I was so relaxed I forgot completely about MarySue, Jim Jensen or anyone connected with the murder. Even the dashing cop who might or might not still suspect me of having a hand in the homicide. When the color consultant came along and asked if I saw myself as a sleek redhead, a tousled brunette or a sun-streaked blond, I was thrown into confusion.
“Leave it to me,” she said. So I did. Where was Marsha? I didn’t need to worry. She came for the final round. Apparently she was at the highest level a stylist can be—she was only there to put the finishing touches: the cut and shaping and the final blow-dry.
“It’s good to see you again,” she said. “You are going to look fabulous when we get through with you.”
Did that mean I was not at all fabulous before I came in? I wondered if she thought I was the biggest challenge she’d ever met. No, of course not. And yet the day I’d met her at the shop she did give me a certain look that bordered on pity. Or maybe it was just that she was dying to get her hands on me for the transformation. If so, I thought, go for it, Marsha. So far I’d been massaged, washed, dried, colored and now this. While she ran her hands through my hair, she called for a manicurist and pedicurist to work on my nails. I didn’t remember asking for them, but apparently that’s what Dolce ordered, so I sat back in the padded chair and let it all happen.
“I see you and your brother are both artistic,” I said, watching Marsha work her magic on my newly streaked golden brown hair.
“That’s right. He’s my idol. If it weren’t for him, I wouldn’t be here. He paid for me to go to cosmetology school, then he got me an internship with Mr. Rene in Beverly Hills after my training with Vidal. He’s always been my guardian angel. Fortunately for me, since our father wasn’t around and our mother had to work two jobs. Harrington swore when he grew up he’d get me anything I wanted—clothes, jewelry, shoes, whatever. If he had to make it himself. Which he does. All I have to say is ‘I like that dress,’ or ‘I love those shoes’ and presto, he figures out a way to make them or somehow get them for me.”
I wondered if one way to get a pair of shoes was to steal them. Not that Harrington seemed like a thief or anything. I just wondered. I wished I could forget the shoes for a few hours. But even now, having a luxury beauty treatment, the MarySue murder was on my mind.
“I suppose you had a lot of business right before that big benefit the other night,” I said, still watching Marsha in the mirror.
“Oh yeah. Lots of women coming in at the last minute. It was a scene all right. We were open until seven. I was exhausted. I went home and collapsed.”
So she wasn’t at the Benefit. But was Harrington? “What about your brother?” I asked trying to sound like I was just making polite conversation. I hardly knew what polite conversation was anymore. Everything I said, every question I asked anyone was designed to elicit some information. Unfortunately it didn’t always work out.
“He’s amazing,” she said proudly.
There you go. I didn’t want to know how amazing he was, I wanted to know if he’d been at the park that night. The night MarySue was murdered for her shoes.
“Everyone says the shows he puts on at the high school are just as good as Broadway,” I said.
“That’s true,” she said as she heated her curling iron for the final touches. “Especially the costumes and the sets. They’re all his designs. All his work. Someday he will be directing plays on Broadway. I’m telling you, he’s that good. He’s wasted on that school. They don’t appreciate him.” With her curling iron in hand, she curled a few more strands around my face, then she stepped back and gave me a critical look from every angle.
“How do you like it?” Marsha asked, swiveling my chair around so I could get a full-front view of my new hairstyle. I gasped in surprise. I looked completely different. My hair was lighter, shorter, fuller and much more stylish. Did I look better? Marsha thought so. I hoped Dr. Jonathan would agree with her. When my nails were done, I thanked Marsha and gave her and the manicurist a healthy tip after I made sure her fee had been taken care of by Dolce.
She told me to have a good time wherever I was going. She said she’d come by the shop to look at the new collections on her day off next week. I was sure that meant she wouldn’t be buying anything. Just like her brother, she was a window-shopper. Having heard about their background, I understood why. If I wasn’t employed by Dolce, I’d probably be in their same boat wearing off-the-rack clothes. I shuddered at the thought.
