Dying in Style (6 page)

She wasn’t going to do that to her daughter. Josie pulled over and whipped off the wig. Her respectable brown bob was hopelessly flattened. “Now I look like I have terminal bed head.”

Amelia looked relieved and Josie knew she’d made the right move.

“Sorry, kid, I can’t do anything about the tube top and the tattoo,” Josie said.

“You can hunch down a little,” Amelia said.

“Good idea. They’ll think your mother is the Hunch-back of Notre Dame. Assume the Quasimodo position.”

Josie hunched. Amelia laughed. She sat with her monogrammed backpack on her lap, ready to launch herself out of the seat before anyone noticed her embarrassing mother.

Josie was pretty sure none of the other car-pool moms saw her tube top. They wouldn’t believe it if they did. White trash didn’t go to the Barrington School.

Who am I kidding? she thought. I’m the closest thing to white trash this school has. They probably think I dress like this for real. Josie didn’t fit in with the other Barrington moms and she knew it. But she wanted her daughter to have the best schooling.

Amelia was the love of her life. The best mistake she ever made.

Thanks to mystery shopping, Josie picked up some cool clothes for her daughter that she could never afford otherwise. Josie used to troll the garage sales in rich neighborhoods for high-priced children’s clothes. Now that Amelia went to Barrington with the kids who had those garages and the palatial homes that went with them, Josie couldn’t risk buying their castoffs.

The job provided other perks. Josie mystery-shopped cruise lines and amusement parks for free vacations. Rating ritzy restaurants gave Josie and Amelia a taste of the good life.

Her mother watched Amelia when Josie was stuck on a job. Jane could be summoned by cell phone with the emergency code 666—MOM.

What did moms do before cell phones? Josie wondered. What did moms do before coffee? She badly needed some after her white-trash near disaster at Barrington.

Josie pulled into the parking lot of Has Beans and checked herself in the mirror. Her brown hair was still flat. She stuck it under the flossy blond wig. It was total trash time.

Josh whistled when she walked into the coffee shop. “Nice outfit,” he said. “Can I take out the trash?”

“Forget it, Josh,” she said. “I’m working.”

“On the Stroll?” That was the city’s prostitution zone.

Josh was three years younger than Josie and the handsomest coffee hustler in Maplewood. He wrote science fiction. So far he was unpublished, but Josh was sure someday he would be the next Orson Scott Card.

“What would you like?” Josh said.

It wasn’t quite a leer, but Josie knew Josh’s intentions were strictly dishonorable. He was as bad for her as a caramel cappuccino, but she craved him anyway.

Why can’t I feel this way about sensible Stan next door? Josh would never fix my air conditioner or do anything else useful. Josh would also never wear short-sleeved drip-dry shirts and a hangdog look.

Josh was her mom’s worst nightmare, down to his pierced tongue. The man was bad—in a good way.

“Earth to Josie,” Josh said. “What can I get you?”

“Double espresso,” she said.

“Whoa, breakfast of champions.”

“I need the ’feine,” she said.

“What are you doing today for truth, justice and the American consumer?” Josh asked.

“Checking out General Cheeps chicken.”

“Ah,” Josh said, “now I understand the outfit. Very clever.”

“It’s my favorite disguise,” Josie said.

“Mine, too,” Josh said. “Your rich suburban lady outfit is low on my list. Makes you look like a total tight-ass.”

“It’s supposed to,” Josie said, finishing off her espresso. She was wired and ready for work.

The first General Cheeps was way up north in Florissant, near a trailer park. No one raised an eyebrow when she sauntered into the chicken store in her WHITE TRASH tube top. Compared to the other customers, Josie looked like she was dressed for a Junior League luncheon.

She hit ten chicken stores. As she drove around the St. Louis area, Josie listened to eighties music. U2 was her favorite, and she sang along with the plaintive “New Year’s Day” and “With or Without You.” Even though she sounded more like a horny cat than a lovesick singer, Josie didn’t care and sang freely. No one heard her.

By two o’clock, Josie had a stack of reports, most of them favorable. General Cheeps was a well-run franchise. Her car was loaded with buckets of chicken, mashed potatoes and corn bread. On the seat next to her sloshed a double tub of green beans, a tribute to Jane. Josie hoped her mom didn’t notice the fatback bacon floating in the vegetables.

