For Better or Hearse

by Laura Durham

  Richard shook his head. “Why would someone commit murder for him? That seems like a pretty big favor to ask. Don’t forget that Marcello was out of the industry for a while. I don’t know how much he would have stayed in touch with his old colleagues.”

  I swiveled around on my cushioned chair. “What do you mean he was out of the industry? I thought you hired him after he left the hotel side.”

  “Henri didn’t only get him fired,” Richard explained. “Marcello was blackballed for years. No one would hire him. He went into a tailspin. His wife left him. He lost custody of his daughter. He basically lost everything before I took a chance on him. It was the best hiring decision I ever made, of course. The man is a culinary genius.”

  I swallowed hard. “That’s an awful story. I had no idea.” I almost didn’t blame Marcello if he wanted to kill Henri. I didn’t want Georgia to take the fall for it, though.

  “It had to be someone on the inside to get to Henri without being noticed.” Richard snapped his menu shut. “Marcello doesn’t have the friends in the hotel world that he used to. I doubt he could have done it even if he wanted to.”

  “That makes perfect sense,” Kate said as our drinks arrived. She balanced her martini gingerly as she took a sip from the flared edge. “So many people in the hotel hated Henri that it seems silly to consider suspects who would have had to come from the outside without being noticed. I think people at the Fairmont would have noticed someone as big as Marcello poking around and trying to get someone to commit murder for him.”

  “Maybe I should tell the police what I overheard just to be on the safe side. Even if Marcello is innocent, he might be able to lead them to the killer because he knows so many cooks who hated Henri.”

  Kate lowered her drink to the table. “It’s true that birds of a feather flock to leather.”

  Fern giggled. “My kind of birds.”

  Richard rolled his eyes. “This is ridiculous. You’re going to tell the police that you overheard my head chef talking to an unknown person about something that may or may not be connected to a murder? Are you trying to ruin me? And are you sure you don’t have an ulterior motive?”

  “I don’t know what you mean,” I said dismissing his accusation.

  “I do.” Kate waved her hand in the air. “You mean Reese?”

  Fern’s eyes bounced back between Kate and Richard. “Who’s Reese?”

  “A cute detective that Annie had a crush on a while back,” Kate said.

  Fern bounced up and down on his chair. “I remember him. He was more than cute.”

  “I didn’t have a crush on him,” I protested. “We were strictly professional.”

  “I know,” Kate groaned. “Such a disappointment. Leatrice had practically picked out the wedding invitations.”

  “Didn’t he have dark hair and nice arms?” Fern raised an eyebrow.

  Kate looked surprised. “Good memory. I’m impressed.”

  Fern pointed to the room below us. “Isn’t that him over there?”

  We all followed Fern’s gaze to a table across the room. Sure enough, Reese was sitting at a low table leaning up against some beaded cushions. He wore a black knit shirt that pulled tight across his chest and showed off his tan arms. My pulse quickened until I looked across from him, then my body went cold.

  If she was a day over twenty-one, I’d have been shocked. Her long hair had been streaked blond, and she wore too much makeup and not nearly enough skirt.

  “Maybe she’s his sister.” Kate turned back around with a stricken look on her face.

  “I hope not.” Fern hadn’t taken his eyes off the couple. “I don’t think it’s appropriate to touch your sister on the leg like that. Even here.”

  “I never thought he was good enough for you, anyway.” Richard made a face. “If those are the type of bimbos he likes, then good riddance. You need someone with more sophistication and polish.”

  “I wouldn’t tell Richard about your date with Ian, then,” Kate whispered to me behind her hand.

  “Can you believe that outfit?” Fern shuddered. “Who would wear a skirt that short?”

  “Hey,” Kate cried. “I own that skirt.”

  Fern patted her on the hand. “And I’m sure on you it looks lovely, but right now we’re trashing Annabelle’s competition.”

  “Thanks, guys.” I steadied my voice. “I’m telling you, though. I don’t have a thing for Detective Reese.”

