by Eva Shaw
I waited for his next statement on the pathetic waif Diamond Dupris as I watched for Tina Yu to leave Carlton Villas.
“Find her father’s killer, find out how Jimmy died, and where he’s buried. Hope he is buried. Can’t you check DNA or something if you dig up Jimmy?”
“No, not at all. DNA is nearly impossible to collect from a body that’s been buried, especially one that’s been dead for over thirty years, Max.”
“But don’t they do that in the movies?”
“Not the movies I watch, or maybe I don’t watch Castle or Bones like you do. Even the chances of finding March after all these years are slim.”
“But you still told Diamond you’d try, so that’s good. You’re a fine woman, Nica, and a Good Samaritan.”
I cringed. “Geez, thanks for the pep talk.”
Then I heard a booming voice in the background, “Hey, Max, my man. Henry’s disappeared. You going to get sandwiches or not? You’re going to have a mutiny on your hands in another five minutes if we don’t get some food.” Then Max said, “Gee, duty calls, Nica, I’m the sandwich kid again. Hey, please just remember, Di’s a good kid.”
“Hardly a kid,” I mumbled. I turned off the phone, no good having it ring while I was alone in Quinn’s office, if I could figure out a plan to get there.
I didn’t budge from the car and was glad of that because right then Tina dashed down the steps of the building and into the arms of a medium-height man with a flashy diamond in his ears. “Well, now, that’s interesting,” I said out loud, still bothered by Tina’s boyfriend definitely looking much like my afternoon’s tail. They shared an R-rated kiss and then jumped into his black compact.
“Sweet Tina had not only sent a text to her tutu, but it seemed that she is somehow involved with a guy who looks a lot like my stalker. Wonder what else is fishy about her?” But this was not the time to ponder that problem. I messed up my hair to look somehow trendy or at least not as I looked previously in case anyone saw me, pulled at the neck of the t-shirt, squared my shoulders, and sauntered across the street. Yes, I did wait for their car move away from the curb.
Just as I anticipated, the truck kisser was at Tina’s desk, iPad in hand, playing games. “Help you, ma’am?”
My acquaintance with Jesus had been a waving one for most of my life until a few months after I was inducted into the Angieski clan. Now, I accepted Him with joy, but Cousin Jane, the good-hearted buttinski she is, took time to accept that or else she just liked to preach to me. Henry says it’s the latter. Yet, at that second, I gave thanks, big time to Him because the previous “wing it” plan now as a bona fide and really good one. I smoothed my hands over the newly purchase and snug red t-shirt, smiled, made my voice go up an octave and hoped it would pass for a southern accent.
“Well, hello there, you dear, sweet thing,” I drawled, and to my ears, it sounded like a high school performance of Blanche DuBois in A Streetcar Named Desire. “Why, aren’t you just the sweetest man. I’m so silly. I was, well, visiting Ollie earlier today, and gosh, my earring came off.” I showed him my left ear, but the truth was I never wore earrings.
“I don’t see anything here on the desk, but if you want to call tomorrow, the receptionist might have locked it here in her desk,” he said, pulling at the drawer, proving that he couldn’t get it open.
“Oh, well, Grandma’s little old three-carat diamond earring, I’m sure, is safe there.” I smiled again and turned to leave. Stopped. Flipped around and said, “You wouldn’t know, by chance, who owns a black Silverado truck way over there in the lot?”
The man looked like he’d just found out he was going to be a daddy. “I sure do. Just got that baby this afternoon. Why?”
“Oh my. It’s probably nothing. I was going to have you tell the owner that a group of teenagers were all over it. I thought I saw one opening the hood while a second was under—”
Luckily, I’d stepped back. The security guard was out the door and I had the entrance to Oliver Quinn’s office to myself. I keyed in his code, and shut the door behind me.
