by Laura Durham
I held up a box of hands-free walkie talkies. “This might work for Leatrice.”
Kate sighed. “That’s right. Leatrice is coming.”
“Do you really think we could sneak a party past her eagle eyes?”
Kate grasped my coat sleeve. “Do you think she’s bringing Sidney Allen?”
I hadn’t thought about that, but now that Kate mentioned it, I felt sure Leatrice would bring the prima donna entertainment designer she’d been dating. “There’s a decent chance of it.”
Kate held up a box with a colorful drawing of three llamas on the front. “How about Llamanoes? It’s like dominoes, but with pictures of llamas in funny outfits.” She picked up a small set of fabric dolls with yarn hair. “And these are like voodoo dolls. Richard would love them. I’m sure he’s worn out the ones he has.”
I was sure he had. “Let’s not encourage Richard to stab imaginary people any more than he already does.”
Kate replaced the dolls on the table. “Good point. So far Llamanoes are the gift to beat.”
I raised an eyebrow. This was not going to be easy. I wandered around the store and was inspecting a set of stemless champagne flutes when Kate glided up to me.
“Pssst,” she said without turning her head to look at me. “I think we’re being followed.”
I swiveled my head to her. “Followed? What are you talking about?”
“Don’t look at me,” she scolded. “Act natural.”
I fought the urge to roll my eyes. “And standing next to each other and talking without looking at each other is natural?”
She motioned toward the large glass front of the store. “Don’t be obvious, but I’m pretty sure that man was walking behind us earlier.”
“So?” I peered across the open space at the short figure in a heavy brown coat and black knit cap standing outside and studying the window display. “It’s Georgetown in December. There are a lot of people walking around.”
“But how many of them also went into the Starbucks on Wisconsin Avenue like we did and are now at The Paper Source?”
I was impressed that Kate was so attentive to her surroundings and scolded myself for not paying more attention. I was a young woman living in a city after all. “Why would anyone be following us?” I asked. “Unless one of your dates is becoming too attentive.”
“You think he’s a stalker?” Kate tilted her head to one side as she thought. “Nope. None of the guys I’ve been seeing are that short, and I’m pretty sure none of them are whack-a-doos.”
“Pretty sure?” I mumbled. “That’s encouraging.”
Kate shrugged. “It’s DC. I can never be 100 percent sure if they’re a bit unbalanced or just congressional staffers.”
I couldn’t see the man’s face because his collar was turned up and he wore a black scarf around his neck, but he didn’t seem to be moving on. I didn’t know too many men who were that captivated by stationery and quirky gifts.
“Here’s what we do,” I said in a low voice, even though there was a hundred feet and a wall of glass between us and our potential follower. “We leave the store and walk back in the direction we came from, then duck into that alcove at the end of the block. If he stays here or walks the other way, he isn’t following us.”
“Sounds good,” Kate said, “but we could also walk out and walk into the Sprinkles cupcake shop next door. That would be more of a win-win.”
“And if he really is trailing us, he wouldn’t need to move to keep an eye on us if we walk right next door,” I said.
“Fine, we’ll do it your way.” Kate looped an arm through mine. “But once we ditch this guy, I’m coming back here to buy the Llamanoes. After I get a cupcake.”
We walked out of the stationery store and made a sharp right, passing the man and taking long strides down the sidewalk. Neither of us turned to see if he was following us, but once we reached the end of the block, we hurried past the white picket fence attached to The Old Stone House and ducked through the low gate and into the gardens. I pulled Kate down low so we were crouched below the fence.
We didn’t have to wait long. A minute later, the man appeared and paused at the fence, looking around. I felt my heart race, and Kate gripped my arm even tighter.
As he stepped through the gate and glanced around, I shot to my feet. “Why are you following us?”
The figure stumbled back and fell onto the ground, the thick scarf falling down to reveal bright-pink lips.
Kate leapt up beside me. “Our stalker is Leatrice?”
Chapter 17
“I’m not stalking you,” Leatrice said once I’d helped her up. “I’m trailing after the person who is following you.”
Kate glanced around us at the empty garden with bare tree branches and low scraggy bushes. “So you’re saying someone is trailing us, and you’re following that person?”
Leatrice bobbed her head up and down, the knit cap no longer hiding her distinctive Mary Tyler Moore flip. “I noticed someone loitering outside our building this morning when I did my usual security sweep of the neighborhood. I didn’t think too much of it, even though I noted it in my activity log. I didn’t think she was a covert agent. She didn’t look the type, but you never know. The city has seen a definite uptick in sleeper spy activity.”
“Yep,” Kate muttered. “That sounds completely normal.”
I shushed her. “Go on, Leatrice. When did you think this person started following us?”
“I heard you and Kate leave and happened to look out my window.” Color crept into her cheeks, and I suspected she’d been watching us go. “Right after you headed down the street, the same woman from earlier started walking about a block behind you. Naturally, I followed.”
“Naturally,” Kate said. “Your disguise was pretty good, you know. We thought you were a man. I mean, a severely vertically challenged man, but still.”
