Death hits the fan

by Girdner, Jaqueline

  "Well," he said, a welcome gleam of gossip in his eyes again. "There were the other two authors. And Ted did do the alien psychic routine first—"

  "Did Shayla steal his idea?" I asked. "Did it make him mad?"

  Ivan wrinkled his forehead. A gossip he was, but not easy with serious accusations.

  "No, I don't think so," he finally replied. "No to either question." He shook his head. "They were similar ideas, but people come up with similar ideas all the time. How could Ted be angry? All ideas arise from the same life source, the same archetypes. And Adams and Smith did their alien sleuths before either Shayla or Ted. Though Shayla was more successful than any of them. But still, I just can't believe—"

  "How about Yvette?" I demanded. It was too hard to listen to Ivan arguing with himself. I knew neither side would ever win. "Is she nuts or what?"

  Ivan smiled gently. Affection, for Yvette? "Nuts, maybe," he agreed. "But in a highly creative way. And very prolific. She and Lou are a wonderful pair. He supports her all the way."

  Lou—there'd been something about Lou. Then I remembered. It'd been nudging my subconscious all the way over.

  "Wasn't Lou's brother killed in a car crash or something?" What if the driver had been Shayla? My pulse beat a little faster. It was far-fetched, but what if—

  "That's right," Ivan told me, his head tilted, wondering why I was asking. "Lou still gets upset about it. They were both kids when it happened."

  "Did they ever catch the driver?"

  "They didn't have to," Ivan answered. "The driver was killed too. He was drunk. Very, very sad."

  "Any relation to Shayla?" I tried desperately.

  Ivan shook his head. "I doubt it. He was a German tourist."

  So much for that idea. I settled back into my chair and sipped tea, thinking.

  Wayne took over. "How about Mr. Quadrini?"

  "Quadrini's an odd one. all right," Ivan said. "He's rich, but deeply unhappy. No inner peace. His wife died of cancer a few years back. That's when he became obsessed with Shayla, I think. But in a perfectly gentlemanly way."

  "Obsessed?"

  "No, no. Not really obsessed. I used the wrong word." Ivan shook his head again, thinking. "Just a real fan. He loved her work more than he loved her, maybe that's the best way to put it. He's certainly not some kind of stalker."

  He took a sip of his own tea before going on.

  "Now Winona is the one who seems the oddest," he told us. "She's always here in the shop. She buys a few books, but not many. I think she really reads most of them here in the aisles so she won't have to buy them. But I expect she's just poor," he finished up. "And that's certainly no crime."

  Damn. Ivan could just about handle the prosecution and the defense of any suspect. What a loss to the legal world.

  "How about Phyllis Oberman?" Wayne suggested.

  "She doesn't come in very often," Ivan said, looking serious again. "I know she's never attended an authors' signing before. And all she ever reads are romances. At least, that's all I've ever sold her." He shook his head. "But once again, that's certainly no crime."

  "No crime! No crime?" I heard from behind me.

  At first I thought it was PMP. But it was Marcia Armeson, her thin lips stretched into a grimace as tight as her designer jeans. "Ivan doesn't want to believe anyone could have done something as unharmonious, as uncouth, as real-life murder. But someone did, and I'm not gonna get hung for it, that's for sure—"

  "So, who do you think—" I began.

  "I don't think, I know," Marcia said with a sudden enigmatic smile. "And—"

  But a customer entered the store before she could finish. A mild-looking woman of about my age who was interested in something with "real literary merit."

  Ivan took his place behind the sales counter.

  "Who?" Wayne challenged Marcia as Ivan suggested literarily correct books in a suitably subdued tone.

  Marcia only smiled back at Wayne. "It's just an idea. And

  I'm not setting myself up for a slander charge until I'm sure/' she told him. Then she turned away pointedly and left to rearrange some books a few aisles over. I looked at Wayne's frustrated face sympathetically. It would be hard to question a head of wavy black hair or the rear end of a pair of tight jeans.

  But I followed her anyway, quietly.

  "Is it okay if I use the restroom?" I hissed into her ear once I was by her side. I wanted to see her unrehearsed reaction. I did.