“Now what?” I whispered, but of course, I sat in his chair and moved the computer mouse to see the screen come to life. User name? Easy. First and last. Password? I sat there drumming my fingers. I’d only hacked into a few computers and wasn’t skilled at that at all, just lucky because people typically use their pet’s name (didn’t know if people like Quinn were allowed to have pets), place of birth (no clue, but he looked more New York than Hawaiian), or car (I’d say he probably drove a Mercedes). I even tried “password” since that is still one of the most common one and easiest to hack, along with the other all-time favorite of 123456. “Crud,” I hissed. Mercedes and all variations of that didn’t work.
In the old days before medical leave, I would have gone through official channels to get the information. Now? I had nothing and unless I suddenly became psychic, I was not going to find out who was paying for Uncle Babes’s care.
Just as I muttered something unprintable under my breath, there was a knock on the door. I froze and sweated and scurried from the leather chair.
I cackled and then again; like someone had just tickled my funny bone or something else. Then very slowly opened the door, just a crack. “Ollie, you naughty boy. What? You want to be left alone and no calls either. I’ll tell the guard. Anything for you, honey bunch.” Then I slipped out and firmly closed the door. “Ollie, I mean, Mr. Quinn—”
“Um, I just wanted Mr. Quinn to know I had to step away from the desk for a moment . . . um, an emergency, but I’m back,” said the guard, who still looked rattled from my story about his truck being violated.
I forced yet another sensual giggle and repeated what the security man said. I didn’t think guard noticed that I’d seen his eyes rolling. That was a good sign since it inferred he believed me in my cheesy acting role.
“What, Ollie Baby . . . ? Okay, I’ll tell him. Mr. Quinn doesn’t want to be disturbed.”
I was nearly out the door, still I couldn’t help myself. I turned and said, “Now don’t go telling anyone I was here. Okay?” This meant that as soon as I left, the guard would be announcing to anyone with an ear for gossip that Slick Mr. Quinn’s had been entertaining in his inner sanctum. It was wrong, but it felt so splendid. Oh, don’t tell me you’ve never done, or wanted to, something like that.
I called Henry before I left the parking lot to let him know I was on my way back. My perfectly perfect plan was a bust to review the financial statements on Babes, but at least I hadn’t gotten arrested for breaking and entering.
Henry picked up my call and started talking even before I could tell him why I was running late. “Nica, honestly, you don’t have to bother. We just need you on the keyboard tomorrow night. You don’t have to practice with us.”
“And like you promised, you won’t have a mike anywhere near me?”
“You’ve got my word. You’re strictly eye candy, so go back to the hotel and rest. Deal?”
So that was what I intended to do, except intentions don’t always work in my world.
• • •
The penthouse was silent and the connected doors to the suites were open. Jane and Harmony and their little dog, too, either had retreated to their bedrooms or were off doing whatever they did, which I think included plenty of shopping on Jane’s part.
Then I saw it. On the dining room table. Not just any little thing like a dozen daisies. Goodness, if it were any larger, it could have been used on a float for the parade in Pasadena. Blood red roses, great gobs of the long-stemmed variety.
Probably for Jane from her husband or maybe from her literary agent.
I walked closer. No. My name was on the tiny, ivory-colored envelope. “Now what did I do to deserve this?” I blinked.
I had trouble reading the card because my hand was shaking. Then it fel
l to the carpet. If words had power, these four jumped off the note and whacked me. “Now who is stupid enough to do this? Why, mystery solved. I’ll just call the florist. Here it is. Monarchs on King Street. We’ll see who this wacko is, pulling a prank like this.” The words came out in a puff which should have helped squelch that creepy feeling at my hairline.
It took seconds to be connected. Miraculously, someone was at the shop. I politely asked my question and longed to add that this was a federal investigation.
“Sorry, ma’am, we can’t provide that information,” came the response. “It’s against our policy.”
“You don’t understand. There’s no name on the card. How can I send a note of thanks?” I lowered my voice, fearing that my discomfort could be heard as tried to coax the truth from the florist. I even tried other methods, and then hit the “I’m fed-up” level. My mom always told me, “Don’t take no from someone who can’t say yes.”
