The Dead-End Job Mysteries Box Set 1

by Elaine Viets

  Helen was afraid to ask how Kiki did that. Sixty-five buttons to go.

  “My real friend isn’t good enough to be in the wedding because she’s fat,” Desiree said.

  Her mother entered the room briskly, shutting her cell phone. “That’s not true, darling. I thought Emily would be more comfortable handling the guest book.”

  “Mother bought Emily the plum Vera Wang,” Desiree said. “She wouldn’t let her pick out her own dress.”

  “Emily has an unfortunate penchant for flappy fabrics,” Kiki said. “She looks like a clothesline in a hurricane.”

  Forty-eight buttons. Kiki was spoiling for a fight. Helen tried to steer the conversation to a safer subject. “What kind of flowers do you want for your wedding, Desiree?”

  “I want red roses,” the bride said.

  “So romantic,” Helen said.

  “So ordinary,” her mother said. “I can give her any flower that she wants, and she asks for roses like a shopgirl.”

  Helen froze at the insult.

  “No offense intended,” Kiki said.

  “Of course not,” Helen said.

  “But I couldn’t let her embarrass me. We’re having chartreuse lady’s slipper and cymbidium orchids.”

  “Science-fiction flowers,” the bride said. “I wanted roses, but I won’t get them.”

  “You’ll have plenty of roses at your wedding, sweetheart. The flower girls are throwing rose petals. So are the guests.”

  “Instead of rice or bubbles?” Helen said.

  “No one has thrown rice in decades,” Kiki said. “And bubbles are so eighties. The bride and groom will be showered with rose petals when they leave the church. At the reception, the attendants are sprinkling rose petals in the commodes.”

  Helen thought she’d heard wrong. “You’re putting roses in the toilets?”

  “I’m not,” Kiki said. “The attendants are. After each flushing. It’s such an elegant touch.”

  “That’s what my mother thinks of my choice,” the bride said. “My roses will be walked on—and peed on!” Angry tears cascaded down her small face and slid into the accordion wrinkles where her chin should have been.

  “Prewedding jitters,” Kiki said. She watched her daughter weep as if it were a third-rate performance. She made no move to comfort her. Helen handed Desiree a fistful of Kleenex. She blew loudly. The little bride had a trombone for a beezer.

  Twenty-seven buttons to go. Helen had reached Desiree’s upper back, and the buttons kept escaping from their loops. The bride was annoyingly limp, like a protestor who’d collapsed on police lines.

  “Straighten your shoulders,” her mother commanded. “And smile. You’re a bride, not a corpse.”

  The bride did look more dead than alive. Helen finished the last button. Desiree failed to smile, but she dutifully tried on veils. Some went to her fingertips. Others fell to the floor. Desiree could have been in a coma for all the reaction she showed.

  “Which do you like?” Helen asked, hoping for some response.

  Desiree shrugged.

  Of course, Kiki had an opinion. “That long veil has the same beading as the dress. I like it.”

  “It’s a bit heavy, don’t you think?” Helen tried to be tactful. In that long veil, Desiree looked like a ghost haunting her wedding.

  “It needs something to brighten it up,” Kiki said.

  Two rooms away, Millicent heard another chance to make money. She said, “Helen, go get that crystal crown off the display.”

  The crown was five hundred bucks, more than Helen made in a week. Helen came back and crowned the chinless little heiress. Desiree looked like she had a headache.

  “Do you like it?” Helen asked.

  Desiree shrugged. Helen wanted to shake her. Why didn’t she stand up for herself? Helen was grateful when Millicent stuck her head in the dressing room and said, “The groom’s here. Should I send him back?”

  “Isn’t it bad luck for the groom to see the dress?” Helen said.

  “Join the twenty-first century,” Kiki said. “These days, the groom may pick out the dress.”

  “Luke might as well see it,” Desiree said, as if he were viewing a fatal accident. “I’ll be out in a minute. Leave me alone, please.”

  Helen tiptoed up front for a quick look at the groom. Luke was definitely scenic. He wasn’t tall, probably about the same size as Millicent. But he was perfectly made from his cleft chin to his well-shod feet. His deep-brown hair was so thick, Helen wanted to run her fingers through it. Luke’s lightweight blue sweater and gray pants were nothing special. Yet Helen noticed them, because they seemed so absolutely right.

