Blue Blood: A Debutante Dropout Mystery

by McBride, Susan

  Rats.

  Guess there would be no glossy photos of Cissy Blevins Kendricks with her bejeweled fingers wrapped around a greasy drumstick on this year’s Christmas cards.

  “You want to talk to your mom?” Sandy asked at my silence. “She’s upstairs dressing. I could give a holler.”

  “Just tell her I’m still working on getting Molly out of jail.”

  “Oh, Andy. Do be careful.” Sandy sounded truly concerned.

  “Aren’t I always?”

  “Do you really want me to answer that?”

  “No comment,” I said and felt like the cop at the back door to Jugs, fending off the reporters.

  After a breakfast of Pop-Tarts and juice, I showered, then stood at my closet door with a towel wrapped around my middle as I tried to narrow down what to wear for my audition to be Molly’s replacement. At least it felt like an audition. I had to dress and act the part of a woman who actually wanted a job wearing hot pants and serving food to drooling men who hid copies of Playboy in their tool chests.

  The last time I’d tested my thespian skills was during tryouts for the all-female production of The King and I in high school. It was my first and last attempt at acting. I hadn’t won the role of Anna or the king for that matter. I ended up being “Siamese, if you please,” in the chorus, thankfully drowned out by far better voices than mine.

  Hopefully, I’d do better at Jugs.

  At least singing wasn’t required.

  I finally pulled on a pair of jeans that hadn’t been worn in several years because they’d shrunk in the wash—or so I’d told myself—and fit so tightly I could barely breathe when I buttoned them up. I didn’t own a Wonderbra so I did the next best thing, inserting a couple of foamy shoulder pads into the cups of a sports bra.

  Viola! Instant C-cups.

  I tackled my hair next, blowing the dust off my set of hot rollers and putting them to work. Then I dug out a shoebox full of Mary Kay cosmetics accumulated over a decade and probably past their expiration date, if such a thing were possible. I painted, tweaked, glossed, and blushed until there wasn’t an inch of face left untouched.

  When I was done, I didn’t even recognize the woman in the mirror. And it was a good thing, too.

  I had to remind myself over and over that I was doing this for Molly; otherwise I would never have made it out my front door. What was that line Dolly Parton used? Something like, “It takes a lot of work to look this cheap.”

  I so understood.

  Molly had told me that Jugs opened for business at eleven o’clock on weekday mornings, so I made it a point to arrive at the restaurant at ten. “Bud was always there at least two hours early to make sure everything was ready and everybody showed up,” she’d said, and I figured that whoever was taking over would probably follow the same routine.

  There were several cars in the restaurant’s back lot when I pulled the Jeep into the Villa Mesa shopping center, but the blue-and-whites and media vans were mercifully absent. I spotted Julie Costello’s red Corvette as soon as I rounded the corner. A shiny white Lincoln Town Car sat beside it, the dark-tinted windows reminiscent of my father’s Caddy. Only, on closer inspection, the Town Car had some hail damage, visible dings marring the snowy white surface.

  I drove around to a space on the other side of Jugs where I could check my makeup in the rearview mirror with some degree of privacy before I dared step out of the car. I wiped a smudge of Paradise Plum from my front teeth, feeling a little like Mata Hari in stonewashed Gap denim.

  Despite the circumstances, I smiled, wondering what Mother would do if she could see me now. Faint? Drag me by the ear and wash my face off with spit? Though a stroke wasn’t out of the question. I looked less like an artist than a striptease artist. But that was the point, wasn’t it? I certainly wouldn’t be hired to wait tables in hot pants if I showed up in my paint-stained sweats and wire rims.

  “Well, here goes nothing,” I said to the stranger in the rearview and gave my bra an upward push. Satisfied that my shoulder pad–enhanced bosoms were symmetrical, I opened the car door and got out.

  The billboard that hovered high above again drew my attention upward. The oversized pair of jugs followed my every move like eyes, giving new meaning to the phrase, “Big Brother is watching.”

  The yellow police tape that had criss-crossed the front doors was gone, though a torn piece had caught on a nearby holly bush and fluttered in the breeze.

