The woman's eyes grew large. "No."
"No, you're not Nicole or no, you haven't talked to your brother?" Bandarra glared at her as if she was trying to outsmart him.
Nicole stood up straight and matched his stare. "My name is Nicole Wilson. My employee number is 6430. I know my rights, and that's all I have to tell you."
Gavin put a hand to his face, trying to cover the growing grin. "Ms. Wilson, we just have a few questions. We're not accusing you of anything."
The blonde shook her head. "I haven't seen my brother, and I won't tell you about anything else with Mr. Douglas. I promised her I wouldn't tell anyone. She made me promise to keep my mouth shut, in front of everyone. She didn't really trust me, called me a blabbermouth."
"Huh?" Ellen and Bandarra raised their eyebrows in unison.
"I've seen Starsky and Hutch. I know how you police work. You want me to break my promise. That's not fair."
Marissa sighed and took another swig from the can. She wasn't in the mood to translate from ditz to English. "Nicole, who are you talking about?"
"Brenda, from Bridal. You've met her."
Marissa remembered the tiny brunette with the too-tight skirts and unbuttoned blouses. Brenda would have only lasted a few minutes in Marissa's department without some new attire. "What about her?"
Ellen's eyes grew big. "She and —".
"She and Steve Douglas had sex between events here," Nicole blurted out. "That's why I was so upset when I found out that he was HIV-positive. Did he know? I mean, now she's going to have to get tested and she’ll have to take lots of medications and he can't tell her because he's dead and I don't want to tell her because how do you tell someone something like that? It's just too awful." The girl bowed her head and started to sob. Strands of blonde hair fell across her face.
Bandarra slipped the notebook into his pocket and rubbed both hands against his temples. "Could we start over from the beginning? This Brenda from bridal had sex with Steve Douglas here? In the store? On the day he was killed?"
Nicole nodded. Marissa watched the reactions of the group as she sat quietly in her chair. Gavin refused to meet her gaze again as if sex were something she shouldn't know about. Ellen pulled at her frizzy blond curls trying to hide a smirk, while Bandarra stood there with his mouth hanging open. Anne looked up from playing with Joshua to shoot Marissa a knowing glance. She mouthed the words "baby" and "daycare center."
Ellen recovered first although she still had her hand in her hair. "Where was Adam during this time? He was supposed to be watching Steve all day, guiding him around the store and such. 'Roll in the hay' was definitely not on the agenda."
"He had to deal with that group of protesters downstairs, the ones who didn't like Steve Douglas. One of them laid down in front of the entrance, and Adam went down to talk to them and make them leave peacefully."
"When was this?"
Nicole tugged on a string on her blouse, still avoiding all their eyes. "After lunch. We went up to watch the photo shoot. We found Steve waiting alone in the conference room across from the luncheon room. He was all by himself, and he invited us in to talk to him."
Bandarra sputtered as he tried to form a question. "How many of you were there?"
Nicole paused for a few seconds. "Four. Brenda, me and Shannon, and Chris."
"How many of you had sex with him?"
Nicole's eyes welled up again. "Only Brenda. He seemed to pick her out right away. They hit it off. After a few minutes, they were making out in the corner. You know, hugging and kissing. Then they stopped for a minute, and Steve asked us to leave them alone for awhile."
"I can't believe it." Ellen's eyes squinted at the clerk. "Right in the store, in the conference room. Some people have no shame."
"So where did the three of you go from there?" Bandarra jaw muscles showed under his skin and stubble. Marissa noticed a nervous twitch behind the glasses.
"We waited outside the room in the hall. I wanted to leave, but the other two wanted to stay to make sure that no one found Brenda like that. So they kept a watch. She could have been fired, you know."
"So did anyone come to the conference room while you were watching out for your friend?"
"Only Steve's business manager and the photographer. One of the girls explained to Mr. West what was going on, and he just smiled. He acted like it was something that happened all the time."
