Purses and Poison

by Dorothy Howell

  Marilyn’s well-practiced smile stayed frozen on her face. “Your mother…your mother…she’s, ah, she’s the lady who…”

  “You’ve catered dinner parties for her. You remember, the one that celebrated National Liposuction Appreciation Day,” I said.

  “Oh, sure. Sure, sure,” Marilyn said, bobbing her head. Her hair didn’t move.

  “Mom does the fruit bouquets,” I added.

  Marilyn’s expression froze again. “Fruit bouquets?”

  “Edible Elegance,” I said.

  Her eyes darted back and forth. “Hmm…”

  I was thinking Marilyn was off her meds, which might explain why she didn’t notice that, at the Holt’s luncheon, one of her servers had disappeared and a stranger had taken her place, wearing a cheesy disguise, no less.

  “Strawberry, pineapple, and pear slices cut into the shape of flowers, dipped in chocolate,” I explained.

  “Oh, sure. Sure, sure,” Marilyn said, looking relieved. “Of course I remember.”

  “Mom wanted me to stop by and make sure you were doing okay,” I lied, “after what happened at the Holt’s event.”

  “Your mother, she’s such a dear. So thoughtful and caring.”

  Now I’m positive Marilyn is off her meds.

  “So, how are things?” I asked, trying to get her back on track.

  “Fine, fine. Just fine.”

  “The police haven’t been here?” I asked.

  “Oh yes! Of course.” Marilyn tapped her forehead with her fingertips. “Yes, the police came and asked questions about…about—oh, now let me think. What’s her name?”

  God only knows what Marilyn was trying to remember.

  “The missing server?” I asked.

  “Sure, sure. That’s it.”

  Marilyn struck out across the office to the desk in the corner. I followed. She rifled through the drawers and finally came up with a big binder.

  “I have all that here…somewhere,” Marilyn said, flipping through the pages. She stopped and squinted down at something.

  “Now, where did I put my glasses,” she muttered, patting her suit, even though it had no pockets.

  “Would you like me to look?” I asked, taking the binder from her before she could answer.

  I scanned the page and saw that it was a personnel roster. Apparently, Marilyn wasn’t comfortable using a computer for things like this. I’m guessing she was still using a VCR and hoped to one day figure out how to program it.

  “Is that it?” Marilyn asked, craning her neck to see the page. “Is Jamie’s name on there?”

  Information on Jamie Kirkwood—the missing server—was all there.

  “I just don’t understand what the fuss is all about,” Marilyn said, looking completely baffled. “I mean, it’s a tragedy, of course, that Claudia died. But all this media coverage about the mysterious Missing Server?”

  Marilyn made little quotations in the air, then went on. “There’s no mystery. The police know exactly who she is. I gave them Jamie’s name, her address, everything.”

  “I guess they haven’t been able to find her,” I said.

  “Well, I don’t know why not,” Marilyn declared.

  Marilyn had a point, and I wondered the same.

  “The police have been here twice. And reporters keep calling, asking all sorts of questions. Like I know something about poor Claudia dying at the luncheon.”

  I’m guessing that Marilyn didn’t know yet that Claudia was poisoned. I certainly wasn’t going to tell her.

  The telephone on the desk rang. Marilyn eyed it as if, for a second or two, she wasn’t sure what to do, then answered. She listened for a moment, then said, “No comment,” and hung up.

  “My lawyer advised me not to respond to any questions,” Marilyn explained.

  She’d spoken to her lawyer already. Not surprising. This was, after all, Los Angeles.

  “Is Jamie one of your regular servers?” I asked.

  “She just showed up one day, asking for work,” Marilyn explained. “That happens all the time. Word gets around. Especially among the college crowd.”

  “Mrs. Carmichael?” a woman called from the curtain doorway. She had on a white uniform and a hair net—not a great look. “Everything’s ready.”

  “I’ve got to run,” Marilyn said.

  “Who hired you for the luncheon at Holt’s?” I asked.

