Ultimate Concealer, A Toni Diamond Mystery: A Toni Diamond Mystery (Toni Diamond Mysteries)

by Nancy Warren

  Ultimate Concealer

  A Toni Diamond Mystery

  Book Two

  By

  Nancy Warren

  Ultimate Concealer

  A Toni Diamond Mystery: Book Two

  Copyright © 2014 Nancy Weatherley Warren

  All rights reserved

  Discover other titles by Nancy Warren at

  http://www.NancyWarren.net

  These stories are works of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Cover Design by Kim Killion

  Contents

  Dedication:

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Other Books by Nancy Warren

  About the Author

  Dedication

  Ultimate Concealer is dedicated to my dear friend and fellow writer Gordon Kirkland. Gordon and I bonded over cream puff swans and really, it’s gone downhill from there. His crazy wit and devious plot ideas have saved me on many occasions. Including this one. You wouldn’t be reading Ultimate Concealer if Gordon hadn’t come up with the genius plot twist that I, of course, will take credit for.

  Thanks for everything, old friend. Since I began this book, Gordon’s faced death, received a last minute liver transplant, and is now unstoppable. You can’t keep a good man down.

  Thanks also to Colleen Collins and her husband Shaun for insights into the PI biz and Nevada law. They are a class act and the duo behind The Zen Man series. Finally, thanks to Belinda Wilson an Independent Beauty Consultant who gave me some makeup pointers and to Judy deVries for her excellent proof reading. I’m also grateful to my street team for being AMAZING. I’m grateful every day for your support and help. Thank you, all.

  Nancy

  Chapter One

  “There are no ugly women; only lazy ones.”

  — Helena Rubinstein

  “If I put on enough makeup, I feel like I’m someone else,” Donna Ray Atkins said. “But then, when you work on a pig farm, you usually want to look like someone else.”

  Donna Ray’s smiling face came through on Toni Diamond’s computer screen along with the faces of the other five members of her top tier sales team. As Independent Beauty Consultants for the Lady Bianca line of cosmetics, each of these women was as important to Toni’s business success as she was to theirs.

  She loved the video conferencing technology that allowed her to talk to her team each week from the comforts of their own homes. She used this time to pump up the team, to strategize ways to boost sales and to hang out with women she liked.

  “I feel like I am showing the best me I can be,” Suzanne Mireille said, the slight French lilt in her voice adding drama to her words.

  Toni wrote the comments down in her notebook, thinking she might make up some slogan cards for her girls.

  “I put my Lady Bianca makeup on in the morning, then I look at my face in the mirror and I see success!” Ruth Collier chimed in. A retired school teacher, Ruth was making more money in her second career than she had in her first.

  “I love that,” Toni said. “You are so right.” She sat in the home office of the house she’d bought herself thanks to her success selling cosmetics for Lady Bianca. “And speaking of success,” she said as she leaned forward, closer to the screen. “The monthly sales report is in.” She pumped her fist in the air. “We beat our sales targets for the month, sold a higher volume than last month. Once again, we are the top sales team in Texas.”

  Toni didn’t think of herself as a ruthless woman, but rather that success floated all boats. And the better other sales teams performed, the more inspired she and her sales associates became, spurred on to offer a few more free facials and makeovers to their friends, family, colleagues and women in the grocery store. However, she wasn’t above a little fist pumping in the privacy of her own office and with her own team.

  She also wasn’t above using the fresh information as inspiration to her girls, the sales recruits she’d brought into the business. She loved every one of them, and she loved their success. Of course, each tube of lipstick and each pot of face cream that they sold not only netted them a commission, but also brought Toni a tiny scoop of the gravy as their sales director. A lot of small commissions could certainly add up.

  When she finished the conference, she sent an immediate email blast to every sales rep in her region. “Hey, girls! We are slicker than this season’s Berry Parfait Lip Gloss. Our team is number one again this month. Congrats to all of you for your hard work. I love you! Toni.”

  “I love you? You have got to be kidding,” a bored and cynical teenage voice drawled behind her right shoulder.

  Toni’s perfectly manicured hand flapped to her chest, a flash of sparkle from the diamond rings on her fingers sparkling in her peripheral vision. “Oh, my goodness, Tiff, you startled me.” She turned to glance at her sixteen-year-old daughter, filled as always with a combination of love and exasperation at so much youth and beauty hidden under the scowl and black, shapeless clothing.

  “Sorry, just needed to check that my gag reflex was still working.”

  “I do love them,” she said. “Some of those women were struggling single moms like I used to be. I helped them find a way to look better, help other women and make money. I am proud of every one of them.”

  “Yeah, yeah. I’ve heard it all before.”

  Tiffany slouched to the big pink corkboard where Toni hung inspirational quotations, lists of ideas and her weekly, monthly and yearly sales targets. In the center of the board was an article she’d cut out of Texas Today magazine. The article was a profile of successful Texas business women. Toni was interviewed about direct selling techniques. Tiffany took one of Toni’s fake diamond-headed push pins in her black-manicured fingers and attached her own notice to the board.

