The Dead-End Job Mysteries Box Set 1

by Elaine Viets

  Thanks also to public relations expert Jack Klobnak, and to my bookseller friend, Carole Wantz, who can sell sand in the Mojave Desert.

  Special thanks to librarian Anne Watts, who let me borrow her six-toed cat, Thumbs, for this series. Check out his picture on my Web site at elaineviets.com.

  Chapter 1

  “Uh-oh, here comes trouble,” Millicent said.

  If this was trouble, Helen Hawthorne wished she had it. A Rolls-Royce Silver Cloud pulled up in front of Millicent’s Bridal Salon on Las Olas Boulevard.

  This was a vintage Rolls, the car of new movie stars and old money. Its long, sculpted curves were the color of well-polished family silver. The shiny new Porsches, Beemers, and Ferraris on the fashionable Fort Lauderdale street looked like cheap toys next to it.

  The driver’s door opened with an expensive thunk! Out stepped a chauffeur in a uniform tailored to show off his broad shoulders and long legs. His pants hugged the best buns beyond the Gran Forno bakery. His hint of a beard would feel deliciously rough on bare skin.

  The chauffeur jogged to the rear passenger door with an athlete’s grace.

  “Baby, you can drive my car,” Helen said.

  “Sorry, sweetie, Rod’s taken,” Millicent said, “and it’s battle stations. They have an appointment here.”

  The chauffeur opened the door, and Helen saw a candy-pink spike heel like something from Barbie’s dream closet pop out. Was the woman wearing a size-four shoe? Did they make shoes in a size four? Helen was six feet tall and didn’t know much about petite people wear.

  The woman barely reached five feet. She had on a sleeveless pink dress with a flirty pleated skirt.

  “Oh, my God,” Helen said as the woman slid out of the car. “She’s not wearing any panties.”

  “Typical,” Millicent said. “How can Kiki spend so much money and look so cheap? That dress cost two thousand dollars and it’s suitable for a child of fourteen.”

  “On a woman of forty,” Helen said.

  “Forty!” Millicent said. “Kiki Shenrad is fifty if she’s a day—and tucked so tight she has hospital corners.”

  Kiki threw her arms around the hunky chauffeur and pulled him toward her. She soul kissed him and ran a slender leg along his muscular one.

  “She’d better pick out a dress quick,” Helen said. “I think they’re going to consummate the marriage right on the sidewalk.”

  Millicent didn’t hear her. She was pulling wedding gowns from the racks. Helen knew she should help her boss, but she couldn’t tear herself from the show outside the shop window.

  A small figure emerged from the huge Rolls like a mouse from a hole and crept around the nearly copulating couple. Miss Mouse was about twenty with no-color hair scraped into a messy ponytail. Her gray sweats were baggy, but Helen guessed a slender figure was buried underneath that lumpy cloth.

  “You’d think Kiki would give her maid a decent castoff dress,” Helen said.

  Millicent looked up from the snowstorm of white chiffon and satin on the silver display stand. “Maid? That’s the bride—Desiree Shenrad.”

  “Uh-oh,” Helen said. “We’ve got trouble.”

  Kiki finally pried herself off the chauffeur, slapped his perky posterior, and sent him back to stand by the car. She flung open the salon door and said, “Millie!”

  Millicent winced. Only big spenders called her that. She hated it.

  Miss Mouse scurried in her mother’s magnificent wake. The shop’s pink paint was designed to flatter most complexions. The mirrors made double chins vanish. But they couldn’t transform dreary little Desiree.

  Kiki started to air kiss Millicent, then swiveled her head so abruptly, Helen thought she’d get whiplash. Kiki had seen the rose dress.

  “I want that,” she said. Helen had never heard a soft voice sound so hard.

  Every woman who came into Millicent’s wanted the rose dress. There was nothing quite like it. The strapless gown had a beautifully beaded bodice. But the skirt was the show stopper. Made of dark red taffeta that shaded to black, the skirt was swirled to look like an enormous bouquet of velvety roses. If Helen ever won an Oscar, she’d wear that dress onstage.

  “I’d like to wear it to my daughter’s wedding,” Kiki said.

  “That’s not a mother-of-the-bride dress,” Millicent said.

