Designer Knockoff (32 page)

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Authors: Ellen Byerrum

Tags: #Mystery

BOOK: Designer Knockoff
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Lacey’s Law: When bad clothes happen to good people, fight back. Toss them, give them away, turn them into rags, or give them to Goodwill. If you don’t they will haunt you with the tenacity of a polyester monster from the back of the black lagoon otherwise known as your closet.
Chapter 21
Lacey took the precaution of shutting all her blinds before Brooke’s team arrived at her apartment. She had taken down her hair and changed into jeans with her new butter-colored sweater, the better to be spotted. If anyone was following her that was okay, diversion-tactic-wise. And the match had been undisturbed—she felt safe for the moment.
Remembering her hostess duties, she was prepared with three dozen Mrs. Fields cookies and several six-packs of sodas. Alcohol would not be a good idea for a conspiracy meeting. And just in case they were all on the Atkins diet, she had picked up some fresh strawberries and a stack of protein bars.
Yeah, right, I’ll be eating those myself for the rest of the week.
She had just a few minutes to call Miguel to ask him to lock up the Gloria Adams pattern and the still unfinished dress.
“Are you kidding? Hello! I am guarding it with my life, and several of my friends’ lives. You think I pay no attention?”
“I love you, Miguel.”
“Love you too. You are going to be fabulous. Now, I have things to do. See you later, sweetie.” She hung up and hoped she had thought of everything.
Brooke showed up right on time. As per her instructions, the others showed up spaced at irregular intervals. Damon arrived about fifteen minutes after Brooke, dressed in black. He was followed by a couple of friends, all in black, and then three more guys showed up, more casually dressed in blue jeans and shirts, like construction guys after calling it a day. Damon introduced them all by code names. Like the rest of the team, Brooke was dressed in stylish burglar black. Lacey thought they didn’t have to be quite so obviously coconspirators. Men in Black,
the alternative version.
“Okay, what’s our scenario, Lacey?” Brooke flipped her blond braid over her shoulder and whipped out a Palm Pilot.
“This may be crazy—”
Damon interrupted her. “We wouldn’t be here if we thought it was crazy. I really believe some people are just like lightning rods for the truth, and you may be one of them.”
Lacey was beginning to feel very foolish.
“You’re certainly dressed like a lightning rod,” Brooke put in. “Don’t you have anything in black?”
“I wasn’t dressing for anything as dramatic as a covert operation,” Lacey said. “I just need a few things moved to a safe location. A storage unit or something. It’s important that they not be found.” She picked up several manila folders that contained all the Gloria Adams documents, letters, and patterns.
“First, I’d like copies of all the documents to be put in different locations. The originals are already taking up residence in a safety deposit box at Burke and Herbert Bank and Trust. I brought them there after work.”
Damon took one set and leafed through them. “Smart move, Smithsonian. This way, if anything happens to you, we still have the evidence.”
Brooke stepped in quickly to reassure Lacey. “But nothing is going to happen to you; we’ll make sure of that.”
Lacey wasn’t terribly reassured. She showed them Aunt Mimi’s black Bentley suit. She had already taken the jeweled button covers off and secured them in the safety-deposit box. They may be only costume jewelry, but Hugh Bentley seemed very fond of them.
“I interrupted a clumsy break-in attempt here Tuesday night,” Lacey said, watching Brooke’s mouth fall open. “It may have nothing to do with the explosion, but Hugh Bentley wants this suit and he wants it bad.” Nobody cracked a smile. Nobody said, “Who’s Hugh Bentley?” Nobody said, “That old dude?” That was good, but somebody with a code name asked what made it so valuable. “Bentley asked me to donate it to his museum and offered me a trade: two couture dresses, my choice, worth many thousands of dollars. I said no. This suit was the original prototype for one of his most famous suits. It was designed in 1943 by a young designer named Gloria Adams. Bentley put his name on her designs, and then she disappeared. By the way, Damon, none of this is for publication yet, because it is not proven yet. And it’s my story. If it is a story.”
“Okay, but someday I’m going to write about it—and about tonight’s adventure. But only after the truth comes out. Deal?”
