Crushed Velvet (9 page)

There was one
obvious reason Genevieve would leave, but I wasn't willing to accept it. “She's not guilty. She has no reason to leave town. Why is she acting like she's on the run?”

“What time was she with you at your store on Monday?” Charlie asked.

“It was around lunch. The workers took a break after the sign fell, and I asked her if she could make lunch.”

“Did she?”

“Yes. The van showed up at the same time we returned with the sandwiches. She took one look inside and vanished. I didn't see her again until she came back to Material Girl on Monday night.”

“All things considered, I'm surprised Frenchy turned back up as soon as she did. You have to admit that's a heck of a way to start a Monday.”

“Maybe she's at the tea shop. Maybe she got up early so she could get a few things and not be seen.”

“You like to believe the best about people, don't you?” Charlie asked.

“Not everybody,” I said. “But with Genevieve, I do. I don't think she has a hidden agenda.”

“For the sake of my newly organized business files, I hope you're right.”

I left Charlie's Automotive. The morning air was chilly. I walked to Lopez Donuts. The small shop was run by Big Joe and Maria Lopez, two friendly and welcoming residents who had helped me out of a jam when I first came to San Ladrón. Today there was a line out the door. Two young boys, no more than ten, made their way through the line. Carlos, the taller of the two, offered small paper cups of coffee. Antonio, his younger brother, held a tray with donut pieces resting on white napkins.

“Want a sample?” Carlos asked each person in front of me. When he reached me, my place in line had crossed the barrier from the outside to in. “Hey, I know you, you're the material lady,” he said.

“Yes, that's me. Polyester.”

“Do you want a sample?”Antonio asked. He seemed pleased to have beaten his brother to the punch.

“Sure,” I said. I took a small piece of donut and a paper cup of coffee. When I reached the front counter, Big Joe leaned across it and gave me a bear hug. He turned around and shouted into the kitchen.

“Maria! Guess who came to see us!”

“Not now, Joe,” she yelled back. I craned my neck and saw her bustle back and forth between tall metal racks.

“Busy morning?” I asked.

“Nonstop. Something about the French tea shop being closed. Good for us, bad for her, I'd say. We ran out of tea bags half an hour ago. Never bothered much with tea before, and we lost some business because we weren't ready. Maria ran out and bought a box of Lipton. You should have seen
the expression on the lady who got that!” He laughed long and loud. Several patrons looked up, startled at the boom of his laughter, but smiled once they saw him. There was no denying the joy of the moment when you were around Big Joe. His laughter was as contagious as poison ivy at a campground of sixth-graders.

“I see Maria brought in the power team to keep the line calm.”

He shook his head. “She doesn't care about child labor laws, that's for sure. Now, what can I get you?”

To keep things simple, I went with coffee and a cruller. I waved to Maria when she turned around. She had a smudge of glaze on her forehead and chocolate down the front of her white shirt. I knew better than to hold her up. She was a woman on a mission.

I finished the donut by the time I was out the door. Across the street, an older gentleman in a plaid flannel shirt and jeans was unlocking the door to Get Hammered. I jogged through traffic and followed him inside. He headed toward the lumber and I headed toward the home décor section. I grabbed the top rug from a stack of clearance carpets and carried it to the front register. I thought about what else we might need to work at Genevieve's. The fabric would take care of my part of things, but if Kim was going to get that outdoor furniture looking new again, she was going to have to sand it, prime it, and paint it.

I balanced the carpet on my left hip and grabbed a small mouse sander from the power tool display. I tucked a few packages of refill sandpaper under my arm and proceeded to the checkout line.

After paying, I readjusted the carpet against my hip and started my walk. I approached the fabric store and looked at the front. Ten years ago my aunt had been murdered inside. Uncle Marius had covered the insides of the windows with thick matte black paint and closed the doors for business. It
had taken me days to scrape the black paint from the glass with a small razor, but once I had, I knew the windows would be perfect for showcasing displays that enticed people into the store. I even considered setting my sewing machine in the window so people could watch me construct items. Once I had a staff to man the registers inside the store, that is.

