Weapons of Mass Distraction (Lexi Graves Mysteries)

by Chafer, Camilla

  “I appreciate it.”

  “Thank you.” We stood, still awkwardly, looking at each other, our conversation having grown stilted until Maddox gave a little nod and stepped backwards. He walked around to the driver’s side and opened the door, pausing as he rested his arms on the roof. “I’m happy for you,” he said. “Still wish I hadn’t screwed us up, but I’m happy for you. Solomon’s an interesting guy.”

  “He’s one of the good guys.”

  “Let’s hope so,” said Maddox as he got into his car. When he drove away, I wondered what the hell that meant and what kind of job Maddox was interviewing for. Maybe he was due a promotion, I decided. He’d been having a good run with his own cases lately. I didn’t have to think about it too long because my cell phone rang, causing me to jump again. I answered it as I got into the driver’s seat. “Hello?”

  “Lexi Graves?” asked a woman. “My name is Marnie Vasquez.”

  “Lorena’s daughter? I’ve been trying to call you.”

  “I know. I got your message. I’m in Montgomery and was hoping we could meet. I’d like to talk to you.”

  “Yes. Yes, definitely. Where would you like to meet?”

  “My mother’s house. If that’s okay with you?”

  “Well… yes, okay. Are you sure you want to meet there?” I asked, hesitantly.

  “I have to go there sometime. I really need to talk to you about what happened. To my mother,” she added, as if I could ever erase the awful scene I discovered there. I hadn’t been back and didn’t plan to, but I couldn’t turn her down. I needed to talk to Marnie. “We don’t have to go inside if you don’t want to,” she added, surprisingly tactfully.

  “Whatever you’re comfortable with,” I replied, because no matter what I’d seen, I couldn’t imagine anything worse than losing your mother so horrifically.

  “Honestly, I’m not that comfortable there either, but I have to go there sometime,” she said again. “I’d like to get it over with. It was my home. It still is, I guess. I’m not staying there. I’m staying with a friend and her family down the street, but I’d like to talk to you privately so I guess the house will do. I’m sorry, I’m rambling. I’m a little…”

  “It’s fine. I have an appointment I can’t get out of now, but I’m free after four,” I decided, after factoring in time to talk to the class, then grab some food. I might not get a chance later on. “Is that okay?”

  Marnie agreed it was fine and hung up, leaving me with a heavy feeling that our conversation would be very hard.

  I made it to the school a few minutes before — not exactly thanking Garrett all the way — I was due to arrive and introduced myself to Chloe’s teacher. She already had the kids assembled on the floor carpet, in a horseshoe shape, and I gathered they’d just finished a story or their discussion time. I wasn’t sure. The kid thing baffled me and awed me. How could one person manage so many of them? I wondered. Wasn’t it similar to herding cats?

  The teacher didn’t appear too frazzled as she ushered me to a lumpy armchair at the front. I settled in it and smiled at the hopeful little faces in front of me. I waggled my fingers at my niece and she waved back.

  “We’re really, really excited to have Detective Graves here today,” said Mrs. Nguyen. “Isn’t that right, class?” She led a little round of applause and I started to enjoy myself. The kids were all so eager to learn and wait… what? Detective?

  “I’m not a detective,” I said.

  “Sure you are,” said Mrs. Nguyen.

  “No, I’m a private investigator. It’s like a detective, but I don’t have a badge.”

  “Do you have a gun?” asked one little boy. “Can I see it?”

  “Yes, I do, and no, you can’t. It’s… at the police station.” I didn’t dare explain why.

  “So you are a detective,” said the little boy’s friend. They nodded to each other.

  “No. I’m really not.”

  “Can I see your badge?”

  “I only have my investigator’s license, but you can see it.” I fished it from my purse and held it out.

  “Boooooring,” said the little boy.

  “That’s enough, Peter. Okay, settle down everyone. Private Investigator Graves is going to tell us a little bit about her job and how she solves mysteries.” She waved at me to continue as another adult appeared in the open doorway who beckoned her. She mouthed, “five minutes” to me as she edged away, exiting the room before I could protest. I wanted to whimper, “don’t leave me” but hey, how bad could it be? They were only kids and this was supposed to be relaxing. Maybe it would even be fun, I decided, smiling at their eager faces.