When I got home with my new clothes in a shopping bag and my new hair, I wished I had somewhere to go. But I knew I had to rest my ankle for tomorrow. When Nick called and suggested coming by after his last yoga class with some cabbage rolls his aunt made for him, I couldn’t say no. It was better than eating a bowl of cornflakes and feeling sorry for myself alone on a Saturday night.
Funny, only a few weeks ago I had expected to be home alone on a Saturday night. In fact, I was always alone on Saturday night and most every other night too. Now I’d gotten spoiled with three men in my life. I knew it wouldn’t last, so I told myself to relax and enjoy it while I could. Who knew when Nick would be overbooked giving classes and Dr. Jonathan might fall for one of those nurses? Not Nurse Chasseure or Nurse Bijou, but someone else. It was almost worth having a sprained ankle, which was almost completely healed. I just hoped Nick wouldn’t start in on my doctor and how he wasn’t good enough to treat me. What would he say if he knew I had a date with him Sunday night?
Actually Nick wanted to talk about his classes instead of my doctor or me. He didn’t say a word about my hair. Instead, he told me all about aerial skills, tumbling, conditioning and break dancing until I was almost nodding off on the couch while he heated the cabbage rolls. And he didn’t say anything about my joining his class. We ate in my living room so I could keep my foot up on the coffee table.
“How do you like Aunt Meera’s galumpkis?” he asked. “She is famous for it, all the way back in Transylvania, they talk about Meera’s famous stuffed cabbage. The recipe is a secret, so don’t ask her.”
I assured him I wouldn’t. Besides who has time to make a sauce, stuff a cabbage and then bake the whole thing for hours? Not me. But I was very grateful to anyone who had that kind of talent and time. Someday I’d learn to cook. I’d take classes at the California Culinary Academy and throw little dinner parties for my friends after shopping for fresh ingredients from the Farmer’s Market. Until then I would happily eat anything someone brought me, like this ethnic Romanian dish.
“Delicious,” I said, scooping up the sweet and sour tomato sauce on the plate with my spoon.
“Not only delicious but good for you,” Nick said. “Packed with many vitamins. They say it can cure ulcers and it is frugal too, which makes it a perfect food.”
“Your aunt must be a wonderful cook. I would love to have her recipe. Does she live around here?”
“In Marin County. When your foot is well, I will take you on her tour.”
“She gives tours of Marin County?”
“She gives vampire tours of San Francisco. She is Romanian after all and knows where they live. In the tunnels under the city. Right here.” He pointed at the floor of my living room.
After minoring in Romanian in college, I shouldn’t have been surprised to hear his aunt believed vampires had taken up residence beneath my house, but I was. “How . . . how did she find out where they are?” I asked as if there were nothing unusual about vampires being nearby.
“She’s been studying vampires since a long, long time ago. She is now one hundred and twenty-seven.”
“Years old?” I couldn’t help gasping.
He nodded, his mouth full of galumpkis, and poured me another glass of Francusa, a soft, smooth Romanian wine that complemented the cabbage rolls perfectly.
“And then she is a vampire herself,” he said with a wink while wiping the sauce off his mouth with his handkerchief. “Which is how she says she knows many histories of San Francisco. Famous people she kn
ew like Mark Twain and other forty-niners. It is all on her tour. Huntington Park, Pacific Union Club hotels and cafés. You will see what a good actress she is.”
“I look forward to it,” I said, sure that Nick didn’t actually believe his aunt was a vampire but just went along with it. How I wished I could tell my Romanian professors about this one-hundred-twenty-seven-year-old so-called vampire. After I took the tour, I could send in her story to my alumni magazine along with a picture of the two of us on her tour. Of course, no alums believed in vampires. But everyone loves a good story. I’d take my camera and get some shots of the two of us at historic spots where the vamps supposedly hung out.
When Nick refilled my glass, I protested, but he quoted the old Romanian saying, “Three glasses of wine are just enough. The first for your health. The second for your delight. The third for a good rest.”