Ellen leaned against one of the glass cases and lit a cigarette. Marissa could see the cigarette shake as she tried to light it. "It probably did." She blew the smoke out slowly. Marissa was too stunned by the events to even comment, though a few passersby shot nasty glances at Ellen.
"Well, after a while, maybe twenty minutes or so, the door opened, and Steve and Brenda came out. Mr. West let us stick around and watch the photo shoot."
Marissa leaned forward in her chair. "Was all this when you were supposed to be working?"
Bandarra waved away the comment. "How did Steve seem after that? Did you notice anything unusual?"
Nicole swallowed hard. "Not really. I mean, Brenda said later that she hadn't noticed anything wrong with him when they were — you know. She did say he was good." Marissa thought she heard Anne sigh in the background. Only a truly naive person could romanticize unsafe sex involving an STD.
"Did they have anything to eat or drink?"
Nicole shrugged. "Brenda didn't tell us those kind of details. She just went around all day, saying what a wonderful lover he was."
Bandarra looked at his watch. "Is Brenda here now? I want to talk to her and find out any details."
"You can't. I mean, she'll know that I told you. She'll kill me."
"Ms. Wilson, this is a murder investigation, not a high school romance. We appreciate your honesty in this matter, and we won't bring your name into our questioning, but we need answers now. This is no time for subtlety."
Ellen put her hand on Marissa's shoulder and squeezed. "If you're okay, I'm going to go upstairs with the police. Someone needs to be involved from the store. We're beginning to need a full-time person just for damage control."
Anne turned around on the floor. "I'll take her and Joshua home. You just find out who's doing these things."
Ellen trotted off with the two men and Anne, Marissa and her son were left alone. Nicole had slipped off while no one was looking.
Marissa dragged herself out of the chair with an effort and folded it against the wall. Her limbs were stiff from the attack, and she felt a pain in her shoulder as she moved the chair. She picked up the bag of toys and followed her friend. Joshua was busy explaining the different Thomas the Tank-Engine trains he owned to Anne and barely noticed Marissa behind them.
Fortunately, she was able to avoid the parking garage since Anne had parked outside. Marissa let the cold rain run down her face and didn't hurry to the car. She was asleep within seconds of her head touching the head rest.
Chapter 13
When Marissa arrived at work late the next morning, the police had already announced their presence. Anne and Tom had returned her car to her apartment last night as an excuse to check up on Marissa. Now she pulled her car next to one of the patrol cars in the open lot, feeling a bit safer as she opened her car door. Tired and worn out from her dreams of death, Marissa pulled herself from the car with effort. She caught herself looking over her shoulder as she entered the store. She tried to shake it off, but her mind refused, playing the scene over and over when she wasn’t otherwise occupied.
She didn't notice any uniformed officers as she made her way through the few early shoppers to the cosmetic department. The only man in her domain looked much too old in his tennis shoes and sweatsuit to be undercover, more likely a mall-walker browsing.
"Don't the police ever go home? Or are they planning to open a branch office here in the store?" Marissa asked Rhonda as she walked towards the back room. She hung up her coat and went back out to the counter to see the crime of the day.
"So what exactly is go
ing on here? Did the police find out anything last night after I left?"
Rhonda shook her long blonde hair. Today she had it curled into corkscrews around her classic cheekbones. "Not a thing. The police stayed for a bit, and then Ellen and Adam watched the exits without any more luck. Whoever attacked you got clean away."
"Not clean away because they would need a bath after all the cologne I sprayed on them."
Rhonda laughed. "Not necessarily. I've often found them in the bars on Second Street with bottles of the stuff on. Their eyes light up when they hear what I do for a living. I think they're figuring up the discount they could get from me."
"So what are the police doing back here? They couldn't think that this person stayed here overnight." Marissa straightened the Oscar de la Renta display as she talked, moving the little bottles across the counter. Rhonda was one of the store's best salespeople, selling scent and glamour to everyone by taking the time to make sure that the look suited them; however, she didn't bother to clean or straighten anything. When she was done with a sale, she just left the remnants where she finished.
