“It’s okay,” he said. He stepped toward me and I stepped back and threw my hands up in front of me as if I were warding off an attack. He stopped where he was. “I’ll go see if the detective is ready to talk to you.” He turned away and went back inside.
* * *
MY conversation with Detective Nichols was of the tell-me-what-happened variety. My experience giving statements to the police was limited but not nonexistent thanks to a couple of scares in Vegas. Let’s just say the kind of apartment a magician’s assistant can afford isn’t in the best part of town. The detective thanked me and handed me her business card in case I remembered anything else. The Proper City shield was printed on the card along with the name Nancy Nichols, PCPD, and contact info for cell, precinct, and e-mail.
The banquet hall was secured, keeping everything from Ebony’s kitchen supplies and leftover decorations to my stuffed ocelot inside. I didn’t want to leave her alone—Ebony, not the ocelot, though I wouldn’t have minded having the ocelot with me too—so I wandered the perimeter of the building until I found her sitting in the passenger side of her Coupe de Ville. The door was open and particles of dust floated in the hot, dry air.
“Let me drive you home,” I said.
“Girl, you drive that little Vespa. You don’t know how to drive my Caddy.”
“You let my prom date borrow your Caddy in high school. Are you saying you trust a teenager in a tuxedo more than you trust me?”
“The boy had ruffles on his shirt. If he looked more like Isaac Hayes, I would have gone to the prom with him.” She pulled the keys out of her handbag and held them out. “Take the corners wide and don’t get bent out of shape over yellow lights. This baby needs some warning time before coming to a stop.” She pulled her medallion to her lips and kissed it as if trusting me to drive her car was an act that required a boost from her good luck charm.
I climbed into the car and cranked the windows down. As I adjusted the rearview mirror, I saw Tak talking to the detective. Ebony noticed.
“What was up with you and Dr. Fu Manchu?”
“Charlie Chan,” I corrected. “His name is Tak Hoshiyama. He’s part of Blitz’s crowd.”
“Hoshiyama?” she repeated. “Like the restaurant?” I must have looked confused, because she continued. “Hoshiyama Steak House. It’s a family-owned teppanyaki grill. Like Benihana except local.” She closed her eyes and settled back against the vinyl seat of her car. “Good fried rice. We should go there sometime.”
I started the engine and pulled away from the curb. Ebony kept her eyes closed. She was right—driving the Caddy was miles outside of my comfort zone—but I managed.
Despite multiple offers for her to spend the night at Disguise DeLimit, Ebony insisted that she wanted to go home. I didn’t tell her that my offers were somewhat rooted in selfishness; after what had happened at the banquet hall, I wouldn’t have minded the company myself.
She also insisted that I drop her off first. I’d parked my scooter in a narrow spot on a side street next to the banquet hall, and as much as I didn’t want to leave it there, I doubted I’d find a space for Ebony’s boat in that neighborhood. After leaving her place, I drove to the costume shop, parked along the curb out front, and went inside.
The house was disturbingly quiet. Soot followed me from room to room as if he sensed my need for companionship. I caught my reflection. I’d forgotten that I was wearing a wig. It added to the feeling that the party, the police, the strange man, and the murder had all been a different person’s experience. I took off the wig and sprayed it with fabric spray to freshen it up, then set it on a wig stand on the dresser. I hopped in the shower and then dressed in pj’s with cupcakes printed on them. Lonely and alone were two different things, and tonight I felt both. I turned the TV on, moved the pillows from the bed to the sofa, and burrowed underneath them. Soot joined me and we fell asleep somewhere between the second and third commercial breaks to a rerun of Friends.
* * *
THE next morning I tossed on a beige linen, Indian-inspired tank top and matching bell-bottoms from the ’70s. Both pieces were trimmed with a band of turquoise, coral, and white beads. I parted my hair down the center and braided both sides, and then pulled a turquoise and black beaded headband around my head under my bangs. After stepping into suede booties trimmed with fringe and tossing my keys, wallet, and phone into a fringed pouch that I wore cross-body, I made a kale, peanut, and banana smoothie and poured it into a to-go cup. Despite my best intentions, I didn’t get far.
