“It’s all set. You can meet with Draco tomorrow,” Terra announced, although she wasn’t smiling about it. She looked tense and her cheeks were flushed, as though she and Draco had argued.
“Is everything all right?” I asked.
“Everything’s fine,” she murmured, and I thought she was going to settle back into the chair between Mother and me. But she merely leaned in and snatched her laptop off the table. “He’s doing a bridal show at the World Trade Center at eleven o’clock tomorrow so he wants us to come, and he can give you a few minutes after. I figure you’ll want to watch the show anyway as it’s his latest bridal couture. It might give you a better idea of what you want. He has his showroom there, too, so we can see more of his samples.”
“Sounds good,” I replied, a little surprised that Draco was still conducting business as usual despite Olivia’s untimely demise. Perhaps he wasn’t any more torn up about her passing than Terra seemed to be. Or maybe I was just cynical. “Are we all going together?”
“How about I meet you there?” Terra said as she scribbled something on the back of a card she pulled from her bag. “Here’s the address for the building and suite. All the bridal showrooms are on the fourteenth floor.” She pushed the card into my hand. “If I don’t make it on time, I’ll reserve you some seats.”
“Why wouldn’t you make it?”
Her face pinched. “I got a voice mail from the Highland Park police. They want to talk again in the morning, and I’m not sure how long that’ll take.”
No wonder she looked tense.
“It’s no problem at all, Terra. Andrea and I will meet you at Market Center,” my mother said before I had the chance.
“If you have any questions or thoughts about your wedding at any point in time, you can always email, text, or call. I’ve got your file started,” Terra said as she tucked her laptop into her giant hobo bag. “I’ll probably be working on the fly for a while. I don’t know when the police will be done with Olivia’s office, or if her lawyers will ever let me go back in, for that matter.”
“Whatever works,” I told her, getting up to walk her to the door. “Thanks for coming by. We’ll see you tomorrow at the show.”
“Yeah, see you tomorrow.” She nodded, glancing over my shoulder to say, “It was very nice meeting you, Mrs. Kendricks.”
Then she took off, and I closed the door behind her, though I quickly raced to the window to peer through the blinds. I saw her get into a dusty old Mercedes wagon with a sticker that read TSFA on the rear window and another sticker on the bumper that declared: HONK IF YOU STOP AND SMELL THE ROSES.
I hadn’t even heard my mother come up behind me until she quietly said, “You’re right, Andrea. That girl is definitely hiding something.”
“Is that so?” I turned around with a sigh. “What makes you so sure? The fact that you don’t like her hair or the way she dresses? So what if she’s not Junior League material? She seems okay to me.”
I hated thinking that Terra might have something to do with Olivia’s murder. She seemed to be a nice person. I’d even begun to like her a little.
Cissy clicked tongue against teeth. “Oh, sweet pea, that’s not it,” she said. “I’m not talking about her awful clothes or her bad hair. Didn’t you notice anything strange about this?” She very deliberately tapped her third left finger, the one that used to wear the platinum and diamond wedding band my father had given her and now sported the radiant-cut emerald engagement ring from Stephen.
I shook my head. Nothing came to mind. As far as I could recall, Terra had all four fingers and an opposable thumb on that hand.
“What strange thing should I have noticed?” I asked.
“She had the tattoo of a wedding band on her finger,” Mother said, her mouth pinched. “Is she married? Is that some newfangled thing kids are doing these days to save money on rings?” she asked.
But I could only stare back at her dumbly because I didn’t have a clue.
“Do you know what TSFA stands for?” I asked, suddenly wondering if Mother wasn’t right about Terra’s secrets.
Mother shrugged. “I haven’t the foggiest.”
So I got my laptop from the sofa, opened it up, and did a Google search to see what came up while Cissy sat down beside me.
“Tax-free Savings Account, Tri-State Fast-Pitch Association . . . ,” I murmured the names as I went down the list of results, although nothing seemed just right. “. . . Toronto Society of Financial Analysts, Toasted Sub Franchise Association, Tobago Sheep Farmers Association, Texas State Floral Association . . .”
