High Strung: A Glass Bead Mystery (The Glass Bead Mystery Series)

by Janice Peacock

  I knew it was important to wear a great necklace tonight. There’d be designers and wholesale buyers at Rosie’s reception. I hoped by wearing this fabulous necklace to show off my work, someone might want to place an order right there on the spot. If the price were right, I’d sell this necklace right off my body. I could always make another one. I put on a matching bracelet and the tallest black pumps I owned—not that tall, really, because I was a wimp when it came to high-heels.

  I fluffed up my short hair. I’d always worn my hair past my shoulders, but these days I was wearing it in a pixie-cut following a small incident earlier this year when I had leaned inside a hot kiln and singed my bangs. On a good hair day, I looked like Tinker Bell. On a bad hair day, I looked like Billy Idol. Fortunately, today was a Tinker Bell day.

  My light brown hair was getting blonder by the year, because every time the gray hairs started overtaking the brown ones, I went to Val’s salon and had her eradicate them with a few highlights. She always pleaded with me to let her do something new to my hair—low-lights or a Brazilian blowout. And lately she’d been going on and on about ombre, whatever that meant. I always resisted.

  I swept some bronzer across my cheeks. Since I’d moved to Seattle I missed having a little tan on my face. Thanks to my Irish genes, I usually burned and freckled, but I did like the rosy glow I could get from being out in the sun each day. I added a swipe of mascara and some tinted lip balm, and I was ready to go. I knew Val would be disappointed I didn’t go full-throttle with glitter eye shadow and burgundy lips, but I had become pretty low-maintenance during the last few years, and could never pull off the over-the-top sparkly makeup Val wore so well.

  I took a look in the mirror. Not too bad.

  I was feeling good and looking forward to the party. I felt like I could use some fun, especially after last night’s fiasco with Allen.

  Ugh. Allen. I wondered if he’d be at the party tonight. According to Tessa, Judy had invited him to all of the weekend’s events. I figured he’d never want to see me again. I was embarrassed, and hoped I never saw him again. Ever.

  Marta came home all red-cheeked and sweaty. Poor Stanley was panting heavily. He galloped into the kitchen, as best as he could with his five-inch long legs, found Gumdrop’s water bowl, and slurped down every drop in it. Then he stood there, with water dripping down each fold on his furry face, and looked at me expectantly with his big bloodshot eyes. I picked up the bowl, filled it, and set it down. He drank it.

  Oh, the poor guy was so thirsty.

  I picked up the bowl and filled it again. And he emptied it again. Marta finally came into the kitchen.

  “Is it okay he’s having all this water?” I asked Marta.

  “Oh, as long as it’s only one bowl, he’s fine. If he has much more than that, he tends to have accidents.”

  “Oh no, Marta! This is at least his third, possibly fourth, bowl,” I said trying to sound calm, but feeling like yelling. Okay, actually, I may have been yelling.

  “Oh, gosh! Well, we’ll just have to be extra careful. Won’t we, my widdle cutie pie? We don’t want any oopsies,” said Marta. I was pretty sure she was now talking with Stanley, and not me. I swear, this woman was going to kill me with her baby talk.

  “Right. Well, there are spare paper towels under the sink, in case you need them to clean up any ‘oopsies.’”

  The doorbell rang and I ran to answer it, but Val burst through the door without waiting. She looked me up and down. I stood at attention as she inspected me.

  “Hmmmm. Red. Very fiery. I like it. Faboo necklace. Oh, and a matching bracelet, that’s a nice touch,” Val said as she circled me. “You pass.”

  I exhaled, glad she considered me acceptable to be seen in public. Val had enough glitter on for both of us, and she had her hair piled up on her head, which added four inches to her height. The high heels added another four inches. With the heels and hair Val was well over six feet tall. She made me feel downright petite at only five-and-a-half feet.

  “Ready?” Val asked me, adjusting her cleavage in the mirror by the front door.

  “Let me go and get my handbag.”