Leatrice beamed. “I didn’t have much time to assemble my disguise. If I hadn’t been in such a rush, I would have added a mustache or a wig.”
“So then what happened?” I asked. “Did the woman stay behind us?”
“For a long time, yes.” Leatrice looked toward the sidewalk. “But when you came out of the paper store, she walked down one of the side streets toward the canal.”
“So if she dropped off, she may not have been following us,” I said. “It could have been a coincidence that she was behind us.”
Leatrice frowned. “I don’t think so. She definitely watched you two for a while.”
“That’s odd,” Kate said. “I’ve never had a woman follow me. Men, sure. That’s nothing new.”
“Did you recognize the woman?” I asked Leatrice. “What did she look like?”
“No, I’d never seen her before this morning.” Leatrice nibbled on her heavily lipsticked lower lip. “I couldn’t see much under her hat and scarf, but I could tell she was a woman from her shape.”
“So we’re looking for a woman-shaped woman,” I said, trying to keep the exasperation out of my voice. “That narrows it down.”
Kate stood up and clasped my hand. “You don’t think it’s one of our brides, do you?”
“Why would a bride follow us?” I asked, knowing very well that a bridezilla didn’t need a logical reason to do anything.
“Who knows?” Kate threw her hands in the air. “Maybe we didn’t return her phone call within the hour, maybe we weren’t available for her wedding, maybe she’s getting divorced and blames us.”
“You’re being ridiculous,” I said, although I mentally reviewed our current client roster to see if anyone jumped out at me as a potential nutcase. No one sprang to mind, but that didn’t give me much comfort. “Why don’t we walk down the street she took and see if Leatrice recognizes her? There must be some detail that sets her apart since she followed her all over Georgetown.”
“Her coat is dark green,” Leatrice said. “And she’s wearing boots.”
“That’s something,” I said. “Most people
in DC wear black coats, so a dark-green one shouldn’t be tough to pick out of a crowd.”
“So we’re going to stalk the stalker?” Kate grinned. “I kind of like that.”
Leatrice rubbed her hands together. “This is so exciting. What if she’s a spy?”
“If she’s a spy, why would she be following me and Kate?” I said, leading the way out of the small garden and back to the sidewalk.
Leatrice stopped and stared at us. “What if you’re both spies?”
“We’re wedding planners.” Kate patted her arm. “You should know. You’ve crashed some of our weddings.”
Leatrice didn’t seem convinced. “True, but wedding planning would be the perfect cover for an international spy. Just think of all the politicians you’ve worked for.”
“Leatrice,” I said. “You know us. We’re not spies.”
Leatrice finally nodded and squeezed my hand. “You’re right. A spy wouldn’t be as messy as you are, dear.”
Kate muffled a laugh behind her hand and tried to assume a serious expression. “So which way did she go?”
My elderly neighbor pointed to a side street across from us that led down to the canal and finally to the Potomac River. “Down that street.”
I pressed the button for the walk signal and watched the electric display across the street until it lit up with a green stick figure. “Let’s go. There may be a chance she’s still around.”
Kate and Leatrice hurried after me, Leatrice jogging to keep up with my long strides and Kate taking short steps in her high-heeled boots. I waited at the intersection for them to catch up and held the collar of my coat close to my neck. Once they’d joined me, we headed down the sloped sidewalk and crossed over the canal bridge, the brown water flowing beneath us.
Kate put a hand on my arm to stop me. “There it is.”
“You see a dark-green coat?” I asked, scanning the few people strolling down the street with us. “Where?”
Kate raised a finger and pointed to the pink-edged doors and windows of the shop across from us, a hot-pink old-fashioned bicycle with a flower-filled basket leaning against the lamppost out front. “You can’t say no to a cupcake from Baked & Wired. They’re your favorite.”
She was right. The cupcakes from the Georgetown bakery and coffee shop were hands down my favorite sweet treat in the city, but I couldn’t focus on buttercream at the moment. “Maybe once we locate this mystery stalker.”
“I could go for a cupcake,” Leatrice said. “Surveillance is hard work.”
So much for my intrepid team.
Kate leaned on the bridge railing and lifted one foot to rub the instep. “Can we at least pop inside Lush and sit down for a second? These boots were not made for downhill walking.”
I suppressed the urge to tell her that her shoes were never designed for any kind of walking. My eyes went to Buster and Mack’s floral shop a few doors down and then scanned the rest of the street. No sign of a green coat anywhere. “Fine. But only for a minute.”
Leatrice and I each took one of Kate’s elbows to keep her from falling face-first on the downhill walk. I held open one side of the glass doors and let them walk in ahead of me. A bell jingled above us to announce our arrival as I was met with the distinct scent of fresh flowers and freshly brewed espresso. I would know Lush with my eyes closed.
I let the door fall behind me as I spotted a woman looking at a table set up with small potted fir trees, Jo Malone scented candles, and topiaries made out of cranberries.
Leatrice nudged me. “Dark-green coat at ten o’clock.”
The woman turned at the sound of the bell and Leatrice’s stage whisper and met my eyes. Well, this was a surprise.