“After my story is published.”
He’ll make me look like a lunatic.
“Anyway, we’ll talk about it later. Are you still interested?”
“Of course, but—”
“Damon, darling, she’s obviously in danger, someone tried to break in, and someone tried to blow up her minivan.” Brooke looked soulfully into Damon’s eyes. He softened instantly. “And she doesn’t even have a minivan!”
Lacey took back the floor. “I believe this suit and other materials can prove that Hugh Bentley stole Gloria Adams’s designs and made his fortune by dancing on her bones.”
“She’s the one who disappeared from the factory during the war?” Damon asked. “You think he killed her? But you didn’t put that in your story in
The Eye.”
“You can’t print it. There’s no way to prove it yet. Maybe never. But his early reputation was based on her work, and now he wants to enshrine his reputation in his self-named museum. I have original patterns, letters, photographs, and supporting materials from Gloria Adams. If all these materials are destroyed, then Hugh Bentley will have won. And this trunk. I also need this trunk moved.” The code-named crew stared at the trunk, waiting for the explanation.
“Oh, Lacey, Aunt Mimi’s trunk?” Brooke asked. “But why?”
“There are irreplaceable things in there. They may not all be Adams designs, but they are priceless to me. They could be stolen or destroyed in Bentley’s drive to obliterate the evidence. If Hugh finds out that this was Mimi’s trunk, he would be just as happy to destroy it. He denies that he knew Mimi, but I know that after Gloria disappeared, Mimi made his life miserable during the war by having his factory investigated. I know that sounds crazy now, but it was deadly serious during World War Two. They never proved that Hugh Bentley was involved, but two of his drivers went to prison for two years for smuggling contraband nylons.”
“Obviously,” Damon said, “they rolled over and took the rap for Bentley, for a price. Now the Bentley Museum has an extra forty million because of a snafu in the appropriations bill.”
“But what does this have to do with Esme Fairchild being found dead at Huntley Meadows?” A guy Damon had introduced by the code name Turtledove spoke for the first time. A huge man, he looked like he was a mixture of a dozen ethnicities. He was hard-muscled, dark-skinned, with wavy black hair. He had beautiful bones and a deep, seductive voice.
“It’s a funny thing about connections, Turtledove. They are not always apparent,” Damon suggested. “Things that happened back then may have created a vortex of evil that still swirls around us unseen. Swirls around Lacey. And Esme. And the trunk.”
“Vortex of evil, dude.” Turtledove grabbed a Coke. “Fair enough. I’m there.”
Lacey kept her thoughts to herself and tried not to smile. They made her paranoia seem very pale—and positively justified.
The team got to work planning. Lacey carefully packed Aunt Mimi’s suit inside the trunk. Copies of all the patterns and materials went with Brooke, duplicates with Damon, and another set inside the trunk. Two of the others also took copies, sealed in manila envelopes. The entire team whipped out their cell phones and exchanged numbers. They looked like a phone commercial. Lacey was embarrassed, but she pulled out her own for show. Brooke’s eyes went wide and she almost smiled, but she said nothing. Turtledove and another guy, code-named Hawkeye, carried the trunk down to the service dock, with Code Name Daisy and Code Name Gibraltar as lookouts, and loaded it into an anonymous white van for its trip to a self-locking, high-security storage unit in Fairfax County owned by the Bartons.
Daisy and Gibraltar followed the white van in a black SUV to make sure it wasn’t tailed. In the meantime, Brooke, Lacey, and Damon strolled into Old Town for a late-night margarita and an order of nachos, just in case Lacey was being followed. Another member of the crew, a large man with a shaved head, Code Name Rosebud, stayed behind in Lacey’s dark apartment to see if anybody would try to break in, and to monitor incoming calls on the answering machine.
After dinner Brooke and Damon escorted Lacey back to her apartment. Rosebud reported that nothing happened. A couple of hang-ups, and a guy named Vic left a message saying hello. Nothing else. Lacey sighed.
Vic calls and I’m out playing secret agent. Figures.
“Vic? Lacey, I think you have something to tell me,” Brooke said. “Not to mention your break-in attempt and your new little toy ...”