Josie checked the dashboard clock and breathed a sigh of relief. If the highway traffic kept moving, she’d have enough time to drop the food at home, change into something decent, and pick up her daughter at school.

Her cell phone rang. She scoped the number on the screen. It was her boss, Harry.

“I need you at the office right now,” he said.

Office? Josie could count the times she’d been in the Suttin office.

“Harry, I’ve been shopping General Cheeps in my white-trash outfit. I smell like a giant fried chicken. My car is filled with buckets of Curly-Crisp. Let me go home and change first. It will only take ten minutes.”

“I said
now
,” Harry shouted. “Don’t stop for anything, not even the red lights. Get your ass in this office.”

Josie’s heart froze. Something was wrong.

Chapter 5

“This cheap tart tried to ruin my fifty-million-dollar deal?” Danessa looked at Josie and laughed.

Mom was right, Josie thought. I should have worn the raincoat.

The fiercely elegant Danessa had charged into the ratty office of Suttin Services, scattering a whirlwind of papers. Chairs overturned in her wake. Office equipment slid off the stands. Staffers crouched down at their desks. She was followed by a small, pale creature in owlish glasses and a beige suit a size too big. The personal PR woman.

Harry, Josie’s boss, had been munching something meaty when Danessa burst through his door. He covered it with a stack of reports, but there were grease specks on his shirt and shiny smears on his mouth and fingers.

His lips trembled in fear, but no sound came out. Josie would have to defend herself.

“Who are you calling a cheap tart?” Josie was in full Maplewood fighting mode. It took guts to say those words with WHITE TRASH on her chest.

Danessa stepped in front of Josie. She was nine feet tall in witch-pointy stilettos. Her eyes were the color of a summer storm. Her simple black dress was the down payment on a house. Her dramatic necklace cost even more. It was a dragonfly in amber. Josie couldn’t stop staring at the trapped bug.

Josie’s fried-chicken fumes overpowered Danessa’s subtle perfume. Please God, don’t let her notice the WHITE TRASH on my tube top, she thought.

She glanced down. God had answered her prayer. The WHITE TRASH wasn’t showing because Josie’s tube top had rolled down to her nipples. Josie yanked it back up.

“For your information, I am dressed properly for my current shopping assignment,” she said. “Just as I was dressed properly when I shopped your stores. I produced a report that was fair, balanced and accurate.”

Josie thought she sounded dignified yet fearless, which was more than she could say for Harry, that trembling blob. Was this the man who told her, “You let me deal with it. You just write your report”? Now he sat at his desk like one of those lifelike people statues. Harry could at least have chimed in with a “Yeah, that’s right.”

Danessa turned a glare on Josie that should have shriveled her soul. Fortunately, Josie had been rendered glare-resistant by her mother.

“Accurate!” Danessa said, in the voice God used when she was displeased. “You call that report accurate? It was a tissue of lies.”

Josie pulled her eyes away from the long-dead bug around Danessa’s neck. Amazing. She’d never heard anyone say “tissue of lies” when she meant “full of shit.” Josie had to admit Danessa was magnificent in her rage. Her anger was a force of nature.

“I am Stephanie with Reichman-Brassard Public Relations. We have found numerous discrepancies in your report,” the PR creature said. She pulled out a beige leather folder and handed a thick packet to Josie and Harry, along with six eight-by-ten glossies.

“My stores are not dirty,” Danessa said. “My displays do not have fingerprints and my counters are not covered with half-eaten candy bars. You made that up.”

“Our professional photos show no sign of fingerprints or debris,” Stephanie said.

“Of course not,” Josie said. “You cleaned the Lucite stands before you took the photos.”

“Shut up!” Danessa said. Josie didn’t know if she was speaking to her or to the pale PR creature.

“You’re a jealous little nothing from Maplewood. Maplewood!” Danessa spat out the word. “I wouldn’t let someone like you work for me, much less shop at my stores. You couldn’t buy one of my purses without taking out a loan, but this thing”—she waved a talon at Harry—“allowed you to tell lies about me.

“And here’s the worst lie: You said there was a rude saleswoman named Marina at my Plaza Venetia store.”

“There was,” Josie said.

“Liar! There is no Marina on my sales staff. I’ve never, ever employed anyone by that name. No one.”

