Death hits the fan (23 page)

I glared over at Ivan, adding to my list another little thing he hadn't bothered to tell us. First, his son's syringe-use, and now, his wife's role as Shayla's dentist.

Ivan got up to clear the dinner plates. Quickly. And refused any offers of help.

Nancy ushered us into the living room on cue. She might not know why I was glaring at Ivan, but she seemed to know enough to back up his retreat. Maybe they had more in common than I thought.

Wayne and I were admiring the view of the Golden Gate and Bay bridges, lights twinkling against the darkness now, when Ivan brought in dessert, a platter of homemade almond biscotti and raspberry dipping sauce. He set it on a white lacquered coffee table shaped like an oversized lap tray. We took our places on the long sofa behind the coffee table, also white with throw pillows in blush and aqua. It was a long reach to the platter. I really wanted to sit on the floor. The plush white rug would have been plenty comfortable. And it was cool in the expansive living room, too cool. It would

probably be warmer on the rug. But I looked at Nancy in her miniskirted suit and decided against the floor.

I'd snagged a biscotti and made the long-distance dip into the raspberry sauce when Ivan spoke again.

"I found the camera and film that Marcia shot during the signing," he announced. I jerked my head around to look at him. And dripped raspberry sauce onto the pristine white carpet. "I got the pictures made up this afternoon. I have the prints."

"Have you looked at them?" I breathed, bending over to absently swipe at the splatters of sauce with my napkin. All that filled my mind was Marcia. Was there a clue in her pictures?

"Don't worry," Nancy said.

"What?" I replied.

"The sauce, I'll take care of it," she explained.

Even then, it took me a moment to bring my mind back. Back from the storeroom at Fictional Pleasures. Ivan squatted down and laid a blue cardboard box of prints on the coffee table next to the platter of biscotti. He closed his eyes for a moment and then slid the top off the box.

"I was afraid to look," he answered belatedly. "Afraid of what I'd see. Or what I'd miss."

I nodded and sat down on the floor next to him. Wayne crowded in next to me and Ivan lowered himself from his squat to sit, too. Even Nancy knelt down across from us, on the other side of the coffee table, miniskirt and raspberry sauce forgotten.

Ivan pulled out an envelope of negatives and a stack of glossy prints. I recognized the first one right away. It was a picture of the authors' table, from the authors' side: neat stacks of books and pens for each author, three glasses of water, and one open book. An open book with Shayla Greenfree's signature. Nothing more, nothing less.

"So she could copy the signature?" Wayne suggested aloud.

Ivan grunted, turned over the print, and laid down another photo of the authors' table, this one a close-up of Shayla's signature. As Ivan flipped the prints over, we saw more and more shots of Shayla's signature. And then, finally, a few close-ups of Ted Brown's and Yvette Cassell's signatures. Then a couple of shots of Ted Brown, S.X. Greenfree, and Yvette Cassell trooping down the aisle from the storeroom, and a few shots of the audience, including Wayne and myself. And one of Winona Eads lurking behind a bookshelf. That was all. No surprises.

We passed around the pictures and scrutinized them one by one. But I didn't see any clues to the murder. Only to Marcia's scam.

"Where'd you find the camera and film?" Wayne asked as he looked at a shot of the authors.

"In the storeroom, behind some books," Ivan told him.

I shivered involuntarily. Was that camera what Marcia had been hiding in the back room of the store? But why? Because the film might show her all-too-evident interest in author signatures? I ran my eyes over the pictures again.

"Would the books be more valuable once Shayla was dead?" I asked Ivan after I couldn't look at the glossy prints anymore.

"Probably," he answered simply.

"But—" Wayne began.

"I know, I know," I finished for him. "Marcia is dead too. So she's not likely to be the murderer." I didn't bother to add that I'd ruled out murder/suicide in my own mind. Self-inflicted handcart injury wasn't a likely method of suicide.

"Why were the books already signed?" I tried.

"We like to accommodate the people who can't make events," Ivan explained, his voice tired, disappointed. I didn't blame him. I'd hoped there would be an answer in the prints too. "The authors sign some books ahead for them."

I took one last look at a shot of Shayla, S.X. Greenfree, a

swan in elegant blue silk. If I squeezed my eyes and thought back, I could just see the former Shirley Green beneath the smooth exterior. I sighed, too. It was too bad PMP wasn't there to join us.

