A Disguise to Die For

by Diane Vallere

  I left them alone and ducked into the stockroom, stacking several boxes onto the dolly. I added two white Tyvek suits that hung on hangers, and the single blue plastic suit that I’d gotten from the crime scene cleanup crew, and then wheeled the cart back out front.

  “The boxes have heads inside, but this is a sampling of what someone could wear for the body of their costume,” I said. I handed her the hanging costumes and unfolded the flaps of the cardboard box. From inside I pulled out three papier-mâché heads: two with antennae that bobbled around the top, and one vaguely peach-colored headpiece designed to look like a classic SNL Conehead. Her eyes lit up and she picked up the Conehead. “I haven’t seen one of these in forever. Do you have any more?”

  I looked in the bottom of the box. “To be honest, I don’t know. When I said this collection was a recent acquisition, I wasn’t kidding. I drove them here two days ago.” I opened the next two boxes and peeked inside. Three more Coneheads.

  “So far, there’s four. Chances are good that there’s more in the back. How many costumes do you need?”

  “Eight, I think.” She handed me back the Tyvek suits on hangers. “This seems a little heavy for the kind of weather we’re having, but this blue thing looks like it might be perfect. Do you have eight of them too?”

  “That’s a sample,” I said quickly. “I’d have to order them for you.”

  “That’s fine. I have a couple of weeks.”

  “Great. Let me check for more Coneheads.” I moved the remaining two boxes off the dolly and wheeled it toward me. The wheels locked up. I moved it back and forward to no avail.

  “It’s caught on something,” Willow said. “Hold on.” She bent down and picked up a chain with a shiny round medallion hanging from it. “Does this go with one of the costumes?” she asked, holding it up.

  Ebony’s lost medallion! I glanced at the ceiling and gave a silent thank-you to Saint Anthony. “That’s Ebony’s favorite necklace,” I said, forgetting that Willow didn’t know who Ebony was. “She said it was missing. I guess it fell off when we unloaded the boxes.”

  “She’ll probably be happy to get it back. I don’t think that’s just any old necklace. That looks like a talisman.” At my confused look, she continued, “A good luck charm or, more likely, something that comforts her.”

  “That’s exactly what it is to her. How’d you know? Most people think it’s just a necklace.”

  “I can tell from how the brass is shiny at the base of it that she probably rubs it regularly. Most people who have a favorite piece of jewelry become so accustomed to it that throughout the day they take a subconscious inventory to make sure it’s where it should be.”

  “I’ve never heard that before,” I said.

  She blushed. “It’s my theory.”

  “Do you always make up theories about people and what they wear?” I asked, wondering what she thought of my tuxedo T-shirt.

  “It’s kind of my job. I’m a counselor,” she said.

  “Like a shri—psychologist?” I asked.

  “I’m not licensed like that. But sometimes people need people to talk to, and I try to provide a safe, confidential place where they can.”

  “Do you have a lot of clients?”

  “I don’t have any,” she said. “I moved here from Texas, where I lived for the past twenty years. Time for a fresh start,” she said. I sensed that there was more that she wasn’t telling me, but it felt too personal to pry. “I rented a small bungalow at the edge of Proper City where I’ll meet with clients.” She pulled two textured, dirt-brown business cards out of her wallet and handed them to me. “Word of mouth helps, so if you know anybody who wants to talk, give them my card.”

  I ran my thumb and forefinger over the texture and read the lettering. WILLOW SUMMERS, read the card, and underneath, in italics, it said TALK IS CHEAP. A phone number followed.

  “Thank you. I might,” I said, and tucked the cards into the pocket of my trousers.

  “If you don’t, then plant them.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “The cards. They’re made from recycled paper and they’re infused with seeds. Bury them in the dirt and you’ll get the beginnings of a houseplant.” She smiled. “Some people might prefer to talk to a houseplant than to talk to me. I figure it’s good to have options.”