Danessa slammed her hand down on Harry’s desk. A pork chop jumped into the air. Harry sat there, a speechless lump of meat. Did he think he was watching a reality TV show?

“That’s the name the sales associate gave me,” Josie said. “The woman wasn’t wearing a name tag, but she was a tall blond Amazon who had what sounded like a Russian accent. This Marina was about six feet two inches tall and her straight blond hair was down past her shoulders. She wore black leather.”

“No one by that description works at any of my stores.”

Stephanie the PR person presented a printout as thick as a phone book to Danessa. Danessa threw it at Josie. She meant it to fall on the floor and fan out all over. Josie caught it in midfling.

“Here’s the staff list,” Danessa said. “Find her on there. Do you see any Russian names?”

Josie scanned the list, holding the printout with both hands to control the shaking. I’d like to walk out that door, she thought. But I have a daughter. I have to keep calm and keep this job for Amelia’s sake.

“Well, there’s Olga,” Josie said. That name was as Russian as roulette.

“Olga is five feet two, weighs a hundred pounds and has black hair. No one in her right mind would call her an Amazon.”

Right. Olga like the composer.

The PR person produced a yellowed
Plaza Venetia Times
, open to an ad. It featured a photo of the shop’s sales staff.

“That’s me at our grand opening,” Danessa said. “And that’s Olga.” She pointed to a pixielike brunette who barely came to Danessa’s elbow. “See any blond Amazons in that store?”

“So you hired Marina later,” Josie said. She checked the paper’s date. “You’ve been at that location seven years. Retail staff comes and goes. The woman who told me her name was Marina lied. She’s on that list. She’s called something else.”

Josie shrugged her shoulders and sent the tube top rolling downhill toward the fake tattoo. “The tall blonde I talked to had good reason to lie. She was rude to me. She probably thought I wanted her name so I could call your office with a complaint. So she gave me a false name.”

Stephanie pulled out a packet of photos. “These are the pictures that we have with every employee application. We have not hired any sales associates over five ten.”

“No one answering that description works at any of my stores,” Danessa thundered, and the ceiling light fixtures swayed.

“I saw her. I talked with her,” Josie shouted back. She was not afraid of anyone who had a trapped dead insect as a fashion accessory. Danessa had wasted good money to wear a prehistoric Roach Motel.

Danessa snapped her fingers. The PR person pulled out a copy of Josie’s report to the Creshan Corporation. “This report says you were in my Plaza Venetia store between one thirty and two thirty in the afternoon, Josie Marcus. Here’s the staff schedule for that date. You read it and tell me who worked that afternoon.”

Danessa threw the schedule down on Harry’s desk. Josie’s boss backed away, as if it might bite him. Josie picked it up. It seemed authentic, right down to the thumbtack holes in the corners.

Josie read the neat boxes marking each day: “Olga: 10 to 5 PM Monday. Tuesday. Wednesday. Thursday. Friday. Noon to 10 PM. Saturday—Sunday Off.” Someone named Tiffany worked ten to five p.m. Josie suspected Tiffany did not have a Russian accent.

“Olga worked afternoons all this week,” Danessa said, “and she’ll swear that in court. There was no Marina. You were never in my store. You made up that evaluation. I have the proof.”

Josie could be fired for a fraudulent report. She would be blacklisted in her profession. She felt like she was standing on the edge of a cliff while the ground fell away under her.

“You made up this Marina,” Danessa said. “Who paid you to ruin me? Who bribed you?”

“No one,” Josie said. “Don’t you dare say I’ve been bribed. Ever. My reputation is impeccable.”

It was Danessa’s turn to stare. Josie bet she didn’t often hear someone in a WHITE TRASH tube top say “impeccable.”

Josie waited for Harry to say she was a model employee, but he was silent as a side of beef.

The pale PR person pulled at her too-long beige sleeves.

“My report was the truth.” Josie was so frightened and angry, her words came out at half speed. “Your display stands were gray with fingerprints. There was a chunk of chewed bubble gum on one. It was pink, for your information. And your staff was rude. Just like you.

“As for your so-called proof, anyone can create a schedule in a computer. You can deny that Marina exists. You can also bribe Olga to say what you want.”

Danessa pointed an exquisitely painted nail at Josie’s eye. “You listen to me. You retract that report or I’ll sue you so fast you’ll never afford another rhinestone. You got that?”