The Good Girl's Guide to Murder: A Debutante Dropout Mystery

by McBride, Susan

  “Glad that’s settled. Now we can discuss less difficult topics, like peace in the Middle East and lack of funding for the arts.”

  “Ha ha.”

  Sandy grinned and tugged her cardigan tighter as the vents began to hum, blasting us with frigid air.

  I reveled in the gooseflesh on my arms, deciding it was a far, far better thing to be cold than damp with sweat. With a contented grunt, I settled back in the cushioned wicker chair—a true Haywood Wakefield, part of the set clustered around me—and I gazed out at the gardens.

  The riot of colors cheered me, as they always did. They’d been concocted by a hoity-toity landscape architect ages ago and were still Mother’s pride and joy. The yard-workers must’ve been around recently as the hedges were neatly trimmed, the grass mowed and edges clipped, so that everything appeared crisp and symmetrical. I wondered how the crew avoided sunstroke, laboring beneath the unforgiving Texas sun.

  Which led me to consider the musclemen I’d seen dragging furniture from the huge orange truck into the house I’d passed on my way to Mother’s.

  Who’d be crazy enough to move in the middle of summer?

  “Did one of Mother’s neighbors die?” I said.

  “What on earth?” Sandy blinked. “Where did that come from, Andy?”

  “The eighteen-wheeler up the street.”

  Recognition dawned on her age-softened features. “Oh, yes, that.”

  The cool way with which she’d dispatched that nonanswer made my antennae go up.

  “So what’s the story?” I cocked an ear and waited.

  “There’s no story, just new neighbors.” Sandy shrugged, brushing me off, which only proved that I was right.

  Something was up.

  I leaned forward, propping elbows on knees. “If it’s nothing, then why was there a camera crew from Fox News hanging around on the lawn? Is a rock star moving in? It’s not a Kennedy, is it?”

  “A Kennedy?” She chuckled. “Land sakes, Andy, but you’ve got the most vivid imagination.”

  Like I hadn’t heard that a couple hundred times before, dating way back to my earliest school days when I’d drawn a Picasso-esque image of my third grade teacher on the blackboard during recess. (No, she wasn’t flattered.) “So what’s the big secret? And you still haven’t told me who died.”

  “There’s no secret.” She fiddled with the bottom button on her cardigan, pushing it into the buttonhole then out again. “As for the other, Cissy must have mentioned to you that Ethel Etherington passed several months back?”

  That was news to me.

  “I don’t think she did,” I said, though admittedly there were times when I only listened to my mother with half an ear, if that.

  “Well, she’s gone, bless her heart.”

  “I’m sorry to hear it,” I told her honestly, but I wasn’t surprised. “So, old lady Etherington finally went boots up, huh? I thought she’d live forever. What was she? A hundred-fifty?”

  “Andy.” That earned me a stern look.

  “At least a hundred?”

  “Ninety-eight.”

  “Is that all?”

  She wagged a finger at me.

  Really, to call Ethel Etherington “old” was like saying Methuselah was “getting up there.” Even when I was a kid, Mrs. Etherington had seemed ancient. I don’t remember much else about her, except that Mother had her over for tea occasionally, usually with other church ladies who’d dressed in gloves and hats and pearls, like someone’s maiden aunts. If there had been a Mr. Etherington, I’d never met him. Maybe she’d been widowed early on, which would account for the “missus” in front of her name. I’d never heard her called anything else. I do know there’d been no children.

  “So when did the house go on the market?”

  “Well, it took a while for it to get through probate. I think it was finally put up for sale about three weeks ago. It sold quick as a jackrabbit. Low mortgage rates, hot market and all that.”

  “Who bought that old castle?” I asked, because that’s what it looked like, complete with turrets and a massive carved front door that seemed big enough to allow a contingent of horsemen through. As a kid, I used to imagine it was Camelot and that King Arthur lived behind its limestone façade.

  “It’s a nice couple from Tyler who’d been subletting an apartment until now.”

  “Couple, as in a man and a woman?” I asked, because you never knew these days and maybe that accounted for Sandy’s reluctance to broach the subject.

