Tote Bags and Toe Tags

by Dorothy Howell

  I whipped into the driveway and skidded to a stop. No police cars, no plain vanilla Crown Vics the detectives drove, no news crews, no helicopters circling overhead, no firefighters—not that I was really anxious to see them, of course.

  I hurried into the house. Everything was silent. I didn’t bother checking in the kitchen—why would Mom be in there?—but caught sight of her through the patio door.

  Mom sat under an umbrella table by the pool wearing a bathing suit—maybe she expected firefighters, too—sipping a fruit drink. She had on a loose wrap, two-inch heels, sunglasses, and full-on jewelry.

  As I walked outside, Mom gestured to her cell phone and day planner on the table in front of her.

  “Don’t worry. I have everything under control,” she said.

  If my mom has everything under control—that’s the best time to worry.

  “Everyone will arrive this afternoon at two,” Mom said.

  Police detectives were scheduling appointments now?

  “Mom, what’s going on?” I asked. “What are you talking about?”

  “The caterer, of course,” she said. “For this evening’s dinner party.”

  “What about Juanita?” I might have yelled that.

  Mom bristled slightly. “This entire incident is very disconcerting,” she said. “It’s nearly taken all the joy out of my dinner party.”

  I drew in a big breath and forced myself to calm down.

  Where was my real family when I needed them?

  “Mom,” I said. “You told me Juanita had been kidnapped. You received a ransom demand.”

  “Yes. A rather disagreeable young woman showed up here this morning jabbering incoherently about Juanita and money,” Mom said.

  “What did she say—exactly?” I asked.

  Mom waved her perfectly manicured hand. “I have no idea. She must have been speaking some arcane language, because I understood only a few words. And you know how fluent I am.”

  Mom’s idea of fluent was knowing how to ask, “Do you take American Express?” in multiple languages.

  I got a weird feeling.

  “Like maybe Romanian?” I asked.

  I’d had a run-in with a Romanian woman—long story—a few weeks ago. It hadn’t turned out so great.

  “Perhaps,” Mom said.

  My weird feeling got weirder.

  “Or Russian?”

  Around that same time, a maybe-or-maybe-not Russian mobster had vowed he wouldn’t forget me—or what I’d done.

  “Possibly,” Mom said.

  “What did you do?” I asked.

  “I insisted she leave, of course, and assured her I would call the authorities if she came here again,” Mom said.

  “Did you call the police?” I asked.

  A few strands of her hair fell across her cheek. She spent a full minute—which seemed like an hour—smoothing them back into place.

  I thought she’d forgotten my question, then she finally said, “I didn’t call the police. Why would I? I called you.”

  Mom rose from her chair and gathered her phone and day planner. “The important thing is that my dinner party will be handled properly this evening.”

  Chin up, shoulders back, Mom pageant-walked into the house.

  I left.

  I drove to Juanita’s house. When I’d been here before, the place had looked empty. Now it looked deserted.

  I got a yucky feeling in my stomach.

  I rang the bell and knocked on the front door. No response.

  I raced around back. Her car was still in the garage. In the kitchen, dirty glasses still sat on the counter.

  These things had seemed so normal. Now they looked sinister. The Chevy in the garage meant Juanita hadn’t left on her own. The dishes on the counter told me she’d left in a hurry.

  The yucky feeling in my stomach got yuckier.

  I walked around to the front of the house and stood under the covered porch. Already, the day was heating up. The neighborhood was coming to life. Down the block, a guy was washing his car. A few kids were playing across the street.

  How could everything look so normal?

  Of course, there could have been a lot of reasons Juanita left dirty dishes in her kitchen and her car in her garage. But why hadn’t she called Mom saying she wouldn’t be at work? And who had showed up at Mom’s place this morning demanding money?

  Juanita had worked for our family for years, and I’m sure she’d shared some choice stories about Mom—not that I blamed her, of course—with her friends and family members. So most everybody knew who Juanita worked for and that our family was somewhat well-off.