  Luke was with a skinny man about sixty dressed in black. His clothes and goatee screamed, “I am an artiste.”

  “I’m Luke Praine,” the groom said to Helen and Millicent. “This is my director, the owner of the Sunnysea Shakespeare Playhouse, Chauncey Burnham.”

  “Kiki, darling, so glad to see you.” Chauncey had a sycophant’s smile. His lips were unpleasantly red and flexible. Helen wondered if that was from smooching patrons’ posteriors.

  “Really, Chauncey, can’t I have any peace?” Kiki said.

  “I saw your car and I had to come over and say hello.” Chauncey’s smile slipped slightly.

  “You’ve said it. Now go.” Kiki started to turn away.

  “Er, could we have a moment alone?”

  “Anything you have to say, Chauncey, you can say right here.” Kiki was daring him.

  The director took a deep breath, rubbed his goatee, and pursed his rubbery red lips. “All right, I will. Kiki, you promised my company five thousand dollars so we could get through December. Now you say you can’t give us any money until January first.”

  “I can’t, Chauncey. The wedding has been expensive.”

  “The landlord says he’ll close us down next week in the middle of the run. We haven’t been reviewed yet, Kiki. The critic for the Herald can’t come until next Thursday. I know we’ll get a big crowd when we get a favorable review.” Chauncey was pleading now, like a mother begging for the life of her child.

  “If you get a favorable review. He called your last production ‘uninspired and derivative.’” Kiki’s face was a frozen mask of meanness.

  Chauncey showed a brief flash of anger. Then he puckered properly. “Kiki, please. You know Luke is marvelous in this production. I beg of you, help us. We won’t make it to January without your support. We’ll die.”

  Kiki’s smile was cruel. “Don’t beg, Chauncey. It’s weak.”

  Chauncey hung his head. Millicent moved away. Humiliation might be catching.

  Desiree appeared in her frumpy wedding dress and veil, an expensive specter. “Poor Chauncey,” she said softly. “You’re much too nice. If you were only more like your Shakespeare characters, you could save your theater. The bard knew what to do with inconvenient women.” Her smile was honeyed malice.

  Chauncey looked stricken. “Please, dear lady, that’s not funny.”

  “Screw your courage to the sticking point,” Desiree said, a demure Lady Macbeth.

  Sweat broke out on his forehead. “Please, it’s bad luck to quote the Scottish play.”

  “Perhaps.” She shrugged. “But my mother’s death would be good luck for you.”

  There was a shocked silence. Chauncey turned white, down to those mobile lips. “I’d better go,” he said. “You look lovely, Desiree.” He backed out of the shop.

  “Money is so important in the theater,” Desiree said. “Everyone thinks Luke is marrying me for mine, but that’s not true. I won’t have any money until I’m thirty and Luke is thirty-five. That’s old for a leading man, you know. He’s getting a little thin on top now, but I think balding men are attractive, don’t you?”

  She patted the groom on his head. Helen thought she saw his hair eroding like a Florida beach.

  “Luke is giving up his big break for me, aren’t you? He has a chance to be in a Michael Mann movie—you know
, the Miami Vice producer. It’s a big part for an unknown.

  “Mother hates the part. Hates it. That’s why she said no. She doesn’t want Luke to be this drooling, brain-damaged coke addict. She says her friends and her committees may not understand that he’s acting.

  “Luke can do Shakespeare, though. Everyone understands Shakespeare, even at Chauncey’s little theater. Luke can do that forever. Oh, and he has that dog food commercial. It’s still running on cable. Do your dog bark, sweetheart. You’re so clever.”

  Helen was dazed by this display. Desiree had gutted her husband-to-be with knife-edged praise. How could he stand her?

  But Luke took Desiree in his arms and gave her a smoldering kiss. “Darling, don’t do this to yourself,” he said. “Take off that dress. Let’s go out for an early dinner before the show.”

  Luke’s performance of a man in love was flawless, but that’s what it seemed, a performance. It convinced Desiree, though. She wrapped her arms around Luke’s neck and kissed him as if he were going off to war.