  “I am not going to wear some pathetic little powder-blue dress,” Kiki said.

  “I don’t sell pathetic little dresses,” Millicent said. “But my customers leave here properly dressed for special occasions.”

  “I’ll decide what’s proper. You!” Kiki pointed at Helen. “Take the rose dress to fitting room A.”

  The largest room, naturally. Helen looked at Millicent, who gave her a slight nod.

  “Oh, yes,” Kiki said. “We should get something for my daughter, too.” The bride was an afterthought at her own wedding.

  “And when is the wedding?” Millicent said.

  “Saturday,” Kiki said.

  “June, July, or August?”

  “This coming Saturday, December fourth,” Kiki said.

  Millicent looked stunned. “Impossible. Three months is a rush job. We can’t order the dresses in time.”

  “Then we’ll buy something in stock. And you’ll have to alter it in the store. Money is no object.”

  Millicent’s eyes narrowed. “You’d better tell me what happened. I can’t help you if I don’t know the whole story.”

  “It’s that bitch at Haute Bridal. I saw what she got in for the wedding and canceled everything. The fabrics looked cheap. The colors were horrible. Nothing was as she promised.”

  “But bridal sales are final,” Helen said.

  Kiki laughed. “My ex-husband is a lawyer. Nothing is final.”

  “It is at this store,” Millicent said. “Do what I say, and I’ll make you look like every one of your thirty million dollars.”

  Millicent was pointing a red talon at Kiki, punching each word for emphasis. Helen thought the blood-red nails were the mark of Millicent’s success. She’d clawed her way up to the chicest shop on Las Olas with only a small divorce settlement and one major talent: She had a gift for making women look good.

  Millicent knew how to emphasize their good points and downplay their figure flaws. She was her own best example. Her hair had turned snowy white years ago. Millicent had the courage to leave it that dramatic color. It made her look younger than most of the highlighted salon jobs in her shop. An unface-lifted fifty, Millicent looked forty. Colorful tops drew attention to her remarkable chest, held high by a cantilevered bra. Dark pants minimized generous hips. But she couldn’t hide her clever, appraising eyes.

  Kiki shrugged like a spoiled child. “Millie, darling, help me into the rose gown.”

  Kiki stepped out of her pink dress and revealed an even pinker body. Her blond pubic hair was sculpted into a dollar sign.

  Helen gaped.

  “Any man who gets me hits the jackpot,” Kiki said and winked.

  It took Helen and Millicent both to wrestle her into the rose dress. The skirt had four layers, including the only hoop Helen had seen since Gone With the Wind. Helen had to admit the outrageous gown suited Kiki. She had the carriage and the attitude to wear a skirt the size of an SUV.

  “I have to have it,” Kiki said.

  “So buy it,” Millicent said. “But don’t upstage your daughter at her own wedding.”

  “No one can upstage the bride,” Kiki said. “I’ll take the dress.”

  “Only if you promise to buy another dress for the church service,” Millicent said. “You cannot wear a ball gown to a daytime wedding, Kiki. You’ll look like a joke.”

  Those words got through to Kiki. She settled on a sleek black knit for the church and a gauzy gold gown suitable for a minor goddess for the rehearsal dinner. Then she put the rose gown back on “to get used to wearing it.” Helen thought she just liked parading around in it.

  Finally Kiki remembered her daughter. Desir
ee stood silently in the corner like Cinderella. Helen didn’t know whether to offer her a chair or some ashes by the fireplace.

  “I want a wedding dress with a full skirt and a cathedral-length train,” Kiki said.

  “That’s a ten-foot train,” Millicent said. “A petite bride like Desiree will be swallowed by all that fabric.”

  “Not if she stands up straight.” Kiki’s French-manicured nail poked her daughter between her slumping shoulder blades.

  “I want something expensive,” Kiki said. “I want snow white, not that off-white color. It looks like dirty teeth.”

  Desiree stood there, mute.

  “What do you want, Desiree?” Millicent asked. “It’s your wedding.”

  “It makes no difference. I won’t get it.” Desiree’s little voice was drowned in disappointment.

  What was Millicent doing? Helen wondered. She was too smart to get between warring mothers and daughters. Did she forget Kiki had the money?