Chapter 18
The woman who’d seemed so unhappy to be at the funeral protest the day before drew in her breath sharply when she spotted me. Now that I was closer to her and she wasn’t bundled in a hat and scarf, I realized she was much younger than I’d originally thought. No way could she be the old guy’s wife, unless he went in for child brides.
Her heart-shaped face was unlined, and there was a smattering of freckles across the bridge of her nose. The ash-brown hair that fell around her face indeed looked like it had been streaked with blond highlights at the ends, and her blue eyes blinked rapidly as she looked at me.
What was she doing here, I wondered, and why was she, of all people, following us?
Her shoulders curved forward, she lowered her head, and she shuffled toward the corner of the shop as if trying to slip out unnoticed. Luckily, my body blocked the doorway.
“I remember you,” I said as she edged her way toward the door. “You were at the funeral yesterday.”
Kate spun around. “What?”
I stepped in front of the woman. “You were with the protest. You were next to the man with the gray hair who seemed to be the leader.”
“I’m sorry,” she mumbled without meeting my eyes. “This was a mistake.”
“You’re one of those horrible protesters?” Kate’s voice went up a couple of octaves. “Why were you following us? Did you want to get in a few more hits?”
The woman looked up at Kate’s face, the purple bruise on her cheek still visible through her concealer, and flinched, shaking her head.
Mack emerged from the back of the shop wearing baby Merry in the black fabric carrier on his chest. Even though I couldn’t see her head, from the direction of her flailing arms and legs I could tell the baby faced him.
“What’s all the ruckus?” he asked, jiggling the baby up and down as he walked back and forth. “You woke up Merry.”
The woman drew in her breath again, and her eyes fixed on Mack.
It only took a second for everything to click in my head. “You’re the mother. You’re the one who left the baby at the church.”
The entire shop went still as every eye turned to her. Crimson flooded her cheeks, and her eyes darted around the room. I was afraid she was going to try to run through me and out the door, so I squared my body in anticipation. Instead, her shoulders sagged as if she were a puppet who’d had her strings cut, and she sank to the floor with her hands over her face.
Buster came out of the back and stood behind Mack. “What’s going on?”
“I think they found the baby’s mother,” Mack said, his voice barely a whisper and his face crestfallen.
Buster gaped at the sobbing woman on the cement floor then looked up at me. “How did you track her down? I thought you didn’t have any leads.”
“Technically we didn’t find her,” I said. “She was following us, although I don’t know why.”
“And I was following her,” Leatrice added. “I thought she might be a secret agent.”
Buster walked over to the woman and lifted her up by the shoulders. “Why don’t you come sit down? You look like you could use a cappuccino.”
“I know I could use a cappuccino,” Kate said, following Buster and the woman to the long metal table near the coffee station.
Buster sat the woman on a metal stool and took the one next to her, keeping his thick arm around her shoulders. “You’re among friends now. Why don’t you tell us why you’re here and why you left your baby at our church?”
Mack hadn’t moved from where he stood near the open door to the back of the shop, but he stroked the baby’s head as she fussed. The woman swiped at her eyes and pushed a strand of hair off her face and turned toward the sound of the baby’s tiny cries.
“Is she okay?”
“She’s fine,” Mack said, holding on to the tiny pajamaed feet with his large hands and gazing down at her head. “She’s an easy baby, you know.”
The woman nodded. “That’s good. I thought she’d find a good home if I left her with you all.”
I pulled out a stool across from her. “So it’s true. You’re the mother.” Part of me couldn’t believe we’d actually located her. Or, to be more accurate, she’d located us.
She took a deep breath and straightened up. “
I’m Prudence, but I like to go by Prue. My father is the leader of our church and, well . . .” She met my eyes. “You’ve seen what he’s like.”
My memories of the gray-haired man screaming curses, his eyes blazing with hate, were fresh in my mind. “I take it he doesn’t know you had a baby?”
She shook her head, her lips pressed together. “I’m only eighteen and still a senior in high school. He would kill me if he knew. My mother’s been gone for a while, so it’s just the two of us. He only became the way he is after she died.” A pained expression passed across her face, but she gave a small shake of her head and continued. “I didn’t know I was pregnant for a long time, then when I realized it I wore baggy clothes to hide the bump. He doesn’t like me wearing anything tight, so it wasn’t hard.”
Mack took a few steps closer, and I noticed his stern expression softening.
“I’d seen you all every time we protested a funeral.” Prue’s eyes filled with tears. “I hated going to them, but my father made me. You and your friends always seemed so kind. I figured any people who would come out and do what you do for strangers would take good care of a baby.”
“So you tracked down their church and left Merry outside?” I asked.
She nodded. “I waited around the corner to make sure someone found her. I didn’t just run off.” A tear snaked down her face. “I almost ran back for her, but then I saw you two come out and pick her up.” She looked between Buster and Mack. “You looked so happy, I figured I’d made the right decision after all, even though it was the hardest thing I’ve ever done.”
Buster rubbed the woman’s back, then stood and moved to the large chrome coffee machine.
