Died to Match Page 18

  “These are dee-lish, every one of them,” Buck announced. “Now, young lady, what’s all this pretty cake going to set me back?”

  I turned to watch, expecting some price resistance, or at least shrewd negotiation. Juice looked Buck right in the eye and named an astounding sum of money. The ladies fluttered a bit, but Buck just half-closed his eyes and worked his jaw for a minute.

  Then he slapped a hand on the plate-filled table and said, “Done! You get what you pay for, isn’t that right, Mother? Juice, honey, you got yourself a deal.”

  It’s the boots, I thought, trying not to think about the man with the doctor’s bag. And then, absurdly, Maybe they’ll start showing up at Juice’s place for breakfast instead of mine.

  The Buckmeisters began the long happy process of deciding on flavors, and as the delectable terms filled the air— cappuccino truffle, strawberry buttercream, Grand Marnier praline—I signaled to Juice that I’d be right back. I jaywalked across the street, glancing down the block as I approached the sign at the intersection.

  My guess was right. The utility roof was on the south side of a building whose main entrance was around the corner, facing west. A building I had been inside just two days before. I hurried around the corner, into the lobby, and onto an elevator, passing clusters of people with eager, horrified faces. As the doors slid closed I heard one of them say to a new arrival, “Some woman fell—”

  The moon-faced young policeman stopped me partway down the hall of the thirteenth floor.

  “Excuse me, miss, may I ask where you’re going?”

  I pointed silently to the door beyond him.

  “Did you know the occupant?”

  Did. Not do. Past tense. Oh, God.

  Angela Sims was dead.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  BY THE TIME I GOT BACK TO BY BREAD ALONE, THE Buckmeisters were gone and Juice was clearing away the cake plates.

  “Hey, where’d you go, Kincaid? Buck and the gang said they’ll see you later. Man, they are great people! And you were afraid—What’s the matter? You look like death.”

  I heard someone laughing, as if from a distance. It was me. She left the plates and came over to take my arm.

  “No kidding, you look like you’re gonna keel over. Here, sit down.” I sat, taking long shuddering breaths, while Juice brought me a mug of milky coffee. “Lots of sugar. Good for shock. Now, what’s up?”

  “I… had some bad news about a friend,” I said at last. I didn’t feel up to explanations. Not that there were any; the cop had just taken my name and address and sent me on my way. I knew what had happened, though, as surely as if I’d been there myself. But why hadn’t Angela secured her door? And why, I asked myself painfully, why hadn’t I warned all the attendants about Skull the day of the dress fitting? I could have saved her life.

  Juice was staring at me, waiting for more, but I shook my head.

  “It’s a long story, and I have to get back to the office. Um, congratulations about the Buckmeisters. You really impressed them. I’ll get back to you later about the cake contract, OK?”

  “No prob. Sorry about your friend.” Then she frowned angrily. “What the hell does she want?”

  Someone was banging on BBA’s locked front door. Juice stomped to the window and gestured at the Closed sign, but the pounding continued, and I heard a woman’s voice.

  “Carnegie, open up!” It was Corinne, wild-eyed and frantic. I pointed toward the side entrance, and went through the kitchen to let her in.

  “I saw him!”

  Corinne stumbled through the door and into my arms. Her raincoat was unbuttoned, the belt dangling, and her upswept hairdo was coming down. For a moment I felt her panic infecting me as well. But only for a moment. It’s funny; nothing helps you pull yourself together like somebody else falling apart. So I reacted as I usually do in a wedding crisis, and started ordering people around.

  “Juice, lock that door, would you? It’s OK, Corinne, you’re safe, he’s not coming in here.” It didn’t sound as though she knew about Angela, and I didn’t intend to tell her until she calmed down. “Now sit here and tell me what’s going on.”

  “I saw the tattooed man! I was going to have breakfast at the Athenian Café, but when I saw him I just kept going through the Market and I think he followed me! I was looking for a policeman but then I saw you through that window and, and…”

  “Here, take a swig of this.”

