Cloche and Dagger (23 page)

“It’s okay,” I said. “I’m good now.”

Harrison gave me a small smile and took my hand and wrapped it around his elbow.

“Lean on me if you need to,” he whispered in my ear.

I pushed the thick strand of hair that fell over my eyes aside and nodded.

Together we made our way up the carpeted walk to the door, where another man dressed in gray opened the door for us.

I don’t know what I had expected when I heard that the wake was private and for family and friends only. No, that’s not true, I expected it to be a small gathering. Instead, it looked as if the funeral home had opened up all of their rooms to make one large room. Seats were placed in rows up by the casket and more were then scattered throughout.

It was elbow-to-elbow, knee-to-knee thick with people. The scent of expensive perfume and cologne fogged the room, making it stifling. I was glad I had Harrison to lean on because I felt suddenly light-headed and a bit dizzy.

“All right?” he asked.

He leaned close when he asked and I was relieved to breathe in the fresh, clean scent of him as if it repelled all of the others away.

“Yeah, it’s just more crowded than I thought,” I said.

“She was a countess,” he said. “A certain crush is to be expected.”

“Can we hang back and watch people for a bit?” I asked.

“Sure,” he said. “Follow my lead.”

He steered me through the throng. Not to just any spot on the wall but to the one that gave us the best view of the grieving family and friends.

“Excuse us,” Harrison said as he propelled me between two young men in suits. “She’s feeling quite ill.”

Both men jumped back as if afraid I’d be sick on their shoes. I gave Harrison a dark look but went with it, because there was no denying that it was working.

“Try to look wretched,” he said.

I put my hand to my forehead as if warding off a headache and said, “You have a devious side to you, don’t you?”

“Do you think so?” he asked. “I thought I was just quick-witted.”

“That, too,” I agreed. “So who do we see with the family?”

Harrison leaned against the wall beside me as if waiting for me to compose myself. I used the hand at my forehead as a shield and glanced through my fingers to check out the people up by the casket, which I noticed was open. That threw me.

I suppose it shouldn’t have; given that her fatal wound had been in her torso, there really wasn’t a reason not to have an open casket, but somehow given that the last time I had seen her she was nude with a knife hanging out of her middle, I wasn’t really sure I could handle looking at her again.

“Are you okay?” Harrison leaned in close again and his eyes looked concerned. “You do look a bit wrecked.”

I blew out a breath and whispered, “Sorry, murder-scene flashback.”

He nodded but I noticed he glanced around to make sure no one heard me.

“Focus, Ginger,” he said. “Can you see the people sitting to the right of the casket?”

“Yes, there’s a thin, pale-looking man in an ill-fitting suit, an older woman dripping diamonds and an older man with an unfortunate toupee.”

“That would be Lord Ellis and his mother and stepfather,” he said.

“What?” I dropped my hand and stood up on my toes to get a better look. I stared at the thin, pale man. I could definitely see him as the sort who would be at home in a graveyard. I could not, however, see him as the man who had been married to Lady Ellis. He was lacking the distinctive thick lips for one thing.

Harrison slid in front of me, blocking my view, or more accurately blocking me from view as I was undoubtedly making the teensiest bit of a spectacle of myself.

“What is it?” he hissed.

“That’s not Lord Ellis,” I said.

He peered back over his shoulder and then back to me. “Yes, it is.”

“But he’s not the man who came to the shop with Lady Ellis,” I said. “When she came to get her hat she was with a different man.”

“It could have been a driver,” Harrison suggested.

I snorted. “He was no driver.”

Several heads turned in our direction and I put my hand back to my forehead as if I were going to burst into tears at any moment.

“Are you sure?” he asked.

“Yes, he was definitely not working-class,” I said. “He had a way about him, a smarmy I-know-something-you-don’t-know way. It was very off-putting.”

“Lover?” Harrison asked.

He was jostled from behind and had to brace himself against the wall with hands on either side of me to keep from flattening me. We were now standing just inches apart and I felt my pulse pound in my ears until it drowned out all sound.

He glanced down at me and for a second neither of us drew a breath. He shook his head and took a quick step back.

“Come on,” he said and he pushed off the wall and took my elbow. “Let’s go where we can talk.”

We worked our way through the crowd, obviously swimming against the tide, until we entered another room that had been set aside for light refreshments. Several long tables were prepared with food and drink and were surrounded by guests who had already paid their respects and were now sharing their memories of Lady Ellis. The room was full of soft murmuring, the occasional sob, and gave off an overall feeling that this was the room to see and be seen in.

“Is it just me or is there another agenda going on in here?” I asked Harrison. He shook his head.

