Lethally Blond (13 page)

Unfortunately, Locket also remained surrounded most of the night, and Alex’s large pale hand was usually holding her elbow or pressed to her like a Post-it note. At about a quarter to ten, just before the party was due to end, I left the main area and ducked into the bathroom, considering what I should do. Perhaps I needed to enlist Chris to work his way into the phalanx around Locket—with me in tow. But it turned out not to be necessary. As I was rummaging through my purse for a tube of lip gloss, I heard the door open, and before I had a chance to glance up, I recognized the overwhelming scent of patchouli and vanilla. Miss Ford,
Morgue
star and beauty guru, had entered the bathroom. Her eyes went instantly to her reflection in the mirror, so it was a few moments before she realized who was standing alongside her.

“Lovely party,” I said. “Congratulations.”

“Thank you,” she said haughtily, her eyes making contact with mine in the mirror. “My, my—you and Chris are getting to be quite the item.”

“Actually, I came with a friend,” I told her. I swiped on my lip gloss, buying time while I quickly considered how to maximize the few short moments I would have alone with her. I decided to go for broke.

“It must be hard for you tonight, though,” I said, offering a newly glistening but sympathetic smile.

“What do you mean?” she asked bluntly. She was the kind of woman who didn’t appreciate people other than herself defining anything about her.

“Well, you have this wonderful celebration for your book, but at the same time you must be grieving over Tom’s death. I happen to know that you two were extremely”—I paused for emphasis—“
close
.”

She was a damn good actress, I had to hand that to her, because her face registered no emotion whatsoever, but I saw her eyes quickly skirt the floor, making certain no feet were visible below the doors of any of the stalls.

“Who told you
that
?” she asked as her eyes found mine again in the mirror.

“Someone with real information.”

At that moment, two postpubescent actressy types burst into the ladies’ room, gawking at a photo on one of their cell phones and giggling like idiots. For the first time, I saw alarm on Locket’s face. She wanted to know what I knew, and she wasn’t going to be able to find out right now. She swung open the ladies’ room door and motioned with her head for me to go first into the small, dark corridor. It appeared that she wanted to resume our conversation there.

But Alex was standing outside, rigid and waiting.

“What’s going on?” he asked when it registered with him that we’d obviously been talking.

“Have you met Chris’s girlfriend, darling?” she asked brightly, rolling her shoulder forward coyly. “Her name is Bailey, of all things.”

“No, I haven’t had the pleasure,” he said coolly, though I could see recognition in his eyes as he met my gaze. He snapped his head in greeting rather than shake my hand. I nodded back. I didn’t have Locket’s acting chops, and I wondered if he could tell by looking at me that we hadn’t exactly been chatting about the new Jimmy Choo shoes while we powdered our noses.

“People are waiting for us, Locket,” he said. “It’s time to go.”

He took her elbow yet again, guiding her away. Neither of them said another word to me.

Damn, I thought. It had seemed as if I’d been about to get
something
from Locket—an admission, perhaps, or a
hint
of admission—but thanks to the two Lindsay Lohan wannabes, I’d come away empty-handed.

Eager to reconnect with Jessie, I decided to call her cell rather than try to search for her. As I was punching in her number, I caught a movement in my peripheral vision. I glanced to my right, and there was Beau again. So he hadn’t left after all.

“Calling in an exclusive on that apricot scrub?” he asked.

“Yeah, they’re bumping a Kevin Federline item for it. Now we’ll never know what books are on his night table.” Still at the top of my game with the witty comeback. Gosh, I was surprised I hadn’t been tapped to do an HBO comedy special.

“How did your summer end up, anyway?” he asked, his eyes quizzical—as if he really
were
curious. Those brown eyes still had the power to blow me away, and I could feel my pulse starting to race again, as if I’d just mainlined a Red Bull. But I felt something else as well: the first swells of anger. Beau had come back and never made contact, subjected me to a DWE—dumping without explanation. And now he was insisting on torturing me with tedious small talk.

“Pretty good, I guess,” I said flatly. “I went up to Cape Cod—my mother has a place there. Ate a lot of clams.”

“I’m sorry I never sent more than a couple of postcards, Bailey. It was pretty crazy in Turkey. We sometimes worked fourteen-hour days.”

“One.”

“Sorry?”

“One. You sent one postcard. But that’s okay. The thing about getting
one
postcard is that it really lets you know where you stand.”

I’d caught him off guard with my sarcasm, and he opened his mouth ever so slightly in surprise. He pulled up the left side of his mouth in a rueful smile.

“Well, you obviously didn’t waste any time fretting over it,” he said, matching my sarcastic tone.

