Groomed for Murder

by Laura Durham

  Reese turned his attention to the brunette in the banana-yellow cocktail dress next to me. “I take it you’re Hedda.”

  “Hedda Lettuce.” She dangled a hand in front of his face as she visibly gave him the up-and-down. “You must be the cavalry.”

  Reese took the hand she clearly meant for him to kiss and gave it a gentle shake back and forth. “I’m a detective with District Two, but since the third district guys are still on their way, I’m here to help secure the scene for them.”

  I motioned behind me. “Kate and I found the body in the casket when we pulled back the drapes. It’s Blanche Davidian, the waiter you were supposed to question about Cher Noble’s murder.”

  Reese sighed. “So this may be my case after all.” He stepped around me to get a closer look at the victim, snapping on a pair of latex gloves.

  “She couldn’t have been killed very long ago, because Kate and I talked to her earlier in the party and so did Hedda,” I said.

  Reese touched the gold cord around Blanche’s neck. “That fits with the general condition of the body. Rigor mortis hasn’t even set in.”

  I looked away quickly and noticed Hedda’s eyes were nowhere near the casket either.

  “So the casket was empty before the victim was put inside?” Reese asked.

  “It was a decorative focal point and was never supposed to have a body inside it.” Hedda grimaced. “That would have been gauche.”

  The Marie Antoinette look-alike in the champagne glass dress crossed in front of us.

  “Makes sense,” Reese said.

  The jazz singer in teal chiffon approached Hedda. “Should the band start playing again, or should we wait for the raffle?”

  Reese raised an eyebrow at me but didn’t say anything. I knew I would have a lot of explaining to do later.

  “Would you like me to make an announcement?” Reese asked Hedda.

  Hedda let out a long exhale. “Aren’t you a doll? That would be wonderful.” She stepped away to talk with the singer, and I pulled Reese over to the tile wall near Fern and away from anyone who could overhear.

  “Are you going to tell them there’s been a murder?” I whispered, not eager to see a room full of drag queens become more dramatic.

  “Yes, but I’m not going to give them any details. They only need to know to stay put until they can give a statement.”

  “Good. I don’t think telling them one of their friends was strangled with a tassel is a good idea.”

  “I would never tell them something not true,” he said, his voice low even though the only person near us was Fern, who was now snoring softly.

  I grabbed his sleeve. “What do you mean she wasn’t strangled?”

  “Oh, she was strangled all right. But not with that cord. It’s too thick and the mark around her neck is consistent with the mark around Cher’s.” He brushed a dark wave of hair off his forehead. “This victim was killed with a wire.”

  I instinctively raised a hand to my neck. “Garroted?”

  Reese’s face was grim. “The same MO and probably the same murder weapon means this was almost certainly done by the same killer.”

  I heard a gasp from below. Fern’s eyes were open. “A serial killer?”

  Chapter 16

  I paused on the stone steps leading up to The Line hotel and peered at the massive columns fronting the neoclassical building that had once been a church. I slipped on my sunglasses to shield my eyes from the sun now high in the sky and lifted my face to enjoy the warmth for a moment.

  “We owe one to Reese for letting us leave Perry’s before anyone else,” Kate said as she walked ahead of me toward the tall doors being held open by two uniformed doormen.

  “Aside from Richard and Hermes.”

  “It helped we had an appointment to make and he knows where he can find us.” I slid my sunglasses to the top of my head as we entered the hotel lobby. “And I think Richard convinced the cops Hermes was about to piddle on the floor.”

  To either side of me as we entered the building were staircases leading up, each with a rectangular gold-framed mirror at least twice my height sitting tilted on the floor of the landings. This was on purpose and was considered avant-garde. We continued across the parquet floor, Kate’s mules slapping against the wood, and I couldn’t help staring at the huge art installation hanging over the expansive high-ceilinged lobby. Made of gold church organ pipes crisscrossing each other and forming a grid, the chandelier looked like a 3D version of the game Pick-Up Sticks. Light streamed in from high windows on all sides of the arched ceiling, and the second-level balcony overlooking the lobby was every bit the choir loft.