  I approached the glass doors and pulled at the green metal bars, but they were tightly locked.

  The best-laid plans, I mused with a sigh. But I wasn’t discouraged. I knew for a fact that Julie Costello was inside. I’d get in somehow, even if I had to bang on the windows and beg entrance.

  I went around back to the door where the uniformed officer with the mustache had stood guard the day before. There was no sign of him now. The door was actually ajar, the deadbolt lock turned so that it couldn’t close properly. With a tug on the smudged metal handle, I was inside. The cool tickle of air conditioning raised goose bumps on my skin.

  “Ready, Freddy?” I asked under my breath. Then I straightened my shoulders, sucked in my gut, stuck out my chest, and plunged forward, the door clanking shut behind me.

  “Hello?” I said to the empty kitchen that sprawled before me in a maze of stainless steel countertops and grills. “Anyone home?”

  The overhead fluorescents glowed a sickly yellow green, and I tiptoed around gingerly, focusing on the floor, looking for bloodstains. But all I saw were some chips in the tiles. One of the faucets dripped with the precision of a metronome, seeming to imitate my footsteps with each blip-blop, blip-blop. I kept looking over my shoulder, imagining someone following me.

  The air reeked of ammonia, and I figured the cleanup crew had swept through sometime earlier. There was nothing left to remind anyone that this had ever been a crime scene. Every surface gleamed.

  I shivered, the hair at my nape bristling as I recalled Molly’s description of Bud pinning her against the countertop and forcing his tongue down her throat. She had felt helpless with his weight atop her. Terrified of what he’d do, she had had no choice but to grab the knife and lash out at him in order to escape.

  And she had gotten away.

  She had run out of the restaurant while Bud had howled and cursed. That’s exactly what had happened. I was sure of it.

  I looked around me at shadowed corners and closed doors. There were plenty of places to hide in the kitchen. Someone certainly could have been watching what transpired between Bud and Molly.

  Watching and waiting.

  My heartbeat quickened. I was giving myself the willies.

  “Hello? Anyone here?”

  I walked toward a swinging door and into the restaurant itself. Dozens of tables with red-and-white checked cloths stood in neat rows, chairs carefully positioned around them. A television beamed noiselessly from above the bar, and I caught a glimpse of racecars buzzing around a track.

  ESPN, I realized.

  Not a soul was in sight.

  I returned to the kitchen and headed toward a rear hallway. “Hello?” I tried again, my small voice sounding so timid to my ears. “Anybody here?”

  Zip.

  I passed a room filled with lockers and detected the faint sound of voices coming from farther up the hallway. My pink high-tops squeaking softly with each step, I crept toward a partially opened door just yards ahead. I could make out the noise of an argument between a man and woman, but caught only snatches of their low-pitched verbal battle.

  “. . . doesn’t change anything . . .”

  “. . . don’t do this . . .”

  “. . . the money . . .”

  “. . . last night . . .”

  “. . . not over yet . . .”

  I strained to listen, creeping closer and closer to the door, wishing they’d speak up, cocking my head toward their voices.

  “The kitchen crew’ll be in soon . . . you’d better scram.”

>   That I heard, loud and clear.

  The door flung wide open and, before I could get myself out of the way, Julie Costello barreled out and nearly knocked me down.

  “Shit!” she cried out as I disentangled myself from her flailing limbs and stumbled backward onto my caboose, which, unfortunately, wasn’t padded like my headlamps.

  “Geez, sorry, I didn’t see you,” I apologized, awkwardly picking myself off the floor, but she wasn’t through yelling.

  “Who the hell are you? And what’re you doing here? You scared me outta my wits!”

  From what I’d seen of her with Cinda Lou, that wouldn’t be hard to do.

  At least she didn’t remember me hanging around the parking lot, watching Cinda do the interview. But the lights from the minicam had been in her eyes, and she’d paid no attention to anything but looking pathetic and skewering Molly.

  “Who am I?” I stood and crossed my arms, buoying my inflated sports bra to utmost perkiness and giving her my most winning smile. The kind I used every time Cissy dragged me to one of her charity events.

  Who was I? Did I use my real name? Something made-up?