Distracted, I tripped. The carpet fell to the ground and broke my fall. My coffee flew in front of me and splashed over the concrete. The cup rolled toward the curb.

The door to the right of the fabric shop opened and Tiki Tom came out. He wore a red short-sleeved shirt printed with the names and maps of various Polynesian islands, and he held a mug shaped like a coconut. “You're running out of time on the sign, aren't you?” he asked.

“The store opens on Sunday. The sign will be up by then.”

“You sure about that? Looked like your construction crew at the Senior Center yesterday. I heard they were gutting the old workout room so they could add a bingo hall.”

I stood up with no help from Tom. I corralled the cup and lid and tossed them into the public trash bin, then dusted myself off.

“I don't know anything about the Senior Center job. The foreman promised me I'd have my sign this week.”

Tom looked at the crack in the sidewalk and scowled. “Better not cost me any more business,” he said. He went back inside his store.

I had four days left before I was supposed to open my doors. On top of everything else, I had to get the contractors to finish the sign job. I didn't want to be known as the woman with the ugly storefront. I also knew I had my own financial responsibilities to take care of. The business plan I'd presented to the bank had secured me a modest loan that allowed me to pay the taxes and place an order for inventory that was more up-to-date than the store had been left with.
The clock was ticking on my opening, and I couldn't afford to default on the loan and lose the store altogether.

I picked up the carpet. It was proving to be cumbersome. I had four blocks to go and it was going to be a battle. I was somewhat uncoordinated, the unfortunate end result of being five foot nine with size-seven feet. What I lacked in balance I made up for in flexibility. Good for mat-based Pilates. Bad for ballroom dancing.

I reached into my messenger bag for my keys and unlocked the gate and door to the fabric store. In the corner of the shop was a small red wagon I'd purchased several months ago. San Ladrón had proven itself to be a small enough town that I could walk most places I wanted to go, but when I found myself loaded down with food, drink, fabric, or carpets and sandpaper, the child's toy was the perfect solution. I put the sander and paper in the wagon, added a portable steamer and a basket of emergency sewing supplies, and balanced the carpet along the top. I pulled it out the front door and locked the shop behind me. Taking great care not to trip over any additional cracks or exposed tree roots in the sidewalk, I made my way to Tea Totalers.

I carried the carpet behind the shop and set it on the landing next to the iron furniture Kim had moved around back. I went to the back door and was surprised that the knob turned easily in my grip. Had I forgotten to lock the back door?

I crept inside the kitchen and looked around. Everything was as I'd left it. In the café portion of the building, the windows were still blocked out by brown paper and the furniture was pushed into the center of the room. I doubled back to the office. The computer was off and the desk was neat. I looked at the counters behind me.

Clean. The bowl of fruit sat on the shelf and the brown paper bag of avocados was tucked next to it. Just like I'd left it two days ago. Still, something felt off.

I stepped back into the main portion of the shop and slowly turned around in a circle. The room was dark, and it was hard for me to see details. I couldn't figure out what had changed except for the rearranging required for the renovation.

I opened the front door and looked across the street at Jitterbug. As long as I knew Rick Penwald's routine, it seemed a good idea to keep an eye out for him. There were no black trucks in sight. I closed the door and headed back through the kitchen and the back door and unrolled the carpet. Time for my experiment.

I stood several feet away from the carpet and took pictures of it, establishing the appearance before I dumped tea on it. I went back inside and filled an empty container from the cupboard with water from the tap. An old bottle of green food coloring sat on a shelf with colorful sugar crystals and spices. If I was going far enough to conduct the experiment, I might as well make sure the results were easy to identify. I poured a small amount into the container and tendrils of emerald green bloomed in the water. I swirled the container until it was an even shade of St. Patrick's Day.

Outside, I poured half of the water on the carpet, set the container down so you could see it was still half-full, stood back, and took a picture. The stain wasn't nearly as big as the stain in the back of the van. I dumped the rest of the green liquid on the carpet, set the container down, and resumed the photo shoot. I heard the latch on the gate out front as I took the last of the pictures.