  Juice, instead of interrupting with questions, had very sensibly kept silent and brought over the rest of my coffee. As Corinne sipped at it, there was another knock at the front window, businesslike this time, and Juice went to unlock the front door for three burly men in coveralls—the cleaning crew, here to do the floors.

  “Kincaid, I kinda need you to leave, I gotta help these guys. If your friend’s OK now?”

  “She’s fine,” I said firmly. “Come on, Corinne, let’s go back to my office for a little while, and then you can go home, or to the Sentinel, or wherever.”

  “I should go to work,” said Corinne. She put down the coffee and rooted in her pocket for a tissue. “I have a deadline—”

  “OK, but we’ll stop at my office first, and we’ll call Lieutenant Graham. Juice, thanks a million.”

  On the way to the houseboat, I tried and failed to reach the detective on my cell phone. Just as well; I didn’t want to break the bad news to Corinne until I had her safely in my office. Climbing my stairs, the two of us kept glancing anxiously around, as if Skull had the powers of Dracula himself and could come swooping at us like a bat. It would have been laughable if I wasn’t still imagining Angela’s plunge from her balcony. Thirteen stories. Did she know what was happening? Did she scream?

  Eddie looked up from a snowstorm of printouts and welcomed us with his customary savoir faire.

  “So how’d it go with the cake? And who’s your friend?”

  My partner rarely meets the attendants for our weddings. I introduced Corinne, then settled her on the wicker love seat in the good room while I spoke to him privately, with the connecting door shut.

  “Eddie, another one of the Lamott bridesmaids has been killed. I have an idea who’s doing it, but—No, don’t interrupt, I need your help. Call Lieutenant Graham—here’s his card—and tell him Lester Foy was in the Pike Place Market this morning. Then call Elizabeth and her sister, tell them Angela is dead and the purse-snatcher is on the loose, they’ll know what that means. Tell them to be very, very careful, and I’ll talk to them soon. Got that?”

  “Got it.” And he picked up the phone. Eddie was a master of fuss and sputter when it came to the small stuff, but he knew a crisis when he saw one.

  Back in the good room, I sat next to Corinne and took her hand. It was cold, and she was trembling.

  “Corinne, you understand that you’re safe now, don’t you?” I said gently. “OK, I have to tell you something, about Angela. The police found her this morning, down below her balcony. She’s dead.”

  I was right about the hysterics. Corinne wrenched her hand away and leapt to her feet with a wail of horror. Then she threw herself against me, clutching me like a life preserver, and sobbed aloud. Always over the top, that was our Corinne.

  Suddenly I was overcome with distaste for her dramatics. I had felt obligated to break the news to her, but now I wanted her out of my office so I could have my own reaction to Angela’s death, and get on with my own work. I wondered, with a horrible sense of déjà vu, if Paul and Elizabeth would still want to carry on with the wedding. Beyond the expense issue and the heartbreak for dear old Enid, lay a grim question: What good would it do to cancel? Skull would still be lurking around, whether Elizabeth and her attendants spent the evening at a wedding or home watching TV

  This nightmare would continue until he was caught. Or until Elizabeth, Patty, Corinne, and I were all dead.

  Gradually the sobs died away, and Corinne slumped back into the love seat, hiccupping.

  “What are we going to do?”
she whispered. “He’s going to get us all.”

  “The first thing to do is get you over to the Sentinel. You’ll be safe there, and they’re bound to arrest this guy soon. Do you have someone who could stay with you tonight?”

  She nodded, just as Eddie came to the connecting door to say that Lieutenant Graham was on the phone.

  “Tell him I’ll be right there. And, Eddie, would you mind driving Corinne to her office?”

  I locked the door behind them, then picked up the phone. The detective was all business. “You were at Angela Sims’ building this morning. Why?”

  “I saw the police and went in, that’s all. Lieutenant, you’ve got to find Lester Foy He murdered Angela.”

  “You’re sure of that, are you?”

  “Don’t tell me you think she fell, for God’s sake! People don’t fall off their own balconies. He broke in there last night and—”

  “What makes you think someone broke in?”

  “Don’t tell me Angela let him in! A guy with a bat tattooed on his head?”

