Sleuthing Women

by Lois Winston

  “Maybe your accomplice was a man,” said Robbins. “Someone capable of hoisting Marlys over his shoulder.”

  These two had already tried and convicted me in their minds. They were too lazy to bother looking beyond the obvious, yet improbable. “Reign in the bait and tackle, Detective. You’re on a fishing expedition.”

  “Is that so?”

  “Yeah, and meanwhile, the real killer skipped town. Instead of trying to entrap me, you should be tracking down Emil Pachette. Are you aware that no one’s seen or heard from him since Monday afternoon?”

  “We have a nationwide APB out for Emil Pachette,” said Batswin.

  “Then get off my back, Detective. He’s your killer. Not me.”

  “We’re exploring all leads, Mrs. Pollack. And we’re thoroughly investigating all suspects. Including you,” said Robbins.

  At that moment my cell phone rang. I fished it out of my purse and glanced at the display. Private Call. Every nerve in my body froze. Private Call had come up on Karl’s cell phone when it rang Monday morning. I took a deep breath. “This could be Ricardo.”

  “Answer it,” said Batswin.

  I pushed a button. “Hello?”

  “You got the money, Sweet Cheeks?”

  “I have the money.”

  I didn’t bother to ask how he got my cell phone number. He’d already unearthed my direct office line, my e-mail address, and my unlisted home phone number. Chances were he even had my social security number and bank account numbers by now. Not that they’d do him any good, considering both my savings and checking accounts had balances hovering just shy of zero.

  Hell, he’d probably dug up my report cards going all the way back to elementary school. Ricardo was nothing if not resourceful. He’d be a real asset to the FBI and CIA if he wasn’t such a sleaze-ball crook. Then again, for all I knew, he moonlighted as a CI for both.

  He snorted. “So, you had it all along, huh? I figured as much. Safe deposit box, right? A little advice, Sweet Cheeks—don’t try to con a con. You’re over your head and way out of your league.”

  “No. I...uhm...I borrowed the money.”

  “Not that I believe you, but I don’t care if you had to kill for it. Just so’s I get what’s mine. Now listen carefully. You take a ride up to the Short Hills Mall. At exactly five o’clock tomorrow night you walk into Burberry and buy one of those oversized tote things they sell. The one that goes over the shoulder.”

  “Burberry?” I couldn’t afford Walmart, let alone Burberry.

  “Yeah. The plaid crap.”

  “Why Burberry?”

  “Cause my girl wants one.”

  “So buy her one with the fifty thousand dollars I’m giving you. I can’t afford a Burberry tote.”

  His voice lowered to an ominous growl. “You can’t not afford it, Sweet Cheeks. So you better do exactly like I say. Capisce?”

  I shuddered. “Fine. Burberry.”

  Maybe Batswin and Robbins could swing some additional cash for this sting operation of theirs. I certainly didn’t have an extra four hundred dollars up my sleeve. Not after what I spent last night at Home Depot on my do-it-yourself home burglar-proofing kit.

  “Then what do I do?”

  “You go into the little girls’ room on the first level. Last stall on the left. Place the fifty G’s in the bag.”

  “And?”

  “You wait for my call. And remember, Sweet Cheeks, you tell no one.” He hung up.

  Ignoring his warning, I disconnected on my end and conveyed the conversation to Batswin and Robbins.

  “We’ll bring the money here tomorrow afternoon,” said Batswin. “Meanwhile, we’ll check the LUDS on your phone. Although, I’m betting this guy uses pre-paid, disposable phones.”

  She placed the photo of Karl and Marlys back in her briefcase and turned to Robbins. “Let’s go.”

  As soon as they left, I collapsed into my chair and buried my head in my hands.

  “What did those two want?” asked Cloris.

  I raised my head to find her standing in the entrance to my cubicle. Erica hovered behind her. “Just bringing more doom and gloom. But I don’t buy it. Even with everything Karl hid from me, there’s no way he could have been having an affair with Marlys.”

  “What?” Cloris’s eyes nearly popped out of her head. She and Erica crowded around me.

