Panty Raid

by Diane Vallere

  Nick grabbed my wrists and kept my arms by my sides. His eyes were dark, and his face was intense. “I just lifted the guestbook from a wedding chapel. Do you want to know why? Because that’s what I thought you would do. I was locked in a bathroom stall with a stolen wedding chapel guestbook outside of the place where couples proclaim their love to each other because I asked myself, ‘What would Samantha do?’”

  That sounded romantic if you took away the whole bathroom stall thing.

  “There I was, with the guestbook propped on the tank of a public toilet that a chaplain now thinks I needed because the thought of marrying you gives me a nervous stomach.”

  Okay, that took a little more of the romance out of it. But still, none of my dates ever asked themselves “What would Samantha do?” Not even the deli guy.

  I chewed my lower lip. I could tell I was expected to say something here, but there’s a delicate line between apologizing for being me and asking Nick to, in the future, keep mention of public bathrooms out of his romantic conversations.

  “Is this about my bad decisions?”

  Nick pulled the guestbook out from under his jacket. He slammed the book onto the corner of the bed and pointed to it. “This is about the fact that I just risked a bolt of lightning for stealing from a chapel because when I looked at things like you do, I thought it would tell us something.”

  “Geez, Nick! I didn’t expect you to steal it! I thought maybe you’d take a picture of the page with your phone and then slip the book back on the counter while I distracted Irene by asking where she bought her hat.”

  “That’s what I was going to do,” he said. He opened the book and flipped through several pages until he reached the most current. “Except there’s one problem.”

  “What?”

  “The page we want is missing. Any details that were in here last night are gone.”

  14

  It wasn’t so much that I didn’t trust Nick, but that I had to see with my own eyes to process the information. I flipped a few pages back, and a few pages forward, and then held the book upside down and shook it so anything tucked between the pages would fall. Nothing did. The most recent entry was for today, slightly before the time Nick and I had arrived at the chapel. The page before that one had been removed.

  Wedding guestbooks are often bound with a saddle stitch which lends them an heirloom quality. This one was no different. When the page was torn from the book, the corresponding half of that sheet of paper remained behind. The same thing happened when you ripped a page out of a composition book, which I’d learned when I was going through my Harriet the Spy phase at ten years old. I always knew Harriet the Spy was a good influence.

  I lay the book down and flipped through the pages a few more times and then shook the book again. Two pieces of paper were loose. I pinched the edges of each and slowly tugged so they stuck out from the even edges of the still-bound pages. Taking extra care not to damage the binding, I located the loose page and slowly found the spot where the corresponding half would be. One was the page before today’s page. No surprise. Nick had already told me that page was missing.

  What surprised me was the other missing page. The one in front of the one we wanted. Based on what we knew, I found it suspicious enough that one page had been removed. But two? What else had been in that book?

  When I finished examining the guestbook, I closed the cover and sat on the bed next to it. “I know you took a risk to get that and as far as I’m concerned, it was a good idea. We’ll figure out a way to get it back to the chapel.”

  Nick lowered himself next to me. “You just figured out that a second page was removed from the book, didn’t you?”

  I nodded.

  “That never occurred to me.”

  “It doesn’t matter. We don’t know what was on the first page or if it has anything to do with the second page. It doesn’t matter if we find out something, only if we find out something relative to the problem we’re trying to solve.” I was so busy trying to figure out our next move that I didn’t realize Nick was staring at me. “What?” I asked.

  “You don’t usually talk like that around me,” he said.

  “I know you don’t like this part of my life. I try to keep it hidden as much as I can.”

  “Kidd, I like every part of your life.”

  “Yes, but you have your things, and I have my things, and I know that, and it’s probably best if it stays that way.”

  “Who told you that?”

  “I don’t know. I probably learned it from a Go-Go’s song.”