  Desiree tried on a simple white strapless gown. Her mother said, “Oh, Desiree. You’re only twenty years old and I can see you as a nun.”

  “And I see you as an old tart.” That soft voice. Those hunched shoulders. That meek expression. Yet she’d insulted her mother with acid-stinging accuracy.

  For five hours, Desiree tried on dresses while her mother stabbed her with stiletto slashes. Desiree seemed sad and beaten. Only later did Helen realize the young mouse had fought back with feline ferocity.

  Helen did know one thing: She was worn out from being in the same room with that rage. Hauling the heavy wedding dresses didn’t help. They were encrusted with scratchy crystal beading and itchy lace. Many of the dresses weighed twenty pounds or more. Helen had to hold the hangers over her head to keep the long skirts off the floor. Her arms ached. Her neck and shoulders screamed for relief.

  When she ran for yet another dress, she saw the chauffeur, Rod, sweating in the shimmering sun. It wasn’t fair to keep him standing by the car in the brutal Florida heat. Helen pulled a cold bottle of water from the fridge.

  “You look like you could use this.” She handed the frosty bottle to Rod. A little sweat improved the man. The chauffeur’s black curls were tousled by the Florida breeze—or an expensive stylist.

  Rod turned pale under his tan and backed away. “Don’t let her see you,” he said. “You could ruin everything.” He sounded really frightened.

  “I’m sorry,” Helen said. “I don’t want you to lose your job. It’s a hot day and—”

  “Job? You could cost me a lot more than any job. Get away from me with that.”

  Why would a water bottle frighten a big, strong man? Helen didn’t have time to think about it. She heard Millicent calling, “Helen, where’s that dress I sent you for?”

  Helen ran inside, grabbed it off the rack, and hurried back with a pearl-and-crystal concoction. Desiree put it on like a hair shirt.

  “It’s regal,” Kiki said, after Helen fought the dress’s one hundred white satin buttons.

  “I look like a homely Hapsburg princess,” the despairing Desiree said.

  She was right, Helen thought. She did look like a sad, chinless royal bride. Desiree was one of those women who looked her worst in white.

  The desperate Millicent went into the odd closet, where she kept her mistakes. She brought out the spider dress. The bride had broken her engagement and defaulted on the seven-thousand-dollar gown. The spider dress had been impossible to resell. It looked bad on a hanger and worse on most women. The color was peculiar: Its pale pink undertone looked dingy next to the true white gowns. The style was odder still, a cobwebby lace that floated on the air like cat hair. Helen itched every time she saw it.

  Desiree tried it on, and for the first time that day, smiled.

  Helen quit shoving a beaded gown back on the rack and stared at the little bride. She had never seen a dress make such a dramatic transformation.

  Mousy little Desiree lived up to her name for the first time in her life. She was beguiling in that dress, a fey fairy princess. The lace was a gossamer web. The crystal beads gleamed like enchanted dewdrops. The subtle pink color turned Desiree’s flour-white complexion creamy and put highlights in her dull hair.

  On this bride, the spider dress looked elegant and extraordinary.

  “It’s perfect,” Millicent said.

  “I love it,” Helen said.

  “I want it,” the bride said.

  “You can’t have it,” her mother snapped. Kiki was still wearing the rose dress. But she was no longer a showstopper. Now she looked overblown in the extravagant gown. “That wedding dress will never do.”

  Of course not, Helen thought. You can’t have your daughter outshine you.

  “Then I’ll buy it myself,” Desiree said softly.

  “Using what for money?” her mother said. “It’s seven thousand dollars. You won’t come into your grandmother’s trust fund until you’re thirty.”

  “Daddy will buy it for me,” Desiree said.

  “Daddy is fighting off bankruptcy,” Kiki said. “Daddy the hotshot lawyer spent millions on that computer-stock class-action suit and lost. Daddy can barely pay his half of the wedding.”

  “Why do you keep running up the costs for Daddy?” Desiree cried. “I wanted a simple beach wedding, not a sit-down dinner for four hundred.”

  “What you want is beside the point,” Kiki said. Helen thought those were the truest words ever spoken in that store.

