Crushed Velvet

by Diane Vallere

  “How’d you guess?” I said with a mouth full of the cucumber and avocado sandwich.

  She rolled her eyes at me. “I don’t know how you eat that healthy crap.”

  “Healthy? This is my third form of bread today. What do you get from Earl’s?”

  “Basket of onion rings and a roast beef sandwich. So, what’s the deal with Phil?”

  I swallowed. “I hired Phil to pick up some fabric for me when he was in Los Angeles today. When the truck rolled up in front of the store, some other driver was behind the wheel and Phil’s body was in the back buried under my fabric. Those bolts weigh like twenty pounds each. I don’t know if he was dead before he was put in there or not, but you’re talking about over two hundred pounds of fabric on top of him. If he was alive, he might not have lasted the trip from Los Angeles.”

  “So Clark was here?”

  “Yes, Sheriff Clark was here. I tried to get him to tell me something, but he wouldn’t.”

  “What do you want to know?” she asked. “Maybe I can help you out.”

  I leaned back against the bench. “How? Five minutes ago you didn’t even know about this. How did you not know about this? Your shop is across the street.”

  “I was out of town this morning. Personal business.”

  I knew better than to ask. When it came to her personal life, Charlie would tell me what she wanted me to know when she wanted me to know it. It was her version of control. She hated that I’d figured out part of her secret within a week of being in San Ladrón, and now did what she could to maintain what was left of it.

  “Okay, so what can you tell me about Phil Girard?”

  “For starters, he was cheating on his wife with the woman who just left my garage.”

  I wasn’t sure what I expected Charlie to tell me, but it wasn’t that. “He was—on Genevieve—with the stripper?”

  “She prefers showgirl, if you ever end up in a face-to-face conversation, but yes.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Phil brought his van in last month. I found a pink garter belt under the floor mat on the passenger side. I told him Genevieve didn’t look like the type to wear a garter belt and he turned as red as the beet soup she serves on Thursdays. At first I thought it was funny, you know, this normal couple who lives in this normal town gets their kicks by spicing things up in the back of the delivery van.”

  “Maybe they do,” I said.

  “Not on your life. The next day I made sure to detail the whole car and I found a flyer for Babs Green’s show. There was a kiss mark on the back of the flyer—same shade of pink as the lingerie. I made a crack to Phil about Babs matching her lipstick to her underwear and he got mad. He said if I ever told anybody about the two of them he’d come after me. I told him to make it worth my while to keep my mouth shut.”

  “You blackmailed him?” I asked, shocked at her admission.

  She waved her hand. “I negotiated. Needed a couple of parts so I could rebuild the transmission on a ’72 Hornet. I made enough on that job to pay my rent and then some. Guess that was short-lived. Babs found out that I knew and that he’d paid me to keep quiet.”

  “Is that what she was so mad about?”

  She nodded. “What’s weird is that she wanted the world to know about her and Phil. She was more mad that he’d paid me to keep quiet than that I’d blackmailed him. All things considered, you’d think it would be the other way around.”

  “Does Genevieve know about them?”

  “If she does, it’s not because I told her. I was planning on milking that cow for a good long time. But if you want my opinion, she’s better off without him. She knows that, right?”

  “I don’t know. I haven’t seen her since we found the body.”

  “She skipped?” Charlie asked.

  “I don’t know where she went. I left her a couple of messages and I went to her tea shop. Her new employee was there, but she wasn’t. The shop was locked up.”

  “How’d you get in?” Charlie asked.

  “Genevieve left a set of keys in the plant behind the café. I went inside and left her a note. The computer had a couple of files open, like someone had been in the middle of something and was interrupted.”

  “Did you tell Clark?”

  “Tell him what? That Genevieve left some files open on her computer? I hardly think that’s his business.”

  “He wants to talk to her, I bet.”

  “Yes. I don’t know why she left. I mean, I’m sure she was upset. He was her husband. But where did she go? And even if she wants to be alone, why is she avoiding the police? It’s not like she could have had anything to do with it. He was killed in Los Angeles.”