  Was this some kind of new kidnapping scheme? Take the servants instead of the children? The servants would be less trouble, and some families probably liked their help better than their kids.

  I mean that in the nicest way, of course.

  Stepping off the porch, I crossed the front yard and went out the gate. I had to call Detective Shuman. Yeah, okay, I knew there could be a reasonable explanation for Juanita’s disappearance, but I couldn’t wait any longer to figure it out.

  Jeez, I really hope I hadn’t waited too long already.

  As I rounded my car to get in on the driver’s side, I pulled out my cell phone.

  “Hello? Excuse me,” someone called.

  A young woman pushing a baby in a stroller waved from across the street, then checked traffic and crossed.

  “Excuse me,” she said again. “Are you a friend of Juanita’s?”

  I figured her for about my age. Her blond hair was in a ponytail and she had that I-didn’t-put-on-makeup-and-I-don’t-care look.

  I didn’t want to get into the whole maybe-she-was-kidnapped thing with her, so I said, “She’s been a friend for years.”

  “I’m worried about her,” she said. “Maybe it’s nothing, but, well, I live across the street, and the other night I was up with Riley.”

  She gestured to the little girl in the stroller, who was smiling and chewing on the toe of her shoe.

  “I saw Juanita leave,” she said. “Two men were with her. She was crying.”

  Oh my God. Juanita really had been kidnapped.

  Oh my God. Mom was right.

  “Listen, if you should see her, or anything else weird going on, would you let me know?” I asked.

  “Sure,” she said.

  I got her name, and we programmed each other’s numbers into our cell phones.

  “Do you think we should call the police, or something?” she asked.

  “I’ll handle it,” I told her.

  I jumped into my car and drove away.

  I didn’t know what was going on, exactly, but that maybe-Romanian-or-maybe-Russian woman at Mom’s house this morning weirded me out big time.

  I only knew one thing for sure.

  The cops wouldn’t do.

  I needed the Russian mob.

  “I want another one of these,” the woman across the counter from me said.

  I stood behind register number three, two hours and forty-six minutes into my four-hour shift at Holt’s—not that I was counting, or anything—providing my own personal brand of customer service to the shoppers who passed through my line.

  This particular shopper was a woman who appeared to be already over the hump and on the downhill side of sixty. She had that I’ve-hurried-for-decades-and-now-I’m-taking-my-own-sweet-time look about her.

  Maybe when I get that old—eek!—I’ll feel the same. Right now, I just wanted to keep my line moving.

  She opened her massive handbag—a brocade satchel that had probably arrived in California via wagon train—and rooted around, finally pulling out an ink pen.

  “I bought this here the other day,” she said. “I want another one.”

  I glanced at my line. Customers were stacked seven deep.

  In a totally screwball how-crazy-is-this moment, I recalled seeing that particular pen in our Back To School aisle last week. Someone had ripped open the packag
e and taken the pen.

  “They’re in aisle five,” I told her, using my move-along-lady voice.

  She didn’t move, except to look down at the pen and roll it around in her fingers.

  “Aisle five,” I said, and amped up to my stop-holding-up-my-line voice.

  “Those pens are in packs of three,” she said. “I only need one.”

  Two more customers got in my line.

  “The single-pen package was a special promotion. They come in three-packs now,” I told her.

  I have no idea if that’s true, of course.

  The woman studied the pen in her hand for another few minutes, then said, “I only need one.”

  “They only come three to a pack now,” I told her again.

  A mom and baby got in my line. The baby started screaming.

  “I don’t think I should be forced to buy three when all I need is one,” the woman told me.

  The man in line behind her rolled his eyes—not that I blamed him, of course. The next three people back shuffled impatiently—not that I blamed them either. I had to get my line moving. Something had to be done.

  “Let me see it,” I said, and plucked the pen from her hand. I studied it for about a half-second, then said, “We can probably special order this for you. Just ask them back in our customer service booth.”