  I rushed down the hall, and as I turned the corner into my bedroom, I skidded across something wet on the floor. I crashed into the wall, knocking a painting of a tropical sunset of its hook. I caught it before it hit the ground, thanks to my fast reflexes, and gently hung it back up.

  “Are you okay back there?” Val asked.

  “Oh fine, there’s a piddle, I mean puddle, on the floor,” I said, looking down at my shoes, which were wet around the edges. Stanley was the worst houseguest ever, and Marta was high up there on the list as well.

  I returned a few minutes later, having changed shoes, and was frankly wearing much more reasonable ones now. I’d taken off the high heels and put on my trusty Mary Janes.

  Val was standing at the front door, checking her backside in the mirror. “My car?”

  “That’d be great,” I said.

  “That way when the sexy guy who was over last night shows up at the party, he can give you a ride home,” Val said, pursing her lips and raising her eyebrows.

  “How do you know about Allen?”

  “I see all, remember? I live like twelve inches from you. I saw him arrive, and I saw him leave a few hours later.”

  “Snoop!”

  “At one point I heard some screaming, but I wasn’t sure if that was a good thing.”

  “Eavesdropper!” I said, “Also, it wasn’t a good thing.”

  “He was walking strangely when he left…”

  “I don’t want to talk about it.”

  ELEVEN

  It had been raining earlier in the afternoon, but fortunately it had stopped. I was glad the party could spill outside onto the patio behind Aztec Beads, so we wouldn’t all be crushed inside during the reception.

  As we arrived, we saw Misty and Nick standing on the sidewalk, loading jewelry into their backpacks. Misty saw me and gave a little wave, but she kept packing. She seemed to be in a hurry, so Val and I went into the shop.

  The air in Aztec Beads felt brittle with tension. Rosie was alone at the front window, looking out as Misty and Nick finished gathering their things, and headed down the street past the gallery window. Rosie’s body was nearly vibrating with anger.

  I approached Rosie cautiously, hoping, unlike Tito, she wouldn’t try to bite me.

  “Hi Rosie,” I said, trying to get her to shift her attention away from the window. I looked out toward the gallery and the patio. Several people had already arrived and were mingling. “Looks like some people are already here,” I said lamely, stating the obvious. Rosie continued to stare out the window, hands on hips. Her face, reflected in the window, was smug, as if she had personally booted Misty and Nick off the sidewalk, when they probably just left on their own.

  “Rosie?”

  “Oh, Jax,” Rosie said, finally unlocking her glare. “Glad you could make it.”

  She was wearing a denim skirt with a sash tied around her waist and a pretty white blouse. It was the perfect outfit for showing off a special piece of jewelry.

  “Wow, Rosie,” I gushed, “that is a fantastic necklace.” It was a long strand of impressive artisan-made glass beads each a couple of inches long. There were all sorts of shapes and styles: sculptural animals, vessels, polka-dotted beads, disks, and long thin barrel shapes, separated by segments of small silver beads so each handmade bead stood apart from the others. The necklace was long, and since Rosie was on the short side, she’d artfully wrapped it around her neck a couple of times.

  “Where did you get such a terrific necklace?” I asked.

  “Oh, it’s my very special collection, a set of beads from twenty different glass beadmakers. These are beads I’ve collected over the past several years. They means so much to me, and I’ve got a story to tell about each of them.

  “Well, you wear it well,” I said, picking the necklace up from Rosie’s chest and admiring se
veral of the beads closely. “Oh, and here’s one Tessa made.”

  “That’s one of my favorites.” Rosie seemed to have left her anger about Misty and Nick behind, and I was thankful for that. I’m sure she wanted tonight’s party to be a success. Even if she wasn’t in the mood, it was in her best interest to put on a happy face.

  “Rosie, this is my friend Val.”

  “Hi, Val, what kind of beads do you make?”

  “I actually don’t make beads.”

  “Oh, then you design necklaces?”

  “No, actually I —”

  “Wholesale buyer?”

  “No, I just—”

  “Well, nice to meet you.” Rosie turned and abruptly departed.

  Val and I looked at each other. “What was that about?” Val asked.