Ah-ha!
I stopped on that last one as something Janet had said earlier came to mind.
. . . he was supposed to do the flowers for the White Glove Society’s annual deb ball and he bailed on them. They were in a tizzy, trying to find someone else at the last minute. The fact that Olivia tarnished his rep on TV was just the final nail in the casket. The whole mess got Jasper unseated as chair of the state floral association. The poor guy practically went into hiding.
It made sense that the “state floral association” was the TSFA, particularly with the “Honk if you stop and smell the roses” companion sticker.
Now a bigger question: was there a connection between Terra and Jasper Pippin besides having worked with Olivia? And was that connection close enough that Jasper would loan Terra his car?
“What’s wrong, sugar?” my mother asked.
“I’m not sure,” I told her, knowing exactly what Nancy Drew would do in such a situation. She’d keep sticking her freckled nose where it didn’t belong until she found some answers.
Chapter 20
Five minutes after Terra took off, my mother left, too.
But before Cissy made her grand departure, she’d invited me to bring Malone to dinner at her house so we could distract Millie for an hour or two. Millie was staying overnight, which I thought was great. That way, she wouldn’t be alone if she woke up with nightmares about Olivia, and it gave Mother someone else to fuss over besides me. I told her I wasn’t sure if my fiancé would even be back in time to eat. When I’d mentioned he was working Millie’s case with Allie, she raised an eyebrow and said, “Allie Price, the blonde who helped us find Brian when he went missing? My, oh, my.”
Yes, even Cissy knew about Brian and Allie’s history, and since she’d met the woman, it made her “my, oh, my” even worse.
“Well, if Mr. Malone can’t make it, come alone, and we’ll have a girls’ night in,” she’d suggested before kissing my cheek and disappearing in a wispy cloud of Joy perfume.
Normally, that type of invitation would have made me run screaming in the opposite direction. But then I realized it wasn’t a half bad idea. I could use some distracting, too. Knowing Brian was spending time with his ex was killing me, though I was trying hard not to let on.
I kept reminding myself that it was a small price to pay to keep Millie out of the penitentiary. So, much as I resented Malone working alongside his former flame on this one, I knew the pair would leave no stone unturned. Allie might be too pretty for a lawyer—much less for her own good—but she wasn’t stupid. That combination of looks and brains had made her a killer in the courtroom. And Malone was no slouch either. He was Atticus Finch in the flesh, a real-life Eagle Scout who earnestly believed in truth and justice.
Millie was lucky to have them both on her side.
As for me, I’d just have to bite the bullet and tough it out until this whole thing blew over, which was why I needed to work fast and gather as much information as I could these next few days. I didn’t want Brian spending any more time with Allie than he had to. The sooner the police had the real culprit in hand, the better it was for everyone.
I called Janet Graham to check in. “So, what have you got for me?” I asked only to hear her dry laughter.
“Geez
, Andy, it’s been maybe three hours since I left your mom’s house. You do realize this isn’t CSI where a homicide investigation gets wrapped up in sixty minutes give or take twenty for commercials?”
After I’d grumbled for her to “get cracking,” I hung up and got back to my homework: watching the rest of Season One of The Wedding Belle.
This time, I settled down on the couch armed with a bottle of Honest Tea and a bag of veggie chips. And it was sustenance I would need to get through endless scenes where Olivia and her minions prepared for some of the most garish weddings I’d ever seen, or heard of, for that matter. Cakes coated with twenty-four-karat gold dust, four hundred guests dressed up like characters from Game of Thrones, even a bride arriving by helicopter and messing up everyone else’s hair in the process.
Oh, yes, and there was plenty of drama involving Olivia and anyone else who dared stand in a frame with her. She argued with bossy mothers-of-the-brides, cajoled fathers-of-the-brides into expanding their wedding budget ad infinitum, and she fired and hired more assistants, all but one running off in tears. The sole standout was a blonde named Candy. Instead of crying, she called Olivia a bitch, claimed she’d ruined her life, and slapped her hard enough to leave a handprint on La Belle from Hell’s cheek.
