'Til Death Do Us Part (9 page)

“May I help you?” the clerk asked as the door slammed. She was young, no more than twenty, with her blond hair pulled back prudishly in a tight bun. I wondered if Peyton made her wear it like that.

“Actually I’m Peyton’s friend Bailey Weggins. I was here yesterday when this whole awful thing happened. I’m trying to help Peyton in any way I can.”

At the mention of yesterday, her lower lip, glistening with pale pink lip gloss, began to tremble.

“It’s just terrible, isn’t it?” she said. “And did you see what that awful New York paper wrote?”

“No, I didn’t. Do you have it here?”

After glancing toward the door, she reached below the counter and pulled out an already opened copy of the
New York Post
, pointing to a small item titled “Is There a Peyton Cross Curse?” The article recapped all three deaths, suggesting that there was a bizarre curse—like something out of
The Hound of the Baskervilles
—on everyone in Peyton’s wedding. Then it listed the names of the three remaining attendants, including mine. Peyton had said the press had started calling practically immediately yesterday, and I was curious how a New York paper had gotten word so quickly. Had someone at the farm tipped them off?

“Do you think there
is
a curse?” the clerk asked mournfully.

“We don’t really know
what’s
happening,” I said. “Did you happen to see anything odd yesterday?”

“No, nothing. Like I told the police, I ate lunch in the big barn with some of the other girls at around twelve, and then I never went out of the shop again.”

“Did you have any customers in the afternoon?”

“It was sort of busy right after lunch—we had about ten or twelve people in here. But as soon as the snow started coming down, business totally fell off.”

“You’d worked with Robin for a while, right? I mean, she oversaw the shop.”

“That’s right. Ms. Cross is doing it now—until we replace Robin.”

There was no joy in her voice as she said it. In fact, she sounded like someone who’d just learned all her wisdom teeth were impacted and had to be extracted.

“In the weeks before she died, how did Robin seem to you? Was she different in any way?”

“How do you mean?” she asked anxiously, as if she were afraid the wrong answer might earn her a penalty.

“Her roommate said she seemed worried about something.”

She thought for a moment, her brow wrinkling again.

“She did seem sort of worried—or maybe it was just that her mind seemed to be on something else. She took meds for depression, you know? I mean, that’s what ended up causing her death. I just thought maybe she was in kind of a down period.”

“You don’t recall her saying anything that would explain her mood?”

“No—but my mind is in such a jumble right now. Can I think about it?”

“Sure, that would be great,” I said. I handed her a business card and told her to contact me if she thought of anything.

I thanked her for her help, and after reviewing with her the directions to downtown Greenwich, I took off. Once in town I had to stop twice for directions in order to locate the street I was looking for. I spent another ten minutes trying to find a parking space.

The Bliss Weddings office was on the second floor of a well-kept two-story building. I tried the door, only to find it locked. But after rapping several times, I picked up the sounds of someone moving across the floor in my direction. The door swung open and I was surprised to discover Megan Bliss standing there herself. She was in her late thirties, I guessed, and no more than five feet two, though with her thick raven hair, high heels, and nubby white wool suit, she seemed to take up more than her share of space. I caught an annoyed, “this morning is starting to work my last nerve” expression on her face that quickly turned into a beaming smile. It was clear that she had just mistaken me for a bride-to-be.

“Oh, you’re early,” she said as chirpy as a chickadee. “I was just preparing for our meeting this morning. Please come in.”

I stepped first into a small reception area, and then she led me through to a large office, which looked more like a living room. There was a couch and coffee table, an armchair, and a round conference table with chairs. The entire room was done in what the
Gloss
decorating editor might describe as champagne color. It was a sort of blushed beige that gleamed.

“It was lovely of the Hubbels to recommend me,” she said, gesturing for me to take a seat. “Is your mother not going to join us after all?”

“Actually I’m not planning a wedding. My name’s Bailey Weggins, and I was a bridesmaid in Peyton Cross’s wedding. I was hoping to talk to you for a few minutes.”

The annoyed look returned with a vengeance.

“I have a new client coming in just a few minutes. That’s who I thought you were.” As she stared at me, I could tell she was mentally clicking through the Rolodex in her mind, trying to recall me from the wedding.

“This will only take a minute,” I said, smiling. “And it’s important. Did you hear about Ashley Hanes’s death?”

She nodded, still wary, and I went on to explain what had happened to both Robin and Jamie. Her blue eyes widened with each detail I revealed, and it was clear that the other deaths were all news to her.

“How perfectly awful,” she said finally. “But I don’t see how you think
I
could help. The wedding was last April.”

“You were very involved in everything that happened that weekend. I was wondering if you saw anything out of the ordinary. Perhaps it’s something that didn’t seem strange then, but now, with hindsight . . .”

“There was
nothing
ordinary about that wedding.”

“I realize it was all very special, but what I’m wondering is whether—”

“I’m not talking about how special it was. I’m talking about all the—how shall I say this? We faced enormous
challenges
working with a bride like Peyton Cross.”

“I imagine she wanted it all to be perfect.”

She sank into the couch, and I took the armchair across from her.

“Perfect? She wanted
beyond
perfection.”

“That
must
have been tough.”