  She paused and squeezed her eyes shut for a second. “I got a call from someone at their corporate office. A woman. Her name was…hmm, let me think. Sally? Sandra? No, no. Oh, now who was—oh yes. It was Sarah.”

  “Sarah Covington?”

  “Yes. Sure, sure,” Marilyn declared. “Got to run. Give my best to your mom.”

  My heart pounded and I felt a little dizzy, as I jotted Jamie’s info on a slip of paper.

  Wouldn’t it be cool if I could pin this whole murder on Sarah?

  Chapter 7

  Although Marilyn Carmichael had probably forgotten her own question a millisecond after it left her lips, the thought fused to my brain like cellulite on thighs, and it was all I could think of as I drove to Holt’s.

  Why hadn’t the police been able to find Jamie Kirkwood, the everybody-is-making-too-big-of-a-deal-about-her Missing Server?

  I guess it wasn’t unusual that the cops hadn’t released her identity to the media yet. They probably didn’t want her put in the spotlight and questioned by the press until they’d had a chance to do that themselves. And the world is full of whack jobs, so maybe, in a way, they were trying to protect her.

  But that didn’t explain why Jamie hadn’t simply come forward. I mean, even though the media coverage was way overhyped, how could she not know the police wanted to talk with her?

  I whipped into the Holt’s parking lot. It was packed. Seemed the news of Claudia’s murder had actually drawn shoppers to the store, which was kind of sick, but there it was. I imagined Jeanette and the rest of the corporate team—except for Ty, of course—salivating over the potential profits.

  Maybe Sarah would come up with an “After Murder Sale” ad campaign.

  Then I spotted a television news van parked at the curb in front of the store. Oh my God. What were they doing here? Had someone else been murdered?

  I didn’t see police cars, an ambulance, or circling helicopters, so I figured this was some sort of follow-up story. Jeez, why couldn’t they just let this go?

  I whipped into a parking space far from the news van and the looky-loos surrounding it, and sat there for a moment stewing on Jamie Kirkwood.

  I wondered why, in media-crazed L.A., a friend or family member hadn’t ratted her out. Surely there was a book deal in this for someone, or at least a mention on The View.

  I could think of only two reasons why Jamie hadn’t come forward voluntarily.

  One: she didn’t want to be in the center of the publicity storm that had built until she’d found a good lawyer.

  Or two: she’d killed Claudia.

  I got a sick little feeling in the pit of my stomach. If Jamie had killed Claudia, that meant I’d aided in her crime and her escape.

  Oh, crap.

  I bolted from my car, ignored the crowd of gawkers surrounding the news van, and dashed into the store. Customers choked the aisles, their arms laden with merchandise, and for once, I was glad to see them. I wanted to be busy tonight, too busy to think about Claudia, Jamie, Mom’s fruit bouquets, or how big my butt would look in a prison-orange jumpsuit.

  I hurried into the employee break room where the time clock was located and found Rita standing at the whiteboard, arms crossed, and glaring. No one else was in there. That meant only one thing.

  I was late. And Rita was loving it.

  Someone up the Holt’s corporate chain—someone who had surely never met Rita and likely never set foot in an actual Holt’s store—had promoted her to the position of cashiers’ supervisor. That meant she was the time clock monitor—or time clock Nazi, as someone had started callin
g her.

  At each shift change, Rita positioned herself by the time clock, and if anyone was late clocking in, she wrote their name on the whiteboard. Four lates in a month and you got fired.

  “You’re late,” Rita declared.

  “I guess that Hooked on Phonics is really working for you, huh?” I said as I pulled my time card from its slot.

  “Everybody else gets here on time,” Rita said. “I got here on time, and I was busy all day.”

  I waved my time card—I still hadn’t punched in—at the top she was wearing. Purple, with a milk cow on the front.

  “It must take a while to achieve that signature look of yours,” I told her. “I’m surprised you made it here at all.”

  I don’t think Rita picked up on my sarcasm. She was in high bitch mode.