  “What’s that, honey?”

  “An article I found on the Greenpeace website about how the chemicals in makeup are poisoning the earth.”

  “You know, every month where sales are as good as this one means more money in your college fund.”

  “Not going to college, Mom.”

  Since Toni strongly suspected that this statement, like the Greenpeace article, was an attempt to irritate her, she bit her tongue and counted to ten. Then eleven. Twelve. At thirteen she felt calm enough to open her mouth without screaming, “Of course you’re going to college. You’re too smart and too talented not to.” Tiffany could claim she wasn’t going to college, but her grade point average argued otherwise.

  Instead she said, “Well, if you don’t go to college, I can use the money to redecorate your room. I’ll turn it into a boudoir where I’ll throw home parties and recruit new Lady Bianca reps. Yep, we’ll destroy the earth, one Fiesta Mocha eye shadow at a time.”

  “Oh, Mother.”

  Toni swiveled away from
the computer. “Why don’t you and I go shopping? We haven’t gone for ages. We could check out the new summer fashions. Maybe get your hair cut?”

  “Can’t. I’m meeting Tish and Jenn. We’re doing a project for the enviro club. Can I borrow the car?”

  “The car?” Toni opened her eyes so wide her mascara-coated lashes poked her upper eyelids. “What about global warming?”

  Her daughter’s voice dripped disdain. “We’re, like, carpooling.”

  Toni knew her daughter had been well-trained behind the wheel. She’d paid for the driver’s ed courses. But it was still difficult for her to hand over the sparkly key chain without a pang. “Drive carefully, okay? Don’t let those girls talk you into anything foolish.”

  “Nah. We won’t get wasted until after the meeting.” Then she cracked the grin that always melted Toni’s heart, and left.

  Toni brewed herself a cup of coffee in the single-brew machine she’d won for hitting the top sales mark in her region last quarter. She knew herbal tea was better for her health and her skin, but she’d accepted long ago that she was never going to be perfect. She was doing the best she could.

  She carried the hot, steaming brew up to her office and resettled herself at her desk. She took another moment to stare lovingly at the excellent sales numbers. When she checked her email she wasn’t at all surprised to find that most of her team had responded to her message with enthusiastic congratulations and excitement. Of course, the fact that they’d all answered their emails so fast suggested that they were also working on a sunny Saturday, one of the reasons why her team did so well.

  Knowing that if she spent too long gloating over last month’s results she’d waste this month, she closed the window and began strategizing on ways to market the newest line of lip glosses. It seemed to Toni that these would interest young mothers. “Little League,” she mumbled as she made some notes for herself. “Must infiltrate Little League.”

  Her phone rang.

  Immediately, before picking up, Toni swiped fresh lipstick over her mouth, inhaled positive energy and smiled. Whoever was on the other end of her phone could without doubt use a makeover, would like to host a home party, or, even better, wanted to sell Lady Bianca cosmetics.

  “Hello,” she said in her most welcoming tone. “Toni Diamond speaking.”

  “And don’t you sound as pretty as a summer’s day,” a deep, sexy male voice replied.

  Her smile fell off her face and dread clenched her stomach. “Who is this?”

  “Oh, honey, don’t you know?”

  She did, of course, but she willed the caller to be a telephone marketer, a politician fishing for votes, an obscene caller. Anyone but—

  “Your own husband?” His voice was still warm and sexy. A woman could lose herself in Dwayne Diamond’s voice — and many a woman had — only to find herself abandoned when something newer and shinier came along.

  “You haven’t been my husband for sixteen years, Dwayne.” He’d left her shortly after their daughter was born. Besides their daughter, the only thing he’d left her with was his fancy last name.

  In a second she was plunged back to those early months after he’d left. She’d had no money, no skills. Barely more than a child herself, she’d had to figure out how to raise a baby on her own, keep some kind of roof over their heads and pay for food. She’d done it, too. Stubborn pride and a desperate need to keep her baby safe and healthy had driven her. Her mother had helped out where she could, but Toni had refused to become that sad cliché, the teenaged single mom living in her own mother’s basement. Besides, her mom didn’t have a basement. She lived in a trailer.

  When a well-dressed woman had offered the young Toni a makeover while she picked over bruised apples in a discount supermarket, she couldn’t have known then that she was Toni’s fairy godmother, but so it had turned out.

  Toni had embraced Lady Bianca and home sales with an energy that came partly from need and partly from discovering that she was a natural born saleswoman. She loved people, she loved makeup and she really, really loved watching her income increase from a few dollars that first month to more than a hundred the second month.

  She was on her way.

  “Doesn’t mean I don’t still care about you.”

  And no two-bit charmer was going to hurt her now. “What do you want, Dwayne?”