  “For heaven’s sake . . . yes, a man and a woman. Married and everything. There’s also a young woman living with them, a daughter who’s about your age.”

  “Have you met them?”

  “Not yet, no.”

  “But mother has?” I couldn’t imagine Cissy not poking her nose into someone else’s business, especially when they were fresh meat. Besides, someone had to be feeding Sandy her information.

  “She has indeed.”

  Ah, just as I’d thought.

  So Cissy had met the new neighbors. Still, if there’d been anything truly scandalous about them, surely she would’ve filled me in.

  Or not.

  Cissy could be closemouthed when she wanted to be. When it mattered. Though she could toss off a catty remark as well as anyone, with a blink of a false-lashed eye, she could become a human Fort Knox, protecting reputations as weighty as bars of gold.

  Sandy was another story. I could always get her to open up if I badgered enough.

  “So what did Mother have to say about them?”

  “Well, really, she didn’t stay there long, just took over some of her roses, because, of course, they’re still settling in, as you saw. They’d had their things in storage, but the second truck was delayed. It finally showed up this morning.”

  Nothing yet explained the camera crew. And in Big D, the media didn’t turn out unless there were bona fide celebrities involved. Or two-headed cattle.

  “What’s so special about them? Are they on the lam?” I asked. “Do they have leprosy? Dear God, they’re not Yankees?”

  “No, they’re not lepers or Yankees, my word.” She fidgeted, plucked at the pillow beside her. “Cissy says they’re lovely people. Which is why your mother doesn’t want us making a fuss.” She sighed. “The Park Cities paper sent over a reporter yesterday, knocking on doors and asking how folks feel about having a family of color move into Highland Park. It’s ridiculous, really.”

  Family of color?

  The phrase sounded so odd, so antiquated, that I nearly laughed aloud.

  I asked with mock gravity, “So what color are they? Magenta? Just tell me they’re not vermilion. Or ochre, God forbid. Those ochre folks look so jaundiced.”

  “Don’t be a smart aleck.” She narrowed her brow. “They happen to be African American.”

  Ah-ha.

  I flashed back to the woman standing in the enormous doorway, gesturing at the moving men, and I realized that I’d likely glimpsed the homeowner.

  “So the media’s interested in these people, not because they’re celebrities, but because they’re not white?”

  Sandy clucked. “Crazy, isn’t it? They’re regular folk, Andy, just like anybody else. Their only distinction is bein’ the first black family to own a home in Highland Park since the 1920s when the neighborhood was legally segregated, or so that reporter told me. An overeager pup named Kevin Snodgrass. Probably thinks he’s gonna get the Pulitzer.”

  Legally segregated?

  Wow.

  I didn’t know much about the neighborhood’s history, especially going back that far. But I had noticed the people I saw tended to be pretty monochromatic, so I wasn’t surprised at the revelation. But it bothered me nonetheless.

  “Yeah, crazy,” I said.

  It was the twenty-first century, and I wanted to feel like things had come a long way, baby. And they had, I guess, in many respects.

  Maybe not so much in others.

  “So did Cissy talk
to that reporter . . . Mr. Snake in the Grass?”

  “Snodgrass.”

  “Yes, him. Did she give him a piece of her mind?”

  Sandy shot me a Mona Lisa smile. “What do you think?”

  Oh, the possibilities were endless. “Did she kick his booty out and slam the door in his face?”

  Sandy laughed. “More like she told him it was about time they had some fresh blood on Beverly and new neighbors were welcome on her street so long as they paid their taxes, kept up their yard, and didn’t kill anyone.”

  I pushed my hair off my neck. “She didn’t say that, did she?”

  “Her very words.”

  “Oh, my gawd,” I groaned, thinking the “didn’t kill anyone” bit would probably end up in a headline. But I was proud of her, in a warped kind of way.

  “Cissy said she likes Dr. Taylor very much . . . Beth’s her name . . . her husband Richard is an investment banker . . . so much so that she’s asked her over to the Dallas Diet Club meeting on Saturday afternoon.”

  “You’re kidding?” I said, because that was a headline-maker in itself.

