Death by Marriage

by Blair Bancroft

  For shame, Gwyn. That curiosity bug has got you bad.

  And not a cure in sight.

  Chapter 12

  There I was, sneaking along the backs of the vending tents, trying to make like a shadow, when the scene shifted to farce. The Chief and the Bairds had encountered a problem fifteen feet short of the parking lot. The golf cart was stopped. Boone and Evie Baird, seated in front, had angled their bodies to watch the show behind them, where a screaming-angry Vanessa Kellerman towered over John Baird, who was perched on a rear-facing seat, clutching the giant wooden phallus and looking like he’d welcome a bolt of lightning. Anything to make the furious widow go up in a poof of smoke.

  The gathering crowd fluctuated between those who openly paused to eavesdrop and parents dragging their children away from the virtuoso duel of profanity spilling from the antagonists’ mouths. Turning my back on the manners my mother taught me, I elbowed my way to the front of the crowd in time to hear Vanessa shriek for what was probably the tenth time, “You want it all, is that it, you blood-sucking bastard? A few knick-knacks weren’t enough. You want the whole fucking company. How sneaky can you get? Coming to town to pick up ‘a few personal items’ and, oh by the way, filing a lawsuit while you’re here. I couldn’t believe my ears when my lawyer called.

  “Do you think Martin was nuts?” Vanessa continued after hauling in a rasping breath. “He’d never promise you his half the company. It’s mine, you hear me, all mine. You don’t get a cent! And I don’t give a shit how you feel about it!”

  Wow! No wonder the crowd was swelling rapidly. Even the rock band shaking the bandstand and the bull riders at the mini rodeo couldn’t compete with this.

  John Baird opened his mouth several times during Vanessa’s diatribe, but each time a glare from Boone kept him quiet. After his initial profane exchange with the widow, silence seemed a wise choice.

  “Mrs. Kellerman,” Boone interjected, clearly operating in cop mode, “please leave matters to your lawyers. Nothing is going to be accomplished here. And you’re attracting quite a—“

  “You bitch!” Sherry Lambert erupted from the crowd, charging straight for Vanessa. “I just heard I don’t get a penny, not one damn Honest Abe. After all I did for that man. He promised, I swear he promised. You must have tricked him into changing his Will. Just pushed, pushed, pushed ’til the poor guy finally caved.” Sherry proceeded to add her own bit of color to the epithets bluing the air at the Hospital Auxiliary Fund-raiser. Vanessa topped her verbal pyrotechnics with ease. I expected them to escalate to hair-pulling at any moment. John Baird looked like he’d make a run for it if only he could get rid of the sculpture.

  Golden Beach’s Chief of Police unfolded himself from the golf cart, stalked around the rear without glancing at the purple-faced John Baird. Boone struck a cop pose in front of the two quarreling ladies, his hands hanging loosely, the fingers of his right hand twitching as if eager to reach for his gun. “Ladies,” he said, just loudly enough to be heard over the names they were calling each other, “you will kindly be quiet or I’m throwing you in a cell, where you can duke it out without disturbing anybody but the guard.”

  I shot a quick glance at Evie Baird, the first Mrs. Kellerman. She appeared to be as agape as all the rest of the audience.

  “Whore!” the widow roared. It’s me he married.”

  “Gold-digger!”

  “Trollop!” Vanessa swung her purse straight for her opponent’s face. Sherry leaped back, the purse bouncing ineffectively off her shoulder.

  “Murderer!” Sherry screamed. “You killed him, everybody knows you did it.”

  Vanessa charged, red-tipped witches’ claws stretched out in front of her.

  Boone Talbot grabbed both women by the backs of their designer shirts and peeled them apart, muscles rippling under his dark blue chief’s uniform. “Last warning.” His ominous tone boomed into a sudden breathless silence. Even the crowd seemed to be holding their breaths.

  Sherry Lambert gave in first, her tense body sagging like a deflating balloon. “I’m sorry, Chief,” she murmured. “You can let go now. I’m heading home.”

  Vanessa’s tension level stayed at max, her lithesome body still quivering with rage. “Nothing! Not a penny,” she hissed as Sherry headed for her car, head high, her pace supremely deliberate.

  “Mrs. Kellerman”—Boone dropped his grip on the back of her striped knit shirt—“I need a promise from you. You are not to go near . . .” He shot a questioning look in my direction.