  Richard was right. If these were the type of women Reese liked, then I could forget about him. I could never compete with Miss Legs. Girls like that didn’t work sixty hour weeks and run around setting up weddings for twelve hours at a time. I reached over, took Kate’s martini out of her hand and took a long drink.

  “Are you still overcome with the urge to tell the police what you heard Marcello saying?” Richard asked after I returned the glass to a startled Kate.

  “Let Reese figure it out on his own if he’s such a great detective. He doesn’t want our help, anyway.” I beckoned the waiter over so I could order a martini of my own. “I’m trying to clear Georgia. The police are on their own.”

  After I’d ordered a French martini, Fern pulled the waiter down by the sleeve. “Give it wings, my son.”

  Chapter 15

  “I’ve been waiting up for you, dearie.” Leatrice stuck her head out of her first-floor apartment as I started up the stairs. “Do you want to watch an episode of Perry Mason with me? I found a channel that plays them late at night.”

  Just when I thought my social life couldn’t get worse.

  “I’m pretty tired, Leatrice. Kate and I were running around all day. Maybe some other time.”

  Leatrice pulled her door closed and followed me up the staircase. She wore a black apron that looked like the front of a tuxedo jacket complete with bow tie and ruffled shirt. It gave a whole new meaning to the phrase “black tie optional.” “I heard that they arrested someone for the chef’s murder.”

  I paused at the first landing and leaned against the metal banister. “Was it in the paper already?”

  Leatrice shrugged. “I don’t read the paper. Too much politics for my taste. I heard it on the scanner.”

  “Right.” How could I forget her scanner? I eyed her apron and tried to change the subject. “So, doing some cooking?”

  “Cooking?” She cocked an eyebrow at me and shook her head.

  Silly me. I should have known better than to assume anything about Leatrice’s choice of wardrobe. I should have been grateful she had clothes on underneath the apron. “Never mind.”

  “Do you know the girl they arrested?” Leatrice hurried up behind me as I took the stairs two at a time.

  “She’s a friend of mine and she didn’t do it.” I reached my doorway a bit out of breath and paused before I put the key in the lock. I thought for a second about how I could go inside without letting Leatrice in, then realized it would be impossible and opened the door anyway.

  Leatrice led the way into my living room, bouncing on her toes. It was almost scary how excited she got about crime investigation. “They arrested the wrong person?”

  “Definitely.” I kicked off my low black pumps and dropped my purse on the floor beside the couch. “Someone framed her for the murder.”

  “How do you know?” Leatrice’s eyes grew wide as she sunk into the overstuffed armchair.

  “Georgia isn’t a killer,” I said firmly. “There are lots of other people who had motive to kill the chef, as well. Better motives.”

  “Like who?”

  “Richard’s head chef, Marcello, for one.” I moved a pile of papers on the couch so I could sit. “Henri ruined his life by blackballing him from the industry over ten years ago.”

  Leatrice edged forward in the chair so her feet touched the floor. “That’s a long time to plan revenge.”

  “He’s Italian,” I explained. “From what I hear, any of the chefs who worked with Henri had strong motive to kill him.”

  “And you
think one of them committed murder and framed your friend for it?”

  “That’s where I get a little fuzzy,” I admitted. “The chefs have the strongest motives, but I don’t know why they would want to frame Georgia. The people who would want to get Georgia out of the way—like the hotel’s general manager—don’t have much of a motive for killing Henri.”

  “That does present a problem, dear.” Leatrice furrowed her brow in concentration. “It’s a shame we don’t have pictures of the event to search through for possible clues.”

  “The photographers had barely arrived at the hotel by the time we found the body,” I said, then snapped my fingers and began looking around the room. “But the videographer got there early and shot footage of the courtyard.”

  “Was that where you found the body?” Leatrice stood up and started looking with me.

  “No, but the courtyard is right outside the room where the chef was killed, and the walls to that room are all glass.” My voice quivered as I dug my hand behind the couch cushions. “The videographer could have shot something in the background without even knowing.”