Wayne and I scarfed down more almond biscotti without the appreciation that Ivan's baking deserved, then took our leave. Nancy and Ivan Nakagawa stood at the door as we left, with identical looks of hopelessness on their faces. Why had I thought the two had nothing in common? They had their son in common, if nothing else. And then Wayne drove back down the winding driveway, through Tiburon, and toward home.

"Should we drive to Yvette's and see if she's there?" I asked as we were almost home. It had taken me that long to remember her again. To remember our promise to Lou.

"Maybe call first so we don't startle her," Wayne suggested as he turned the car into our driveway.

"Right," I said. We sat in the car for a moment.

Then we left the Jaguar's warm leather womb and climbed out into the cool night air.

We had walked halfway up the stairs before we noticed that someone was waiting for us. Someone seated quietly in one of the chairs on our deck. Was it Ingrid? My heart beat a little louder. Or Bob? Or one of our murder suspects? I tried a long, cleansing breath to calm myself down. Or was it Felix? Or maybe an overgrown skunk? Or were Felix and an overgrown skunk one and the same?

The silent figure didn't speak as we took the next stair. And its identity didn't become any clearer. In part, because the figure was dressed in black, from its headdress and veil to its long black robe. Dressed in black with its head lolling back over the top of the chair.

Had Death come to our house for a visit?

^iQtiTffn

Whaa?" the figure in the chair mumbled, jerking its head forward. "Damn, fu-fuddin' ... guess I fell asleep."

It wasn't Death. It was Yvette Cassell. And for once, I was actually glad to see her.

Or at least to hear her through the heavy black veil she wore.

She jumped out of her chair, stretched out her black-robed arms like an oversized crow in the starlight, and then yawned.

I walked up the last few stairs and gave her an impromptu hug. Lou would be happy. Not only was his wife alive, I had her in my grip. For the moment.

"Whaa?" she repeated, suspiciously this time, and I released her from my embrace. Her costume smelled of must and mothballs anyway.

"Been here long?" Wayne asked from my side.

"Shi-shift, no. No more than half an hour, I guess," she answered, pulling the veil up and tossing it over the rest of

the headdress. Sure enough, there she was, sharp nose, tinted glasses, and all. "I rang the doorbell, but no one answered."

"Why are you wearing that. .. that stuff?" I asked. With the veil and black burnoose, if it was a burnoose, she might have been a combination sheik/nun ... or something.

"I'm in disguise," she confided, lowering her voice mysteriously.

"I can see that," I told her slowly, suddenly not as happy to see Yvette as I had been. How do you protect a woman who disguises herself in outfits that wouldn't even blend in on Halloween? "But why are you in disguise?" I finally asked.

"That's for me to know and you to find out," she replied, her voice a falsetto now.

Ugh. Not only was she speaking in the language I remembered as noxiously peculiar to high school, but I couldn't even remember the ritual response. I hate it when that happens.

"So anyway," she went on, "I gotta talk to you guys. I think maybe I've got a lead, you know. Whaddaya think, huh?"

"About what?" I asked carefully.

Yvette looked around her as if for eavesdroppers. I found myself following her glance nervously until I reminded myself that any eavesdroppers out here were likely to be non-human ones, and probably black with white stripes. Yvette pulled the veil over her face again.

"Let's go on inside," I suggested.

"Yeah, yeah," Yvette agreed impatiently, looking around her again as I opened the front door.

I didn't have to turn on the living room lights. Ingrid had already done that. She was folding a pair of jeans and placing them in her suitcase as we entered. And I was hoping that meant she was packing.

"Hey!" Yvette objected as she followed us into the living room.

I turned to Yvette, wondering what the problem was now. Was she upset by the lingering scent of skunk? But Yvette's eyes were on Ingrid. Ingrid folded a halter top in three precise rectangles and added it to the jeans in her suitcase. My heart executed a premature jump for joy.

"Were you here the whole time I was ringing the bell?" Yvette demanded, pointing her finger at Ingrid accusingly.

"Uh-huh," Ingrid muttered. I figured she'd have a hard time actually speaking while keeping her lower lip jutted out that far.

"Then why didn't you answer the figgin' bell?" Yvette shouted.