  “What do you mean?” asked Erica. “What did Karl hide from you?”

  Shit! Nothing like stress and sleep deprivation to induce diarrhea of the mouth. I had wanted to keep that unsavory chapter of my widowhood out of the office gossip mill. I looked to Cloris for help.

  “Cat’s out of the bag now,” she said. “You might as well tell her.”

  So I did. Reluctantly. And only after swearing Erica to secrecy.

  “I promise,” she said.

  I omitted all the gory details. “After my husband died, I discovered he had a gambling problem. He left behind quite a bit of debt.”

  “That’s terrible,” she said. “I’m so sorry, Anastasia. I wish I could help.”

  “You can help by keeping your mouth shut about it,” said Cloris.

  Erica cringed as if Cloris had slapped her. “I already promised Anastasia I wouldn’t say anything.”

  “Just don’t forget.” Cloris turned back to me. “Now what’s all this about Marlys and Karl?”

  “Batswin and Robbins found a photo of the two of them.” I went on to explain the detectives’ new theory. “Maybe Karl was cheating on me,” I said. “He certainly deceived me about everything else. But not with Marlys. What would she see in him?”

  “It’s not like he could help advance her career,” said Erica.

  “And we all know that’s the only reason Marlys put out for anyone,” added Cloris. “Have you considered the possibility that the photo was doctored?”

  I had. “I suppose anyone with a little knowledge of Photoshop could have switched Karl for whomever was originally photographed with Marlys.”

  “But where would that person get a photo of Karl?” she asked.

  The strobe light in my head flashed on, forcing my brain into overdrive. “He took it when he broke into my house last night.”

  I slapped my hand on the table. “Batswin and Robbins didn’t notice the photograph on Tuesday because whoever is trying to frame me didn’t plant it in Marlys’s apartment until sometime yesterday.”

  “So who’s trying to frame you?” asked Cloris. “Emil Pachette?”

  “Maybe.”

  “Or someone trying to protect Emil Pachette.” She stared pointedly at Erica.

  “You can’t mean Gina!” Erica glared back at Cloris. “Gina wouldn’t do something like that.”

  “She was hiding something,” said Cloris. “It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to have figured that out yesterday.”

  “No, you’ve got her all wrong,” said Erica. “She’s just worried about Emil. Gina would never harm anyone.”

  “Not even to protect the man she loves?” asked Cloris.

  I held up my hands to stop them before they came to blows. “If Gina broke into my house and stole a photo of Karl, she did it before we spoke with her yesterday. It doesn’t add up. She first met me last night.”

  “But she knew about you,” said Cloris. She turned to Erica. “Didn’t she?”

  Erica stared at the floor. She twisted her fingers into pretzel knots and mumbled, “I did tell her about the murder and Anastasia finding Marlys’s body glued to her chair.” She lifted her head and turned puppy dog eyes to me. “I’ve known Gina all my life. She wouldn’t do this to you. To anyone. It’s got to be someone else.”

  I wasn’t so sure. Some women would do anything for love, and Gina struck me as so head-over-heels gone when it came to Emil Pachette that she might be capable of anything. Even an accessory to murder. I decided to have another chat with Gina but without Erica or Cloris.

  NINETEEN

  On the way to Emil’s studio, I called Zachary
Barnes. “Sorry to disturb you,” I said after introducing myself over the phone.

  “Calling to make sure I’m still not backing out of the apartment?”

  “I’m usually not such a worry-wart. As you now know, life kind of flew off into Bizarro Land lately.”

  “More so than you let on last night.”

  “Exactly what else besides belly buttons did my family tell you last night?”

  “Something about a dead body.”

  As much as I’d wanted to keep the boys from hearing about Marlys’s death and my involvement in it, our forefathers had written in that annoying Article in the Bill of Rights about freedom of the press. Marlys’s murder had made both the New Jersey and New York papers. I’d been mentioned as having discovered the corpse. Overnight my kids became school celebrities because their mother had stumbled across a dead body in her office. It’s amazing what will boost a teenager up the ladder of popularity.

