Dog Collar Couture (9 page)

“Everything okay? You seem . . . edgy.”

“Aside from being accused of being a thief? I'm fine.” She slapped her palms on the desk. “No. That's a lie. I hate it that every time something goes wrong people automatically assume the worst of me because I'm a Rizzo.”

“Well . . .”

“And don't try to tell me I shouldn't let it bother me. That's crap, and you know it.”

Ever the drama queen, Ro swung her hands over her head. “Whoa. Relax, Sister. All I wanted to say was that not all people assume that. And the ones who do don't know you.”

“Oh, huh. Sorry. And thank you for being on my side.”

“Always. What crawled up your bootie today?”

“Can you believe the owner of that dress was waiting for me when I walked Fin this morning? He marched right up, asked me if there was anything else I remembered and then implied that maybe I was in on it.”

Ro sat back, looked at her over the rims of her glasses again. “I'm telling you, men are idiots. That's all I have for you. I'm sorry. If I get started it'll be a bloodbath, and that'll be a great way to ruin a perfectly fine day. And I'm not in the mood to bury a body today. Whoever he is, he's not worth jail time. We're too good for that.”

Leave it to Ro to cut right to the heart of the matter. But, yes, she was right. Mr. Dukane
was
a moron.

The rage she'd felt during that encounter had already drained her. And her energy bucket only had so much to spare. With all that had gone on, she was already down to half.

“You're right. I can't let him get to me. Please, give me some good news. Anything. What are you working on?”

“Leads.”

Perfect. New business opportunities. “What leads?”

She shrugged. “I'm trolling doggie message boards.”

Lucie cracked up. Thank God for Ro making her laugh when, once again, her life had been thrown into a bout of chaos. “That sounds a little twisted.”

“Laugh all you want.” She slapped her hand on her ever-present spiral notebook and swung it in the air. “I've got three lists going. One with target retailers, one with design ideas and one for wholesalers.”

Now that was interesting. “Seriously?”

“Yes. You find all kinds of stuff on message boards. For instance, there are three pet-accessory boutiques downtown that we didn't know about. I mean, Lucie, how did we miss that? This afternoon, I'll take them some samples, see what we can do. And, did you know there's a market for doggie skiwear?”

“Now I know you're joking.”

Again with the stern-librarian glare. “I never joke when it comes to revenue. And winter is coming. I'll work with your mom on some new designs. I'm thinking ski jackets—with faux-fur collars for the girls.”

A lot of times Lucie humored Ro. This would be one of them. Then again, they'd managed to build a business on blinged-out dog collars and coats. Why should skiwear be any different?

“I bet we could get Jeanette at Sammy Spaniel to put a few pieces out for us as a test run.”

Sammy Spaniel, an upscale dog boutique in Chicago, had been Coco Barknell's first retail client.

“Exactly what I was thinking. Great minds.” Ro's computer dinged, and she went back to scanning. “A new message.”

“Anything good?”

“No. Just some dope trying to pick up women. You can't be too casual about these message boards. There are some real freaks out there.”

“Well, sure. It's the Internet. And then if you get into the Deep Web, it gets really crazy. Tons of criminal activity out there. We just don't see it.”

Kinda like her completely missing two guys stealing a million-dollar slice of movie history.

Message boards.

“Uh-oh,” Ro said. “You have a look. That one you get right before the randomly floating ideas in your brain come together.”

Lucie hustled over and shoved Ro from the chair. “Move.”

“Knew it.” Ro grabbed one of the two guest chairs in front of the desk and slid it around next to Lucie. “What are you thinking?”

“This message-board thing. You're a genius.”

Ro gave her the over-the-rims look again. “As if we didn't know that?”

“I'm talking about our dress investigation. As popular as that dress is, there have to be hundreds of message boards out there. The fans of the movie are rabid. Someone, somewhere, has to be talking about this dress going missing.”

“I like it, supersleuth.”

Lucie did a search for Maxmillian-dress message boards. It took less than three seconds to get over two million results.

“Two million. Yowzer.”

“Don't panic. We'll split the list.”

Split the list? Was she insane? Well, she was Ro. Ro equaled insanity. Still, they weren't researching one million sites each. “We need to shorten the list.”

“Be more specific with your keywords.”

Lucie grinned. “Look at you, all Internet savvy.”

“Blah, blah. Shut it. Try searching for most popular Maxmillian message boards.”

That narrowed them to just over one million, and Lucie held her hands palm out. “Okay. Progress.”

The third link on the screen led to the movie fan club's Web site. She tapped the screen. “If I were a rabid fan looking for info, I'd start at the fan club.”

