Terror in Taffeta

by Marla Cooper

I only hoped it wasn’t the reason he had died.

  We arrived early and filed into the church, following a procession of people down the center aisle toward the casket, which was draped with a blanket of gladioluses and surrounded by enough candles to light the room on their own. One by one, the mourners stopped and said a quick prayer.

  I wondered if I might be able to learn more about how Father Villarreal had died, and tried eavesdropping as we inched our way slowly past the packed pews. My Spanish wasn’t good enough to catch anything other than an occasional noun, and I quickly realized that I didn’t even know the word for “murder,” much less any of the terms for the various ways a person could die. I wondered if it would be rude to whip out my phone and open up my Spanish-English translation app. Probably.

  Nicole and Vince were in front of me, and as we got closer to the front of the room, I heard her let out an audible gasp. She turned and grabbed my arm, her face white as a ghost.

  “Nicole,” I said, “what is it?”

  She pointed mutely to the open casket, where the priest’s body lay peacefully, his hands folded over his chest, holding a rosary. Had she not expected an open casket? The sight of him must have been too much for her. I put my arm around her reassuringly. “It’s all right, Nicole,” I whispered. “You can do this.”

  Vince was nudging me in the shoulder, trying to get my attention. “What?” I said, allowing a little bit of irritation to creep into my voice. If anyone should be comforting his wife, it should be him.

  “Kelsey,” he whispered, his voice tense. He pointed at the casket. “Who the hell is that?”

  I stood on tiptoe and leaned to one side so I could get a better glimpse of the gray-haired man in the casket, who looked particularly unlike the man we were here to say good-bye to.

  I shook my head as my voice caught in my throat. I looked at the couple, my eyes wide.

  “I have no idea.”

  CHAPTER 18

  This could not be happening. I felt the blood rushing to my face, making my cheeks hot as I looked at Nicole and Vince. Mrs. Abernathy was a few seconds behind, but she quickly caught on.

  “Who is that man?” Mrs. Abernathy hissed, grabbing me by the arm and squeezing harder than was entirely necessary.

  “I don’t know,” I said, my mind a complete blank. The three of them stared at me expectantly, waiting for answers, but I had none. The man in the coffin was a good twenty years older than Father Villarreal, and nowhere near as handsome; I could see that, now that we were right in front of him. I wanted to run out the church doors and into hiding, but since we were still standing in the front of the church with a couple hundred mourners looking on, I did the only appropriate thing there was to do: I pretended to pray.

  I dropped down onto the kneeler and closed my eyes, my brain frantically trying to put together the pieces. Who is that man in the coffin?

  The answer was actually fairly obvious. It was Father Villarreal. After all, it was his memorial service, at his church. If there had been some crazy mix-up at the morgue, someone would have noticed by now.

  But that brought up an even more important question: If that’s Father Villarreal, then who was that man who married Vince and Nicole?

  I knew if I waited for an answer, I’d be kneeling there all day, so I whispered a quick “amen” and got up to make room for the next mourner. A church attendant helpfully gestured to some empty seats in a nearby pew, squashing my plans for escape. Not wanting to disrespect the dead man, we dutifully filed into the wooden bench and sat in stunned silence as the service began.

  We stood as the priest led everyone in a prayer in Spanish. We sat while he continued to speak. We knelt when everyone else knelt, but for the most part, the service was lost on us. We were attending the funeral of a man we’d never met, which was being performed in a language we didn’t speak.

  A woman came to the front of the church and started singing a slow, mournful tune, and Nicole let out a loud sniff from two seats down. She’d been holding back her tears ever since our discovery, and something about the song released the flood. The tears started slowly at first, then built to gentle sobs. An elderly woman sitting on the other side of Nicole offered her a handkerchief and patted her hand reassuringly, thinking Nicole was a loyal congregant in mourning.

  Mrs. Abernathy, of course, was shooting daggers at me with her eyes. I was glad the funeral gave me a chance to prepare for the confrontation that was sure to come. Even if it was just delaying the inevitable, it allowed me a few minutes to figure out what I was going to say.

