“Thanks,” I said to Serena.
“For what?”
I smiled. “For asking Walter to make sure Nick wouldn’t show.”
Josephine met my eyes and winked. We both knew where the idea had come from and it certainly wasn’t from Walter.
Serena jerked her thumb over her shoulder. “You can thank me by getting your tuchus moving toward the door. I want you to look amazing when you meet this guy.”
“Okay, okay,” I said, pulling on my coat. “But I don’t know how ‘amazing’ one can look dressed as an oversized M&M, which is probably all the costume shop will have left.”
“Honey,” she said as she grabbed my purse, “I would never let you go as an oversized anything, you know that. Besides, you and Nick broke up three whole months ago. It’s time for you to get back on the horse.”
Josephine was typing at her desk. She looked up when she heard Serena’s plan, and I gave her the Help me look. She replied with a toothy grin.
“Thanks a lot,” I mouthed in her direction. She crossed her eyes at me as her phone rang.
“Good luck, loves,” Josephine said as we waved and closed the door. Locking it behind us as we always did when one of us was left to work alone, we heard Josephine answer the phone in Dutch.
“Vertaaldiensten door Josephine Haroldson. Kan ik u helpen?”
“I know where we can find a super cute genie outfit,” Serena was telling me as we walked out to her car. “Although maybe that would be too close to Josephine’s belly-dancer ensemble…”
“I’m thinking you’re right,” I said, as movement near the edge of our parking lot caught our attention. We watched as a guy with a cell phone to his ear was using our parking lot as a cut-through from Tenth Street to Congress Avenue. He wore jeans, a long-sleeved T-shirt that hugged some impressive arm muscles, sunglasses, and a baseball cap. Seemingly in no hurry, he strolled past the wrought-iron door to our fire escape, turned onto the sidewalk, and headed north toward the capitol.
“What about him? He could be single,” Serena said, obviously choosing to not recall that I wasn’t yet ready to date again. “He looks a few years younger, but there’s nothing wrong with a young one—for a couple of fun weeks at least.”
I made a face. “He had a tattoo on his back, I could see it peeking out of his shirt. You know how I am about guys with tats. If he has one or two in some discreet place, fine. When they start taking over large chunks of his body, it’s a total turnoff.”
“Yeah, but if his bod is as hot as that guy’s…”
We turned right, heading toward SoCo, but I glanced over just in time to see the guy had stopped to type a message on his phone. His bod was definitely hot, and his profile wasn’t too bad, either.
My mind veered to cute guys in general. Would I go on a date if I came across a guy I liked—one without a multitude of tattoos, of course—and he asked me out?
The thought actually wasn’t as unappealing as it had been a couple of weeks ago. Huh. Was I ready to start dating again?
Then Nick popped into my mind. How he used to look at me, how he’d touch my face, cupping it gently in his hand before he kissed me, and my heart did an involuntary nosedive into my stomach.
Damn. I still missed him, or at least the idea of him, despite how badly he’d dumped me. Note to self: For the sake of the next poor guy, you might want to wait a bit longer for the dating stuff.
“Why not go as an Olympic beach-volleyball player?” Serena asked, bringing me out of my reverie.
“Are you serious?” I said with a laugh. “First of all, I’m way too short to pull off that look. I’d need another ten inches or so of leg at least. Secondly, considering another cold front is supposed to come in sometime Saturday night and your parties are always indoor-outdoor, I’d like something with a little more coverage, please.”
“Spoilsport.”
“Halloween-costume-dictator-slash-pimp.”
Serena thought about it. “Yep. I’m okay with that label.”
“Excellent. I’ll have it put on a T-shirt for you.”
“And I’ll wear it, loud and proud.”
“Speaking of wearing things,” I said, “who or what are you going as on Saturday night?”
“It’s a surprise.”
“You say that every year,” I said. “I don’t like surprises.”
“Don’t even give me that. You love being surprised.”
Yeah, I kinda did. But it didn’t stop me from ribbing her, saying, “Tell me. Come on. You know you want to,” at regular intervals until we pulled up at the costume shop—just to see if, for once, I could break her.
