Kiss of Death Page 18

  “Maybe the kid talked her mother into breaking up with the actor,” Walter said, “an’ now she feels guilty about it because her mother’s dead.”

  “Possible, but that seems a little weak, considering the powerful reaction she had to the mention of Jay Garwood’s name.”

  “I’m gonna comb through the registries of sex offenders an’ see if I can turn up something on your actor.”

  Walter searched thoroughly, but he didn’t find anything on Jay Garwood supporting my suspicion that he’d molested Didi. I had to admit my guess was wrong.

  “If conclusion-jumping was an Olympic sport,” I told Walter, “I’d have taken home the gold.”

  Chapter 32

  TUESDAY MORNING, AS I reached the Global Broadcasting building, I was surprised to see Nancy standing outside, waiting for me. That was so uncharacteristic I asked immediately, “What’s happened?”

  “They’ve set the date for my trial. September twenty-fifth.”

  A jolt of apprehension shot through me. “So soon? That’s less than three months away!”

  She gestured toward the building’s ground-floor coffee shop, the Central Park Café. “Do you have time for coffee, so we can talk about things?”

  “Absolutely. The show’s crisis du jour can wait.”

  The cafe was only half full this morning. Summer vacations had temporarily thinned the ranks of the regulars. Nancy and I took a booth in the back.

  I asked her if she’d had breakfast.

  She shook her head. “I’m not hungry.”

  In an attempt to lighten the dark atmosphere caused by an approaching trial, I told her, “At times like these, best friends say, ‘you’ve got to keep up your strength.’ At least have some toast, or a muffin.”

  Without waiting for her to agree, I ordered coffee for both of us and a blueberry muffin for Nancy. As soon as we were alone again, I asked, “Can’t Kent get the trial date moved back, maybe to after the New Year?”

  “He doesn’t want to. We refused to waive my right to a speedy trial. Kent says that the quicker we get to court the better it is for me, because the State will have to rush in preparing their case.”

  “And when people rush, they make mistakes. The prosecutors have a lot of cases to handle,” I said. While Kent Wayne’s strategy made sense, still the thought of Nancy going to trial so soon, or at all, made my stomach muscles clench with tension.

  “Don’t look so worried,” she said brightly. “I’ve got an invincible team around me.”

  I matched her bravado. “Bobby and Walter and Kent and Matt, and the two of us. Six against the State of New York.” I wanted to think the State didn’t have a chance, but I knew that in this David and Goliath battle to save Nancy, we were David. Unfortunately, we didn’t have a slingshot. At least, we hadn’t found one yet.

  “There’s something else,” Nancy said.

  “What?”

  “Have you heard from Chet?”

  “He calls a couple of times a week,” I said. “Last I heard, his father was almost ready to leave the hospital.”

  “He’s home now. And Chet’s on his way back to New York.”

  “I didn’t know that.” So he told Nancy before he told me. That’s interesting. “Chet’s been worried about you,” I said. “Every time we talk he asks how the investigation is going.”

  “He’s been very supportive,” Nancy said. “Do you mind?”

  “Of course not! I’m glad he’s such a good friend.” But I realized Nancy wasn’t really asking if I minded that Chet called her. Something else was going on. “We’ve been best friends for almost thirteen years. Out with it.”

  Nancy looked down at the blueberry muffin her fingers were taking apart. “I know you and Matt … well, what I mean is … if things aren’t going to work out with you and Chet, how would you feel if Chet and I saw each other once in a while—I mean, just as friends.”

  “I’d be very happy about it,” I said sincerely.

  “I don’t even know if he would want to. He hasn’t said anything about it. I was just asking.”

  “Don’t turn that muffin into crumbs, eat it,” I said. “You’ve got to stay healthy while we find out who really killed Veronica Rose. Chet’s going to be a great addition to Team Nancy.”

  And maybe he’ll turn out to be the right man for you, I thought. Chet’s a wonderful person—almost as good a man as my best friend deserves.

