Shot Through Velvet (35 page)

“If there is a connection, and I’m not saying there is,” Vic said, “it would be jumping the gun, so to speak. Linking the two murders on DeadFed could make it much harder to find this killer. Or it might provoke him to escalate.”

“You’re saying that the Velvet Avenger reads Conspiracy Clearinghouse?” Brooke assumed her lawyer-in-court stance.

“If he didn’t before yesterday, he probably does now. You were both at the funeral, weren’t you?” Vic said.

“And you had a tableful of fans,” Lacey added.

“And I got a great exclusive,” Damon said.

“You weren’t the only writer there,” Lacey said.

“But I’m the only one working the conspiracy angle.”

“We have to isolate what we know from what the killer knows,” Vic said. “Pojack wanted to fire Lacey. She mentioned it to a lot of people yesterday after the funeral.”

Lacey took a deep breath. “I’m going to tell you something strictly off the record, Damon, if you can handle that.”

Brooke and Damon shared a look. “Okay. For now.”

“Pojack had a blue velvet ribbon in his hand.”

“Aha! And now he’s dead.” Brooke jumped ahead to the conclusion. “So they are connected! No question. But how?”

“One of my DeadFed readers could be the Avenger? Or an Avenger copycat?” Damon put his chin in his hands. For a moment, he looked both intrigued and repelled. Intrigued won by a landslide. “All right. We won’t feed the beast. We’ll just monitor all the online comments and ask for information,” he finally said. “Let’s see what’s out there. Okay, partner?” he asked Lacey.

“We’re not partners,” she said.

“Sure we are.” Damon smacked her in the arm.

Vic held Lacey back from slamming Damon’s laptop on his fingertips.

The perfect chocolate cake rounds were cooling on the racks when Stella arrived, limping on one cast and one very high heel. She was followed by Nigel Griffin and his mother, Lady Gwendolyn.

“That’s funny. I didn’t schedule a party tonight,” Lacey said at the door.

“Brooke called and invoked the Code,” Stella explained as she handed her coat to Lacey. “The Pink Collar Code.” Their sort-of-secret code that called out the Pink Collar Posse: the three of them.

Lacey spun on her heels and faced Brooke. “You didn’t.”

“I did. One for all, and all for you,” Brooke said.

“Like you did for me,” Stella said. “We are here for you in your hour of need. You got a murder. We got champagne. I gotta sit down.” Stella hobbled to the sofa and collapsed. She pointed to the amazing Technicolor cast on her leg. “This thing is heavy.”

“No wonder. We glued ten pounds of rhinestones on it,” Lacey said.

Nigel plopped down on the sofa and looked at Vic. “Got a beer, mate?”

Vic dug a Dos Equis out of the refrigerator. “What are you doing here, Griffin?”

“Not quite sure, actually. My wounded dove, Stella, told me she was going to help Lacey figure out this murder business. There’s another one, I take it? Because Smithsonian can’t throw a stone without stumbling over some new cadaver.” Griffin looked remorseful. “I expressly forbade Stella to get involved. And, well, here we are.”

“Nigel
forbidding
me? It was hilarious, Lacey. Like something out of
Father Knows Best
. Lady G and I thought we’d bust a gut laughing. So cute.” She combed his hair with her spiky fingernails and kissed his forehead.

Griffin put his feet up on Lacey’s trunk. He was obviously loving the attention. “Next thing I knew, the three of us were in Stella’s Mini on our way over here.” His head swiveled from Stella to Gwendolyn and back again. “And I thought they’d hate each other. Shows what I know about women.”

“But, Nigel,” Lacey said, knocking his feet to the floor. “Aren’t you glad they like each other?”

He sank even farther into the upholstery. “It’s like putting two forces of nature together and creating a perfect storm.” He put his hand against his forehead in a swoon, like Camille.

“Where’s the ambassador tonight?” Vic asked. “So nice to see you again, by the way, Lady Gwendolyn.”

“And you, dear Sean Victor. The ambassador is at Nigel’s flat. Drinking your dreadful American beer and watching some sort of bizarre sporting event on the telly. Told us to have a wonderful time,” Lady Gwendolyn said. “My, something smells delicious.”

“Lacey, you’re baking!” Stella said. “Whatcha making?”

“A cake for Vic’s mom. A Valentine surprise.”