  “You’re right, Luke,” she said, becoming a heroine in her own romance. “Let’s leave here. I’ll get ready.”

  “I’ll help you.” Millicent wanted this emotion-charged scene out of her salon. She herded the bride and her mother back to the fitting room. “Helen, stay with Luke, will you?”

  “You’re in the current production?” Helen said, trying to break the uncomfortable silence.

  “I have the lead in Richard the Third. But I’m leaving the production after next Thursday. I’ve got a part in a movie.”

  “I thought your mother-in-law wouldn’t allow it,” Helen said.

  “I’ll bring her around,” he said. Luke’s long lashes had to be natural. They didn’t have eyelash transplants, did they? Helen thought his eyes were brown, but now they looked green. She couldn’t stop staring. Maybe they would turn blue, or gray, or start spinning stars.

  “I bet you will,” Helen said. Had she really said that out loud?

  Luke didn’t seem offended. He hesitated, then said, “Look, Desiree has the bridal version of stage fright. She didn’t mean what she said. Here are two tickets to next Thursday’s show. A critic from the Herald is coming. Will you help us pack the house? You’d be doing me a huge favor.”

  How could a muscular man look so winsome? “Why, thanks.” Helen hadn’t been to a theater since she had money in St. Louis. She smiled back.

  Desiree came out of the fitting room, saw Helen’s smile, and frowned. She almost ran across the room to grab Luke’s arm.

  The couple was gone before Kiki tip-tapped out in her spike heels, talking on her cell phone. “Friday night then,” she cooed. “After the rehearsal dinner.” Kiki looked sly as a cream-fed cat. Helen wondered if she was arranging a horizontal interview with a new chauffeur.

  “I’ll take that crown and the long veil,” Kiki said. “You’ll be at the rehearsal tomorrow night. I’ll also need you at the church Saturday morning.”

  “Helen will be there,” Millicent said.

  “I will?” This was the first Helen had heard of it. She didn’t want to spend her weekend with the wedding horror show. “I don’t have a car.”

  “Take the shop van,” Millicent said. “I’ll pay you overtime.”

  Overtime? Kiki would pay through the nose for this personal service. Well, Helen could use the money.

  “Good,” Kiki said. “We’ll see her at six.”

  “My name is Helen.”

  Kiki didn’t acknowledge her. “Oops. I forgot my checkbook. I’ll give your check to what’s-her-name at the rehearsal.”

  “My name is Helen.” Kiki still ignored her.

  “Can’t you send your chauffeur with it this afternoon?” Millicent said.

  “He’ll be busy with me.”

  Busy how? Helen wondered. But Kiki was heading for the door. Helen could see Rod the chauffeur standing next to the car, mopping sweat off his brow with a handkerchief.

  Helen and Millicent simultaneously plopped into the pink chairs.

  “How long do you think that marriage will last?” Helen asked.

  “Here’s the Millicent Marriage Rule: The length of the marriage is in inverse proportion to the amount spent on the wedding. The more you spend, the sooner it’s over. I give this marriage a year, tops.”

  “A year? The bride is worth millions.”

  “Not for another ten years. Luke will have to spend a decade with the mother-in-law from hell to see that money.”

  Millicent studied the blood-red nails that had clawed their way to the top of the bridal business. “Luke has big plans for that handsome face. It will take lots of money to get it on movie posters. There’s been no mention of a prenup for the groom. Desiree’s parents are too busy fighting with each other to worry about their daughter.

  “If Luke’s smart—and he is—he’ll stay with the bride a year or so, then file for divorce. He’ll ask for big bucks, settle for a million, and spend it on his career. Desiree’s father will still be paying off the wedding when the groom calls it quits.”

  “I guess a year is a long time with those two,” Helen said. “How you can stand Bridezilla and her mother?”

  “I’m not marrying them, dear. I’m just taking their money. I rather admire Kiki. She’s smart, she’s tough, and if she’d been born ten years later, she’d be running the family business. But her Neanderthal father refused to train her for business and her silly mother pushed her into society. I admit she’s vulgar. But if she were a man, would you even notice her outrageous behavior?

  “Besides, Kiki may not seem like it, but she’s a god-send. I need this order to survive. Business has been too slow for too long.”