  “We don’t know who she let in, if anyone. What we do know is that two weeks ago a woman was raped in a building two blocks away. Her assailant threatened to push her out a window if she resisted him.”

  “And you think the same ‘assailant’ killed Angela?”

  “All I think is that it’s a far more likely hypothesis than your obsession with Lester Foy. He has no record of violence.”

  “It’s not an obsession! He was stalking me at the cemetery, and this morning he chased Corinne through the Pike Place Market.”

  “Chased her?”

  “Well, followed her.”

  “Did he threaten her in some way? Were there witnesses?”

  I kept forgetting: in Graham’s eyes, Skull was still just a petty thief and Corinne was still the girl who cried wolf. “I don’t think so. But you should talk to her. She’ll be at her desk at the Sentinel in a few minutes.”

  “Excellent idea,” he said dryly. “Any more suggestions about how to do my job?”

  “No, I guess not. Wait, what about Tommy Barry?” I’d been calling the hospital every day to check on Tommy’s condition. Some slight improvement, they kept telling me, but still no visitors. “Are you still guarding him?”

  “Round the clock.”

  “Good.” I could imagine the scene the sportswriter must have witnessed. The dim corridor, the shallow water lapping on stones, and Dracula looming over the fallen gypsy queen. Did Foy know there was a watcher in the shadows? Maybe he hadn’t seen Tommy clearly enough to identify him again. Or maybe he was casing the hospital as well as stalking the women who turned him in. “Tell your people to look out for those tattoos. Or maybe a rubber Dracula mask.”

  “Ms. Kincaid, I really don’t believe that Lester Foy was at that party.”

  “Why not?”

  “In any case, he’ll be picked up on the bail violation.”

  “And how long will that take? Foy must know that Corinne saw him at the Market today. He’ll go into hiding for a while, and then come after us again!”

  “I assure you, we’re doing all we can. Good-bye.”

  I hung up, frowning in concentration. Skull had to be drawn out into the open before he killed again. And I thought I knew how to do it.

  I paced along the picture windows lining the front of the office, and stared out unseeing at the pewter surface of the lake. It won’t really be dangerous, if I handle it right. And what else can I do? I just have to get a message to him…

  By the time Eddie returned, I had my plan. But first I had to make some explanations.

  “What in the Sam Hill is going on around here?” Eddie demanded. “Who’s Lester Foy?”

  “He’s the purse-snatcher from the bridesmaids’ luncheon last month. Have a seat and I’ll tell you the whole story.”

  Of course, I edited the story, telling him about Angela’s death and Corinne’s panicked flight, but nothing of my newly hatched scheme. Eddie seemed to take it all very calmly, until I told him I was going downstairs to rest for a while. He insisted on coming with me, peering ferociously up the dock toward the parking lot with every step. Then he checked through all the rooms, including the inside of my miniscule bedroom closet. If Graham was right, this was sheer paranoia and a waste of time. But I didn’t object.

  On his way out my front door, Eddie inspected the dead bolt. “You keep this locked, sister.”

  “I promise.”

  “And you should have one of those peephole things. For Christ’s sake, anybody could be standing out there and you wouldn’t—”

  “I’ll have one put in tomorrow! Besides, it’s daytime. Foy’s not going to show his face until—I mean, he’s probably lying low.”

  “Yeah, but you don’t know that. You want me to sleep down here tonight?”

  “Thanks, Eddie, but I think I’ll have company.”

  “Zack, you mean?” His clear gray eyes were uneasy. “Carnegie, it’s none of my business, but…”

  “But what? That’s never stopped you before.”

  “Dammit,” said Eddie, who actually seemed to be blushing under his leathery tan. “Dammit, maybe he’s a nice enough kid, but he’s too young for you! And besides, I thought you and Aaron were all set.”

  “Aaron and I are anything but ‘set.’ As far as I know he’s in Portland and not speaking to me, so let’s drop that subject, OK? And of course Zack’s too young for me. We’re just friends. I’m seeing someone else tonight. It’s… it’s a first date. Honestly, Eddie, let me run my own life, would you?”

  “Suit yourself,” he grumbled. “I’ll let you know when I’m ready to go home.”