* * *
When it came to keeping her Halloween-party costume secret, there was no breaking Serena Vogel. Yet when it came to sticking to my guns that I wanted a getup that didn’t leave me exposed to the impending elements, I could be broken faster than a duck on a June bug. Especially when the getup in question came in the form of a super-cute, mod-style 1960s tennis dress.
It hadn’t been so easy to find, though, with Serena and me going to two costume shops and another couple of vintage clothing stores around town before finally finding the sleeveless white tennis dress with green piping at a little consignment shop on the Drag, the storied section of Guadalupe Street bordering the west side of the UT campus. Realizing we’d nearly lost track of the clock, though, we tore back to the office. I had enough time to wolf down a sandwich from the sub shop next door and borrow a bottle of pinot noir from the small stash of wines we kept at the office before taking my own car over to the north side of campus and the Hamilton American History Center.
The sun was setting and a brisk wind was starting to blow as I pulled into one of the parking spots that fronted the long, three-story, modernist-style building. Leafy post oak trees reflected off the abundance of plate-glass windows on the first level, doing a good job of softening the building’s heavy-looking concrete exterior. A mixture of museum and educational facility, the Hamilton Center housed exhibits and events on one side of the building and research areas for both the staff and public on the other.
Buttoning up my white coat, I couldn’t keep the goofy grin off my face when I thought of Winnie planning a collection of Jeb Inscore’s photographs and how it would be a major coup for me in helping to facilitate it. The Hamilton Center, which collaborated frequently with other museums and universities around the world, was a big deal in the world of historical preservation. Despite the fact I’d worked here five years ago, I’d never come as close as I did now to having anything up to Winnie’s standards for an exhibition.
Wine in hand, I walked up the short walkway to the glass double doors, where I could see a tubby security guard ambling off to an unknown destination within the building. I rapped on the glass, startling him. He turned back, his mouth open and his dark brown eyes wide. Seeing me, he waddled back and spoke through the doors.
“Can I help you?” he asked loudly.
He looked to be in his fifties and, remembering Winnie telling me his hearing wasn’t so great, I matched his volume. “Yes, sir,” I said, “You must be Homer. I’m here to see Dr. Winnie Dell. My name is Lucy Lancaster.”
“Oh, yes,” he said, his dark features softening. He pulled a bunch of keys from the retractable chain on his belt, selected one, and unlocked the door. “I was just heading to the back door to let the cleaning crew in to handle the mess from this afternoon’s event. Forgot there’d be a second visitor for Dr. Dell. Come right in, Miss Lancaster.”
He gestured to the elevators at the back of the main hall. “Dr. Dell’s having a meeting with the gentleman who came a few minutes ago, but she left word for you to go on up when you got here. Third floor—take a right, all the way to the back.”
I smiled, knowing the way. Passing the long, high counter concealing his guard post, I stopped when I smelled a heavenly scent. A potted gardenia plant was sitting on the counter with a bright-blue sticky note bearing my name attached to the pot. Before I
could ask, Homer saw my confused expression and said, “This plant was given to Dr. Dell, but she said she wanted you to have it. Brought it down here just a little while ago. Said it was important you don’t forget it when you leave.”
It being the same size as the one Gus gave me last week, I opened my mouth to say I already had received a gardenia of my own, then realized it would be unnecessary to explain that to Homer, and it might sound ungrateful to boot.
“I won’t forget. Thank you so much,” I replied with a smile instead. He nodded and concentrated on locking the door again. I made my way to the elevator, passing a group of glass cases with photos of turn-of-the-century Brownsville, Texas, and pushed the button for the elevator. I used the time to check my Facebook account as, the car slowly clambered upward and spit me out with a muffled, exhausted-sounding ding. Turning right, I read some of my friends’ latest posts and walked slowly down the hall’s familiar orange and brown industrial carpet, past posters of upcoming exhibits taped to closed doors, and toward the shaft of bright light coming from the office at the end of the hallway.