  She whirled around, arms flailing, then dropped them to look into my eyes suspiciously. But finally, she just nodded. There was no way she was going to bar my access to the storeroom. I'd been there many times before. But her eyes tightened before she turned back to her books. Was I her suspect? A shiver ran up my arms. I hoped not. She was not a woman I wanted to tangle with.

  But she was a woman I was incredibly curious about. That's why I was heading for the storeroom, full bladder notwithstanding. What had she been in such a hurry to hide back there the night before? If anything. She'd probably just run to the restroom to be sick.

  I scooted down the main aisle to the back before she could change her mind.

  But all I saw is what I always saw in the storeroom of Fictional Pleasures. Books. In carts, in stacks, in boxes. And atop the highest stack of boxes, a large, precariously balanced two-wheeled handcart with a wicked-looking metal scoop-end. I found the door to the little office Ivan and Mar-cia shared. I jiggled the doorknob. Locked. I longed for burglary skills, but had to settle for a trip to the restroom and an empty bladder.

  The literary customer was gone when I returned, and Marcia was talking, her fragile features lit up with pure malice.

  "... Zoe and Shayla weren't all the good friends they pretended to be," she was finishing up. "I'm not as stooo-pid as some of the rest of the folks around here."

  Was Zoe the one she suspected?

  "And Dean and Scott and Shayla were in some kind of weird threesome—"

  "Now, Marcia," Ivan objected, butting in at exactly the wrong time. Why did he have to be confrontational now? No wonder he never made it as an attorney. No sense of timing. "I never quite understood their relationship, but Shayla, Dean, and Scott were all genuinely fond of one another. You could see it in the way they treated each other. Almost like a family."

  "Huh!" Marcia snorted, turning on her heel. "Some people never see what's in front of their faces."

  "So what's in front of your face?" Wayne asked gently.

  "Wouldn't you like to know." was her only answer, and then Marcia disappeared down another aisle. Just as another customer came in, a young man this time.

  Ivan motioned us to stay where we were as he got up to wait on the man.

  I looked at PMP, willing her to ask, "Where's Marcia?" but the bird remained silent. Well, it was certainly no crime, as Ivan would say.

  After Ivan had loaded the young man up with an unexpected armful of Mary Higgins Clark, he sat back down with us again.

  "Do you really think Marcia has an idea who the murderer is?" I whispered to Ivan. I didn't like Ivan's manager much, but still, if she kept talking the way she was, her health was going to be in serious danger.

  "Probably not," Ivan answered slowly. He closed his eyes for a minute. "You see, Marcia likes to think of herself as unique. Special." He could have been speaking about one of

  his kids. Maybe that's how he saw her, I realized. "And with all this, this ... you know, she's getting a lot of attention."

  As long as she didn't get the wrong kind of attention, I thought.

  But then Ivan was talking again.

  "I think we might be able to reach some consensus about dealing with this situation if we were all to get together tomorrow," he suggested.

  I groaned inwardly. Sharing the experience of murder was not an exercise I was fond of.

  But Ivan pointed out that the next day was Saturday. If we were going to gather a group, it probably was the best time. So, reluctantly, Wayne and I agreed, and then escaped
into the weak February sunlight, but not before Ivan had slipped me a typed list with the address and phone number of each and every member in the group. But it was Shayla I couldn't get out of my mind as I pulled the Toyota back onto the street. She was the one person we really hadn't talked about. What was her relationship with her husband, Scott? And with Dean? And Zoe? And who was she, besides the famous writer, S.X. Greenfree?

  "I wonder what Shayla was really—" I began, a few blocks later.

  "Kate," Wayne announced quietly, "I think we're being followed."

  At first I thought he was joking, but a glance at his rocklike face convinced me he wasn't.

  I started to swivel my head for a look.

  "No, look in the rearview mirror," he ordered.

  I did. Wayne was, after all, a former bodyguard. This was his area of expertise. And when I looked into my rearview mirror, I saw a battered, old, red VW bus behind us.

  Just for fun, I took a turn off the main road. The bus took the turn too.