  “You don’t know that.”

  “Charlie,” I started. “The van pulled up in front of my store and Phil was dead in the back.”

  “That doesn’t mean he was killed in Los Angeles.” Charlie picked up a strip of turkey from the tinfoil and held it down for Needles. “I don’t think Frenchy killed her husband any more than you do, but she’s not doing herself any favors by avoiding Sheriff Clark.”

  Pins swarmed around our ankles, meowing for his own piece. I held my sandwich down toward the floor. He sniffed it and walked away.

  “I don’t know what Genevieve’s going through right now, but I feel like I need to talk to her. Phil was her connection to the San Ladrón community. Without him, she’s all alone,” I said.

  We both grew quiet. I finished my sandwich and put my plate in the sink. I looked out the back window and noticed a woman in the parking lot. She was wrapped in a blanket that covered her head, making her look like a monk. Her eyes darted left and then right. The blanket shifted back on her head and I recognized Genevieve’s soft blond curly hair.

  I unlocked the window frame and pushed it up. “Gen?” I called.

  She looked up. Even from the distance of two stories above the parking lot I could tell she’d been crying. She put a hand up in front of her and waved it side to side, and pointed to the back door.

  “Wait there,” I said. I turned to Charlie. “Genevieve’s in the parking lot. I’ll be right back.”

  I ran down the stairs and across the exposed concrete floor of the fabric shop. I skidded around the corner of a display of silk and tulle I’d been working on and reached the back door. When I opened it, Genevieve stood in front of me, bundled up like a dethroned princess from one of Grimm’s fairy tales.

  “Come in, hurry,” I said. She bustled past me and I locked the door behind her. “Where have you been?” I asked. “I’ve been calling you all day.”

  “Poly, you have to help me,” she said. “I’m afraid—”

  “Don’t be afraid, Genevieve. I know it’s scary to think you’re on your own now, but it’ll be okay.”

  “No, that’s not it. I’m afraid I killed my husband.”

  Four

  “Come again?” said Charlie from the bottom of the stairs. Genevieve looked past me at her, then back to me. Despite the blanket, she was shaking.

  “Charlie, go upstairs and get the brandy,” I said. “It’s in the cabinet in the living room.”

  Charlie turned around and climbed the stairs. I looked for something for Genevieve to sit on. The only chairs in the fabric store were in the front by the work station, but there was a small plastic stepstool by the shelves I’d been clearing off early last week. I moved the stool to her, guided her down, and handed her a package of tissue paper from the register. I rolled an already-dirty bolt of burlap in front of her and straddled it like it was a log.

  “Genevieve, why do you think you killed Phil?”

  “I’m almost sure of it. And now the sheriff’s office wants to talk to me, and I can’t go to jail, Poly! I’ll lose the shop and the house and everything I have.” She sniffled.

  “Slow down. Tell me what happened.�
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  Charlie returned with a heavy cut-crystal glass that held an inch of amber liquid. She offered it to Genevieve, who took it with both hands and drank. She lowered the glass, looked up at Charlie, then raised it again and finished it off. She set it on the floor. Charlie stooped down and picked it up.

  “Poly, can I see you for a second?” Charlie asked. She set the glass on the white laminate wrap stand and walked to the back of the store.

  “Wait here,” I said to Genevieve, even though she showed no signs of moving. “I’ll be right back.” I followed Charlie to the back door.

  “I’m going to take off,” she said in a low voice. “Frenchy’s not going to talk around me. That’s fine. I’m going to the sheriff’s office. Clark can’t show up here if I’ve got him detained there. If she needs a place to stay, she can stay with me. Nobody will look for her there. I’ll call you when I’m back at my place and we’ll work something out.”

  She unlocked the door and slipped out. I locked it behind her and went back to Genevieve.

  “Tell me what happened, Gen.”