I didn't want to have to answer questions about what I was doing. I shoved my phone back into my jeans and doubled the carpet over itself twice just as Kim pushed her bicycle around the side of the building.

She seemed surprised to see me. “I didn't expect you to be here already.”

“I wanted to get an early start.”

“If you want me to show up earlier, I can.”

Considering we'd moved from can-Genevieve-still-afford-to-pay-her to will-Genevieve-turn-up-by-payday, I didn't think it was in my best interest to extend the new employee's hours.

“You should stick to whatever you and Genevieve agreed to.”

“Okay,” she said. “What are you doing with that carpet?”

“It had a stain on it, so I'm throwing it out.”

“Want help?” she asked and made a move to grab the end.

“No!” I yanked it out of her reach. “I can handle it. I bought some sanding supplies, so you can work on the furniture.”

“Okay. There's one thing I have to do first.” She headed inside while I used determination and a good hard shove to move the carpet from the ground to inside the Dumpster. It stood on end, the bound edge jutting out above the rim. I rested the black rubber lid on top of the edge of the carpet. An opening of about six inches would allow us to fit in anything else we needed to toss.

I scanned the area for traces of my experiment. Some of the green water had seeped through the carpet and left a splotch on the back sidewalk. I ran the bottom of my boot over it, but nothing happened. Maybe it was fresh enough for me to douse with water. I headed to the back door with the empty pitcher, prepared to fill it with tap water to flush the sidewalk clean.

Only, I couldn't get to the faucet. Kim stood hunched over the white double bowl sink, emptying all of the pitchers of tea from the refrigerator down the drain.

I ran to
the sink. “What are you doing?” I asked.

Kim pushed me out of the way. “I'm emptying out the fridge.”

“Who told you to do that?”

“The shop's been closed for a few days and everything is probably bad. There's no reason to have it sitting around.”

I'd had the very same idea, dumping the tea that might have poisoned Phil. I hadn't done it because I wanted to believe in Genevieve's innocence. And now that the tea was down the drain, it didn't really matter. If it was evidence of something against her, it was gone. Still, Kim's actions bothered me. Why was she inside dumping the tea when her task was to sand and prep the iron furniture out back?

I looked around the kitchen. “Did you throw away anything else?”

“No, there wasn't anything else to throw out. I figured you took care of that.”

“What do you mean?”

“Yesterday there was a big plastic bin with wax envelopes of tea. Croissants, too. Now they're gone.”

I turned my head to the right, and then to the left, scanning for traces of Genevieve's tea. That's what was wrong. The tea and the pastries that Genevieve moved from the front of the café to the kitchen each night when she closed were all gone.

When I had first started coming to Tea Totalers, I watched Genevieve flip through a small repurposed French armoire filled with parchment-paper envelopes of loose tea. She sprinkled the contents of an envelope onto a square of cheesecloth, clamped it shut, and steeped it in hot water. She kept larger quantities of the dried tea leaves in rubber bins behind the counter and brewed them in batches to serve as the daily special. That's what had been in the refrigerator. But today, the drawers of the armoire were empty and the rubber containers were gone. I opened the refrigerator and checked the plastic bins for the herbs that had been there on Monday. They were empty, too.

I had an uneasy feeling that someone had been inside Tea Totalers between last night and this morning. Maybe Topo di Sali had broken in and stolen Genevieve's tea when she refused his offer to buy. Or maybe Kim had thrown out more than she'd admitted to. If so, was she playing me to see how I'd react?

“Vaughn and I cleaned up after you left yesterday. We carried out bags and bags of garbage. I wonder if we accidentally threw it away. I'll have to ask him when I see him.”

“Is he going to help us again today?”

“No, today we're on our own.”

“Oh.” She stood by the sink, her back pressed up against the counter. Today her pink T-shirt had a picture of a kitten in the middle of it. Her ill-fitting pink jeans sat low on her hips, this time exposing the waistband of floral cotton panties.