  There had to be some simple explanation, some sort of miscommunication caused by the language barrier. Maybe there were two Father Villarreals. A father and son? That didn’t make sense; priests don’t have kids. A nephew who’d been inspired by his uncle to go into the clergy? I scanned the room to see if our guy was among the congregation. Mrs. Abernathy gave me a sharp elbow to the ribs. “Sit still,” she hissed. “This is bad enough already.”

  I slunk down into my seat, wishing I could disappear.

  After what felt like hours, the funeral was over and everyone slowly started making their way to the back of the church. I started to get up, but the others were frozen in their seats. Mrs. Abernathy sat on one side of me, Vince and Nicole on the other. I was surrounded.

  “Kelsey,” Mrs. Abernathy began, exhibiting an eerie calm that was more terrifying than if she’d just begun yelling right off the bat. “What have you done?”

  “Let’s just stay calm,” I said. “I’m sure there’s some explanation.”

  “Who was that man?” Nicole asked, her voice frantic.

  “That man,” said Mrs. Abernathy, “is Father Villarreal. It says so right here on the remembrance card. The real question is, who performed my daughter’s wedding ceremony?”

  “He—you—I…” I stammered. I was doing fine with pronouns, but I couldn’t seem to get any nouns or verbs to come out. I shook my head vigorously to release more words from my head to my mouth. “I don’t know!”

  “Oh my God!” cried Nicole. “We were married by an impostor!”

  “Now, let’s not jump to any conclusions,” I said. “Maybe there are two Father Villarreals.”

  “And my honeymoon!” Nicole wailed, ignoring my lukewarm reassurances. “I can’t go on a honeymoon if I’m not even married.”

  You can’t go on your honeymoon anyway.

  “Look, let me see what I can find out. I’m sure there’s a simple explanation,” I said. “Why don’t you guys head back to the villa and get some lunch, and I’ll talk to someone at the church.”

  Mrs. Abernathy gathered her things to go. “I suppose if that’s the best you can do, we’ll just go eat some more Mexican food and pretend everything’s hunky-dory.” With that, she departed in a huff.

  Vince gave me an uncomfortable smile. “Thanks, Kelsey. Let us know what you find out.”

  “Thanks, guys. I really am sorry about this. You deserve better.”

  “It’s not your fault,” Vince said.

  “Yeah, there’s no way you could have known,” said Nicole.

  But I could have. And I should have. And now in addition to finding a murderer, I had another mystery to solve. I had no doubt Mrs. Abernathy would ruin me if I didn’t make this right.

  As we were leaving, I saw the woman I’d talked to the day before snuffing out candles in the front of the sanctuary. Hoping to catch her before she left for the burial, I excused myself and hurried to the front of the church.

  “Excuse me?” I said. “Remember me? From yesterday?”

  She nodded. “The one who wanted to get married.”

  Close enough.

  “My name is Kelsey. Beautiful service, by the way. I know this is bad timing, but can I ask you a question?”

  She glanced toward the door and looked at her watch. “I’m supposed to be leaving for the cemetery.”

  “I’m sorry, I know. I’ll be quick.” She nodded in agreement as she continued ext
inguishing the candles, leaving acrid smoke behind. Now that I had her attention, I wasn’t sure where to begin.

  “The man in the coffin—”

  She nodded. “Father Villarreal.”

  “That’s just it. Are you sure it was him?” I hadn’t meant to blurt it out like that. She was going to think I was nuts. Besides, I already knew the answer. If it weren’t him, one of the couple hundred other people attending the funeral would have mentioned something. She furrowed her brow and nodded again, naturally puzzled by my question. “Of course it was him. He’s been with this church for years.”

  “Okay, sorry. Let me start over. Remember yesterday when I said Father Villarreal had performed my friend’s wedding? Well, it turns out it wasn’t him.”

  She looked confused. “Then why did you come to his funeral?”

  “We thought it was him, but it wasn’t, and now we have to figure out who our priest was. Are there two Father Villarreals?”