  “Sherry Lambert,” I supplied. “She works for Wallace Realty.”

  Boone turned back to the Widow Kellerman. “You are not to go near Sherry Lambert. You are not to speak to her. You are not to write to her. Your only communication will be through your lawyers. Is. That. Understood?”

  Between the Bairds and Sherry Lambert, I didn’t envy the Kellerman’s attorney.

  “Do you think we can go now?” John Baird inquired, sounding more plaintive than angry.

  “Mrs. Kellerman,” Boone said, “please return to the Admin Tent. We’re done here.”

  Vanessa made an elaborate job of brushing Sherry contamination and police cooties from her designer clothes and exposed flesh. Then she stalked off in a grand imitation of Sherry’s dignified exit.

  Before returning to the golf cart, Boone gave me a nod of thanks. As he drove away, I heard John Baird declare, “Black-hearted witches, the both of them. May they tear each other apart.” He tightened his grip on the sculpture, whose suggestively rounded top projected at least two feet above his head.

  If the whole thing weren’t so tragic, I’d laugh.

  Golden Beach, Florida. God bless.

  Later that night, I stared at my cellphone. Its glassy surface stared right back. Coward! Just because I suspected feminine charm didn’t work as well over the phone as in person didn’t mean I was a coward for not calling Boone Talbot. Truth was, I kept hoping he’d call me. I wanted his take on what happened this afternoon so badly that I couldn’t think of anything else. What did it mean? Did John Baird arrange Martin’s murder to gain control of the company? Did Sherry kill him out of pure spite? Or did she think she was in the Will and she, too, did it for money? Or were local rumors right, after all—Vanessa Kellerman was a lethal black widow spider, devouring her mate?

  Let’s face it—I hesitated to call Boone because I was afraid I was going to babble it all out like some featherbrained idiot and make a complete fool of myself.

  But I wanted to know. I mean, what was pie-in-the-sky speculation this morning had blossomed into truly intriguing possibilities. A plethora of suspects. I suppose I should have felt overwhelmed or horrified. Instead, I radiated excitement.

  So pick up the blasted phone! Talk to the man.

  I was in my bedroom, leaning back against a stack of pillows, wallowing in the comfort of being off my feet at last. I’d showered, washing away, along with layers of dust, the tantalizing smell of roast pig, the sharp tang of horse manure, and, alas, the revivifying whiffs of salt breezes swirling in from the Gulf. The excited chatter of the crowd, the bawl of a tired baby, happy smiles, and sudden bursts of laughter faded away, leaving only exhaustion behind. And the devastation on Evie Baird’s face when she realized she and her husband were going to have to talk to the Chief of Police before they began the hundred-mile trip back to Naples.

  Fear? Or was she simply as tired as she said she was? I could certainly relate to that.

  And that was all before the grand cat fight. Truthfully, by the time Boone led the Bairds back to the police station for a more serious chat than originally intended, I’d begun to feel sorry for them. For Evie, at least, who looked like she’d just risen from a table in the morgue. But John? He’d shot to the top of my list of suspects. Had Martin really promised Baird his share of the company? Perhaps they even had a long-standing written agreement and Martin’s Will, leaving everything to Vanessa, had come as a shock. I wasn’t sure how the law worked, but I could easil
y picture a nasty and costly court battle to settle the issue.

  Sherry? Although not a native, she’d lived in Golden Beach a long time. I’d known her ever since she chose my mother as her real estate broker. A strong but not pushy salesperson, she practiced her trade with class. This afternoon, she’d stuck to a verbal exchange. It was Vanessa who had escalated the battle into violence. Yet Sherry was a woman scorned, which was motive in itself. And now that it appeared Martin was a multi-millionaire, she was the woman who could have inherited all that lovely money if Vanessa hadn’t come along. Talk about motive . . .

  Boggle. Up and functioning since dawn, my brain was threatening to shut down.

  I scowled at the glowing red numbers on my alarm clock. Nine-thirty. Too late to call Boone? Excuses, excuses. No, wiser to leave it ’til morning. Coherent thought was fading fast.

  My cellphone rang. “Hi,” said my favorite baritone. “Did you survive?”

  “Barely. I was just about to call you,” I added before my brain caught up with my mouth. No need to sound like an overeager puppy just because he’d called me first.