  Kate stopped and rested her hand on the back of a half-moon blue velvet couch that appeared to seat at least a dozen. “I need coffee. How about you?”

  Since the lobby also housed one of the hotel’s restaurants, the faint scents of lunch lingered, reminding me it had been hours since I’d eaten. “Definitely. And a croissant if they have one.”

  “I’ll grab it if you want to wait here so we don’t miss the client.” Kate headed off to the hotel’s coffee bar, The Cup We All Race 4, while I crossed to one of the long black tables to the side of the couches. I pulled out a black leather high-backed chair and turned it so I could see the entrance. I did not want to miss our client or Kate’s return with caffeine.

  As I waited, I thought back to the scene at Perry’s. When we’d left, Reese had been assisting the District Three detectives taking statements since there were so many people who’d been in the room when the murder had taken place. I tried to rub away my goosebumps as I remembered talking to Blanche only minutes before she was strangled. It still seemed surreal someone had killed her in a room full of witnesses.

  I flashed back to the restaurant and the gold fabric in front of the casket. The hanging velvet had definitely been pulled back when we arrived. Someone, I presumed the killer, must have untied it so they would have cover while they did the deed. The music had been loud enough to drown out any sounds of struggle, and the heavy fabric extended across the entire tiled wall, which meant anyone behind it would not have been seen. I’d told all this to Reese, but I hadn’t been able to tell him who had lowered the fabric or slipped behind it. I only hoped one of the other guests had seen something.

  My phone buzzed, and I pulled it out of my purse. I shook my head as I read the text message.

  “Uh oh,” Kate said, walking up to me. “That doesn’t look good.”

  I dropped the phone back into my purse and looked up at her. “Debbie wants us to find an ensemble that can perform the type of music carousels play as they spin around.”

  “That should drive us all insane within the first hour.” She held out a pale-pink ridged paper cup with the words “The Cup We All Race 4” printed on its side and a white wax-paper bag. “Mocha with oat milk and a cinnamon-raisin pastry.”

  “Oat milk?” I asked.

  “It’s hip,” she told me. “The croissants were whole wheat, so I went another direction.”

  I took a bite of the sugary swirled pastry and a few flakes fell onto my lap. “Good call.”

  Kate took a long drink of her coffee. “I still can’t get the image of Blanche Davidian out of my head. And Cher Noble.”

  “I know how you feel.” I kept my voice low as a man sat down a few chairs away and opened a laptop. “I can’t imagine going the way they did.”

  Kate made a face. “Not even a feather boa and gold tassel could dress it up.”

  I agreed with Kate, and from what I’d overheard Reese say to the District Three detectives, I knew he thought the killer’s use of the props was meant to make the crimes seem more spontaneous than they were. I wondered if anyone would actually put a hit out on drag queens and why?

  I pushed the thought out of my mind. “As awful as it is, we still have weddings to plan.” I took another bite of the pastry, the sugar doing its bit to perk me up.

  Kate held up her phone. “Speaking of, I got a text fr
om Laurel. She and Mark are running a few minutes behind and will meet us upstairs.”

  “Let’s go.” I stood up, taking a sip of the mocha. It was sweet enough so I couldn’t tell I was drinking oats. “I’d like to scout out the rooftop without them anyway.”

  “Promise me you won’t start speaking with a British accent when they get here,” Kate said as we headed for the back of the hotel and the elevators.

  I tried to give her my best scandalized expression as we walked around the reception desk. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  Kate sighed. “You know how you are with accents. If someone speaks in one around you for too long, you start to mimic it.”

  I knew she was right. Our newest groom, Mark, was from London, and after I’d spoken to him on the phone for five minutes, I’d sounded like Eliza Doolittle before her transformation. For this reason, I’d made Kate take the lead on the wedding. Plus, I was prepping her to take weddings on her own so Wedding Belles could expand. I didn’t relish the thought of finding someone else to assist me if Kate had her own weddings, but I knew it was time to give her more responsibility.