The two gigglers spilled out of the bathroom suddenly, squealing now, as if they’d just done a few lines of coke in a stall. Before things got any worse between Beau and me, I decided to beat a retreat.

“Well, I’d better go,” I said. “Have a nice night.”

“You too,” he said dryly as I turned from him.

Walking away, I smirked. It was fun to imagine him thinking of just
how
nice a night I would probably have with the star of the show. But as I emerged from the corridor into the main room of the restaurant, my heart sank. Until tonight I’d harbored fantasies that there was still a chance for me and Beau, that he would return from his journey, blow off the Turkish dust from his belongings, and realize that he had missed me horribly. Now I had to face the truth: It was really over.

The crowd had thinned out in just the short time I’d been absent. Obviously, as the first wave of A-listers had moved to the door, others had taken it as a signal that the fun was about to come crashing to an end. To my despair, Chris was at the bar talking to two Bottega Veneta bag bimbos, but as soon as he spotted me, he broke free and made his way to me. Simultaneously, Jessie headed toward me from another direction. I introduced her to Chris, and I could tell from Jessie’s expression that she liked what she saw.

“I ran into some friends from
People
, and we thought we’d head downtown and hear some music,” she announced. “Want to come?”

Chris glanced at me with uncertainty on his face. “Are you up for that, Bailey? You’ve had a pretty rough twenty-four hours.”

“Probably not,” I told him. “We could grab a bite somewhere—or I could just make you something at my place.”

“Really? That sounds pretty appealing.”

We said good-bye to Jessie and hailed a cab outside. As we hurtled down Second Avenue, Chris pulled me into the crook of his arm.

“How you doing, anyway?” he asked softly. “Do you really feel up to standing over a hot stove?”

“I think it’ll be therapeutic—though I can’t make any promises about the quality of the food.”

I had learned to cook in just the past few years. During my marriage, I’d been more than game to wrestle with a chicken breast or two in the kitchen, but my ex had been almost rabid about eating out. We were always in a different bistro, brasserie, or sushi bar, and it was only later that I understood why. He’d already begun to accrue his mondo gambling debts, and being on the move made him feel safer, less in the line of sight of guys who wanted to break his legs in two. After the divorce, I’d bought a few cookbooks, and though I was no Giada De Laurentiis, I could whip up a dozen or so dishes pretty well.

My cupboards were nearly bare at the moment, but I had bacon in the freezer, so after we arrived at my place, I cooked a few pieces in the microwave and made spaghetti carbonara. All you need are bacon, eggs, white wine, and Parmesan cheese, but the sauce is dreamy, especially when accompanied, as Hannibal Lecter would say, by a nice Chianti. I served it indoors, with the terrace door open a crack because the night was indeed cool, finally more fall than summer. I was grateful for the temperature change, because pasta on my terrace would have reminded me too much of Beau—and I was having a hard time chasing him from my thoughts.

“You were really holding out on me last winter,” Chris said. “I had no idea you could cook like this.”

“I like to keep a few aces up my sleeve,” I said, smiling.

“Oh, is that what you were doing?” he said, leaning toward me and stroking my hair. “I thought you were just torturing me.”

“Not intentionally.”

“Speaking of torture, anything else from the party?”

I shared my conversation with Locket outside the bathroom. “She’s definitely hiding something,” I said.

“Well, we know she’s hiding her fling with Tom,” Chris exclaimed, almost in exasperation. “But that doesn’t mean there’s more. Just because Tom was drinking her brand of champagne doesn’t mean she drove up there—or—or killed him.”

“What makes you so sure?” I said, surprised by his stance.

“I just don’t see her doing it. What would be the reason?”

I was about to make the case for Locket as a definite suspect but decided to back off. Chris didn’t seem at all happy with that as a possibility, and I wasn’t interested in any contentiousness. I moved on to Deke.

“Do you think you can get me in his presence again soon—like on set?” I asked.

“We’re shooting at Chelsea Piers on Monday,” Chris said. “I may be able to sneak you in.”

He helped me with the dishes after that, and then we didn’t even bother to sit on the couch and play the seduction game—we went straight to my bed. The sex was different this time, not the fierce, bittersweet variety we’d engaged in the other night, but still amazing. Later, his arm around me, Chris made me laugh with a story about sharing a bed one summer with his little brother, nicknamed Kicker.

I nodded off right after, with him spooning me, but just after one, my eyes popped open. It had started to rain suddenly, and I could hear the drum of it on the metal railing around my terrace. I closed my eyes again, willing sleep to return, but it was clear within a few minutes that it had no intention whatsoever of doing so.

