by Laina Turner
Accessories & Alibis
By
Laina Turner
Presley Thurman Mystery #10
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Copyright 2014 Laina Turner
Laina Turner
Five Seas Ink Publishing
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Chapter 1
“Are you both ready?” Jim, my attorney said.
“I’ve been ready. We need to hurry up and get this over with soon. I have a meeting in thirty minutes,” James said, looking at his watch impatiently. Typical behavior as James was one of those people who gave the impression he didn’t have time for you. That he always had somewhere else to be, somewhere else to go that was much more important. I had learned not to take it personal. He acted like this with everyone. That much I had learned about him from our previous dealings.
It was all could do to keep from rolling my eyes at his behavior, but since I was sitting in a lawyer’s office getting ready for James to sign over a former million dollar business, I thought I would be an adult and refrain and act like a soon to be business owner. I was dressed the part in a black pantsuit from Niemen Marcus so I should probably behave like it as well. But it wasn’t easy because he was such a jackass. Even in light of him giving me this opportunity, he was still a jackass.
My name is Presley Thurman, thirty something, HR director turned food blogger now about to be a business owner. There were many other jobs in between, but some things are better left glossed over. The reason I was sitting in my attorney’s office right now was in between the HR gig and now, I had been a manager for a high-end clothing boutique named Silk. The boutique owner, Solange, James’ wife, was murdered, so James inherited the store and had let it run into the ground. In an uncharacteristic moment of niceness on his part, and I was still looking for the ulterior motive as nice wasn’t one of James’ qualities, he had recently called and offered to give the business to me.
I was still unsure of the real reason he wanted to make this seemingly generous gift. He had many other businesses, and this one wasn’t important to him, and it would have been easier for him to shut it down. He said he didn’t want just to close it down since it was his dead wife’s. He wanted her legacy to live on and all that. A wonderful sentiment, but coming from James I was skeptical, especially since they had been going through a divorce at the time of her death, so it didn’t make sense he would care now. While it was a generous thing he was doing, it wasn’t all rainbows and unicorns. The company had serious financial problems, and while I was not on the hook for all the money owed, it was still going to make it very challenging to restore Silk to the profitable store it once was. That had been my biggest concern with doing this. Starting in the hole. But as my friend Katy, who was a business owner, and my accountant said, if I started a business from scratch I would be in the hole with loans and start-up costs. So it wasn’t much different and at least Silk had clientele and a reputation.
So here we were. Moments away from signing on the dotted line giving me more responsibility and more debt than I had ever had except my mortgage, which freaked me out, but was exciting at the same time. I knew what Silk was capable of and even though I was nervous, I knew there was the potential to restore it to its former glory.
“Ok, I need you James to sign here and here. Then Presley you need to sign in the same two places under his name,” Jim said, sliding the paper over to James, who signed it and slid it over to me. Signing my name with shaking hands, I finished and slid the papers back to him. This was more nerve wracking than when I had bought my condo, which had been another risky financial proposition that had paid off. The only reason I had been able to afford that place was its location in a rundown building in an area that was less than desirable. A development company had bought the building and had said their goal was to revitalize and bring new life to the area. To get that process they had priced some of their units at a steal. I took a gamble, much to my mother’s dismay; she worried about me living in the city, but now a few years later it had paid off. I hoped Silk would be the same.
Jim picked the papers up, looked at them and sat them back down again. “That’s it. I will have my clerk file these this afternoon. Congratulations to you both.”
“That’s it?” I said tentatively. It seemed so easy, much easier than signing a mortgage.
“That’s it,” Jim smiled at me. He had been referred to me by my roommate Jared’s boss and had done all the due diligence on researching Silk, along with my accountant. Trying to make sure it wasn’t involved in the financial and legal mess that James’ other businesses were. James was currently involved in an ongoing fraud investigation pertaining to some money handling issues with his other businesses. Jim had also assured me; like all my friends had that I could handle it. I was happy to have so many people who had confidence in me, but hoped it was well placed. I didn’t always feel that confident about myself and had never owned a business. I knew I had so much to learn.
We all stood up and shook hands. “Well James, I guess this is it,” I said, not knowing what the right words were to say to thank him. They didn’t make a hallmark card for this one. Even operating in the red it was a pretty big gift.
“Good luck,” he said gruffly and walked out of the room presumably to rush to his important meeting.
“Thanks for everything, Jim,” I said.
“Not a problem,” he said handing me an envelope of paperwork. “Here are all the contracts you currently have existed with vendors. I looked them over and talked to the vendors who had cut you off. You have some terms that are pretty outrageous, due to the nonpayment issues, but they are willing to sell to you on credit, which you need to get this backup and to run. In six months we can go back to them and if you’ve paid on time, hopefully, renegotiate. Right now I’m afraid there isn’t much you can do besides give them to what they’re asking if you want to keep merchandise coming in.”