  “Are you Nancy Drew?” asked the girl who sat next to my niece. She had the cutest bunches on either side of her head and her sleeves were spattered with red… oh, it was paint. Phew!

  “No.”

  “Is your name Nancy Drew?”

  “No,” I sighed, holding up my license. “See here, on my license it says Alexandra Graves, but everyone calls me Lexi.”

  “Is too Nancy Drew. You solve mysteries and so does Nancy.”

  “Well, yes, I do solve mysteries.”

  “Knew it!”

  “But I’m not Nancy…”

  “Are too.”

  “Like I said, I’m…”

  “Do you have a TV show?” piped another kid before I could win that argument.

  “No, sorry.”

  “Nancy Drew has a TV show,” said the little girl.

  “See, I’m not…”

  “Dog, the Bounty Hunter, has a TV show!” yelled Peter.

  “Ahh, well, I’m definitely not a bounty hunter.”

  “You suck,” said the shortest kid in the front row, who had a surprisingly loud voice.

  “I thought your aunt was Nancy Drew,” sighed the little girl next to Chloe, a fat tear sliding down her cheek. She sniffed and a tear slipped from her other eye. Chloe looked up at me, absolutely appalled. I knew how she felt.

  “I thought you were cool,” she whispered.

  “Oh, my life!” I sighed as the barrage of disappointment hit me to the tune of a dozen little kids singing Dog’s theme song.

  Chapter Seventeen

  “How did it go at Chloe’s school?” Lily asked when I joined her. She was parked down the street from Perfect Brides and listening to a local radio station while looking utterly bored. I had to move three candy wrappers, a pair of binoculars, and a water bottle before I could sit on the passenger seat. “Feeling all maternal?”

  “No,” I wailed, searching for more candy. I knew Lily had to have more somewhere. She reached over, opened the glove box, and handed me a Twix. “They hated me. They were expecting Nancy Drew and I totally disappointed them. You should have seen their faces. It was like I told them Christmas was canceled.”

  “Big whoop. I’m Jewish.”

  “Hanukkah, too. And you celebrate Christmas. I’ve seen you.”

  “I celebrate anything with gifts.”

  “I need sympathy.”

  “Ahh…” Lily paused.

  “Oh, come on!” I waved the half-eaten candy bar at her.

  “To be honest, I’d be disappointed too if I was expecting Nancy Drew and got you instead. You probably ruined Chloe’s life. Have you apologized?”

  “No! She’s only little! She knows what I do for a job.” I rested my head in my hands, still chewing. “What do I do?”

  “Easy. Get your own TV show!”

  “You know I was nearly killed last night. I could have talked about that and terrified them.” I waved my injured arm at Lily. I was lucky. After swallowing two painkillers, it barely hurt, and I could take some satisfaction that the other guy came off a lot worse than I. I would be really satisfied when he was caught.

  “They would definitely remember you. I noticed last night you had a really nice manicure. It lasted really well. Not even a chip!”

  “That’s what you noticed last night?”

  “That, and I
remembered I was still pissed you didn’t ask me to come with you to the manicure bar. Oh, and I also noticed that your house is a really good party house. The amount of people in there, the flow… have you feng shui’d it yet?”

  “No. I IKEA’d it instead.”

  “I thought you got a new plant. So when are we getting manicures?"

  “You’re really not going to ask how I am?”

  “Nope. You shot the dude and you’re barely hurt. You totally won.”

  “You don’t seem very concerned about me nearly succumbing to a mad man.” Just what did one have to do for sympathy around here, I wondered. Or was my life now so crazy that even my best friend didn’t blink an eyelid after hearing a psycho came after me in my own home?

  “You’ve succumbed to loads of mad men and you’re still here. Anyway, I doubt this one was mad. Besides, I came over wearing a onesie! In public! How much more concerned can you get?”

  “Well… I guess… wait! No! Be more concerned! I’m your best friend.”

  “I was concerned!” Lily exclaimed, turning to watch two women as they entered the wedding store. “Right until I got there!”