For a few minutes anyway, I had Candy on my suspect list, until I Googled her name and saw that she’d ended up on another Salvo Productions reality show called The Devil’s Apprentice. In that one, contestants vied for a position in the firm of a pompous real estate mogul. I figured that after her experience working for Olivia, Candy had a good shot at winning the whole shebang.
I found myself wondering if the slap had been written into the script. The further I got into the season, the more everything about the show seemed very deliberate, if not downright staged. Surely not every day was jam-packed with drama in the average event planner’s life.
But on The Wedding Belle, the soap opera quotient ramped up and up and up until the final episode of Season One when things really exploded. That was the show where Jasper Pippin stood up to Olivia and got his ass kicked to the curb. It also featured the hiring of Terra Smith—seemingly Olivia’s opposite—and showcased the relationship between Olivia and Draco with Olivia inadvertently (ha, right!) catching a bride’s bouquet and later walking into her bedroom with the ribbon-tied blue succulents and white spray roses in one hand—and Draco in the other—before shutting the door.
The moment I saw them together, I let out a snort.
I knew in my gut that they weren’t a real couple, and it wasn’t because of anything either of them did or didn’t do. The designer formerly known as Melvin Mellon was nearly a decade younger than Olivia and he was way prettier. She might have had the face of a homegrown Texas pageant girl, but he had an air of mystery and the looks of an Eastern European hunk with silky dark hair, brown eyes, slim nose, and full lips. If he were on the cover of a romance novel, it would sell a million copies. Plus, he openly flirted with other women—especially Terra—right under Olivia’s nose.
But the real kicker was something only a school mate of La Belle from Hell would know: Olivia had always dated older guys, all with nice cars and rich fathers, but never more than average looks. Everyone at Hockaday could recognize her M.O. Nope, she never would have hooked up with anyone who outshined her in youth and beauty, but Draco did both in spades. Maybe he wasn’t gay, but I didn’t buy that he was sleeping with Olivia. I had to wonder how much of the show—and her life—was real and how much was fake.
I shut down my laptop and pressed my fingers to my aching temples.
Something told me that Terra knew the truth. As Mother had pointed out, there was more to Terra than met the eye. I just had to hope she didn’t see through my faux wedding planning before I had a chance to learn what deep, dark secrets Olivia had been hiding.
When my phone rang, playing the ring tone for Def Leppard’s “Animal,” I jumped and dumped my laptop to the couch.
I knew it was Malone before I picked up.
“What’s wrong?” I said, ever the optimist.
“Sorry, babe”—he sighed—“but I’m not going to make it home for dinner. Allie just talked to her friend in the DA’s office. It sounds like they’re working hard and fast to build a case against Millie. They’re setting up interviews with anyone who knew Olivia La Belle and subpoenaing footage for Olivia’s show that hasn’t aired yet. Sounds like an arrest warrant could come down anytime, so we’ve got to get our ducks in a row ASAP.”
“Oh, my God, they are going after Millie. They’re not looking for anyone else,” I breathed the words, my heart pounding. How could this be happening? There were plenty of other suspects, people who despised Olivia more than the Cake Lady.
“We’re gearing up for the worst,” Brian said, “but we believe in Millie. So don’t give up, Andy.”
“I’m not,” I assured him. I just had to work faster to find some answers.
“We’re ordering pizza so we can keep working,” Brian said. “You okay?”
No, I wasn’t okay. My faith in the justice system was being shaken yet again. I wanted to believe that innocent people never went to jail, but I knew otherwise. Still, I drew in a deep breath, exhaled, and managed to sound halfway calm as I answered, “I’m all right. I’m getting ready to head to Mother’s for dinner. Should I say something to Millie? Have you talked to her? Does she already know?”