I put the card on the table. “It makes one’s job complex when one must stand behind rules, doesn’t it. Let me talk with your manager.”
Whispers filtered through a hand over the receiver and then, “Ms. Dobson, hello. This is Jerry, and I’m the manager. Sorry about that ‘policy’ thing. Unfortunately, the order was placed in person, here in the shop.”
“Did you take the order?”
There was the sound of rustling paper followed by muffled words before the manager came back. “The clerk you were first speaking with did. She just told me the gentleman was not one of our regulars. We know our clients. The card was already written and sealed when the clerk accepted the order.”
“What name was on the credit card?”
“Let’s see.” Rustle, rustle, and a whisper.
As I learned early on in the bureau, follow the money, so I waited.
“Hmm, that’s interesting. Why, the order was paid for with cash.”
“Cash” was said as if it were a foreign term. “The clerk said it was busy in the shop and she can’t describe the sender. We at Monarch’s pride ourselves on being discrete and we hope you understand.”
I wanted to yell, “Blah, blah, blah,” but I politely replied, “Thanks,” and clicked off. I flopped to the sofa and read the message, trying to make sense of it. “Jimmy March is dead.” The note was written on plain stock, except the gold boarder, no way of knowing, unless one could fingerprint it, to find out from whom the message was sent.
I looked across the room. The roses seemed to be shouting a message that I could hear, but didn’t understand. Who even knew I was looking into Jimmy’s death? Okay, except my immediate family, Payton Yu and entire Yu grapevine, and the guy who was medium height with a flashy diamond in his ear, but he only tailed me from Carlton Villas. Jimmy’s only odd connection was with sweet old Babes.
If this were a statement, then someone absolutely knew that Jimmy March was dead. If it was to frighten me, the sender didn’t realize a bouquet of flowers wasn’t likely to do that. Besides, why not send a letter and spell it out? Why the theatrics, if this actually was a threat?
Absently, I weaved the card through my fingers. Okay, I’m forgetting how Babes yelled when I talked about Jimmy. Others had heard everything that was said, but no one seemed especially interested.
“Wait,” I muttered. What of Ollie, the ever-so-slick Oliver Quinn? Anyone and everyone in the band knew. Henry probably talked about Jimmy and according to Jane, all musicians were known to relish good gossip. I heard Max tell Henry that he’d visited the musician’s union the day before, too. As chatty as Max seemed to be, by afternoon, probably half of Honolulu heard that I was asking for info about Jimmy March.
If I were just another camera-laden, overly suntanned tourist planning to eat my body weight in pineapple, I’d be thrilled with the flowers. But you and I know that you can’t just turn off what you’ve been trained to do for ten years. That message was a warning. But was it a threat?
No one would really care if I threw up my hands and pretended to be the poor, little breast cancer survivor. Oh, too much for my chemo-addled brain to figure any of this out. That did cross my mind. But what if I was determined to find my birth parents or dig into my heritage? Could I not do the right thing and still face myself in the mirror? “Three dozen flowers can’t scare me off,” I said, grabbed the humongous arrangement, and placed it outside the suites with a sign that read, “Free.”
Done. Over. Gone. Period.
Chapter 10
Have you ever tossed and turned all night long and then woke with a dread of a known origin? Yes, I said “known origin.” Unless God brought the Rapture and I was one of the chosen, the dread shouted that I would be standing by a keyboard in front of five-hundred, charitable fans of Slam Dunk. I would be pretending panic wasn’t clutching my heart. Could I keep up with the band? Now that’s a silly question. Of course not. Could I not faint as I walked onstage with the band? No guarantees.
I threw open the curtain to the suite thinking how Henry had promised that as their “eye candy,” nothing would be expected of me. I could act as if I knew what I was doing. More than a strong cup of coffee, I needed to have my head examined. I swallowed hard knowing it was much easier to face a terrorist with a homemade bomb than for me to walk on stage at the Hawaii Theatre Center.
