Some Like It Haute: A Humorous Fashion Mystery (Style & Error Book 4) (2 page)

Harper and I stood off to the side, waiting for an appropriate pause in their conversation so we could interrupt.

“When is Nick getting here with the shoes?” Tiny asked.

“Nick isn’t bringing the shoes,” Amanda said.

“We still have to do a hem check.” Tiny gestured toward the models with a hand holding several spools of metallic thread. A row of silver straight pins lined the hem of her sweatshirt. “I thought he knew how important it was that we had everything here tonight.” Tiny glared down at Amanda.

“Nick didn’t want to show up today because of—” She stopped mid-sentence. The two of them turned and looked directly at me.

This had been one of the worst months of my life. And that’s counting the times when I’d happened upon dead bodies, stood face-to-face with maniacal killers, and more than one investigation where I had to steer clear of the cops. This was worse than all of that.

Somehow, after breaking up with Nick Taylor, I’d gotten myself in the position of helping his ex-girlfriend Amanda Ries coordinate her runway show.

2

Breakup Rule #1: Show no signs of weakness to your ex’s friends. That’s why I arrived, on time, on that first day of scheduling. Amanda had hired me for my fashion experience, and professionalism, and I was prepared to bring it. I wasn’t going to give her fuel for any fodder about me.

But as I stood off to the side of the conversation between Amanda and Tiny, it was painfully obvious that Amanda wouldn’t be singing my praises. Her show was being railroaded because Nick wanted to avoid me.

“I’m sorry to interrupt,” I said. I thought it best to pretend I hadn’t overheard them. “Harper has a problem with the sleeves on her kimono. They’re too long. There must have been a mistake.”

Tiny was the one to talk. “We picked every model’s looks based on their measurements and coloring. There is no room for error, and considering these decisions were made by us,” she used her hand to make a sweeping gesture that included herself and Amanda, “I highly doubt there’s been any mistake. Remind the girl that she’s supposed to be a professional, and that she has about five seconds to decide if she can do that before we replace her.”

“But look at this,” I said. I grabbed one of Harper’s wrists and held her arm out. The fabric at the bottom of the sleeve pooled onto the ground. I turned toward Amanda. “Is this really what you wanted?”

Tiny didn’t give Amanda a chance to answer. “She’s wearing the kimono. End of story.”

I turned to Harper and dropped my voice. “If you don’t want to do this job, you better say so now and get your things. But I need to tell you, you won’t be getting any kind of positive referral from Amanda, and you might want to rethink your decision to get into modeling if this bothers you so much.”

Tears spilled down Harper’s cheeks and dripped onto the silver lamé. They rolled down the surface. I held out a box of tissues and she pulled three out of the box in quick succession. Up close, she looked even younger than before.

“Tell you what,” Tiny said to Harper. “I’ll look at it after I finish dealing with our shoe emergency.” Tiny glared at me, her momentary expression of compassion instantly replaced with annoyance. “Apparently you had something to do with that too.”

Harper blew her nose loudly and dabbed at her eyes. I felt awkward. Tiny’s response had done little to make Harper feel like she had been right to speak up. She’d treated her more like a robot than a human. Harper and the rest of the models had been on their own since the day they’d first showed up.

No one was looking out for these women. Harper straightened up to her five foot nine in bare feet height. “If Amanda wants me to wear the kimono, I’ll wear the kimono, but only because Samantha stood up for me,” she said to Tiny.

Tiny looked back and forth between the two of us and then walked away. Amanda went the other direction.

“I didn’t really stand up for you,” I said to Harper. “I just asked the question.”

“You went to Tiny. No one goes to Tiny.”

I patted her arm in a soothing manner. “It’s going to be okay. You have to admit, she and Amanda seem to be leaving no room for error. That means they think you’re going to rock that kimono better than anybody else here. Right?”

“I guess so.” She sniffed twice in quick succession and blinked away more tears.

“I’ll give you a couple of minutes to get together. Amanda’s having a meeting at 6:15.” I checked the wall clock. “That’s in about ten minutes. Can you make it? I think it would be best if you’re there and no one knows how you felt about this.”

She blew her nose again. “I’ll be there.” Then her voice turned nasty. “I just wish Tiny wouldn’t.”