  “Yes, I have my ‘things’ as you put it. And yes, you have your ‘things.’ But I want to build a life with you and that means accepting everything about you. Not just accepting it. Cherishing it.” He brushed a strand of my dark hair away from my face. “You accepted when my dad moved in with me. You accepted the truth about my family and my business. You put your life on the line. You have to believe I’d do the same thing for you if it came to that.”

  “You have,” I said. “You’ve been there for me more than once. You saved my life with a shoe. Remember? Just like Prince Charming.”

  “I don’t remember Cinderella being in an interrogation room when Prince Charming showed up with the glass slipper.”

  “You know what I mean.” I shifted my position on the bed to face him. “Nick, I figure things out because I can. When things don’t fit, I keep on working at them until they do. It’s like one of those standardized tests, where you stare at pictures to find a pattern. I love those things.”

  “Nobody loves standardized tests.”

  “I do. You know when I moved back to Ribbon I had a hard time, right?” He nodded. “I was like a bull, just plowing ahead into every crazy situation. I didn’t even know enough to be afraid half the time. But that’s because even though my personal life was a mess, I could concentrate on the other problems. I knew something didn’t fit, and I knew if I studied the situation long enough, I’d figure it out.”

  “Is it possible we could solve this whole interest in crime by getting you a thousand-piece jigsaw puzzle?”

  “Too easy.”

  ***

  Monday morning, I woke to my alarm. We’d spent the balance of last night with adult activities that kept us in the same bed before taking a joint shower, ending up in the other bed for round two, and snuggling up to sleep.

  What I didn’t tell Nick was that I had a plan. Lydia and Chryssinda were lingerie models, and I was going to spend the next three days at the lingerie fair. While Nick helped Marc with whatever details had to be attended to, I’d see what I could find out about the two models’ lives. With the perfectly sound cover story of representing Tradava, I’d have unrestricted snooping access to their world. If they had friends, I’d make them my friends. If they had enemies, I’d find them, too.

  I dressed in a strapless pink top and long, narrow pencil skirt, added a collarless black blazer, and black sandals that laced up to mid-calf. Despite the weather report of highs in the eighties, it was hard to predict the climate of the convention center. I doubted it would be cold since the models would be in barely any clothes. But still, layers felt appropriate.

  By now, I had the Deuce down to a science. I left The Left Bank, arrived at the Bellagio, and climbed aboard the double-decker bus a few minutes later. In record time, I was back at Flush Casino. A couple of elevator rides and a brief check-in at Registration and I was ready to go.

  Entering a convention center in full-trade show mode is something like discovering the underwater city of Naboo. Once through the doors, there was a whole world that outsiders knew nothing about. Over five hundred thousand square feet of convention center space had been divided into booths with elaborate pipe-and-drape configurations. This being a show for the intimate apparel industry, platforms for models, changing areas, secluded screening rooms, and displays of raw materials to be ordered for private label production were necessary, as was a ba
ck-corner runway for trend presentations.

  In addition to the vendor booths and sales representatives, models in underwear walked about, loosely covered in long, open robes. One might have thought the proximity to showgirls on the Vegas strip would desensitize me to the presence of mostly-naked women. It did not. What it did was make me:

  A) Regret the six pieces of bacon I had with breakfast, and

  B) Happy I’d worked off some calories before (and after) breakfast, and

  C) Thankful I hadn’t asked Nick to join me today.

  There’s only so much one can expect from a fiancé.

  I consulted my agenda. My first appointment was with Joey Cheeks, a new-to-me designer whose collection appeared interesting for Tradava’s client base. I found his location on my convention center map (Blue section), checked it against a giant blown-up floor plan by the front wall, and headed that way. I passed two models in cotton panties and cropped T-shirts. One T-shirt said, “Taken.” The other said, “I’m with her.”

  There was something familiar about their T-shirts, and it took me a moment to realize they were similar in style to Lydia’s “Marry Rich: Pending” one. As the models passed me, I turned around. Both women had #GetCheeky printed across their fannies.