“Thank you. I was wondering how I was going to have a way to pay them if I didn’t have something to sell because they wouldn’t fill my orders. It’s quite the catch 22. At least having merchandise in the store will give me a fighting chance to make sales happen. I’m grateful they were this willing.”
“You’re going to be fine. I know you will.”
“Thanks again, Jim.” I walked out of the conference room and back to the reception area where Katy was waiting for me with a huge grin on her face. She was excited for me. Katy was my best friend from childhood. And was in the process of selling her beauty salon in the town where we grew up. She was temporarily moving up here to Chicago to help me get Silk off the ground and running. Until she figured out what her next move was, I had guilted her into helping me, saying I wouldn’t do it otherwise because she had experience as a business owner, and I needed her. She had wanted a change, and I needed help, so it seemed the perfect temporary solution for both of us. She didn’t want me to give up this opportunity so here she was, and I felt so lucky to have her
help. This was going to be a lot of work, but I was ready for it, especially with her by my side.
“It’s official! I am now a business owner!” I said, probably a little too loudly for this quiet office, pumping my fist in the air.
Katy jumped up and hugged me. “I am so proud of you! What do you want to do first? Celebrate or go to the store and check out your empire?”
“Hardly an empire yet. I think you have to make money before you can consider yourself an empire. Tonight we are celebrating with everyone so let’s head to the store. No time like the present to dig in, I’ve got bills to pay!” The vendors hadn’t been the only people he had stiffed. He hadn’t always paid the employees on time either, and it had been quite the revolving door and the condition of the store reflected it. The most recent manager James hired was a young girl named Roxanne. I had met her once for a few minutes, and she seemed very well put together, but hadn’t seemed like store manager was one of her skill sets. The store had been a shambles and looked very unappealing. I couldn’t imagine any of the customers I had known from working here before coming in here to shop. Not when the store was in this condition. I was hoping once I cleaned up and re-launched Silk, I could attract those customers back. I was hanging my future on that happening.
“Alright, let’s go,” she said.
We hailed a cab and headed to the store with a quick stop at Starbucks. Being an addict, I had to fortify myself with a caffeine fix. Soon we walked in the front door of the store. The sight before me almost made me want to turn around and walk back out, but I couldn’t. As messy as, it was it was my mess now, no turning back. Katy could sense my hesitation and give me a hug.
“C’mon, you knew it was bad. Just think it is only going up from here. You can do this!”
I looked at her. “I think it’s worse than last time. How is that even possible?” I said quietly not wanting the employees to hear, waving hello at them. Over the Christmas holiday, I had come in for the first time in months, and I could notice a difference in where the store was from my last visit. Then James made me this offer and while the deal was finalizing it had continued to go downhill. The good employees had all left, and I was looking at 2000 square feet of half empty racks and the ones that held clothes were unorganized and many items were falling off the hangers. The sight of thousand dollar dresses touching the floor made me shudder. There wasn’t a single customer in here and if someone did walk in they would probably walk back out. At least the higher end customers used to shopping here. The way it looked now was more garage sale than high couture. In fact, I had seen garage sales that were better merchandised.
“Yeah, I think it is,” Katy agreed, “but it’s going to be OK. You’re here now,” she tried to reassure me.
“Maybe we should close until we can fix it?” We had discussed at length how to handle the transition and a re-launch, knowing this was going to take a lot of work. However, had decided it would be better to stay open while we were fixing things so the people that did come in we could tell to come back and see the new and improved Silk. At least that would give us a chance to connect with people, but looking at this I wasn’t sure we’d be able to convince anyone to come back after seeing it like this. It might do us more harm than good.
“Nope. Let’s stick to the plan. It won’t take that long to clean and get what is here organized. These girls just need direction, and if they can’t take it, we will find new ones. Closing would send people elsewhere without us being able to tell them to come back. I don’t think that is a good idea,” Katy said.
“You’re right,” I said, and we walked through the store to the back office saying hi to Roxanne and the other employees as we passed them.
The thought of closing was still in my head when a few minutes later I heard the sound of several people walking through the door. I peeked out the door to the front hoping it was a group of motivated shoppers and wanting to see how the employees up front handled them. Instead, I saw three police officers walking up to the cash register. I walked up to meet them with Katy right behind me, heart pounding. Wondering what was going on.
“Can I help you, Officer?” I asked the one in front, my brain racing trying to figure out why they were in my store. There was nothing like the appearance of the police to make you feel instantly guilty even when you hadn’t done anything wrong.