I’d just hit like on a post from my sister Maeve of her and Kyle’s new D.C. townhouse and was typing a comment telling her how beautiful it looked, when I heard a sound from Winnie’s office. It wasn’t sounds of conversation, though, so that meant her other visitor must have left.
Good, I thought, because I’m ready for a glass of wine. I posted my comment, slipped my phone back into my handbag, and strode into Winnie’s open door with the bottle of pinot noir held high, singing out, “Knock, knock. Ready for some—”
I stopped cold, my words catching in my throat. The wine bottle slipped from my hand and dropped to the carpet with a muffled clunk. Surprisingly, it didn’t break; rather, it rolled until it hit the knee of a man kneeling on the ground next to an inert form.
“Lucy.” His voice was a ragged whisper. In one hand, he held a cut-crystal award resembling a large, pear-shaped diamond. The other hand was hovering over the head of Winnie Dell, which was covered in blood.
I felt disembodied. One word came from my mouth.
“Gus?”
NINE
“Put that down, Gus,” I said, indicating the large faceted crystal he still held. “Please.”
Gus stared at me for a second, his face strained and pale. Then indignation flooded it with its usual color.
“Land sakes alive, Lancaster. I only came in a minute ago. She was like this when I found her. The office, too. The first thing I did was call 911.”
“Thank goodness,” I said, taking a split second to glance around Winnie’s long, rectangular office. To put it bluntly, it was in shambles, but I’d think about that later.
Winnie was sprawled on her right side, facing the legs of an oval conference table that was only inches away. Two wineglasses were on the table, waiting for the pinot noir I’d brought. A bud vase holding a sprig of gardenia flowers was next to the glasses. I stood rooted to the spot where I’d stopped, waiting for Winnie to move, pushing back the bad feeling that was trying to do a cannonball into my gut.
Gus grunted with arthritic pain from his kneeling position, and struggled to his feet holding the crystal award and my bottle of wine. He put them both down on the conference table, the award having clearly come from a grouping of them on the nearby bookshelf, which was situated between two large casement windows.
“Blast it all,” he said, wiping his hands with a handkerchief from the inside breast pocket of his charcoal-gray suit. “That damn crystal was right in the doorway, I tripped over it when I walked in.” He looked down at Winnie and sadness came into his voice. “I didn’t even see poor Dr. Dell here until I’d picked it up.”
With the finality in his voice, my handbag crashed to the floor. Rushing forward, I dropped to my knees beside her, and grasped her arm. It was lifeless.
“Don’t touch her, Lancaster,” Gus said sharply. “This is a crime scene.”
“I know, I know,” I said, drawing my hand back in frustration.
Winnie’s eyes were open, her pupils fixed. Dark-red blood had seeped from her left temple, onto her forehead, and into her short dark bob, staining any wiry gray hairs in its way. Her jacket was knit and watermelon pink; she wore it over a matching silk shell with light-gray trousers. On her feet were low wedges in a cute snakeskin print.
The smell of blood finally reached my nose. It was a weird, metallic smell that was sort of sweet, sort of heady, and it jolted a realization into my swirling brain. Winnie didn’t just die, she’d been killed. Murdered.
A major case of the heebie-jeebies rushed over me followed by swoop of nausea and I had to swallow hard, twice.
Then panic set in and I had the strongest urge to flee. I wanted to get up and bolt from the room, screaming my lungs out. I wanted to pop a decongestant-laced antihistamine, go to the nearest bar, and order a triple of some hundred-proof whatever so I could have another memory blackout and forget this ever happened. I wanted to hug my friends and feel comforted and safe. I wanted …
I realized what I really wanted was to turn back time and save Winnie so that she could be alive again, happy and unharmed. That painful thought cut through the worst of the panic and I stayed still, next to my friend.
Tears were pricking at my eyes and blurring my vision, but they sharpened when I noticed something in Winnie’s right hand, which was at an odd angle underneath her. “Gus, she’s holding some sort of document.”
