It was perfect, and enough of a coup to put Team One’s knickers in a twist. The moment our fundraiser was announced on Cemetery Survivor, calls started coming in to the station and tickets to the event were selling like hotcakes. We were going to make a bundle for the Monroe Street volunteers, and make Team One look like losers in the process.
Because I didn’t want to act all superior, I was trying not to think about that on the Saturday afternoon I arrived at Mae Tannager’s Shaker Heights home for Team One’s fundraising tea.
I said home, right? Silly me. I should have said mansion.
The Tannagers live in a monstrosity of a house built in the early 1900s. It has tastefully decorated rooms, high ceilings, and a maid’s quarters on the third floor. I would bet any money they’re still in use. The pink walls, white furniture, and gold bric-a-brac are so not my taste, but I was plenty impressed, anyway. So were my team members.
“Sweet mother of pearl!” Wearing freshly pressed black pants and an ivory-colored silk camp shirt that emphasized the impressive breadth of his shoulders, Absalom stepped inside the front door and whistled below his breath. “This ain’t a house. It’s a-”
“Palace.” In honor of the occasion, Sammi had designed a summery strapless dress out of Wonder Bread bags. When she sighed and looked around in… well, in wonder… the yellow, blue, and red dots jiggled.
Our fans-many of them already inside sipping tea and nibbling tiny sandwiches-cheered our arrival.
“Pepper, you’re looking fabulous, girl!” a lady called to me, and it’s not like I’m vain or anything, but I knew she was right. For our fundraiser, I was planning on pulling out all the stops. For Team One’s, I’d toned things down a bit, but honestly, that didn’t mean I had to look like a frump. After all, I was planning on seeing Bianca that day, so I’d chosen my outfit wisely. I was wearing a taffeta dress decorated with huge orange red poppies with gold centers. The dress had a V neckline, a low back, and a gathered skirt that swished and twirled when I walked.
I twirled to wave to our groupies.
My skirt twirled, too.
“But, Pepper…” There was a group of fans around us, and I didn’t see the person who started talking, but I heard the voice. It belonged to a man, and I saw his hand shoot out of the crowd, reaching in my direction. “Pepper, what about the-”
The hand briefly clutched my arm and, startled, I pulled it out of his grasp. I never had a chance to see who it belonged to. By the time I spun around, the crowd had closed around me, and along with Absalom and Sammi, I was carried toward the back of the house and an elegant sunroom that looked out over a perfectly manicured garden. Out there, more partygoers (was a tea considered a party?) walked the stone paths between topiaries cut into geometrical shapes and ponds where water lilies floated in the afternoon sun. The sunroom itself was glassed-in on three sides and filled with more guests who sat on the wicker furniture and waited in orderly lines at the tables mounded with finger food.
“Now we’re talkin’!” Absalom went for the lox and bagels. Sammi disappeared in the other direction. Delmar and Reggie were over near the punch bowl talking to Mae. Reggie was wearing jeans (they were clean) and a T-shirt that said HUNNIES PLAY ME CLOSE LIKE BUTTER PLAY TOAST. I saw Mae’s eyes glaze when she tried to make sense of the message.
Across the room, Bianca’s eyes met mine, and she looked me over, smiled, and nodded her approval. I hoped Greer got that and a full-length shot of me while she was at it because, of course, she was there, recording the whole, elegant affair for posterity. She’d even chosen a dress for the occasion, though something told me gray polyester wasn’t exactly tea-party fabric.
But I had better things to worry about than Greer’s poor fashion choices. Like everyone else there, I’d paid my twenty bucks to get in, and I planned on getting my money’s worth. I glanced over at a table stacked with designer brownies, and my stomach growled. I was just about to fill a plate when I realized Jefferson Lamar was standing right next to me.
“Don’t do that.” I pressed a hand to my heart. “Can’t you ring a bell or something when you show up, just to let me know you’re here?”
The sarcasm went right over his buzz-cut head. “You know I can’t touch anything, so how could I ring a bell? I had to see you, to find out about Dale Morgan.”
This was not the time or the place to discuss my progress (or lack thereof) on the case. I shushed him with a look, but since nobody but me could hear him anyway, I guess he didn’t think that was any big deal.
“It might be important,” he reminded me.
I looked longingly at the brownies before I turned and walked out of the sunroom. It wasn’t easy finding a private place to talk. The house was as big as a boat, but there were people in the study and people in the dining room and people in the hallways. Never one to let pesky numbers get in the way-of anything-I didn’t try to tally the size of the crowd against the kind of money we’d need to bring in to beat Team One at the fundraising game. Instead, I poked my head into the well-appointed kitchen, saw there was no one there, and ducked inside. Lamar and I had the place to ourselves, and the added bonus of a tray of broken brownies left out on the counter. I grabbed a hunk and popped it in my mouth. Chocolate caramel.
“So…” The warden pinned me with a look. “What did Dale Morgan have to say?”
I swallowed and grabbed a chunk of what looked like chocolate chip. It was, and the chips were dark chocolate.
“You haven’t picked the best place for a little heart-to-heart,” I told him, dodging the question. “You could have shown up someplace else. Anyplace else but here. Like when nobody was around.”
He didn’t apologize or explain. “I’m here now,” he said. “And if I didn’t know better, I’d think you were avoiding the subject.”
“Not avoiding.” I had chocolate on my fingers and the perfect excuse to avoid the subject some more. I washed my hands, then couldn’t find a towel, so I searched through the nearby catering boxes, found a napkin, and dried my hands. “I’ve been busy,” I finally said, tossing the napkin aside.
“You haven’t talked to Morgan.”
“I have talked to him.” That was the absolute truth, so I gave my statement all the oomph it deserved. “By the way, it looks like you were a little off base when you said you thought he could turn his life around. Morgan’s in prison.”
“That’s too bad.” A pained expression crossed Lamar’s face, but he didn’t let his disappointment distract him for long. “You asked him about the silver dollar? About me? About why-”
There was only so long I could keep up the shillyshallying. I crumbled like one of those brownies. “He came to the phone. Once. But he refuses to talk to me about anything. Not until I go and visit him.”
“And you haven’t done it?”
The question was so blunt and well… so darn logical, I had no choice but to be outraged. My shoulders shot back. “Like I said, I’ve been busy.”
“Not too busy to go shopping.” His gaze briefly grazed my taffeta dress. “You said this case was important to you.”
“And it is. You know that. But the coin doesn’t have anything to do with Vera. How can it? It’s just a whatchacallit. Red heron. Or red Herman. Or-”
“Red herring?”
“Yeah, that’s it.” He’d gotten me riled up, and as every woman alive knows, there’s nothing like the endorphins in chocolate to calm a girl down. I grabbed another hunk of brownie and talked with my mouth full. “Did Morgan have some kind of grudge against you? No, I didn’t think so. And besides, wasn’t he in prison at the time Vera was killed? You said he was a small-time crook, so was he the type who could have arranged a hit from the inside? Because of some sort of vendetta? What, you guys were fighting about the value of wheat pennies?”