Iced Chiffon (9 page)

I rounded the corner and headed for my house but stopped dead at the property line, one foot on lush green, the other on lush weeds.
Well, bless her heart!
When Chantilly sends out
the word,
people listen. My porch had three ladies carrying hangers of clothes, and it all looked like really nice stuff. If I wanted to keep the Prissy Fox prissy and only take good-quality items, I had to figure out a nice way to tell someone their clothes weren’t good enough. Men in Savannah weren’t the only ones who packed heat these days, and “Your dress is downright ugly” and “I don’t want it anywhere near my establishment” sounded a mite confrontational.

By five I was tired to the bone with trying to come up with a system to keep consigners straight and mark what clothes belonged to whom. For now, I pinned account numbers along with the price to the clothes, then marked down the name, account numbers, and prices when the items sold. I needed one of those barb-gun things that attached price tags to the clothes instead of pins, and I really needed a crash course in Bookkeeping 101.

I closed the Fox at five, grabbed a shower, and got a blue
dress from the stash in the shop. Another good thing about running a consignment shop was an extensive wardrobe at your fingertips. Buy it, wear it, have it dry-cleaned, and resell. I couldn’t afford to do that often, but Raylene’s party meant I had to look good. Hadn’t I seen the cutest pair of taupe strappy sandals that had just come in? The heel was higher than what I usually wore, but considering I usually wore flip-flops, anything was higher.

With Urston on my
maybe
list of murderers, this could be a very interesting night. Maybe I’d find out what exactly he and Cupcake were up to and why he was giving her money.

“
A
BOUT
time you got yourself here,” Raylene huffed when she answered the door of leaded-glass panes and gleaming brass hardware. “I have guests arriving any minute now, and I want that fountain up and running right quick or I’m stopping payment on my check.” She made a sour face, then stepped aside to let me enter. “Do you always carry that ugly yellow purse everywhere you go? A little evening purse wouldn’t hurt, you know. Something with class.”

Raylene had married Junior Carter, of Carter Bank and Trust fame, and went from nobody to somebody in six months flat. That Junior Jr. was born two months
premature,
weighing nine pounds, six ounces, may have had something to do with the speedy wedding. Raylene, Junior, and Junior Jr., aka JJ, now lived in the historic Lester Reed House, a huge white antebellum Greek Revival with seven fireplaces,
a side veranda, and the ghost of Lester Reed’s cat, or so we tour guides embellished.

Raylene pointed to the back. “Raimondo is putting the final touches on the gardens, and for pity’s sake. don’t step on anything and kill it dead, but get that fountain running. That newswoman here from Atlanta is taking pictures of the gardens tonight and doing interviews.” Raylene stood tall, looking very impressed with herself. “She’s interviewing me and Junior in the library, so don’t you be wandering in there and disturbing her while she’s setting up.”

Raylene scurried off, and I followed the hallway past lovely rooms filled with beautiful antiques and rich fabrics in shades of gold, yellows, and blues. Raylene may be a snob of the first order, but she had an incredible house. Pushing through the double French doors that led outside, I spied Raimondo bent over an azalea bush. He expertly cut off blooms that had dared to die in Raylene’s yard and stuffed withered petals and stems in his pocket so as not to leave plant shrapnel.

“Mr. Baldassare?” I came up behind him, enjoying the view—and not of the flowers. Raimondo was tall, dark, and gorgeous, with an excellent butt.

He stood and turned, then flashed a dazzling smile, his teeth white and perfect against his Italian skin. “Ciao e saluti.”

I had no idea what that meant, but it sounded sexy as all get-out and turned my legs to Jell–O. I put out my hand to shake his. He held out a withered dogwood bloom. He laughed and slid it into his pocket, but when he pulled his hand out a dead daffodil petal and tulip leaf came with it. “I am like a kangaroo with many pouches.” He laughed, his
dark eyes twinkling as he shook my hand. He picked up the leaves and petals, and I took the fountain pump from my purse.