Being enamored of the fashions of the twenties and
thirties as I was, I'd never been much of a fan of the whole show-your-underwear trend. It was so prevalent on the streets of downtown LA that I'd come to identify strangers by the brand they wore. White Cotton Boxer, Navy Blue Jockey. Little Red Devil was the only nickname I used to someone's face. The guy who worked at the convenience store by the corner of my old apartment building gained notoriety—and the nickname—when his jeans fell down around his ankles while he was making change. From that day on he wore a belt, but the nickname stuck.

“We should get started. I'm going to be in here working on installing the fabric I brought. Are you okay out back with the sanding?”

“Sure.”

Kim assembled the sander and found an extension cord. She ran it through the back door, which meant I couldn't shut her out from inside. When I heard the buzz of the handheld device, I filled the steamer with water and plugged it in. I checked the photos of my experiment on my phone while the steamer warmed up.

First I cued up the photo from inside the van and used my fingers in a reverse pinching action to blow up the detail of the tipped tea pitcher. Next I moved to the photos I took out back in my spilled tea experiment. It was obvious that the second photo, with the entire container of tea spilled on the carpet, was the stain that matched the inside of the van. It wasn't much, but it was something.

I looked out the window. Kim had her blond hair up in a ponytail on top of her head. She wore a pair of clear safety glasses over her eyes and used the small sander to scrub away at the finish on the iron table. By the looks of it, she was absorbed in her project. I pushed a chair against the back door, making sure it didn't blow open any farther than it was, and used Genevieve's phone to call the sheriff's mobile unit.

“Sheriff's office,” said a familiar voice.

“Deputy Sheriff Clark, this is Poly Monroe. I have something I think you need to see.”

“You're calling from Tea Totalers?”

“Yes. Can you come to the tea shop?”

“Is Mrs. Girard with you?”

“No.”

“How long are you going to be there?”

“Most of the day.”

“I'll be there after noon.”

After I hung up, I copied the photos to Genevieve's hard drive and e-mailed them to myself as backup. I closed down the Internet window and turned off the monitor. It was slightly after ten. Time to get to work.

I moved into the store and flipped through the curtain panels I'd made. At the time, it had been little more than a project to take my mind off bigger problems, but it had gotten me back in touch with my love of combining textiles, creating a warm, cozy world with fibers, fabrics, and imagination.

The fabric colors and prints that I'd chosen for Tea Totalers complemented each other nicely. I used three different
toiles de jouy
: a pretty yellow, blue, and cream pattern; a cream and white; and a blue and white. I added a soft blue chambray and a cream jacquard. To add dimension to the color palette, I finished with a multicolored Provençal that captured the lush florals of France. Images of yellow roses and pink ribbons danced across a white background with green leaves. The curtain panels were all lined in a yellow-and-white gingham, which I also planned to use inside the store on the seat cushions and napkins.

I measured the circumference of the existing curtain rods, folded the fabric toward the front, and pinned along the fabric, creating a pocket through which to thread the curtain rod. When I finished pinning, I stitched the fabric into place, threaded the rod through the pocket, and set the curtain rod back on the wall-mounted supports. I stepped
down from the chair and stood back. Aside from the wrinkles, the curtain was close to perfect.

I debated on whether or not it would be better to hang all of the curtains and then steam them, or hang and steam one at a time. I decided on the latter, impatient as I was to see how the curtains would look when finished. It took me longer to get from one window to the next, but by the time I had the west-facing wall complete, I could see how well my fabric choice complemented the butter color Genevieve had painted the shop when she first moved in. Alternating complementary fabrics created the effect that Tea Totalers had been here for generations. The mismatched fabrics worked together to give the interior warmth and timelessness, like a French cottage. I lost myself in the project and didn't hear Kim enter the room.

“It's like another world in here,” she said.

I was steaming out the last of the curtains and turned to look at her. The steam shot onto the back of my hand and I dropped the steamer. Water sprayed the bottom of the curtain.

Kim rushed forward. “Are you okay?” she asked.