  I drove back to the main road, keeping an even speed with

  difficulty. I could still see the red hulk behind us. Then I saw the local health food store where Ivan had picked up our pastries. I jerked the wheel, pulling into the parking lot with shaking hands. What the hell, I told myself, I wanted a tofu burger for lunch anyway. We walked into the store nonchalantly. I got my tofu burger. Wayne chose a soba noodle salad and ratatouille for himself. I made him promise not to show Ingrid our food. We'd eat in the car and come home empty-handed, thus reducing her to a further diet of Whol-ios and soy milk. I didn't even mention the old VW as we stood in the checkout line and returned to the parking lot with our purchases. But it was still there, parked a couple of rows away.

  We watched the bus from the rearview mirror as we scarfed down health food. I couldn't see any face, just the front bumper. No one moved. No one got out of the bus. No one got in. And when I pulled back out of the parking lot, the old VW was with us.

  "Should I try to lose the van?" 1 asked Wayne. As if I could. "We have to go home sometime."

  "Probably knows where we live anyway," Wayne replied glumly.

  So I drove home slowly as the VW bus followed us, even turning down our street, only passing as we wheeled into our driveway. Then it was gone in a flash of red.

  Wayne and I turned to each other.

  "Did you see his face?" I demanded.

  "No," he said. "And the license plates were covered in mud."

  "Oh."

  We were both completely spooked. Who had followed us? And why?

  We were still asking each other unanswerable questions when we walked into the living room.

  Ingrid was there. I'd actually forgotten about her.

  But we had another visitor too, Bob Xavier.

  And for once, he wasn't yelling.

  Six

  ^F)ut what was Bob Xavier doing in our living room, anyway? The threat of police intervention had been enough to drive him away last night. What was different about today?

  Bob smiled broadly and got up from the swinging chair. Ingrid stayed where she was, huddled on the floor, arms around her crossed legs, an orphanlike stare on her baby face. Apollo was next to his mistress, quiet for once. I wished he'd at least yip at Bob a little. Actually, Bob was looking quite handsome today, his dark eyes gleaming with pleasure, his white teeth gleaming with good dental work.

  "Guess who my big brother is?" he challenged, his shark's smile growing wider.

  "Cal Xavier," Wayne answered evenly. Nothing on Wayne's face betrayed any of the feelings I knew he had to be having. His face was carved rock. But Bob's face was molten.

  First he frowned with disappointment. But then the frown

  Death Hits the Fan 67

  deepened and his formerly handsome features contorted with anger.

  "And that doesn't change the fact that you are unwelcome in this house," Wayne added, still calm. Still quiet.

  "Listen, man, I can get you into all kinds of trouble, trouble you can't even imagine," Bob hissed, throwing up his arms. The sour scent of his anger mingled with leftover skunk fumes. "You don't know what the hell you're messing with here—"

  "We know," I answered, keeping my voice as calm as Wayne's. My answer was the plain truth, even if my tone was manufactured. I knew exactly what we were messing with. A vicious bully whose brother just might like to pin a murder on that bully's enemies. I only hoped the bully in question didn't notice the tremor that was dancing its way from my brain to my extremities.

  "And I'm going to call the police now," I finished up. 1 didn't need Wayne's cue this time. Bob Xavier was a real menace. But as I walked to the phone, a possible happy ending stopped me with one foot still in the air. I turned.

  "Unless, well... Ingrid wants to leave with you?" Forget calm and cool. Now I was pleading. Not with Bob. With Ingrid.

  I looked at my houseguest, willing her to leave with Bob, psychically pleading with her to get out of our lives. And to take the Verduras police captain's brother with her.

  "Well," she said slowly, widening her eyes. "If Bob was a little more reasonable, like about that stupid prenuptial agreement—"

  "Hey!" he shouted. "The agreement isn't stupid, get it? I told you before—"

  Now I turned my psychic powers on Bob. Please, I thought, please be reasonable. Forget the prenuptial agreement.

  Oh, sure.

  "You think you can keep messing with me. don'tcha?" he blasted away, ignoring my psychic pleas. "Well. I'm talking here—"

  "Not here." Wayne disagreed. "You can talk somewhere else, but not here."

