Killer Heels (18 page)

Or maybe Fred wasn’t the prime source. I scanned and actually was glad to find Gretchen standing across the bullpen, even though tears were streaming down her face. Girl to girl, I could probably get more out of Gretchen than out of Fred. And as Teddy’s assistant, she’d know more worth getting. I should’ve thought of her before.

Tricia looked over at Gretchen, her eyes widening in alarm at the tears. But emotionally overwrought probably worked to my advantage right now, so I motioned for Tricia to follow me and made my way over to Gretchen.

She wasn’t trying to hide her tears, but no one sitting near her seemed to notice. Of course, she’d been crying off and on for over twenty-four hours now and there was work to be done. “Hey, Gretch. What’s wrong?”

I held out an arm to her. Gretchen slid under it, forehead pressed to my shoulder, and muttered, “How mad is she?”

“Mad as ever.”

“I mean, about Brady and the ads.”

“She kicked us out before they got into details. Something about ‘irregularities.’ What’s going on?”

Gretchen hesitated, casting an uncertain look at Tricia.

“It’s okay, you remember my friend Tricia.” Tricia gave Gretchen one of her best client smiles, the kind of smile that gets people to fork over big bucks without thinking twice. “What’s going on?”

Gretchen glanced around the bullpen, then backed into Teddy’s office, watching us as we followed her. I didn’t relish the thought of stepping back into his office, but I did like the idea that Gretchen was about to tell us something that warranted some privacy.

“I know he’s going to blame Teddy. And Teddy would never do anything to hurt the magazine.” She took a ragged breath and her voice moved up the scale. “He would never do anything to hurt anyone. He would never do—”

“Gretchen.” I couldn’t imagine what the rest of the octave was going to be, but I knew it was going to shatter glass. I couldn’t afford to let Gretchen get too operatic on me. “Are you talking about financial irregularities? Is there money missing?”

“That’s what Brady says, but he’s wrong. I know he is. Teddy would never—”

“Yes, he would never do anything to anybody. I’m sure Brady and Yvonne will get it all straightened out before we go to press.”

Gretchen tried to pull herself together. “I just don’t want them dumping on poor Teddy.”

“We all want to protect Teddy’s memory, Gretchen. That’s why I need you to be completely honest with me. Can you do that?”

Gretchen seemed to shrink before my very eyes. “I’ll try,” she whispered.

I didn’t want to play a lot of games and give Gretchen time to develop cold feet. If I wanted to draw another side to the triangle, I had to come right out and ask the question. “How do I get in touch with Camille Sondergard?”

The sob exploded from Gretchen with such force that I almost fell back a step. I looked at Tricia, perplexed. This was not the reaction I’d anticipated. Tricia looked at Gretchen with detached wonder, like a child studying a hyena at the zoo.

“Gretchen …”

“How’d you know?” she wailed. Poor thing. Not only did she put up with all Teddy’s crap in life, now she was left to try and defend his honor, questionable as it seemed, in death.

“His PDA. I talked to the detective. But I need to talk to Camille.”

“Why?”

“I just need to. For Teddy’s sake.” Telling Gretchen I was trying to solve the crime was one step away from taking out an ad in the Sunday
Times
, so I had to be careful here.

“They broke up.”

“Still …”

“I’m handling the guest list for the funeral reception,” Tricia inserted smoothly. “In fact, I’ll need to sit with you later and go over some names. But it would be inappropriate for Ms. Sondergard to attend unless she’s willing to present herself solely as a business associate. That’s a conversation Molly has volunteered to have with her.”

News to me, but a brilliant idea. A little smile played at the corners of Tricia’s eyes. She knew it was a great idea and she knew I’d owe her for it. But at the moment, she was focused on willing Gretchen into cooperation. Tricia’s really good at this sort of thing, getting her ideas to look like other people’s ideas. It can be a dangerous trait in a friend, but it’s really nice when she’s willing to throw her mojo your way when you need it.

Gretchen thought a moment, mashing her lips into all sorts of odd shapes. “I have a number,” she finally admitted.

“Thank you.” I hugged her lightly. “This will be so much help.”

She nodded, not completely convinced. She took a notepad out of her pocket, wrote a number on it, and handed it to me. I decided to press my luck. “And there’s no one else?” I asked as neutrally as possible. “Who might be a problem?”