  Only time would tell whether I’d be listed among Westfield’s famous or infamous residents. We had them both—cartoonist Charles Addams of Addams Family fame and John List, a man who’d brutally murdered his family in the early seventies and eluded capture for nearly twenty years.

  “Hey, don’t worry,” said Zack. “I believe in innocent until proven guilty.”

  Which meant last night Mama had probably said something about me being a suspect. “Good to know.”

  “Is that why you called?”

  “In a way. I was wondering if you’d ever dated Marlys Vandenburg.”

  “Running out of suspects?”

  “How did you—?”

  “You left your Who Killed Marlys list on the table in the apartment. I saw it when I was jotting down measurements last night.”

  Since I was now certain between my bigmouthed sons and my bigmouthed mother, Zachary Barnes knew plenty already, I filled in the few blanks left, including about the photo the cops had found. At this point, what did I have to lose?

  “I don’t know what to believe about Karl anymore,” I said, “but I find it hard to believe he was having an affair with Marlys Vandenburg.”

  “You think someone’s framing you?”

  “Exactly.”

  “And how do I fit into this?”

  “I thought if you had dated Marlys, you might be able to give me some insights to help me clear myself. Or find the real killer.”

  “Wish I could. Never met the woman. I photograph wildlife, not the wild life.”

  “What about your night life?”

  “What about it?”

  “According to the gossip columns, you frequented the same clubs.”

  “Didn’t your mother ever teach you not to believe everything you read, Anastasia Pollack?”

  “But—”

  “I did tell you those were all staged photo ops, didn’t I?”

  “Right. I just thought maybe—”

  “I’m not the club type. Unless it’s a golf club. Or a club sandwich. Believe it or not, I never dated any of those women I was photographed with. None of them are my type.”

  “Oh.”

  “Sorry to disappoint you.”

  Okay, so part of me had hoped that Zachary Barnes would pull a name out of his hat and hand me a killer. However, another part of me was glad he’d never fallen under Marlys’s spell. But I chalked that feeling up to pre-menstrual scrambled hormones and lack of REM sleep. And a sorely battered ego that still needed a bit of stroking.

  If it wasn’t, I didn’t want to know what it was because there was also the tiniest part of me smiling over the fact that Zachary Barnes didn’t date those women.

  And where the hell had that come from?

  ~*~

  Two hours later I stood in the hall outside Emil’s studio. Throughout the train ride into Manhattan I had pondered how I’d approach Gina, but I still had no idea what to say to her or how to say it without causing either her suspicions or hackles to rise. I’d have to wing it.

  Ratcheting up my courage, I reached for the doorknob and opened the door.

  Gina jumped up from her desk chair and greeted me with an ear-to-ear grin. “Anastasia! Look who’s back.” She turned to a GQesque stud with spiked black hair and a fine layer of fashion stubble covering his jaw.

  Dressed head-to-toe in black jeans and a black turtleneck, he sat in what looked like a trash-picked folding chair alongside the battered desk. A pair of black-framed glasses perched on the tip of his nose. He sized me up in the way that men who know they’re God’s gift to the double-X chromosome eye women.

  “I’m so relieved,” said Gina. She grabbed one of his hands in both of hers and graced him with a smile of unabashed adoration. His lips thinned into a tight line as he pulled his hand out from under hers.

  “Emil Pachette?” I asked.

  He rose. “Oui, and you are?”

  Gina introduced me. “This is Anastasia Pollack. She works with my cousin Erica. You know? Marlys’s assistant? Erica and Anastasia helped try to find you yesterday.”

  “I told you I wasn’t lost, ma chère.” He spoke in an affected French accent that could only fool Gina or someone from a galaxy far, far away.

  Gina flushed; her voice rose into a high-pitched whine. “But I didn’t know that, Emil. Not then. What was I supposed to think? You didn’t call, didn’t answer your phone.” She shuddered and gulped back a sob. “You could have been dead. Like Marlys.”