  “A beach wedding is fine when a secretary marries a mechanic,” Kiki said. “But for our sort, weddings are for the parents. We’re paying the bills. Your father will invite his important clients. I will invite patrons of the arts. They will expect to see a traditional bride walk down the aisle, not some hippie. I will buy that one.”

  Kiki indicated the Hapsburg princess dress. Its wide, stiff skirt looked like a satin pop-up tent. Its ten-foot train was loaded with crystal beads. Helen wondered how the tiny bride could drag all that fabric down the aisle.

  Desiree hated the dress. So did Helen and Millicent.

  “Mother, I can’t dance in that at the reception. Not with that huge train.”

  “We’ll bustle up the train,” her mother said.

  “Can’t,” Millicent said. “It’s too bulky. It will look like a bale of fabric on her back.”

  “Is the train detachable?” Helen said.

  Millicent raised an eyebrow at Helen’s faux pas.

  Kiki’s smile dripped malice. “Let me guess. You had your reception at the VFW hall next to the turkey-shoot posters.”

  “Knights of Columbus Hall,” Helen said. “And it was the Holy Redeemer rummage sale.”

  Millicent frowned. Helen shut up. She’d let a detail from her old life slip out in her anger. Her fingers itched for the crowbar she’d used to end her marriage. She was on the run, but she never regretted the satisfying crunch she’d heard when she first started swinging and connected with her target. The cries and crunches felt good. Kiki was a candidate for just such a shattering experience.

  The silence stretched on. Then Kiki said, “We shall buy two wedding dresses. One for the church ceremony and one for the reception. If Desiree will wear the dress with the train for the wedding ceremony, I will buy her the hippie dress to dance in.”

  The bride said yes, happy for even a half victory.

  Helen was surprised that Kiki would compromise. Thank goodness for the trend among rich brides for two dresses—and Kiki’s eagerness to run up bills for her cash-strapped ex.

  “We’ll take these and come back tomorrow to pick out the veil and bridesmaid dresses,” Kiki said.

  Another welcome surprise. Helen didn’t think she could survive another five-hour fight. She did some quick calculations. Kiki would be spending maybe sixty thousand dollars on dresses, accessories, and alterations at Millicent’s. Helen would have to work more than four years to make that much at this dead-end job.

  Kiki left in a tornado of promises and air kiss
es, invigorated by the afternoon battle. Desiree trailed listlessly behind her. Rod, the delectably sweaty chauffeur, opened Kiki’s door. She slid inside decorously.

  When the Rolls pulled away from the curb, Helen and Millicent collapsed into the pink chairs. They were soft, but not too yielding. A tired woman could get out of them with dignity. No woman ever sat on the gray “husband couch.” She knew her eyes would glaze with boredom if she went there.

  Helen sighed and kicked off her shoes. Millicent fanned herself with a bridal consultant’s brochure.

  “The things I do for money,” Millicent groaned.

  “Rod the chauffeur is doing something strange for his bucks,” Helen said. “You won’t believe this, Millicent. He was afraid to take a bottle of water from me. I mean, really scared. He said, ‘Don’t let her see you. You could ruin everything.’ He acted like I was handing him a bomb. Why is he so afraid?”

  “Because Kiki is a jealous bitch. She doesn’t want her chauffeur talking to a younger, better-looking woman.”

  “I wasn’t coming on to him. I’m happy with Phil.” Boy, am I happy, Helen thought.

  “Then don’t interfere,” Millicent said sharply. “Kiki’s name should be kinky. She likes watching her chauffeur stand by that car and sweat. She probably does him that way. Don’t feel sorry for Rod. That’s his job. Don’t cater to him like he’s married to a client. He’s not a husband, although God knows he has some of the same duties.”

  “At least Rod is well paid,” Helen said.

  “He thinks he is, the fool,” Millicent said. “Kiki’s had many chauffeurs. She pays them minimum wage and puts them in her will for a million bucks. When she bounces them, she writes them out. Gets herself cheap help and first-class service that way. It must be a shock for those young men to go from millionaire dreams to minimum-wage reality. I can’t imagine what it’s like.”

  I can, Helen thought. I used to make major money and live in a mansion before I caught my ex-husband with my next-door neighbor. I’d kill Kiki if she pulled that on me.

  “How do you know these things?” Helen said.

  “It’s the talk of the town,” Millicent said.