  “I have no idea, but I don’t think people skills are Rosie’s strong suit,” I replied. “I guess she figures if you are coming to this event, you are into beads. And if you’re not into beads, then she has no use for you.”

  “Well, I do like beads. I don’t have to make them to love them, right?”

  “Right. Kind of like kids. I don’t need to have one of my own to love Tessa’s kids.”

  “I’ll drink to that,” said Val, who could frankly drink to just about anything.

  Rosie had strung some strands of tiny lights up around the patio, added some outdoor heaters to help keep everyone warm outside in the chilly Seattle night, and set up tables for food and drinks. Someone had hooked up an iPod to a set of huge speakers that were blasting some great music. There may have been some artistic differences about what type of music to play. The soundtrack was alternating between Latin rhythms and eighties pop.

  Marta showed up at the party right after we did, and tracked me down like a hound.

  “Jax, sorry, but you didn’t give me a key to your house. I couldn’t lock the front door. I left Stanley there, and I’ve got to get back to him.”

  “I’ll get a spare key for you. But the good news is Stanley can guard the house in the meantime,” I said.

  “I’m worried someone might break in and steal him!”

  “Steal him?” I couldn’t believe anyone would want him, let alone break into my house to take him.

  “He’s a very valuable dog,” Marta said seriously.

  Knowing I wouldn’t be able to convince her that Stanley would be perfectly safe at my house without locking up, I went in search of Val. I found her by the front door, trying to convince Judy from JOWL that a new haircut would change her life. And, of course, that Val was just the right person to give her that new style.

  I sidled up to Val. “Give me the spare key to my house. Do you still have it?”

  “What? Are you taking away my key privileges?” Val responded. “Does this mean I’m going to have to start breaking in again?”

  “What do you mean ‘again?’” I asked, wondering just how much time Val spent at my place when I wasn’t home.

  “Oh, nothing, nothing,” Val said vaguely. She started rummaging through her giant silver shoulder bag and pulling things out to loosen up all of the junk in there. A brush, a cell phone covered with rhinestones, Tic-Tacs, another brush, mirror, lip-gloss, lipstick, lip-liner, lip-plumper…

  “Val, how many lip products does a woman need?”

  “Oh, about this many when I’m out and about, but I’ve got more in the car for backup.”

  She pulled out a small pair of pliers. Pliers? What in the world did she need with a pair of pliers? Address book, nail file, scissors, and finally, a set of keys.

  “Here you go,” Val said snippily, removing the key from her miniature disco ball key ring and pressing it into my hand. “When do I get it back?” She looked at me with a small pout.

  “When Marta leaves on Monday. Let me give this key to her, and I’ll be right back.”

  I dashed back to Marta and gave her the key. “You’ll go right now and lock up?”

  “Of course. I’ve got to keep my widdle puppy-wuppy safe! See you back here in a little while,” she said with a big toothy grin.

  “Okay.” I really had nothing to say to her about her “widdle-puppy,” other than I wished she’d left her annoying dog at home in Idaho.

  “We are going have so much fun tonight when we get back to your house—it will be like a slumber party,” Marta said enthusiastically.

  “Uh, yes. A slumber party,” I said, trying to match her enthusiasm, and failing. I remembered what many slumber parties were like when I was growing up: staying up all night, too much junk food, someone throwing up, and usually someone in tears.

  “Looking forward to that,” I said, mustering a weak smile as I watched Marta, with her stubby ponytail bouncing, as she headed out the door.

  TWELVE

  As we looked at the jewelry on each pedestal, I told Val about the artists in the exhibition.

  “This is the work of Indigo Martin,” I said, as we approached one of the pedestals. We were looking at a necklace of sculpted leaf beads in a gorgeous palette of autumn colors: red, orange, russet, and an earthy brown. There were delicate tendrils of tiny beads wrapped around the glass leaves to complete the necklace. Indigo was a beautiful black woman, who was well known for her nature-inspired jewelry, and notorious for her flakey behavior. I looked around the room, but I didn’t see her in the crowd.

  “Indigo thinks she’s still living in the sixties, all peace signs and daisies. She’s coming to the reception, I’ll introduce you.”