  CHET CALLED THAT night to invite me to lunch—lunch, not dinner. That told me I was right to sense that our relationship had changed.

  “Name the restaurant,” Chet said. “How about something Broadway glamorous, like Sardi’s? Or French elegant, like Jean Luc’s?”

  “I’ve got so much work to do. What if we just have lunch in the Central Park Café on the ground floor of the Global building?”

  “You’re a cheap date. Here I’m willing to spring for the fresh fish of the day, and order chocolate soufflés for dessert.”

  “How about we go to the cafe, and I promise to order the most expensive thing on the menu?”

  “Whatever you say.” Pause. “How are you doing, Morgan?”

  Now he’s calling me Morgan. He used to call me “gorgeous.”

  “I’m okay, but I’m worried about Nancy, as you can imagine. Hey, wait a minute,” I said, as though the idea had just this moment occurred to me. “Instead of taking me to lunch, why don’t you take Nancy? Between my workload and following leads in the murder case, I barely have time to sleep. It would cheer Nancy up a lot if you could spend some time with her. Take her to dinner—maybe to a show. It’s been months since she’s had any fun. When you see her, she can fill you in on the investigation. You might even come up with some brilliant idea nobody else has thought of.”

  On the other end of the line, Chet was silent for a moment. Then: “You’re a good lady,” he said softly. His words were a perfect example of an unspoken communication.

  “Yeah, yeah. I’m going to run for saint, but if I win I’ll demand a recount,” I joked. “Go on, call Nancy. Give her something to look forward to.”

  After we said goodbye, I picked up the Yellow Pages. It was time to buy a black wig.

  Chapter 33

  AT A QUARTER past twelve the next day, I told Betty that I needed fresh air. “I’m going for a walk and have a hamburger somewhere. Can I bring anything back for you?”

  “No, thanks,” she said. “Craft Services has Swedish cabbage rolls today. I’m going to fill up a plate and eat lunch with the makeup twins.”

  I flashed my cell phone at her. “The electronic leash. Call me if there’s a crisis.” Giving her an affectionate salute, I left the Global Network building and hurried up the street toward the subway entrance at Sixty-sixth and Central Park West.

  It was hot and noisy under the city streets. Even in the middle of the day, when the tunnels weren’t crammed with people, the odor of sweat was the heaviest perfume in the air, but for traveling long distances around New York City, there’s no transportation that’s faster or cheaper than the subways. I bought a MetroCard at a vending machine and caught the A train.

  There were a few vacant seats in my car as it sped north, but I was too full of nervous energy to sit. I hooked one elbow around a standing pole and watched the stations flash by the subway car’s dirty windows.

  It took almost half an hour to get to my destination: Dyckman Street, in the Inwood section of the city.

  The neighborhood of Inwood, at the northern tip of Manhattan, is one of many small town-type areas in New York City, with schools, a lovely big park, high-rise apartment houses on tree-lined streets, and many local businesses. It was to three of those businesses that I was headed today. I’d chosen to come to Inwood on this shopping trip because no one who worked on the show lived up here, nor did anyone else I knew. The chance of my running into someone who recognized me was about as low as a chance could get.

  Using the Yellow Pages, I’d found a wig shop on Dyckman Street. Next, I�
�d looked up stores that sold the other items I wanted, and found everything within a three-block radius.

  Armed with my list of addresses, I made my way through heavy pedestrian traffic on Dyckman until I reached Marilyn’s House of Hair. The shop occupied a narrow space between an Italian grocery store and a three-story commercial building with a blue and white sign that advertised the office of a CREDIT DENTIST on the second floor.

  Wig stands with painted faces, sporting a variety of hairstyles and colors, filled a shelf in the shop’s front window. Propped on a display easel at the end nearest the entrance was a faded eight-by-ten framed publicity photo of Marilyn Monroe.

  A little bell jingled over my head as I entered. There were no customers, but a girl with rainbow-streaked hair came through a curtain that screened the front of the store from whatever was in the rear.

