by Annie Knox
She fluttered her fingers at Jack and then gave me a less flirtatious wave. “Thanks for being such a sport, Izzy.”
As soon as the door closed behind her, I spun on Jack. “A sport? What was that supposed to mean? And coffee? You’re going to get coffee with her?”
“Yes. She’s an old friend. It’s the polite thing to do.”
He reached out to take my arm and pull me close. “Are you maybe a little jealous? I think I like that.”
“Oh, honestly. I’m not jealous.”
“You sure? Not even a little bit?”
My eyes fixed on the mascara stain on his T-shirt, and my heart plummeted. “I am. I’m being one of ‘those’ women.”
He laughed. “What women?”
“The kind that cling to their boyfriends and get upset when they even talk to another woman. I don’t want to be that kind of girl.”
Jack leaned in and gently brushed his lips across mine. “I think you’re entitled to a bit of jealousy. After what happened with Casey I can imagine you’re a little low on trust.”
“Maybe. But still, I’m a grown woman.”
“Believe me, baby, I know that,” he growled. Then he got serious. “I understand why you’re jealous. Mari is a flirt. That’s one of the things I liked about her. Fifteen years ago. But look in my eyes.”
I tilted up my chin to meet eyes the color of the heart of a flame. “You have no reason to be jealous. I’m in this for real. And there’s a reason I broke up with Mari. I realized that I wanted someone simple and honest rather than someone who plays games. I wanted someone just like you.”
Warmth radiated from my chest to my limbs, and I had to resist the urge to jump into his arms. We both had work and no time for nooky. Instead I stepped back and smoothed down my Trendy Tails golf shirt.
“What do you think of her claims about Marsha?”
He shrugged. “I don’t know. Obviously, we’re checking every angle, and that bit of information may come in handy. Or not. Lots of people talk to divorce attorneys and then quickly change their minds.”
Jack may not have been swayed by Mari’s little tidbit, but I knew how I’d be spending the day: trying to get the dirt on Marsha Denford.
* * *
As promised, I tromped up the steps to reassure Ingrid that everything was fine.
“No one’s dead. Except Phillip, of course, but that’s old news.”
Ingrid ducked her head back into her apartment to look around.
“Do you mind if we go up to your place for a few minutes? I know you need to get to the show, but there’s something I’ve been meaning to talk to you about.”
“Of course!”
Ingrid followed me up to the third-floor apartment. She made herself at home on my worn sofa. I liked to think of it as shabby chic, but it was really just shabby. I popped into the galley kitchen to get us a couple squares of Rena’s coffee cake and a couple mugs of coffee.
By the time I brought out the morning goodies, Ingrid had been mobbed by my creatures. Jinx had claimed her lap, and the giant cat took up every inch, while Packer had found a way to lie next to Ingrid’s leg so that every part of the dog was touching a part of Ingrid.
“Thank you, dear,” she said as she took the coffee, and I set the cake on the side table next to her elbow.
“Is everything okay?” I asked. Ingrid was a straight shooter. She was being uncharacteristically hesitant about speaking her mind.
“Actually, no.” She took a deep breath. “It’s Harvey. Last winter he had a clot in his leg. Now he just had some tests done and they’ve found two more.”
“Oh, Ingrid. I’m so sorry. Will he be all right?”
Ingrid set her jaw. “I don’t honestly know. What I do know is that he needs good medical treatment. So we’re heading back to Boca next week. The doctor gave him some compression socks to wear on the plane, and once we get there, he’ll have close access to really good hospitals and doctors. Plus, he’ll be closer to his daughter and the grandkids.”
“That makes sense. We’ll all be sad to see you go, but I don’t blame you for wanting to get Harvey the treatment he needs.”
“Well, here’s the thing. Harvey’s not going to get any better. The best they can do is keep things from getting worse. He’s not going to be able to fly anymore, and I just don’t know when—if—I’m going to make it back to Merryville.”
If? Was there really a possibility that Ingrid would never come home?
“You could fly back for a long weekend now and then, right? Even if Harvey can’t?”
“Oh, honey, I wish it were that simple. Getting old’s a bitch.” She stroked Jinx’s head and listened to her purr motor up. “I’ve had a couple of tests, too, and the doctor saw a spot on my lung.”
“A spot.”
“As in cancer.” As if to prove her point, she began to cough, scaring Jinx away and setting Packer to whining.
“But you’ve never smoked a day in your life,” I said when her coughing fit subsided.
“Me, no. But Arnold smoked like a chimney. Do you know how many evenings we spent sitting in that front parlor, reading and watching I Love Lucy while Arnold sucked down a whole pack of Lucky Strikes?”
“That isn’t fair.”
“Life rarely is, my dear. Now, I may just beat this cancer thing, but with both of us sick, we have to face facts that our snowbird plan just isn’t going to work. So I want you to have the house.”
“What?”
“The house. I’m signing the deed over to you tomorrow. I’ll need a dollar or something to make it a legal transaction. I don’t know. The lawyer’s got it all figured out so you don’t have to pay much but the government won’t treat it as a gift. If it’s more money than you have on hand, we’ll consider it a loan.”
