The Case of the Flashing Fashion Queen - A Dix Dodd Mystery

by N.L. Wilson

  Every evening, Dylan met with me. Between six and eight, when Ned Weatherby headed home and I followed at a discreet distance in whatever vehicle I could wangle, I would call my assistant. As soon as Ned turned down Ashfield Drive with its row of humongous houses, I’d hit #1 on my autodial. Dylan would meet me down the block from the Weatherby home—close enough that we could see the driveway, far enough away so that we appeared to be visiting elsewhere. And of course, always parked in a slightly different location.

  Dylan would slide into the passenger seat and the two of us would go over what was happening at the office. A quick study, he knew not to bring the overdue bills along, not even the ones where the friendly reminders had turned considerably more hostile. Those would be taken care of soon enough anyway. Mostly he would fill me in on our other two cases that were on the board.

  Why not do that whole thing over the phone, you’re thinking, rather than arranging this nightly tête-à-tête? Because I’d have starved to death. Mrs. Weatherby had insisted I conduct the entire surveillance personally, and given how much money she was paying me, I wasn’t about to quibble. So to keep continuity, I was reliant on Dylan to bring me enough stakeout food to get me through the night. When this case was over, I never wanted to see another wrapped burger or oversized shake as long as I lived.

  Each evening as we met up, Dylan left his window down a little lower, and pushed up against the passenger door a little closer. By this fifth night, he was practically hanging his head out the window. “Gee, Dix,” he said, exaggerating a gag and waving a hand in front of his nose. “Wonder why you’re alone on a Friday night.”

  Did I mention I desperately needed a shower?

  It was just after seven and my mark was home. It had been a busy day for Ned, but I’d known that going into it. Jennifer had inked it in on the now grease-stained and worn itinerary she’d provided. Friday: meet with J. Poole 9am his offices, 11:30 lunch meeting with potential clients from Toronto—expected to go into the afternoon, 4:15 massage at gym/meet for racquetball if time permits.

  Dylan picked up the wrinkled itinerary and looked it over. “Did you follow him into the massage?”

  “Hardly!”

  “Dix, I’m surprised at you,” he said. “And frankly, a little disappointed.”

  I sighed. “It’s a restricted gym. Men only. Even the staff are men.”

  He waited.

  I opened the glove compartment and pulled out my fake mustache. “Good thing I can pass for a guy when I have to.” Which of course, is really quite easy—memorize a random fact about some big-boobed starlet, tell a good flatulence joke (and under pain of death, never use the word flatulence), and say, “How ’bout them Blue Jays/Leafs/Raptors?”. And of course, pray you don’t have to go for a pee.

  Dylan lifted an eyebrow. “Tell me you didn’t give him the massage.”

  “Hell, no. But I was the bungling incompetent trainee who delivered the towels to the room.”

  He nodded. “Now, that’s the Dix Dodd I know and respect. And did our Mr. Weatherby behave?”

  “Model customer. Just what you’d expect from a choirboy. He even kept his t-shirt on.”

  “You’re kidding!”

  “I’m not.”

  This had surprised me. In fact, a lot of things I found out about Ned Weatherby this week had surprised me. The stories around Marport City always painted him as not just a shrewd businessman, but a bit of a prick about it. Before trailing him, I could have easily pictured this guy elbowing little old ladies aside if he spied a quarter in the middle of the street, or cheerfully drowning puppies if puppy-killing paid. But I’d witnessed no such bad conduct. If anything, Ned Weatherby was too good to be true. Literally. Because I’d seen too much to believe too good to be true could be true.

  I watched as Dylan—a good six feet with a few inches to spare—attempted to get comfortable in the passenger seat of the vehicle-du-jour, a subcompact Hyundai. He put his left ankle on his right knee then down again. With one foot on the floor, he attempted to hike the other up on the dashboard, but that wasn’t about to happen. Finally, he just gave up and let his feet stay flat in the nut-crushing confines of the car.

  Good. Served him right for so indelicately pointing out that I stank. It sort of leveled the playing field, seeing him sitting there with his folded knees nearly touching his chin. My satisfaction was short-lived, however, because he found the lever on the side of his seat and reclined it.

  Oh, yikes!

  In this half-reclining, totally sexy pose, he sipped his own super-sized drink and rattled the ice in the cup. “You’ll be pleased to know things are under control at the office.”

  The office. Right. I paused to sip my drink. “The McGarvie case?”

  “You nailed it. The guy was cheating with her best friend.” Dylan said. “Lori Lee McGarvie won’t be marrying that dog. She’s moving on and not looking back.”