  Rainbow Hair was about twenty. She stopped within a few feet of me—close enough to see the pair of little silver rings that pierced her eyebrows, and the silver stud on her chin. In a bored voice, she asked, “Help ya?”

  Forcing my eyes away from her face hardware, I said, “I’m looking for a black wig.”

  “Real hair, or fake?”

  “Real.”

  “We got three styles made with human.” She ticked them off on her fingers. “The Snow White model—ya know, like in Disneyland? We got a Diana Ross Afro. An’ the Cleopatra. I saw all about Cleopatra on TV. A snake bit her on a boob.”

  “I’m not superstitious. Let me see the Cleopatra, please.”

  She removed a wig from a glass case below a display of beaded necklaces, and gestured for me to sit in the chair that faced a tabletop mirror. The Cleopatra looked like it was going to be exactly what I needed: straight black hair, shoulder length, with bangs.

  In seconds, the girl had expertly pinned my own hair flat against my scalp and fitted the wig to my head.

  The transformation was amazing. When I added the pair of nonprescription eyeglasses I’d bought in a drugstore, I was pretty sure that not even Nancy would recognize me, at least not at first glance. If anyone in Belle Valley, Ohio, ever described me, their details wouldn’t match Morgan Tyler.

  As I stared at my reflection, the girl asked, “Wha’cha want this for?”

  “A costume party.”

  “Oh, good!” She sounded relieved. “I was afraid you were gonna have chemo an’ lose your hair. If that was the problem, then I was gonna recommend a blonde wig, something close to the color of your own hair. That way, nobody would have to know.”

  Nobody would have to know. In the mirror, I saw genuine concern in the girl’s eyes and realized that I’d formed a wrong impression of her. By focusing on the piercings, I hadn’t looked for the person beneath the metal. Shame on me.

  I paid for the wig in cash. Waiting for a receipt, I asked if she worked on commission. When she said she did, I bought a hundred dollars worth of the beaded necklaces that hung on a Plexiglas stand next to the register.

  Back out on Dyckman Street, I went to the end of the block and turned left. My next stop was a store called The Blessed Event, to buy a maternity dress. After I selected one, I’d leave the necklaces in the dressing room, for whoever might like to have them.

  Finally, I would go to the hardware store a block farther down for the last two items on my list: a roll of duct tape, and a pair of needle-nose pliers.

  Chapter 34

  I BEGAN GETTING up at five A.M. instead of six. With a mug of coffee on the right side of my bedroom keyboard and Magic curled up on the left, in easy petting distance, I worked on scripts and new storylines for the show. At six-thirty, I zipped off what I’d written to my office computer and to Betty’s, and closed the program.

  While I showered, I thought about Walter because I was going to have to lie to him. He’d spent years in law enforcement, seeing through phony stories. I’d have to give a really convincing performance if I was going to succeed in leaving town without sending his “lie meter” flashing.

  At seven, dressed and ready for the day—and hiding my nervousness behind a sunny smile—I met Walter in the kitchen for breakfast. Magic, scurrying ahead, jumped up onto the counter and sat next to his can of Natural Balance salmon, swishing his tail. He fixed me with the “open-that-now” stare he’d perfected. I obeyed.

  “Good morning,” I said—and right away wondered if I was sounded too cheerful.

  At the other end of the counter, Walter was whipping eggs with a fork. “Morning.”

  I removed the top from Magic’s salmon, put the food into his dish, and watched as he attacked his breakfast.

  “You’re getting up pretty early these days,” Walter said.

  He’d provided an opening for my lie. I yawned, hoping that would disguise any hint of nervousness in my voice. “I’ve decided to treat myself to a three-day weekend at a spa, so I’m getting ahead on my work. I haven’t taken a vacation in three years.”

  Walter didn’t say anything. Because he was facing away from me, I couldn’t see his eyes. He slid the beaten eggs into the heated frying pan and reached over to put slices of whole wheat bread into the toaster.

