a load of crap and you know it.”

  “Let me stay tonight and teach you a couple of things to help you.”

  “I—I’m kind of in a relationship,” I said with less conviction than I probably should have.

  “Considering this Nick guy probably feels pretty strongly toward you, I’m sure he’d appreciate knowing I’m going to arm you with a little knowledge that might protect you when you go off tilting at windmills.”

  He might have had a point. Whether or not it held water was still to be argued. Only, it was getting late, I was curious about what he had to teach me, and it was good to not be alone for the night.

  “You think someone else is the killer. That’s a pretty big accusation.” Dante sat forward and propped his elbows on his thighs. “Not that I don’t follow you, but you’re going to need a pretty solid set of connectors to get anyone to buy it. Why don’t you spell it out for me one more time?”

  I let out a big sigh. I didn’t want to be mocked or shot down anymore. “It’s going to take a lot of time for me to go through what I know and try to convince you.”

  Logan entered the kitchen and nuzzled his head in the duffle bag. We watched him pull his head out, and then step his front feet in and circle a few times. Less than a minute later he was curled up inside, purring.

  “I hope your entire lesson plan isn’t under my cat,” I said.

  “Drink your coffee. I’m going to check out a couple of things.”

 
; He left his mug on the table and walked upstairs. Logan raised his head and watched, stretched, stepped out of the bag, and followed him. I reached down to the bag and started digging through it. But before I could determine what Dante brought, his tattooed arms reached down and grabbed the nylon webbed handles and hoisted the duffle away from me.

  “Bring the coffee.” He turned back toward the stairs and disappeared.

  “Where are you going?” I asked with a little more than mild alarm. My bedroom was up there.

  “My sister’s not the only one around here who knows how to accessorize.”

  “Accessorize?” I called behind him.

  “Yeah.” He stood at the top of the stairs, staring down at me. “You’re getting another makeover. This time on my terms.”

  31

  I climbed the stairs and went to my bedroom. Dante wasn’t there. Not sure if this was his idea of a prank, I whipped the closet doors open, expecting to find him staring back at me. He wasn’t. I dropped onto all fours and bent my head down, peering under the bed, butt in the air.

  “Do you want to tell me what you’re doing?” he asked, only not from under the bed as I expected. I pulled my head out and looked up at him propped against the doorframe, holding Logan and scratching his ears.

  “This isn’t a bedroom kind of thing tonight. I’d prefer to do this in the room over here.” He jerked his head back and to the right.

  “What exactly do you prefer to do?” I asked, scooting to my feet and dusting a few cobwebs off my harem pants.

  “Luck has brought you further than anyone expected.”

  “It’s not luck. Everything I’ve done has been completely reasoned out.”

  “Like I said, not a single woman I know would jeopardize her job and send her cat confidential paperwork from her place of business.”

  “But it was—”

  “Not a one.”

  “But”

  “Unless you plan to go drop on the floor and look under the bed again, there are no buts in this room.”

  “Smartass.”

  “You have some kind of talent for this stuff, but you also have a knack for finding trouble. I can’t in good faith send you out there to the world at large thinking luck is going to protect you.”

  “What do you plan to do? Outfit me in Kevlar and wire me with a camera that looks like a tube of lipstick?”

  Dante looked at my tank top for a second, and then back at my face. “No, I kind of like the way you dress.” He pulled a couple of things out of the duffle bag and placed them on the old wooden desk in the room. A Bay City Rollers poster hung on the wall, one of the only things left from when it was my older sister’s room. My parents had never tossed the last of her high school belongings, and I had yet to figure out what I was going to do with the room anyway, so I’d left it empty. At times I thought it would make a good walk-in closet.

  “What do you call this room?”

  “My sister’s old bedroom.”

  “You might want to start calling it your crime lab.”

  And that’s when I went from being all butts to all ears.

  “I’ve been doing some digging. I’m not 100 percent sure you’re making this whole thing up.”

  “Really? You believe me?”

  “Not entirely, but I’m not going to discount your suspicions, either.”

  This was it. This was the time to flat-out tell Dante what I thought. I was bolstered by the fact that I’d shared this very knowledge with Andi and she hadn’t balked.

  “I think Tony Simms is the killer.”

  Once again, our eyes held for several seconds. Even Logan, who had followed us into the room, sat as still as a Puccetti, waiting for the inevitable reaction.

  “So that’s the real reason you’re going to the dedication.”

  “I thought we went through this already? You said he wanted me there because I’ve been part of the whole thing.”

  “That’s what I said, but I don’t think that’s it.”

  “What do you think now?”

  “If he can keep tabs on you, you can’t get to him.”

  I stared at Dante while he made his point. There was more, and I knew it, and I wanted to know if he would go far enough to say it out loud.

  “But if he’s keeping tabs on me, then I can keep tabs on him too.”

  “Simms’ plan isn’t just to watch you, sweetheart. If he’s the killer and thinks you know something, he’ll kill you too.”