Ebony’s Cadillac was still parked along the curb in front of my house, but even the most skilled driver would have had trouble with it today. The two tires facing me were flat. The driver’s side windows had been smashed out.
And the word Murderer had been spray-painted across the hood.
Chapter 5
I DROPPED THE smoothie. The lid to the cup popped off on contact with the sidewalk and the murky green concoction oozed out. I bent down to pick it up and saw a scrap of plaid fabric caught on the metal trim by the car’s window. I crept closer to the Caddy, feeling broken shards of glass crunch under the thin soles of my moccasins. As I bent forward to get a better look at the fabric, a dark gray RAV4 pulled up behind the car. Tak Hoshiyama hopped out.
Today he wore a blue oxford shirt and khaki pants. The Charlie Chan facial hair was gone, as was the slicked-back hairstyle. His shirt was rolled up a few times at the cuffs, exposing what looked to be an expensive watch on his wrist. His longish hair was pushed away from his face, but a few strands had fallen down and waved loosely by his cheekbone. His strong brows were drawn together in a look of concern.
“Greetings, Pocahontas, I come in peace,” he said.
I stared at him, having forgotten my outfit, braids, and beaded headband. When I didn’t answer, he continued. “That was supposed to be a joke. Is everything okay?”
“I don’t think so.”
He came around the side of the car and took in the broken windows and the flat tires. “Is this your car too?” he asked.
“No, it’s Ebony’s. What do you mean, ‘too’?”
“I knew you drove the scooter—that’s why I’m here.” He gestured toward the SUV with a hitchhiker-like thumb jerk. “You were about to get a ticket. I loaded it into my truck and brought it here.”
“How did you know it was mine?”
“I saw you arrive at the party yesterday.”
Translation: he saw my wig come off when I took off the helmet and then watched me wrestle a stuffed ocelot from where it had been bungeed to the back of the scooter. My hairline grew damp.
As if he could read my thoughts, he continued, “If I hadn’t seen the wig come off, I might not have known it was you in the costume.” I didn’t say anything, and an awkward silence grew. “Let me get it now.” He walked around to the back of his truck.
While he was gone, I picked the piece of plaid fabric from the door. It looked familiar, as if it had come from one of the costumes at the party yesterday. But more than one costume had been plaid, so which one? And what was it doing stuck on Ebony’s car?
A few seconds later, Tak returned with my scooter. I shoved the scrap of fabric into my fringed suede pouch while he rolled it—my scooter, not the pouch—up the sidewalk, right through the puddle of dumped smoothie. He made a face.
“Sorry about that,” he said.
“It’s just a smoothie,” I said. “I dropped it when I saw the car.”
“What’s in it?”
“Banana, kale, peanuts, almond milk . . .”
“That’s what you eat?”
“For breakfast.”
I took the handlebars from him and rolled the scooter to the front of the shop. He opened the door and I steered it inside and parked it next to the rack of colorful boas that Blitz had fingered earlier that week. A trail of green sludge followed along, growing g
radually more faint the farther I went.
“I need to call Ebony.” I looked at the phone on the counter and then back at Tak. “Can you give me some privacy?”
Tak stepped back. “Sure.”
He stepped outside. I pulled the shop door shut and flipped the dead bolt. Even though he said he’d wait, I wanted to ensure privacy.
I could tell from the sound of Ebony’s voice that I woke her up. “Margo, girl, I thought that Vegas lifestyle would have made you a night owl. And after yesterday, I’d just as soon stay in bed till noon. What’s so urgent?”
“It’s your car,” I said.
“I’m not ready to get up and face the day yet. You can drive my car over here this afternoon and I’ll drive you back.”