  Willow Summers had such a pleasant disposition that I was tempted to tell her all about Ebony on the spot. But I didn’t. Instead, I wheeled the cart into the stockroom and loaded it up with three more boxes. We had to open only two to find the remainder of her Coneheads.

  She reserved the heads for rental and ordered several of the blue plastic suits for pickup. I made a notation and promised to call her when they were in. Already the alien costumes were proving to be a nice addition to our collection.

  As soon as she left, I called Ebony’s cell to tell her that I’d found her medallion. She didn’t answer. I tried the landline at Shindig, but I already knew that she wouldn’t be there. Which meant Detective Nichols might be closer to getting that arrest warrant than I thought.

  * * *

  BY the time Kirby showed up at three, I was eager to leave the store. In addition to Willow’s rental, I sold a dozen boas to a group of ladies who stopped in after a luncheon. I’d long ago learned never to underestimate the shopping power of a group of women who were powered by champagne and shrimp cocktail.

  “Hey, Margo, any word on Jerry?” Kirby asked.

  “He’s coming home tomorrow,” I said.

  “That’s great! That means things can get back to normal around here.”

  “Normal, right.” If normal meant Ebony in jail for a murder she didn’t commit and my dad selling the store so he could travel the country.

  “Are you going to leave when he comes back?”

  “I don’t think that’s a good idea. He has to learn to take it easy.”

  “Oh, okay, sure.” Kirby’s shoulders dropped. He walked past me and put his dune buggy magazine and keys into a cubby behind the counter.

  I was taken aback by his reaction. As far as I’d figured it, he and I had gotten along just fine since my father’s heart attack. Maybe he didn’t like me telling him what to do. If that was the case, he’d have to get over it sooner rather than later. I didn’t have time to get into that conversation because I’d been waiting for him to show up for hours. Now that he was here, I could finally get out of the store and try to help Ebony.

  “I meant to tell you, I talked to Varla. She’s stoked about the discount and the background. She asked if I could take measurements of the window so she could start working on something,” Kirby said.

  “Why don’t you tell her to come and see it for herself? She can still take measurements, but it might help to see it in person.”

  “You want me to ask her to come here?” He turned beet red.

  “Don’t you think that makes the most sense?”

  “I guess so.”

  “Great. Call her now if you want. I need to head out for a bit and I don’t want to wait until it’s too late.”

  He perked up. “You’re going out? Sure, I’ll take care of everything.”

  I scanned the store for a project to delegate, but Kirby was already opening the boxes that he’d carried inside. “If I’m not back by seven, are you okay closing up?”

  “Yep.” If I didn’t know any better, I’d say that Kirby liked working in the store a lot more when I wasn’t around. Was I such a bad boss? I shook it off, grabbed my keys, and left.

  * * *

  I took my scooter this time and drove directly to the house of Linda and Black Jack Cannon. The same black town car sat in the driveway as before. I parked the scooter and walked up the sidewalk, preparing to knock on the front door. I adjusted the hem of my tuxedo T-shirt and stood straight. The door was answered four seconds after I rang the bell,
something I knew only because I counted out the Mississippis to help calm my nerves.

  Linda Cannon answered the door herself. Today she was elegant in a light blue skirt suit set off with deep blue earrings, necklace, and ring set in gold. Her blond hair was up in a French twist and her lipstick looked freshly applied.

  “May I help you?” she asked with no apparent recognition.

  “Mrs. Cannon, I’m Margo Tamblyn. We met at your son’s memorial service.”

  “The costume woman,” she said.

  “Yes, that’s right.”

  She glanced at my T-shirt. “Won’t you come in?” she asked, indicating a path behind her.

  “Thank you.” I entered the grand foyer and glanced up. The chandelier that hung over my head must have been at least twelve feet in the air. For a paranoid second I feared her hospitality was motivated by an elaborate plan to have the chandelier fall on my head, eliminating me from her life. I shook off the thought. It had been too long since my last therapy session.

  “May I offer you something? Tea? Water? Wine?”

