Dior or Die (Joanna Hayworth Vintage Clothing Mysteries Book 2)

by Angela M. Sanders

  The detective reappeared next to Joanna and settled in his chair. "The uniforms are taking care of the rest." She had to lean forward to hear him over the mayhem. Sedillo picked up his fork and stabbed a cherry tomato.

  "You were after Kay all along, weren't you?" Joanna asked.

  Sedillo, his mouth full of salmon, nodded and swallowed. "Uh huh. Once we saw the guest list, we put two and two together."

  "That’s when you decided to go ahead with the sting."

  "Yep. Kay wouldn't pass up the chance to make sure any link between him and the diamonds was severed completely, so he hid gems in the frame of that last painting just before the dinner began. He wanted to foist the blame completely on the auction house. Lee has it all on tape. We've been after him for better than a year."

  "But what about Ben?"

  "He had no idea—probably still doesn't—who sent the diamonds to the auction house. All he knows is they showed up, and his job was to take them out of their settings and polish off serial numbers, then hide them back in the item they showed up in. Kay had a ring of jewel thieves up and down the coast selling to him."

  "So, Poppy is free now, right?"

  "We’ll have a few loose ends to tie up, but this pretty much clinches it."

  The emcee struggled to regain control of the frantic crowd. Clary and Jeffrey argued next to the stage. Jeffrey, his wireless headset bobbing, waved his hands helplessly. Clary spun and walked away, disappearing behind the stage. The brass ensemble stumbled into the theme to Dr. Zhivago. Eve coolly sipped wine and examined the Oscar statuette in front of her.

  The emcee's microphone squealed. "For chrissakes, everyone shut up!"

  The lights dimmed again, but it did little to calm the crowd. The detective sighed and put down his fork. "Follow me."

  Joanna trailed Sedillo to the side of the stage, where Jeffrey dispatched one of the caterers to open more champagne in the hopes of quieting the crowd.

  The detective stuck out his hand. "Alex Sedillo, Portland P.D. Joanna here will fill you in." He patted Joanna on the shoulder and wandered back toward the table. Jeffrey raised his eyebrows.

  "The police caught Donald Kay hiding stolen diamonds in a painting. He'd been moving the diamonds through Poppy's auction house, but she didn't know anything about it. Poppy's completely innocent. Let's make an announcement."

  "You." Lacey pushed Jeffrey aside and punched a finger into Joanna's chest. "You ruined this night. I told you we shouldn't have let Poppy come back."

  Jeffrey stepped between Lacey and Joanna. "Mr. Kay? But we're hoping on a big gift from him during the paddle raise."

  "Yeah, well that's clearly not going to happen now," Joanna said.

  Jeffrey hesitated and pulled at his bow tie. "I don't know."

  "The party is destroyed, and it's all the fault of that auctioneer," Lacey said.

  "Lacey, I think I saw Porsche squatting under table six," Joanna lied.

  “Porsche!” Lacey disappeared into the crowd.

  Joanna turned to Jeffrey. "Look. People want to know what's going on. We can't just leave them hanging like this. Take charge."

  "I can't make this decision myself. I have to ask Clary. Where is he?"

  That figures. Joanna squelched her irritation. "I don't know—he was here a second ago. Let me go see if I can find him."

  The crowd, drawn to the tables by the pop of champagne corks, was quieting. Joanna glanced toward the table where Clary should be sitting. Helena slid into her chair and checked her lipstick in the reflection off a knife. Clary's chair was empty. Eve locked eyes with Joanna and smiled the classic "teeth together, lips apart."

  Damn. It looked as if there would be no way to avoid this. Joanna took a deep breath and approached the table. "Hello, Eve. So nice to see you here." She adjusted her smile. "Where's Clary?"

  "He went to the little boy's room." Her silky voice smoothed over the noise like butter on warm brioche. "Where's Paul? I don't see him."

  Joanna's face burned. Did Eve know about their fight and was playing with her? She wouldn't put it past her. Joanna forced a laugh. "Not dealing with this mess, that's for sure."

  "I would have thought he'd want to be here with you, see what you did with the greeter's dresses. Besides, he's been working pretty hard at my place." Her lips parted slightly. "The man needs a break."