“What am I going to do with this big ol’ house?”
Ingrid threw back her head and laughed. “Just what you’re doing with it now. Run your business here, live here, rent out one of the floors. Maybe to that Wanda child.”
“Wanda’s only seventeen. She still lives with her parents.”
Ingrid harrumphed. “Mark my words—that one will need a home sometime soon. Hetty Tucker says the girl’s been running around with Will Thomas, the preacher’s son from Christ the King out on Highway 59. She’s gonna be knocked up in two shakes of a lamb’s tail.”
“Ingrid Nyquist, there’s no way you can know such a thing,” I chided.
“I think we’ve established that I’m an old lady. I’ve seen lots of young girls in my day, and I’m pretty good at spotting the ones who get talked right out of their good sense and their panties.”
I laughed. We both did. And then I sobered, thinking I might not get many more times like this.
“Look, Izzy, I never had children of my own, but you’ve come mighty close over the years. I want you to have this house. Even if you just turn around and sell it, I’ll know that it brought you some joy. Some value. Now, let me have my way.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
CHAPTER
Eleven
On the second full day of the cat show, all of the attention turned to the ballroom and the conformation competitions, where the cats would be judged against the standards for each breed: Were their ears set at the proper angle? Were their bodies the correct shape? Did their profiles match some ideal (if arbitrary) standard? Each of the judging rings was packed with onlookers, and you could tell when every round ended by the squeaks and gasps and moans of the audience.
Rena and I set up our booth, and I agreed to man it while Rena took a tour of the floor to pass out cards and, of course, get a look-see at all the action.
“Are you the designer?”
I looked up to find Peter Denford standing at the corner of our table, that familiar Joe Time Coffee cup in his hand. I’d seen him hang
ing around the show and had even seen him the morning of his father’s death, but we’d yet to actually speak.
“Yes. Izzy McHale,” I offered, extending my hand.
He shook my hand, and I couldn’t help but notice the calluses on his fingers. He might play the part of artistic dilettante, but he actually worked hard at something.
“I’m glad to get to meet you,” I said. “The collar ornament you designed is beautiful. I loved the openwork surrounding the gems.”
He waved off my compliment. “As my father said, the drawing’s the easy part.”
His dad had said that? Still more evidence that Phillip was a complete sleazeball.
“I enjoyed the design work, but my real passion is for sculpture. Large-scale metalwork, actually. The exact opposite of that little charm I drew. I rarely find the patience to work on smaller projects like jewelry. I mean, there’s a reason my father didn’t have me execute my own drawing. The jeweler is the real hero.”
“Jolly’s a good friend. I’ll let her know.”
“I like your work,” he said.
“Oh, uh, thanks. Do you own pets?” I asked.
He grinned, and there was something charming about his smile. He had deep lines running from his nose to the corners of his lips, and when he smiled, those lines nearly bracketed his whole mouth.
“No. No pets. I leave the animals to my father. I just like your designs. Hipster designs for hipster pets. I like the social commentary.”
“Thank you.”
I didn’t intend my parkas and pj’s to be social commentary, but if this artist chose to view my work that way, I wasn’t going to stop him. If I told him that I designed the clothes just because I thought the animals looked cute in them, he’d probably think I was a loon, so I chose to take his comment as a compliment.
“I’m sorry for your loss,” I added, suddenly realizing that this was the very first thing I should have said to the man.
He looked at me quizzically before the light of recognition dawned in his eyes. “Oh, of course. I keep forgetting. Thank you.”
I just stared at him, taken aback by how nonchalant he seemed to be about his father’s death.
He must have picked up on my shock—and possibly the undercurrent of judgment—in my eyes, because he ducked his head and let forth a self-deprecating chuckle. “I know I sound like a horrible son. It’s just that my father and I weren’t that close.”
“I’m sorry to hear that.” My own poor father, living in a house full of gregarious women, hardly said boo and kept himself holed up in his study with mountains of history books to read. But if he were gone, I’d miss him like crazy. I felt bad for Peter that he didn’t have that kind of bond with his father.
He shrugged. “My father had his own interests and, uh, pursuits, and I had mine.”
“Like your art.”
“Precisely. My father didn’t think my artwork was a serious career. It was a hobby, he said, like his cat shows. The difference was he’d earned a time-consuming and expensive hobby by being a crackerjack businessman. I had earned nothing.”
“But at least he came to you when he needed the collar ornament designed.”
Peter laughed. “Actually, he didn’t. I’d heard about his plans from . . . dinner, and I took it upon myself to draw the design. He didn’t even pay me for it. Or ask me to execute it.”
“Wow. That must have burned.”
“No. It’s just the way our relationship was. Trust me. I’m a grown man, and I’ve learned to be self-sufficient over the years. I can take care of myself without my daddy pitching in.”
From across the aisle, Ruth Kimmey gave me a little wave and I returned it. Peter watched our exchange with a half smile on his face.
“I see you’ve made Ruth’s acquaintance.”
“Yes. She’s been very helpful, showing me around.”
He took a sip of his coffee. “I’m sure she has. She’s probably told you about the good old days when these shows were a little wilder.”