"I'm homeless," Ingrid answered briefly, then turned her perfect back on us as she continued to pack. Yes, packing. Her back was a beautiful sight in movement.

"Yeah, that's cool," Yvette replied, seeming to accept In-grid's explanation. "Anyway, I think I've got it. It took a while, but now ..." Her words trailed off suggestively. If she was trying to create suspense, she was doing a great job. If she was trying to drive me crazy, she was doing even better.

"What?" I prodded. "What do you think you've got?"

Yvette put her left hand up in the halt position, shaking her head. I was sure she was grinning under that veil.

"Not so damn-darn fast," she warned, plopping down in one of the swinging chairs and pushing off with her feet. Her veil floated in the breeze as she swung to and fro. "First we talk suspects. Huh, huh?"

"Fine," Wayne agreed, laying a restraining hand on my arm. He must have felt the micro-movements in that arm, urging it up and toward Yvette's neck. I willed my arm to rest, and Wayne and I took a seat together in the other swinging chair to wait for Yvette's murder-suspect review.

"First, you guys," she began.

Ingrid turned back to us with interest then, holding a piece of lime-green spandex in midair.

"Shayla called out your name—" Yvonne accused.

"But that was because—" I began.

"I know, I know," she cut back in impatiently. "But still, she called out your name and you were there. Even if I can't think of any motive, to tell you the truth."

"Me neither," I assured her, as my mind actually tried to think of one. My mind works that way, unfortunately.

Ingrid turned her back on us again with a small sigh of discontent.

"Marcia Armeson was up to something, some kind of scam, I'll bet," Yvette went on, bending forward eagerly. I wondered how much she knew. "But she's toast. Or scrambled eggs maybe."

Ivan's lovely meal flip-flopped in my stomach. The description was too apt. I wondered where Yvette had gotten her information. Or had she been there? Was Marcia's scrambled head—

"Now Ivan had the best opportunity. Talk about your man on the spot. Shick, he set up the whole fuddin' show—"

"But if he wanted to kill Shayla, would he have done it in his own—" Wayne began.

"Naah," Yvette agreed, waving a hand. "Probably not. Unless it was some spur of the moment thing. But it couldn't be, not with that bracelet. Though there's his kid and that Winona person."

Before I could ask what his kid and Winona had to do with it, her mouth moved on.

"Now Zoe's an interesting one ..." Yvette's words faltered again. And I couldn't see her face under the veil. Was she torturing us on purpose?

"Why is Zoe so interesting?" I asked, keeping my voice

calm with an effort. Or at least trying to. A squeak at the end of my sentence ruined the effect.

"Well," Yvette whispered, pushing her veiled face our way, her chair suddenly stalled.

I leaned forward to hear her words. But I never got the chance. The expectant silence was pierced by the sound of a sudden hiss, a skittering of paws on linoleum, and terrified yips from the kitchen.

Apollo came rushing into the living room, a streak of upright fur followed by C.C., who stopped on one front claw as Apollo slipped behind Ingrid, then licked her other front claw smugly and exited the room. I was pretty sure that drop of red on her claw had been blood. I was afraid to look at Apollo. Though my racing heart beat with something like pride for a moment. My cat was tough.

"And Dean," Yvette went on unperturbed. Yep, Yvette was tough, too. "And of course, Ted—"

"And you," I countered. "And Lou."

"What the figgin' heck!" she objected. She yanked the veil back from her face, revealing the anger it might have hidden. "Whaddaya mean Lou?"

"Lou was there just like the rest of us—" I began.

"Well, Lou is no murderer," she cut in, crossing her arms and glaring our way. "You can count on that."

Right, I thought. That's all I needed, Yvette's word that Lou wasn't a murderer. And she hadn't even bothered to assure us that she wasn't a murderer.

"But which one had all three?" Yvette went on before I could voice those or any other doubts.

"All three what?" I asked as she paused for a moment to fiddle with her veil.

"Motive, means, and opportunity," she replied, pushing off the floor with her tiny feet and putting her chair in motion again. "Whaddaya think?"

"I don't know, who?" I said evenly.

"That's for me to know and you to find out," she answered.

Til kill her, I thought. My pulse beat out the message like a war drum. Kill Yvette. Kill Yvette.