  She stared at me and shook her head. “No, there is only one.”

  “He doesn’t have another family member who is also a priest? Maybe a brother or a nephew or something?”

  “I’m sorry, no. It is just him. Perhaps you got the name wrong.”

  I was sure I hadn’t. I had made the arrangements myself, and I vividly remembered being relieved when Father Villarreal agreed to step in after our original plans fell through.

  “I’m sure that was the name I was given. He was supposed to fill in for Father Delgado.”

  Her eyes widened in surprise. “Wait, Father Delgado—are you talking about the wedding that was this past weekend?”

  “Yes, in the chapel at the Instituto Allende.”

  “I remember it,” she said, crossing her arms in front of her chest. “It was on his calendar, but then they called and canceled.”

  “They what? No, that’s not right. I would have been the one to call, and I definitely didn’t.” I was pretty sure I would have remembered something like that.

  “We thought you must have found someone else.”

  “We were expecting Father Villarreal, and in fact someone showed up and introduced himself as Father Villarreal.”

  “I don’t know what to tell you,” she said, looking as uncomfortable with my questions as I was feeling. “It wasn’t him.”

  “And there’s no chance he sent someone else in his place?”

  “No, as I told you, it was canceled, so there was no need.” She snuffed the last candle out and turned to me. “Is there anything else?”

  There was so much else but, unfortunately, nothing she was going to be able to help me with.

  “No, thank you for your time.”

  I retreated back up the aisle, thoroughly confused. Someone had called Father Villarreal and told him not to come? How could that be? I couldn’t fathom why someone would cancel on our behalf and then show up pretending to be Father Villarreal, if that was what had happened. Was it a misunderstanding, or was the man who’d performed the ceremony an impostor?

  Either way, not knowing was bad. Really bad. I had no idea what to do. I couldn’t go back to the villa without answers. Nicole and Mrs. Abernathy would bombard me with questions, and this time I wasn’t going to be able to get out of it by saying, “I don’t know, I’m just the wedding planner.” As much as I’d protested that solving a murder wasn’t part of my job description, finding out who had crashed their wedding—and performed the ceremony, while he was at it—definitely was within my jurisdiction.

  I dug my phone out of my bag and dialed Brody. “Pick up, pick up, pick up,” I chanted under my breath. I had promised to call after the funeral and was relieved when he answered on the third ring.

  “Hi, it’s me,” I said. “Can you come meet me? The funeral was a mess and I have to talk to you, but not there at the villa.”

  There was a pause on the other end of the line. “Yes, of course. I’d be happy to give you a bid on that,” he responded cryptically, a strangely formal tone in his voice.

  “A bid? Brody, it’s me. Can you not hear me?” My cell phone worked pretty well in Mexico, but Brody’s often had bad reception.

  “I’ll have to look at my calendar and get back to you.”

  “What?” It was like he and I were having completely different conversations. “Is that some sort of code?”

  “Brody, who is that?” a familiar voice in the background demanded. Mrs. Abernathy. Of course.

  “Ohhhh,” I said. “They’re standing right there, aren’t they?”

  “Yes, sir. That is correct.”

  “Is she still pissed? Never mind, I know the answer to that already.” If he was afraid to tell them it was me on the phone, then it must be bad. “Okay, come meet me at Evan’s house, okay? Cough once for yes, twice for no.”

  “Sounds good,” he said. “I should be able to get a proposal over to you within half an hour.”

  “Great,” I replied. “See you then.”

  “I look forward to working with you.”

  I hung up and dialed Evan to let him know I was coming over, but it went to voice mail. Luckily, he’d given me the spare key to his house in case I needed it. He’d told me to make myself at home, an offer I was relieved to be able to take advantage of. If there was one thing I could use right now, it was anything vaguely resembling a home. It didn’t even have to be my home, but it was good to have someplace to retreat to where I wasn’t on duty twenty-four hours a day.

