All Sales Fatal (29 page)

“My interview is today,” I said to distract him.

His eyes lit up. “Knock ’em dead.”

“That might be counterproductive.”

He laughed.

“Hey, isn’t tonight your date with Sunny?”

Joel nodded, anticipation lighting his face. “Yeah. I can’t swim today ’cause I’m going home right after work to get ready.”

I couldn’t imagine why a man would need more than half an hour—shower, shave, and dress—to get ready for a date, but only said, “That’s fine. I don’t know if I’ll make it to the Y either; it depends on how long the interview goes.”

“Should I take flowers?” Joel asked, scrunching his face anxiously. “Roses?”

“Not on a first date. You’ll look like you’re trying too hard. Just be on time, don’t talk about ex-girlfriends—”

“I don’t have any.”

“—and let her choose the movie. Believe me, that’ll be
more than enough.” If I’d had a kid brother, instead of a condescending, teasing, sometimes aloof older brother who’d had girls calling the house at all hours from before he was thirteen, that’s the dating advice I’d have given him. “And don’t spend the whole night worrying about whether or not to kiss her when you drop her off.”

“EJ!” Joel flushed red and I laughed.

The phone rang in the front office, and Joel dashed to get it. I followed more slowly, planning to patrol for a while and touch base with shop owners and managers as they opened their stores, before they got too busy. I stopped when Joel flagged me down, waving his free hand wildly.

“We’ll have someone there in just a moment, ma’am,” he said into the phone. Covering the receiver, he said to me, “This is the clerk at Starla’s Styles. She says there’s a catfight going on and wants a security guard to come break it up.”

“Oh, please.” I hurried to the Segway.

“I’ve never seen a catfight,” Joel called after me. “Can I come?”

I could hear
the yelling as soon as I rounded the corner into the Pete’s Sporting Goods wing. It was muffled, but the anger underlying the incomprehensible words was palpable. Parking the Segway outside, I walked into the store. Mayhem reigned. Starla was running clockwise around a rotating clothes rack spinning so fast that blouses, tank tops, and camis billowed out. Aggie Woskowicz chased her, a look on her face that made me glad she didn’t have a weapon, while a salesclerk cowered behind the counter, trying to summon help via the phone. Clothes dotted the floor or draped haphazardly over racks, the settee, and an expressionless mannequin. Starla’s hair winged out to one side, as if someone had grabbed it, and Aggie was missing a
shoe; I saw the loafer kicked half under another rack of clothes.

“You sicced the police on me,” Aggie yelled at Starla, doing a quick one-eighty so Starla almost ran into her before spinning and running counterclockwise around the rack. “I know it was you. You told them I killed Wosko, that I was pissed off because he preferred you to me.”

“Who wouldn’t?” Starla said, blowing a straggling lock of hair off her forehead with an upward puff of air.

Aggie growled low in her throat and spun the rack so hard one diaphanous blouse went sailing. “Home wrecker!”

“Like Dennis wasn’t married when you took up with him.”

Aggie flung the
b
-word and the
s
-word and even the
c
-word at Starla as I stepped forward, pitching my voice at a soothing level.

“Ladies, let’s calm—”

Starla turned her head toward me, and Aggie took advantage of her distraction, diving under the clothes carousel to grab at her ankles. Starla staggered backwards and, as Aggie popped up, thrust a palm-heel strike at the younger woman’s face. I had the dubious satisfaction of realizing I must be a pretty good teacher; the heel of Starla’s palm connected squarely with Aggie’s nose, and she clapped a hand to her face as blood spurted.

“It worked!” Starla turned to me for applause, which gave Aggie the opportunity to tackle her. Woskowicz’s stocky ex-wife ploughed into Starla, wrapping both her arms around the woman’s plump waist and dragging her down.

“You boke by doze,” Aggie growled as the two women fell to the floor. Luckily, they landed on a pile of clothes, so no bones were broken.

“You’re bleeding on my stock!” Starla cried, trying to wiggle out from under Aggie, who was, indeed, dripping
blood from her nose onto a silk blouse and a chiffon dress. “That dress just came in yesterday!”

Leaning forward, I grasped Aggie under the arms and hauled her up. As Starla wiggled free, she kicked at Aggie, her foot getting tangled in the folds of a velour skirt.