  “No thank you,” I said. “I came here to talk to you.”

  She picked up a glass filled with ice and took a sip, leaving a faint smudge of coral lipstick on the rim. “I’m afraid I may have been rude to you at the memorial,” she said. “My husband thought it would be a good idea to throw a public memorial for our son, to help me grieve. At the time I agreed with him, but perhaps there are things that should be kept in the family.”

  “Mrs. Cannon, I understand that you were upset. I may have been a little upset myself. My father is hospitalized with his second heart attack in two weeks.”

  “That must be hard on your family,” she said.

  “My father is my family. My father and Ebony Welles.”

  “She’s not your mother!” she proclaimed.

  “She’s the closest thing I have to one. My real mother died when I was born,” I explained. “Ebony became friends with my dad when I was five. She was the most consistent female role model I had.” Linda Cannon looked away. “I don’t know what I would have done without her,” I continued. “She taught me to be strong, honest, and hardworking. She’s the person I turned to when I couldn’t talk to my dad. And now—”

  Linda set the glass down. “You seem like a fine woman, but I’ll credit your father with your upbringing, not Ms. Welles. She has been nothing but trouble for this family since I first knew her. And after my late husband’s generosity, what she did to my son . . . I just can’t forgive her. I cannot.”

  “Ebony is innocent,” I said quietly. “She didn’t hurt Blitz.”

  “Margo, your loyalty is misplaced. Ebony Welles blackmailed my late husband, killed my son, and robbed my house. Now, I’ve been hospitable and invited you into my home, but if you are going to insist on defending that woman, then I must ask you to leave.”

  I stood up. “How can you convict a person without proof?” I asked.

  She stood up with me. “The police have all the proof they need. Ask yourself: who was standing over my son’s body with a knife in her hand?”

  “That wasn’t the knife that killed Blitz. The police know that.”

  Black Jack stepped into the room and put a consoling arm around his wife. “Margo, we can both understand that it’s hard for you to accept what happened, but there’s just too much evidence pointing to Ebony for us to ignore it. Maybe we could if she hadn’t been linked to the robbery, but now”—he shrugged—“there’s just no denying it.”

  “The robbery?” I asked. “What about Amy Bradshaw?”

  “She’s the one who put two and two together for the police,” Linda said. “She found my engagement ring at a local pawnshop. She even spent her own money to buy it, the poor thing. It was awfully brave of her to come forward like she did, but she knew it was the right thing to do.”

  “When did this happen?” I asked. The information didn’t fit together the way it should.

  “Amy came to us yesterday,” Black Jack said. “Once we spoke to the police, they tracked down the pawnbroker. He made the ID. Ebony Welles was the woman who pawned my wife’s jewelry.”

  Chapter 25

  EBONY COULD NOT have been the person to bring in Linda Cannon’s jewelry. The robbery had taken place on Monday night and Ebony had been—Ebony had been missing all day. Before I tried to defend her, I needed to know where she’d gone.

  I quickly assessed that it would do more harm than good to admit that I didn’t know Ebony’s alibi for the day of the robbery. What I did know was that Amy Bradshaw had been wearing that engagement ring on Sunday morning, a full day before the Cannon house was broken into. Maybe she hadn’t expected me to notice, but I did. I’d even commented on it. And what had happened days later when I mentioned the engagement? Denial. Which meant one thing: she knew the presence of that ring on her finger on Sunday morning was going to create problems for her.

  There was nothing more to be gained from an afternoon at Linda and Black Jack’s house, so I made as polite an exit as I could under the circumstances. Across the street, Grady’s silver sports car sat in the driveway. He would have easily seen my scooter when he parked his car. A friendly hello might have been in order, but all I wanted was to get out of Christopher Robin Crossing and find out what was going on.