“Sorry I wasn’t around when you stopped by my house,” I said to Raimondo. “I’ll get the fountain up and going in no time.”

My fountain was made up of metal and stone lily pads, with water flowing from one to the other, surrounded by birds and animals. Raimondo had it tucked into a corner of the garden surrounded by tulips, daffodils, and green moss. As much as I hated to admit it, the fountain looked a lot better in Raylene’s garden than it ever did at my place. That she had a top-notch Italian gardener on retainer and an endless supply of money may have had a little to do with it.

“It only takes a few minutes to get the hoses connected,” I explained. “Then I’ll need to fill the basin.”

“I will do that for you.” Raimondo’s smile widened a bit, and he added, “The blue color of your dress is beautiful with your eyes. You have lovely eyes.”

I suddenly felt light-headed and with an honest–to–goodness urge to swoon. Until this moment, I had no idea what a swoon was. I think I thanked Raimondo, than floated over to the fountain and started sticking tubes and plugs together, the chore taking twice as long as it should have since floating got in the way of concentration.

A string quartet started up from the veranda, and
ooh
ing and
aah
ing guests spilled out into the torch-lit garden. I stepped back to check that the fountain trickled from lily pad to lily pad without sloshing over the edges and bumped right into Walker Boone. Tonight he had on a navy sport coat and khaki pants. Considering he spent his pubescent
years between street fights and drive–by shootings, he cleaned up pretty good.

He snagged a glass of champagne from a waiter wandering though the crush and handed it to me. Very un–Boone-like, and I wish he’d snagged a deviled egg instead. “What do you want?”

His brows drew together questioningly, but it was strictly for show. He knew I was onto him.

I said, “So, what—you give me something and now you want something in return.”

“Actually the drinks are free.”

“You still want something.”

A waiter served Boone a beer in a bottle with some snooty label, but a beer is a beer, and it suited Boone better than champagne ever would. “Are you staying away from church rallies?” He held up his hand to stop my protests. I guess the
Drop dead
expression on my face hinted as to what I was thinking. “I know you don’t take orders from me, but this time do it. There are more people involved with Hollis’ case than you think, and they all have a lot to lose. Let me handle things, and forget about your house. There are other houses.”

“Not ones I’ve rebuilt from the ground up.” Or maybe it was the top down. It was hard to remember with all that rebuilding going on, but this latest information from Boone about more people being involved was very interesting. I’m sure his intention in telling me this was to get me to back off, but it had just the opposite effect.
What people? What were they losing?

“You’re out of your league, Reagan.”

“Or maybe I’m getting too close to finding out what’s
really going on, and you’re worried you’ll look bad if I get to the truth before the big, bad lawyer.”

Boone took a swig of his beer and rocked back on his heels. “That’s not going to happen.”

“Or you’re afraid it will.” I made little chicken sounds. I was poking the bear, and it felt good. “This time there’s no prenup or legal mumbo jumbo getting in the way of my doing what I want.”

“This isn’t something you and your auntie talk about over sticky buns and pecan coffee for kicks. This is serious.”

Two years ago, Boone could intimidate the snot out of me, but not now, not this time. “How much do I owe you so far? It better not be much because you haven’t done much. Hollis is still in jail.”

I handed my glass to a waiter, hiked Old Yeller up on my shoulder, and turned to leave, but the heel of my cute little strappy sandal got stuck in the grass. I wobbled, trying to steady myself, promising God I’d go to church for a month if he’d spare me from falling flat on my face at Raylene’s party and—most of all—right in front of Walker Boone, who I had just made chicken sounds to. Like Cher says, “The worst thing in the world is to be uncool.” Uncool was happening real fast.

Boone snagged my elbow, holding me upright. God did indeed work in mysterious ways. “You can’t even walk across the garden without causing a scene. The killer will see you coming a mile away,” he whispered as he drew close.

I wiggled my arm from his hand and took off in search of a deviled egg. To eat it or throw it at Boone, I wasn’t quite sure yet.