  “We were busy,” Rita went on. “Tiffany and I. We gave a purse party for one of the ladies on the morning replenishment team. Her sister works for a big company. We sold two hundred handbags.”

  My temper shot up. Rita had stolen the purse party idea from Marcie and me. We thought of it first and everything. Now Rita and her friend Tiffany were taking all the good customers—and making a fortune.

  I hate her.

  Rita glared at me and the time card in my hand, waiting for me to punch in. I wouldn’t give her the satisfaction.

  “You’re supposed to work in domestics tonight,” Rita said, nodding to the schedule posted beside the time clock. “But I want you in infants and children’s wear instead.”

  Crap. I hated that department. Screaming babies, whining kids, stroller gridlock. The moms spoke a whole different language there, asking for things like sleepers, onesies, and some chick named Dora.

  Rita knew I hated that department. She made that change in the schedule just to irk me.

  “Still making the big decisions, huh?” I rolled my eyes. “I’m surprised you haven’t made store manager yet.”

  I huffed to the back of the break room before Rita could answer, wrote the time down on my card, then stored my handbag in my locker. When I came back, Rita was gone. I saw that she’d written my name on the whiteboard and that she’d misspelled it, which, I’m certain, she’d done on purpose.

  I erased my name and left the break room.

  Lots of screwups happened with time cards. Almost a daily occurrence. So, with mine in hand, I headed for Jeanette’s office intending to have her sign off on my card, after I gave her some bogus reason why I’d forgotten to punch in. But farther down the hallway I saw that the door to the training room was open and that employees were seated there, talking among themselves.

  Hmm…was this a meeting I was supposed to attend? I hadn’t seen a notice posted in the employee break room—all I’d seen was that fat cow Rita in her fat cow shirt. I wasn’t big on meetings, but attending was a great way to avoid infants and children’s wear.

  I found a seat on the back row near the door behind that heavyset guy from menswear—a good place for dozing, making it a favorite spot of mine—and noticed that Ty was at the front of the room on his cell phone.

  Ty seldom came to the store. He was always at the corporate office, or in a meeting, or something. I knew he was only here because of Claudia’s murder.

  Seeing him, I felt my heart doing its usual little flip-flop. Only this time something else was going on in there. An ache.

  Had Ty really been trying to get back together with Claudia before she was murdered?

  I still wondered if Detective Madison had told me the truth. And if so, how had he known? Who had told him? One of Claudia’s friends? Someone in her family?

  That little ache in my heart got worse. Sarah knew about Ty’s trip to Europe—the one he hadn’t mentioned to me—along with just about everything else that went on in his life. Maybe she knew he intended to get back together with Claudia. Maybe she’d mentioned it to Detective Madison.

  I got out of my chair and approached Ty just as he closed his cell phone. My heart did a bigger flip-flop when he saw me, and a tiny smile cracked the corner of his mouth.

  “How’s it going?” I asked.

  “The usual,” he said.

  I presented him with my time card. “Would you initial this? I didn’t punch in when I got here.”

  Ty pulled a pen from the breast pocket of his suit jacket, looked at the start time I’d noted on my card, and raised an eyebrow. “You were ten minutes early?”

  “Twelve, really, but I just rounded off to ten,” I said.

  He scrawled his initials on my card and handed it back to me. I stood there for a moment, thinking that he might want to know how I was doing, or ask me out, or something. But he didn’t—which didn’t prove anything. He could still be nuts about me. He just didn’t want to make me the target of store gossip by getting personal right now. And that proved how much he cared about me. Right?

  I resumed my seat on the back row behind that big guy from menswear as Ty addressed the employees. Jeanette sat off to the side, nodding wisely as he talked about the untimely death of Claudia Gray, the condolences expressed by everyone at the Holt’s “family,” the hardship it had caused the employees, blah, blah, blah. He said all the right things, and sounded sincere.

  I guessed that guy sitting in front of me was getting antsy—or maybe, like me, he was sick of hearing about Claudia—because he glanced back toward the door. He must have caught a glimpse of me from the corner of his eye, because he spun around so quickly I thought he might flip his chair over.