The doggie bells jangled, and Joey walked in. He'd finally ditched his basketball shorts —hello, it's October—for what looked like expensive jeans and a long-sleeved Henley. Her brother had always been handsome. In a caveman sort of way. But recently his looks had changed. His dark hair was cut shorter, his clothing choices a little sharper, his shave a little closer.

Gee, wonder whose influence that is?

“Hey, handsome,” Ro said.

He swung his gaze first to Ro, then to Lucie. “This looks dangerous. What are you nutty broads doing?”

“We, my love—”
My love? Blech.
“—are researching message boards.”

“What the hell for?”

“Rabid Maxmillian fans.”

Joey rolled his eyes. “You geniuses think you're gonna find that dress on a
message
board?” He stepped closer, shoved Lucie's hands away from the keyboard. “Get the hell off there. Do you know what kind of lunatics hang out on those message boards?”

Lucie scooped up the laptop, clutched it to her chest. “It's not like we're talking to anyone. We're just looking.”

“Right. And what if you find something? You gonna tell me you didn't plan on commenting. Maybe throwing some feelers out there. Please. I know you two. If there's trouble, you'll find it.”

“Seems to me,” Ro said, “we've done pretty darned well when we've teamed up.”

“Yeah.” Lucie set the laptop down and clicked one of the fan club links. “Here we go. Maxmillian Fan Forum. A chat room devoted to lovers of the Maxmillian couture dress. Let's just see what we've got here.”

Joey's phone beeped from somewhere in the vicinity of his pocket, and he checked the screen. “This is Dad. I gotta go. You two want lunch?”

“No,” they both said.

The last thing Lucie needed was their father horning in on this chat-room thing. “Joey, I'm begging you, keep him at Petey's. He keeps popping in here, disrupting our day.”

“I know. But give him a break. He's been in a cage for two years. Walking down the street is a big deal right now.”

Lucie hadn't considered that. The feeling of being locked away, controlled to the point where you couldn't leave a room, grab a snack from the fridge, open a window.

And all that time she'd been mad at her dad for his lifestyle, for leaving their mother alone. For humiliating them. Her father was no saint, and maybe that derision had been well earned; but just once, she could have meant it when she'd asked how he'd been feeling.

“Huh,” Lucie said. “I never thought of it that way.”

“He can be a pain in the ass, but throw him a bone every now and again. Have lunch with him. Or go for coffee.”

Lucie turned to Ro, who'd said almost the exact thing to her the day before. “Did you tell him to say that?”

She grinned. “No. He's smart and doesn't need me to tell him things like that.”

Joey's phone beeped again. “I gotta go. You two be careful on those message boards. And whatever you do, don't comment.”

“
O
h
, Sister, I think I got something.”

Thank God.

Two hours forty-two minutes and thirty-nine seconds they'd been scouring the Internet. Ro worked the message boards, while Lucie researched all things props and the making of
Peacock Island.

Lucie shot up from her chair and stormed across the room to Ro's desk, where rays from the early-afternoon sun soaked the front of the room in warmth. “What did you find?”

“Cock Heads.”

“
Excuse
me?”

“I found an underground fan club. The Cock Heads.”

Lucie gagged. “Ew. That's kinda gross.”

“Yeah, well, from what it says on this message board it's a takeoff of the official fan club, The Peacocks. The Peacocks' message board has too many rules—I guess they're prudes—so a group of renegade fans started this little subculture.”

“And to piss off the prudes, they called themselves
Cock
Heads?”

“So it seems. But, look at their membership. The second group far outnumbers the official group.”

Ro scrolled to the top of the screen and clicked the “home” button. “They have their own Web site and everything.”

“Click on the ‘about' button. Let's see what it says.”

A screen with a photo of a peacock and several paragraphs popped up. Lucie tapped the screen. “Right here. It says there are ten thousand Cock He—uh, members. Only three thousand belong to the official fan group. That's rather interesting.” Another link led to a membership page, and Lucie tapped it. “Click this link.”

Another screen with a form to join the group popped up. Along with the form was an invitation to attend a meeting. Free of charge for the first time. Below that a search box. Ro typed in their zip code, and the little hourglass churned for a few seconds before spitting out a list of meetings broken down by town. There had to be thirty locations in the Chicago area alone.

Lucie leaned over Ro's shoulder. “There are meetings all over the place.”

“And every day at different times.”

“These people make Trekkies look like amateurs. We need more info on them. Maybe go to a meeting.”

“Honey,” Ro said, “I go to a Cock Head meeting every time I see my rat-bastard, stripper-banging husband and his legion of lawyers.”

Oh, ouch. Despite her bravado, the divorce had taken an emotional chunk out of Ro. It was all so . . . unnecessary. The heartbreak, the fighting, the holding on.