  “I’m pleased to meet you,” I told her, avoiding the question entirely, and extended a hand, though she just stared at it blankly. “The back door was unlocked, so I let myself in.”

  “The restaurant doesn’t open for another hour yet. Come back then,” she said in clipped tones, but at least she wasn’t shouting.

  “I’m not a customer,” I admitted.

  Her heavily lined eyes looked me over from stem to stern. “Are you a reporter?”

  She sounded hopeful, appearing visibly disappointed when I shook my head.

  “I’m a waitress,” I said. “I saw on the news that a girl who used to work here got arrested, and I figured you’d need to replace her fast.”

  “You heard about the murder, huh? Did ya see me on TV by any chance?” She perked up, suddenly eager as a pup and nothing like Barbie’s angry cousin Snippy, which she’d played to perfection when Cinda Lou had given her the mike. In fact, she seemed excited that I’d brought the subject up.

  I fanned the flames, telling her, “Matter of fact, I did catch you on Channel 11 with Cinda Lou Mitchell.”

  “Really?” She flashed a perfect set of pearly whites and flipped a stray blond curl off her forehead. “What’d you think? How’d I look?”

  She wanted a rating of her performance? Her hair and makeup? Can you say “self-absorbed?”

  “Oh, gosh, I felt really bad for you. You seemed so sad.” I remembered the single tear that had rolled down her cheek. Meryl Streep couldn’t have played it better. “So you knew the guy who died?”

  “Knew him?” She let out a deep sigh. “Bud Hartman was my boyfriend.”

  “Oh, wow, I’m so sorry,” I said, praying that I sounded convincing. “That’s gotta be hard, losing him like that.”

  “Harder than you can imagine.” She bit her bottom lip, leaving a smear of color on her front teeth. “I can tell you’re a sensitive person, er, what did you say your name was again?”

  I hadn’t.

  “Andrea,” I said, making a snap decision. If I used something fake, I might not come when I was called.

  “Yeah, Annie, Bud’s murder was a shocker.” A pink-tipped finger twisted a lock of hair. “It’s a nightmare really. Things were going good for us. The restaurant was doing great, and he promised to use me in the next ad campaign. He was getting me some purple pompoms so I could do a cheer, ya know, like J-U-G-S”—she whipped her arms in the air—“what does that spell?”

  She suddenly hesitated. I wondered if the spelling part had stumped her. Should I give her a hint?

  But she arched an artfully penciled-in brow in my direction and said, “I used to be a Cowboys cheerleader, as if you didn’t know.”

  Oh, man, I wished I didn’t have to do this. But I told myself it was for Molly and David. So I went for broke.

  “Golly, yes!” I blubbered, drawing my hands to my mouth, fawning like an eleven-year-old gone gaga over the latest teen idol. “You were my absolute favorite. The games weren’t the same without your high kicks.”

  “Damn right.” Her eyes lit up, and she nudged me with an elbow. “Remember this?” She did a little pose with her elbows bent behind her head and lips puckered. “I was Miss August on last year’s calendar.”

  “Amazing.” I acted appropriately awed, which wasn’t hard to do. It floored me, how quickly she’d turned from being outraged at my presence to grieving over her lost beau to preening like a beauty queen. “So, what happened? Did you quit?”

  She made a face. “Nope, got cut for being too friendly. Just because I hit it off with some of the guys.”

  Hit it off?

  Interesting euphemism.

  “Well, that sucks.” I mimicked her pout.

  Julie put her hands on hips encased in a shiny pink miniskirt, and she checked me over, up and down. “So you’re a waitress, Amanda?”

  “Andrea,” I corrected. “And I’m the best waitress you’ll ever hire,” I lied, willing to do just about anything to get on the inside. If she didn’t go for it, how else would I be able to help get Molly out of Lew Sterrett? “I . . . I can’t imagine anything more fulfilling than working for a celebrity like you, Ms. Costello.”

  Her blue-lidded eyes watched me closely, and I wondered if I’d laid on the bullshit a little too thick. “Celebrity?”

  “You’re a . . . an example for women everywhere.” I scrambled for the right words, a way to push her buttons to get what I needed. “You’ve shown that we don’t have to sacrifice our femininity for strength.”

