Some Like It Haute: A Humorous Fashion Mystery (Style & Error Book 4) (5 page)

I felt sick. The bacon churned in my stomach and an acidic taste gurgled up into my throat. I filled a glass of water and chugged it, and then sat back down and clicked off the TV.

Only six looks had come down the runway. The sixth was Harper’s kimono. There had been something off about that garment from the start. The poor fit, the assignation to Harper, and the refusal to alter it. The rest of the show had gone off as fashion shows do. Which made me think that someone had planned all along to use the kimono to start the fire.

Was that why I’d been attacked? Because someone didn’t like the fact that I spoke up on behalf of Harper and asked for it to be altered? Because maybe someone had been planning all along to sabotage the show, and the kimono had been the trigger?

But still, rigging a garment to ignite on the runway in the middle of a show was a pretty out-there concept. I couldn’t help think of how many people had a stake in a fashion show’s success: designer, financial backer, models, model management, venue, press. And every single one of these people had not only been there, but had access. Would one of them gain more by destroying the show than helping to create it? What secret had been hidden amongst the garments and the shoes and the rose petals?

This wasn’t the first disastrous runway show in fashion history. The year Lindsay Lohan was affiliated with Ungaro and failed to show up for the runway show was pretty bad. So was an early Michael Kors show when plaster fell from the ceiling of the loft where the show took place and landed on the heads of some high profile models. But neither was this bad. A collection that quite literally went up in flames.

Amanda wasn’t the luckiest of designers. A little over a year ago, she’d been favored to win a local design competition that never took place because one of the judges was killed. While she missed out on the cash prize, the publicity helped her land financial backers who funded her debut runway collection tonight. But like I said, luck wasn’t on her side. People knew her name, but little more. There might be no such thing as bad press, but for a designer, sooner or later you’ve got to prove your worth. Otherwise you’re little more than a runner-up on a cancelled reality show. No one quite remembers who you are.

It didn’t take long for me to find out what everyone was talking about even though I was squirreled away at Dante’s house. The local news, the Internet, and the
Ribbon Times
fed me information. None of which compared to what I could find out from Eddie. I found my phone sitting on an end table and called him.

“Hey, dude,” he said. “How are you feeling?”

“A little banged up but mostly okay.”

“You heard about Amanda’s show?”

I paused for a second, weighing the pros and cons of admitting that I’d ignored his cautionary words and had gone to Warehouse Five anyway. “I heard,” I said.

“It was crazy, dude. People went nuts. I didn’t think I was going to get out of there alive.”

“You were there?”

“Tradava arranged for me to attend. I got there right when the lights went down.”

Tradava was the reason I’d left my job as Senior Buyer for designer shoes at Bentley’s New York. Okay, so maybe the chance to start over was the reason, but Tradava was the enabler. I wouldn’t have quit my job in New York without something lined up in Ribbon, and when I’d landed that job, I’d felt the planets aligning to give me a chance to get on the road less traveled. It was either my greatest spontaneous decision, or my greatest mistake; the jury was still out on which.

So after landing the trend specialist job at Tradava, the fashion director who hired me was murdered, and everything went downhill from there. A year into my relocated life in Ribbon, I didn’t know if I wanted to work for a company who had shown so little interest in employing me once the murder was cleared up. Still, they had benefits.

“Do you think you could do me a favor?” I asked.

“Sure. Are you still at the hospital? Need me to sneak in a meatball sandwich?”

“No. I—I went to the show last night too. With Dante. And now I’m at his house. Can you swing by my house and check on Logan?”

“I’m not sure which part of that to comment on first. You went home with Dante?”

“Yes, but it’s not like that.”

“I’m reminded of a phrase that includes frying pans and fires, but in light of what happened last night, to actually say it out loud might be in poor taste. Let’s just say I hope you know what you’re doing,” he said. “And yes, I’ll check on your cat on my lunch break.”

“Thank you,” I said. Tires crunched in the driveway out front. I peeked out the window. Dante’s motorcycle pulled onto the bottom of the gravel-covered driveway and slowly snaked up to the house. “I’ll call you back,” I said and hung up.