  Yeah, okay, it was a total lie, but what else could I do?

  The woman still didn’t budge, and finally said, “Could you call them for me so I don’t have to walk back there?”

  I hate my life.

  I spotted Colleen wandering through the racks of workout clothes near the registers. She’d worked for Holt’s longer than I had but never seemed to realize what a crappy job it was. To be generous, I’ll say Colleen is a little slow.

  Slow worked for me right now.

  “Colleen!”

  About thirty seconds passed before her own name seemed to register with her. I waved her over.

  “You need to take over for me,” I said. “I have training.”

  Yeah, okay, it was another total lie.

  “Training?” Colleen asked, looking lost.

  “Yeah,” I said.

  I punched in what I like to think of as the thank-God-I-can-leave-this-boring-job-now code into the register, and headed for the stock room.

  Since leaving Juanita’s house this morning and realizing I had to call my was-he-or-wasn’t-he-connected contact, Mike Ivan, I knew I’d been putting it off. I mean, jeez, phoning up somebody rumored to be in the Russian mob wasn’t to be taken lightly. Sort of like making an impulse purchase at a department store handbag section—yeah, sure, you could pick up a mini skinny or a wristlet with little thought, but a satchel or hobo required considerable contemplation.

  But I had to do it. I knew I did. Juanita’s life was—maybe—on the line. If anybody could find out who the mystery woman was at Mom’s house this morning, it was Mike Ivan.

  I hurried through the store, past the lingerie department—keeping my gaze focused straight ahead so as not to encourage customers to actually ask me for help—and went through the doors into the stock room.

  It’s usually quiet back here, but today I heard voices and all kinds of racket. I followed the sounds and saw two big rigs backed up to the loading dock, and the truck team busy unloading zillions of boxes.

  “Hey, girl,” somebody called.

  I spotted my Holt’s BFF, Bella, lounging on an empty U-boat surrounded by a forest of hanging plastic-wrapped dresses. Beside her was Sandy, my other Holt’s BFF.

  “What’s up?” I asked, as I walked over.

  Bella gestured to the dresses. “I’m getting a red thirty-six C underwire for a customer.”

  “I’m restocking towels,” Sandy said.

  “I’m in training,” I said. I grabbed another U-boat, dragged it over, and sat down.

  “Want to hear some crap?” Bella asked.

  I always want to hear some crap.

  “Holt’s is cracking down on training,” Bella said, shaking her head. “They’re keeping a log of who goes and who doesn’t.”

  Holt’s was going to make sure we actually attended the training meetings?

  Yeah, that was some crap, all right.

  “I heard the corporate office is sending someone to the store to monitor attendance,” Sandy said. “No more skipping training for you, Haley.”

  This could seriously impact my day here.

  The noise level from the receiving department picked up a little. I saw the guys on the truck team closing up one of the big rigs. The engine fired up and it pulled away. Gorgeous Southern California sunshine beamed into the stock room.

  “I need a new life,” I said.

  “Yeah,” Bella said. “I need a condo on the beach.”

  “I wish I was dating a vampire,” Sandy said.

  “Now’s your chance,” Bella told her.

  By the tone in her voice, I knew instantly that I’d somehow missed out on some totally major news.

  Bella gestured to Sandy. “Her boyfriend dumped her.” “It wasn’t a dumping,” Sandy insisted. “He thought we should break up and I agreed to it.”

  “It was about damn time,” Bella said.

  I couldn’t have agreed more. Sandy’s tattoo artist boyfriend treated her like all-out crap, and she was such a nice person, she totally put up with it. I couldn’t imagine what had happened that she’d finally agreed to their split.

  Then it hit me.

  “Tat-boy has a new girlfriend, doesn’t he?” I said. Sandy squirmed for a few seconds, then said, “Yes, he’s seeing someone. But they only just met. He swore to me that absolutely nothing was going on between them until after we broke up.”