  Joanna's blood pressure mounted. "He sure does. I don't know how he puts up with everything he does at work—especially lately." Joanna started to care less about finding Clary than about finding Poppy. Kind, compassionate Poppy. The anti-Eve.

  Helena cleared her throat. She seemed to size up the situation at once. "Eve, you have lipstick on your teeth." Eve grabbed her evening bag and pulled out a compact. Meanwhile, Helena leaned closer to Joanna. "What's going on? The police took Donald Kay away."

  Eve, examining her flawless, un-lipsticked teeth, opened her mouth to say something, but a hand on Joanna's shoulder drew her attention away. Clary. "Jeffrey told me what happened," he said. "Poppy seems to have disappeared. Go find her and tell her we're getting started again. I'll make an announcement."

  Yes, Poppy. At the very least they needed a celebratory glass of bubbly when the night was over. "I’ll be back in a minute," Joanna said to Helena.

  First Clary, now Poppy. Apparently she was going to spend the rest of the evening rounding up people. She scanned the room. A few tables over, Apple pulled Joanna's dessert to her place and cracked the crème brûlée's top with her spoon. The detective's seat was empty. No Poppy in the dining room.

  She might have gone back to the green room to freshen up. Joanna glanced toward the door connecting the green room to the main part of the warehouse. No way she was going that direction—Eve’s table was too close. She'd get to the green room through the loading dock.

  Joanna pushed through the crowd, then slipped out the side door into the cool night air. A few volunteers stood in the alley smoking cigarettes, their feet crunching the gravel as they moved to let her pass. Gripping the cold handrail, she climbed the cement stairs to the warehouse.

  A naked bulb lit the back room. "Poppy?" Joanna called. Muffled speech, probably Clary making the announcement about the arrests, filtered through the concrete walls. Cheers and applause greeted his words. Joanna's heels clicked as she crossed the cement floor to the green room at the back of the warehouse. It was almost unnervingly calm here compared to the chaos next door. "Poppy?" Her voice echoed.

  No reply.

  Huh. Maybe Poppy had returned to the dining room or the police had asked her to go downtown to answer a few questions. She rubbed her bare shoulders against the chill. Well, since she was here, she might as well grab her wrap. Joanna parted the curtains cordoning off the green room and fumbled for the cord to the shop lamp clamped to the curtain rod. The darkened silhouettes of wardrobe bags draped a rack.

  She clicked the light's switch. The shop fixture's brilliant light blinded Joanna for a second. As she blinked away the white orbs, she dropped her purse and backed against the curtain, sending it crashing it down. There, dangling from a beam, was Poppy.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  Joanna ran blindly through the warehouse and to the loading dock. She grasped the railing. "Call the police," she gasped. "The police. The green room."

  One of the smokers tossed his cigarette into the gravel and hurried into the dining room. Joanna breathed hard and fast but couldn't get enough air. "Sit down," she heard. Another voice said, "She's going to pass out. Make her breathe into this."

  Joanna slumped to the concrete pad. A paper bag that smelled of take-out burrito clamped over her mouth. She pulled the bag away. "Get her—" She wanted to tell them to get Poppy down, take her down. The bag clamped to her mouth again, and again she swatted it away. "I have to—" She tried to suck in air, but her lungs were so tight. She had to tell them. She had to get Poppy down.

  Someone pushed her back on the concrete and fastened the bag over her mouth with callused fingers. Another
hand cradled her head. "Shut up and breathe."

  The next few minutes seemed to stretch forever. Joanna’s vision faded, and voices drifted far away as her consciousness waned. Eventually, struggling for oxygen, her lungs loosened and drew deeply.

  The hand lifted the bag from her mouth. "That's better," a deep voice said.

  "Let me talk to her." Detective Sedillo. His bulky form knelt on the loading dock. The scent of his gardenia pierced the settling cigarette smoke.

  "Did you get her down?" Joanna's breathing was still uneven, but she wasn't going to faint now.

  "She's down." The words sounded final.

  "And?" It's not too late, she prayed. Whatever happened, they'd get past it, they'd celebrate yet.

  "I’m sorry."

  No, she thought. Please. No. "Sorry?" she whispered.

  Sedillo shifted knees. "The medical examiner will say for sure, but it looks like suicide."