  Then Wayne, too. turned his gaze on Ingrid.

  "Ingrid. it's up to you whether you stay, or go with Bob." he stated, the slightest quaver of a plea shaking his deep voice.

  Ingrid crossed her arms, tilted her head, pushed out her lower lip. and looked up at the ceiling.

  "Bob just doesn't understand me." she murmured. "Now Raoul . . ."

  If she had wanted to goad her former boyfriend into a further frenzy, she'd done a damn good job.

  "Raoul!" he bellowed. "WTio the hell is Raoul?" Then he turned to us. reeking of rage now. "You guys put her up to this. If it weren't for you—"

  "You're leaving now." Wayne told him as Apollo belatedly began to yip.

  In the end. Bob left. But he was still shouting.

  "I'll get you guys for this!" were his last words, trumpeted over his shoulder as he stomped down the front stairs.

  Unfortunately, his old threat no longer seemed empty. It seemed full, full to the point of bursting. And I didn't want to be there when it happened.

  Wayne turned to Ingrid once Bob had roared off in his Mercedes.

  "Maybe it would be better for all concerned—" he began.

  "Oh. please, don't throw me out." she begged, her baby-doll face shining with a thin trickle of tears. "You heard him. He's violent . . ."

  I put my hands over my ears and crossed the hallway to my office. Now I was shaking with anger, not fear. If I listened to Ingrid's babbling stream of consciousness anymore.

  / would get violent. Or else just curl into a fetal ball and roll away.

  No, I admonished myself. No fetal-ball bowling. No In-grid crunching. Forget Ivan. Forget justice. It was time to concentrate on survival. Wayne and I had to figure out who'd murdered Shay la. And fast. Before Captain Cal pinned the crime on us donkeys.

  I turned to the telephone and let my fingers do the trudging. It was time to talk to suspects. More than anything, I wanted to get a fix on Shayla, S.X. Greenfree. I still didn't know who the woman was. Or why she'd called out my name, for that matter.

  I tapped out Dean's number first from the list Ivan had given us on our way out of Fictional Pleasures. And got to listen to a very gentle, kind, and understanding answering machine. I tried the next number on the list. Winona didn't even have an answering machine. Nor did Ted. And Vince Quadrini was "in conference" according to the alert but intransigent human who answer
ed his phone. I cursed and then remembered that it was Friday, after all. Presumably, everyone was working.

  / should have been working. I glanced at the pile of Jest Gifts paperwork on my desk.

  But some kind of pit bull seemed to have control of my fingers. I averted my eyes and punched in another set of numbers on the phone. Bingo. Zoe Ingersoll was in. Shayla's friend. Hopefully, her confidante. And Zoe even agreed to talk to us that evening. Yes!

  I still had more than a few hours to practice work-aversion therapy before talking to Zoe. I started to call Phyllis Ober-man's office.

  But I had only tapped in two numbers when Wayne interrupted me.

  "What are you doing?" he demanded. His face displayed as little sympathy as his voice.

  "Calling suspects," I shot back, straightening my backbone into steel and glaring at him. It was a shame I had to tip my head back to look him in the face. It ruined the effect somehow.

  I waited for his sigh. For his objections. For his arguments.

  But all he said was, "Okay."

  I let my spine ease back to its normal spongy state. And told him my plans. Eagerly.

  ". . . and Zoe is willing to talk to us .. ."

  It was then that I remembered that Wayne ran La Fete a LOiel Friday evenings. And it was Friday.

  "Right," he said, as if he'd heard my thought. Til call in the assistant manager. We'll go together to Zoe's."

  And then we both retreated to our respective home offices. My retreat was the easiest. I just had to turn my head back to my desk.

  But I was too wired to deal with stacks of paper. So I shoved the piles of order forms and inventory lists to the side and worked on my new design for a cat-carrier cup for veterinarians, as my mind simmered with strategies and theories and fears, fears being the dominant flavor of the stew.

  An hour before our date with Zoe, Wayne reappeared to ask if I wanted dinner.

  I looked around. Ingrid was nowhere in sight.