How to Murder a Millionaire (4 page)

Before I could reach the top of the steps, however, I heard arguing. Staccato voices, sharp words.

Two people burst out of a side room: a man clutching the elbow of a large, imperious woman.

"I don't care what you think," the woman was saying. "You're a fool."

I recognized Kitty Keough and instantly wished I were invisible. The man scuttling beside her was none other than Stan Rosenstatz, the
Intelligencer
features editor and our boss. "Kitty," he hissed, "you can't go around saying things like that about people. You'll get us both fired."

"If anybody tries to fire me," Kitty snapped, "they'll regret it."

"Kitty—"

"You think I don't mean it?" She threw her car keys squarely into the chest of the startled valet. Then her glacial gaze landed on me.

Stan caught sight of me, too, and stopped dead.

Kitty said, "Well, if it isn't Mary Sunshine herself. What the hell are you doing here?"

"Hello, Kitty. I completed the assignment you gave me." I spoke calmly and smiled, not quite paying homage, but polite. "The story's written and ready for your approval."

She wore a full-length black satin skirt with a frothy white blouse that made her bosom look like the puffed-up breast of an exotic bird. Her very blond hair was upswept and lanced with her signature accessory,
a feather. No matter what Kitty wore, she had a feather incorporated into her ensemble somewhere.

From two steps above, she eyed me. "I didn't tell you to come here tonight. What do you think you're doing? Trying to beat me to the story?"

"No, of course not. I'm a guest."

"A guest?"

Her tone was insulting, but I fought my temper down. "Yes, I was invited."

Stan hurried down the steps to me. "Hi, Nora, nice to see you. Lovely evening—"

"Stuff it, Stan." Without taking her gaze from my face, Kitty dared me to lose my good manners. "Don't take sides in this."

"Sides?" Stan forced a laugh. "What are you talking about? Nora's just—"

"I'm sorry, Kitty," I said. "Perhaps I should have told you I was coming." She came down a step and we were face-to-face. I could smell the wine on her breath. She'd had too much, revealed by the glassy look in her eyes. And the scars from her last face-lift hadn't quite healed.

She stiffened as if she knew what I'd noticed. "I know the game you're playing, Miss Blackbird. You want my job, and you think your relationship with Rory Pendergast can get it for you. Well, I've got a few years left, young lady."

Feebly, Stan said, "Kitty, don't be an idiot. This is a team effort. We all work together. Nora's on board to help us improve—"

She swung around on him. "And you—you think you're going to get the managing editor job just because Sweet Knees waltzes into my department?"

"Sweet Knees?" I repeated.

"Kitty—"

She cut off Stan's placating with a sharp gesture. "I'm out of here," she said.

The valet arrived with her car, an aged white Mercedes with a crooked front bumper. Kitty got into the driver's seat and revved the engine before the valet had closed the door. Then she was off, narrowly missing the corner of the portico. Her vanity plate, I saw, read
MEOW.

"I'm sorry, Nora," Stan said in the silence left behind like the cloud of her exhaust. "She's temperamental."

"I know, Mr. Rosenstatz. That's what makes her great at her job."

He looked relieved. "You're a good kid. Call me Stan, okay?"

Stan Rosenstatz could have been anywhere from fifty to seventy, with a thin frame, nervous hands and tufts of gray hair growing out of his ears. His dinner jacket was a size too large and had been hanging on a wire hanger too long. He looked as if he didn't have much fun.

I patted his arm. "Coming back into the party?"

Stan shook his head and used his handkerchief to mop the perspiration from his forehead. "I've had enough hobnobbing for one night."

"You okay?"

"Sure. Y'know, Kitty's just blowing off steam. And she's had a few drinks. Don't take it personally."

"I'm trying not to. I can't possibly be a threat to her."

"Well, you are," said Stan on a rueful sigh. "But she'll come around. You'll get to like her, I'm sure."

