Tulle Death Do Us Part Read online

  “As long as you walk in on my arm,” Eve said, “I don’t care where we sit, but I would have sat with them if I was alone, so, perfect.”

  “It’s a date,” the airman said, tweaking her chin, tinkling a tiny bell of a button at her neck, and looking at me to find out our next move.

  “You’re all pinned up for alterations. You can go and change back into your own clothes.”

  When he shut the bathroom door, Eve erupted in squeals. “You found me the perfect man.”

  “You’ve only known him five minutes.”

  “He acts like I’m normal, which I am.”

  I regarded her from spiked copper hair to padlock-trimmed pumps. “Yep, normal. That uniform was his father’s.” I lowered my voice. “That uniform was his father’s but he has one of his own. He’ll ship out again and leave you behind. You ready for that?”

  “He looks like he could be worth waiting for. We don’t have to get engaged, right? The ball will only be our first date.”

  “Right.”

  “All things in their own time,” Eve said without snark.

  When Airman Gilchrist came out, he asked Eve to lunch, and even offered to bring me something. I declined and watched them leave the shop with a really good feeling about them in my gut and the knowledge that in a couple of days, that ball could be, like, their fifth date. “Jay, call me so I can tell you when the alterations are done,” I shouted after him.

  Then I locked the shop and called Werner, opening the picture of Airman Gilchrist’s father. “Do you have the pictures of the people who attended the fiftieth as a result of your search warrant?”

  “Yes, Madeira—you are not my boss—I do.”

  “Meet me here. I’ll lock the shop for an hour. Late lunch/booty call/photo hunt. You choose the order. Bring a snack, though, besides yourself, I mean.”

  His phone went static, then dead.

  Dante appeared, laughing. “Booty call? Here? Really? Where I can watch?”

  I could have drowned in Dante’s killer grin. I wagged a finger at him. “Now you show! Get lost.”

  “But you wanted answers.”

  “Now? Well, okay. Talk fast.”

  Dante leaned against my counter, arms crossed. “Zavier is innocent. Always will be.”

  “I believe that. But Werner said he confessed.”

  My ghost straightened. “He’s protecting somebody he loves or acting under orders from somebody who scares him to death. I saw him hide the box. He was crying like the boy he mentally is.”

  That broke my heart. “Point taken.” I bit my lip, upset that an innocent like Zavier had to endure any of this.

  “Who died that night at the warehouse?” Dante asked. “I heard just enough to know somebody did.”

  “Wayne O’Dowd. His wife is Wynona. She was in my vision but not him.”

  “Oh, he was there. He was a regular ringleader at those events. Could you identify everyone in your vision?”

  “No, there’s still the guy I dubbed Snake, and another I called Tuxman to keep them straight in my mind.”

  “Both could be Wayne. Oily. Everybody hated him. Slimy bastard.”

  “Wynona must be our first suspect.” My head came up. “Hey, I forgot to tell Werner about you. That I could see and talk to ghosts. That you live with me here.”

  “You told him everything else? Visions, witchy tendencies?”

  I nodded.

  “Save me for Valentine’s Day.” He chuckled. “Back to Wynona.”

  “They called her Lady Backroom,” I said.

  Dante nodded. “She gets her husband’s money, but Lady Backroom or not, she’s not stupid enough to kill for it in the middle of a reopened investigation. After the fiftieth, she and hubby both wore guilt like diamonds. Dolly said that.”

  “What are we missing, then? Who wanted Wayne and Robin dead?”

  “Wynona is too easy to fall back on for both murders, and somebody knew she would be. Don’t overlook Zavier’s family. He didn’t fit the mold. He was a flaw in their perfect bloodline.”

  “Where’s his mother?”

  “Died while he was in the birth canal. He was deprived of oxygen too long.”

  “Fifty years ago, that kind of thing happened.”

  “Concentrate on his living family, Mad.”

  “Eric, I know. Councilman McDowell. I still hate that guy, but he wants to save Zavier from their father, and I don’t know why. So now I have only a weakening dislike, because he seems to care what happens to his brother.”