I opened and shut a few drawers in Dante’s kitchen, looking for a scrap of paper and a pen. I needed to take notes of what I remembered from Warehouse Five last night while the memories were still fresh. At home, I knew where I kept everything. In Dante’s apartment, I was at a loss.

The third drawer down was filled with an assortment of cards and photos. And the photo on the top was of Dante, a pretty blonde and a young boy. I flipped the photo over. In green pen was the caption, “Dante, Linda, and Jameson.”

I should stop. I knew I should stop. I should put the photo back in the drawer, close the drawer, take a Sharpie out of one of the cups next to sofa and write my notes on a napkin. But instead, I pulled out the next several photos. The blonde and the boy by a birthday cake.
Jameson’s 6th birthday.
And one of Dante and the boy fishing. Happiness—and similar bone structure—evident in both of their faces.

The click of the door hijacked my attention and the photo floated to the floor.

“I forgot my wallet,” Dante said from the doorway.

“I was looking for a piece of paper,” I said.

“Paper’s in the bottom drawer.”

“I didn’t get to that one yet.”

He walked over and scooped the dropped photo from the floor. The open drawer was next to my thigh. He dropped the photo into the drawer and pushed it closed with his knee. I didn’t move. When he stood, he was inches away from me.

“I have a son. He’s seven now. He and his mom live in Philly.”

I tried to act nonchalant, to pretend I wasn’t curious or surprised, but I felt the heat climb my face and suspected that I was failing miserably. “I thought when you weren’t here,
you
lived in Philly.”

“I do.”

“You’re not married, are you?”

“No.”

“Were you?”

“She and I didn’t work. It’s about what’s best for Jameson.”

“Do you see him often?”

“Weekends, mostly.”

“But today is a weekend and you’re here.”

“Something else came up.”

I looked away, embarrassed. I was suddenly overwhelmed with questions that I had no right to ask.

“I’m sorry about the violation of your privacy,” I said.

“No worries.” He stepped away from me and glanced down at my T-shirt. I crossed my arms over my chest. He smiled. “How’s the pain?”

“I’ll deal. It’ll get better.”

“In time. With rest.”

“And what happens in the meantime? Whoever did this gets away with it?”

“Gets away with what?” Dante prodded.

“I don’t know.”

“I’ve been thinking about it myself.”

“And?”

“And I haven’t reached any conclusions. You look like you have a couple of theories. Use me,” he said, and cocked an eyebrow, “as a sounding board. Unless you want to use me for something else.”

“We are not going to have that conversation while I have an assortment of internal injuries around my midsection.”

“That’s fair.” He leaned back in his chair and a grin tugged at his lips. As much as Dante knew from his work with a private investigator, this wasn’t his world. It was mine. And I could use a fresh perspective.

Ever since moving to Ribbon, I’d surrounded myself with people who knew what the fashion world was like. Nick was a shoe designer. Eddie was the visual director at Tradava. Cat owned her own off-price designer boutique. Every one of us accepted the peculiarities of the industry as if they were normal. But here we were, with a sabotaged fashion show in our own back yard. Nothing normal about that. There was a possibility that Dante really would listen to me, that he’d help me see something that I hadn’t seen so far.

Or, there was another possibility that he was playing with me the way Logan played with the occasional chipmunk he caught in the yard. Swat them, let them run a few steps away, then catch them and swat at them again. I saw what Logan’s game did to the chipmunks. I didn’t want that to happen to me.

Dante carried the plates to the kitchen and washed them. He transferred them to a drying rack that sat on his counter. “I can tell you’re wrestling with something,” he said. “Let me know when you want to talk.”

I bit my lip and stared at the coffee table. I still had too many questions I needed to work out.

“I’m going to take a shower,” I said.

“Go crazy.”

When I was done, I spritzed last night’s dress with Dante’s cologne and put it back on. I dried my hair and pulled it into a low ponytail, and then capped it with a gray houndstooth fedora from the Justin Timberlake part of Dante’s closet.