“Can’t say I find that strange since we’re in her office and there’s papers everywhere,” he said.
True, but there was something odd about it. It was only a scrap of a document, for one thing. Yellowed, old looking. I could just see a few words written in a careful script that seemed familiar.
I was about to lean over Winnie to try and read it when Homer the security guard appeared in the doorway. The man may have been pudgy and hard of hearing, but he was quick to react at the sight of Gus and me, healthy and unbloodied, and Dr. Winnie Dell, not.
“Move away from her!” he roared. Pulling what looked like a thick metal pen from his pocket, he swung his arm, causing it to expand into a mean-looking tactical baton. “And put your hands up!”
Gus and I both swore, but did as we were told, moving obediently when he ordered us to stand in the middle of the office.
Homer moved to inspect Winnie and, seeing she was dead, he turned on us, brandishing the baton.
“What did you two do? What happened to Dr. Dell?”
There not being a good answer to either question, I was grateful to see two uniformed officers and a third man wearing khakis and a shirt and tie walk in the door. A fourth man, also in plain clothes, hung back in the doorway.
“That’s what we’re going to find out,” the man in khakis said. When Homer wheeled around, ready to be a badass with his baton, the man introduced himself.
“Detective Maurice Dupart, Austin PD,” he said. “The cleaning lady let us in. One of my men is interviewing her now.”
Homer was breathing heavily, but visibly calmed at the sight of the police. When the detective motioned Homer aside, my eyes went with them, though my peripheral vision noticed the fourth man, in dark pants and a white button-down, looking around the room.
Homer was telling Dupart he’d been on his regularly scheduled rounds and intended on asking Dr. Dell how long she planned to stay this evening when he discovered—and he pointed to Gus and me as he said, “Them two, standing over Dr. Dell.” Dupart thanked him, then explained he needed a consent-to-search from the university before starting an investigation. He passed Homer a business card and asked the security guard to assist one of Dupart’s men in getting in touch with the right UT officials. Dupart motioned a uniformed cop forward and introduced the men, once more blocking my view of the man in the doorway.
Homer said, “Yes, sir. I’ll do it right away,” and disappeared with the other cop, but not without giving Winnie’s body one last mournful look and Gus and me the stink eye.
Detective Dupart turned our way. I judged he was in his mid-forties, with dark skin, a slightly receding hairline, groomed circle beard, and nearly black eyes that had been sweeping the room from the moment I saw him, even when talking to Homer. He was about six feet with a slim build, yet with the beginnings of a slight waistline paunch. Seeing the bags under his eyes and the wedding band on his left hand, I guessed he might have young children running around at home, keeping him from enough gym time, and interrupting his sleep. Hearing the surname Dupart, though, I didn’t have to guess: I would bet serious money that his ancestry was Louisiana Creole.
His dark eyes took in Winnie, her position on the floor, and then the bloodied crystal award on the conference table and my bottle of wine before fixing on Gus. “Mr. Halloran, if you would step in the hall with me for a moment, I would appreciate it.” He addressed me. “Ms.…?”
“Lancaster,” I croaked. “Lucy Lancaster.”
“Thank you, Ms. Lancaster. If you’ll please wait where you are, we’ll be with you momentarily.”
“Of course,” I said. Realizing I was going to be interrogated by the police for the first time in my life, I had to clasp my hands together to keep them from shaking.
Gus said quietly, “Don’t worry, Lancaster. It’s all routine,” as he walked out. Another one of the detective’s men, a stocky Latino guy with full lips and acne scars on his cheeks, stepped inside the room. With barely a glance at Winnie’s body, the officer stood between me and my friend, mutely looking into the middle distance, though I was sure he was eyeing me suspiciously in his peripheral vision.
Reining in my nerves, I looked around the room at the destruction. Along the near wall were five tables of varying lengths I knew represented the different sizes of Hamilton Center display cases. Useful, Winnie had always said, for laying out projects in progress. From the pattern of debris swept onto the floor, there had been a project on each table.
Murder Once Removed Page 8