After slipping out of Chris’s grasp, I padded naked out to my kitchen, where I tried milk therapy, night two. Yet even as I swallowed the milk, I knew it probably wasn’t going to do the trick. Seeing Beau again was bugging the hell out of me, and the afterglow of sex with a gorgeous guy I really dug wasn’t going to ameliorate the situation. What had he been about to say when he’d uttered the words
I’d really like to . . .
? Thanks to that sarcastic missile I’d lobbed, I’d blown my chance of ever knowing.

As I set the glass in the sink, my home phone rang, startling me. I wondered if it might be the infamous night caller, now with access to my home number, too. I picked it up as quickly as possible, not wanting to wake Chris.

“Is this Bailey Weggins?” demanded the voice on the other end.

“It is.” I glanced at the clock: 1:14.

“This is Locket Ford.”

I caught my breath in surprise.

“Hello,” was all I said. Clearly she was the one with an agenda now, and I was not going to say anything that would short-circuit it.

“We should talk,” she said coolly.

“Now?”

“Now isn’t good. Tomorrow.”

“Okay, when?”

“At four. Meet me at my apartment.” She gave me a number on Central Park West.

“Is that in the Seventies?”

But she’d already hung up.

I slipped back into bed a few minutes later, and Chris stirred.

“More insomnia?” he murmured.

“Unfortunately.”

“I have a way to help.”

“I’d love to try.”

“I heard the phone ring,” he said as he pulled me toward his naked body, ready for sex again.

I opened my mouth to tell him about Locket’s call—and then, for some reason I couldn’t define, I thought better of it.

“Wrong number,” I said.

CHAPTER 11

T
his time I slept straight through till morning and woke to the light seeping through the shades on my windows. I felt Chris stir beside me. I turned my head toward the middle of the bed and saw him lying on his stomach, his bare arms folded on the pillow under his head. It felt really good to have him next to me, and I couldn’t help thinking of the contrast between last night and the horrible night before.

“Hey, good morning,” Chris said. His eyes were still closed, but he offered me a sleepy smile.

“Good morning to you. Are you hungry?”

There was a pause, as if he were deliberating.

“Actually, yes,” he said, opening his eyes. “I’m ravenous.” By the mischievous look he gave me, I could see that he didn’t mean for breakfast. We had sex in the soft, almost autumnal light. I felt a growing connection between us, but I didn’t know what the heck we were supposed to do about it. As we lay in each other’s arms Chris announced that it was his turn to cook, that if I had more eggs, he would make me an omelet to end all omelets.

After starting coffee, I turned my tiny kitchen over to him. Before long, I could hear him rummaging through the drawers of my fridge.

“There’s some cheddar in there somewhere,” I called out.

“Found it. I’ve also located some scallions that have clearly been here since the Clinton administration—but they don’t cause botulism, do they?”

“Only heartburn, I think.”

As I set the table, I watched him out of the corner of my eye. He had slipped into his pants but not bothered with a shirt yet and had tucked a yellow dish towel into his waistband as an apron. He hummed as he worked, at least when he wasn’t exclaiming a triumphant “Yes!” at each successful step in the omelet-making process. There was a totally boyish quality to his effort, as if he were a kid working with a chemistry kit that he secretly hoped would blow up the kitchen. I realized for the first time that the boyishness wasn’t because he was barely over twenty-one; it was just the way Chris
was
. Chris would be eternally open and easy and fun—what you saw was what you got. Unlike with Beau, there was nothing that felt elusive about him or maddeningly mysterious.

That’s not to say I felt I totally knew Chris. As he set the plates on the table, announcing, “I’m Brent and I’ll be your waiter today. We used only eggs from free-range chickens and aged California cheddar,” I couldn’t help wondering how many other chicks would love to be treated to one of his après amour omelets. That swarm around him last night had been awful. When Chris and I had dated briefly in the winter, I’d been conscious of how good-looking he was and that other women were often devouring him with their eyes, but I’d never felt very discomfited by it. His success, however, was going to ratchet up everything. How would I fit into the picture? Wouldn’t Chris want to sample all the bounty before him, especially all the lithe twenty-two-year-olds? Did I really want to get involved with a hot young actor who was ten years my junior to boot?

“You okay?” he asked. “You look kind of perplexed.”

“Oh, I was just contemplating the feast I’m about to devour.” I took my first bite. “Oh wow, this is awesome,” I said. “You’re a real soup-to-nuts kind of overnight date, aren’t you?”