  “Really?” Boone put a wealth of meaning into the word.

  Ruthlessly, I quashed my leaping pulse. I had to be Gywn Halliday, designer, daughter of Jo-Ann Wallace, Chair of the Fund-raising Committee. “You were a hero out there today. That was a nasty situation. I thank you, Mom thanks you, the Hospital Auxiliary thanks you.”

  “For grabbing two unarmed women by the backs of their shirts?”

  “You know what I mean. The Bairds, the thing with that blasted sculpture, generally keeping the peace.”

  “Providing extra added entertainment for the gawking multitude.”

  “That too.” I sighed, then gathered my scattered wits and plunged ahead. “Did you know Sherry Lambert is Martin’s ex-girlfriend? I bet he promised her money she never got, or maybe even marriage. She must have been fit to be tied when Martin married Vanessa. And somehow killing by peanut butter seems like a feminine crime. Not a man’s way of killing—”

  “Gwyn!”

  My mouth snapped closed. I bit my lip.

  “Listen carefully,” Boone said, enunciating each syllable with care. “I called to congratulate you on a job well done. The barbecue was a rousing success, and you were Miss Fixit from morning ’til night. I bet your mom’s really proud of you.” The implication that he hadn’t called to hear my murder theories was patently clear.

  I ducked my head, scrunching my face into a gargoyle mask I was grateful Boone couldn’t see. “Sorry,” I mumbled, “but I couldn’t help wondering—”

  “So help me, Gwyn . . .” Boone sputtered to a halt.

  Obviously not the time to ask what he’d discovered from the Bairds or if he’d found out anything more about Basil Janecek’s finances and the whereabouts of the missing caretaker.

  “You needn’t slap me down so hard.” I’d intended to sound dignified, but it came out more like a whine. “I was just trying to help.”

  “Gwyn . . .” Boone paused for what sounded like a sigh. “I was not slapping you down, just trying to keep you from obsessing about Kellerman’s death. Believe me, we haven’t written him off. We’re still investigating.”

  My attempts at caution exploded in my face. “And what about Basil Janecek? There’s another case where someone close to him may have killed him. Don’t you think there might be some connection?”

  “How about you come down to the station in the morning? You can handle my job while I rent costumes for the day?”

  For ten silent seconds I sulked. “That wasn’t nice,” I told him. “Goodnight.”

  I ended the call.

  Scott wasn’t the only one to benefit from the fund-raiser’s leftovers. I smiled as Artemis attacked his breakfast of roast hog, hunkering protectively over it in case any other creature dared contest his right to the rare treat. In the alley behind DreamWear all was right with the world. But elsewhere? After a soft sigh, I tried reaching for my cloak of invisibility, or whatever it was that had isolated me from the world for the last five years. I was standing at the door to DreamWear. I only had to open it, step inside, and shut myself up in the land of make-believe. I only had to tell myself that things might be slightly askew in Golden Beach at the moment, but surely the new year would calm troubled waters and return the golden glow of peace and contentment to our little bit of paradise.

  I couldn’t do it. My cloak, my armor, my shell—whatever I wanted to call it—was shattered, gone on the wind, nothing more than blowing dust. I’d exposed myself to reality, and there was no going back. The trouble was, I wasn’t all that happy about it.

  Reality. My watch read ten o’clock, and I was still standing in the alley, the front door deadbolted, the sign reading, Closed. With a last glance at Artemis, still hunkered over his food, I headed inside to the business that was no longer the sole be-all-and-end-all of my life.

  I’d told Crystal to take the day off, a well-deserved rest after handling the shop all alone yesterday. Her protests faded when I told her that after the barbecue, a day in the shop would be a vacation for me. Not far from the truth. There were no check-outs scheduled for today, no returns, giving me time to get a head-start on laying out the rentals for tomorrow’s New Years Eve parties. Not exactly a challenge. I’d have plenty of time to start reading the books I’d picked up on my way to work.

  I’d found five books on scams in our local library. I hadn’t expected that many. Somehow I’d managed to reach the ripe old age of thirty-one without being aware how thoroughly fraud invaded our society. Oh, sure, I’d heard plenty about fraud in politics; about sleazy contractors, embezzlement, cheating in sports, cheating the IRS, but one-on-one fraud—a con artist pitted against a “mark”—that was new. Maybe tomorrow’s check-outs could wait and hour or two.

