I stacked the last box on top of the others and went up front. Charli was behind the sales counter, studying a couple of ad proofs. “I just finished. There were nine new ones too. We need to get more of those alpaca wool scarves. They’re selling really fast. There are only five left. I updated the quantity in the on-line store.”
“Thanks. I’ll see if we can get another two dozen before next Friday. They’re going to be hot item for the holidays.” Charli distractedly glanced up from the paperwork. When she saw the goose egg on my head she did a double take. “What the heck did you do? That looks awful.”
I told her a heavily edited version of the attack. “That’s why I had to open the shop late. Don’t say anything to Mom and Dad about it yet. They’ll freak out and I’ve already gotten enough grief from Tim about it.”
“So what were you doing out at Skillet Road?” she asked. “That’s really off the beaten track.”
I ignored her question and got her mind off the subject by telling her what I’d found out about the gift basket. “So I’m going to scoot over to the station in the morning before I open the shop to sign my termination papers. While I’m there, I’ll ask Connie about the basket.”
“Be careful, sweetie. This is really scaring me. It seems like someone is out to get you.”
“Actually, I don’t think so. I don’t think I was the target. Think about it. I’m not even sure that the attack from this morning is related. Whoever it was just wanted to hurt me, not kill me.”
“I don’t know if I buy that, Marty.” Charli set the ads aside and gave me her full attention. “Why do you think you weren’t the target?”
“The police found lethal amounts of cyanide in both the coconut water Vivi drank and in her vape juice. I think whoever killed her knew she was going to be at the station and knew I wouldn’t drink the water.”
“But who would want to kill Vivi? Everyone loved her.”
I hesitated. “ I hate to even say it, but do you think it’s possible that Izzy killed her sister? She definitely knew Vivi liked the coconut water and she knew I didn’t because she heard me talking to Otey about it. Plus, she could have easily gotten access to Vivi’s vape juice.”
“Wow,” Charli said. “I hadn’t thought about that. You’ve definitely got a point. There’s always been something a little off about Izzy. I don’t know if she’s capable of murder, but as we know, I’ve sure been wrong about people and murder before. The thing is, why would Izzy want to kill Vivi? Especially now? It’s not like they’re conjoined or anything. They didn’t even live in the same city.”
“True, but they both worked for Ricky Ray. I don’t know for sure, but I’d think the head of the fan club and the publicist would work together pretty closely. Otey said there was a major issue between Vivi and Izzy that started not too long ago. Maybe it was just the same old sibling rivalry and Izzy’s jealousy rearing its head. Or maybe they were fighting over Ricky Ray.”
“Maybe,” Charli said. She seemed skeptical. “I just don’t think that’s it. Ricky Ray’s caused a lot of problems in his life, but murder?”
“Here’s another theory, then. May Lynda told me Vivi had promised her and Izzy that when she got a promotion, she’d pay off their college loans. Maybe she changed her mind and backed out.”
“Dang! Miss Guydie told me that Vivi was doing really well for herself, but I didn’t think publicists made that kind of money. Maybe we’re in the wrong business, Marty.”
“I know. I thought that myself when I saw all of her designer clothes and shoes and bags. She had seriously expensive taste. Oh, I forgot to tell you, when I picked up her things, I found her itinerary. You were right. She came here from Nashville. And one other thing! Did you know that Vivi and Beauline Tileman were besties? May Lynda told me.” I didn’t mention that I’d also heard it from Beau herself.
Charli’s eyes widened. “Holy cow! That is amazing. You know, maybe it isn’t money after all. Maybe Izzy was upset about Ricky and Beau.”
“That doesn’t make sense. Why would she kill Vivi? If she was angry about Beau and Ricky, seems like she’d go after Beau, not Vivi.”
Charli tilted her head to the side. She looked like she was deep in thought. “True. I feel like I’m talking myself in circles. Heck it might not even be Izzy. We’re acting like she’s guilty. It’s more likely someone else. Maybe one of those crazy fans.”