  It was after five. I hadn’t eaten since my smoothie that morning and I was hungry. And I had to go to the bathroom. Not the best combination when driving a scooter over a road with potholes and ruts. Main Line Road was backed up with cars, and I’d never been the type of scooter driver who was comfortable easing my way up the aisle between two lanes of traffic. On the right, I saw the glowing sign for Hoshiyama Steak House. As soon as I got close enough, I pulled off and parked in the back.

  Truth be told, it wasn’t just the possibility of a bathroom that led me there, or the fact that Tak had asked me to stop by. My mind was a loop of problems with no solutions, and the best way think outside of the box was to get outside of the box. In short, I needed unfamiliar surroundings to shake me out of what I already knew.

  I’d been a fan of teppanyaki restaurants since my sixth grade graduation. Dad, Ebony, and I had driven into Las Vegas for the day. He’d promised that I could pick any restaurant I wanted for dinner. After a day spent wandering around the strip, I think he expected me to choose McDonald’s or Burger King, but I didn’t. I spotted an old wooden building with a low gabled roof. MORI’S RESTAURANT read the sign over the door. A pretty lady in a pink satin kimono opened the front door and looked out. Her black hair was pulled back in a bun that was secured with sticks. She smiled at us. I thought she was the most beautiful woman I’d ever seen. My dad must have noticed, because he asked if I wanted to eat there.

  “That’s a restaurant?” I had asked.

  “Yes. They make the food in front of you like a show,” he said.

  Ebony clinched the deal. “I love their fried rice. Let’s go!”

  They were right. I loved every aspect of it, from the outfits on the serving staff to the volcano that the chef made out of a sliced onion. After I moved to Las Vegas, I’d treated myself to lunch at Mori’s every year on my birthday, even when the cost of the meal could buy my groceries for two weeks.

  Tak’s truck wasn’t in the lot. I approached the door to the restaurant and prepared myself for the experience of dining alone. The table, I knew, would accommodate eight people. Me being a party of one, I’d be slotted into an empty seat at a table of strangers. I didn’t mind—I never had. Sometimes sitting with strangers felt more comfortable than trying to force conversation with people I already knew. I ducked into the restroom out front and then approached the hostess station.

  A woman greeted me. She had long, straight, brown hair streaked with gray, and was dressed in a green linen dress that ended just above her ankles. Tasteful flat brown sandals were on her feet. She wore very li
ttle makeup and her natural attractiveness shone through. Despite the creases by her eyes and laugh lines by her mouth, there was a youthfulness about her that kept me from pinpointing her age.

  “How many?” she asked.

  “One.”

  “Name?” She bent over the seating chart with a pen.

  “Margo. Margo Tamblyn,” I said.

  She looked up quickly and smiled. “Follow me,” she said.

  She led me to a back table with three couples. Two empty chairs sat along the side of the table. I thanked her and sat in the chair to the right, leaving an empty chair between me and the couple to my left. Some people preferred their privacy, even in such a festive location. I scanned the menu, looking for my usual—sesame chicken—and cringed when someone sat in the chair next to me. I focused on the menu even though I already knew what I was ordering.

  Dining alone in Japanese steak houses had become a way for me to practice being myself among strangers. Odd as it seemed, I was comforted by the anonymity of the people around me. But tonight, I couldn’t stop thinking about the accusations against Ebony. I picked at my salad, rolling the single grape tomato around the bowl with my chopsticks, while the chef sliced and diced our food. He finished the whole presentation before I was done with my soup.

  A woman in a kimono stepped up to my left. She held a black and red laminate tray. One by one she picked up my plate, my salad, my bowl of fried rice, and my glass of water.

  “I’m not done,” I said.

  She nodded. “We have a better room for you,” she said. “Come with me.”

  Three conversations stopped. Six pair of eyes watched me stand up and follow the woman to the side of the room. She went behind a large screen and I followed. I hadn’t known there were private rooms in the back until she slid a wood-and-muslin panel to the left and exposed a low table flanked by even lower seats. She set the tray on the table and bowed slightly. I reciprocated. Moments after she left, Tak appeared in the doorway.