I slipped on my bathrobe, headed for the kitchen, and wondered how I was going to keep my mind off the charity concert. Then I stopped short. Like out of some Stephen King novel, that colossal arrangement of blood red roses was back. It was right in the middle of the coffee table.
From her suite, Jane waddled into the room, yawned and gave me a hug. “You were asleep when Harmony and Tom got back from their snorkeling trip and I got back from the city council meeting and wow, those flowers were right outside the door.” She’d switched to herbal tea with the announcement of her pregnancy, and still she was bouncing around. “They’ve got to be from my publisher. What a sweetie. Who’d thunk that my memoir would be number one on the New York Times bestseller list, other than me and God?”
“The publisher left a note?” I would not tell Jane my thoughts about the flowers being a treat. If I was wrong, she’d worry or stick her nose into it and I’d seen what happened when she did those things. If I was right about why I got the flowers, I knew how to handle the situation.
Jane laughed because Toughy, the Welsh terrier, jumped on the sofa squeaking a tiny soccer ball that had such a high pitch it could have cracked crystal. “Oh, no, but the arrangement is definitely for me. And you know what? Some joker put a ‘free’ sign on them.”
Touching the bathrobe pocket, I felt the edges of that card that declared that Jimmy was gone. When my eyes flashed open at three in the morning, however, I attempted to convince myself the flowers were from Diamond. But at three-thirty, I knew she would have signed the card. At four, I tried to believe that maybe Payton had sent them because if I remembered correctly, and I did, he loved to pull pranks. At four-thirty, I threw out all the theories. The note was clearly a warning. But from whom? And why pay with cash? The arrangement must have cost more than three-hundred dollars I guessed.
I thought back and at about six, I wondered if someone, who wanted to simply wanted to be discrete or anonymous hand sent them in order to assure me that Diamond was Jimmy’s daughter and he was dead. That is, someone who could afford to send this reassuring message with flowers when a text or maybe an email would have worked just as well.
As if on cue, my cell rang. It was Diamond and unlike her jumbled phone call from Switzerland, right then she was all business. “I’ve been here for two days and I am settling in at the Dupris mansion,” she said. “I made my mind up on the flight over that I’d talk with auntie the minute I got into Honolulu.”
“Before losing your nerve?” Yes, like my Cousin Jane, I do speak my mind quite often and it has gotten me into more than one scrape even before
I became a McAgent.
“She’s so fragile, Nica, so tiny. I’d forgotten that she is fifteen years older than my mother. Auntie says she’s jubilant I’ve come to her. She’s so alone now that Mother’s dead. She’s begged me to stay with her.”
Something in Diamond’s words or her voice puzzled me. All these years and still Auntie is thrilled that dear little Diamond has returned to the nest? Why didn’t she contact Lanie or Diamond long before this? Or it could be that Auntie was in the same room as Diamond as her voice, to my jaded ears, sounded hardly enthusiastic.
“I’ve explained everything to Auntie and she would love to meet you. Are you free for tea? At two?”
Wild horses, raging rivers, and the rain that threatened wouldn’t have been able to stop me. “Thank you. I’d be delighted,” I said, and copied the address on a pad in the kitchen.
I didn’t budge from the penthouse until I put on that little black dress I wore for the reunion dinner, tied a scarf around my neck, and slipped on sandals. And then with the rain still coming in sheets, but with promises from the Weather Channel that it’d stop by late afternoon, I opted to take a taxi rather than navigate the drenched streets of Honolulu.
The mansion looked like one of those places you see in Architectural Digest and even though my husbands were wealthy, we simply hadn’t lived in Monte Carlo opulence. The rain had stopped when the cab pulled to the curb. The porch circled the house and if Scarlett O’Hara lived in Hawaii, she’d choose the Dupris home.
As if the butler had been waiting for me, and he probably was, the heavy koa wood doors opened and he stood there like a sentry. I walked into the foyers. The place reeked of old money, old furniture I knew was worth a mint. Both of my late spouses had been wealthy, but theirs was new money. This was the old, stale kind that made you want to open a window if you wanted to breathe again.