The tears welled back up. She widened her eyes to keep them from spilling over, but it didn’t work. Tricia quickly handed her a tissue. Gretchen took it and twisted it nervously, rather than using it.

“I really like working here, Molly,” she protested.

“You’re not getting fired. No one’s going to even know we talked.”

Gretchen sank into the armchair by the door. “Why did this have to happen? It’s so wrong. It’s not fair.”

“It stinks,” I agreed, sliding into columnist mode. “Especially because there’s not much we can do now except remember him with love and help other people to do the same. But that means that any chance we have to minimize new pain for his family and friends, we have to grab.”

Apparently, I scored on the sincerity scale, because Tricia’s eyebrows lifted in approval and Gretchen’s crying quieted slightly. Tricia handed Gretchen another tissue and Gretchen used this one, wiping her tears and blowing her nose. When she was finished, she took a deep breath. “There is someone else, but I don’t think you need to talk to her. She knows all about keeping up appearances.”

“Who, Gretch?”

“Yvonne.”

My first instinct was to jump up and yell “Score!” but I pretended to be shocked. “Really?”

“She’ll behave, though, because he just broke up with her, so she wouldn’t want anyone to know.”

“Really?” Now I actually was surprised. I’d figured all signs pointed to the affair being current.

Gretchen nodded vigorously. “He broke it off.”

“Why?”

“Why? Because Helen found out and she was furious. I overheard them fighting one night last week, here in the office. She was ready to—” Gretchen stopped herself, horrified by where that sentence was headed. She actually clamped her hand over her mouth.

“Don’t go there,” I advised. Not just because it was the opposite direction from where I was going, but also because it wasn’t a pleasant place to go.

“I didn’t mean that,” she moaned from behind her hand. “Don’t tell anyone I said that. Please.”

“Of course not.”

“You don’t think Helen could—”

“Of course not.” I said that with extra conviction and headed for the door before she could ask me anything that would be tougher to answer.

Tricia followed me, stopping to put her hand on Gretchen’s arm. “I’ll be in touch about the guest list. Thank you for everything you’ve done.”

Gretchen erupted yet again and we left, pulling the door closed behind us.

“Damn.”

Tricia led me back toward my own desk. “That doesn’t mean you’re wrong.”

“Damn.”

“And even if you are wrong, it’s not like you’ve done anything as a result besides think evil thoughts about her, which you pretty much do anyway, so it’s okay.”

“Damn.”

“Except that you hate to be wrong.”

I stopped at my desk and retrieved our handbags from the bottom drawer, deciding in the process that I liked Tricia’s much more than I liked mine. I had my black Fendi messenger bag. Now, I love it, I’ll probably be buried with it because it will have grafted onto my shoulder by then. But she had her Kate Spade soho bag in porcelain leather and it didn’t have a nick on it anywhere and taking a moment to covet it took my mind off other things for a moment.

“You’re not going to respond to that, are you,” Tricia chided as we headed for the elevators.

“That’s the thing. I don’t feel like I am wrong. But it’s just a feeling.”

“When you’re investigating a homicide, I believe you’re supposed to call it a hunch. Don’t underestimate its importance. If you don’t think you’re wrong, you’re probably not.”

Her certainty made me smile in spite of myself. “You’re a pretty amazing friend, you know that?”

“Is that a hunch?”

“More than.”

“Then, thank you. What’s next?”

“You go ahead and get the reception lined up. Call me when the walkthrough’s set and I’ll be sure to meet you there.”

“Where are you going, so I can worry about you appropriately ?”

“To paraphrase my grandfather, I’m going to see a woman about a dog.”

10

I love the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Of course, I grew up with the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, DC, so it always strikes me as odd to have to pay to go to a museum, but I love the Met. I’m even a member. But still, it would never occur to me to shoot a perfume ad there.

I guess that’s why I advise people about their personal lives and not about advertising. If anything, advertising makes my job harder. It’s bad enough that we jack up our own expectations of what success should look like, what love should feel like, what happiness should sound like. When you add the tsunami of daily advertising with all its secrets for instant bliss, it’s a little hard for real life to measure up. And the realization that life is not a Ralph Lauren ad can be difficult to embrace, especially when you don’t have an appealing alternative in mind.