“It’s not you. It’s as if they’re all trying to figure out where the paparazzi are so they can have the most advantageous placement.”

We each grabbed a crystal glass of watery punch. I wondered if Lady Ellis’s mother-in-law had been in charge of refreshments. It seemed likely given that if it had been anyone who knew Lady Ellis, it would have been an exotic beverage, reflective of her personality, not watered-down and lacking in sparkle.

“So, you’re quite certain that wasn’t the man who came into the shop with Lady Ellis?” Harrison asked.

“Positive,” I said. I scanned the room. “I don’t see him here. I didn’t see him in the other room either, but I wasn’t really looking for him.”

Harrison scanned the room with me. There were all ages here, all dressed their best, all waiting for their photo op.

“What about the mother-in-law?” I asked. “If she can walk around under that poundage of diamonds, she is definitely strong enough to run a long knife through a skinny woman’s chest.”

“That seems far-fetched,” Harrison said. “It’s well known that she hated her, but enough to kill her?”

“I don’t know, no grandbabies might do that to an old girl,” I said.

We were both silent while we watched the crowd.

“I suppose it could be one of her childhood friends,” I said. “Although, when I had them over for tea none of them seemed particularly lethal.”

“Excuse me?” Harrison asked and turned to face me. “Tea? When did you have her friends over for tea?”

“Yesterday,” I said.

“And you’re just telling me about it now?” he asked.

“Well, in my defense, the break-in threw me off track yesterday,” I said.

I noticed the muscle in his jaw was clenching and unclenching. At a guess, I’d say he was miffed. That’s a nice way of saying “furious,” isn’t it?

“You could have mentioned it at dinner,” he said.

“I forgot,” I said. It was true. Once Andre and Harrison had shown up at the restaurant all thought of the tea and Lady Ellis and who might have killed her had fled my mind. I decided not to dwell on the whys and wherefores of that realization.

“It was nothing, really. Fee was with me,” I said. “We had some hats that could have been Lady Ellis’s that we thought her friends might want to keep as mementos, so we invited them—”

“What do you mean ‘could have been Lady Ellis’s’?” he asked.

“Um.” I sipped my punch. “When I say ‘could have been’ . . .”

“You mean you lied to them to get them to come over—why?”

“I thought it would be good for the business if people saw or heard that Lady Ellis’s friends were still coming into the shop, and there did happen to be several reporters lurking about,” I said. It sounded so coldhearted. I did feel ashamed, truly.

“Shrewd,” Harrison said. “And incredibly stupid.”

“Stupid?”

“Didn’t it occur to you that one of them might be the killer?” he asked. “That you were putting yourself and Fee in terrible danger by inviting them to the shop when it was closed?”

I raised my glass and held it in between us as a buffer to keep him from looming over me, which it looked like he was about to do.

“No, it did not,” I said, which was a big fat fib. I remembered all too clearly hearing her friends talk about her and thinking any one of them could have murdered her. “I mean honestly, these are her childhood friends, why would they—”

“Scarlett Parker?” a voice called from behind Harrison.

My eyes went wide and so did Harrison’s. I peered over his shoulder and saw Marianne standing there with Chelsea and Susie.

“And look at that, there they are,” I muttered to Harrison.

All three were dressed in dark-hued dresses that accentuated their figures and were appropriately somber for the funeral of their friend. Susie’s mascara had run, giving her a bit of a Goth look, and Chelsea’s nose was bright red. Marianne looked even paler than usual, which was the only evidence of her grief.

“Scarlett, why, it’s so nice of you to attend the wake for Vicks,” Susie said. She gave me a nice air kiss and the heavy floral scent of her perfume hit me like two fingers in the eyes.

“Yes, so thoughtful,” Chelsea muttered with an air kiss for my other cheek.

Marianne just looked at me with an eyebrow raised. She was not the air-kiss type, for which I was grateful. I blinked furiously to keep the tears back from the perfume assault, but I figured if one did escape at least I would fit in with the mourners.

“She was a loyal customer,” I said. “And I wanted to be sure to pay our respects.”

Marianne gave me a doubtful look, but then turned to take in Harrison, from head to toe, in a very thorough perusal. I found I wanted to stand in front of him and protect him, but I resisted.

“May I introduce our business manager, Harrison Wentworth,” I said.

Susie gasped, Chelsea’s eyes went wide and Marianne cocked her head to the side, “Not
the
Harrison Wentworth, the wizard of the
Financial Times
?”

Harrison gave her a charming smile. “Afraid so.”

“And he’s your business manager?” Marianne persisted.

I gave her a bewildered shrug, because I’m quick on my feet like that. Then I glanced at Harrison. Obviously, he was a bigger deal than I realized, and he never mentioned to me his revered status as a financial wizard. Huh. Was that why I’d always gotten the feeling he was keeping something from me? Interesting.