  The memory of Lydia’s body on the sidewalk came back to me. I’d recognized her from her T-shirt and veil, but there had been something printed across her panties as well. It was going to be hard to give the designer the proper level of professionalism with that memory burned into my brain.

  That turned out not to matter. As I got closer to Joey Cheeks’ booth, I heard a male voice addressing his staff.

  “I went to great lengths to get publicity for the collection. Six months from now our panties are going to be on every ass in the country.”

  “I guess it takes an ass to dress an ass,” said a voice next to me. I turned and saw the two models who’d passed me earlier. The other one giggled.

  I inched closer to the booth and strained to hear the conversation inside. “But Lydia isn’t here yet,” said a woman with a New York accent.

  The man swore. “This is exactly what happens when models get famous. They think they can live by their own rules. Was it an ‘I’m running late’ excuse or a ‘you’ll get me when you get me’ excuse?”

  “Neither. Nobody’s heard from her.”

  The man cursed again. “I can’t believe I signed her for a two-year exclusive contract. Teresa, call the lawyers. Tell them to find me a loophole. Lydia is out.”

  “What about today? I doubt I’ll find a fill-in model on such short notice. Not with Lydia’s portfolio. She’s the hottest model at the show.”

  “I can’t build an empire with irresponsible models and employees. Call the agency.”

  “I’ll see what I can do.”

  Two thoughts jabbed my brain like index fingers of a five-year-old who just discovered an unattended piano. One had to do with Lydia’s recent and possibly yet-to-hit-the-news demise. The other included words like “suspect” and “motive.”

  My head hurt with dueling thoughts. Just as I pulled out my cell phone to call the police, the soft pink curtain pulled open and a man with a shiny black pompadour, long sideburns, and chrome aviator sunglasses glared at me.

  “This is a private booth,” he snarled. “If you so much as think about using what you know from spying on me, I’ll call security and have you tossed from the trade show.”

  There was no mistaking the voice as that of the speaker who’d complained about Lydia’s absense. What I didn’t know was what he expected me to do.

  15

  Cover story. What was my cover story? Oh, yes. The truth.

  “I’m Samantha Kidd. With Tradava department stores. I have an appointment to see the collection.” I stepped backward and looked up at the logo. “This is Cheeky Panties, isn’t it? I’m a little early, but I hoped that wouldn’t be a problem.” As confident as I was that my agenda had been set before I left Ribbon, I let my statement turn into a question.

  “You’re here to view the collection,” he said. His eyes narrowed behind his red lensed glasses. “You’re a buyer?”

  “Yes.” Ish.

  He turned around and knocked on the melamine table inside the booth. “Teresa, I thought you canceled all my appointments this morning?”

  A petite woman with streaked strawberry blond hair secured in a low side ponytail came out from behind the curtain. She wore an olive green satin bomber jacket over a T-shirt that said #GirlBoss, and ivory knit jog pants with elastic cuffs. What she lacked in genetic height she made up for in neon pink stiletto-heeled pumps that were unexpectedly large for her otherwise small frame.

  “I canceled all the appointments but one. I didn’t have a way to reach Samantha Kidd from Tradava.”

  The man looked at me. The woman looked at me. I held up my lanyard. SAMANTHA KIDD. TRADAVA.

  “Samantha, hi!” the woman said. Immediately I placed the New York accent I’d heard earlier. “I’m Teresa Kander, Joey’s line manager. Sorry about the mix-up. Come on in.” She unclipped the pink velvet stanchion and stepped back so I could enter the booth. After the initial drama, it felt a little like gaining entry to Oz.

  Everything about the man’s attitude shifted. “Samantha Kidd from Tradava. Where is Tradava? New York?”

  “Pennsylvania.”

  “Philly or Pittsburgh?”

  “Philly side.”

  “Cheesesteaks?”

  “Pretzels.”

  He held out his hand. “I’m Joey Cheeks.” We shook hands. Teresa clipped the stanchion closed behind me.