  Did I really say that?

  Stewardess, a barf bag!

  But Julie didn’t seem as nauseated by my spiel as I was making myself. She tossed her Heather Locklear hair and smiled beatifically. “You’re a smart one, aren’t you, uh . . . ?”

  “Andrea . . . Andrea Blevins.”

  My pulse was beating faster than it ever did on the Stairmaster. Speaking of pulses, I knew Mother would have heart failure if she ever learned I’d used her maiden name as an alias to apply for the wait staff at Jugs. But I was undercover after all. That was part of my disguise. Like a trench coat or Groucho Marx glasses.

  “All right, Andrea Blevins,” Julie drawled. “Leave me a number, and I’ll think about it.”

  Think about it?

  That’s not what she was supposed to say.

  In fact, it was the opposite.

  “Can you show yourself out?” she asked and started to turn away dismissively. “I’m kinda busy.”

  No, no, no.

  My brain swirled, searching for a way to turn this around and fast.

  I had only a split second to react.

  So I burst into tears.

  Big, noisy theatrical tears that would’ve made Mrs. Coogan, the Hockaday drama coach, giddy with pleasure.

  Through my suddenly gooey mascara, I saw Julie stop and swivel around.

  “Please,” I sobbed, “you have to give me this job. I . . . I have no one else to go to, and I’m in trouble. Deep trouble.” The fear of being tossed out on my rear made me appear truly frantic, and the words came out in breathless gasps. “Please.”

  “Huh?” She stood stock-still, looking more stunned than angry as she had when she’d first discovered me lurking behind the office door. She blinked, probably wondering if I was crazy and if she should call 911 rather than hearing me out. “What the blazes are y’all talking about?”

  I blurted out the first thing that came into my head. “I’m pregnant.”

  I’d dazed her. “You’re . . . ?”

  “Pregnant,” I repeated, hating myself for fibbing so outrageously and proud at the cleverness of my lie at the same time. “You know”—I placed my palm over my button-down fly and made as pathetic a face as I could muster—“I’m with child, got a bun in the oven, knocked up, baby on board.”

  “Oh, sugar,” she sighed. “Yo
u weren’t taking antibiotics with your pills, were ya? That’s what happened to Liz Hurley.”

  “Yes, yes, that’s probably what it was. And now I’m all alone and unemployed,” I rushed on, barely able to see with the clots of black sticking my lashes together. Damn that old mascara in my shoebox! It obviously wasn’t waterproof. I took some deep breaths and made sad little gulps. “My, uh, boyfriend left me for another woman, and he wants nothing to do with the child. He won’t give a dime for support, the lease is almost up, and I have nowhere to go, no money in the bank. Nothing.” My chin was actually quivering, my heart banging hard against my ribs.

  Would she bite?

  Or had I gone too far?

  Would she kick me out, call the police?

  If she did, what would I tell Molly?

  That I’d failed miserably? That I was a sorry excuse for a friend?

  Now I really wished I’d called Reverend Jim Bob’s prayer line.

  I needed big-time help.

  “I don’t know what else to do,” I sobbed, trying to blink hard and pry my congealed eyelashes apart as I waited for her to say something. Anything except “Buzz off.”

  Finally, I heard a rush of air escape her lips.

  “Oh, Andrea,” she cried and grabbed me in a bear hug that crushed the breath from my lungs. “You poor, poor thing. Of course, I’ll help you out. What an awful, awful boyfriend to put you out on the street when you’re in this condition.”

  I could barely see, but I didn’t think anything was wrong with my hearing.

  “You’ll hire me?” I squeaked, sucking in my breath, as she finally pulled away and stared at me from arm’s length.

  She glanced down at my belly, which wasn’t near as flat as hers to begin with, the slight curve only helping my cause. I just prayed she wouldn’t pat it. Then she looked up at me, suddenly all business.

  “How ’bout this, sugar? You can work part-time for now, which means no medical insurance or 401k, just minimum wage and tips. No maternity leave or anything like that, so you’d just better save up for Junior. And when you really start showing, I’ll have to move you to the kitchen. Which, in your case, might be sooner rather than later.”