  We stepped into an open elevator and I pressed the button for the roof. “I’ll promise if you promise not to look at him like he’s a piece of cake.”

  “Can I help it if he’s the best-looking groom we’ve had in years?” she said, taking a sip of her coffee as we surged up.

  “No, but you can keep from drooling. I’m afraid the bride might notice and decide having a wedding planner hot for her groom isn’t the best idea.”

  “You know I would never pursue a groom,” Kate said. “It’s nice to have one with a full head of hair who’s taller than me, though.”

  “Stefan and Jesse both had hair and were taller than you,” I said, reminding her of our recent grooms.

  She gave me a side-eye glance. “They don’t count. And the groom the week before made me powder the top of his bald head during pictures so it wouldn’t create a reflection in the sunlight.”

  “Why didn’t you have Fern do that?” I asked.

  “Because Fern has watched too many Kardashian makeup tutorials.” She shook her head. “He kept trying to use different shades of powder to contour the guy’s head and it was starting to look deformed.”

  That sounded like Fern.

  “It’s fine to appreciate our groom,” I said as the elevator came to a stop. “Can you do it a little less obviously?”

  “I’ll try.” Kate followed me out of the elevator and almost bumped into me when I stopped abruptly.

  “Did you know there would be an event up here?” I asked as a man in black rolled a rack of linens in front of me.

  We walked to the open rooftop overlooking the city. The space was bordered by two brick walls covered with crawling vines and fronted with a row of low black planters filled with boxwood. In the distance I could see the Washington Monument, but in front, near the glass railing at the edge of the roof, was a long table draped in white linen with people scurrying around it.

  “I don’t think it’s an event.” Kate nudged me and pointed to a photographer setting up a tripod in the corner. “I think it’s a styled shoot.”

  I gave a mental groan. The phenomenon of event planners designing tabletops complete with linens, flowers, china, glassware, menu cards, and even food for the sole purpose of taking pictures of it to splash all over social media was one I’d grown to loathe. I was probably so hostile because Kate and I didn’t have the time to create fake events to fill our feeds. We were too busy planning actual weddings (or solving actual crimes).

  “Who even does these anymore?” I asked. “You really have to have too much time on your hands.”

  I watched a woman set a long trough of white flowers in the middle of the table. From her apron, I guessed she was a florist but one I didn’t recognize. Then again, floral designers like Buster and Mack, who had plenty of real events, wouldn’t be caught dead doing a freebie styled shoot. I recognized a couple of guys from my usual lighting crew on the top of a pair of ladders suspending string lights over the table and a stocky man in a blue suit leaning against one of the brick walls and observing with his arms crossed. Did they hire security for a styled shoot?

  “That’s Renee,” Kate said, waving to a blonde who didn’t look much older than her. “I know her from my wedding assistants support group.”

  I turned to face her. “You have a support group?”

  “I didn’t mean support group,” she said when she saw my face. “It’s the drinking group I told you about. It’s mostly wedding assistants but also florist assistants and catering assistants. Since we’re all twenty-somethings and single, we started hanging out every week or so.”

  “So whose assistant is Renee?”

  Kate tapped her finger to her chin. “I forget. Renee is new to the group. One of Brianna’s assistants brought her. Boy, do those girls complain a lot about their boss.”

  Renee rushed over to us, and I noticed the tips of her hair were dyed pink. She gave Kate an enthusiastic air kiss accompanied by a giggle. “What are you doing here?”

  “I was about to ask you the same thing,” Kate said, waving at the setup behind her.

  Renee giggled again. “It’s a styled shoot. We’re trying to get in DC Magazine.” She made a pouty face. “You weren’t at Sunday’s happy hour.”

  “We had a rough weekend, so I stayed in.” Kate put a hand on my arm. “Renee, this is my boss, Annabelle Archer.”

  Renee’s eyes popped open wide. “I’ve heard of you.”

  “Good things, I hope,” I said with a laugh, although from the look on Renee’s face I wasn’t so sure.

