I balled up the pillow and blankets and tossed them in the powder room behind my desk. After pulling the door shut behind me, I walked to the front of the studio.
“Welcome to Mad for Mod,” I said, as I unlocked the door from the inside. I held the door open. “Technically I’m not open, so you surprised me.”
“I’m sorry. I drove past and saw your windows. The sign on the door says Open. I can come back if you’d prefer,” he stammered.
I looked at the door. I didn’t remember flipping the sign, but he was right.
“No, it’s fine. I’d be opening in a few minutes anyway. I’m Madison Night,” I said, and held out my hand.
“Archie Leach,” said the man, returning my handshake.
Archibald Leach was the real name of actor Cary Grant. The nervous man in front of me couldn’t have been further from his namesake.
“How can I help you, Mr. Leach?”
“I like your style. I mean, your decorating style.” He blushed as though he’d said something inappropriate. “I recently moved into an apartment in Turtle Creek. For the past five years, it’s been my wife and me, but now it’s just me.”
“I’m sorry,” I said automatically, though I wasn’t sure what I was apologizing for.
“Me too. Seems she wasn’t so interested in me as a husband. Now, I’m back on my own.”
“Once you get past the sting of it, you might find this is an exciting time.”
He looked at me as though I were speaking another language. “How does this work? Do you want to see the apartment?” he asked.
I seriously doubted that Mr. Leach would come back to see me if I said it was as bad time. “Let’s start with your contact information and address. We can get some of the paperwork out of the way.”
We went to my office. Mr. Leach sat in one of the Barcelona chairs, while I pulled a New Client form from a drawer.
“The first page is contact information: name, address, phone number, email. The next two pages get into what room you’d like to have designed and any specifics you like. Designers, textures, textiles, et cetera.”
He looked at the wall covered in paint chips, fabric swatches, pages from magazines, and stills from Doris Day movies. Thanks to a lifelong obsession with the actress, after discovering that we shared a birthday, I found inspiration in her vast body of work. From Calamity Jane to With Six You Get Eggroll, the precision and beauty of mid-century design was caught on the sets of her films, and, by studying it, I had perfected my eye.
I caught my reflection in the glass of a framed set of Eichler floor plans. I looked worse than I thought. The front door chimed and I excused myself. “I’ll give you a couple of minutes.” I stood from my desk and stepped out front.
A petite woman with jet black hair was bent over a Rat Pack-era portable bar that I used to house cleaning products.
“Connie? Is that you?” I asked.
She stood up straight and broke out in a smile. “I’m glad you opened early. I have news,” she said dramatically.
Connie Duncan and her husband Ned were two of my newer clients. They’d recently bought a small house on Mockingbird Lane, a stretch of flat-roofed ranches that were among the cheaper properties in Dallas because of their unfortunate eighties remodel. The Duncans were interested in undoing the damage and reviving the original mid-century style. They claimed my method of using original pieces I’d amassed from estate sales, flea markets, and dumpsters had caught their attention. I suspected it had more to do with my new-client friendly rates and willingness to work with their shoestring budget.
“I wanted you to be the first to know. Well, not the first because Ned’s the first, but the second, but really Ned’s the second because I’m the first, not counting the insurance company—”
“Connie,” I said and patted the air with my hand, prompting her to lower her voice. “I have a client in the office. Give me a second to finish up.”
I left her wandering around the studio while I went back to see Mr. Leach. He was hunched over the application, the end of the pen in his mouth, deep in thought.
“How are you doing?”
“I’m having a hard time deciding.”
“On what?” I asked. “Maybe I can help.”
“You want me to list the room I want you to work on, but I want you to do the whole apartment. I can’t decide where I want you to start.”
“Why don’t we decide that together after a walk through?”
He set the pen down and exhaled, as though I’d presented the solution to the biggest problem in his life. I had a feeling his divorce was taking more out of him than he would have liked to admit.
“Thank you, Mrs. Night.”
“Call me Madison.”
“Thank you Madison.” He stood up and held out a hand. “When will you be in touch?”
“How’s tomorrow?”
“Great.”
I walked him to the door and watched him leave. He walked down the block and turned onto one of the narrow side streets, disappearing from sight.
“Connie?” I called. “I’ll be out in a second.”
She popped up from an orange ottoman. “No rush.”
I went back to my office and picked up the receiver on the yellow donut phone that sat on the corner of my desk. I dialed Tex’s number from memory.
“Lt. Allen,” he answered.
“Lieutenant, it’s Madison. I need to see you.”
“One of these days I’m going think you mean that in a different way.”
“Something happened after I saw you at Trader Josh’s.”
His voice took on an edge. “Where are you?”
“My studio.”
“I’ll be right there.”
“Wait. I need a favor first.” I paused. “Can you go to my apartment and bring me a couple of things?”
“Night, the citizens of Dallas don’t pay me to be your personal assistant.”
“Fine, I’ll do it myself.”
“Does the personal assistant gig come with perks? Because maybe I’ll reconsider.”