“No, that’s not it. I left it parked in front of the shop and someone vandalized it. I was about to call the police, but I wanted to tell you first.”
“Somebody messed with my Brown Sugar?” she asked, instantly alert. “The universe is sending me some kind of message. What’d they do? Did they key the doors? Don’t tell me they keyed the doors. I hate that.”
“They didn’t key your doors.”
“Thank the man upstairs for that.”
“They punctured your tires, smashed your windows, and spray-painted a nasty word on the hood.”
“Oh,” she said. “What’s the word?”
“Murderer.”
She cursed and then immediately apologized for her language, like she’d been doing since I was five. Considering I worked in Vegas, I’d heard much worse. “What did Jerry say?” she asked.
“Dad’s not back from his road trip. He doesn’t know about this.”
“That’s probably good. No use upsetting him in his condition. But I don’t want you calling the cops neither,” she said. “I’ll come to the store this afternoon. Can you throw something over the car until I get there? No need to advertise somebody’s opinion of me.”
“Sure. Are you sure you don’t want me to call the police? We should report this.”
“It’s not a matter for the police. It’s a matter for the insurance company, and my rates are high enough already. I’ll handle it.”
I turned around and looked outside. Tak was squatted on the sidewalk, taking pictures of the glass next to the side of the car.
“Ebony, what can you tell me about Tak Hoshiyama?” I asked.
“Why do you want to know about him?”
“He brought my scooter here from the banquet hall this morning. Now he’s outside looking at the car.”
“Don’t know much about him, only his parents. They’re good people. Go talk to him. I’ll be there as soon as I can.”
After hanging up, I went to the storage area to find a tarp. The best I could do was a set of water-damaged Twister mats. I grabbed a roll of duct tape and met Tak on the sidewalk.
“Can you help me make a tarp out of these?” I asked. “Ebony can’t get here right away and she asked if I could cover the car.”
His eyes cut to the Twister mats and he looked as if he was fighting off a smile. I braced myself for a snide comment, but none came. He took the Twister mats and the duct tape from me.
“I can handle the tarp,” he said.
“Thanks.” I turned back to the store.
“Where are you going?”
“To get a broom to sweep up the glass.”
“We should probably leave everything the way it is for the police.”
“I didn’t call the police.”
“Why not?”
“Ebony asked me not to.”
“You shouldn’t listen to her,” he said.
“Why not? She’s the second-most important person in my life. If it wasn’t for her and my dad, I wouldn’t have anybody.”
I was as shocked by my admission as Tak appeared to be. I regretted the outburst. Tak took the Twister tarps and turned away. I went inside for a broom and dustpan. When I returned, he was surrounded by unfolded Twister tarps laid out in a grid. He secured the edges with strips of the durable silver tape while I swept the sidewalk.
“Do you think it’s weird that the glass is on the outside of the car and not the inside?” I asked.
He stared at me. The dark brown intensity of his eyes made me uncomfortable, but I couldn’t stop myself from talking. “Someone would have had to break the window from inside the car.” I put my hand on my suede pouch, thinking about the torn fabric. For the moment, I kept it to myself.
“Did you look inside the car?” he asked.
“No. You arrived right when I first saw the damage. Why? Did you look?”
He hesitated. “No,” he finally said. I remembered seeing him crouched by the side of the car taking pictures with his phone, and immediately knew he was lying. I just didn’t know why.
“I’ll finish this up out here if you want to get your store opened,” he said.
“That’s okay. I’ll stay and help you.” I moved to the far end of the Twister-mat tarp and waited for him to finish taping the last ends together. When he was done, we each picked up a corner and carried the patchworked plastic to the Cadillac. I went behind the car and he went to the front.
The makeshift tarp barely covered the enormous vehicle. I peeled off two short strips of tape and secured the back corners to the undercarriage next to the wheel wells and then did the same for the front. I didn’t want anybody—Tak included—poking around Ebony’s car before she arrived.