“You might be in luck. I think she’s going out to get the shoes.”

Harper looked up. “Mr. Taylor isn’t coming here?”

“No.”

“Oh. I like it when he comes. He’s such a great guy.”

Now it was my turn for a tissue.

Harper left in the direction of the other models. She bent down over her duffle bag and came up with a small makeup pouch. She pulled a bottle of eye drops and a compact from it and went to work on her red eyes and nose.

A flashbulb went off. “Excuse me, who are you and why are you taking my picture?” I asked.

“Clive Barrington.” He held out his hand and I shook it. “Freelance photojournalist. Amanda agreed to let me document her show. I’m taking background shots tonight to flesh out the-behind-the scenes aspect.”

Santangelo Toma had been right. This was turning into a circus.

Clive leaned against a cutting table. He was a moderately built man who I’d place in his forties. Longish golden blond hair was parted on the side and tucked behind his ears. His camera dangled from a black strap around his neck. He wore a T-shirt, plaid blazer, cuffed jeans, and green bucks. Those were nice. I wonder where you got a pair of green bucks these days? Wait. I was getting distracted. I looked back up at his face and he winked at me.

“I think we might want to go talk to Tiny about the pictures you’re taking. I don't think she'd be too pleased with your presence here.”

“Tiny left to get the shoes,” Amanda said, having materialized from out of nowhere. “But Samantha’s right. Maybe you’ve taken enough pictures for tonight.”

Clive adjusted his lens. “A few more shots and I’ll be out of your hair.”

“Keep it brief. The models are going to do a run through, and they don’t need any distractions.”

He turned to face me. “I’m going to sit in front of the runway. Where are you going to be?”

“I can’t see how that matters.”

Amanda, who had started to walk away, stopped and turned to face us again. “Actually, Samantha, maybe it’s you who should head out for the night. I think we’ve got it from here.”

I was tired and didn’t really mind the idea of going home and collapsing in bed. “What time should I be here tomorrow?”

“You don’t need to come tomorrow. We’ve got it under control.”

“But tomorrow is the show,” I said.

“That’s right. And we don’t need you anymore. You can pick up your check at my studio on Monday.” Amanda spoke with a finality that cut me to the quick. With one hand, she tossed her shiny black hair behind her shoulder. The gesture allowed her to look down her nose at me. I wasn’t entirely sure that hadn’t been the desired goal.

I felt like I’d been stung center mass by a swarm of angry bumblebees. It was bad enough to have spent the past four weeks pushing aside petty jealousy in order to work with Amanda, but worse yet, she was firing me. If my back and knees and feet and shoulders didn’t hurt so much, and if the pot of coffee I’d finished a few hours ago wasn’t starting to wear off, then maybe I would have tried to establish my role backstage. But, all things considered….

“Fine. I’ll get my handbag and coat. Good luck,” I said with as much dignity as I could muster. None of this had been easy. Nor appreciated, apparently.

I weaved through the same labyrinth of rolling rods, mannequins, and fabric bolts that I’d worked around for the past few weeks and collected my belongings. I bundled up into a wool coat and hat and braced myself for the blast of cold from outside. Good riddance.

The main portion of Warehouse Five, where Amanda was putting on her runway show, was connected to the front foyer and adjoining galleries of other artists by a hallway that ran the length of the building. I turned right and headed past the picked over food service table toward the exit. Closer to the door, the lights were out. I flicked the switch on the wall next to the lavatories a few times, but nothing happened. No worries, I thought, as I trudged toward the glowing Exit sign.

And then I noticed a figure hovering in the parking lot. Fear folded around me like a blanket.
Act natural
, I coached myself.
Just keep walking. Your car is right outside the door.

I fumbled for my keys, mentally kicking myself for not having them in hand already. The figure slunk back into the shadow. Adrenaline replaced the numbness of being dismissed, and the hair on the back of my neck stood up. My panic sensor was on red alert. I turned around to see if there was anybody else in the hallway with me. There wasn’t. I pushed forward and then out the exit doors, head down. I was almost to my car.

And then a flicker of light caught my eye. I turned to look at the source, and quicker than you can say “supermodel” a trail of fire ignited a path from the edge of the parking lot to where I was standing. I jumped away, too slow. The flame licked my boot and climbed the hem of my pants. I swatted at the flame.