“Let me help.” Stella hobbled to the kitchen and studied the recipe. “Holy cow! You do need help. Lucky we came over. So now we make the filling? Where’s your raspberry jam?”

“Really, Smithsonian,” Nigel said. “You’re at home on a Saturday night, domesticating? You’re not out baiting a killer? I’m shocked.”

“I’ve never smashed a cake on anyone’s head before, Nigel, but there is always a first time,” Lacey promised.

“Wait till I get my camera,” Brooke said.

“I want a copy for my blog,” Stella chimed in. “Stellariffic dot com.”

“Nigel, do behave,” Gwendolyn said. “It’s only men who can do just one thing at a time. Sometimes you have to do something restful with your hands, like cooking, while your mind works on an entirely different problem. Like murder. Now, do be quiet, and let the answers bubble up. We can discuss the murders while we bake. Victor, will you assist me with the bubbly?”

Vic popped the cork and Lacey poured hot cream over chocolate chips to make a ganache.

“Nigel, sweetheart, you can help me mix the raspberry filling?” Stella asked.

“Yeah, why don’t you?” Vic said. “I like to see you working, Nigel. It reminds me that anything is possible.” Nigel’s mother snorted with laughter into her champagne.

 

After the troops went home, Lacey surveyed the crumbs of their culinary handiwork. There were just a few slices left. If they hadn’t determined who the killer was, they had at least declared the dessert a success. She grumbled and rubbed her back, sore from stress and standing and stirring batter.

“What’s the matter, Lacey?”

“I had hoped we could just make the thing and freeze it for your mom’s party. And then the whole posse came over and we ate it. Every bite. Now we’re going to have to do it all over again.”

It was Vic’s turn to grumble. “I forgot about that part. But next time we can do it without the posse. Right?”

“Only if they let us bake a cake at an Undisclosed Location.”

Chapter 32

“Smithsonian, what in the name of the sweet First Amendment is going on at
The Eye
?” It was after eleven p.m., very late by Washington standards. It had been a very long day.

“Hi, Mac. Yes, I’m fine. Thanks for asking.” Lacey leaned back on Vic’s sofa and closed her eyes. She heard the blender in Vic’s clean and up-to-date and nearly empty kitchen, blissfully free of baking pans. Vic was whipping up piña coladas, another talent of his of which she had been unaware.

Vic had recently moved from his temporary digs near his folks’ house into a newish town house in McLean, Virginia. Although it was an impressive place, with plenty of room and light, the oh, so desirable granite countertops, and a two-car garage, it felt very far from the action to Lacey, who loved her slightly funky and crowded Old Town Alexandria.

Aunt Mimi’s trunk didn’t exactly mesh with Vic’s bachelor décor of leather and heavy wood, but its brass buckles glistened in the firelight and made Lacey feel more at home. She put her feet up on it.

“I just got some frantic garbled message from Claudia Darnell, and of course your name popped up in the middle of it,” Mac complained. “Is it true? Was Walt Pojack shot dead right in front of you?”

“Um, yes and no, Mac.” She reeled off the facts the way an obituary writer might put it. “Walter Pojack, chief operating officer of
The Eye Street Observer,
died today in his office, slain by an unknown assailant. The cause of death was not released by the Metropolitan Police, but sources said Pojack was shot once in the head. Foul play is suspected. He was
not
shot dead right in front of
Eye Street
fashion reporter Lacey Smithsonian. She just found the body, the way she always does.” Lacey heard the blender shut off.

“I read all that, Smithsonian. Where were the security guards?”

“You got me, Mac. But you know there are ways to evade the guards. Like coming up through the garage and the back stairs. You might want to talk with Wiedemeyer for the more colorful commentary. He was with me when we found Pojack dead. I think the words
solid-gold bastard
might figure in pretty heavily.”

“The jinx was there?” Mac tried to stay as far away from the death and dismemberment reporter as he could. “I don’t want anything to do with Wiedemeyer. Not if I don’t have to. And what on earth were you doing at
The Eye
on Saturday?” That looked like it was going to be the question of the day. “You filed your story. You were done. And why were you talking to Pojack? He’s the last person on earth—”

“Hang on a minute.” Lacey put the phone down. Vic came bearing drinks on a tray. She sat up and sipped the cool white concoction. She imagined Mac was likewise guzzling something soothing from his favorite blue bottle of Maalox. She picked up the phone again.