  “For the McDowells,” Dante said, “life is a stage and nothing is as it appears. And don’t discount the father. Power is to Thatcher McDowell like blood is to vampires.”

  “Vampires? What the scrap do you know about vamps?”

  “A vamp used to be a seductress in my day. But hey, you put a television upstairs for when you’re sewing. I’ve been catching up on the world. And frankly, it’s gotten scary. Not my fault you like Buffy reruns.”

  I chuckled, imagining his reactions. “Okay, I’ll check out Zavier and Eric’s father, Thatcher the vampire, the Savile Row suit wearer who snowed us at the country club,” I said. “Oh, here comes Werner.”

  Dante faded. “I’ll be upstairs,” my ghost whispered, “wearing earphones—sort of.”

  I laughed nervously as the ghostly image departed and my hunky detective silently backed me to the fainting couch, his bedroom eyes boring into mine like a fast flash of pure seduction. When I hit the couch, I was forced to sit, while my hands trembled and my heart tripped a rapid beat. Then Werner gently pushed my shoulders back as he leaned over me. “Just a kiss to get us through the day.”

  I’m surprised the fainting couch didn’t burst into flames. Just our hands touched, then our lips, for a thermonuclear kiss so hot, I wondered why we weren’t radioactive.

  I gasped for breath. “Where did you learn to kiss like that?” I asked. “I never—”

  “Really? Never?” He crowed like an alpha cock in a henhouse.

  “Where?” I repeated.

  “Jocks are sought after in college and I was one of the best. It’s called practice.”

  “It’s called technique, like freezing your prey with a look. One kiss and you lure the sense right out of me. I’m like a jellyfish with the palsied tremblies panting for more.”

  “And after making love?” he asked.

  “We both pass out. You’re on an ego trip, aren’t you?”

  “You said I was better than…you know. Let me wallow, will you? I’ll return to earth, or maybe not, because I want to kiss you again.”

  Someone started hammering on my door with a fist.

  “Madeira Cutler, you let me in. I’m supposed to have a fitting in half an hour, and I need to start early so I can leave early. I have an important appointment. You can eat lunch later.”

  I sighed. “My sign says out to lunch, but my car’s in the lot.”

  “So’s mine.” Werner furrowed his brows at the sound of her voice. “Tell me that’s not—?”

  “Yep. Deborah VanCortland in the flesh.”

  “You picked her for This Is Your Life? You have an exasperation wish?”

  “I have visions. The petticoat pieces come from her petticoat. This way Dad and Aunt Fee will research the story of her life, plus I get to read the dress with her in it, always a more powerful read.”

  “Okay, when you put it that way, your visions make me worry about you. How much trouble can you get into in somebody else’s body?”

  I thought about the living Dante laying me on the bed while I occupied Dolly’s body once, though I got out in time. I remembered the moment I stood on a high level of the Eiffel Tower with a gun pointed my way. “Nothing I can’t escape.”

  “I’ve pulled you out of a few deep holes. Were those the results of visions?”

  “No, just bad timing. I guess you need to see for yourself. We’re sharing right now, so stay, but don’t let on when I zone, and don’t freak if I talk in some
one else’s voice.”

  “That’s not funny, Madeira. And you may just be sharing, but I’m looking at us as having a committed relationship.”

  I threw my arms around him, reveling in his busy hands. “Me, too. Committed. A relationship. Yes!”

  The banging on the door did not stop. We gave up. I went into my bathroom to freshen up while Werner straightened his jacket and tie and let Vainglory in.

  I took one look at her when I came out and knew she hadn’t changed a bit. Not since she’d stolen her mother’s gown for the fiftieth, tearing up the petticoat with malice and joy, and not since she’d stolen the VanCortland name by lying and saying she was pregnant so Cort would marry her, nor since he’d divorced her and allowed her to go out on her own to annoy the world.

  “Madeira Cutler,” she said. “I want my glass shoe inkwell back.”