  The Dallas Diet Club wasn’t anything like it sounded. It had nothing to do with calorie counting, exercise, or weight loss. Several times each month, a small group of my mother’s friends gathered at the house of one, where cards were played, gossip shared, and decadent desserts devoured; goodies prepared by the finest pastry chefs in Dallas, usually called “Death by Chocolate” or something equally lethal-sounding. Cissy and her pals rarely let a new member in, so this Dr. Beth Taylor didn’t know how privileged she was. There was practically a waiting list of women who wanted to join. Had Ethel Etherington’s demise opened up a spot? Because it pretty much took a member’s death for that to happen.

  “So Mother’s hosting?”

  “Yes.” Sandy didn’t exactly look thrilled. “Which wouldn’t be any more bother than usual, except I’m told that Marilee Mabry wants to bring her cameras and film the Diet Club meeting for a segment on her show. She’d like to feature some of the recipes, and your mother thinks it’s a grand idea.”

  “You’re joking?”

  “I wish I were.”

  Marilee was bringing a crew to tape at Mother’s?

  I sat with my mouth open, already envisioning the chaos sure to ensue.

  Marilee bossing around women who took orders from no one. People tromping on Cissy’s priceless silk rugs, sitting on her antique furniture, setting up lights, and rearranging rooms in order to get the best shot.

  It was a disaster waiting to happen.

  Oh, to be a fly on the wall . . . .

  “Would you like sit on the sidelines with me, sweet pea?” Sandy asked, and a slow smile tugged at her lips. “I might need help with crowd control.”

  “You know, Sandy, I just may do that,” I replied, returning her grin.

  Might just take some of the sting out of having to attend the party this evening. Speaking of which—I checked my watch—I had to get rolling.

  So I thanked Sandy for the lemonade and the reassurances, picked up the bags from Escada and headed home before my Jeep turned into a pumpkin-shaped BMW.

  Chapter 5

  A better part of the day had vanished by the time I parked in front of my condo and walked through the front door.

  So much for a quick trip to Beverly.

  My goal to return empty-handed hadn’t exactly panned out either, I mused, as I hung up the cocktail dress in its zipper bag on my closet door. I plopped down on the edge of my bed with the shopping bag and spent the next few minutes plucking out scads of tissue paper before unearthing the slingbacks and trying them on. I stared down at my feet, dangling over the edge, and a drawn-out sigh escaped me.

  At least I wouldn’t have to repaint my toenails. No one would see the chipped green while I was wearing these babies. I didn’t even want to think of how much they’d cost. Nope, I wasn’t going to dwell on how many bags of Iams I could donate to Operation Kindness with what Mother had spent to dress me up as the proper little heiress, suitable for public consumption.

  It would be a completely guilt-free evening.

  I’d spent the drive back to my condo convincing myself that, as long as I was going to have to suffer through this damned party, I might as well look good. Or as good as I got without being dragged to the salon with Mother, which was definitely not on my agenda this afternoon or any afternoon in the foreseeable future.

  If I needed a trim, I either paid $9.99 at Fantastic Sam’s or got out the kitchen scissors, which might be why my shoulder-length ’do often ended up in a ponytail.

  It drove Cissy nuts.

  May be part of the reason I did it.

  I saw the red light blinking on the Caller ID, indicating voice mail messages, but I wasn’t going to deal with anything more until I’d had a shower. I kicked off my party shoes and peeled my shirt off for starters, dropping my sweaty clothes in a pile on the floor.

  The water felt great after the sticky hundred-degree air I’d been swimming through, and I stayed beneath the showerhead until my skin pruned, letting the lukewarm spray of water wash over me. I emptied my mind of all the thoughts that had accumulated along with the grime, and, by the time I stepped onto the bath mat and wrapped myself in a towel, I felt better about myself and the world in general. Enough to smile and hum a favorite Def Leppard tune as I pulled a comb through my hair and wiggled a Q-tip in my ears.

  Amazing how something as simple as a shower can make you feel like a new woman, but it had and I did. So much so that I actually started to think that tonight might not be so dreadful, after all.

  I dared to check my voice mail while I let my hair air-dry a little, finding a “call me” message from Brian Mal-one followed by four panicked rants from Marilee, wondering when I’d be arriving, asking if I’d remembered to do this, that, or the other. I pressed the “3” key to delete the lot of it, and then I dialed Brian’s number.