“Yeah, that Sugar is completely bonkers.” I told Charli about my other run-ins with her.
“Maybe she’s the one who attacked you this morning.”
“That’s pretty much what I think. I just need to find proof.”
Charli got that gleam in her eye that means she’s excited about something or has an idea. “I think we should investigate all of this ourselves. Think about it. We’ve been pretty darned successful the other three times. Better even than the police.” She looked around and lowered her voice like the place might be bugged or something. “Don’t tell John or Tim. You know how they are.”
“Exactly. Tim especially. He’s so overprotective,” I said. “Question for you: let’s say we want to investigate a little bit. What should we do next?”
“You find out about the basket. See if you can get May Lynda to open up to you. Get as much info from Tim as you can wheedle out of him. That’s your part.”
“Okay. What are you going to do?”
Charli’s face pinked. “Okay, so I, uhm, I don’t want you to laugh about this, but I’m, well, I’m a member of this online gossip forum. It’s just a little light-hearted distraction. It started out back when I was pregnant with Jaelyn. We post blind vices and try to guess them and make fun of bad celebrity fashion and stuff like that. Everyone on it is really nice and, even though we don’t actually even know each other’s names or anything, we’re sort of friends, if that makes sense. Anyway, some of the people on there are actually in the business. I can ask them and see if they’ve heard anything new about Beau and Ricky. I’ll ask about Vivi too. It’s possible that one of them even knew her.”
“All right then,” I said, picking up my nearly empty latte cup and offering up a mock toast. “The Marty and Charli Detective Agency is back in business.”
Charli air toasted with an imaginary glass and winked at me. “I told you it’s Charli and Marty Detective Agency,” she joked. “After all, it was my idea.”
A customer, one of our mom’s friends, came into the store just then, so I helped her find just the right star for the top of her tree while Charli finished proofing the ad copy.
While I rang up the purchase, Charli gathered her things and shrugged on her coat. “Come over to the house when you get off,” she said. “John’s working late. I’ll feed the kids early and then you can eat with me. I might have some answers from my gang by then.”
Answers, of course, sounded great. The promise of free food? Even better.
21
After Charli left, I spent the rest of the afternoon nibbling on my pizza, inventorying our local college merchandise, chatting with the guy who picks up our packages to be shipped, and helping the few customers who came in.
I was locking things up shortly after six, when I heard skittering sounds coming from one of the apartments upstairs. I made a mental note to tell Charli we needed to get Dad or John to call the exterminator to do something about the mouse problem. Last thing I wanted if I was going to live up there was to have to deal with mice. Delbert’s a good cat, but the one time I had a mouse in my apartment, he just ignored it.
When I got home, Beau wasn’t there. For someone who didn’t want to be noticed, she sure spent a lot of time out and about. I cleaned up her usual mess, liberated Delbert from his linen closet hideout, fed and petted him, and changed into a warmer jacket since the temperature had dropped another ten degrees over the course of the day. I finally gave up on talking to Beau, so left her a note, letting her know I’d be back later. I guess the good thing about not seeing her was that I didn’t have to worry about spend
ing more of my money at the grocery store to buy her stuff.
Charli’s porch light was on and she stood at the storm door staring out. “Oh my gosh, oh my gosh, oh my gosh! You won’t believe what I found out!” she said, tugging me inside as soon as I stepped up on her front porch. She held my arm, towing me after her toward her cozy kitchen. I heard the boys laughing and giggling in the adjoining family room. “There’s so much, I don’t even know where to start.”
“That was fast.” I pulled my jacket off and hung it on the back of one of the chairs. “Yum, it smells delicious. I’m starving.”
Charli motioned for me to help myself to the food, picked up a leather-bound notepad from her breakfast bar, and opened it. The top page was filled with her neat handwriting.