  “I was mad at Phil when he left yesterday. We had a fight at the tea shop. That’s why he went to Los Angeles a day early instead of leaving Monday morning. Remember I mentioned the food distributor? His name is Topo di Sali. Phil wanted me to sell to him. I accused him of setting up a meeting without me. He didn’t deny it. He said I was being selfish by not considering what it would do for us. I was so mad, I wanted to punish him.”

  “What did you do?”

  “Before the fight, before everything, I was planning to make him a basket of food to take on the trip—you know, sandwiches like the ones I brought you this morning. That’s how I knew I had the supplies to make them when you asked. I thought if Phil realized what a considerate wife I was, he’d start to appreciate me more. But after the fight, he stormed out of the store. I got mad. I packed his basket with sandwiches and a batch of catnip tea.”

  “Catnip?”

  “I read about it on a tea blog. It’s very relaxing, and I thought Phil needed to calm down. When I first experimented with it, Phil complained that it made him sick. This was a different blend from that first one, but, Poly, if he got sick from the catnip, I might have killed him!” She doubled over, her face in her hands, her shoulders shaking with sobs. I held out a piece of tissue paper to her. She took it and blew her nose like a foghorn.

  “When I looked in the back of the van, I saw the empty container. He drank it. All of it. And he’s dead. People are going to think I did it because I was mad at him. They’re going to think I killed him on purpose!”

  “What about Rick, the man who drove the truck? Do you know him?”

  She sniffled. “His name is Rick Penwald. He lives in the town next to San Ladrón. He has his own delivery company, and he helped get Phil started. Sometimes he borrows Phil’s van when he wants to make smaller deliveries.”

  “Isn’t that like taking business from Phil?”

  “No, he only borrows it when he knows Phil is on his taxi route, so it’s no bother. And he throws business to Phil all the time. I always thought when the tea shop took off, Phil would turn his delivery route over to Rick.”

  I thought about the van that I’d seen. “But the truck said Special Delivery on the side.”

  “That’s Rick’s company. He has a magnetic sign that he can put on whatever vehicle he needs.”

  “So that was your van? And he put his sign on it and drove it here with Phil in the back?”

  “That’s what he usually does when he borrows it,” she said. She wiped her face with the edge of the blanket. A fresh wave of tears poured forth.

  “What else did you see when you looked in the back of the van?”

  “I saw Phil’s arm and I saw the tea container rolling around. I knew what happened. Poly, I have pitchers of that stuff at the shop. The police are going to put it all together and come after me. I can’t let that happen, Poly. What am I going to do? I lost my husband. I can’t lose my business and my home. I can’t lose my whole life. I’m all alone now. I’m going to lose everything!” She buried her face in her blanket-covered hands and her shoulders shook with sobs.

  I closed my eyes and thought back to what I’d seen inside the back of the van. Genevieve was right, there had been an empty tea container next to Phil’s hand. I wasn’t certain, but thought there had been a logo from Tea Totalers on the outside of it. There had also been crumbs scattered on the floor around it. Had he eaten the contents of the picnic basket when he drank the tea? And if so, would the police be able to determine anything from the contents of his stomach?

  But after he ate or drank whatever she had packed for him, his body had been buried under the fabric. No matter what was in the picnic basket that Genevieve sent him to Los Angeles with, there was no way he would have buried himself under the fabric after being poisoned. Maybe Genevieve had accidentally slipped Phil a Mickey, but that wasn’t what killed him. And as long as Sheriff Clark was holding my fabric hostage as part of his investigation, I was going to do my darnedest to figure out what did.

  I moved from the burlap to the stool and put my arm around Genevieve’s shaking shoulders. “It’s going to be okay,” I said. “You don’t know if Phil was poisoned. You don’t know how he died. I know you feel scared and alone, but you’re not. I’m going to help you through this. You didn’t kill your husband. I believe that.”

  “But the police might not. Especially if they find out about our financial troubles and the fight. There were people at Tea Totalers when we fought. Mr. di Sali was there. Customers, too. There’s no way people didn’t hear us argue.”