“In a manner of speaking,” he said, laughing. “I do like cooking, though, and I want to get better at it—preparing great food for friends. What I don’t want to ever do again is put on a black tie and serve a meal to people I don’t know.”

“I think your waitering and bartending days are over. Maybe the next time you put on a black tie will be for an event like the Golden Globes.”

“You just can’t ever count your chickens in this business,” he said. “Guys like Patrick Dempsey and George Clooney did a billion pilots before things took off for them. Think of how many times they must have thought, Okay, this is it. And then it wasn’t. And even worse is when you consider the people who did a billion pilots and
still
didn’t make it.”

“Are you worried that the show won’t take off and you’ll be back making the rounds in L.A.?”

“Oh yeah. I lucked out and got a show right away. But instead of relishing it, I worry that it came too easily.”

I asked him then about the couple of months he’d spent in L.A., because other than during those brief moments in the bar last Tuesday night, we really hadn’t had a chance to talk about it. He described the craziness of pilot season, the nonstop auditioning, meetings, and drinks, and the occasional trips to the beach just to stay tanned through the whole thing. He made me laugh out loud as he imitated the
Entourag
e-style way agents and casting directors talked. It was one of the first times since he’d been back that we’d been discussing a topic other than Tom. His disappearance and death had colored so much of our interactions, and it was nice not to be burdened with that for a brief while.

It wasn’t long, though, before Tom was rushing my thoughts. As Chris reached the part about auditioning for
Morgue
and his screen test with Locket, I flashed back on what Harper had revealed to me: Tom had nearly nailed the role originally, but after providing the tip about the show to Chris, he had promptly lost the part to him. If Chris ever found out, it would probably be devastating for him.

“Speaking of
Morgue
, I’d better tackle these dishes and hightail it out of here,” Chris announced. “I’ve got a lot of lines to learn today. Alex has a shit fit if you mess up.”

“So he’s around a lot during shooting?”

“In the beginning, apparently. I hear his MO is to micromanage like crazy, make sure the show’s a hit, then finally step back a little.”

“Has he ever been really tough on you? Harper said he came down pretty hard on Tom a few times.”

“No, thank God. He lit into Tom in front of people, and it was pretty awful. Even the director seemed taken aback.”

“Maybe he sensed something was up with Tom and Locket.”

“Or maybe
Tom
felt totally awkward because he was banging Locket, and that affected how he delivered his lines.”

“That’s a legitimate explanation. But in my mind, both Locket and Alex are still suspects. There’s motive for both of them.”

“To be honest, I just don’t see either one of them going to the effort,” he said.

This would have been the moment to mention the call from Locket and her insistence that she needed to speak with me, but once again I decided not to go there. For some reason, Chris didn’t seem to want to entertain the idea of Locket as a murderer.

“For the show’s sake, let’s hope they’re innocent, then.”

“I thought Deke was at the top of your list right now,” Chris said, rising from the table. He picked up both our plates and headed toward the kitchen. “Tom had a long fuse, but he wouldn’t let you just roll over him. I bet he was furious at Deke about the money. I could definitely see a confrontation happening.”

“Yes, Deke is still high on my list. I need to get in Deke’s face a little bit and see what his reaction is. I hope you can really get me on set tomorrow.”

I heard the sound of running water and dishes being slid into the dishwasher. Chris stepped back into the living room, his eyes lowered as he thought.

“They let people sneak in a friend or relative as long as they don’t get in the way. I think I could pull it off. But I’d have to call you later and let you know. I need to enlist one of the production assistants to help me.”

“Great. Leave the rest of the dishes. I don’t want Alex taking off that gorgeous head of yours.”

As he leaned down to kiss me good-bye, a memory surged through my mind: Chris admitting Friday night that he’d snatched the note from Locket to Tom so the cops wouldn’t find it. I had urged him to turn it over. I needed to follow up on that, but this wasn’t the moment.

“So I’ll call you later about the set visit,” he said. “I’d love to see you tonight, but I try to hit the sack pretty early on Sundays. Are you open Monday night? If I can get out in time?”

“Yup,” I said, experiencing a twinge of disappointment. I was enjoying the sex, the comfort, and everything else that came from being with Chris. “Why don’t we talk tomorrow.”

“I was thinking of more than talk,” he said, grinning, and kissed me again, long and tenderly.

It was just nine-thirty when he left, too early to call Harper without irritating her any more than I already had. I grabbed my tote bag of exercise clothes and headed over to the gym. Thirty minutes on the StairMaster seemed more miserable than usual, but when I was done and showered, I realized that for the first time since Friday, I actually felt completely like myself again. Maybe I’d sweated the last of the drug out of my system.