  I looked over the book titles and selected the one that focused on scams aimed at seniors. Settling myself on my nicely padded stool, I began to read. I was soon so absorbed, a customer was wandering through our racks of costumes before I realized she’d entered the shop. Bad, bad, bad, Gwyn. Not only did customers deserve my undivided attention, the way things were going in Golden Beach, she could have been an axe murderer.

  “Good morning,” I said brightly. “Can I help you find something?”

  Tall and stylishly dressed in clothes that looked like she’d bought them in the resortwear department of Saks or maybe Bloomie’s, she favored me with the perfectly gauged smile of an upper echelon executive to the sales girl in a costume shop. “I’ve been invited to Key West for New Years,” she said, confirming my analysis by her brisk, no-nonsense tone. “I understand everyone will be costumed, but I have no idea where to begin.” Her smile turned wry, an unexpected sparkle gleamed in her eyes. “I suspect,” she added, “that the costumes in Key West are not quite like those I can find in Golden Beach.”

  A challenge. I liked challenges. Too bad I didn’t stock my Randi Wolff designs. They were exclusive to the distributor in California.

  Together, we considered the classic French Maid—the black and white one, even more risqué than the Mrs. Santa worn by Vanessa Kellerman. My customer deemed it okay, but way too common. The pink ballerina was a possibility, she conceded . . . but it was so cotton-candy sweet. I had to agree. Her green eyes brightened when she saw the Gold Genie, but a trip to the dressing room—a.k.a. Crystal’s Cave—put an end to that. She was so tall the harem pants looked like knickers, and her boobs threatened to pop out of the cropped top at any moment. Maybe okay in Key West but, no, the genie simply didn’t work for her.

  Perhaps one of our elaborate masquerade masks, I suggested, while racking my brain for something in our inventory that might pass for a domino cloak. Unfortunately, only a parti-colored jester cape came to mind. And then I remembered Lady Godiva.

  “What about this?” I said, whipping the wig off its peg and holding it up so the long fall of blond curls, at least five feet longer than her short whiskey-colored hair,
would show to best advantage. “Lady Godiva.” I grinned, my eyebrows lifting in a suggestive leer.

  She stared, eyes narrowing. Ever the pragmatic businessperson, she asked, “What goes with it?”

  “Nothing.”

  A gasp—or was it a chortle?—escaped her lips. Her eyes widened.

  “I’m sorry,” I added. “We can’t stock nude bodysuits in every size, so you’ll just have to improvise. I do have a lovely blue Medieval gown if you want to go for the Lady-Godiva-in-her-Castle look.”

  “I can improvise,” she said, with a decisive nod. “Lady Godiva, it is.”

  In the course of writing up her paperwork, I discovered she was Alexis Lippincott, a lobbyist from Washington, D.C. She’d heard Golden Beach was a great place to “get away from it all.” And, yes, she was having a marvelous time, even better now that she’d met the someone who was taking her to Key West for New Years Eve.

  “That’s a long way,” I said. “Are you driving?”

  “Only to Fort Myers. From there we’re going by hovercraft, would you believe?”

  Where had I been that I didn’t even know there was hovercraft service from Fort Myers to Key West? With my nose in my costumes, of course, what else?

  I made all the suitable remarks—which wasn’t hard, as I was truly impressed by her New Years plans, so much more exciting than mine—while I wrote up her rental for the extra time needed to go to the tip of the Florida Keys and back. As Alexis Lippincott went out the door with a bag bulging with Lady Godiva’s wig, I realized I was a bit envious. I wasn’t a party animal, but the thought of a trip to Key West by hovercraft was truly intriguing. Maybe sometime when the town wasn’t caught up in the frenzy of New Years, I might try it.

  But not alone. I was going to have to make some changes in my life before I went on an adventure to Key West.

  Another hour into my reading, goosebumps rose on my arms. In general, I’d learned, con artists were not violent. They practiced their fraudulent trade with finesse and oodles of charm, winkling money from their marks more easily than taking candy from a baby. Sometimes, they did it so well that their victims simply refused to believe they’d been taken. Not by dear so-and-so. More often, the victims were too ashamed to report the fraud, and the con artists were long gone before friends or relatives learned what had happened. But in each case no one was physically harmed.