  “Do you know the police have an APB out on you, Mr. Pachette?”

  He waved his hand as if shooing away a dust mote. “No more.”

  “You’ve spoken with them?”

  “Oui.”

  “It was all a huge mix-up,” said Gina. “Emil didn’t even know Marlys was dead until earlier today.”

  Emil rose from his chair and sauntered over to a second folding chair sitting beside the cutting table. He dragged the chair over to the desk and indicated I sit.

  “You look like a woman with a million questions on the tip of your tongue, ma chère.”

  Only a million? My mind swirled. “So where were you since Monday afternoon? Minnesota, perhaps?”

  He spun around and glared at Gina.

  “I didn’t tell her! I swear!”

  “She didn’t,” I assured him. “But how about dropping the faux French accent and coming clean?”

  He sighed. “First,” he said, “you must promise not to divulge my secret to anyone.”

  “Is this secret illegal?”

  His jaw dropped, his eyes grew wide in mock horror. “Mais, non!”

  Gina jumped in to defend her love. “Emil wouldn’t do anything illegal.”

  His glare pierced her with a warning expression that told me Gina’s ardor for her boss fell far short of being reciprocated.

  “Well?” he asked me.

  I slipped out of my coat and sat down. “As long as it’s nothing illegal, you have my word.”

  “I can assure you I’ve broken no laws.” He took his seat and crossed one leg over the other. “My real name is Edwin Peepers.”

  “Why the deception?”

  “Would you spend three thousand dollars for a designer gown from The House of Peepers?”

  “I see your point.” Although from what I had spied of Emil’s—or Edwin’s—couture, I wouldn’t shell out three dollars for one of his dubious creations.

  He raised his arm and waved it in an overly dramatic flourish, like some minor prince casting a crumb of information to a knowledge-starved dolt of a peasant. “Emil Pachette is my fashion nom de plume.”

  “Along with the phony accent by way of Horse Thief Falls, Minnesota?”

  His arm and his jaw dropped simultaneously. Along with his phony accent. “How did you—?”

  I didn’t bother to explain. “I’m betting you’ve never even been to France.”

  He sighed and shook his head. “Only in my dreams.”

  “So what happened?”

  In upper Midwestese, he continued. “Late Monday morning while
I stood on line at the corner deli, waiting for a sandwich, I received a call that my folks were involved in a head-on collision. The call from the hospital said they were both in the Critical Care Unit and not expected to live. I rushed home to pack a bag, then grabbed the next flight out of La Guardia.”

  “And didn’t bother to tell anyone?”

  His features hardened. “Business was the last thing on my mind.”

  “So Marlys didn’t know not to expect you to show up for your date with her?”

  “Meeting,” muttered Gina.

  He shot her a glance but continued to speak to me. “If your parents were close to death, would you remember to cancel a dinner date?”

  So why was he now back here so soon after the accident? I would have thought he’d be busy making funeral arrangements, dealing with lawyers. “Did your parents pull through? Are they all right?”

  He laughed. “Oh, they’re fine. Never better, as a matter of fact.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “Neither do I. Except that some creep has a sick sense of humor. He not only scared the shit out of me, he sent me on a wild goose chase through the worst blizzard to hit northern Minnesota in over a decade.”

  He stood and paced across the cramped room. “My plane was the last to touch down in Duluth before the airport closed. I rented a car and drove six hours through a blinding snowstorm. When I finally arrived at the hospital, guess what I discovered?”

  “What?”

  He spun around, his arms akimbo. “They’d never heard of my folks!”

  “Were they at another hospital?”

  “There are no other hospitals within a hundred-mile radius. I tried calling them at home, but by then all the phone lines were down.”

  “What about cell phones? Don’t they have one?”

  “Cell phones?” He spit out a wry snicker. “Horse Thief Falls isn’t exactly the Manhattan of Minnesota. The entire county is a dead cell area. It took me another hour to drive what should have taken ten minutes to get to their house. I found them snuggled under quilts, roasting marshmallows in front of the fireplace.”