“I’m waiting, Smithsonian.”

“Pojack called me at home. Said he had to see me. Told me to come to the office. Said it was important.”
Ow! Ice headache!
Lacey closed her eyes and rubbed one temple.

“What on earth for? Don’t keep me waiting, Smithsonian. I got the lede, now give me the jump.”

“Okay, okay. I raced downtown because Pojack, the big jerk, made it sound like a matter of life and death.” She paused. “Which I guess it was. But I really thought he was going to can me.”

“Where the hell’d you get that idea?”

“From Walt Pojack! He told me the other day to update my résumé.”

Mac paused a moment. “I don’t know what kind of game he was playing, Smithsonian. Your beat’s not in danger. Never was. And Claudia wants you on the Black Martin story. She’s counting on you. I’m counting on you.”

“Lucky me. Anyway, when I got to the office, I went to my desk. I hung up my coat and looked for coffee, because that’s what I do. I ran into Harlan, and he volunteered to go with me and fight the dragon. That’s what he does. We found Pojack shot dead. And that was that.”

Lacey could hear Mac’s wife, Kim, in the background, calling Mac to bed. Once upon a time, Mac would have been in the office six and a half days out of seven. Now he was a soon-to-be adoptive father of two young daughters and he was taking fatherhood seriously. That was the reason Mac hadn’t been in the office today and was catching up with the Pojack story in the middle of the night, Washington time. These days he scheduled his weekends around bike rides and family time with little Jasmine and Lily Rose. Lacey heard him tell Kim he would be off the phone in a minute.

“Who’s covering the story for the paper?” Mac asked.

“Trujillo. I thought he’d called you,” Lacey said. “Check your messages, Mac. But I guess he could hand it off to Kelly Kavanaugh, if you like. She’s dying for a real, meaty crime story.”

“Bite your tongue, Smithsonian.”

“Consider it bitten.”

“And Lacey, are you all right?”

“Me? A little shaken up, but I’m fine.”

“Good,” he grunted. “Kim and the girls would have my head if anything happened to you. And, um, I’d be upset too.”

“Thanks, Mac. Kiss the girls for me.” Lacey hung up the phone.

Vic joined her on the sofa with his cocktail. Her cell phone rang again. Lacey handed it to him. “Whoever it is, tell them I’m dead. Wait, unless it’s my mother.”

Vic answered the phone and listened. He said a few words and handed it back to Lacey. “I think you’re going to want to take this,” he whispered. “Claudia Darnell.”

She gave him the evil eye. Lacey sat up and swung her feet to the floor. “Yes, Claudia?” Her heart was beating fast.

“I can’t believe Walt Pojack is dead. I’ve just spent the last hour answering questions from that Detective Lamont, but he didn’t answer any of my questions,” Claudia said in a rush. “He kept asking me if I’d been threatened. He said you were there! You discovered the body? That’s dreadful. Are you all right?”

“Just another day at the office.” The piña colada wasn’t soothing her headache yet. “I heard you were at
The Eye
today too.”

“That’s right. The detective was all over me about that. I stopped by to pick up some things. I was going to do some paperwork. But Walt was there, doing God knows what,” Claudia said. “I didn’t feel like dealing with him, so I took my files and left. Apparently, I just missed the killer.”

“You were lucky.”

“Yes. It’s just sinking in.”

“What does Lamont think?” Lacey asked.

“He thought it would be very nice if I were the killer so he could wrap this up and go home. He dropped your name several times.”

“Yeah, we’re old—Um. Acquaintances. Unfortunately.” Lacey took a cautious sip of her icy drink. “What did he say about the blue velvet ribbon?”

“He said anyone can pick up a ribbon at a craft store. And do I own a gun? At that point, I told him he could contact my lawyers. I was through with the interview.”

“I’m sure he liked that.”

“I don’t particularly care what he likes. Lacey, tell me what you saw at
The Eye.
”

“Walt was shot in the forehead. There was a blue velvet ribbon wound around his hand. It looked identical to the one you got. And the one I saw in Gibbs’s coffin.”

“But why Walt? He had nothing to do with Dominion Velvet.”

“It doesn’t make sense to me either. Unless—” Lacey hesitated.

“What? Go on. Nothing makes sense about this.”

“Unless someone actually decided to be an avenger, not only in Black Martin, but at
The Eye
as well.”