  “I’m looking forward to my trip to the spa.” Immediately, I regretted saying that. It was one sentence too much. When people lie, they tend to overtalk.

  Walter turned and peered at me through the round glasses that, with his spherical face, made him look like an owl. A skeptical owl. “A spa. That one of those places where they make you drink juice made out of grass? You don’t need to lose weight.”

  I busied myself setting the table. “I won’t be on the weight-loss program. I just want a weekend of facials, massages, and sleep.”

  I felt him watching me. A nervous fluttering began in my stomach, and I wondered if he’d had this same effect on the people he’d arrested back in his sheriff days.

  “When are you plannin’ to go?”

  “Friday morning, and I’ll be back Sunday night.”

  The toast popped up. I took the slices out and put them into the silver toast rack on the table. I never thought of myself as a silver toast rack kind of person, but Penny had given it to me last Christmas, and I kept it polished. My one attempt at domestic elegance.

  Walter turned off the flame under the eggs and divided them onto our plates.

  “You don’t mind taking care of Magic while I’m gone, do you?” I asked. “His cupboard is stocked with food, and taped inside the door are the name and number of his veterinarian, Dr. Jeffrey Marks.”

  “I know where everything is. The little fella and I get along real well.”

  “I’ll keep my cell phone on,” I said. “If something breaks in Nancy’s case and I’m needed here, I’ll come back right away.”

  “Bobby an’ me, and Kent Wayne’s people, are still checking out the Boston suspects. It’ll probably be awhile before we know anything concrete. You go on your trip.”

  Eager to change the subject, I said, “At the studio today, I’m going to talk to people who work with Jay Garwood, to see what I can find out.”

  “Good,” Walter said. His tone was pleasant, but his smile was perfunctory: lips only, no eye contact involved. That told me he was somewhere deep in his own thoughts.

  WHEN I REACHED the office an hour later, I repeated my lie to Betty.

  “You could use a little time to yourself,” Betty said.

  “Sometimes I think you work an eight-day week.” She picked up her notebook. “Where will you be?”

  I shook my head. “That’s my secret. If there’s a crisis you or Tommy can’t solve, you can get me on my cell. Short of a catastrophe, from Friday morning until Sunday night, I don’t want to be bothered.”

  “I’ll be the dragon guarding your cave,” Betty said.

  Ten scripts for future episodes were waiting for me on my desk. They’d come in from my staff of associate writers. Going over them, making minor revisions, and rewriting the dialogue where necessary occupied me all morning. It was intense work, and ke
pt me from thinking about where I would really be on this coming Friday night.

  At lunchtime, I went looking for Eva Martin. On the days she worked, Eva, who played Sylvia, usually had lunch in her dressing room while she studied her lines.

  Her dressing room door was slightly ajar. I knocked.

  When Eva called, “Come in,” I pushed it all the way open and saw that she was rehearsing with actor Bill Randall, who played Stuart, Sylvia’s longtime nemesis on the show. That was a piece of good luck for me. I’d planned to talk to Bill after my chat with Eva. Now I had both of them together. These two actors, who had been on Love for twenty years, might be able to tell me something I needed to know.

  Eva, “with the movie-star face,” to quote an enchanted male magazine writer who rhapsodized about her mature beauty, was in her early fifties. She’d been an actress in Hollywood, doing moderately well playing leads in low-budget films. It wasn’t until she moved to New York that she’d found stardom and lasting success in Daytime drama as one of the most beloved characters on Love of My Life. As Tommy had remarked one day when we were watching her on-screen, Eva had been wasted in movies; her exquisite face was made for Daytime drama’s many lingering close-ups.

  Bill, in his late fifties, had dark blond hair that was going silver at the sides. He was attractive in an off-center way; his features would never be described as handsome, but his eyes were so lively and intelligent that the effect made him compelling. Even though Bill played a character with few scruples and a bushel of flaws, he brought such emotional nuances to the role of Stuart that he had acquired many loyal fans.