How to Crash a Killer Bash (5 page)

“Hey, schweetheart,” he began. To my surprise, his Bogie accent was right on target—and the guy could act. I didn’t know he had it in him.

Christine Lampe was up next. She moved into the spotlight wearing a ruffled white blouse, long wool skirt, ratty shawl, thick, droopy stockings, and old-fashioned nursing shoes. She completed her Agatha Mistry look by twisting her hair into a bun and adding wire-rimmed glasses. When she spoke, she used a high-pitched, nails-on-the-blackboard English accent.

“Yoo-hoo, everyone . . .”

When she finished her humorous introduction and the laughs died down, her assistant Dan Tannacito took center stage. He was dressed to kill in a tweed cape/coat, deerstalker cap, and black boots. In one hand he held a curvy meerschaum pipe, and in the other a giant magnifying glass.

“Good evening. My name is Sherlock Holmes . . .”

He nailed the stuffy English accent, reminiscent of Basil Rathbone’s Holmes—and the women in the room instantly fell in love with him.

Dan lifted his hat to the adoring crowd, then made room for Delicia, who stepped up in her role of Nancy Prude. She spoke with a perfect Valley Girl accent, a jarring—and hilarious—contrast to her vintage outfit. She wowed the crowd with her over-the-top portrayal of the beloved girl sleuth.

Totally.

It was a hard act to follow, but Treasure Island security guard Raj Reddy nervously moved to the microphone. As Hercules Parrot, he’d padded his belly, waxed his fake mustache, put on high-water pants, and slicked back his hair. His combination French/Indian accent only made him funnier.

“
Bonjour, mes amies
. I am being Hercules Parrot, ze famous Belgian detective . . .”

But Berkeley Wong’s take on Kutesy Millstone, the tough-gal detective, brought down the house. Dressed in drag in a classic black dress, Berk had removed the cap he’d worn earlier and replaced it with a sweatband around his forehead, then spiked his hair into a porcupine do and added tats featuring menacing knives, swords, and guns.

“Yo, Millstone here . . . ,” he/she began.

He had me laughing out loud.

As the detectives took a group bow for their introductions, the audience cheered riotously. When the roar died down, Mary Lee made her grand entrance onto the platform, in the guise of California de Young. Refusing to wear a costume of the stereotypical stuffy museum curator, she’d opted for her trademark look. She was dressed to match her mannequin double, in yet another pink Chanel suit with matching Choo shoes and Coach handbag. She’d even dyed her purse pooch pink to coordinate with her outfit. Her makeup was expertly, albeit overly, done, and her blond curls formed an incongruous halo around her head. She grinned at her benefactors as she took over the microphone and began to read her lines.

“Welcome, everyone! I’m California de Young, the museum curator. I’m hoping to make our museum the best in the world, but as you know, state-of-the-art costs money, so we’ll be doubling your annual donation requests after tonight.”

The crowd laughed at the financial joke. As for Mary Lee, she was having the time of her life. After all, she was the star.

She went on. “You’re here tonight to solve the ‘Mystery at the de Young Museum,’ and compete with six of the world’s best mystery detectives.” The crowd gave an appreciative round of applause as the sleuths took another bow behind her.

“Each of the masterminds will receive a weapon to defend themselves in case something happens during the evening.” Mary Lee continued to read her script as she handed out various replicated antiquities/weapons to the suspects—the dagger, the bow and arrow, the beaded necklace, and so on.

She wrapped up her speech and announced a twenty-minute break, encouraging the amateur sleuths to question the suspects, hunt for hidden clues, and down more champagne. After waving at the crowd like a queen acknowledging her loyal subjects, she stepped off the stage to collect accolades from the guests.

Twenty minutes later, I rounded up the suspects—all but Mary Lee, whom I hoped had taken her place on the floor in the mural room for the crime scene. She was to stay there and await the discovery of her “dead body” during the second act. I glanced around and saw no sign of her. Good.

Meanwhile, Brad had finally arrived. He was chatting with Sam Wo in a far corner, and looked very official—not to mention hot—in his white Crime Scene Cleaners jumpsuit.

About time, I thought, still annoyed.

At my signal to Sam, the lights in the room flickered on and off, gathering the attention of the guests for Act II. The lights went out again, this time for nearly thirty seconds, alerting Delicia to scream from the mural room.

Her scream was bloodcurdling. She’d been practicing.

When the lights came on again, the crowd looked half amused, half puzzled.

“A scream!” Christine called out as Agatha Mistry.

“Coming from in there,” Dan’s Holmes said as he pointed toward the mural room.

The crowd buzzed as they moved toward the doors of the waiting crime scene. I couldn’t wait to see their reactions when they found Delicia hunched over the body of the recently “murdered” California de Young.

But before Dan could open the doors to let in the amateur sleuths, they burst open.

Delicia stood at the entrance to the room, her face flushed.

This wasn’t in the script. Was she ad-libbing again?

Before I could shoot her a questioning look, she held up her trembling hand. It was covered in fake blood.

I looked down at Dee’s flowered Nancy Prude dress. It too was stained red.

Half the crowd gasped; the other half giggled.

Brad appeared behind me, having elbowed his way through the crowd instead of being summoned. The whole second act appeared to be falling apart right in front of my eyes.

Mary Lee was definitely going to kill me now.

Brad stepped up to Delicia, took her arm, and gently lowered her upraised hand. Pulling out his cell phone from his pocket, he commanded, “Presley, get everyone back.”

He took hold of Dee’s wrist and led her back into the mural room.

“Presley!” he said, shaking me from my trance. None of this was in the script.

“What? We’re supposed to go into the crime scene room and—”

Brad reached out, grabbed my arm, pulled me into the room, and closed the door.