  “I wanted to congratulate you, honey. I got this here glossy magazine in front of me, and it says you’re a real successful business woman.” Her smile might have dropped to the floor but his was plastered all over his face. She could hear it oozing over the phone line, as fake as his protestations of love had been.

  “Thank you. Now I’ve got to g—”

  “Whoa! Not so fast there, honey. We’ve got some catching up to do. When I saw that picture of you in the magazine, and saw you were as pretty as ever, I figured it was time we got reacquainted.”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “Toni, you used to be a lot softer.”

  “I wonder what toughened me up?”

  “Listen, let me buy you a drink. A cup of coffee.”

  “You’re in town?” Horror sharpened her tone. He’d left Dallas as well as her and moved to Austin, which she’d only discovered when a very pissed-off woman had called a few months later looking for him.

  “I could be on the next plane.”

  “Plane?” It was a three-hour drive, give or take, to Austin.

  “Sure, babe. I’m a headliner in Vegas.” The only place she could imagine Dwayne being a headliner was at a lice convention. He was a country singer with a mediocre voice and songwriting skills that were derivative at best.

  “No. Thank you. I don’t want to have a drink with you.”

  “Darling, it would be worth your while. I’ve got a business proposition for you, you being such a top business woman and all.”

  She refused to scowl. She wasn’t getting wrinkles for Dwayne D. “Dwayne, did you seriously call me up after abandoning me sixteen years ago to ask for money?”

  “I’m not asking for a gift, sweat pea. It’s an investment.”

  “An investment. In what? A new guitar?”

  “I don’t just play country and western music.” He sounded stung. “I’m diversified.”

  “I bet you are.”

  “Look, if you’re not interested in an investment, I’ll take a loan.”

  She didn’t know whether she wanted to laugh or cry. “Dwayne, please don’t ever call me again.”

  “Don’t hang up.” She heard a tone that hadn’t been there before. He’d dropped the smarmy tone and something sharp came through. “We haven’t talked about that sweet daughter of ours. How is she?”

  Toni practically had to pry her teeth apart to get words out. “She’s fine.”

  “You tell her hi and that I’m going to come and see her real soon. We’ve got lots of years to catch up on.” In the background, a woman called his name and he said, “I’ve got to go now, but I look forward to seeing you both real soon.”

  When she got off the phone she found that the fingernails of her left hand had dented half-moons into her palms and one of the diamantes she had embedded into her nail tips had come out, leaving a small round hole in her nail like somebody had shot a bullet through it.

  Chapter Two

  “I don’t have a girlfriend, but I know a woman who’d be mad at me for saying that.”

  — Mitch Hedberg

  Rage. She recognized the emotion even though she hadn’t experienced it for a long time. Rage. Directed at Dwayne D. Diamond.

  Toni couldn’t settle to work. She couldn’t settle to anything. In fact, she couldn’t stand her own company cooped up in her house. She’d go to the salon, that’s what she’d do. Take comfort in the familiar ritual of a manicure. Even if it was a week ahead of schedule, she would not go an entire week when a hole existed where a diamond ought to be.

  But when she got to her garage and the space where her pale mauve Prius usually s
at was empty, she remembered she didn’t have a car. Tiffany had it.

  She grabbed her cell phone out of her bag, speed dialed Linda Plotnik.

  “Mom,” she wailed when Linda answered. “I need you. Can you come get me?”

  And the wonderful thing about a mother, whether her daughter was sixteen or thirty-four, was that, of course, she did.

  Toni was waiting outside on the curb when the mauve Cadillac screeched to a halt — with “Here You Come Again” blasting out the windows. Her mother’s obsession with Dolly Parton, which used to embarrass Toni into a coma, now seemed endearing. She only hoped Tiffany would grow similarly appreciative of her own eccentricities given enough time.

  When she jumped into the passenger seat, her mother said, “Baby, what’s wrong?” before Toni even had time to buckle her seat belt.

  “Dwayne called.”

  Her mother’s generous cleavage almost catapulted out of her apricot tank top when she gasped. “Dwayne Diamond?”

  “Yep.”

  As they drove to the salon, Toni filled her mother in on the call.

  “He abandons you and your infant daughter. Doesn’t see either of you for sixteen years.” She turned left, so wide she nearly took out a Humvee, which honked loudly as it swerved. “And not one single cent does he ever send you. And he’s got the nerve to ask for money?” She was so angry her platinum curls were smacking her cheeks as she ranted.

  “Pretty much what I thought,” Toni said.

  There was silence but for the sound of Dolly. Then Linda said, “Do you think he’ll try to get to you through Tiff?”

  And that, of course, was the part that Toni didn’t even want to contemplate. “I think he said that to piss me off. He’s never wanted to see her before, why would he now?”

  “Does she still ask about him?”

  Toni shook her head. “Not for a few years now.”

  “We should have told her he was dead like I wanted to.”

  “But he’s not dead.”

  “And ain’t that a surprise? I thought for sure some jealous husband would have put a bullet through his cheatin’ heart by now.”