“It’s not that I’m unfamiliar with difficult brides,” she said, folding her arms across her ample breasts. “They all suffer from various degrees of what I call PMS—pre
marital
syndrome. And that makes them absolutely crazy at times. They take it out on me, their mothers, their bridesmaids, even their fiancés. Sometimes the craziness doesn’t stop even when the wedding is over. You may find this hard to believe, but an associate of mine who runs a bridal dress boutique was actually sued in small claims court by a woman who claimed that her dress restricted her ability to dance at her wedding reception—and that the trauma from it lasted a year. But in all the years I’ve been doing this, I’ve never witnessed anyone like Peyton Cross. Nothing, absolutely nothing, pleased her. I shouldn’t be talking out of school like this—I never do, you know—but I really don’t care in this case. I had this idea when I took Peyton as my client that it would be a feather in my cap, but it was hardly worth it.”

“Since she catered the wedding reception herself, what exactly was your role?”

“The catering involves just the food. I took care of everything else—the invitations, the setting, the flowers, the decor. Peyton had pretty clear ideas about what she wanted—my job was to supervise and make certain it all came off flawlessly. Unfortunately, Peyton Cross’s idea of flawless is something no human can achieve. The day of the wedding she threw this enormous hissy fit when she decided the roses were the wrong shade of yellow. I half expected her to ask me to
paint
them.”

“Think back on the day of the wedding, will you? Was there anything that didn’t seem right to you?”

“There was a terrible problem in the kitchen. The crust on the sea bass was soggy, and you would’ve thought there was a tsunami wave on the Long Island Sound by the way people were running around in hysterics, thinking that Peyton would have their heads. That poor executive director of hers was supposed to be a guest at the wedding, but she spent half the night in the kitchen with a tea towel tucked into the waistband of her party suit.”

“But I mean with people. Any friction? Any quarrels? Anyone acting really secretive?”

“Well, I probably shouldn’t be saying this. But I’ve worked with much happier couples.”

Oh boy. I flashed back on Peyton and David’s altercation the night before. “How do you mean? Did they fight a lot?”

“Not
fighting
so much. But at times you could cut the tension between them with a knife. When I first met them, I could tell he thought he was winning the trophy wife to end all trophy wives. But as time went on, I think he started to . . . to know the real her, if you get my drift.”

“Were there any problems on the day of the wedding?”

“He was annoyed at her.”

“Really?
They seemed really lovey-dovey to me.”

“In the beginning of the reception, yes. But later in the day he was clearly miffed. Everyone was looking for her to cut the cake, and it turned out she’d gone back upstairs to the dressing room to nurse a headache. Can you imagine someone feeling entitled to a nap in the middle of her wedding?”

I vaguely recalled the moment. Peyton’s mother had come up to me, twittering like a bird and wondering whether I’d seen the bride.

“And nothing else? Nothing that seemed odd or unexplained?” It was hard to pursue this line of questioning when I had no idea what I was looking for.

“Not that I can think of. Look, I really need to get ready for my appointment.”

I told her I understood and gave her my card, asking her to let me know if she thought of anything.

“That wedding couldn’t have been much fun for you, either,” she said, walking me to the door.

“I survived.”

“She kept sending all of you those awful e-mails and cc’ing me. I remember she was terrified that her maid of honor was going to get pregnant again and it would spoil the pictures. And then that poor cousin of hers.”

I froze in my steps. “You mean Phillipa?”

“I’m not sure of her name. The one who works with her. She was dying to be a bridesmaid, but Peyton wouldn’t let her.”

“You’re kidding?” I said. “She wouldn’t
let
her?”

“That’s right. I mean, the girl is seriously overweight, so I could understand on one level. I still remember the exact phrase Peyton used. She said if we put one of the yellow bridesmaid dresses on her cousin, half the schoolchildren in Greenwich would attempt to board her.”

CHAPTER 5

F
IVE MINUTES LATER
I was dashing down the steps of the building on my way to the street. I’d wanted to probe more about Phillipa, but just as I’d started, there was a tapping on the door. It was the bride-to-be and her mother, tall brunettes dressed in nearly matching brown mink coats, looking like a pair of selkies who’d once lived in the Long Island Sound but had decided to try their luck on land.

As I unlocked the Jeep, I looked up and down the street a couple of times. Should I be nervous? Was there a chance my life really
could
be in danger? If someone wanted to murder me and make it look like an accident, what would they try?

After I’d navigated my way out of Greenwich and onto I-95 back to New York, I called Maverick PR in New York, the only agency I’d ever heard of using the owner’s first name. Maverick turned out to be as anxious to talk to me as I was to her, and we arranged to meet at her home office at six.

Once I was off the phone, I had time to focus on what I’d learned this morning from Megan Bliss. Peyton’s cousin had wanted to be in the wedding, but Peyton had cruelly denied her. I knew that my boss at
Gloss
, Cat Jones, sometimes took actresses off the list of potential cover subjects because they’d packed on the pounds and had failed to pass what she called “the chubby check,” but this was real life we were talking about. It must have been humiliating and painful for Phillipa. Was she so angry about her rejection that she was killing off all the girls who
had
been bridesmaids? It didn’t seem to make any sense. If Phillipa had acted out of rage and revenge, why wait several months between killing Jamie and Robin? And then why kill Ashley only a few weeks after Robin’s death? It was also hard to imagine how Phillipa, who did not appear to have set any land records as a runner, could have gotten to the silo, climbed the stairs, and pushed Ashley to her death, then turned out all the lights and escaped before Peyton and I arrived.