“We’re here for Roxanne Baxter,” he said and Roxanne, who was on the other side of the room, slowly turned around. By the look on her, face police coming in and asking for her wasn’t something she had been expecting when she came to work today. She looked confused, embarrassed and scared, as she looked in my direction.
“Roxanne Baxter,” he repeated and she nodded. “You’re under arrest.
Chapter 2
“What’s happening, Presley,” Katy whispered from behind me.
“One of our sales girls is getting arrested I think,” I said more calmly than I felt, trying to take in the situation and sarcastically thinking what a wonderful start to my new venture this was. It all felt surreal.
“I can see that. You know what I mean.”
“Are you wondering, how I could get so damn lucky to be given this wonderful opportunity that on my very first day of business ownership I’m faced with the police coming in and arresting one of my employees?” My voice rising against my will. I didn’t want to add to the spectacle.
“Yeah, that’s exactly what I was thinking,” she whispered, ignoring my tone. “Being around you is never boring.”
“What are you doing?” Roxanne’s voice broke into my thoughts as the policeman pulled out his handcuffs and asked her to put her hands behind her back.
“Ma’am, calm down you are under the arrest for the murder of Drew Conner. You have the right to remain silent…”
The cop continued, and I turned to Katy and said, “Murder? This is happening?” I had just assumed she had some less nefarious infraction, such as an unpaid parking ticket or Jay walking, or even writing a bad check. Something like that. A crime, but not a major crime.
Two of the three cops started to lead Roxanne out. “Presley, I’m innocent. I swear! I’m being framed!” she cried as they took her out the door to the waiting squad car I could see outside. The cop who had initially spoken walked back over to us.
“Are you her manager?” he asked.
“You could say that; I guess. I own the place.”
“You guess?” his eyebrows lifted questioningly, giving me that look that made me question everything coming out of my mouth for fear it would be taken wrong.
“I own this place as of about an hour ago and arrived minutes before you did,” I explained.
He chuckled though I saw nothing funny about this situation. “Sorry. What a rough first day,” he said, and it seemed like he meant it though I still didn’t find the situation funny.
“You can say that again. So Roxanne murdered someone?”
“Allegedly,” he corrected me. “I am going to need to ask your staff some questions if you don’t mind.”
Even if I did I doubted there was much I could do about it. I presumed his was a rhetorical question and to not comply would be obstructing justice or some such thing, and I did have a healthy respect for the police. Besides the minute, the cops walked in the customer's shopping had walked out, and the two other staff members were just staring at us dumbfounded so it’s not like they were going to get anything else done.
“There is an office in the back room. Go ahead and take them back there if you want to so you can have more privacy. Just get it over with.”
“Thanks. I’m Officer Castillo by the way.”
“Presley Thurman,” I said shaking his hand.
Officer Castillo took the staff to the back room, and Katy and I both slumped against the counter. I took a drink of my coffee and realized I still had my coat on. Seriously, I hadn’t even been here long enough to take my coat off and already one of my employees had been arrested for murder. I couldn’t believe
this.
“Why? Why does this happen to me?” I said and sat my coffee down to take off the dark grey wool coat I had worn over my basic black suit and pearls I felt said professional, and stuffed it under the counter. I didn’t want to go back to the office where I had originally planned to put it. Who knows what would happen if I went back there again. The counter was probably full of dust that would cover my coat when I took it back out, but right now I didn’t care. Katy took hers off as well but took the time to hang it up on a rack.
“You’re just lucky like that. C’mon, I know it’s a little disappointing that this is your first day and all owning Silk but just think this will be a great story someday that will be fun to tell,” Katy said, trying to lighten the mood.
I rolled my eyes. “If you say so. Do you think we should change our plans and close now? You know with what just happened. Then re-open for the re-launch? I wished I could close my eyes, and when I opened them, this wouldn’t have happened.
“No, I don’t. I think the best course of action is business as usual. I know it sounds crazy, but the best way to overcome this newest problem is to get so busy you forget about it. I say we get started right now. It’s early, and we can get in a few hours of work evaluating what needs to be done here.”
“Get our strategy together, work in the store, pretend my employee didn’t just get arrested, and move forward?”
“Exactly,” Katy said.
I knew she was right. It was just hard to not let it get me down just a little.
“Why do you think she called out to me that she was innocent? I’m surprised she even remembered who I was. Much less feel like she knew me enough to ask for help,” I said, a few minutes later, thinking talking about it might help, and rummaged in my purse for a ponytail holder, pulling my thick red hair out of my face.
“Good question. Ask her,” Katy said and pointed to one of the staff who had just come from the backroom after talking with Officer Castillo. She looked upset, and I could tell she had been crying. From seeing Roxanne being carted away or the experience with Officer Castillo or both, I didn’t know, but she was a wreck. Not that I could blame her. If only I could remember her name. I was so bad with names and had only met her once.