  “It’s not yours. Cort got it in your divorce settlement. He gave it to his new daughter-in-law—my sister Sherry—who gave it to me for being her maid of honor, because I’d always loved it.” I knew that the inkwell would match the one described on the scavenger hunt list—that the family it was stolen from might identify it—and prove Deborah’s duplicity to a larcenous T. At the very least, she and her scavenging friends had obstructed justice, though to be honest, I didn’t know the statute of limitations on such crimes. And however much I loved the memento of Sherry’s wedding, I’d soon be turning it over to the police. “We have bigger fish to fry,” I said.

  “Like who?” she asked.

  “Well,” I said, “you.”

  “Me?” she squeaked.

  “Sure, we have to make sure your dress fits for the This Is Your Life segment of the ball, now don’t we?”

  Werner nodded. “Mad can’t wait to see what her parents uncover about your past.”

  Deborah paled. “Maybe I should withdraw,” she said to herself.

  “And never have your friends aware that you were chosen?” I knew which buttons to push.

  She primped. “Hurry up and fit me. I have a hair appointment in twenty minutes. Gotta look smashing for the ball.”

  I smirked. Smashing and fit and ready to be handcuffed.

  Twenty-nine

  The creative part of fashion has always worked alongside the creative forces that have defined and colored a decade, an era. As much as art, fashion is a manifestation of the times—of its psychological, social, political, visual existence.

  —IRENE SHARAFF (AMERICAN COSTUME DESIGNER FOR STAGE AND SCREEN)

  Deborah came out of the dressing room wearing the peach gown with chevron stripes and stepped onto my round dais.

  I proceeded to fit her to her gown.

  Chakra toyed with the petticoats and made Deborah so fidgety that I had to go in deep and get my happy cat out from where she was rolling on Deborah’s feet while toying with the tulle beneath the dress.

  Werner, from his seat in the dressing room—the husband/significant other seat—kissed his fingers when I backed out on all fours. He’d had a connoisseur’s view of my nether end.

  I chuckled, but Deborah huffed, because Werner’s attention had not been on her, and I got back to work. “I have to let it out a bit,” I said. “But not much, after forty years. Congrats.”

  “That and the Spanx should do it,” she added.

  “Maybe a protein drink for breakfast and lunch until the event?” I suggested.

  She harrumphed.

  Werner kept his detective’s face on, but I could read the amused twinkle in his eyes.

  I looked at him as I began to twirl away, and put my fingers to my lips in a farewell kiss.

  Before long, I saw a dance floor from a balcony above it. The person I watched, from my vantage point inside Deborah VanCortland, was the late Robin O’Dowd. Deborah hated her with a passion.

  One could suffocate surrounded by so much hate.

  Well, Robin was more beautiful than Deborah, and though she had a man’s adoration, other men also flocked around her.

  Wynona ambled over to us. “Give it up, Deborah. He’s hers.”

  “He should be mine.” Deborah had been trying to take other women’s men since I’d met her. I guess it held true. Rich brat, rich bitch.

  “You wouldn’t have him anyway. He’d be overseas all the time.”

  Deborah huffed. “How can I break them up? Tonight. Keep them apart? Just for kicks.”

  I felt sick in such a dark soul.

  A man old enough to be Deborah’s father walked by.

  Deborah grabbed his hand, but he didn’t turn to her, as if he shouldn’t be seen with her, like maybe they were…having an affair? “Hey, big guy,” she said. “See item seventeen on the scavenger list? Try earning those points with flyboy’s girl, will you, so I can have some time with him?”

  I couldn’t see the guy’s face, only part of a hand with the beginning of a scar that might just continue down between thumb and index finger. “My kind of sport,” he said, and if the scar did extend as far as I suspected, I could identify the speaker.

  They were altering people’s lives, he and Vainglory, about to kill, a deadly accident likely caused by their utter selfishness. I wished Deborah could be arrested for the premeditated act of “grand theft lover.”

  The man in the very expensive tux went down and spirited Robin away from the dance floor. I saw him get them drinks at the patio bar. Wynona kept flyboy busy flirting. She kept him from looking for his girl.

  The airman finally abandoned his drink, and as Deborah leaned forward to call his name, she slipped and we fell a little too far over the balcony rail, teetering just enough to make people scream…and allow her accomplice to spirit Robin out of the room.