  “What am I thinking?” I jumped up from my chair and spun around, not wanting to face the tough guy who was listening to me and leveling with me, because my inner tough girl had run screaming for the hills, and what was left was the scared voice inside of my head. Only that voice wasn’t inside my head anymore. “Why am I doing this? What is wrong with me?”

  I started to leave the room, feeling hot tears on my cheeks, feeling desperation taking over the confidence and the planning and the sarcasm. I wanted to get out of there before Dante saw me break down. Only I tripped over his duffle bag and started to fall toward the door.

  He caught me with both arms and spun me around. I buried my head into his T-shirt and took deep breaths, trying to get my emotions under control before I redesigned the logo on his shirt with mascara smudges.

  “Shhh. Breathe. Calm down,” he said, one strong arm holding me and the other stroking the back of my head. I was shaking.

  “All I wanted was a job where I could wear nice clothes. And instead I’m a failure.”

  “Look at me.” He gently pushed me away from him and took my face in his hands. His thumbs swept the tears from under my eyes like wiper blades. “You are not a failure. Get that? You are … not a failure.”

  “You’re not the person whose cotton I should be using,” I muttered. Clearly this was not a time to be worried about grammar.

  “Does your guy in Italy wear cotton?”

  “Sometimes.”

  “Then pretend I’m him.”

  It was such an innocent statement, said with no ulterior motive. If ever Dante had an opportunity, he had one now, but he didn’t go there. Aside from the heat from the arms that encircled me, there was nothing hot about the way he held me. In that one second, Dante had gotten more personal than any of my fantasies.

  When I finally figured I wasn’t going to wail like a scared four-year-old being thrown in the deep end of a pool during swimming lessons, I spoke. “I have no business sitting around here, coming up with a plan to catch a killer.”

  My voice was clearer now that I wasn’t speaking into his shirt. “I’m just going to have to convince Detective Loncar that he’s got the wrong person. I don’t know how to do that, but he has to listen to me. He’s obligated by police code to protect the public. He has to do something, right?”

  I excused myself and went to the bathroom. I splashed cool water on my face, put drops in my eyes to offset the redness, and delivered a pep talk to my reflection.

  “Why are you doing this? Why can’t you just let it all go? You’re going to be all alone if you can’t stop doing this. Alone, or dead.” Nice options.

  There was a tap on the door. “Samantha? You’re not going to be alone. I’ll be there too.”

  I dried off my face and opened the door. “You’re going to help me?”

  By the time Dante left it was well past one o’clock in the morning. The pot of coffee had kept us going for hours, but the emotional rollercoaster I’d ridden had left me drained.

  True to his word, Dante taught me a couple of tricks of the PI trade, and true to my word I promised not to repeat anything he’d said. When he left I was emotionally drained but strategically stimulated. He was right. It was crazy to think I’d gotten this far on instincts alone. After triple-locking the door, I changed into pajamas and crawled into bed. I had a daunting task ahead of me. Tomorrow morning, stage one of our plan, I was going back to Heist.

  32

  I wanted to get in and get out. If I timed everything well, no one w
ould know I had been there—well, besides the security team I’d have to walk past. But I was ready for them. I flashed my ID to the glass window that separated us.

  “Sign the sign-in sheet,” Gabe said. He waved toward the clipboard and the pen connected by a dirty white string. His swivel chair squeaked under his weight as he spun away from me.

  “Here’s my ID,” I waved again.

  “Store’s closed, and no one is to go in or out without signing in.”

  “Fine.” I scrawled my name on the first available line and scanned the names above mine. Only about half a dozen were on the sheet, and none looked familiar.

  “Who else is here?” I asked, attempting small talk.

  “Couple of guys from the stock team. They’re starting to pack up stuff for the store in Philly.”

  “Already?”

  “Simms doesn’t want this stuff to sit around here too long, or it won’t be worth anything to anybody. They’re taking a couple of full trailers tonight. Some kind of fire sale happening on Monday.”

  “Well, I just want to get a couple of personal things from my office, so I won’t be long.”

  I rested the pen on the top of the clipboard and moved on to my office. The store was glowing with light, and if it wasn’t for the lack of employees, you’d think it was open for business. As I rounded the corner from the contemporary department to handbags, I found the stock team throwing merchandise in giant plastic garbage bags.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Everything goes,” said the shortest guy of the bunch.

  “Where?”

  “To the Heist in Philly. We’re transferring as much of this inventory as we can.” He hoisted a full bag onto his shoulder like Santa Claus and bent at the waist to counter the weight. Many of the handbag shelves were empty, though scads of the inventory had been dumped on the selling floor. Other members of the stock team were scooping up the inventory and dumping it into the plastic bags too.

  “Wait! Those bags aren’t cheap!”

  They looked at me like I was nuts. “There’s a cloth inside each one. Put the bag in the cloth and then throw it in the plastic.” I opened a purple clutch and pulled a Vongole-stamped felt bag out from against the yellow suede lining, placed the bag in the felt, and pulled the drawstring shut. “See?”