  “This is so exciting.” Leatrice lifted the chair cushion and peered underneath. “What are we looking for?”

  “The phone.” I recovered it from under a blue fleece throw at the end of the couch. “I’m going to call the videographer and see if we can look at her footage. I just hope she isn’t in a chatty mood today.”

  Leatrice hurried over and stood next to me while I dialed my favorite videographer’s number by heart. Usually I loved gabbing with Joni about the latest industry gossip because she somehow knew the dirt on everyone, but today I didn’t have time for chitchat. The phone rang a few times before a soft woman’s voice answered. She sounded a little more like a phone sex operator than a videographer.

  “This is Joni, how can I help—”

  “Hey, it’s Annabelle.” I cut her off. “Sorry to be so rushed, but do you have the footage from Saturday’s wedding?”

  Joni’s voice switched from professional to relieved. “Hi, Annabelle. I’m glad it’s you. I wanted to ask you what you think I should do with this video. I have great dressing and ceremony coverage, but after that it’s all mostly mayhem. I do have a pretty good shot of everyone stampeding for the front door when the bride ran out into the courtyard in hysterics, but I don’t think she’s going to want that on her wedding video.”

  I cringed, remembering the chaos the bride had created once she came to and saw the dead chef and shattered ice sculpture. We hadn’t been able to stop her from running into her cocktail party screaming bloody murder, and it hadn’t helped matters that she had an enormous bruise on her cheek from where Fern had dropped her. No amount of editing could make that look pretty.

  Joni continued, “I tried to do the last part in slow motion and put some romantic music in the background but it looks like a chase scene in a horror movie.”

  I groaned. “That bad?”

  “Yep. It’s going to take some major work to make this look halfway presentable. You don’t think they’re in a rush for this, do you?”

  “No,” I reassured her. “I don’t think the video is their major concern right now.” I doubted the bride would be eager to relive her wedding anytime soon since I’d heard that she’d gone to a holistic healing spa “for her nerves” in lieu of taking a honeymoon.

  “I wish they’d gotten the short version instead of the long. I can make anything look great in a highlight reel. Maybe they’d agree to the short version, considering what happened.”

  “You haven’t cut any footage yet, have you?” I held my breath for the answer.

  “No way. I always keep the raw footage.”

  I let out a sigh of relief. Thank God she was as paranoid as me about keeping things.

  “You never know what you might need later,” Joni added. “I’ve had clients ask me to re-edit their video a year later because their grandmother died and they want more footage of her in the video. Or they want me to take out someone they aren’t speaking to anymore. I even had one bride ask me to redo the entire video without the groom after they got divorced. Then there was the time that—”

  “I need to ask you a huge favor, Joni.” I knew this would be a hard sell. “I need to see the raw footage of the wedding.”

  She hesitated. “You know I don’t like anyone to see the raw footage. It’s like guests walking into the ballroom during setup. It ruins the magic of the finished product.”

  “You know I wouldn’t ask if it wasn’t important,” I pleaded as Leatrice tugged on my sleeve.

  “Tell her why we need it,” Leatrice whispered.

  “I only gave the raw footage to a bride once, and that was because it was a nudist wedding. I couldn’t bear the thought of having to look at all those middle-aged naked people again.”

  “You shot a nudist wedding?” I forgot all about the murder for a moment. “Did you have to work in the nude?”

  “Of course not,” Joni gasped. “It was years ago, when I first started out in the business. I wouldn’t take a nude wedding now.”

  I had no idea there was even a market for nudist weddings in D.C. I wondered what the proper wording on the invitation would be. Would Crane’s even engrave the words “Clothing optional” in the bottom corner? Somehow I doubted it.

  Leatrice poked me in the arm. “Well?”

  “It’s really important that I see the footage before it’s edited,” I begged. “I promise to return it to you as soon as I look at it.”

  “What are you looking for?”