  The scream became a siren in my head—Deborah’s head, with me inside her. When we caught our balance, and opened our eyes, the dance floor had shifted and changed, for me at least.

  I stared down into the belly of the whale, which I now knew was that dirty old brick mill, in better shape back then. A sunrise lit the scene. The morning after. Everyone bedraggled. Tuxman was indeed Wayne. I’d seen him more clearly in the other morning-after vision, a few hours later than this, possibly, though in this same mill, the word “steam” on the inside brick wall being my touchstone.

  Not that I recognized any other faces—forty years had changed them, body shapes, hairlines, and all.

  Except for Grody, better known as Eric McDowell, who looked like he’d slept, or swam, in his tux. No wonder I’d named him Grody.

  The stench of the sea remained as the night before, but the stench of guilt was ebbing. Daylight brought rationalizations and acceptance. “I won’t tell, if you don’t.” And “What if she had been walking along the shore when a huge wave…”

  The view of them was, however, so sharp that one aspect struck me like a bolt of lightning: their shoes. Most wore formal footwear, heels and stockings, except for one tuxedoed chap who wore neither socks nor wingtips, but a well-worn, wet pair of sturdy Sebago boat shoes.

  Behold the sailor. Behold the blood that had dried dripping down his hand and the hand of one other in the group.

  I couldn’t get a name before I got whisked back to the present, to my shop’s dressing room, where Deborah continued to talk about herself and her accomplishments as if nothing had happened to any of us.

  Werner, though, sat straight up in the lounge chair on full alert, watching me like he wanted to scoop me into his arms, right there in the chair.

  I sent him a virtual kiss, with a here-I-am nod.

  He saw I’d returned, fell against the back of his chair, and wiped his brow with a trembling hand.

  “Take off your jacket, Detective, if you’re too warm.”

  “Don’t mind if I do.”

  “You’re all set, Deborah. You can go change,” I said. “Detective, come with me.” I reached behind me for his hand, and he clutched mine. Then, around the corner from the dressing rooms, I backed him against the wall to the enclosed stairs and kissed him sens
eless, or he kissed me, or we kissed each other, each with something different to prove.

  He wrapped his arms around me and held me against his shoulder while he kissed my ear, then he placed his brow to mine, his breathing thready. “I have never been so scared in my life.”

  “I learned a few things,” I said.

  “That you’re my Achilles’ heel?”

  “That, too.” I couldn’t help the grin that split my face. Being so cherished was new to me. Not by family, but by a significant other who didn’t jaunt off and not call for months. “I learned that and more.”

  He set me back half a step so he could look into my eyes. “Like what?”

  “How they’d spirited Robin away.”

  “Is that you being psychic?” Werner asked.

  “No, just the psychometric facts, sir.”

  He closed his eyes and shook his head. “I gotta get back to the station.”

  I cupped his cheek. “My instincts say to find out who was still in the belly of the whale the next morning and why. Leave me the pictures and rosters so I can match names with faces, then I’ll call you.”

  “I’ll leave the pictures, but bad news, Mad. There’s not one of Robin.”

  “They stole the evidence?” I said.

  “Fifty years is a long time,” Werner said. “Thatcher could have done it when he became chairman.”

  I bit my lip for a disappointed minute. “Wait. She was presumed dead, so I presume the police looked for her before that happened, right? So maybe you have the pictures of her in your old records department.”

  “The basement. But I looked. Nothing on Robin O’Dowd.”

  The two people coming out of the shower, me covered by an airman’s jacket. “Look for records on Robin Gilchrist.”

  “What do you know?”

  “Vision—not worthy of evidence. At some point, Robin married her airman in secret, I believe, and the police who investigated after the…quote ‘rogue wave’…might have figured that out.”

  “Mad, are you here?” Aunt Fiona called from the door.

  “Coming, Aunt Fee.”

  Werner kissed me quick and let me go.

  Deborah caught us at it. Her look said there was no accounting for taste, as she left with a silent afterthought of a wave.