  “Yuck! I’m not sure if I’ll like someone who smells like patchouli,” said Val, looking disgusted.

  “Well, why don’t you hold off judging someone until you meet her?”

  “Pffft!” Val gave me a lady-like raspberry. “I’m going to find the snacks.”

  “Very mature,” I said, as she sashayed away.

  I ran into The Twins next. They were not actual twins, but rather two women who had chosen to look nearly identical in their long black dresses, pale skin, and blood-red lips. They’d had this Goth look for as long as I’d known them, and their jewelry reflected their funereal fashion sense. Around each of their necks hung beautiful rosary-type necklaces full of crosses, skulls, pentacles, and ankhs. They were definitely making sure to cover all of their bases in terms of mystical and religious icons. Their beads were gorgeous in their black, purple, and ruby palette.

  Sara and Lara were known as Dark Star Beads. It was a cosmic coincidence their names rhymed, they assured me. Each young woman was equally talented, and they were absolutely impossible to tell apart. Whenever I thought I’d figured it out, something would change. For a while Sara had a birthmark on her cheek, making it easy to know who was who. One day, her birthmark was gone, having migrated to the area below the corner of Lara’s mouth. Apparently this birthmark was applied with black eyeliner, and could disappear with just a dab of makeup remover.

  “Jax,” The Twins said simultaneously. This was their version of a warm greeting.

  “Hi there,” I said, being clever and avoiding calling them by their individual names. “How are you?”

  “Awful,” said one.

  “Terrible,” said the other.

  “Why? What’s up?”

  “Oh, we hate events like this,” said Sara, or possibly Lara.

  “Yes, we always have to be cheerful at receptions when meeting potential clients,” said the other one, scowling. They were clearly not clued in to what it meant to be cheerful.

  “And no one seems to understand our work,” the first one continued. “I mean, really, they’ve got to understand the existentialism in our work, the dark zeitgeist, the impossibility of redemption.”

  I was certain I didn’t understand what her beads “meant,” and I’m not sure she did, either. Their beads were dark, and some were almost scary.

  But, in that darkness, there was unusual beauty, and that’s what mattered most to me.

  “I think they are pretty,” I said, not knowing how to respond to the multi-sy
llabic gobbledygook, that Lara—or Sara—had just spouted.

  “Whatever,” they said together, and walked off, their long, straight blue-black hair swaying in unison as they left.

  “So, that’s The Twins,” I said to Val, when I turned and found her at the appetizer table on the patio a few feet away.

  “And do you call them that to their face?” asked Val.

  “Oh, no, they wouldn’t be amused.” In fact, I don’t think they were amused by much of anything.

  “They have that Goth look. Is that still a ‘thing?’” Val asked, more as a criticism than a question.

  “Yes, it’s still a ‘thing.’”

  “Well, it seems so passé. Everyone was doing the Goth thing in the nineties. I mean, even I did the Goth thing back then. I’ll have to show you pictures some time.”

  Now that I had to see. Val was the most non-Gothic (un-Gothic?) person in the world.

  “Seriously,” Val continued, “I had this one black corset—”

  “Val, get a grip. I don’t want to hear about your underwear.”

  “Underwear? Oh no, honey, you don’t understand, I wore this corset on the outside, I—,” Val continued as she picked up a cube of cheese with her long fingernails.

  “Yuck! Val! Use a toothpick to pick up the cheese.”

  “Who died and made you Miss Manners?” Val asked rhetorically, as she popped the cheese in her mouth.

  I saw Dylan sneak in the garden’s back gate. He looked overwhelmed to see so many people. I squeezed through a group gathered at the wine table, filling their plastic glasses with what I hoped wasn’t terrible chardonnay, since I planned to have a glass.

  “Dylan, you look wonderful. I’ve never seen you look so…so…suave!” Dylan looked at me, perplexed.

  “You know, handsome, well put-together, fashionable and cool, all mixed together.”

  “Yeah, Jax, I know what suave means,” Dylan said, looking more serious than I’d ever seen him before.