  “Teresa, get me a set of line sheets, an espresso, and”—he turned to me—“you want anything? Yes. You want an espresso too. Trust me.” He turned back toward Teresa. “Two espressos and get a couple of Diet Cokes for the models while you’re at it. I’m taking Samantha Kidd from Tradava to the display.”

  “Sure thing. Be right back.” Teresa sprang into action like she was wearing Nikes. I admired her efficiency. Maybe it was the track pants.

  Joey Cheeks looked like he’d stepped out of the pages of a Fifties pretty boy men’s magazine. If his hair wasn’t naturally black, there were no traces of its natural shade. He’d dyed it shoe polish black and styled it with a product that gave it a sheen. While there was no doubt Elvis was his spirit animal, his outfit, a white T-shirt, dark blue jeans, and red windbreaker, had been lifted from another icon: James Dean in Rebel Without A Cause.

  “Please forgive me for my reaction back there. Shows like this are great for exposure, networking, and convenience for the buyers, but it seems we designers spend every minute playing keep away from knock-off artists.”

  “You thought I was trying to steal your designs?”

  “Happens all the time. Sometimes they have inside help.”

  “Your employees?”

  “The models,” he said with disdain.

  I followed Joey Cheeks behind a fabric partition that separated his samples from the prying eyes of people who’d gained entrance to the show for reasons other than placing orders and ogling half naked women.

  Gaining attendance to Intimate Mode hadn’t been difficult, but that was because I legitimately worked for a store that carried intimate apparel. Even with Tradava’s financial problems, it was a five-store chain that needed merchandise to sell. That was five times the order a small boutique would place. But I wondered how hard it would be for someone to fake credentials, shop the market, and source raw materials and production? Knowing how quickly knockoffs showed up in the market, it had to happen more often than not.

  It was obviously a real concern for Joey, but it made me think along other lines. If Lydia’s murder wasn’t connected to Marc, could it have been related to either her job or one of her escort clients?

  If her modeling career continued on its current trajectory, it wouldn’t be long until she crossed into supermodel territory. That would bri
ng professional jealousies and backstabbing to a whole other level. Plus, she’d have behind-the-scenes access to designer collections before the public, and that information could prove valuable to the knockoff market. And if not her job, were there possessive former escort clients who didn’t want Marc to take her off the market? Or someone who feared she’d reveal his identity?

  Jealousy. Theft of intellectual property. Fear of public humiliation. I’d found three possible motives for murder before my first cup of coffee.

  Behind the curtain were bright chrome rolling rods holding T-shirts and panty samples. A floor to ceiling display of framed cotton displayed messages: BIG GUNS, BORN THIS WAY, BAD GIRLS MAKE GOOD GIRLFRIENDS, BOTTOMS UP, and the one I’d seen on Lydia: TO DO: MARRY RICH: Pending. At the time, I thought she’d written “Pending” on herself, but by the looks of the display, that was how the T-shirt was produced. Across the top of the frame were the words Get Cheeky!

  “These are yours?” I asked Joey.

  “That’s right. Cheeky Designs. Get it? Ironic underwear with just enough crass to turn heads.”

  “I think I saw your designs on a bachelorette party last night. At The Left Bank?” I pointed to Marry Rich. “I’m pretty sure I saw this one on Lydia Moss.”

  A flush of color washed Joey’s face, and his mouth drew into a narrow line. “Lydia Moss is our new company spokesmodel, so yes, she does have access to the samples.”

  “She was probably trying to do her job. Get you some publicity. I’m not up on the emerging models in the industry, but everybody’s trying to grow their platforms through social media. She was no different. That’s why you hired her, right?”

  Joey curled one lip and peered at me over the top of his Elvis glasses. “Samantha Kidd from Tradava, how long have you been in the industry?”

  “You could say I’ve been in women’s lingerie since I graduated from my training bra,” I said, hoping to avoid the actual answer which was more along the lines of “since I registered twenty-seven minutes ago.”