A figure bundled up in a puffy down coat stepped out of the shadows. I couldn’t make out if it was a man or woman.  They swung a lumpy bag that connected with my midsection and I doubled over. “Stay out of this,” said a distorted voice. The person swung the bag again. I fell to the ground and curled into a ball. I watched as the person ignited the bag with a match. The eerie orange light cast shadows over a face mostly hidden by a thick scarf.

As I lay on the ground, the person swung the flaming bag at me again and again. The fire went out, but the beating continued. After several hits, the person opened the bag and dumped the contents on me. I rolled to the side, my face wet with the tears of pain.

3

“And that’s where I found you,” said Amanda from her seat next to the hospital bed. She wrung her hands as she spoke. She had just told us about finding me curled up in the parking lot, surrounded by burnt fruit, unable to stand or get help for myself.

She’d done the right thing, calling 911 to get an ambulance for me, and not letting anyone else into the area. When the EMTs arrived, I’d been taken to the hospital, where I relayed what little I could remember to a police officer after being poked, prodded, and X-rayed. My own version had been told under the influence of painkillers, and may have included a few extra details, but the overall gist was the same. I’d been attacked in the parking lot between the Warehouse Five exit and my car. I’d been beaten with a bag of oranges and set on fire. I’d been left to die.

And now, thanks to Amanda, I lay recovering from internal bruising and second degree burns. My left hand was wrapped in a gauze bandage and it hurt to take deep breaths.

“What time did you find her?” Eddie asked.

“It was a little after eleven. Tiny was late getting back with the shoes. I went out to the parking lot when some of the girls left. I wanted to see what was taking so long.”

Eddie voiced my thoughts. “So nobody knows what happened.”

“No.”

I sat up and spoke in a raspy voice. “Somebody set me on fire and beat me. That’s what happened.”

“That’s what you keep saying, but nobody saw anything. Tiny had to go meet Nick—” Amanda paused mid-sentence and looked at me. A tension-riddled pause ballooned into the small hospital room while every one of us wondered if I would react to the mention of Nick.

For the past five weeks, the name “Nick” had been a largely unspoken four-letter-word. Our breakup had been unexpected; my ability to move on had been overestimated. The week I let it all sink in, I’d bought out the local grocery store’s supply of frozen chicken tenders and subsisted on them, vanilla ice cream, and waffles for a week. I gained seven pounds, dropped out of society, and spent the majority of my time with my cat.

I love my cat, but there are some who might say my behavior was not entirely healthy. Still, there was no way I was going to let Amanda, Nick’s maybe-former girlfriend, know how I felt.

Eddie took control of the conversation. “You said Tiny was gone a long time?” he asked.

“It seemed like a long time, but that’s because we were at a standstill until she got back. I mean, there were little things for us to do like tack seams and steam samples and go over the order of the looks, but I was keeping the models there so we could do a walk through, and that was costing us money. We couldn’t do anything without the shoes.”

“So the models were there late. Who else?” Eddie asked. In the background, the vital sign monitor beeped like the Atari videogame I’d gotten for Christmas 1981.

“The interns and assistants, a few hair and makeup people.”

“What about other artists who rent space in the building?” Eddie pressed.

“They were gone for the night.”

“You’re sure?”

“The last one to leave was an artist. He complained to Tiny about the noise before he left.”

I strained to speak. “What about the photographer, Clive Barrington. Was he still there?” The effort of speaking made me cough.

Amanda averted her eyes. In that split second I recognized the look. It wasn’t guilt. It wasn’t appreciation. It wasn’t sympathy. It was pity.

“Clive, Amanda. Was he there?” I asked again, this time with more conviction.

“I don’t know if he was there or not. He said he wanted to get a few pictures of the models walking the runway, but I don’t think he knew we’d keep him waiting for hours.”

“Who does he report to?” I asked.

“Nobody. He comes and goes as he pleases. When he started, he made a point of telling us he needed unlimited access if he was going to capture my story. Tiny agreed to give him full access, as long as she got picture approval before anybody else saw them. That was her demand. That we see the photos before any of them went public.”