I slammed down the phone.
When I wandered out of the office into the studio, I found Connie studying a shelf of mid-fifties kitchen appliances in shades of yellow and aqua. She didn’t hear me approach and jumped when she saw me.
“What’s your big news?” I asked.
“I finally got reimbursed for a car accident two years ago. Totally not my fault, by the way, so don’t let that affect your decision to let me drive your car some day. Anyway, Ned agreed that we should use the money for the kitchen. I’ve got one word for you: atomic! Can you fit me into your schedule?”
“Sure,” I said. Immediately, I pictured Rod Taylor’s kitchen in The Glass Bottom Boat. I hoped both Connie and Ned knew what they were in for.
Connie was the closest thing I had to a girlfriend in Dallas. The rest of my friends were either still in Pennsylvania or people I’d befriended over the Internet through decorating forums and volunteer work at the theater.
“Come to my office. I’m having a hard time getting started this morning.” I ushered her in front of me and trailed behind her.
“No offense, but you don’t look so good,” Connie said when she reached my desk.
She wore a fitted baby doll T-shirt with a picture of a pin-up girl on the front, dark denim jeans with a two inch cuff, and black penny loafers. Her black hair was held back with a pair of cat eye sunglasses, and her bangs, trimmed to land above her eyebrows, hung perfectly straight across her forehead.
“I had a rough night,” I said.
“I can tell.” She handed me a Styrofoam cup of coffee that had come from one of the many 7-Elevens in Dallas. “I couldn’t remember if you had a coffee maker here or not, and I don’t
really function until after I’ve had at least three of these.”
“Thank you.”
“It’s black,” she warned.
“That’s fine.” I sipped the bitter beverage out of necessity, not desire.
“You need something, I can tell. I’m good at reading people. What is it?”
“I need a change of clothes, but I don’t want to go back to my apartment.”
She leaned forward. “You spent the night here?”
“I’d rather not get into details, if you don’t mind.”
“I can bring you clothes. I have a whole closet full of them. Anything else?”
“Knock on the door when you’re back. I’m going to lock up behind you.”
“Madison, are you in some kind of trouble?”
I considered the truth, but I knew too little about my situation to know what the truth really was.
“I’m avoiding someone, that’s all.”
“Ex-boyfriend?”
“Something like that.”
“I knew it had to be juicy. Listen. Stay put and I’ll be back in a jiffy and you can tell me all about it.”
That’s what I was afraid of.
Connie returned with a change of clothes and an overnight kit. I freshened up in the powder room behind my office, changed from the wrinkled peony printed dress into a tight red pencil skirt and a short sleeved sweater with a scoop neck. A pair of red patent leather kitten heeled pumps was in the bottom of the bag. Connie didn’t understand the reason I wore ballerina flats and canvas sneakers most of the time had as much to do with functionality as it did style. Judging the rockabilly style of both of the Duncans, I wasn’t surprised by her taste.
“If I looked that good in a wiggle dress, I’d wear one all the time,” she proclaimed when I returned to the room. “Here, tie this in your hair.” She handed me a red and white polka-dotted chiffon scarf. I handed it back.
The door chimes sounded again. “Madison?” called Tex.
Connie put one hand palm-side out toward me and held the other in front of her mouth, motioning for me to be quiet. She stepped into the studio.
“You bastard!” she said.
I followed her into the studio just in time to see her slap Tex across the face.
SEVEN
Tex’s hand flew to his cheek. The slap left a red mark. Connie stood in front of him with her hands on her hips. She was no more than five feet tall, but based solely from the look on her face, if they were to throw down, I’d put my money on her.
“What the hell was that for?” Tex asked. “Who are you?”
“I’m Connie. Aren’t you the ex from Madison’s past?”
“No,” I said, stepping out of the doorway. “He’s the Tex from Madison’s past.”
“What?” they said in unison.
“Connie Duncan, meet Lt. Allen. Lieutenant, meet my client, Connie Duncan.”
“Lieutenant?” Connie said, her eyes wide. “I assaulted a police officer?”
“I don’t think the lieutenant is going to press charges, are you?” I asked Tex.
“I haven’t decided,” he said.
I ducked into my office, pulled a cold glass bottle of Coke from the mini-fridge, and returned to the studio. I handed the bottle to Tex, and he held it against his cheek.
“Connie, can you give us a minute? Maybe take Rocky out for a walk?”
“Sure. I’m sorry, Lieutenant. I didn’t know—”
“Forget about it.”
Connie collected Rocky’s leash and clipped it onto his collar while Tex and I stood by my office door. After she left, he opened my office and set the Coke bottle on the edge of my desk. His eyes lingered on my outfit.
“She thought you were Brad,” I said.
His eyebrows went up.
“I told her I spent the night here and she brought me a change of clothes.”
“You spent the night here to avoid your ex?”
“I don’t want to talk about my ex.”