  “Your words?”

  He beamed with pride. “Hers.”

  “What about Roberta Street?”

  “Hitting the road.”

  Ha ha. I poked the ice in my drink with my straw. “Without her cheating boyfriend, I hope.”

  “Actually, with Lori Lee McGarvie.”

  “Excuse me?”

  I blinked wide as Dylan flashed a sugar-eating grin. He locked his hands behind his head. “I have a sense about these things. And I just love happy endings.”

  He did. Believe in happy endings, that is. Of course, if he stayed in this business long enough, he’d wise up.

  Dylan nodded toward the house where Ned Weatherby had yet to enter. The millionaire was outside still, wandering around the gardens in the early evening light. He picked at the flowers and examined the shrubs. He pulled the rare weed that the gardener had missed.

  “Why doesn’t he go in?”

  “He does this every night,” I said, sticking my cold drink in the cup holder and wiping my condensation-dampened fingers on my jeans. “Fiddles around outside for a while. He’ll stay out there until the sheers pull back and Jennifer knocks on the window.”

  “Regular green thumb, is he?”

  “He’s a lot of things.” I hauled out the photographs from the week and handed them to him. Most of them were taken with a very sharp telephoto lens that would have given any paparazzi an orgasm. Ned in meetings with his staff looking annoyed at times, perplexed at others, never quite happy about the discussions on the table. Ned with his lawyer having a business lunch at Chez Lenore, and heading to the racquetball court after. Ned at the dentist, the jewelry store. But never at the Underhill Motel. And the closest he got to a blonde babe all week was his ready-to-retire secretary Luanne Laney, and she was more silver than blond.

  There was one photograph that was out of place. A hellishly angry one that I’d shuffled to the bottom of the pile before handing the pics to Dylan. I watched his eyes as he riffled through them and came to this picture.

  “This guy...” Dylan pointed to an older gentleman standing beside Weatherby in the photo. “This guy I’ve seen before.” The two were standing beside Ned’s BMW. And even from the still shot, the anger of the stranger was evident. His hands were fisted, his face red.

  “That’s Billy Star,” I said.

  “Did you get an audio on this exchange?”

  “No. Wasn’t close enough. And he’s obviously no blond chick so I don’t think Jennifer would be too concerned with that.”

  Dylan flipped once more through the pictures. “Here,” he said, pointing to the one of the boardroom gathering. It had taken some roof climbing, fancy angling and a fifty dollar bribe to get that shot through the window, but I was nothing if not resourceful. “That’s the same guy sitting to the left of Weatherby.”

  “Good eye.” I smiled like a mama cat watching her kitten nab its first mouse.

  No, not a mama cat. Definitely feline, though. Hell, as I sat there with Dylan, I could almost hear myself purring.

  “Man, he even looks angry here
in the boardroom,” Dylan said. “Controlled but pissed-off. That guy’s got some serious attitude with ol’ Ned.”

  “Billy Star works at Weatherby Industries. Top floor. His office is right next door to Ned’s.”

  “Not after this, I take it.” Dylan flipped again to the picture of an angry Star giving Ned the one finger salute.

  “That’s what I would have thought too. But this gentlemanly exchange happened yesterday, Thursday. And I saw Billy strolling back in to Weatherby Industries again this morning.”

  “Wonder what they were fighting about?” Dylan mused, echoing my very thoughts.

  I was curious, too. Damn curious. Mentally I began building scenarios and checking off possibilities. Were they fighting about business? Old money? New money? Maybe the blond bombshell Mrs. Weatherby suspected her husband of boinking was playing honey in the middle—hottie in the middle?—with these two. But then I thought Mrs. Weatherby was being paranoid, didn’t I? Didn’t I? The only way I’d know for sure would be to check it out. The winged money Jennifer Weatherby had given me, coupled with that she had promised, tweeted their chastisement as they flew above my head.

  “We’ll never know what they’re fighting about, because that’s not what we’re being paid to find out.”

  “Yeah, but doesn’t it drive you nuts, Dix? The not knowing stuff like this. Isn’t that why you got into the business in the first place?”

  I got into this business because after twenty years of working in an office with chauvinistic men, they still treated me like the new kid on the block. No, the new girl on the block. I got into the business because I was tired of watching newbies come in and get promoted over me just because they had dicks. I’d had enough of not being taken seriously because of the way I looked. I knew I could do better. Damn right well knew it.