“Please, Brooke, some other time.” Brooke acquiesced but threw her a meaningful look before heading out, holding hands with Damon.
Lacey was glad that Mimi’s trunk was secure, but the apartment felt lonely without it anchoring the living room. And the sofa bed was empty too. Stella’s off-and-on boyfriend, Bobby Blue Eyes, was back in town—and Stella was making up for lost time. After the crowd was gone, she sat out on her balcony to look at the Potomac. She noticed the dim red glow of a cigarette in one car in the parking lot far below, but the driver never emerged or started the car to leave, and eventually the glow went out. Maybe it was Turtledove watching over her under orders from Brooke.
Or maybe not.
Lacey shivered, went inside, and locked the balcony door.
Lacey decided on Friday morning that she was sick of being a lily-livered coward. In an act of defiance, she chose an arrest-me-red vintage suit from the late Forties. The jacket had a nipped-in waist that draped long over her hips. The skirt was slightly flared with side slits. It was sexy and attention-getting and she didn’t care. She teamed it with a sassy little bag that sported red roses swimming in a field of yellow and red.
She showed up at Stylettos for her final Forties hairdo with a present for Stella: a gift certificate at the stylist’s favorite leather store in Georgetown. Although Lacey could not imagine what on earth Stella might possibly lack in the world of leather, her stylist was thrilled.
“Mmmm, leather. You really know the way to a girl’s heart. I’ll treat myself this weekend. Thanks, Lacey.” She kissed the certificate and tucked it into her cleavage.
“It’s the least I could do,” Lacey said. “Thanks for looking out for me.”
“No problem. Your sofa bed is pretty comfortable, considering.”
“Considering what?”
“Considering I don’t usually sleep alone.”
“Right. How is Bobby?” Lacey was led to the shampoo bowl. She put a towel around her shoulders and sat down in the chair.
“Fabulous, and I’m not sharing.” With that Stella got down to the serious business of creating a Forties look to complement Lacey’s bold choice in suits. “There’s only one thing we can do to your hair that will hold its own with that suit—Rita Hayworth!” She pronounced it as if it were law. Lacey had been prepared to be a little rebellious today in her saucy red suit, but the mere mention of the goddess of
Gilda
sent a shiver up the back of her neck.
“Okay, Stella, make it pure danger.”
Stella took over, washed Lacey’s hair, applied styling gel, and made her sit under the hairdryer for forty minutes.
Lacey enjoyed her coffee and the latest edition of
The Eye Street Observer,
especially its photos of Mrs. Van Drizzen and the matching Bentley scarves. Her “Crimes of Fashion” column was missing; Stella had already cut it out and passed it around the salon. She saw it tacked on a bulletin board near the front door.
CRIMES OF FASHION
No Such Thing as a Fashion Clue?
By Lacey Smithsonian
You are what you wear—aren’t you? Your clothing is a clue to your personality, your lifestyle, your many moods. But believe it or not there are some people who believe that there is no such thing as a fashion clue. Most of them are men and some of them are cops, the very people you might think would appreciate a fashion clue. Make a sports analogy and they can analyze it and categorize it and beg for more, but throw them a fashion clue and they call it a foul.
But not you, stylish reader. You observe people every day and draw conclusions based on what they wear. Think you can decipher a fashion clue? Here are a few test questions for those who dare.
Your normally over-the-top casual coworkers start wearing suits and ties, heels and hose. What does it mean? Are they looking for a new job or a getting a promotion? Are they going to a funeral after work or a wedding? When a friend suddenly stops wearing makeup, puts on weight, and wears baggy clothes, is she depressed, pregnant and elated, getting in touch with her inner slob, merely following a fad, or joining a cult?
Even experienced fashion observers might not know for sure. But they would know these are clues.
Fashion clues.
So when it was discovered that Esme Fairchild planned to go to a fancy boutique to purchase an expensive Bentley’s silk scarf the same day she disappeared, and she was later found strangled with a silk scarf, that too is a fashion clue. A clue that even the most fashion challenged could not miss—unless you’re a fashion-clueless detective....

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