Shot Through Velvet (28 page)

“Another cookie for the road?” Felicity asked. “I’m writing about what to feed your significant other on Valentine’s Day.” As she offered the tray to Vic, newsroom feeders began to surface like a school of sharks, led by the most notorious sugar fiends of all, editor Mac Jones and police reporter Tony Trujillo. Felicity had trained them well. She beamed at them. They were her Pavlovian lapdogs, and she the mad food scientist.

Lacey held on tight to Vic and her warm, fluffy mouton coat to avoid taking a cookie. She and Felicity might be friendlier these days, but the food editor was still a one-woman diet-demolition team, skulking about with her sweets and treats. Lacey’s stomach growled. Tony took a bite out of a cookie and made
yum
sounds.

“Felicidad, you are the queen of tarts.”

“And the queen of hearts,” Wiedemeyer added gallantly.

Mac grabbed a cookie too. “Are there more desserts for your feature, or is this it?”

“Oh, there’s more, Mac.” Felicity picked up one of her carefully crafted cookies and admired it. “I’m working on a special coffee cake with strawberries and chocolate for breakfast in bed. And what to bring to your office mates. I’m perfecting the red velvet cupcakes, with a twist. And this time the recipes will be simple enough for
anyone
to make.” Felicity cast a glance in Lacey’s direction, and everyone laughed. Except Lacey.

“I can cook perfectly well when I want to. I simply choose not to,” Lacey said. “Not every day. I can shoot a gun too, when I want to. Keep that in mind.”

Mac smiled and ignored her. A well-fed editor was a happy editor. “Keep me posted, Pickles. I want to ride shotgun on your story.” He picked up another heart and an arrow cookie. “Pretty.”

Vic began to reach for one, but Lacey grabbed his hand and led him away. “Don’t want to ruin your appetite. For
amour
.”

“You mentioned food for thought?” Lacey said. Vic took her to a Lebanese restaurant, where the waiters were setting down piping-hot pita bread.

“Yep, I did say that.” Vic was enjoying making her wait.

“Hey, spill. Please! Spill!”

“You’re so impatient,” he laughed. “It’s cute. Okay. I had a chat with Gavin Armstrong. You remember him.”

“Dudley Do-Right. Who could forget?” Lacey sat up straighter. “So this is about our blue guy?”

“Sort of. Turns out the security cameras at Dominion Velvet were turned off that night.”

“The night Rod Gibbs was dispatched to blue heaven, I take it?” She leaned forward. “So there are no pictures? No killer on film?”

“No pictures.” Vic dipped a piece of bread from the basket in olive oil.

“What about fingerprints?” She broke off a piece of bread.

“That’s the interesting part, Lacey. They had some of Wade Dinwiddy’s prints. It seems when females worked late at the plant, he’d turn on the cameras and move them around so he could watch the women. He liked to spy on the ladies. He swears he didn’t touch the cameras that night. The rest of the fingerprints belonged to . . . Rod Gibbs.”

“You’re kidding. You’re telling me our dead guy turned off the very cameras that might have told us who killed him and dumped him in the tub?”

“Ironic, isn’t it? Gibbs had no particular reason to mess with them, but apparently he did.”

Lacey frowned. “So Gibbs arrived at the factory that night, he got the security guy drunk, and then he switched off his own cameras? But why?”

Vic perused the menu. “That’s the million-dollar question.”

“To hide something he was doing? Something illegal? Nicholson suspected Gibbs of stealing from the company. Maybe he went back to cover his tracks.”

“Maybe. And something else. The state cops found a few things at the bottom of the vat.”

“Stop playing with me, Sean Victor Donovan.”

“Oooh, all three names. I must be in big trouble.” He smiled at her reaction. “It seems they found Gibbs’s wallet, some change, about a hundred dollars in greenbacks that are now bluebacks. And they found the gun that killed him. It belonged to . . . Rod Gibbs. No fingerprints.”

“Gibbs’s own gun?” She whistled. “And a hundred dollars? The killer may have been a worker facing unemployment, but didn’t take the money? I wonder why.”

“It would be interesting to find out. For the cops, for the state police, for the professionals. Not for you and me. They can figure out why Rod Gibbs was there and who killed him without our help. Right, Lacey?”

“I don’t know what you’re trying to say, Vic. I’m not getting any more involved in this mess than I have to. For my job. Besides, I already filed my story today.”

Vic raised an eyebrow. “And by the way, you didn’t hear any of this from me.”

“Of course not, darling. But what about your country song?”

The story had hooked her and it would hook the reader. News was a funny business. Some stories caught the public’s imagination. Others never would. There might be hundreds of murders a year in the District, and only a handful would receive any significant press. In a small town like Black Martin, Virginia, Rod Gibbs would be news for years. Gibbs was unimportant to the rest of the world, but throw a little blue dye in the mix, and he was sure to become notorious on tabloid newsstands across the region.

Vic ordered their drinks, and Lacey picked up Vic’s copy of
The Washington Post
, which finally had a small story on Gibbs’s death. It was hidden on the inside of the Metro section and given only three paragraphs, demonstrating how unimportant the story was to
The Post
.

“Typical of the Other Newspaper in town,” Lacey said.
“
If they don’t write it first, it doesn’t exist.” She read the headline aloud to Vic.

Lacey was aghast. Vic just laughed. “Oh, there’s a classic headline for you to pass around the newsroom!” he said. “Gibbs was hit on the head, shot in the chest, strung up with velvet, and dyed blue—and they merely
suspect
foul play?”

“In the District,” Lacey reflected, “the cops might have called that a suicide.”

Chapter 26

It’s not every day a woman gets to bury a big blue devil.

Honey Gibbs made sure her husband’s funeral would become a local—if not a national—legend, the kind of memory that Black Martin natives would savor and pass around till it was blown up into a tale of shock and awe.