  ***

  "It was my fault." Joanna told Apple. She kicked her heels off on her living room floor and fell into the couch. "Poppy didn't want to do the auction, but I convinced her. I keep thinking of her, the rope. One of her shoes had fallen—" She'd pushed away the image of Poppy's body, but that shoe haunted her. One black calf stiletto on its side.

  "I know, I know," Apple said gently. She put her handbag on Joanna's dining room table. "I'm going to make some tea. It's practically morning, anyway."

  "Go ahead. I'm getting out of this dress."

  In the bedroom, Joanna stripped off her gown and pulled on a plaid Beacon bathrobe, leaving a pile of black rayon and rhinestones on the bed. She shivered. "Let's make a fire. It's cold in here. I don't see myself going to sleep any time soon." Maybe never, with the way she felt.

  Soon, Apple and Joanna sat on cushions in front of the fire with mugs of dark tea. Pepper padded in from the bedroom and stretched on the tile hearth, his black fur soaking up the heat.

  Apple searched Joanna's face. "Do you really think she killed herself?"

  "No." Sure, Poppy had hesitated to work again, to be in public in front of so many people, but she'd seemed so vibrant and happy at the auction. "She couldn't have. Besides, the sting worked. She knew she wouldn’t go back to jail. There's no way."

  "I don't think so, either. Her energy was so good."

  Joanna's breathing quickened.

  "Inhale. A long one. There." Apple came over to the couch and sat down.

  "I should have never convinced her to work the auction. She didn't want to, you know. She said she had a bad feeling about it." Joanna had tried to make things better and failed. Colossally. Had she listened to Poppy—and Paul—Poppy might still be alive.

  "You didn't hang her, Jo. If someone was bent on killing her, he would have done it whether she was at the auction or not. It's just that the hullaballoo of arresting Ben gave the murderer good cover. Poppy seemed happy at the auction, not like she was there against her will."

  "Then at the station." Fluorescent lights, raised voices, the clatter of the keyboard. "I told Sedillo everything I could think of. They brought in Detective Crisp from homicide, and he worked me over, too." She shifted her hips. The fire's warmth was beginning to reach her.

  "Let's talk about something else. You need to relax." The fire popped and a cinder flew into the chain curtain. Pepper started, then settled again to warm his other side.

  "I'm fine, thanks. I just need a while to process everything."

  Apple returned to her chair. Her eyes shifted to the answering machine.

  Paul. Joanna knew the machine's light shone steady—she'd checked it as soon as they entered. "No, he didn't call."

  Apple jumped on this new topic of conversation. "Where did you leave things with him?"

  Joanna sighed and leaned back. "This is not relaxing chat, by the way. But the answer to your question is ‘nowhere.’ He told me I had to choose between him and Poppy, and when I wouldn’t do it he walked out. Now he won't return my calls."

  "I don't know why you promised not to get involved in the first place. Why didn’t you explain it to him?"

  "I couldn’t. I know it sounds stupid now, but I was afraid he’d break up with me. I figured I could pull everything off without telling him. It didn’t seem like such a big deal at the time. Besides, why should he be telling me what to do?"

  "Look how well that worked. I’m not saying he doesn’t have issues, but you could have talked it over earlier."

  "Right." Joanna stared at the fire.

  "Jo?"

  "I keep thinking about Poppy. I had a hand in this—this trouble—and now there's nothing I can do to make it better."

  "You need to put your mind somewhere else for a few days. Take it easy." Pepper jumped into Apple's lap. "Focus on Paul. Explain things to him. That, at least, you can do something about."

  Joanna showed no signs of hearing Apple. Her gaze remained fixed on the fire. "I never could figure out how Vivienne's death tied into the diamonds, either."

  "Diamonds were found in Vivienne's things. That's the most obvious connection."

  "Might have been coincidence. Maybe the police only found them because they were looking. Diamonds could have been hidden in other lots. Who knows? But maybe somehow Vivienne found out what was going on, so she was poisoned." She pulled a piece of split alder from the basket next to the fireplace and opened the screen. When the new log caught fire, she returned to the couch.

  "If Poppy’s death wasn’t suicide, then whoever killed Poppy had to be at the event," Apple said.

  The adrenaline that had kept Joanna up all night was starting to ebb. She rubbed her eyes. "That limits the suspects to about five hundred people."