The travails of Western existence aside, I just needed a few minutes with Camille to get the break-up story from her and find out where she and Teddy got together to … get together. Not exactly something you can just drop into a conversation with a total stranger. But Teddy had always been a man of set habits, so maybe he took all his mistresses to the same hotel. Cuts down on the number of bellboys you have to bribe and that sort of economical thinking was Teddy’s stock in trade. If I could figure out where he and Yvonne spent their time as a couple, I might be able to find someone who knew them as a couple, and that person might be able to shine the spotlight on Yvonne as a killer. And that’s where it belonged.

It wasn’t hard to find the gallery where they were shooting: There were tourists and security guards and policemen twelve deep in every available doorway. Camille, a breathtaking blonde whose perfection was a freak of biology, sat on a bench in front of Boucher’s
The Toilet of Venus
, which features nude cherubim helping a similarly nude Venus primp. I could tell there were at least a dozen men among the onlookers who clung to the desperate hope that Camille was also going to strip down. Probably a couple of the women did, too.

The hairdresser was trying to get Camille’s hair to fan perfectly across her shoulders and back as Camille looked up at the painting and wasn’t having much luck. There were several suits sweating and watching their watches, but the photographer seemed cool with the delay. Or maybe he was stoned. Whichever, he was doing some yoga position on the floor in front of Camille that involved torque-ing his hips in a way I can’t imagine men are supposed to be able to bend, while his assistants scrambled to get all his equipment ready.

When I’d called the number Gretchen had given me, I’d spoken to Camille’s assistant, Peggy, who didn’t want to even confirm I had the right number until I said it was about Teddy Reynolds. She had then whispered their location to me and said she’d see what she could do, but stressed that she couldn’t make any promises.

Now I could see why. Camille suddenly shrieked at the hairdresser, slapped her hands away, and got up. Suits descended like pigeons on spilled popcorn. Camille shook them all off and strode over to the far corner of the gallery where a cowering little brunette awaited the full brunt of Camille’s wrath. Must be Peggy.

Peggy held up towels and water as soon as Camille got within reach; Camille grabbed a water, didn’t acknowledge Peggy, and waited for the suits to start their portion of this afternoon’s entertainment. One was already laying into the hairdresser, another was yelling into his cell phone. It was like choreography, watching them skittering around. I kept expecting them to burst into song: “When you’re a suit, you’re a suit all the way …”

I edged my way through the onlookers to try and catch Peggy’s eye. It was going to be tough because Peggy seemed intensely interested in the floor while Camille and one of the suits ranted at each other. I waved, I bobbed and weaved, I cleared my throat, nothing. Finally, I dialed the number again.

Peggy jumped visibly and answered her phone quickly.

“I’m the friend of Teddy Reynolds who called you before. I’m in the north doorway,” I explained, watching as she looked up and turned to face me. I gave her a friendly smile and a little wave. “This is probably not a good time—”

“No, no, it’s perfect. It gives her an excuse to make them wait. She loves that,” Peggy whispered into her phone. She hung up and skittered across the room to me. I thought of the captive mice enslaved in
The Nutcracker Suite
. This poor girl needed a new piece of cheese. She spoke to a security guard who ushered me under the ropes and over to her.

I shook her hand. “Thank you.”

“I liked Teddy a lot,” she said in explanation. I nodded in agreement and followed her over to Camille.

The suit pleading with Camille was running out of steam, so they were both open to my interruption. Camille told the suit she needed a few moments for a personal matter. He looked at me as though he were hoping I was there to have sex with her, anything to improve her mood, and withdrew, warning her that she had five minutes as he went. Peggy hurried after him. Or ran away briefly, I couldn’t be sure which.

Camille looked me over as though I were modeling the outfit she was supposed to wear in her next ad. “Peggy said this was about Teddy’s funeral,” she said in an accent I couldn’t quite place. Sweden meets Manhattan by way of London, maybe. Her vowels were tight and round, but so was the rest of her and that’s why she’s a millionaire and I’m an advice columnist. But I’d already coveted Tricia’s handbag, I wasn’t going to go down that path again so soon.