  Bella rolled her eyes. “That’s b.s., if I ever heard it.”

  “You could definitely do better,” I said.

  Bella glanced at her watch and stood up. “I’ve got to go. It’s time for my break.”

  “See you,” Sandy called with a little finger wave as she, too, headed back into the store.

  I knew I had to call Mike Ivan. And I would. Really. But I couldn’t bring myself to do it quite yet.

  One of the men from the truck team walked to the control panel beside the big rollup door, ready to throw the switches that would bring it down and shut off my view of freedom.

  “Hang on a second,” I called.

  I hurried over and stood on the loading dock. It was only a view of the back parking lot and the Dumpsters—which was kind of pathetic, I know—but I wasn’t ready to let go of it yet.

  A yellow VW Beetle shot out of a parking space, whipped past the big rig, and disappeared around the corner of the building.

  Hey, wait a minute.

  Were there a couple quad-zillion yellow VW bugs on the road these days, or was I being followed?

  I pulled out my cell phone. Not only did I need the Russian mob—I needed a smoking-hot private detective.

  CHAPTER 11

  I’d never actually been in a beauty pageant or walked a runway, but I could strut it with the best of them—as long as I was in a dressing room and the clothes were for me, of course.

  Marcie had met me at Nordstrom at The Grove after my shift ended at Holt’s and we were shopping for business suits. I couldn’t possibly show up at work on Monday still wearing my old ones from last fall.

  “This will look great on you,” Marcie declared, pulling a suit off the rack.

  I’d already picked out about a half-dozen black ones and, really, they were all starting to look alike. But Marcie was almost always right about things so I nodded. The sales clerk who’d been following us around took it and headed off to the dressing room she’d reserved for us.

  “How’s Ty feeling since his car accident?” Marcie asked, turning back to the rack.

  “Okay,” I said, flipping through the suits again. “Except, well, something kind of weird happened.”

  “With Ty? Ty’s never weird,” Marcie said.

  See h
ow Marcie’s right about things?

  “He told me the accident was kind of a wake-up call for him. He’s not going back to work,” I said.

  “Ever?”

  “And he said he knew he’d been a crappy boyfriend, and that from now on he was going to devote himself to being the kind of man I deserve,” I said.

  “Oh my God. Are you kidding?” Marcie spun around to face me. “Did he sustain a head injury in the crash, maybe?”

  “I told you it was weird,” I said.

  “So what’s he done for you to prove he’s a great boyfriend?” Marcie asked.

  “Well, nothing yet,” I admitted.

  “It must have been nice to hear him say those things, especially after what you’ve been through with him,” Marcie said. “Ty is sort of closed off—to everything but his job, of course.”

  Everything that had happened with Ty since I’d gotten the call from the emergency room flashed in my head. Marcie read my expression, as only a best friend can.

  “What? What is it?” she asked.

  “The whole car-crash thing,” I said. “It was kind of strange.”

  Marcie didn’t say anything. She didn’t have to. She just stood there with a charcoal gray, single-breasted crop jacket and matching swing skirt in her hand, waiting. The sales clerk started to take it from her, then saw our expressions and backed off. That’s the kind of service you get at Nordstrom.

  “The accident was near Palmdale. Holt’s doesn’t have a store there and doesn’t plan to open one—that I know of, anyway. So why was he there?” I said. “And another thing: when I picked him up, he had on jeans and a polo shirt.”

  “It was the middle of the day—a work day—and he wasn’t wearing a suit?” Marcie asked.

  I shook my head. “Amber told me he’d asked her to cancel all his afternoon appointments, then left.”

  Marcie didn’t say anything.

  “I found a receipt from a convenience store in his pocket,” I said. “Like maybe he’d stopped there and changed out of his suit.”

  Marcie still didn’t say anything, which didn’t make me feel all that great. She can most always think of a logical explanation for just about anything.

  “And he was driving a rental car,” I said.

  “Oh, wow,” Marcie mumbled.