  Since he was staring straight at me, I gave him a little head nod. He kept watching me.

  Ty told all employees not to speak with the news media camped out in our parking lot. No one in the store was authorized to speak on behalf of Holt’s. If questioned, simply reply “no comment.” The corporate lawyers had probably told Ty this would avoid a huge lawsuit somehow, but Ty didn’t say so.

  The longer I sat there, the weirder I felt—and not because that guy from menswear kept staring at me. Some sort of volcano was building inside me. My feelings roiled like hot lava, ready to spew out.

  I couldn’t get the thought of Ty and Claudia together again out of my head. Or the question of why Ty had never told me the reason he liked me. Or why he was going to Europe and hadn’t told me.

  Then it came to me. I’d confront him. Right after the meeting. Yeah, that’s what I’d do. And I didn’t care if anyone in the store overheard us, or if they knew the two of us were—

  “Haley.”

  The sound of my name snapped me out of my mental tirade. I glanced around. Jeanette stood in front of the room pointing at me. Everyone stared, except Ty, who was in the corner talking quietly on his cell phone.

  I’m pretty sure I just missed something important.

  Jeanette smiled. “It seems Haley has no objections, so everyone, please see her.”

  See me? About what?

  Oh my God. What just happened?

  “Okay, that’s it,” Jeanette declared. “Thanks for your hard work.”

  Everybody rose from their chairs and headed out of the training room. I needed to ask someone what was going on, but I didn’t want to look like an idiot with Jeanette and Ty standing there.

  “Count me in, Haley,” someone called.

  “Yeah, me, too,” another person said.

  All around me, heads nodded and I got a couple of thumbs-ups.

  Well, apparently I had a lot of support for whatever had happened. Maybe everyone else would handle it for me and I wouldn’t have to bother.

  Anyway, I didn’t have time to worry about that now. This thing with Ty and Claudia was getting to me big time. I had to find out what had been going on between them before her death. Jeanette and several of the department managers had crowded around Ty—trying to kiss ass, I’m sure—so I couldn’t approach him with my questions now. I’d have to find out another way.

  I didn’t know any of Ty’s friends to ask—just because he never introduced me to any of his friends did not prov
e he wasn’t wild about me—so I’d have to look elsewhere for info.

  The obvious source was Mom. Her family and Ty’s family were both from old money, dating back to the founding of California, or something, so they had lots of the same friends. If I alerted Mom to the situation, she’d root out crucial info at warp speed.

  But no way could I talk to her about this. One hint, one tiny hint, that Ty was interested in me and she’d have me looking at bridal gowns until I went cross-eyed.

  Luckily, I had sources myself. People who knew people.

  What did I care if they wouldn’t want to talk to me?

  Chapter 8

  “He said what?” Marcie exclaimed.

  We sat at opposite ends of my sofa drinking Corona and munching pretzels. I’d called her after I’d finished my shift at Holt’s and she’d rushed over.

  You can’t ask for a better friend than that.

  “Yeah,” I said, nodding and waving my beer bottle in indignation. “That dumb-ass Detective Madison said that Ty was trying to get back together with Claudia.”

  “I don’t believe it,” Marcie declared, as a true friend would. “Ty’s crazy about you.”

  “Yeah?” My spirits lifted. “How do you know?”

  Marcie thought for a second, then said, “He just is, that’s all. I mean, you can tell by the way he looks at you.”

  Not exactly the definitive proof I was hoping for.

  “That detective probably made the whole thing up,” Marcie decided.

  I’d wondered about that myself. Maybe Madison had concocted the whole story to judge my reaction, to scare me, to shake a confession out of me. I wouldn’t put it past him.

  “So where did Madison claim he got this info?” Marcie wanted to know.

  I took another sip of beer. “He didn’t say.”

  “You need to find out,” Marcie advised.

  “Yeah, I know,” I said.

  “You think it might be true, don’t you?” Marcie said, looking both wise and compassionate, as only a best friend can look at an all-time low point in your life.