“I hope the police arrest you. Call the police, Martha-Anne,” she called to the clerk, who dropped the phone and ducked under the counter.

“You hit me first,” Aggie said. “I’m having you arrested for assault.”

“I hope we don’t need the police,” I said, forcing her backwards by twisting her right arm up between her shoulder blades. “Starla, get up.” I could hear Mrs. Wendell’s voice from the fifth-grade etiquette class Mom had stuck me in, saying, “Ladies, let’s strive for a little decorum.” I was tempted to emulate her, but I didn’t think I could pull off her velvet-glove-over-iron-will tone. And Starla and Aggie were not exactly giggling ten-year-olds.

Starla stood, twisting the elastic waistband of her skirt around to the front and brushing a hank of hair off her forehead. Judging that Aggie now had control of herself, I released her but stayed near enough to grab her if she went for Starla again.

Aggie, looking half-abashed and half-angry, tucked the tail of her pink blouse back into her jeans. Snatching a handful of tissues from a box on the counter, she crammed them against her still-bleeding nose. “I loved Wosko.”

“So did I,” Starla chimed in.

“I loved him more.”

“Not possible.”

“He loved me more.”

“Sure. That’s why he was divorcing you and marrying me.” The smug expression on Starla’s face made even me want to slap her.

Aggie started toward her rival again, and I stepped between them. “Stop. Aggie, we’re leaving now.”

“Why do you call yourself ‘Aggie,’ anyway?” Starla asked, her tone implying it was just one more example of Aggie being difficult. She smoothed her hair with her palm. “Dennis always called you Delia.”

“Delia is my real name, but most of my friends call me Aggie. You can call me Mrs. Woskowicz,” she added, clearly trying to rile the other woman.

As Starla fumed, Aggie went on. “AG is the chemical symbol for silver, so some of my nerdier friends thought it was clever to call me Aggie. It stuck.” She bent to pick up her loafer and slipped it on her foot.

“Why silver?” I asked, a funny prickling at the back of my neck.

“Silver was my maiden name,” she said.

Her words hit me like a piano dropped off a third-floor balcony. My mind raced, remembering she had mentioned a brother named Billy who was tight with Woskowicz. “Come on,” I said, herding her out of the store. “I need to talk to you.”

“And stay away,” Starla called, all bravado now that Aggie had herself under control. I looked over my shoulder to see her standing, arms akimbo, in the middle of the heaps of clothing. Despite the blood splotches dotting her daffodil chenille top and silky pants, not to mention her mussed hairdo and chipped manicure, she looked as satisfied as a junkyard dog who had successfully defended her territory. I wondered if I should cancel the self-defense classes.

“I’m sorry,” Aggie muttered once we were out of Starla’s Styles. She eased the tissues away from her nose, determined that it wasn’t bleeding anymore, and dropped them into a trash can. “I don’t normally lose it like that. But when the cops came by first thing this morning, saying they’d ‘heard’
that I was angry about Wosko divorcing me, that I’d made threats, and asking me all sorts of rude questions, I lost it.”

“Let me buy you a cookie,” I offered. I mounted the Segway, and she walked beside me the short distance to the food court.

Jay greeted me with a smile and a questioningly cocked eyebrow but simply handed over two cookies and coffees when I shook my head to show this was not a good time. I also asked for a cup of water, which I handed to Aggie, along with a napkin, and indicated she might want to swab some blood off her nose and chin. Dipping the napkin in the water, she rubbed off the blood, ignoring the spatters on her blouse, and then devoured half the cookie in short order. Taking a sip of coffee, she said, “I get low blood sugary when I don’t eat. I should never leave the house without breakfast.” She finished off the cookie before I’d taken two bites of mine.

“Does your brother work for Allied Forge Metals?” I asked.

“He owns it. Why?” Suspicion lowered her brows.

How to answer that? Because I suspect he murdered your soon-to-be ex-husband? Because I think he supplied the gun your precious Wosko used to kill a teenager? Hm. Before I could say anything, she solved my dilemma.

“Oh, because of the gun that was used to kill that gangbanger?”

My brows soared toward my hairline and I nodded.

“Billy’s been so upset about that. I suppose you saw in the news that that gun had been turned in as part of a gun amnesty program. Billy was livid when I emailed him the link to the article that ran in our local paper. He says the cops running the program must have held back some guns instead of passing them along to Allied for destruction.” Pressing her fingertip on the cookie crumbs that sprinkled the table, she licked them off her finger.