When I returned to the living room, Dante was on the sofa inspecting a camera and a couple of lenses on the table in front of him. “Is that my hat?”

“It is.”

He raised an eyebrow. “Looks good on you.”

“Thanks.” I scooped up the keys, pulled on my black wool coat, and headed to the front door.

“Where are you going?”

“I need some fresh air.” I paused by the door, not sure if he was going to tell me when to be back, or if I was going to tell him where I was headed. A few seconds passed, and I left.

I have never driven a sports car before in my life, and the concept of being handed the keys to a Corvette Stingray, no strings attached, was slightly beyond my grasp. I sat in the soft leather bucket seat and ran my hands over the steering wheel several times before starting the car. The engine roared to life the way the lion roars at the beginning and end of MGM movies. I undid the parking break, put the car in gear, and coasted down the driveway. I pulled onto Duryea Drive and followed the winding road until eventually I made it out to the streets of downtown Ribbon. Minutes later, I parked in front of Amanda Ries’ workroom.

What was I doing here? I wasn’t sure. What I was sure of was that Amanda did not want to see me or talk to me. After the way she’d dismissed me the night before the show, and after her reaction to me at the hospital, it had been clear that we weren’t destined to become the kind of friends who braid each other’s hair. But I’d been attacked because of my affiliation with her. Maybe nobody else was trying to find out who had assaulted me, but I wasn’t willing to let it go.

I got out of the car and locked the doors, then followed the sidewalk up to the front entrance. I paused in front of the white front door and tried on greetings and explanations as to why I was there. Much like bathing suit shopping after the holidays, none of them fit. Before I came up with the perfect salutation, the front door opened inward. Tiny stood in front of me, barely contained in the frame of the door.

“Don’t just stand there,” she said, “come on in. We’ve been expecting you since last night.”

7

I stepped backward and glanced at the sign mounted to the left of the front door. “ARS | Amanda Ries Studios,” it read. I tried to look around Tiny but was unsuccessful.

“What do you mean you’ve been expecting me? Nobody knew I was coming here.”
I didn’t even know I was coming here.
“Who is ‘we’?”

“Your reputation precedes you. Amanda knew you’d show up sooner or later.” She handed the door to me and headed inside. She turned around again. “Coffee?” she asked.

“Sure.”

She went into the next room. I unbuttoned my coat but left it on. The only time I’d been here before, Amanda hadn’t invited me inside. She’d met me at the front door with a rolling rack of garment bags filled with samples and closed the door behind me.

This time I was inside and more than a little curious. I couldn’t say what it was about Amanda that got me, unless I did a little soul searching and acknowledged a basal jealousy that left me feeling an unattractive shade of green.

Amanda had attended I-FAD, the Institute of Fashion, Art, and Design, with Nick. I didn’t know how much intimacy was included in their college history, but they had remained close long after graduation. Amanda was gorgeous, with sleek long black hair parted on the side, her perfect size four figure, her five-foot nine frame in flats, though she rarely wore them. She could have been one of the models walking the runway like Harper instead of the designer producing the clothes, and the fact that she’d chosen the more creative of the two paths, and showed every indication of being successful at it, seemed an unfair bounty of talent. At least, that’s what a petty person would think. I was doing my best not to be petty. For now.

Amanda’s waiting area was a study in black and white. The carpet was black and ran wall to wall. The walls were a crisp contrast. Abstract paintings on unframed canvases filled the walls. A vintage bust form, covered in black patent leather, sat by the front window, as if to welcome visitors with its limbless figure.

“Here’s your coffee,” Tiny said. “Cream, no sugar. Right?”

“Right. How’d you know?”

“I watched you make it every day for the past four weeks.”

I wondered what else Tiny might have noticed about me in those four weeks. Did she think I’d seen something that I shouldn’t have seen? Did she have reason to want to scare me off? Tiny might be over six feet tall, but that didn’t mean she was above suspicion. I took the mug from her outstretched hand and blew on the hot liquid.

“Sam, before Amanda comes out here, I want to say something. We both appreciate the work you did on the show. Neither one of us considers you in any way responsible. I don’t know if that was ever made clear.”