  “So what changed?”

  “Apart from you actually being alive? Lexi, you were wearing those PJs. Anyone who’s watched a huge amount of crime TV knows that the killer only goes after the hot girls who wear nothing but matching bras and panties along with full makeup.” She waved a hand at my figure. “You were in no danger. Your hair wasn’t even done.”

  “Are you saying my jammies saved my life?”

  “That, and we should go shopping. Stat!”

  “Until then,” I said, thinking about how far my paycheck would stretch, “are we any further on the wedding dress thefts?”

  “Nope. I’ve been watching the place every evening, and so far, nothing. I’ve also been checking in on Sharon, who hasn’t noticed anything either, besides that one woman. She’s still antsy so I said I'd watch over the store this afternoon too. Hey, since I’m stuck here, can you get me a drink and a snack from across the street? I’m hungry and you ate my chocolate.”

  “Sure. And I’ll take the next shift,” I told her, feeling simultaneously magnanimous and guilty that I hadn't helped Lily more. “Solomon said I should take it easy for a day or two.”

  “Cool. Maybe Jord and I will go out for dinner, Hey, what about the gym?”

  “Dead end,” I confirmed. “Well, sort of. There was a little break in the case. I’ll tell you later.” I waved away her money and crossed the street to get Lily her snacks, feeling rather pleased that I volunteered to take over her shift. Truth be told, it wasn’t easy watching the wedding store when I had another case that was growing more confounding by the moment, but maybe a change of scenery could reboot my brain. That Lily managed to put in the surveillance hours already, around her wedding arrangements and running her bar, was commendable. She deserved a night off to hang out with Jord.

  I pulled two drinks from the tall refrigerator and grabbed a couple of candy bars, and some chips, moving to the front of the small store. As I reached the stand, the front page of the Montgomery Gazette caught my eye. “Oh no,” I groaned, reaching for it. “Damn, damn, damn.”

  “You read it, you bought it,” said the little woman behind the counter, fixing me with angry eyes as I scanned the front page.

  I pushed over a few bills and hightailed it back to the car. “We’ve been watching the wrong store,” I told Lily as I slid inside. “Another bridal store just got hit in Chester.”

  “No! You’re kidding!” Lily wailed, taking the paper from me and skimming it. “That’s thirty miles away. Look at all the designer dresses they stole!”

  “Maybe this is the last one,” I suggested, “Maybe the thieves have enough dresses now.”

  “What do they need with that many dresses anyway? Do you think it’s one of those illegal bridal rings?”

  Sometimes Lily had great ideas, sometimes they made me say, “Huh?” This was definitely a “Huh?” moment. “Huh?” I said.

  “Maybe they need the dresses for fake brides to have sham weddings to get visas?”

  “I don’t think they’d go so far as to let the sham brides choose their sham dresses.”

  “I totally would,” decided Lily. “I’d keep it and sell it afterwards. I’d insist on a honeymoon, too, just so it looked really real. We could go together!”

  “You’ve been thinking about this sham wedding a lot.”

  “Not much else to do when you’re sitting in a car for hours. I passed a lot of Candy Crush levels, too, but now I’m out of lives.”

  “Wait… what did you say about selling the dress? After?”

  “I’d sell it. There’s good money to be made from a high-end wedding dress. Between the auction websites and the seconds websites, you can almost make your money back.”

  My original suspicion was that the dresses were stolen and the re-sale value confirmed that, but the volume of thefts puzzled me. “But I don’t think you could sell that many dresses without arousing suspicion. We’re talking three to four hundred dresses missing, and they have to take up a lot of space.”

  “Where else could they go?”

  That had me stumped. I couldn’t see the thieves setting up a store, and it would be no easy feat to fence that many dresses from a trunk. For a start, barely ten dresses can fit in the average trunk, and that’s providing they weren’t puffy meringues. “I don’t know. I’ll think about it. I have to run. Lorena Vasquez’s daughter wants to meet me at her house and I don’t want to be late. Call me if there’s any news?”