“I saw him with my own eyes,” they would say. “He was the color of a bowl of blueberries.” Maybe they would add, “He really did look like a blue devil.”

Rod Gibbs’s body was on display, as Honey had promised, the center of attention, in front of the minister’s podium. Rod was looking considerably more peaceful than the last time Lacey had seen him. His face didn’t seem to be any the worse for the autopsy. But he was still many shades of blue. His cerulean eyes were now closed and his royal blue tongue was pushed back behind closed blue-black lips, with a trace of pink lipstick overlay. He rested in a light blue, eighteen-gauge steel casket with a white velvet interior, providing a nice contrast to all that indigo.

There wasn’t much the funeral home could do about Rod’s color. There had clearly been an attempt to mask the permanent dye with a little makeup, but his Midnight Blue tint bled right through. Rod was wearing the dark blue suit and shirt that Honey had selected. His hands were folded over his chest and a pale blue paisley tie (courtesy of Honey). Rod Gibbs looked like a prop in a surrealist play, not a real corpse. A play that Honey Gibbs was directing. A play that was assured of spectacular notices.

Lacey left Alexandria in her vintage green BMW before six in the morning and arrived in Black Martin at eight-thirty. The funeral was scheduled for ten. But even at that early hour, the mortuary chapel was almost full of waiting spectators. Lacey felt they couldn’t quite be called mourners. In anticipation of a maximum-capacity crowd today, folding doors on either side of the main room had been opened and chairs set out for the overflow.

Dressing for this particular funeral was tricky. Wearing black might communicate a grief Lacey didn’t feel, and she might end up looking either mocking or morose. Wearing any shade of blue would be ridiculous under the circumstances. Red, which could signal hatred or passion, was always inappropriate at a funeral. Pink would be too perky. It was a fashion conundrum.

She finally settled on her dark green, vintage wool suit from the late Forties. She loved the green velvet chesterfield collar and cuffs and covered buttons. She appreciated the way it fit snugly at her waist. The suit made her feel strong and capable. A great pair of violet suede pumps finished the look. Lacey thought the outfit was both attractive and appropriate. And it featured a touch of velvet. Somehow this occasion called for a nod to velvet. And no more than a nod.

She told the mortuary assistant she was a member of the press, and Lacey was shown to a reserved seat on the side, near the front. She didn’t know whether Honey Gibbs had loved or hated her articles in
The Eye
, but Lacey didn’t question her good luck at snagging a ringside seat. The assistant even let Lacey bring her morning latte with her, as long as she disposed of it before the service began.

Lacey made herself comfortable. Soon she was joined by other reporters, including local newshound Will Adler, looking like a pallbearer in a dark suit, white shirt, and dark tie. A television reporter and cameraman from Richmond were informed they could not shoot footage during the funeral. They filmed Gibbs in his coffin, and contented themselves with setting up at the entrance and practicing news bites.

By far the most interesting character was a reporter from the
National Enquirer
. His press badge said he was Glen Potts. The man was about fifty years old, pudgy, with thinning hair on a large round head. He wore a tan sports coat, white shirt, striped tie, and baggy khaki slacks. Lacey was willing to bet he wore a variation of that outfit every day of the week.
Inquiring minds want to know: Why do reporters dress this way?

The
Enquirer
’s Glen Potts did not introduce himself to the other reporters. He walked right up to the casket and took up-the-nostril shots of the dead man with a small digital camera. He returned to his seat among the crowd and shunned the other press. Lacey didn’t blame him. Even with its nomination for a Pulitzer, working for the
Enquirer
was its own punishment, and perhaps, its own reward.

“I didn’t know they had actual reporters,” Adler said. He seemed more pleasant today, being allowed to sit with the big city reporters.

“What did you think?” Lacey asked, amused. “Somebody has to make it all up.”

“I thought the editors just sat around throwing darts at a big chart on the wall. Like they throw a dart and hit the fat-actress story block, so they write about how she only has two years to live because she’s going to explode or something. Or they throw a dart and hit the Elvis block, so Elvis has to surface in a shack in Montana and he’s going on tour, but his nose froze off and he’s having plastic surgery first. That kind of thing.”

“It would simplify the job, that’s for sure. Maybe dead blue guy wasn’t on the chart.”

Adler smiled at her. “They’ll have to add that now. And to think, Rod Gibbs is going to add a story block to the
National Enquirer
.”

“How does it feel to be part of tabloid history?”

“It’s a proud moment for Black Martin. Those
Enquirer
s are going to sail off the grocery store racks here. Do you think they’ll put him on the front page?”

“I’m just sorry the
Weekly World News
folded. We won’t get to hear about Gibbs being a blue-skinned alien and Bat Boy appearing at the funeral.”

“Ah, the golden days of journalism are over,” Adler said.

Lacey looked for Vic and didn’t see him at first. Then out of the corner of her eye she spied him talking with the mortuary director. Tom Nicholson was with him. Lacey didn’t try to distract him. It was enough to know he was in the room. She could tell by the slight turn of his head that he had spotted her. He smiled, looking seriously sexy in his suit and sunglasses. They were aware of each other.

Someone in front of the casket snickered. From where she sat, Lacey could just see Gibbs’s blue nose peeking up above the velvet-lined casket. She walked over to take another look. Had she missed anything? No. Rod looked just as weird the second time.

Mac insisted he needed a photo to go with the funeral story. She scanned the crowd and was grateful when she saw
The Eye
’s head photographer arrive. Long, tall Hansen would spare her the indignity of taking out her own digital camera and shooting a photo of a blue corpse in his blue coffin. Lacey suspected Hansen was not just getting a photo for the paper, but documenting the event for Claudia.
Better Hansen than me.