He left before I had a third glass of wine, when I kept yawning. I told him it must be the pain pills that made me sleepy. Certainly not his vampire stories. He suggested a trip to the Palace of the Legion of Honor to see the Impressionist exhibit the next day, but I wanted to rest up and give myself a facial before my big date. So I said I had some e-mail to get caught up on. He promised to get us tickets for his aunt’s tour in a week or two. Before he left he kissed me on both cheeks as they do in Romania, I suppose.
Nine
I pampered myself all day Sunday. First I washed my face with a gel cleanser, then I gave myself an exfoliating scrub, which left my face tingling. After that it was time to steam open my pores. I filled the bathroom sink with warm water and pressed a warm wet washcloth on my face three times. Next step—the mask. Some people make their own with glycerin, honey and oil, but I used a commercial hydrating clay mask. I had to keep it on for twenty minutes, so I went out to my back patio in a pair of old gym shorts and an extralarge T-shirt to sit on my deck chair and soak up some vitamin D on my pale legs. I slapped on my earphones, taking care not to disturb a single strand of hair, and listened to some tunes on my iPod to make the time pass.
I couldn’t believe it when the sound of my front doorbell penetrated right through my earphones. I debated whether to ignore it and pretend I wasn’t home. But maybe it was a special delivery package. Who cared if the delivery man saw me in my gray mask? I was sure he’d seen worse. And my hair still looked perfect. If he cared.
I rushed through the house to the front door so he wouldn’t just leave a notice and drive his truck away with my package in it. But when I opened the front door, it was Detective Wall. I almost slammed the door in his face I was so startled and embarrassed. After a brief hesitation and a quick cover-up of a wry smile, he said he was sorry to bother me.
“It’s no bother,” I said stiffly so my face wouldn’t crack. “It must be important for you to be working on a Sunday.” I was more convinced than ever he was a workaholic either immersed in his police duties or his volunteer efforts.
“It is,” he said. “I just received a series of photos from the newspaper taken at the Benefit. If you have a moment, I’d like to show them to you.”
Realizing I didn’t have a choice in the matter, I could only hope this would only take a moment. I glanced at my watch. I was afraid what might happen if the mask hardened on my face. I mean really hardened. I pictured myself trying to remove it with a sharp tool. Maybe having to call 911. How embarrassing that would be.
“This won’t take long,” he assured me. “I know you must have other things to do on your day off.” I knew he was thinking, “like painting your face with gray sludge.”
“Yes, I do.” It was only weeks ago I couldn’t say that. But my life had changed. I backed into my living room and sat on my usual couch, the same couch where the detectives had interrogated me previously. If Jack Wall could ignore the fact I was wearing a mask, then I could too. He handed me a manila envelope full of black-and-white eight-by-ten photos and sat down next to me.
“Take your time. See if there’s anyone you recognize there.”
I slid the pictures out on the table. “Actually I recognize several of these people. They’re our customers.”
I flipped through the pictures, naming names as I went. “Liz Forester in Gucci. Not my favorite design. Anita Halperin wearing a white trench over last year’s gown. Not bad. Margot Fielding in an edgy design from Camelia Skaggs. Looks good in it, don’t you think?”
He didn’t answer. I felt his eyes on me. I sensed he was waiting to hear something more. He was waiting for me to say something he could wrap his inquisitive mind around. But I didn’t know what. Until I came to the last picture. It was a woman in a black dress looking like any number of fashionistas we’d dressed who was holding a drink in her hand and talking to someone. Someone I knew quite well. Someone I had no idea was at the Benefit.
“Recognize her?” Jack Wall asked.
“That’s my boss, Dolce.”
“You sound surprised,” he said.
“Not at all. Why should I be?”
“Because you didn’t think she’d gone to the Benefit.”
“Her social life is none of my business,” I said stiffly.
“Uh huh.”
I didn’t like his tone.
“Why do you think she was there?” he asked.
“I couldn’t say.”