I studied her. She looked remarkably unconcerned, and I got the distinct feeling she was telling the truth or, at least, the truth as she knew it. Of course, she was unaware—I assumed—that Woskowicz had hidden the gun in his file drawer. “Is it hurting your brother’s business at all?”

“Nah. He’s got plenty of contracts. His business isn’t all gun destruction, you know.”

I bit into my cookie, not sure what else I could ask her without revealing facts I knew Detective Helland would crucify me for leaking. “You said your brother came to visit not long ago—were he and Woskowicz close?”

“Two peas in a pod,” Aggie said, pulling a face. “They could talk politics, taxes, the state of the economy all day long, sounding like a show on Fox News. And they were both into guns big-time and went to a shooting range together sometimes. Too damn loud for me.” She looked at the large, stainless steel watch on her wrist. “I’ve got to go. I’ve got a couple coming back for another test drive. The pregnant ones who want the van.” Glancing down at her sullied attire, she added, “I’ll have to change before meeting them. Thanks for the cookie.” She hesitated. “And for not calling the cops on me back there.” She jerked her head toward Starla’s Styles.

Rising to my feet, I said, “Maybe you’d better stay away from her. She seems to push your buttons.”

“You got that right,” Aggie said, eyes smoldering anew. She gave an awkward laugh. “I guess what goes around comes around, right? Or we make our own karma.”

I guessed she was referring to the fact that she had filched Woskowicz from Paula and now was on the other side of the equation. “Hey,” I asked, “did you ever find the key to the safe-deposit box?”

“No.” She sounded disgruntled.

“Just out of curiosity… what’s in there?”

She opened her mouth as if to snap out “None of your
business,” then closed it and thought a moment. Maybe because she figured she owed me for not calling the police, she finally said, “Tapes.” She looked half-embarrassed, half-mischievous.

So Joel had been right. Ick.

“Not videos. Cassettes. Wosko liked to record some of our…
special
phone conversations. That’s how we met—I worked for a phone-sex outfit.”

I goggled at her, completely surprised. Before I could answer, she gave me a cocky grin and walked off, chucking her cup in the direction of the trash can. When it fell short, she didn’t stop to pick it up. I retrieved it and plunked it in the trash along with my own, then turned to see Jay Callahan beckoning to me from Lola’s.

Remembering that I wanted to tell him what I’d learned about guns, I crossed to his counter, trying not to wonder if selling used cars paid more than being a phone-sex provider. They both probably paid better than being a mall cop.

Jay interrupted my speculation. “Do you have time to come in for a moment?”

Without waiting for an answer, he disappeared into his kitchen and then reappeared at the door that opened to the left of the counter. Curious—I’d never been in one of the food court kitchens—I followed him into the kitchen and looked around. The space was compact, but intelligently laid out and clean as an operating room. Maybe cleaner if what I’d been reading about infections at hospitals was true. A deep stainless steel sink was set into a tile counter. Ovens with lots of racks set close together for cookie sheets gave off a warm glow.

“Stand here.” Jay patted the doorjamb in the opening that led to the sales counter. “Let me know if we get a customer. My helper’s not in this morning, and I’ve got to make more cookies.”

Leaning against the jamb, I watched as he scrubbed his hands in the sink, slid on single-use gloves, and retrieved dough from the freezer.

“So, are you going to play outfield for us Monday?” he asked. “I’ve got an extra glove you can borrow.”

I’d made up my mind to pass on the softball, knowing I’d look like a total idiot if a ball came my way, but something about his expression, challenging yet mischievous, made me say, “Sure. What time?”

“I’ll pick you up at six. So, what brings you to my cookie lair this morning, other than the desire to watch the amazing cookie maker at work?”

“Celio Arriaga, the guy whose body was left here, was his gang’s weapons procurement officer,” I said. “Why are you grinning?”

“‘Weapons procurement officer.’ No one would guess you were in the military. Go on.”

“I suppose you read about the murder weapon having been surrendered to a New Jersey gun amnesty program?”

He nodded, laying out rounds of peanut butter cookie dough on a series of cookie tins. I liked the way his hair curled at the nape of his neck. It would be crisp and springy under my fingers. I reined in my thoughts.