  I shrugged the tension from my shoulders. “Yeah, a little. It comes with the territory—insatiable curiosity. The need to know more than you need to know.”

  “What’s your intuition saying about this Billy Star guy? How do you read him?”

  That’s another thing I liked about Dylan, he didn’t laugh off female intuition the way some guys did. I let my head roll back into the seat and closed my eyes, not just because they were tired, but sitting this close to Dylan... sometimes I just needed the pretense of privacy myself.

  “He’s a hothead. That I’ll give him, but...”

  As I pondered how best to sum up my feelings about Billy Star, Dylan must have figured I’d drifted off, because the next thing I knew, I felt his hand on my arm and his low-voiced whisper in my ear.

  “Dix? You asleep?”

  The tingle that went down my spine crawled around me, gripped me. I felt my nipples tighten under my t-shirt.

  Holy frig!

  It had been a long time since the touch of a man had made me react like that. And that had ended badly. In heartache and anger and many nights cursing myself as much as I cursed him. And damn it, as much as I hated to admit it, a night or two wondering where he’d gotten to. I was the one who always searched the faces at the airports, and glanced back over my shoulder at the movies when I heard a certain laugh. And, I reminded myself, the one who’d sworn never again.

  “I’m awake.” I sat up straight.

  “Ned Weatherby just went inside.”

  “Did he pick a rose from the garden?”

  “Yeah, but Jennifer didn’t knock on the window. Ned just— “

  Dylan’s words were cut off by the panic-stricken scream of Ned Weatherby,

  “Help! Somebody help!”

  My eyes saucered as I looked at Ned Weatherby running down his neat stone-paved driveway. His face was contorted with shock. Blood reddened his shirt. He still held the rose in his hands—the thorns cutting into it, his blood dripping down from it.

  “My wife... somebody’s killed my wife. Somebody help!”

  Even as we jumped from the car and ran, I was on my cell dialing 911.

  “77 Ashfield Drive. Yes, Ashfield Drive, and hurry. I think there’s been a murder.”

  I hung up quickly before the emergency dispatcher could ask me a million questions I didn’t have the answers to. Yet.

  Yes, I’d be speaking to the police. I had no doubt about that. I had to tell them what I knew, about Jennifer’s visit to my office a few short days ago. But for now, I had to get into that house before they did. See for myself. And it was more than insatiable curiosity; this was personal. This was my client.

  Dylan and I ran up the driveway together, but he reached Ned first. Reading my intent, he turned Ned around so that his back was to me as I dashed into the house through the open front door.

  The Weatherby home was impressive. Even in my heart-thumping state, I couldn’t help but take in that fact. Great high ceilings, marble flooring in the foyer. The house was huge, and from where I stood, there must have been four or five different doorways or hallways before me. It was like a maze. But I didn’t need a map to tell me which way to find Jennifer Weatherby, I just followed the trail of blood. The trail that started right at my feet.

  Already I could hear the sirens, and from just outside the door, the sounds of Dylan gently grilling Ned about what he’d seen.

  Quickly I followed along the foyer and through a set of open double doors.

  And oh shit, there she was. Jennifer Weatherby lay face down on the floor of what appeared to be a study. A fire burned in the fireplace, incongruously cheery. Two glasses of wine—one full, the other half full—sat on an occasional table between two tall wingback chairs. The plain white pantsuit she wore was soaked through with blood—two dark bullet holes torn in the fabric. One tan sandal remained on her foot, while the other lay askew on the hardwood floor.

  I rushed to her and bent to check for a pulse. But before my fingers even touched her neck, I knew what I’d find. No pulse. No life. Just the cold feel of death on my hands. And Jennifer’s blood.

  “Oh Jennifer,” I whispered. I knew I’d get no response, but I had to say it. “I’m so sorry.”

  Her words rang in my ears. The words I’d so easily dismissed as she’d said them when leaving my office. “Oh, I forgot to tell you, she’s threatened me. Several times she’s called the house telling me she wants me out of the way.”

  Guilt lumped itself into an indigestible ball in my stomach. Dammit, I should have done something.

  Oh, sure, I’d warned her it sounded like a matter for the police, but when she shrugged it off, I hadn’t pressed it. Mainly because I was convinced Jennifer Weatherby was just being paranoid. And now she lay dead before me. All because I hadn’t taken her seriously.

  I stood up, a new determination burning in my gut. I would find that mysterious blond mistress no matter how long I had to tail Ned Weatherby. No matter what it took. Because Jennifer’s other words rang through my mind also.

  “It’s a matter for you, Dix. I have faith in you.”