Tommy had cheated—not to mention the disgusting, vile way he'd done it—and now he wanted to punish her for leaving him?

Lucie set her hand on Ro's shoulder. “I'm sorry he's putting you through this. Are you any closer to a settlement?”

“Eh. Getting there. He's pissed about Joey. Ironic, isn't it? As if humiliating me in front of our friends and families wasn't worse than me dating a great guy. Stupid stripper-banger.” She went back to the computer. “Don't get me started. I'm trying to move on and just thinking about it makes me crazy. Anyhoo, if my BFF wants to go see a bunch of Cock Heads, I'm all for it. You know I love an adventure.”

The more Lucie considered the idea, the more it grew on her. “We could just go check it out. Maybe start up a conversation about the dress being stolen. See if we get any good dirt.” She pointed to the screen. “Find us a meeting for tonight. Lucie and Ro ride again.”

A
t seven o'clock sharp
, Lucie and Ro strolled into the Java Pit, a cute little coffee house in an ancient brick building on Chicago's West Side. The place had a cool vibe. Kind of artsy with abstract prints on the walls, but the metal coffee pot and mugs scattered along shelves offered a homey feel.

The place wasn't very large. Only seven tables with a bar and another five stools. A couple sat at the back table, huddled together and giggling.

Lucie paused just inside the doorway, let the aroma of freshly brewed coffee bring her senses alive.

“It smells so good in here. Now I have to have coffee.”

“Just make it decaf,” Ro said. “You know the regular will keep you up tonight and then you'll be crabby tomorrow. And I'm not dealing with that.”

“Good point.”

“Can I help you, ladies?” the young guy behind the bar asked.

“Hi,” Lucie said. “We're here for the . . . uh . . .”

“Just say it,” Ro muttered.

But Lucie couldn't get the words out. They just sat there, on her tongue, ready to be spewed, but . . . no.

She turned to Ro, shook her head and was rewarded with an eye roll that could have knocked the building down. Ro marched toward the bar, swinging her hips and everything else attached to her. “We're here for the
Cock Head
meeting.”

And, wow, that was loud. But the cute barista laughed. “Yeah. They're upstairs. Go straight back, and take the stairs up. If you want something to drink, though, you gotta get it here. No service up there.”

“Okay,” Lucie said. “I'll have a latte.”

“Nonfat,” Ro said. “Decaf. Make it two.”

Lattes in hand, Ro led the charge upstairs. “I can't wait to see what these people look like. The Web site said some of them come in costume. Costume!”

“What kind of costumes?”

“Replicas of the dress. Peacock headbands. That kind of thing. It looked a little looney.”

Lucie grabbed Ro's arm, stopped her midway up the steps. “Did you tell Joey we were coming here?”

“Please, girl. Are you kidding? He would have blown his stack. After we get home, I'll tell him. All I have to do is strip, and he forgets why he was mad.”

That information Lucie didn't need, and a little vomit backed up in her throat.
Blech.
“I didn't tell anyone, either. No one knows we're here.”

“So? You think a bunch of insane Cock Heads are going to kidnap us from the second floor of a coffee house? What are they gonna do, toss us out a window?”

When put like that, it did sound far-fetched. But hey, this was Chicago, and Lucie's last name was Rizzo. Anything could happen. “I don't know. They could be dangerous.”

“Tell you what, if they are, I have enough anger in me that'll I'll open a can of whoop-ass they won't soon forget. And if they're men, even better. They'll be the Cockless Heads by the time I get done with them.”

“Oh, just, ew.”

Ro laughed. “Do you want to leave? Say it now, and we're gone. But we schlepped all the way down here, we should at least check it out.”

Another good point. This whole damned situation was just . . . unsettling. As a matter of general safety, someone should know where they were. Just in case.

She should text Tim.

That's what she'd do. Just send him a casual text saying hi and that she and Ro were at the Java Pit sharing a coffee. He didn't need to know they were chasing Cock Heads.

She shoved her coffee at Ro and dug through her purse for her phone. “I'm texting Tim. If we come up missing, he'll know where to look first.”

“If we come up missing he'll trace your phone. But suit yourself and text him.”

Lucie blew raspberries at her, and Ro laughed. After sending the text, Lucie grabbed her coffee and took a breath. “You ready?”

“Waiting on you, sweet cheeks. “

At the top of the steps an open door led to a large rectangular room decorated in the same style as the first floor. Near the windows sat a group of about two dozen folks who'd gathered a series of four-top tables into a weird semicircle so they could all see each other. Other patrons filled in the surrounding tables. Not a bad turnout.

A tall, heavyset woman pushed out of her chair and headed for them.

“Give me strength,” Ro whispered.