“Thanks for your help,” I said with a small wave. I opened the shop door, but Tak called out behind me.
“Margo—hold up.” He caught the door with his hand. “Were you here last night? All night?”
“Of course I was,” I said. And then added, more tentatively, “Why?”
“I was wondering why you didn’t hear this.”
In the section of Vegas where I lived, I’d learned to hear the questions that people often wouldn’t ask out loud. My self-protection walls went up. It didn’t seem like a good idea to tell Tak or anybody that I was staying at the shop alone. It also seemed as though I needed to convince Ebony that maybe there was a very good reason for reporting the vandalism to the police.
“My dad’s a heavy sleeper,” I said, which was true. I was sure wherever he was sleeping in the middle of the desert, he hadn’t woken up once. “And I fell asleep in front of the TV.”
“I guess that explains it,” he said. “But still, you should be careful. Whoever did this might come back, and the next time they might do more than vandalize a car.”
Tak drove off. I propped the front door open, wheeled a rack of fringed ponchos onto the sidewalk, and went back inside to open the register. A petite woman in tennis clothes followed me. A canvas tote, weighed down by something bulky, hung over her shoulder.
“Are you open yet?” she asked.
I glanced at the clock. “Close enough,” I said.
“Oh good. I wanted to get here before I hit the courts.” She went to the counter and pulled a bunched-up garment bag from the tote. “I want to have this appraised.”
I stepped around the back of the counter. “What is it?”
“It’s a costume,” she said. She studied me out of the corner of her eyes. “You do buy costumes, don’t you? You don’t make everything yourself, right?”
“Right.” I hung the garment bag on an empty hook that was mounted to the wall. I’d watched my dad inspect potential costumes hundreds of times, and I’d learned how to back into an offer based on how much we could rent the costume for. I unzipped the garment bag and looked inside.
It was the sweater vest, shirt, and pants from one of the Charlie’s Angels costumes at Blitz’s party. Judging from the shoulder-length brown wig that was clipped to the hanger and the large pinkish glasses, I guessed it was Kate Jackson.
“You and your friends
did a great job with the Charlie’s Angels costumes,” I said. “Do the other women plan to bring theirs in too?”
“We didn’t talk about it. After what happened, we haven’t talked about much.” She pulled her bobbed brown hair off her face. A sparkling diamond on her left hand caught the light and glittered. It was bigger than any engagement ring I’d ever seen.
“That’s a beautiful ring,” I said. “Looks heirloom.”
She dropped her left hand and closed her right hand over it. “It was Blitz’s mom’s ring. I—I can’t bring myself to take it off, even though”—she tucked her head, and fat droplets of tears fell onto the front of her tennis whites—“even though we can’t go through with our plans anymore.”
“I didn’t know Blitz was engaged,” I said. I studied the woman in front of me. She clearly knew what had happened to Blitz. So why was she trying to pawn her costume the day after he was killed? The timing—if nothing else—was strange, at best. “I’m sorry for your loss,” I added. It was an expression that I’d heard my whole life, from the earliest memories I had of people expressing their condolences to my dad over the passing of my mother. The words felt empty, because I knew they couldn’t change what had happened.
The woman wiped her eyes and kept her head down. I waited for her to say more, but she didn’t.
I turned my attention back to the costume. The wig was a standard, store-bought brown. The glasses were vintage ’70s and had their share of scratches. The long-sleeved blouse was made from stretchy polyester. I took the shirt off the hanger and studied the plaid pants. Aside from the style, they could have passed for brand-new. There were no pills, no stains, no missing buttons. They were in just about perfect condition.
Except for the tear on the back of the leg that roughly matched the size of the fabric I’d pulled from the window of Ebony’s car.
Chapter 6
“I’LL TAKE IT,” I said. I made her an offer, low enough that I’d have wiggle room, but high enough that it sounded respectable. She agreed to it. “How would you like me to pay you? Store credit?”
A Disguise to Die For Page 5