“Our families go way back,” Harrison said. “My family has always managed the finances of Scarlett’s family.”

“Well, any friend of Scarlett’s is a friend of mine,” Marianne said. She looped her arm through his and before I was quite sure what had happened, she’d walked off with him.

“She always does that,” Chelsea whined.

“Only because Vicks is dead,” Susie said. “She’d have made off with him before we even knew who he was.”

“Made off with who?” a voice inquired from behind me.

I turned to see that Elise had joined us. She was looking picture-perfect in a knee-length navy dress with cap sleeves and a cute ruffle at the waist. Like Marianne she seemed pale and her eyes were puffy as if she’d just recently recovered from a crying jag.

“Marianne just took off with Scarlett’s date,” Chelsea said.

“He’s not my—” I protested but no one was listening.

They all turned to watch Marianne with her head pressed close to Harrison’s. I felt a flutter of annoyance. Marianne was the one I had liked the most, so I really didn’t appreciate her making off with my escort.

“You see, girls, this is what happens when one chooses to be smart and decides to have a career instead of marrying a nice eligible man when she’s in her prime. She is reduced to hitting on men at funerals.” Elise said it loud enough for Marianne to hear her.

Marianne gave her a dark look and then took Harrison’s arm and led him back to me as if he were a pet poodle she had taken out for a stroll but found wanting.

“Excuse me,” a low voice broke into our little group. “Don’t I know you?”

I turned to find a short chubby man with sweat stains under his armpits, staring at me. He had unkempt, black wiry hair on his head and face, more on his face than his head to be truthful, and he looked as radiant as if he’d just found a winning lottery ticket.

Before I could open my mouth to utter a word, he wrestled a small camera out of his pocket and was holding it up to my face. Then I recognized him. He was the reporter that Harrison had tossed out of the shop the other day.

“The party crasher here at Lady Ellis’s funeral,” he chortled. “This is going to make me, Bernie Lutz, a fortune. Hey, love, any chance I can get you to throw some cake?”

Harrison jumped in front of me and held open the sides of his jacket shielding me from any shots from the icky man’s camera.

“Time to go,” he said, and he ushered me away from the group.

“Hey, you told me she’d be okay with this,” the man whined.

“I guess I was wrong,” a voice answered.

It was Elise’s voice. Why would Elise tell him I was okay with having my photo taken and at a funeral, no less? I barely knew the woman but it hurt me that she judged me to be such a media hog. Is that how people saw me? Was fleeing my home country not enough proof that I was not into being the viral flavor of the month?

We were hurrying out of the funeral home with the photographer hot on our backsides when I saw him. He wore a dark suit and he stood at the back of the room, leaning against the wall as if he didn’t have the strength to stand on his own two feet. I stopped when I saw him, and Harrison stumbled into my back.

I met the gaze of the man I had believed to be Lord Ellis and all I could think was that he no longer looked smarmy and condescending but rather, he looked shrunken, as if the weight of his grief diminished him.

“Ginger, we have to go.” Harrison prodded me forward a few steps into the crowd. When I looked back the man was gone.

Not so the photographer. We lapped the reception hall once in our effort to lose him. I kept an eye out for the man who’d been with Lady Ellis when she picked up her hat, but I didn’t see him again. The photographer, however, kept popping up until Harrison surprised him by doubling back through a door we’d just gone through. The door caught the photographer on the chin and knocked him out cold.

Harrison took the opportunity to hustle me outside to the valet. He pushed me into the shadow of a large yew shrub. I don’t know what he said to the valet but the boy took off at a run and was back with the car in moments. Harrison pulled me out from the bush and assisted me into the car. We zipped out of the parking lot as if the hounds of hell were chasing us.

We were silent for most of the ride, not relaxing until we were near Portobello Road and the shop.

“I’m pretty sure you lost him,” I said.

I turned from looking out the back window to glance at Harrison. His gaze kept flitting up to the rearview mirror, checking to verify that the photographer was nothing but a memory.

“I’m sorry that happened to you,” he said.

“At least he didn’t get a picture,” I said with a shudder. “That would have been a nightmare.”

“Is that what it was like afterwards?” he asked.

“Somewhat,” I said. “There was one photographer who climbed onto my balcony, but other than that it was just the phone calls from television and radio stations who wanted to interview me and lawyers who wanted to represent me. I unplugged my phone and didn’t leave my apartment for three days.”

“Probably a good strategy. You don’t deserve to be treated like that,” he said. He glanced at me when he said it, and I could see the sincerity in his eyes. For some reason, it made my throat get tight.