I blushed.
“Mmm-hmmm. Did she tell you that she and my father had a fling? It was between my mom and Marsha, so my father wasn’t technically cheating. But something tells me it wasn’t a coincidence that Ruth’s big Russian blue, Jampaws Mr. Jumbo, took home the crown that year.”
“Ruth?”
He laughed. “She didn’t always look like that. I remember her from back then. I’ve always had a thing for older women, and I had a big ol’ crush on her then.”
I had actually been thinking that she didn’t seem like the type to dally, but I couldn’t help but turn to study Ruth through the lens of that bit of information. I could see it: the gray hair a rich auburn brown, those fine cheekbones, her delicate build, less grannylike glasses on her face.
“Huh.”
“The march of time, right?”
“I guess.”
“So, Izzy, I wanted to make a suggestion to you, one struggling artist to another. I assume you have a Web storefront?”
“Sure. We do good volume over the Internet. Merryville’s a tourist town, and I get a surprising number of regulars from the community, but most of our sales are online.”
“Have you heard of theartisanway.com?” He took another sip of his coffee before setting it on the edge of our display table.
“No. Should I have?”
He grinned. “Maybe not yet. We’re a start-up right now, just getting off the ground. But we can make you a lot of money if you give us a shot.”
I sighed. We. The father was trying to kill my business and the son was trying to save it. I wondered if Peter knew about his father’s plans to take over my niche in the marketplace.
“See, the great thing about theartisanway.com is that it’s strictly high-end handcrafted goods, but it’s not limited to pet stuff. So a shopper may come to the site looking for a gift for his dad, find Trendy Tails, and end up buying Dad a sweater for his dachshund. Or the shopper may come looking for a trench coat for herself and find one for her beagle on the Trendy Tails page. It’s a way to reach a whole market that didn’t even know they needed your products.”
“So it’s like an online craft fair.”
“For hipsters,” he agreed with a nod. “And rich people. Basically, your clientele.”
I had plenty of average Joes who bought ruffs for their cats and little fleece booties for their pups, but he was right that I needed to appeal to that group of buyers if I wanted Trendy Tails—soon to be Swag and Wags—to grow.
“It’s perfect for you. We’ll accept only handmade items, so anything made in a factory—no matter how high-quality—can’t be sold on the site.” Again, I wondered if he knew about his father’s efforts to undercut my business, whether that was the very reason he was approaching me. Was he hoping to nurture my business so it would be a legitimate competitor with his dead father’s business? Or was he genuinely interested in growing small businesses?
“Well, you’ve given me a lot to think about. How much does it cost to participate?”
He held still, gauging my reaction. “Right now, a thousand a month plus two percent of your pretax net sales. We’re upping to four percent of initial sales after the first one hundred accounts.”
I let out a low whistle. With my margins, that would mean a serious hit.
Peter jumped right back in to assuage my fears. “That thousand, though, that provides all your technical support. We’re negotiating to hire a full-time Web designer who would help artists set up their stores, organize products so they’re easier to find, basically do everything other than taking pictures of your stuff. He’ll even pump up your copy for you. And our clients are quality seekers. They’re willing to pay more than your in-store customers. You can make up that two percent with slight markups to your prices that won’t impact demand.”
On its face, the prosp
ect was compelling. Rena and I had just talked about emphasizing the handmade custom quality of our work, and theartisanway.com would be drawing people who were interested in supporting that kind of business. But in the end, I had no idea how Web marketing worked. Maybe this was the opportunity of a lifetime. Or maybe it was a lot of hocus-pocus. Either way, I couldn’t make a move without input from my business partner, Rena.
“You keep saying ‘we’ when you talk about this program. Who else is involved?”
“I have a silent partner, who prefers to remain silent.”
“It’s not your father?”
He laughed. “Not exactly. Why?”
“I am a little persnickety about whom I do business with.”
“Well, he’s gone anyway.”
He had a point, but I was still leery of getting involved in anything to do with Phillip Denford, his kith, or his kin.
“Listen,” Peter said, “some of us are going to lunch tomorrow at Red, White and Bleu. Basically, me and all the people running the cat show. Why don’t you come with us?”
“I have to check with Rena, make sure she doesn’t mind covering the booth and getting a doggy bag, but if she’s okay with it, I’d love to tag along.”
Maybe, I thought, I’ll find a new way to make a little cash. And maybe I’ll learn a little more about a murderer.
* * *
Rena had asked me and Jack to join her and Jolly Nielson for dinner that evening. Though Rena was playing hostess, we were dining on the main floor at Trendy Tails. Rena shared a place with her unpredictable father, and Jolly lived out of a corner of her studio. The old dining room at 801 Maple had become the official gathering spot for our circle of friends, and since Rena knew her way around that kitchen as well as she did her own, it made sense for us to meet in the store.
Still, while we were eating on what amounted to my own turf, the evening belonged to Rena and Jolly.
Even though Rena and I had been best friends since we were in kindergarten—even before Sean Tucker moved to town and rounded out the Musketeers—she hadn’t come out to me until just a year before. Even then, she rarely talked about her love life.