“Couldn’t or wouldn’t?” he asked. “You didn’t know she was there, did you? I believe you assured me she doesn’t do benefits. Yet here we have evidence she made an exception to her rule. Can you tell me why?”
“No,” I snapped. What could I say? I couldn’t believe she was there. Why would Dolce have gone to the Benefit without telling me? If she was there, why hadn’t the detective found out sooner from another guest? And of course the big question, why had she gone? She always said by the time she’d dressed everyone else she had barely enough energy to climb the stairs to her apartment and crash. Not to mention the fact that the tickets were prohibitively expensive. I’d seen her the night of the Benefit before I left for the Jensen house. She looked exhausted. The only reason I could think of for her to leave the house was to retrieve the shoes.
“Maybe I was wrong. Maybe it’s someone who looks like her,” I suggested hopefully.
“I think it is her. I think your employer attended this function for the sole reason of stealing back the shoes.”
“It wouldn’t be stealing,” I insisted. I was so wrought up by this accusation I felt my face mask crack. Now I’d have to start my facial all over again when the detective left. “Since MarySue hadn’t paid for them in full, technically they still belonged to Dolce. So if that is Dolce, either she was just an innocent last-minute guest of one of our customers, or she’d gone there to get the shoes back. Either way, what she did was no crime.” Surely I didn’t have to tell an officer what was a crime and what wasn’t.
“Murder is a crime,” he said sternly.
“Dolce is not a murderer,” I said firmly.
“You’ll be glad to know she says the same about you.”
“You asked her if I’d killed MarySue?” I felt a chill go up my spine. I was incredulous that I was still a suspect. After all we’d been through, the detective and I.
“You were at the Jensen house. You wanted the shoes. It’s not rocket science to assume that the shoes and the murder are connected.”
“But I told you I was unconscious. You can ask my doctor.”
“We have.”
“What? You’ve questioned Dr. Rhodes?” Oh, fine, now he’d think he had a date with a homicidal maniac. My face was feeling hot. I began to worry. How much longer was this going on?
“He was extremely cooperative. He verified your story at least between certain hours.”
“Then I’m no longer a suspect?”
“I would describe you as a person of interest.”
“Which is why you’re here, isn’t it?”
“I’m here to encourage you to be more forthcoming. If you have information, I expect you to come forward
with it.”
“I do. I did. I told you about Jim Jensen threatening me, didn’t I?”
“Have you seen him lately?” he asked.
“Not since the funeral. Have you?”
“Yes, I have. He’s cooperating with our investigation, and he’s recuperating at home. Still planning to have his big celebration for his wife.”
“Really? I don’t suppose I’m invited,” I said. Invited or not, I was determined to go. How else could I continue to investigate this murder? I needed to see who else showed up, what they said, how they looked, how they acted and of course, what they wore. I couldn’t tell Jack that. He thought I was a self-centered female who spent Sunday afternoons wearing a mud mask. But I would show him.
“Knowing you, I’m assuming you’ll go anyway,” he said.
I didn’t say anything. I didn’t want him to tell me not to. I was afraid that Jim would try to keep the time and date a secret, at least from me. But I was sure Dolce and I would find out and yes, we’d be there. She was just as determined as I was to get to the bottom of this crime. We needed to clear our names and the only way to do that was to catch the real killer. I’d bet anything, even my Manolo black alligator boots he or she would be there at the so-called celebration.
“Are you sure you haven’t spoken to him since your encounter at your store?” Jack asked.
“Of course I’m sure. What did you think? That I’d harass him at his own home?” The look on Wall’s face told me that’s exactly what he thought. He thought I had no sympathy for Jim Jensen and he was partly right. “Meetings with Jim Jensen are hard to forget. Just ask his wife. No, you can’t do that, can you?”
He didn’t answer. Instead, he stood up, indicating the interview was over, at least I hoped so. My face felt like it was covered with cement. He thanked me for my time. “Sorry to bother you on a Sunday. When you are obviously in the midst of some sort of process.”
“It’s a facial mask,” I explained tightly, even though I didn’t owe him an explanation.
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