I wasn't the least bit sure, but I knew it would help Stan if I agreed. So I did, and added, "I'll e-mail my story later tonight, okay?"

"Sure. Listen, I appreciate you not coming to the office much yet. It keeps the peace—you know what I mean? But don't think you're out of sight, out of mind. You're doing good work, Nora."

I thanked him. He left, and I went into the party.

A waiter from Main Events caught me just inside the doors. "Glass of wine?"

"Thank you." I accepted a glass and tried to put Kitty out of my mind. I wanted to enjoy myself. "Am I fashionably late?"

He smiled conspiratorially. "People are just getting loose now."

I headed down the long carpet towards the party noise. The strains of a quiet jazz quartet soothed the underlying chatter of human voices. For the first time since my parents took a powder, I plunged into a party.

The throng was a mix of newspaper people and Pendergast cronies, like old Heywood Kidd, the art collector, as well as some of the New Crowd on the Philadelphia social scene. Rory liked to have young people around, so I was well acquainted with many of the guests.

I heard the distinctive laugh of my friend Lexie Paine and turned to see her staking out a corner with several eligible bachelors, probably telling Nasdaq jokes while they breathed her perfume and fantasized about her assets. We caught each other's raised eyebrow signal. We'd meet at the bar as soon as she could get away.

Rory's downstairs rooms looked as if a florist's truck had exploded there. More RickandGabe flowers competed for attention with the art collection, the furniture, the glimmer of crystal and the soft glow of leather-bound   books.   Someone   had   matted   and
framed a selection of newspaper relics that celebrated the long and happy Pendergast ownership of the
Intelligencer.
I avoided the crush in the center of the room and strolled along the display, looking at headlines from long ago when the first Pendergast got bored with selling whale oil and started up a newspaper. In a day when companies were bought and sold within weeks, a single-family ownership of a newspaper— even a slightly tacky one like the
Intelligencer
—for a hundred and fifty years was impressive indeed.

Halfway along the display I heard footsteps on the main staircase and turned. Peach Treese came barreling down the steps and rammed straight into me. For a woman of unspoken age, she could move like a locomotive.

"Peach! Are you okay?"

She caught herself on my outstretched arms and looked at me in shock. "Nora." Her good manners kicked in. "Nora Blackbird, how nice to see you."

I put my glass of wine down on a table and held her hands in mine. They were cold and trembling. "Peach, are you all right?"

She wasn't. Although she'd obviously tried to pull herself together upstairs, fresh tears blurred her eyes. Her face was white beneath carefully applied makeup.

Even in tears, Patricia "Peach" Treese looked every inch her role as one of Philadelphia's most-respected hostesses. She'd grown up a child of privilege in the home of her grandfather, the city's mayor back when mayors were dignified and honorable even if social injustice ran rampant. Her handsome husband had died young of a lingering illness, but she'd finished college after his death, raised her children to be community leaders and become a woman of considerable influence in her own right. She had been president of
the museum board since forever, and everyone credited her with saving the symphony from its latest financial crunch by her iron-fist-in-the-lace-glove fund-raising efforts.

It was also common knowledge that Peach had been Rory Pendergast's intimate companion for thirty years.

She was the party's unofficial hostess, but she looked anything but welcoming. Her silver Armani suit was impeccable, and her gold jewelry looked spectacular on the simple clothing. But her face was uncontrolled, her expression rattled. The tremble in her hands did not subside.

"Peach? You're really not feeling well. Can I get you a glass of water?"

"Oh," she said, making a visible effort to control her emotions. "No, thank you, Nora. You're very kind. And my goodness, don't you look smashing tonight? And after everything you've been through."

Lightly, I joked, "Better smashing than smashed, I guess, which is more than I can say for some of your guests."

Peach tried to laugh, but I knew she was operating on automatic pilot.

"What can I do to help?" I asked.

She released a broken sigh of exasperation. Or maybe it was genuine anger. "That old buzzard!"