  This whole experience had been enough to make me rethink my career choices. An occasional bridezilla I could handle, but having to travel to other countries with people I barely knew and then being held responsible for their happiness was starting to seem like a bad idea.

  Maybe I should have been a funeral planner instead. Your responsibilities are finite, the expectations aren’t as high, and no one’s going to be happy anyway.

  Besides, business seemed to be booming.

  CHAPTER 19

  While I waited for Brody to arrive, I perched awkwardly on Evan’s sofa. I was trying to make myself at home, like Evan had instructed, but it felt odd to be in his house without him there.

  Just act natural. What would you do if you were at home?

  I kicked off my shoes and leaned back on a scratchy, kilim-weave throw pillow.

  If I were at home, I would replace this pillow, I thought, tossing it to the other end of the couch and sitting up again. Relaxing just wasn’t on the agenda at the moment.

  I noticed an ancient PC on a desk in the corner. Surely it had Internet access. I could at least use my time productively while I waited, lest I start rearranging Evan’s kitchen out of sheer nervousness. The connection was slow, but I was able to find a couple of new posts on Craigslist for last-minute rentals, which I jotted on a notepad I found in the desk drawer. I couldn’t return to the villa without something good to report, and if I didn’t have answers about Father Villarreal, I could at least distract the family by telling them to start packing.

  As long as I was online, I Googled Father Villarreal and confirmed that there was only one of him in the entire state of Guanajuato. Unfortunately, it was the one in the coffin, not the one who’d performed the ceremony. If only I had Googled him in the first place, I would have known what the real Father Villarreal looked like, and then I would have known to ask more questions when Father What’s-His-Face arrived. Of course, I didn’t usually feel the need to run background checks on my officiants—although maybe it was time to start.

  That gave me an idea. I might not be able to look up the wedding crasher’s name, but I could probably find his face. I texted Brody and told him to bring the pictures he had taken at the wedding.

  Moments later, there was a knock at the door, and I scrambled out of Evan’s oversized leather desk chair to go answer it.

  “These pictures?” Brody asked, waving his digital camera in the air as I swung open the door.

  “Hooray! You read my mind.”

  “I did indeed.” Brody came in a
nd set his things on the painted wooden bench near the front door.

  “How did Mrs. Abernathy seem?” I asked. I hoped that having a little bit of time to process the morning’s events had helped her put things into perspective.

  “Not that different from usual. Although she did tell me that I might as well burn all the pictures from the wedding since they were probably going to have to do it all over again anyway, but I figured she was being hyperbolic. Anyway, Nicole and Vince filled me in on what happened. I figured you’d want to look through the photos to see if we could find some evidence of fake Father Villarreal.”

  “Yes! That’s exactly what I was thinking. Thank you.”

  “Actually, I uploaded them all earlier, so we can look at them online, too, if you want.”

  “Perfect,” I said, gesturing over to the desk. “Evan is on dial-up, but I’m already connected.”

  “I will warn you,” Brody said. “Whoever this man was, he was awfully camera shy. At the time, I thought it was kind of odd, but I guess if he was an impostor, he’d have good reason to avoid the camera.”

  Sure enough, our mystery priest had managed to position himself so that his face was obscured by the backs of the couple’s heads for the entire ceremony. You could glimpse a forehead here or an ear there, but without Photoshop, we wouldn’t be able to do anything with the separate body parts.

  “Go back further, to before the wedding,” I said.

  Brody had taken the requisite photos of the bride fixing her veil in the mirror and the groom doing shots with his friends. There were pictures of us setting up, including one of Mrs. Abernathy scolding the florists. There were even pictures of me in there, making faces at the camera to render myself an unappealing subject, in an effort to keep Brody from taking any more.

  “Wait!” I said, as he was scrolling through some shots of the guests arriving. “In the background there. That’s him!” The man we had known as Father Villarreal was crossing the courtyard behind a group of cousins in sunny, flowered dresses, smiling for the camera with their arms around each other.

  “You’re right,” Brody said, zooming in on the man in the background. “It’s a little blurry, but it’s him.”