  “Hey, Kendricks,” he said, picking up on the second ring, knowing it was me thanks to his own Caller ID. Little chance of anonymity in our brave new world, huh? “You still planning on going to that shindig tonight?” he grilled me right off the bat. “Or can we do dinner at Dragonfly and a movie after?”

  Shindig?

  It sounded like a Midwesterner’s idea of how Texans talked, though Malone was a Midwesterner, I reminded myself. He hailed from St. Louis, Missouri, the “Show Me State,” which explained why he always had to see something to believe it. He was a budding defense attorney with the prominent and enormous firm of Abramawitz, Reynolds, Goldberg, and Hunt, better known as ARGH around these parts. They covered the law from all angles: corporate, criminal, wills, and divorce. It was a one-stop shop for well-to-do Texans who found themselves in need of expert counsel.

  The brain trust at ARGH had handled the legal work for Daddy’s pharmaceutical company, on whose board Mother remained to this day. J.D. Abramawitz was a close friend of Cissy’s and had arranged for Brian Malone to take on Molly’s case when my friend had been accused of murder. As I’d later found out, Mother had requested Brian handle the matter in order to throw us together, hoping for a love match.

  While there were definitely sparks, it wasn’t a fullblown fire. Not the kind that made either of us want to say, “I do.”

  Not yet (much to Mother’s chagrin).

  We’d both agreed not to rush into anything serious, though we were sure having a good time doing the getting-better-acquainted routine.

  It was definitely the most successful of any of Cissy’s crazy matchmaking schemes, the vast majority ranking right up there with Hurricane Andrew in terms of disaster quotient. Like the time she’d set me up with the son of an oil magnate and GWH (Great White Hunter) whose fun idea for a date was to go to the shooting range. While he’d squinted an eye at the man-shaped target and squeezed off quick shots from a 9mm Beretta, he’d hissed through his teeth, “Take that, Daddy! And that and that and that!” I’d feigned a trip to the lad
ies’ room, had made a dash to the parking lot, and burned rubber getting out of there.

  Even the bluest of blue bloods could be freaks.

  “Andy? You doze off on me?”

  “Am I going to the shindig,” I repeated, putting aside thoughts of the blind date from hell and getting back to Brian’s question. I perched on the arm of the sofa, the towel tucked around me, a bare leg dangling. My freshly washed hair drip-dripped on my shoulders. “Unfortunately, it’s not optional.”

  “Your mother won’t let you get out of it?”

  “Worse.” I sighed. “She bribed me with Escada.”

  “The nerve of her.”

  “Exactly.”

  “I mean, how dare she?”

  “It’s despicable,” I said, playing along, and he laughed, doubtless thinking, “Poor little don’t-wanna-be-rich girl.”

  Still, he knew my mother, so he had to feel some pity.

  I imagined his boyish, slightly crooked grin, and his unruly brown hair, tousled upon his forehead. It amazed me that I was attracted to someone so centered, so preppy, and so, um, white bread. Well, he was Ivy League—a Harvard law grad—so I guess he couldn’t help it. Not a single tattoo or piercing graced his lean body. And, believe me, I’d done a fair amount of investigating in that respect.

  Nope, Malone was entirely too presentable for my taste, which leaned toward longhaired poets with sad eyes, brilliant minds, and always-empty wallets. But, in spite of his passion for things buttoned-down, I liked him. A lot. He made me feel warm all over and tingly at the same time. A little like prickly heat.

  “So you want me to go with?” he offered. “You know I own a tux, if that’s an issue. It’s Armani.” Quick pause. “All right, it’s a knock-off, but it looks real.”

  “It’s not the tux. The issue is Cissy,” I said, feeling horrible when I had to turn him down. “Mother insisted I go solo. She’s hoping I’ll meet an eligible bachelor.”

  “What am I? Chopped liver?” He sounded hurt.

  “It’s not that exactly. She does like you, Malone. It’s just that”—how did I explain Penny George’s spying and that stupid “milk for free” theory without completely humiliating myself and Cissy?