Deadly Dues (30 page)

I felt a surge of sympathy. Yes, he had put an end to my career and income. I blamed him for being weak. But I now knew that it was Sherilyn who had ended my Doggie Doggie Bow Wow days, Pete's marriage, Geoff's lucrative leading-man gigs, Gretchen's contracts and Bent's coaching gigs.

On contemplation, I did mourn him. I theorized that he was a man who had tried to do the right thing, but had been felled by his hormones and Sherilyn's cleavage.

What surprising paths we take, as a result of the wrong directions, map or mood, I mused.

As I munched on a pork bun at Yen's Market, I wondered, shockingly, if it had been so terrible that my career as the spokesperson for Bow Wow had ended. The gig had been wonderfully lucrative, and I loved my tiled kitchen floor and my Stuart Weitzman boots, but . . .

But.
I chewed on the bun and the thought. Did I really, really want to spend the rest of my working life as a cute, adorable dog-food icon? How many more times could I stand to hear people singing that damned song into my face, as if I should be thrilled to hear it? I was invariably polite. But another part of me wanted to scream, “Enough already! Get a life!”

Maybe I should take my own advice. I had had other options, which I had not pursued once the Bow Wow contract was in place. I had turned down the second lead in a comedy series about singing grave robbers because of the dog-food gig, and I hadn't minded. On reviewing the pilot script, I really hadn't minded. But had I closed too many doors?

I wanted respect. I wanted what was due me. Realistically, I knew I should be respected for my work in the commercials, which were well produced, funny and compelling. I had taken the text to a level that was warmer and more human than what was on the page. Yet I had never felt respected enough for that work, even though the commercial had won numerous awards over the years, including several for me as an individual.

I finished the pork bun and placed the wrapper in Yen's waste bin.

“Wonderful,” I said.

“I know,” he said, beaming serenely. I thought
, How good it must be to know on a daily basis that you have done good work and that people are happy.
Was this any different from people singing Doggie Doggie into my face?

Perhaps those annoying Doggie choruses, off-key or not, were a tribute to my talent. Maybe it was time to put my resentment to rest.

I climbed back into the Sunfire and returned to Puppy Spa, where Horatio was waiting for me. He swanned into the lobby like Peter O'Toole in full regalia, nose in the air, with a peach ribbon tied to one ear and a satiated, happy look in his eye.

Lonnie's hair had now drooped into a shaggy, fluffy mess, a sign that she and Horatio had connected on a spiritual, cosmic and cosmetic plane.

“Horatio seems a little mellow, as if he has moved through some transition to a deeper understanding of himself,” she said reverently.

“Probably,” I said. “The poor guy has been traumatized the past few days, but I lucked out. I found a dog whisperer.”

Her eyes turned into Frisbees.

“A dog whisperer? Wow.”

She pressed a card into my hand.

“Tell her to call us. We would so love a dog whisperer.”

“
Him,
” I said. “I'll tell him.”

As I drove away, with Horatio's extremely heavy head on my leg, I thought that Hal and Puppy Spa would be a good match. He could give them doggie dimension. They could give him doggie dollars.

Inside the condo, Horatio padded over to his dog cushion and collapsed happily. He gave me a look of such sweetness and love that I beamed at him. Then he settled down into his usual big hairy blob of contentment.

I remembered why I loved him. Because he was, for the most part, reliable, lovable, cuddly and (except for the unfortunate lapse with Zonko) loyal. And he was sincere, which is more than you can say for some other forms of life.

I smoothed his head and rubbed his right-hand towel—I mean, very large ear. Horatio just needed unconditional love and attention a few times a day, and gave it back generously. Mitzi had once said to me that she would love a man who was like a dog—just pat him once in a while, scratch his ears and send him out to play. Seemed sort of cold to me.

After I had settled Horatio, I checked my e-mail. More Viagra. Several invitations to Las Vegas (alas, not from gentleman callers or old friends, but from a travel agency). And a message from Mitzi with an urgent flag on it.

“Please come to my condo ASAP.” She already had her BlackBerry. Maybe she was worried that I had found her exchanges with Stan and wanted to explain. I checked my cell. No messages. Usually she would call my cell, every actor's lifeline to work.

I suspected that Mitzi was hiding something more than her surprising relationship with Stan. But she was my agent and, despite all suspicious events, my friend, and I was going to go.

What about Horatio? I peeked around the corner of my den to check on him. He was snoozing and rumbling.

I couldn't impose on Mrs. Lauterman again. She had been such a good sport about sitting with him last night. Horatio took that moment to raise one giant ear and open one eye. I interpreted that as a signal that he would be just fine.

I had forgotten to deliver Mrs. L.'s groceries. Maybe it wouldn't be a bad idea to tell somebody where I was going. Mrs. Lauterman wasn't my first choice, but she was convenient.

I wanted to believe that Mitzi was still my best friend, my ferocious agent, my big-time shoe pal, and that whatever she was doing was for a good reason.