"I'm not really sure. Ellen came by this morning to see if you were here. She said that the police were coming by because they got a tip this morning."
Marissa looked up from the display bottles. "Did she say who gave them the tip?"
"No one knows, but it came from Zack Martin's office phone again. Ellen was hopping mad. Anyway, the police came here and took Sam Munson and Adam Ziegler with them into one of the offices upstairs."
"Adam's here two days in a row? Is that a record?" Marissa wrapped a green and red bow around one of the gold gift-wrapped boxes and set it on the counter under one of the Christmas trees. The firs were very decorative, but fell over constantly. "Not that he was much help yesterday when someone tried to kill me."
"He’s here, but he looks terrible. His face was so sad." Rhonda was resting her elbows against the counter as she spoke. "I almost didn't recognize him. He'd lost a contact and had on his glasses."
Marissa handed her some Christmas bows to put on various perfumes around the department. The department head felt a need to keep busy to occupy her mind. "His sister just died. He is having a very hard time dealing with it."
Rhonda nodded, making the curls look like slinkies. "That can be tough. I had a beau whose brother died young, and the whole family was never the same. I think death can be like that — I mean, end more than one life, kill a whole bunch of folks at once. Do you think Steve's family is going through that right now?"
Marissa stopped rearranging the boxes and turn to face the girl. Maybe she had underestimated the Appalachian girl's depth. "You know, I'd never really given Steve's family much thought. I imagine they'd still live in Cincinnati. I'll ask Gavin about it."
"He stopped by this morning on the way to question Tom. He looked around, but he didn't say nothing."
"Maybe he was just looking for cologne." Marissa busied herself with the display, bending over to study the words on the display bottle.
She looked up to see the police approaching. The manager of the young men's department followed in the distance with Zack following closely behind him. Gavin smiled as he walked into the cosmetics area.
"Hi. I stopped by earlier, but I didn't see you around. How are you feeling today?"
Marissa rubbed her neck slowly. She had noticed the mottled purple bruises around her throat this morning and had tried to cover them with concealer and powder. "I'm doing okay. I avoided the garage today, though. I was up for hours last night trying to figure out who would want to kill me, but I couldn't come up with anything."
"Was the list that long?" Gavin drew a circle with his finger on the glass display case.
Marissa watched him and then brushed his hand from the case. Didn't men realize that someone had to clean this? "No. Except for a certain ex-spouse and a few disgruntled co-workers, I couldn't think of a soul."
"Well, if you think of anyone else, just let me know."
Marissa rolled her eyes. The police seemed to have no focus, drifting from suspect to suspect without a plan. They reminded her of the time she'd been in the hospital a few months after Joshua had been born, and no one knew what was wrong with her abdomen. She had been sure that the doctors had a chart listing her vital organs, and the hospital tested each one until they found her problem. The doctors had finally called it a muscle strain, gave her some Motrin and sent her home. "What exactly does Sam from young men's have to do with the murder or my attack for that matter? I barely know Tom. We hadn't said two words to each other."
Gavin pulled her aside and stared at her. She could feel his fingers press into the flesh on her arm and she shook him loose. The thought of someone grabbing her made Marissa go cold inside. Not today, not again. Any contact was too much at this point. "Then you shouldn't be too upset about us questioning him. Why don't you just put it on the loud speaker? As a matter of fact, we had a good reason to question Munson. He went to high school with the deceased, a fact he chose not to tell us when we talked to him."
"So what? I'm sure that hundreds of people went to school with Steve, and you haven't pulled any of them out of their jobs for questioning." Marissa turned her head to the side and checked her arm. Was there a bruise from Gavin's grip or was that left over from yesterday's ordeal?
Gavin's eyes surveyed the department store and whispered, "We got a tip this morning. It seems that Sam and Steve were on the same high school basketball team. They both were in line for a big scholarship from the University of Kentucky. Steve ended up getting the scholarship, and Sam didn't."