“Honey, what’s got you all in a dither?” Auntie KiKi said, sidling up next to me.

I glared at Walker Boone’s back as he chatted with Urston Russell. Urston had his red notebook tucked under his arm. He and his committee must have just come from judging someone else’s garden. Word had it Urston would go off by himself after a judging and make notes. He never let that red notebook out of his sight, and everyone knew that at home he kept it under lock and key. KiKi’s gaze followed mine, and she let out a dreamy sigh. I was willing to bet the bank she wasn’t sighing over Urston. She said, “Whatever that man did to you this time, he did it while looking right nice. Walker Boone sure does fill out a jacket to perfection.”

KiKi cut her gaze back to me. “I came over here to let you know your fountain isn’t working right, and water’s spilling over the sides and making a soggy mess in the grass. You know how Raylene is about messes. Given half a chance, she’ll use it as an excuse to stop payment on your check.”

I glanced at the fountain, which was making uneven splashes instead of tranquil drip-drops. “I’ll take care of it. I’m counting on that check to pay bills. I think we should go to the wake Dinah Corwin’s hosting tomorrow night.” What better place to find out who else was involved with Cupcake?

KiKi took a glass of champagne from another waiter passing by and downed it in one gulp. “I knew when I saw you and Mr. Hunk together there’d be fireworks. You got something cooking in that brain of yours, I can tell.”

If I told KiKi the truth about going it alone on finding the killer, she’d wring her hands, say novenas, and add me to the prayer list at church. “No fireworks,” I assured KiKi with a big smile. “As a matter of fact, I’m going to stop by
Boone’s office tomorrow for a chat. I might find something out at the wake that could help him out.”

I could go to Boone’s office, so this wasn’t a lie at all. His secretary and I had become good friends during the divorce. I could sneak up the back stairs that had been closed off when the offices were remodeled, chat with Dinky, the secretary, over lattes, and not have to see Boone. She might even know some dirt about Cupcake. “We’ll get free martinis from Dinah,” I said to KiKi. “We’ll see who else at the Marshall House is celebrating Cupcake’s demise.”

“And you’ll tell Boone all about it?”

I’d tell him to take a long walk off a short pier, but instead I said to KiKi, “I promise to go to his office.”

KiKi batted her green-shadowed eyes. “Well, now that I think about it, Marshall House does do a right-fine martini, with those big olives stuffed with blue cheese. I’ll bring Putter. You wouldn’t believe the gossip that takes place over those little white balls. It makes the gals at the beauty salons look like a bunch of amateurs. We have to do an obligatory appearance at the Paxtons’ anniversary party first, but we’ll be there.”

I left KiKi and skirted around an array of purple and white creeping phlox, the grass verdant and green. I stooped down behind the soggy fountain, which was listing to one side and making—God forbid—a puddle. I wedged myself between the fountain and the bamboo fence, which was covered with yellow trumpets of Carolina jessamine that separated Raylene’s garden from the yard next door. Rummaging around in my purse that was just about the same color as the trumpets, I came up with a lipstick, a spiky brush that did horrible things to my hair, a mascara I hated
because it left clumps, and two rolls of half-eaten cherry Life Savers. I’d contemplated cleaning out my purse, but, thankfully, I hadn’t gotten around to it. Now I could jam all that unwanted stuff under the back edge of the fountain and level it out.

I plastered my bag against the fountain as a cushion to push it forward, the water making it heavy. I slid the mascara tube under the one end, followed by the lipstick, then heard Raylene’s voice low and threatening coming from the other side of the trumpet-covered fence. A lot of what she said got lost in the splashing of the water, but it was Raylene’s holier-than-thou voice in a tirade saying, “The little slut is dead, so what’s stopping you?”

As far as I knew, there was only one recently dead little slut around here. So Raylene Carter was a member of the we–hate-Cupcake fan club. Someone replied to what she said, but it was more of a whisper, and Raylene added, “I paid a pretty penny to take care of our problem.”