I ground my teeth.
Lu, stop that. Remember how Sherilyn sounded.
I forced myself to relax my molars and looked around for an easily hidden weapon. I decided against the rolling pin.
Would Mitzi's doorman say, “Is that a rolling pin in your pocket, or are you happy to see me?”
I rummaged in my junk drawer and found a Swiss Army knife (one dollar, Shelter from the Cold thrift store). I had never been able to open it, so dumped it back into the drawer. An umbrella. (Stupid idea. I wasn't Mary Poppins.) A nail file. (Pathetic.) A spray bottle of a high-end, beautifully packaged perfume called Snake Venom, given to me as a gift years ago, which sent anybody who smelled it into paroxysms of gagging. Perfect. I put the bottle in my purse.

Horatio raised his head dreamily as I closed the door, bag of groceries on my arm.

I walked across the lawn to Mrs. Lauterman's building, thankful that no fence separated her apartment condo building from the Rockvale Estates townhouses, and pressed the elevator button. She was waiting for me with her door open. She was either psychic or had been watching for me through the window.

“Thanks, Lulu,” she smiled from behind her walker. “You're a little doll.” Funny, I would object to those words from a stranger on the street, but from Mrs. Lauterman they made my heart warm.

She backed up with her walker. She was an excellent, if somewhat erratic, driver. Better than I was with the Sunfire. I carried the paper bag to her counter and unpacked the milk, bread, apples and Metamucil. And a jumbo-size chocolate bar. She seized it with joy. I thought she was going to inhale it, wrapper and all. Guy Lombardo played in the background on her record player, which, like her, was old but still ready for action.

“Oh, Lulu, you remembered!” She hadn't asked for a chocolate goodie, but one look at her radiant face when you produced anything with chocolate and more fat and sugar than a human body should ingest in a week, told me I had done the right thing. She hated dessert. She loved candy. I figured that at her age she should darned well eat what she wanted. She was going to outlive all her fussy doctors anyway. They didn't like the ginger wine and the martinis she downed regularly either, but I was totally in Mrs. L.'s camp.

“So where are you off to now, Lulu?” she asked, her sharp little eyes watching me while the strains of “Boo Hoo” played.

“I'm going to Mitzi's,” I said.

Mrs. L. watched me.

“Do you always clench your pretty hands like that when you are going to Mitzi's?”

Whoops.

“No,” I blushed. “I guess I'm a little nervous. No big deal.”

I told her about Mitzi's message, trying to sound casual. Mrs. Lauterman was very quiet for a moment.

“Maybe you should call that nice detective before you rush over there.”

I shook my head and turned to go.

“Let me know what you need this weekend, and I'll pick it up at Barnaby's Market.”

“Thanks, dear, you're a little doll.”

She and her walker followed me to the door, with a few false steps here and there, so we did our usual dance with her swaying and my catching her, and then we reversed positions and I almost tripped on her walker, and what can I say—it is an interesting diversion from being first a famous television actor and then a not-so-famous fry flinger at McDonald's. And now I was ex–both of those.

She watched me from her door, trembling over her walker as I walked to the elevator.

“Lulu!”

I turned, wondering what treat she wanted.

“Be careful, dear.”

“Oh, yes,” I said blithely, using the carefree tone that viewers had loved in
Daddy's Girls
, a forgettable, syrupy TV movie in which, at the ripe old age of thirty, I had played a pregnant teenager. It was the dimples. No-fail cuteness.

I waited until the elevator doors closed behind me, then leaned against the wall and breathed deeply. Yes, I would be careful. If I didn't survive this visit to Mitzi's, who would bring Mrs. Lauterman her groceries? Maybe I should have sent an e-mail to Geoff, Pete or Bent. Surely one of them could manage to make a few stops at the market after my funeral. Why hadn't I thought to revise my will before I left the condo? All it would have taken was a few hours, several hundred dollars and incredible stress.

Mitzi's e-mail had sounded urgent. What if she needed me?

After a stop at the bank, arriving just before they closed the doors, I drove down Westvale to Rutherford, then took the shortcut through the upscale neighborhood of Mount Royal, until I landed at the entry to Mitzi's street, a cul-de-sac flanked by trees that must have come straight out of
Architectural Digest
. No real street ever has trees that well groomed, as if they had just come from a treatment at a spa.
Groan. Even Mitzi's trees are better tended than I am.

Mitzi's building was a three-storey, upscale complex. Security was usually scrupulous, but given the erratic changes in employment in the city, the people I had seen for years at the market, the post office and security posts were abandoning their safe and comfortable jobs to try their hand at the wild world of stock trading start-up companies, pet-food bakeries and any new technology that looked as it if might be hacking edge. Then the economy would shift again, and they would run back to their safe jobs, however boring. Even Max, the elderly sentry at Mitzi's building, had decided to trade several days of reading magazines and playing Sudoku for one day a week at Nouveau Gas and Oil, where he made more in one day than he did in a week guarding Mitzi's building door. On the other days, he teed off with his pals from the seniors' centre. Consequently, the right sort of criminal just had to learn Max's golfing and oil schedule and stroll into the building.

Max was either on his supper break or whacking the turf, so I walked past the front desk and buzzed Mitzi's apartment.

The answering buzz sent me through the glass doors to the elevator. I pushed 3 and entered the elevator, my stomach so jittery, I wondered if I were reliving some awful opening night.

When I got to Mitzi's door, it was ominously ajar. I didn't like that. I read a lot of mysteries and watch too much television. Doors that are ajar never bode well. I thought about running to the fire exit and stampeding down the stairs in a rerun of what we idiot actors had done just a few days ago in the HAMS building.