  “Was it 9/11?” Helen said.

  Millicent leaned forward to confide. “You won’t believe this, but for a month after the disaster, my sales shot up. I sold dresses like there was no tomorrow. You know why? Because the brides believed there was no tomorrow.

  “One bride came back here six times,” Millicent said. “She wanted a twenty-six-hundred-dollar dress, but she was budgeted for two thousand. She couldn’t justify that price—and women are great justifiers. Come September twelfth, she bought the dress. She said, ‘What’s six hundred dollars when I could be ashes tomorrow?’

  “Around November, reality returned and my sales slumped with everyone else’s. They’ve never quite come back.

  “The eighties were the great days of retailing in Florida. That’s when the cocaine cowboys were riding high. The drug dealers would come into the shop with a suitcase full of cash. I’d lock the door and they’d pick out twenty dresses for their girlfriends. I’d have a forty-thousand-dollar sale in one afternoon. Those days are gone for good. Now I have to work to sell a two-thousand-dollar dress.

  “So I can take all the dirt Kiki hands out, because it looks green to me.”

  Chapter 4

  It was bad luck. It was also unnatural.

  There were no mistakes during the rehearsal. Not one.

  In Helen’s experience, if the wedding party stumbled around during a rehearsal, missed their cues, and laughed a lot, then the ceremony would be perfect. But everything went right at Luke and Desiree’s rehearsal. Something bad was going to happen tomorrow at the wedding. Helen knew it. She also knew that was superstitious nonsense.

  Kiki had chosen Coco Isle Cathedral, the most fashionable church in South Florida, for the wedding. She did not belong to the congregation, but a big donation made her devoutly welcome.

  Jeff, the wedding planner for Your Precious Day, was directing the extravaganza. Jeff was high-camp wholesome. He looked like a cute kid brother, right down to his freckled nose, but he fluttered, fussed, and talked in italics.

  “Kiki, this cathedral is just divine,” he said.

  Helen stifled a laugh. Jeff didn’t realize he’d been punning. The cathedral wasn’t a sacred place for him. It was a theater. The altar was a stage.

  “Wait till you see how those stained-
glass windows look in the photos,” Jeff said. “The altar is up four steps. That’s so important.”

  “Why?” Helen said.

  “So the bride is displayed properly. The way that cathedral train drapes on those marble steps. Oh!”

  Jeff was practically palpitating. Helen wondered if she should get the smelling salts from her emergency kit. Millicent had packed her a suitcase with everything from sewing materials to spot cleaner.

  Jeff had recovered from his surge of ecstasy and was now only wildly enthused. “Wait till you see the orchids. Absolutely faboo.”

  Helen felt sad that no one in the wedding was as excited as Jeff. Some wedding party. Helen had never seen a grimmer gathering.

  The blond bridesmaids had the bland young features that passed for beauty and the slightly superior expressions of private-school graduates. Their skin seemed steam cleaned. They stood a little apart from the others. Helen knew their names were Lisa, Allison, Amy, Jessica, Jocelyn, Julia, Meredith, and Beth, but she couldn’t have said which was which if you put a gun to her head.

  The groomsmen looked like actors hired for the occasion. Most were. Kiki had chosen the best-looking men from the Shakespeare company. Jason was the studliest, but Helen thought his arrogance spoiled his good looks. Jason had the overconfident manner of someone who’d always been handsome—and knew it.

  Still, his blond hair, bold green eyes, and beefcake body were eye-catching. Jason had leading-man looks, until he stood next to the groom. Luke glowed with energy. People turned toward Luke like flowers toward the sun.

  Next to Luke’s star power, Jason wilted. He moved to the far side of the church. Helen wondered if Jason was jealous. He outshone Luke only one way: Jason was the best-dressed man at the rehearsal. His Hugo Boss outfit could have paid Helen’s rent.

  Jason was paired with the blond Lisa. They exchanged smoldering looks and hot smiles for almost an hour at the rehearsal. Then Kiki homed in on Jason. She’d flirted with all the groomsmen, but her behavior with Jason was outrageous. She enjoyed taking the young man from Lisa, who turned sulky and snippy.

  Kiki practically propositioned Jason in front of Lisa. She looked like a has-been movie queen in her gold gown.