  I knew Sheriff Clark knew about the financial troubles. I knew it because even if nobody else had said anything, I had. All the more reason to help Genevieve get past this.

  “I want you to listen to me. Something else happened on that trip to Los Angeles. Can you give me a list of what he was getting for you?”

  She nodded. “I keep all of my shopping lists on the computer at the store. I can print you a copy tomorrow.”

  “You’re going to open the shop tomorrow?”

  “Maybe I shouldn’t. I don’t know what to do. If I don’t open for business, I won’t be able to pay my bills, and now that Phil’s gone—” Her voice caught in her throat and she stopped talking.

  I had an idea. “Wait here. I have something to show you.”

  I left Genevieve sitting on the stepstool and I went to the sewing station in the corner, where I’d been working on the secret French-themed makeover for her café. I carried the pile of completed items back to where she sat, hoping to temporarily distract her from her troubles.

  “I’ve been working on a surprise for your tea shop. A French renovation with fabric.” I held up a partially finished apron made of blue-and-cream toile. “I’ve only been working with fabrics that my aunt and uncle bought in France. I have tablecloths, seat cushions, aprons, placemats, and curtains.” I held up the cuttings of fabric with the rooster. “I haven’t had time to frame these yet, but I thought they’d be nice to decorate the walls with.”

  Genevieve’s smile was small but genuine. “When did you have the time to do this?”

  “I started it after we first met. I haven’t been able to sleep much now that the grand opening is getting close. This relaxes me. And it was fun.” I leaned against the wrap stand and refolded the apron. “Here’s what I’m thinking.”

  I outlined my idea. Genevieve would hang a sign announcing that Tea Totalers was under renovation. With the store closed, I could easily come and go under the guise of measurement taking. And hopefully, by the time Tea Totalers was the French paradise she’d always dreamed it would be, Genevieve would be experiencing La Liberté and not become one of Les Miserables.

  “It sounds perfect. I hope I’m around to see it when it’s done,” Genevieve said.

 
“Don’t talk like that. You didn’t do anything to bring this on yourself. Now come upstairs with me.” I held out a hand and pulled her to her feet. Her blond curls had turned frizzy and moved in wisps around her face. She blew at the strands that fell in front of her eyes and kept the blanket tightly wrapped around her like a protective shell. We marched up the stairs to the living room. “Lie down and try to relax.”

  I brought Genevieve a fluffy pillow from the hall closet. It was encased in a cotton pillowcase printed with tiny pink rosebuds. A ruffle of pale green that matched the leaves and stems in the pattern framed out the pillow. I tucked the pillow under her head and covered her with a soft, white crocheted afghan. She closed her eyes. Even breathing followed. I retrieved the empty brandy glass from downstairs and carried it into the kitchen.

  Charlie called at nine thirty. “How’s Frenchy?” she asked.

  “She’s passed out on my sofa. Either too much brandy or sheer exhaustion. Probably both. I think we have a plan. She’s going to close the tea shop for renovations. I’ll handle them. That’ll give her a reason not to interact with the general public, at least for a while.”

  “Did you find anything out from her?”

  “There’s a food distributor who wants to buy her tea recipes, and Phil was pushing her to sell. They had a big fight before he left and a bunch of people saw.”

  “Anything else?

  “She said the driver of the delivery van knew Phil. I want to talk to him. I think there’s something fishy about the fact that he didn’t know his ‘friend’ was dead in the back of the truck. He must know something. Did Clark mention him?”

  “I said I was going to detain him. I didn’t say we discussed the case.”

  “How’d you detain him?”

  “He’s been pestering me about looking at his radiator. Clark wants to talk to Frenchy, but I get the feeling he knows something he’s not saying. We have to keep her out of sight. Tell her to come to my auto shop tomorrow morning around six.”

  “Why are you helping her?” I asked.

  There was a pause on the other end of the phone. “Maybe I’m trying to broaden my social circle,” she said. “Six A.M. Don’t forget.” She hung up.