Tex followed me to the front door. I looked up and down the street and spotted Connie about half a block away, across the street from one of Greenville Avenue’s many Tex-Mex restaurants. Rocky trotted at a spirited pace, stopping occasionally to lift a leg and pee on a strip of crab grass that had sprouted up through one of the cracks on the sidewalk.
“I never noticed what a sweet walk you have, Night,” Tex said.
“It’s not me, it’s the skirt. For the record, I would not have picked this outfit out for myself.”
“Connie’s responsible for this look? As far as I’m concerned, she’s forgiven.”
“I don’t want to have to explain any of this to her. As far as she knows, I’m a successful interior decorator who may or may not be designing her new atomic kitchen.”
“What’s an atomic kitchen?”
“A colorful kitchen renovation re-imagined with the space-age, robotic influence of the fifties.”
“Assuming that’s even possible, someone actually wants that?”
“Mid-century decorating is a niche market, and I happen to be good at it.”
He dropped his head and shook it from side to side. “Atomic kitchen. Crazy.”
“Lieutenant, she doesn’t know what happened yesterday. Can we keep it that way?”
“Sure. Why am I here again?”
“I called you. I told you I needed to see you. That was like twenty minutes ago. Remember?”
“Sorry. Once I saw you in that outfit, everything else went out the window.”
“Maybe Connie was right to slap you.”
“Maybe she was, but not because of this.”
“So, how’s life, Lieutenant? Are you still seeing Officer Nasty?”
“See, Madison, things were going perfectly fine until you brought her up.” He rubbed his forehead. “Donna and I have gone out a couple of times. It’s not like I asked her to wear my class ring.”
I raised my eyebrows. He rubbed his hand over his eyes and forehead, then pushed his hair back and shrugged. “Feels like I’m driving Rizzo to Thunder Road with you sitting there looking like that.” He shook his head. “Donna’s fine. She’s better than fine. Only, she’s not like you.”
Now there was an understatement.
My first run-in with Officer Donna Nast was during the homicide investigation. Her nickname, “Nasty,” had been used by more than one officer, including Tex. She was a classic late-twenties bombshell, with long, chocolate brown hair, bottle-green eyes, and the kind of body that probably inspired a lot of wishful thinking. I’d bet that wishful thinking had more to do with her nickname than any behavior on her part. Tex was twenty years older than her, but in cop world, that didn’t seem to matter.
I was the counter opposite of Nasty: blonde-haired, blue-eyed, forty-seven years old. I was a vintage-wearing, sunscreen-addicted Doris Day lookalike. It was the Doris Day lookalike part that put me at the center of a homicide investigation and had almost gotten me killed.
Tex had called me to the carpet on the emotional walls I’d put in place—ironic, since I was an interior decorator. I didn’t like to admit that he’d gotten through. And despite the fact we’d kissed—a kiss we never acknowledged, but occasionally kept me awake at night—we moved on in separate directions. Tex and Nasty had fallen back into their on-again, off-again relationship.
I rebuilt my emotional walls faster than a bricklayer on a deadline and moved on with my life. And now, here I was. Sitting next to a playboy police lieutenant while my past reared its ugly head and threatened my way of life. Funny how life throws you the kind of curve ball where hanging out with a homicide detective is a pleasant escape from reality.
Tex and I stared at each other across my desk. The donut phone jingled its shrill
ring that had become all too popular now that people could program it into their iPhones. I made no move to answer it. The machine clicked on after the fourth ring and Brad’s voice filled the room.
“Hi Maddy. Just wanted to check in and see how you’re feeling. I guess this is a lot, me showing up out of the blue. I didn’t want to scare you off last night. I want to hear from you, to make sure you’re okay. I’m still at The Brite House Apartments. I’ll be here if you need me.” He disconnected.
I focused on a pair of Holt salt and pepper shakers shaped like cats. They sat on either side of my computer screen. The wide, almond-shaped eyes of the cats looked suspicious, like they could read my thoughts.
“I left the restaurant shortly after you did. Someone followed me. No—not followed me. Someone tried to scare me. At first, I thought it was a drunk driver, so I took a lot of different roads until it was just me and a brown sedan behind me. The driver bumped into the back of my car a couple of times.”
“Are you okay?”
“My neck is sore. I’m not sure if it’s from being hit or sleeping on the floor.”
“Night, that’s not a joke.”
“I know it’s not a joke, Lieutenant. I was going to call you when I got home, but my neighbor said someone had been in my apartment. I went to leave and saw a car that might have been the one that followed me parked across the street. I left out the back door and walked here.”
“You should have called me when you got here. I could have sent a car over to look for your friend in the brown sedan.”
“Once I got here, I was fine. Besides, calling you feels like using a Get Out of Jail Free card.”
I turned the salt shaker over in my hands while I talked. When Tex wasn’t in lock down police mode, I could read his expressions fairly well. I didn’t need to see I told you so written on his face.
“Did you go into your apartment?”
“No. Well, I looked inside. Effie was right. There’s paint on the walls and a torn up carpet.”
That Touch of Ink Page 5