“As it so happened, one of the folks on the gossip board actually knows a friend of a friend who works at Vivi’s agency. Marty, Vivi got fired from there six weeks ago! Apparently, because of some sort of big financial scandal. She wasn’t clear on the details, but it had something to do with Beauline Tileman and the financing of a movie that she planned on producing. Beau’s part in whatever happened got covered up, but Vivi paid the price. The bottom line, though, is that Vivi’s reputation was in tatters and no way was she going to get another job in the industry. Ricky was the only client who stuck with her and that’s basically because the agency didn’t really want to work with him anymore since he’s not an actor.”
I was in the process of filling up the water carafe on her coffee maker so I could make myself a cup of decaf. I nearly dropped it into the sink. “Holy crap! So sounds like the problem between her and Izzy maybe was money related, then.”
“Most likely. Although, according to what I was told, Vivi was just a junior publicist and she only made about sixty grand a year, including bonuses.” Charli passed me a napkin and a fork.
“That’s not bad for around here, but how on earth could she maintain her lifestyle and expensive tastes out in L.A. on that kind of salary?” I asked. “When I went out there that time with Ricky when he opened for George Teoria, I couldn’t believe how much everything cost.”
“Exactly. Even as a senior publicist, she’d be just comfortable, certainly not rich and certainly not able to pay off her sisters’ college loans.”
I loaded my salad with honey mustard dressing and stirred it around. “Sounds like when she made that promise, she thought she was going to be coming in to some big money. I think we need to find out more about the movie deal and what happened exactly.”
Charli tapped her notepad. “I’ve got it on my list to research already. One of the other members of my group said she has some contacts at the production company Beau’s project was partnering with and might be able to find out more info tonight or tomorrow.”
“Perfect. Did they know anything about Beau and Ricky?” I took a bite of the chicken enchilada casserole Charli had made. It was delicious, as usual.
“A little. Most of the ones who are in the know said Ricky’s just a minor player in all of this. They seem to think Beau was using him as cover since a lot of stories have been dropping implying that Stephan Johansson is about to come out of the closet. I’d completely forgotten about this, but there were a couple of blind gossip items when they first started dating that she was using him as a cover, too, because she was supposedly messing around with a married producer or director. Somebody super important, anyway. I’ll dig back into the archives and see what I find. Sounds more and more like they might have been double bearding.”
“Double bearding?” I helped myself to another big serving of the casserole.
“A beard is what they call someone who’s dating someone else to help them cover up their sexual orientation or some other situation they don’t want made public. Double bearding just means that they’re both using the other person as cover.”
“I don’t get it. Why would they want to go to all of that trouble?”
Charli arched an eyebrow. “Marty, you’re not that naive, are you? There’s a lot of folks in this country who are prejudiced against gay people. For someone in the public eye, there’s a lot of financial risk involved in coming out of the closet. Stephan’s fan base is filled with teen girls who are madly in love with him. Beauline Tileman’s brand is all about how loyal and upstanding and faithful she is. A lot of her fans would be appalled if she was messing with a married man.”
“I guess I hadn’t really thought of it before. You’re right, of course. How does Ricky fit in, then? Was he going to be her new cover?”
“I don’t know. It makes sense, especially if Beau is trying to ease her way out of her good girl image, which is what my source said. Since she needed a new man in her life, I’m guessing Vivi decided to kill two birds with one stone and boost Ricky’s profile at the same time she helped out Beau. Vivi and Beau have been best friends for a couple of years. In fact, after she got fired, Vivi lived in Beau’s guest house and sort of worked as her assistant. You know, running errands, handling correspondence, stuff like that.”
Sort of like what I’d been doing for Beau, so I did know, although I’d been paying for the privilege.
“Maybe that’s where all of Vivi’s fancy designer goods came from then. Beau’s castoffs. It seems sort of weird though that if Vivi lost her job and reputation because of Beau, she’d still want to be friends with her.”
“That’s what I thought. Maybe Beau felt guilty about what happened and was trying to make it up to Vivi. You want a brownie?”