  “Don’t hold your breath. Hey, give me the newspaper. Maybe I’ll call the store that just got burglarized and see if I can get any clues,” said Lily, thrusting her shoulders back with newfound conviction that she could save the day. She gave her hair a sexy swish as she grabbed her cell phone and spread the paper over the steering wheel. “I bet I can sweet talk some information out of them! Just because Perfect Brides hasn't been burglarized, doesn't mean it won't. We are still on this case!”

  I hugged Lily, told her that was a great idea, bid her goodbye and hotfooted it to my VW, pointing toward the direction of Lorena’s house. I wasn’t looking forward to the meeting. For one, I hadn’t been back to the house since finding Lorena, and the idea of being there made me extremely uncomfortable. It wasn’t because someone died there; that kind of thing didn’t creep me out. It was because Lorena died there, violently, and I liked her. I knew that whatever I felt, her daughter had to feel a hundred times worse, and she deserved to know what was going on, even that her mother’s death might be part of a larger crime. I tried to imagine going to my family home, knowing my mother was no longer there, and my throat caught. By the time I pulled up outside the house, my sniveling subsided and I got myself under control.

  Lorena’s daughter needed the truth, and yes, my sympathy, but she didn’t need me making things any worse for her. I gave myself a little shakedown, checked to see my mascara didn’t run, and climbed out, turning to face Lorena’s home, a home that was now someone else’s.

  The door opened just as I raised my hand to knock. The woman framed in the doorway was the image of Lorena’s younger self. She had the same big eyes and glossy hair, and I had no problem immediately identifying her as Marnie. She had clearly been waiting for me, but somehow I doubted it was eagerly. All the same, I admired her courage as she shook my hand and introduced herself, before inviting me in. I took a forced breath and stepped over the threshold.

  “Can I get you a drink?” the young woman asked, politely and pleasantly, almost like I just stopped by for a social visit. “There’s a shelf full of coconut water in the fridge that my mother kept stocked for after her daily runs, and I think there’s coffee too.”

  After declining Marnie’s offer of a drink, I couldn’t conceive going into the kitchen, and was grateful when she suggested we sit on the couches for our talk.

  “I was with my father when he had
his heart attack and died. I’m sorry you had to find my mother like that,” said Marnie, indicating I should sit opposite her. The door to the kitchen was closed, I noticed, and nothing was moved in the living room, barring the plastic bottle of coconut water on the coffee table, which Marnie reached for, drinking straight from the neck. Except for a wilting plant on the bookcase, it was like time stopped still.

  “I just wish I could have gotten there… here… earlier. I’m so sorry for your loss. I liked Lorena a lot,” I said, hoping she sensed the sincerity in my voice. Marnie nodded and gave me a weak smile, making me wish there was something I could do for her, something more practical. I hoped her uncle and friends were taking care of her and that she wasn’t alone.

  “She mentioned you a few times. We talked every other day on the phone, you know. She liked you too. My mom was really impressed to have a friend who was a private investigator. She said she wished she had the guts to take a job like yours.”

  “It takes more patience than guts.”

  “I imagine it does.” Marnie clasped her hands together and fell silent.

  “I don’t know how I can help you, Marnie, or what I can tell you, but I’ll try,” I told her. “You can ask me anything you want. If it's okay, I'd like to ask you a few questions too.”

  “I only really want to know what happened. The police came to my apartment when they informed me of her… her…” Marnie took a deep breath, but couldn’t finish. “When I got here, I went to the police station with my uncle to find Detective Maddox and he told me what happened to my mother and said that you found her. He called you a friend of his and my uncle said you left a couple of messages. I guess I just wanted to hear it from you.”

  “In my own words?” I asked. Marnie nodded. “Okay. I’ll tell you and you can stop me any time and ask any questions you like. Okay?”

  “Okay.”

  So, I told her everything that happened from the phone call that morning to the very end, when I called 911. Marnie asked me to repeat some parts, and had a few questions, but mostly, she stayed quiet while I talked. It wasn’t easy reliving the experience, especially now that I could totally relate to a home intrusion. I tried to speak carefully and clearly without getting emotional. When I finished, Marnie was frowning, and she stared past me, although I didn’t think she was looking at anything. She appeared deep in thought.