“I'm fine, just clumsy.” I stepped down from the chair and moved the steamer from the floor to the windowsill. “That's probably a sign that it's time for a break. What do you think? Do you want to stop and get some lunch?”

“I'm kind of on a roll outside. But you can go get something if you want. I'll stay here.”

Before I had a chance to answer, I heard a knock on the front door. I crossed the room and opened it, finding Deputy Sheriff Clark out front.

“Ms. Monroe,” he said. “May I come in and talk to you?”

I glanced over my shoulder at Kim, but she wasn't there. To keep things confidential, I stepped outside and pulled the door shut behind me. “Let's talk out here. The windows are all covered inside and it's pretty dark.”

I followed Clark down three concrete stairs. Like the morning, I scanned the lot across the street, looking for Rick's truck. It wasn't there. Clark looked around my head at the store and back at me. “Tell me again what you're doing here?”

“Renovations.”

“I don't see any paint cans.”

“It's not that kind of renovation.” At his confusion, I continued. “I'm making over the interior of the tea shop with fabric. Curtains, seat cushions, napkins, placemats. Serving trays, wall hangings.”

“Is Mrs. Girard paying you for the fabric? Or for your time?”

“I'm donating both.”

“Seems like a costly donation.”

“Genevieve is my friend, and this will help me out as much as it helps her. My store opens on Sunday.” I pulled a coupon out of my back pocket. “Maybe you want to stop by and check it out?”

He glanced at the coupon. I kept it out in front of me until he finally took it. “This,” I said, gesturing to the curtains, “is advertising. It's a perfect way to show people how important fabric is in decorating. When the store opens, I plan to run classes to teach people how to start with a concept and build a mood board and make it into a reality. Fabric is inspiring.”

“What happened to her outdoor furniture?” he asked, looking at the bare yard. “Are you going to sew her a couple of tables and chairs?”

I ignored his sarcasm. “It's out back. It seemed as though it could use a freshening up to match the interior.”

He nodded his head as though he agreed, but the slight crease in his forehead and the distant look in his eyes told me he hadn't been paying much attention to our conversation. He appeared to be looking for evidence that Genevieve was there, or had been there, or was going to be there.

“Sheriff, I have something to show you.” I cued up the
photos on my iPhone and blew up the detail of the photo from the back of the van. “See this? It's from the back of the van the morning Phil Girard was found.”

A shadow crossed Clark's face, probably because he didn't like that I'd taken that picture. “Is this about your fabric again?”

“No, it's not.” I slid the photo to the side with my index finger and enlarged the image of the tea container. “That's one of Genevieve's tea containers.”

“I know.”

“Okay, good. See this stain? That's spilled tea. See the size of it?” He nodded. I flipped to the photos I took that morning. “I ran an experiment this morning. This is a carpet with half a jug of water spilled on it. And this next one is with all of the water on it. Notice anything?”

I handed my phone to him. He stared at the phone and used his fingers in the same reverse pinch, blowing up the detail. I held my breath, waiting for him to reach the same conclusion I had. “Why's it green?”

“Food coloring.”

After he'd flipped back and forth between the two pictures, he handed my phone back to me.

“Ms. Monroe, what are you trying to prove here?”

“That the tea in the container spilled into the back of the van. If Phil didn't drink the tea, he couldn't have been poisoned by it.”

His expression changed with a flash of excitement, like a contestant on Final Jeopardy who is an expert on the category. “I thought you wanted me to check your fabric for a death mask. Why do you think poison was the cause of death?”

“You said you were going to run a tox screen.”

“Phil Girard's stomach was empty, so I already know he didn't drink the tea. That doesn't interest me nearly as much as you suspecting that the tea Mrs. Girard made for her husband was poisoned.”

“No! I didn't say that. I was just saying if
you
thought he was poisoned, it couldn't have been the tea, because he didn't drink the tea. So you shouldn't be concerned by the tea.”

“The tea isn't my concern. I already know it wasn't poisoned. What concerns me is the fact that I have five witnesses who can place Genevieve Girard in Los Angeles on Sunday night.”