“That’s a stupid question. Of course I want a brownie. Do you have ice cream?” I took my empty plate to the sink, rinsed it, and stuck it in the dishwasher. “Was that all you found out?”
Charli heated a brownie in the microwave and then piled a bunch of vanilla ice cream on top. “There’s one other thing, but I don’t really buy it. There’s a blind item that some folks think is about Beau and Vivi. According to the story, a famous actor and her assistant recently had a falling out, supposedly over some sort of sexual assault that happened to the assistant by some guy working with the actor, but it’s from a source that we, I mean all the people in my gossip gang, we all think is sketchy. The guy that runs it got caught several times making stuff up. He occasionally gets it right, but not very often, so people are pretty skeptical unless they hear something similar from a more trustworthy source. I think it’s more than likely something he made up or is about someone else.”
I didn’t buy it either. Beau had told me she was trying to get in touch with Vivi to borrow some money from her before the murder. Not to mention, if they’d had a falling out, it didn’t seem likely that Beau would still be camped out in my apartment. I yawned.
“I’m going to finish my brownie, then scoot. It’s been a long week and I’m just flat worn out.”
“Okay,” Charli said. “I’ll check back in with my gossip gang tomorrow morning to see if anyone else has information or found out the answers to the questions I asked. Are you sure you’re good with working the whole day tomorrow? I can come in if you need me.”
“No, I’ll be fine. I’m going to finish the inventory. I’ll call and let you know what I find out about the basket and see if you’ve got anything new,” I said, before digging into my dessert.
I didn’t tell Charli, of course, but I decided that, since I was already a pro at going through other people’s things, I was going to check out Beau’s messenger bag first chance I got. Hopefully, as soon as I got home.
22
I finally got my chance to snoop later that night when Beau decided to take a shower. I waited until the water started running and I heard her close the shower door.
She’d tossed her messenger bag on the coffee table next to the sofa. I crouched on the floor next to the table and quickly unlatched the buckles, keeping a part of my attention focused on the bathroom door.
Beau’s bag didn’t have much inside it other than a worn copy of Anna Karenina, her notebook, and an overstuffed wallet. The wallet was pret
ty rough looking, made of scuffed up black faux-leather, the sort that you buy at the dollar store for around $5. Beau, or someone, had reinforced the folded part with camo colored duct tape. It was full of cash. I counted over three thousand dollars.
I was pissed. She had all that cash on her and she was mooching off of me? I stuffed the money back inside the wallet and put it down in the bottom of the bag. I found a zippered compartment in the bag as well and inside were Beau’s passport, and a blue box containing a ring.
It was definitely the same one Vivi had photos of, which sparked my curiosity. Why would Vivi have pictures of her friend’s ring? Maybe for insurance? That was a possibility, but it wasn’t a fancy ring and I doubted it was worth more than a few hundred dollars. I stuck the ring box back inside the zippered compartment.
I was really itching to get my hands on Beau’s notebook, so pulled it out of the bag next. It was one of those cheap black and white composition books and the binding had been reinforced with more of the camo duct tape.
If my curiosity had been sparked by the ring, the journal sent it into the stratosphere because Beau’s handwriting was tiny and cramped and messy, just like the handwriting in the photos I’d found in Vivi’s jewelry case. Why had Vivi taken pictures of a letter her best friend had written? Was she planning on blackmailing her friend? Or her friend’s married lover?
Like the letter, the journal pages were difficult to read. The first few entries seemed to be a combination of her thoughts and notes related to the character she was playing in the current movie. Further back she had written several pages of quotes from The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test, The Alchemist, On the Road, Catcher in the Rye, The Bell Jar and Anna Karenina, all those books teenagers who fancy themselves hipsters seem to love. Several pages in the back of the notebook were filled with overwrought and badly executed poems. I blushed with embarrassment at one of them, which I suspected was about her married lover and his, uhm, skills. It was even more explicit than the letter had been.
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