Before returning to my place, I headed off in search of a cappuccino. On University Avenue, I ran smack into Landon, walking down the street in a navy blazer and lemony yellow tie.

“Are you doing the walk of shame—preppy style?” I asked.

“If
only
,” he said. “No, I have a very nasty client who insisted we meet for breakfast early Sunday morning. I was actually going to knock on your door when I got back. What’s the latest?”

“Could you handle more coffee? You wouldn’t believe everything that’s going on—and I could really use your advice.”

He agreed eagerly, and we slipped into a small café halfway up the block. I ran through all the developments on the case with him, including my Friday night saga.

“Goodness, Bailey. Oil riggers have safer jobs than you do. You worry me sick.”

“I admit that I’m a little bit freaked this time. I feel I’ve been able to defend myself pretty well in a bunch of situations in the past. But getting drugged is a whole other story. You’re completely helpless. That’s why I have to figure out who killed Tom. Whoever it is—man or woman—is toying with me. Right now the plan seems just to scare me, but it could get uglier.”

“Any ideas who it is?”

“A few. But that’s not all I need to talk to you about. Guess who was at the party last night? None other than Beau Regan—back from the sacking of Constantinople.”

“Oh dear. How did it feel to see him?”

“Not bad, really. About the same as if someone had just backed over me with their SUV. Honestly, it was this god-awful mix of unrequited love and raw humiliation over the fact that he hadn’t called me. If they could only harvest that feeling, it would make a perfect weapon of mass destruction.”

“How long has he been back in town?”

“A day or two, I guess.”

“Well, that’s not so bad. He may have intended to call when—”

“He started to say something about it. He said, ‘I’d been planning to call you. I’d really like to . . .’”

“Like to what?”

“I don’t
know
. Chris came by at that moment and grabbed me like the Jaws of Life. I’ll never know what he was going to say.”

“You could call and ask him.”

I told him then about the final conversation and Beau’s sarcastic barb about my not wasting any time.

“That kind of seals the deal, doesn’t it?” I said. “There’s no place to go from there.”

“Well, what do you want to happen? I thought you had the hots for Chris these days.”

“I
do
like him—very much. But I can’t seem to get Beau out of my system.”

“Then I’d call him,” he said, swirling his spoon around in his coffee. “Ask him what he was going to say.”

“Isn’t that groveling?”

“Yes, but as you know, I do think it has its place in love. Besides, you really have nothing to lose. If he’s hoping to connect with you, you’ll be giving him a second chance. If he was just blowing smoke up your you-know-what, you’re no worse off than if you didn’t approach him—except for the dent in your pride, that is.”

Later, after our walk home, I mulled over what he’d recommended. It was the kind of advice (permission to call him) that I’d secretly been hoping for, the kind of advice that friends often give because they know it’s what you want them to say, but in the end all it does is leave you feeling like an idiot for making contact with a guy who probably couldn’t even remember what state you were from. I pushed it out of my mind and settled down to work.

First I tried Harper—yet again—but got only voice mail. I left a message, saying it was urgent that I speak with her. I also tried Sheriff Schmidt’s cell and, when he didn’t pick up, the office. The woman who answered told me he was unavailable but she would take a message. Last, I called Beverly’s antiques store again. She answered the phone grimly. Clearly, Tom’s death was still weighing on her.

“The sheriff’s department has been around talking to people,” she told me. “I know they’ve spoken to Barry and also the Realtor, but based on the questions they’re asking, they’re not very far along in their investigation.”

“What will happen to the house, do you think, considering there are no heirs?” she inquired.

“I learned that the money in Tom’s trust will probably revert back to the Fain estate and go to charity. But I don’t know what will happen to anything that was outright Tom’s. At his age he may not have had a will.”

There was a moment before she said anything else, and I could sense her ruminating.

“It’s a shame there couldn’t be a way for the play to still be staged, though,” she said finally.

“The play?” I asked, curious.

“Tom had written a play, and he was hoping to mount and direct it at a small theater somewhere. He was going to use part of the proceeds from the house to do it.”

“Why not just use money he already had? I mean, he was able to come up with plenty of cash to advance Barry.”

“Oh, Tom needed more than that to put on a play. Originally he was hoping to get it from his trust, but there turned out to be complications from that.”

A question for Mr. Barish, it seemed.

I thanked her for her help and asked her to call me if she heard anything at all—even if it was only rumor.

There was an empty chunk of the day ahead of me before my planned assignation with Locket. I scribbled notes in my composition book—recaps of my meeting with Barish and the party. For the next two hours, I worked on my freelance piece, writing a rough draft on my laptop.