“Look, I’m bringing her downtown to the office tomorrow so she can talk to the whole team. We have to go over every minute detail of her relationship with Olivia and set up interviews of our own, like with you,” Malone replied. “Maybe you can come down in the afternoon?”
“Yeah, sure,” I said. I would be more than happy to talk their ears off about Olivia La Belle and what I knew.
“We should get some autopsy results by then, too. So chin up, Kendricks, and don’t make tonight any rougher for Millie, okay? Let her enjoy a nice meal and get some sleep tonight if she can. She’s going to have a rough road ahead.”
“This sucks,” I said, and not for the first time. “Give me a call when you’re heading home. I love you,” I said.
“Ditto.”
Then he was gone.
I gathered up my things to head to Mother’s house, hoping I could act something other than morose at dinner knowing the cops had set their sights on Millie.
Chapter 21
I heard the voices coming from the kitchen as soon as I let myself in. There was music, too, and it sounded very much like Frank Sinatra singing, “I’ve Got You Under My Skin.” As I pulled my key from the lock and shut the door, I realized I was bopping to the beat, my shoulders swaying.
It had been a long time since I’d heard these walls filled with song. The house felt alive again, like it had a real beating heart. My dad used to play music all the time when I was growing up. I still remember the old LPs he reverently placed on the turntable of his RCA stereo with the big-ass speakers. He loved the Rat Pack, Elvis, and Nat King Cole, and he’d introduced me to Maria Callas, Luciano Pavarotti, and Beverly Sills before I even understood what opera was. “It’s as though the words alone aren’t enough. There’s so much raw emotion,” he had told me, “that they have to be sung.”
He was every bit a man’s man. He liked skeet shooting—but not hunting anything with a beating heart, thank God—and he loved sports, especially golf and Malone’s passion, hockey. But my father wasn’t afraid to admit he loved the arts, too. I think he was the reason I’d fallen in love with drawing and painting and sculpture back in school. And books—how he adored books! It was no wonder I’d been such a daddy’s girl. I had always found him to be the more sensitive of my parents, and I went to him more often than to my mother when I had a problem.
How I wished he were here now, I thought, and I felt myself choke up.
If only I could ru
n to him and have him enfold me in his arms. It didn’t matter how much time had passed. I still missed him like crazy.
I wondered how I was going to get married without him walking me down the aisle. There was no one who could fill my dad’s shoes, not even my soon-to-be stepfather, Stephen, as nice as he was. That was another reason I was dragging my heels over actual wedding plans. I was no more certain of what to do about my Big Day than I was about how to find Olivia’s killer and clear Millie’s name.
What would Daddy have advised me to do? Would he tell me it was best if I stayed out of the mess entirely? Would he suggest that I sit back and let the police—and Malone—do their jobs? Would he have insisted I twiddle my thumbs while I waited to be called as the prosecution’s star witness?
No, I thought, letting out a slow breath. I was sure that my father wouldn’t choose any of the above. He would tell me what he always had: to follow my heart. Maybe it got me into trouble sometimes. Maybe it even made me act like a brainless fool. But I didn’t care. I had to do what I felt was right.
I cleared the lump from my throat and called out, “Hello, hello!”
Not surprisingly, no one answered.
Clearly, more was going on in the kitchen than just the music. There was the warm, inviting scent of something baking in the oven, and I knew my mother couldn’t possibly be responsible. Was Millie playing chef?
As the final notes of “Under My Skin” trailed off and Frank began to croon “Strangers in the Night,” I followed his voice and the tantalizing smell. Halfway there, I heard a throaty burst of laughter.
Was that my mother?
Was she drunk?
As soon as I’d passed the butler’s pantry and entered the kitchen, I hesitated, my eyes doing a double take. For an instant I thought Sandy Beck had returned early from her visit with her sister and was dancing around the room in oven mitts while Cissy sat on a stool at the granite island, singing out loud and tapping the toe of her pump against the foot rail. She waved a glass of wine in the air, and I saw the bottle nearby. It looked like she’d broken out her favorite Château Margaux Bordeaux.
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