Delicia stood frozen to her spot. Fake blood mixed with mascara was smeared on her face from wiping away her tears. What had that witch said to Dee that would make her so upset? I looked from Delicia to Brad, searching for answers.

“Brad, what’s going on? What did Mary Lee do to Delicia?”

Brad nodded toward Mary Lee, who lay facedown a few feet away.

I stepped over. “Mary Lee?”

The fake dagger in her back was encircled with fake blood.

She wasn’t moving.

I glanced back at Brad, the hairs on the back of my neck raised like a porcupine’s quills.

“Mary Lee really has been stabbed,” he said gravely. “She’s dead. Seriously.”

“We need an ambulance . . .” Brad was talking on his cell phone, but I went on asking questions, a wave of heat rushing through me.

“What . . . what do you mean, dead? She can’t be . . . There must be some mistake . . . ,” I stammered, not comprehending what had just happened. My murder mystery was supposed to be fiction, not real life. Following the heat wave, a cold sweat broke out over my body. I shivered.

Brad covered the mouthpiece. “Parker!” he commanded. Then he lowered his voice and spoke to me slowly, as if I were a child. “Get. Those. People. Away. From. Here. Now.”

I nodded, zombielike, hoping the feeling would return to my wobbling legs.

“But don’t let them leave!” he added.

“What about Delicia?” I looked at my friend across the room. Tears streamed down her flushed, mascara-streaked cheeks.

Brad moved over to her and wrapped his free arm around her. “I’ve got her. Go!”

With a last glance at the bloodied body lying on the floor, I slipped out of the room to face the puzzled crowd gathered near the doorway. Granted they were supposed to be puzzled, but not like this. What now? I didn’t relish canceling the event, but obviously the fictional murder mystery couldn’t continue, not with a real murder mystery in the second act.

I stepped up on a nearby granite sculpture, no doubt a priceless piece of art, even though it just looked like a big rock. Waving my hands at the murmuring crowd, I shouted, “May I have your attention, please?” I repeated the words several times until the raucous noise quieted to simmering whispers.

“Thank you.” I took a big breath and ad-libbed my lines. “Thank you all for coming tonight and . . . uh . . . supporting the museum. Unfortunately, there’s been . . . an accident, and I’m going to have to ask you to return to the main court.”

People glanced at each other, clearly puzzled. A man channeling Charlie Chan yelled, “It’s a clue!” Several others giggled at his outburst.

“No, seriously!” I said, trying to be heard over the excited conversations. “I need you to—”

Before I could finish, half a dozen uniformed San Francisco police officers flooded into the room, hands on their sidearms, ready to draw their weapons.

“Awesome!” a young Dick Tracy called out. I recognized Ed Kaufman from the mayor’s office.

“Real cops!” a Perry Mason look-alike shouted. Rodney Worth from the Board of Supervisors.

“Hey, they do look real!” yelled Judy Wheeler, well-known philanthropist, dressed as another Nancy Drew.

The police spread out, surrounding the crowd, weapons ready, waiting for orders. From behind them stepped a tall, good-looking man with slicked-back hair, an Italian suit, and black wing tips.

My nemesis, San Francisco Police Department homicide detective Luke Melvin.

He moved forward, spotted me standing on top of the big expensive rock. He covered his mouth with a hand and shook his head.

Uh-oh.

Meanwhile the crowd watched the action, mesmerized. Apparently they believed the police invasion was part of the script.

Corbin Cosetti, still wearing a London Fog overcoat, shouldered his way through the mass of people. He glanced at the police surrounding the crowd, then frowned at me, clearly confused at this latest turn of events. He—aside from the other cast members—was the only one who knew we had veered far from the original story. And he also knew who was in the next room—his mother. He started for the door and was blocked by a uniformed officer.

“Excuse me, but I’m going in there!” Corbin shouted loud enough to be heard by nearly everyone in the room. The crowd hushed, eyes wide. I heard the scratch of pencil on the mini-notebooks we had provided.

Detective Melvin, who’d reached the door to the crime scene room about the same time as Corbin, recognized Mary Lee’s son. “Hold on, son. You don’t want to go in there—”

Corbin forced his way around the detective, causing a uniformed officer to raise his weapon. Detective Melvin held up a hand to stop the cop as Corbin ducked inside. Melvin mumbled something to the officer, then followed Corbin into the crime scene room. All eyes stared at the door, anticipating the next scene.

Seconds later I heard an agonized “No!” from inside the room.

Corbin.

My skin broke out in goose bumps at the heartrending sound.

Detective Melvin reappeared at the door, alone. He motioned for an officer to enter, said something to him, then headed for the rock, where I still stood frozen to the spot. Offering a hand, he helped me down, then stepped up and took my place.

“Ladies and gentlemen, could I have your attention? I’m Detective Luke Melvin from the San Francisco Police Department.” He flashed his badge.

A woman dressed in something “tart-noir” said, “He looks too cute to be a real cop. They should have got someone who looked like Bogey to play the part. That guy should be on
Male Runway Models
.”

Her partner, apparently Magnum PI in a Hawaiian shirt, replied, “You know, I think I’ve seen him somewhere. In a commercial or something.”

The crowd gradually quieted, waiting to hear the detective give his lines.

“I’m afraid the party’s over,” Melvin announced.

Everyone looked puzzled for a moment.

“There’s been a homicide . . .”

The crowd broke into mirthful murmurs and nodding heads.

“I’m afraid Ms. Miller, your host tonight for the de Young Museum fund-raiser, has been . . . killed.”

A few exaggerated gasps. A few inadvertent chuckles.

“You mean California de Young, don’t you, Officer?” a Dick Tracy shouted.