No fooling there. The woman wore a replica of the Maxmillian dress and a headband with peacock feathers poking at least twelve inches into the air.

“I gotta get a picture,” Ro said.

“Ssshhh. Be serious. We have to act like Cock Heads.”

“Hello,” the woman said, a big smile spreading across her face. “Are you here for the meeting?”

“Um, yes,” Lucie said. “We're thinking about joining.”

“Ooh.” The woman clapped. “Everyone! Potential new members. Let's all be nice.”

The crowd raised a cheer, then went back to their individual conversations while the woman focused on Lucie and Ro.

“We always love having new members. I'm Annabelle. Please, come in.”

“Thank you.”

Lucia fell into step behind Annabelle, who led them toward the group at the far end of the room. As they walked, she pointed to a table with various items, pins, T-shirts, headbands, all sporting peacock feathers.

“We have some spiritwear available for purchase if you'd like one. The headbands are my favorite. They're all a little different. Some are ten dollars. The more elaborate range from thirty to fifty.”

Yowzer.

Ro stopped in front of the table and perused the items, her gaze landing on an elaborate headband similar to Annabelle's. She picked it up, studied the placement of the feathers. After a few seconds, she flipped the band over, ran her finger along the edge, probably checking for errant glue that held the feathers in place.

She gave Lucie the same stern-librarian look she'd given her earlier in the day, only without the glasses. “The craftsmanship on these is quite good.”

“Thank you,” Annabelle said. “One of our members makes them. Of course, the feathers aren't the double-eyed, but we do what we can.”

Ro held up the headband. “I'll take this one.”

“Wonderful. We love enthusiastic new members. That'll be fifty dollars.”

A gag broke from Lucie's throat. She slapped her chest, swallowed back the sudden hairball. “Sorry. The acid reflux is a killer.”

Ro sighed, but in terms of recoveries, Lucie didn't think she'd done half bad.

“Luce, you should get a headband.”

Not a chance.
“I'm good. Thanks. Maybe a T-shirt on the way out.”

Ro forked over her fifty dollars, while Lucie contemplated the madness of paying so much for something Ro could have whipped out herself in three minutes. Maybe less. Ro was all about getting into character when the two of them did these mini-missions, so Lucie chalked it up to dedication.

When it came to parting with her own hard-earned money, Lucie wasn't nearly as committed to the cause.

Transaction complete, Ro plopped the hideous headband on, gave the feathers a fluff and winked at Lucie. “Let's do this, girlfriend.”

“Helloooo, all.” Ro did one of her flirty finger waves to the group. “I'm Roseanne and this is my friend Lucie.”

All at once the group responded with various greetings.
“Goedeavond.
Bonsoir.
Shalom.”

An absolute United Nations of Cock Heads. Friendly bunch, though. One of the men, an older gentleman with salt-and-pepper hair and funky, horn-rimmed glasses, grabbed two chairs from an empty table, while the others made room for Lucie and Ro to squeeze in.

Before setting her purse on the floor, Ro checked her phone. “Joey just called me. And texted. He wants to know where we are. Let me text him. That'll keep him at bay for an hour.”

Ro fired off her text just as Lucie's phone buzzed from her back pocket. “Whoopsie. Someone is looking for me, too.”

She swiped the screen, saw two texts. She must have missed the first one. Tim. Just responding to her incognito if-we-get-kidnapped text and telling her to have fun and call him when she got home. Easy enough. The second message was Joey. Asking where the eff she and Roseanne were.

“Joey texted me, too. Don't tell him where we are.”

Ro waved that off. “I told him to keep his pants on, and I'd call him later.”

With that, she turned her phone off, shoved it back into her purse and gave the table at large her attention. Already Lucie could see the clusters. The three people huddled together directly across from them, a young couple holding hands, three twenty-something women with green hair. Then there were the two men and two women sitting bolt upright, hands to themselves, staring straight ahead. Obviously, they'd each come to the meeting on their own. Not wanting to stare, Lucie chose not to scan the rest of the group and brought her gaze back to her latte. Might as well have a gulp while Ro did her thing. Within seconds, her BFF worked the table, and chatter erupted all around.

They'd gotten pretty good at these investigations over the last few months. The general system required Ro to chat up the group, asking semileading questions while Lucie quietly observed and committed everything to memory.

They were, in short, a great team.

Annabelle stood and tapped her long nails against one of the water glasses. “Attention, everyone.” The group immediately piped down. Even Ro. Lucie might have to put Annabelle on the payroll. “Such a great crowd tonight. And we have guests—this is Roseanne and Lucie. Welcome to the Cock Heads, ladies. We won't introduce everyone, but we have several board members and volunteers here tonight, so we'll let them say hello.”