  Apple settled a hand on Pepper's back. "Or worse. The back of the warehouse—the area we set up in—was open all night. Once the event started, it was empty. The caterers were all on the opposite side. Anyone could have gone in there."

  Joanna picked up her mug of tea. The Sunday newspaper thunked at her front door. Pepper lifted his head. What an awful, awful day.

  "Don't go there, Jo." Apple set her tea cup on the coffee table. "I need to get home. Gavin's waiting, but I don't want to leave you alone." She dumped Pepper off her lap and pushed open a velvet curtain. An apricot sunrise streaked the sky. Across the street, a bundled woman walked a Bernese Mountain dog. "People are already up." She turned to Joanna. "Will you be all right?"

  Joanna rose and hugged Apple. "I'm fine. Thanks for seeing me home."

  She locked the door behind Apple and turned toward the living room. The fire was dying. Paul's work shirt still draped across the couch's arm. Where the hell was he, anyway? Didn't he know she needed him? She touched his shirt, then pulled it over her and settled on the couch to sleep, willing away the image of Poppy's dangling body.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  When Joanna awoke, the fire was dead and the midday sun streamed through the front window. Pepper had made himself at home sleeping on her stomach. She lifted him off, then swung her legs to the floor. She stretched her back. The couch was no Posturepedic, that was for sure.

  She brought a cup of coffee to the bathroom and drew a bath. Last night's mascara caked around her eyes. Normally a bath equalized her moods, but today all the soap in the world wouldn't wash away her sadness—and foreboding.

  She reached for a towel. What was Paul doing today? He usually started his workday early, but this was Sunday. He might be at the convent, or—Joanna let the thought pass quickly—at Eve's. Maybe Eve called him after the auction to fill him in on the diamond bust and Poppy's death. But he might be at home, too, reading the Sunday paper with Gemma at his feet.

  If this were a normal Sunday, they'd be together. They'd make waffles or omelets or walk up to the bakery for pastries. He’d let her talk about Poppy, and his presence alone would be a comfort. Not today.

  Tallulah's Closet wasn't due to open yet, but she could go in early and sort through Vivienne's clothes. Three trunks full needed sizing and tagging. Joanna
let that idea rest in her brain. Nothing. Not the tiniest hint of excitement. When gazing at vintage Dior couture didn't rouse her, something was truly wrong. Not that she should be surprised.

  "Aunt Vanderburgh," Joanna asked the pastel of a tight-lipped woman on the living room wall, "What should I do?"

  Auntie V stared reproachfully.

  "Okay, you win." Apple was right—maybe she couldn't do anything about Poppy, but she could at least find out where she stood with Paul, try to explain. She pulled her "pinochle dress," a 1950s housedress with a blue and gray print of alternating queen of hearts and jack of spades, from her closet and took a thick wool cardigan from a hook inside the door. With both hands she pulled her hair into a pony tail—no time, or need, to get fancy. She dabbed some vintage Femme perfume between her breasts for luck.

  Paul clearly wasn't going to respond to her calls. If he wouldn't come to her, she'd go to him.

  ***

  Paul's shop windows were dark. Joanna knocked on the door anyway and heard the dog bark. "Hush, Gemma," Joanna said through the door, and Gemma the Beast gave a short, happy yip, nails scrambling on the cement floor. Joanna had bought some muffins for Paul as a peace offering. Their fragrance wafted from their bag.

  She cupped her hands around her eyes to peer through the door's window. Two unfinished drawers sat on Paul's workbench, but he didn't appear to be home. Gemma scratched at the door again and ran in a tight circle. Joanna paused. He hadn't asked for his key back. If they were broken up, she had no right to be there. But everything had happened so suddenly. It couldn’t be over yet. They still needed to talk. "Oh, all right," she said to Gemma and let herself in.

  The dog whined and licked her hand. Joanna pulled a jar from on top of the refrigerator and gave her a dog biscuit. Gemma took it to the corner of the workshop, near her bed, to eat.

  Joanna stood in the center of the shop, immobile. Now that she was in, she knew she shouldn't be there. A few days ago, he would have welcomed her dropping by and leaving a note. Not now. Besides, she’d broken his trust already. She’d better leave before he returned.