"You mean Rory? Is he giving you trouble?"

"He won't come downstairs again. He says he's had enough for one night. Can you imagine? They're all here to be nice to him!"

"Maybe he's just tired."

"Maybe he's just stubborn!" Peach drew a long breath to calm down. "Why don't you go up and reason with him, Nora? He's so fond of you."

"I'll take him a drink," I suggested. "Does champagne still make his nose turn pink?"

"Yes, pink as a bunny's." Peach laughed shakily. "Thank you, Nora. You're a dear. Give him a few minutes to calm down first. Then work your magic."

"I'll do what I can. Now go find somebody to flirt with," I advised. "You have a big family wedding coming up. You'll need a date if Rory's being such a pill."

"My granddaughter's wedding, yes. Oh, Lincoln is your nephew, isn't he? By marriage? Well, it's the talk of the whole town, I know, and I wish it were over already. See? Rory's not the only one being a bore."

"You'll recover," I said. "Both of you."

She smiled, gave me an air kiss and slipped off in the direction of the powder room.

I pressed through the crush of men in the dining room to where the bar had been set up. I knew most everyone there and exchanged pleasantries with a few people. Some others saw me coming and subtly turned their backs, making me wonder from whom my father had borrowed money to abscond. Jamie Scaithe, looking tan from his latest trip to his family's Bermuda house, waved. I waved back at the alpha dog of Todd's pack, but continued to the bar. I didn't want to hear Jamie ask again with exaggerated concern how I was coping without my husband.

Just as I reached the bar, a tallish young man with a shaven head grabbed his drink and spun around. We nearly collided.

"Oh, I'm sorry," I said automatically.

He managed to avoid spilling the drink on either one of us and uttered a surly, "No problem." Then he pushed past me and hastily plunged into the party.

I blinked after him. Peach Treese wasn't the only upset guest.

Jill Mascione, whose father had built Main Events into the most relied upon catering service in Philadelphia, was mixing drinks with effortless speed. We'd been friends since the days of the lavish parties my parents threw when they were burning through the family fortune. Jill and I used to play together under the bunted tables. Now she wore a tuxedo-style jacket and ran the bar with cool efficiency while I learned to be a reporter.

"Hey," she said when she spotted me. "What's this? Your Audrey Hepburn period?"

"I raided Grandmama's closet."

"Looks good on you. And I'm not the only one who's noticed." Hands busy, she jerked her head in the direction from which I'd come.

"Jamie Scaithe can take a long swim in the Schuylkill."

"You don't date cokeheads, huh?"

"I'm learning not to be Peter Pan's enabler."

"Atta girl. It's time you were the main event in a relationship."

"Listen to you," I said on a laugh, knowing full well her relationship with her volatile partner, Betsy, was on-again, off-again. "How about lunch some day soon?"

"You're on. I'll call you."

She reached under the table for a bottle of champagne she'd clearly kept precisely chilled in ice water for someone special. "I saw Libby here a few minutes ago. She okay?"

"Just crazy, but what else is new?"

Jill
grinned, pouring. "Heard from your folks?"

"A postcard weeks ago. They're having a ball."

She laughed. "I expect nothing less."

"Your dad?"

With another tip of her head towards the kitchen, she said, "Running the show, as usual. He says we're always on the edge of bankruptcy, and he's the only one who can save us." She handed me the champagne.

"Are things that tight?"

"We're afloat," Jill said. "He's too generous with people. If he'd let me take over, we might actually make a profit."

I knew all about parents and money trouble. "I need a glass for the guest of honor, too," I said. "I'm going upstairs to lure him down."

"Good luck." She poured another glass and then wiped her hands on the bar towel. "I took him some supper a little while ago. He's had one scene after another tonight. First Kitty Keough—man, she is just a few rattles short of a snake—and some other guy I didn't know. That bald guy who just ran you over. Weird party. I think Rory's hiding, and I don't blame him."