Marissa rubbed her arm and turned away from the police officer. She twisted a beaded necklace in her fingers. "So Sam held a grudge for fifteen years over a scholarship and bumps off Steve because he was a better basketball player than him?" She raised an eyebrow, in mock appraisal. "It's a pretty slim motive."
"It gets better. Because Steve got the scholarship, Sam couldn't go to college and started work here where he's climbed up the ranks. After his sophomore year, Steve quit the team over some sex scandal in the dorm and dropped out to go to Hollywood."
"There have been days where I'd kill because I have to work at this place, but it's pretty flimsy." Marissa smirked at her own joke. "I don't see Sam as the killing type. The 'whining about it to everyone' type, but not a murderer."
Gavin slapped a hand to his forehead. "Thank you, Dr. Fraud. Since when did you become an expert on criminal psychology?"
She threw the necklace on the counter and turned around. "In a way, we're all victims of this murder, not just Steve Douglas. I think it stinks that you question all these people, dragging them out of their jobs, making them nervous and causing their co-workers to speculate on their innocence. Whatever happened to innocent until proven guilty?"
Gavin stood there with his arms folded across his chest and his head down. "Are you about finished? If we don't question people, how do you think we're ever going to solve this case? People don't exactly come running up to the police and say that they have vital information about the murder to share with us. How long do you think Nicole would have kept that story about Brenda to herself if we hadn't started to question her? Or West about the Combivir? Or the mysterious Dr. Smith from Los Angeles who still hasn't returned our calls?"
"Nicole can't keep a secret to save her life. Another day or two and she would have had a core meltdown. Brenda would have done better to call The Cincinnati Enquirer. Besides, you don't know that his sexual habits had anything to do with the murder."
Gavin pushed his hands far into his pockets, making his change clink. "It certainly helps explain the mention in the medical report that states he had sexual intercourse in the last twelve hours of his life. Didn't you think we would wonder about that?"
Marissa's eyes widened as she pushed her dark bangs out of her eyes. The police did have something on the ball. Maybe this case would be solved after all. She longed to feel safe again. "You have the autopsy back. Why
didn't you tell me? What did he die of? Was it something he ate? Was it something we all ate at lunch? Why didn't we all get sick? I've wondered if they don't put something in the food here."
Gavin stroked his chin, pulling at the small cleft. "I can't tell you what's in the report. It won't be made public until tomorrow when we release the information to the press."
Marissa stepped closer to the man and could feel the warmth of his body. She felt a tingling and remembered her desire to hold and be held from yesterday. "Please, for me. After all, I am very involved in this case. I was attacked yesterday. My cologne was stolen. Don't I deserve to know why someone tried to kill me?"
Gavin twisted his mouth. Marissa could tell he was wavering and moved closer. He sighed, "I already told you about the Combivir, and Bandarra almost had my head for it. Couldn't we change the subject? Nice weather we're having."
Marissa struck him lightly on the arm. "Gavin, it's rained for almost twenty hours, and the temperature has dropped thirty degrees since yesterday. If we're going to change subjects, tell me about Steve's parents. How did they take the news about their son?"
Gavin wrinkled his brow and took a step back. "They didn't have much to say. They've been dead for the past seven or eight years. Where did that come from?"
"Rhonda and I were talking about losing relatives, and we wondered about Steve's family." Marissa pointed out the blonde who seemed to be arguing with a woman holding a bottle of Nautica. She took back all the nice thoughts about Rhonda's intelligence and sales as the customer stormed away. "Didn't he have any brothers or sisters?"
"He was an only child, born late in life to his parents. No siblings, no cousins, not a single relative that we can find. We've tried contacting his attorney, but he hasn't returned our calls either. So we don't know yet who profits by his death."
"I thought Ray West was a lawyer. Didn't he write up the will?"
Love Stinks Page 9