  “I’ll be back up before then. I just want to nap for a bit, and maybe make some calls.”

  But once my partner was safely upstairs, I skipped the nap and went straight to the phone.

  “Juice, I need a favor.”

  “You got me another client!”

  “Sorry, no. That guitarist you told me about, Mandy Do you know how to reach her?”

  “Sure. Rita’s got her number.”

  “OK, I need you to call Mandy and tell her I want to see her boyfriend Lester. I think he’s probably staying with her, or at least she’ll know where he is.”

  “OK, but—”

  “Have her tell him that I’ve got a business proposition for him, and he should come to my houseboat. Tonight, at nine o’clock. Give her my address, directions, anything she wants. Tell Mandy… Tell her to say to Lester that I know all about Angela.”

  “Kincaid, is this gonna make sense to her? ’Cause it sounds pretty weird to me. Like blackmail or something.”

  “Trust me, Juice. Just do it, and call me back after you reach her, OK?”

  “OK.”

  Juice called back an hour later. It was a long hour. I clean house when I’m anxious, so I set about dusting my bookshelves, book by book, whether they needed it or not. I worked my way across the living room and then to the coffee table, and when the phone finally rang I dropped the biography of John Adams on my foot.

  “Ouch! Hello, Juice?”

  “Yeah. Mandy says he got the message, and he’ll be there. Are you going to tell me what’s going on?”

  “No.”

  “That’s what I figured. Watch your ass, Kincaid.”

  I assured her that I would. Then I called Lieutenant Graham and requested the pleasure of his company that evening.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  GRAHAM WAS FURIOUS, OF COURSE, AND TREATED ME TO A short, sharp summary of his views on civilians who meddle in police affairs. He scrupulously avoided profanity this time—a waste of effort on my account, really—but the words “harebrained” and “dangerous” cropped up repeatedly. I made myself comfortable on the living room couch and waited for him to run out of steam before I replied.

  “Look, Lieutenant, you keep saying that you don’t think Lester Foy is the murderer.”

  I could almost hear his teeth grinding. �
�That’s beside the point.”

  “No, it’s not! If you’re right, then all I’m doing is inviting over a small-time thief who jumped bail. You’ve had trouble finding him so far, but now you know exactly where he’s going to be at nine o’clock tonight.”

  “Unless he comes early.”

  “So, you can come earlier. I’ll feed you dinner.” Graham might even be good company, once he forgave me.

  But forgiveness was in short supply. “Never mind dinner. You just stay in your office with your partner until I get there. And don’t ever, ever, even consider pulling this kind of stunt again, or I will do my best to have you incarcerated myself. Understood?”

  “Understood.” I said it meekly enough, but I climbed the stairs to the office nursing a flicker of quiet triumph. This will work, I know it will. Then we can all stop being afraid.

  Meanwhile, though, the fear was still there. I spent the afternoon in a state of numb determination, going through the motions of a normal day just to pass the time until Skull’s arrest. Not that it’s ever normal to call a bride and ask her if she’s still alive.

  “I’m OK,” said Elizabeth, when I reached her at home. “Paul’s here, and he’s not letting me out of his sight. Patty’s at work, and she’s going to spend the night with friends.” I heard Paul’s voice in the background. “He says Zack is staying with Corinne at the newsroom.”

  “I know. She’s pretty upset.”

  “I bet she is, with this guy stalking her again.”

  “So you believe Corinne’s story now, about being attacked at the Aquarium?”

  Elizabeth laughed, a brief and bitter sound. “Angela didn’t, and look where it got her. Jesus, how long is it going to take for them to catch this maniac? I could have found him myself by now.”

  It struck me, suddenly, that for this particular warrior princess, losing control of a situation was almost worse than being in danger. Maybe making some bridal decisions would help.

  “Elizabeth,” I said briskly, “let’s assume, hypothetically that the police arrested Lester Foy like, maybe tonight. Would you and Paul want to go ahead with the wedding, do you think? I’m sorry to press you about it, but we’ll have to make some decisions soon. The cake, for one thing. It’s a three-day job, and I see I’ve got a message here on my desk to call the baker.”