  “Your White House wedding in Insider Weddings magazine was gorgeous,” she said, glancing back to Kate and lowering her voice. “But I heard about your wedding on Saturday.”

  Kate’s eyes flicked to me before she answered. “It was pretty upsetting, but we’re cooperating with the police to find who did it.”

  Renee shook her head slowly. “I can’t imagine what I would do if our officiant was murdered right before the ceremony.”

  “It was a first for us,” Kate said, her fake laugh falling flat.

  “And I heard it was Cher Noble,” Renee said. “We almost used her once, but it didn’t work out.”

  “Really?” Now my interest was piqued. “Why not?”

  Renee tilted her head while she thought. “I don’t remember exactly, but it was a month or so ago. We had to cancel her at the last minute, and I remember she was pretty mad. She called my boss and screamed at her so loudly I could hear it across the room.”

  I’d never seen Cher Noble angry, but I wouldn’t have wanted to cross anyone over six feet tall and three hundred pounds.

  “But it was really her fault for not having a cancellation clause in her contract,“ Renee continued. “We technically didn’t owe her a penny. It was not our problem, and that’s what my boss told her.”

  “Who’s your boss?” I asked.

  “Tina Pink,” the bubbly blonde said. “Do you know her?”

  Kate and I exchanged a look, and I could tell neither of us was the least bit surprised.

  Chapter 17

  “Renee!” The shrill voice was accompanied with a sharp clap of hands. “This is the not the time to socialize.”

  Tina Pink strode across the open terrace, a pair of sunglasses with the gold Gucci monogram on each side holding her straight blond hair off her face. I noticed she looked too tan for DC in the spring, but the lines around her eyes told me it wasn’t courtesy of fake-and-bake or bronzer. I’d bet money she was a tanning bed aficionado.

  When she saw me and Kate standing with Renee, she forced a smile. “Oh, it’s you two.”

  “Hi, Tina,” Kate returned her fake smile. “Love your white-on-white styled shoot. Cutting-edge.”

  Tina’s expression told me she didn’t know if Kate was being sincere or not. “Thanks. Why are you up here?”

  “W
e’re showing the space to a client,” I answered. “We called ahead to see if the terrace was available a week ago.”

  Tina twitched one shoulder. “This was last minute. I didn’t call the rental order in until last night.”

  Since their delivery schedules were set the day before, I knew the rental company must have loved that.

  “We’ll stay out of your way,” I said. “Our clients only need a peek at the view and the size of the rooftop.”

  Renee looked over her shoulder at the table. “Shouldn’t the individual cakes be here by now, Tina?”

  Tina tapped the sheaf of papers in her hands. “Why don’t you read your schedule and tell me, Renee?” She rolled her eyes and gave us a backward look. “I need to get back to work.”

  Renee followed her as Tina stormed over to the table, saw there were no cakes, and began screaming into her phone at an unnamed baker. I watched as Renee ran toward the elevators and disappeared. If she was smart, she was catching a ride home so she could work on her resignation letter.

  “Have I mentioned lately what a great boss you are?” Kate said, her voice low even though Tina couldn’t have heard us over her own shrieking.

  “She definitely has a temper,” I said, observing Tina pacing in front of the long table and waving her arms as she talked.

  Kate eyed me. “What are you thinking?”

  I gave myself a shake. “Tina is another person who knew Cher, and she happened to have an issue with her.”

  “But from what Renee said, it sounded like Cher was the wounded party. Not Tina.”

  I watched Tina’s florist cringing under a verbal onslaught regarding the wilted flower Tina shook in the trembling woman’s face. “I doubt Tina is ever the wounded party.”

  Kate focused on something over my shoulder, and her expression changed into one I’d recognize anywhere. There was an attractive man approaching.

  “Hi Mark, Laurel,” I said as I turned to greet our newest bride and groom.

  Laurel was my height with light-brown hair she wore in a pixie cut, and Mark had wavy, dark hair and starkly contrasting blue eyes. I thought our bride was adorable and our groom swoon worthy. I pinched Kate’s leg to remind her to behave.