  If I really wanted her to show me the video, I’d need to tell her. “I think you might have recorded something through the glass walls of the Colonnade without knowing it.”

  “Really?” Joni sounded interested. “Like what?”

  I exchanged a hopeful look with Leatrice. “Like the murder.”

  Chapter 16

  “Did she agree to let you see it?” Kate’s voice crackled through my cell phone as I walked down a side street toward Georgetown’s business district. Georgetown already brimmed with energy at ten o’clock in the morning, with box trucks double-parked for their deliveries and boutique owners putting out sidewalk signs. I passed a New Age shop and noticed a sign advertising two-for-one chakra balancing, hanging amid the dangling crystals in the window. The sale would have tempted me if I had any idea what or where my chakras were.

  “After I explained our theory about Georgia being framed, Joni was more than happy to help out.” I glanced at my watch to make sure I still had enough time to get my morning frappuccino before meeting Kate. “She’s bringing it by this afternoon.”

  “Our theory?” Kate sounded amused.

  “Yes, our theory,” I insisted, dashing across M Street before the light changed. “You, me, Richard, and Leatrice.”

  “Leatrice? How did she get involved in this?”

  “You know Leatrice. Do you have to ask how she got herself involved?” I pushed the glass door to Starbucks open with my shoulder. The M Street coffee shop boasted lots of exposed brick, wood floors, and a large front window perfect for people watching. I sucked in the intoxicating aroma. Too bad I couldn’t stand drinking the stuff unless it was mixed with enough chocolate and milk to make it nearly unrecognizable as coffee. With its whipped cream topping and faintest hint of coffee flavor, the frappuccino had been the heaven-sent answer to my coffee aversion, and now I’d become addicted to them. I ordered a Grande Light Mocha Frap and congratulated myself for not splurging on a Venti.

  “This isn’t turning into one of Leatrice’s amateur sleuth projects, is it?” Kate asked. “Like the time she believed that she saw the old guy in 2B on America’s Most Wanted and started following him around in a trench coat?”

  “Of course not,” I lied, knowing full well that Leatrice considered herself an equal partner in finding the real killer and clearing Georgia whether I liked it or not. I took my drink from the counter and walked back out to M Street. “Anyway,
she hasn’t followed that guy around in ages.”

  “That’s because he moved, Annabelle. Not that I blame him. Who wants to be stalked by an eighty-year-old midget?”

  I headed down a side street toward the harbor, taking small sips of my frappuccino. “She’s not a midget, and you know it, Miss Smart Aleck.”

  “Maybe not legally, but she is pretty small,” Kate argued good naturedly. “I think she’s shrinking, too.”

  I arrived in front of the trendy flower shop, Lush. Monochromatic bunches of green and white flowers sat in galvanized buckets in the window. I tried the door. Locked. “How far away are you?”

  “Right around the corner,” she said as I saw her red car squeal around the curb, clipping the edge of the sidewalk. She parallel parked semilegally at the end of a row of cars and hopped out. “Are we the first ones here?”

  “The boys must be running late,” I called out as she strode across the street. By “the boys” I meant the two floral designers, Buster and Mack, who owned Lush and had become our new favorites. Their edgy modern designs were only one of the reasons they weren’t your typical florists.

  I heard a low rumble in the distance. In a few seconds two shiny chrome Harley-Davidson motorcycles appeared around the corner. They growled to a stop in front of us, and the massive riders, clad almost entirely in black leather, dismounted the bikes. The color of their goatees, one brown and one red, was the only way to tell them apart from a distance. They pulled off black helmets and pushed their riding goggles onto the tops of their heads. The “Mighty Morphin Flower Arrangers,” as they preferred to be called in the biker world, had arrived.

  “I swear those pants must be special order,” Kate said under her breath. “I don’t think Big and Tall shops in Washington carry leather. Not stretch leather, at least.”

  Buster of the dark brown goatee took two long steps to reach us. “Would you believe we got pulled over?”