Have Your Cake and Kill Him Too (5 page)

“I'm so sorry about this, Boy.”

“Me, too.” He looked up at the imposing home and sighed. “Gosh, this old house has a lot of memories. I fell out of that window once.”

We both turned at the sound of footsteps behind us. Emma came striding up the sloping garden, looking every inch the girl who'd been expelled for seducing a high school football coach.

Boy caught sight of her and stopped breathing, completely absorbed by the tensile strength in her long-legged walk, the lean curves of her body and the knowledge of all things sexual that glowed in her eyes. I prepared to watch the Emma Phenomenon.

To me, Em said, “Who's the leaning tower of propriety?”

I gave her a stern glance. “Emma, you're probably too young to remember Boykin Fitch. Boy, this is my sister Emma Blackbird.”

They shook hands firmly, and perhaps Boy flinched. Emma said, “Don't I know you from somewhere?”

I said, “Boy is our state legislator. He may be running for the Senate next year.”

Boy ducked his head humbly. “Well, now, nothing's official.”

Emma frowned. “I usually go for the lawbreakers, not lawmakers. Are you—?”

“Maybe you saw my picture in the newspaper.”

Emma sized him up. Although she'd been burned by love, that didn't stop her from pursuing the opposite sex when she felt the urge. Her recent history with men had included an alcoholic country-western has-been and the toothy kid who drove the tow truck that hauled her pickup out of a muddy horse pasture. The only characteristics they had in common were a willingness to be bossed around by Emma and plenty of stamina in bed. To me, Boy seemed an unlikely prospect.

Emma must have reached the same conclusion. She shrugged and hooked her thumb in the direction of the Kingsley's truck. “What's going on? Looks like the place is getting robbed in broad daylight.”

“In a way,” I said. “Zell is clearing out the house. He's selling everything.”

Emma looked surprised. “No kidding? The old cowpoke is settling up his gambling debts at last?”

We heard some yelling from the direction of the house. The security guard dropped his cigarette and ran over to help one of his compatriots, who plunged out of the ballroom French doors, wrestling with a tall, rangy woman with spiked white hair.

“Uh-oh,” said Boy. “Cousin Verbena.”

Verbena Fitch Barnstable let out a scream that shook the tree limbs around us. It was the scream that tens of thousands of rock-and-roll fans had heard in stadiums all over the world fifteen years ago. Backed by the howling guitars and thundering drums of the rock band Harass, Verbena had belted out raunchy lyrics and spewed whiskey on mosh pits on five continents.

She shrieked again and fought her captor like a tigress.

As we ran up through the garden, I saw her twist and viciously knee the burly young man in the groin. He let out a strangled yelp and crumpled to the ground. But the second security guard reached Verbena at that moment and locked one muscled arm around her body. Her prematurely white hair flashed in the sunshine as she struggled with him.

“Let me go, you son of a bitch! Let me go!”

“Take it easy, lady!” The young man panted while his friend rolled on the wet flagstones, groaning and clutching his wounded parts.

“Verbena!” Boy cried.

“Take your hands off me,” she snapped, elbows flying with lethal accuracy. The former rock-and-roll star knew her karate, and it wasn't just stage moves. Verbena squarely jammed her elbow into the young intimidator's liver.

“Release her immediately,” Boy commanded unnecessarily. The guard had already dropped her, and Verbena landed on her feet. Without thinking, I reached out to steady her, but Verbena swung on me with a murderous glare in her eyes.

“Take it easy,” Boy soothed, his hand light on her shoulder. “Let's not hurt anybody else.”

“These anabolic idiots won't let me inside,” she shouted, shaking off his touch. “There are things I own in that house!”

“I know.”

“Sorry, miss—uh, ma'am—uh—” The security guard who was still standing rubbed his sore belly. “We have orders not to let anyone inside.”

“My desk.” Her jaw trembled with rage. “That's all I want. It was my desk from childhood, a gift from my mother long before she married that bastard. It's not Zell's, but mine, and I want it!”

The guard shook his head so firmly that I knew he'd fought with families before. “Sorry, but our orders—”

“Let's be reasonable,” Boy said, mustering the sort of persuasive bonhomie that seemed natural to politicians. “I can have a court order here in a few hours. Can you stop moving things into the truck until I get the proper paperwork?”

“Sorry, sir.”

“This is ridiculous,” Verbena snarled. “Boy, stop sucking up to this Neanderthal.”

She was still wildly, grotesquely beautiful—skinny and arrogant with a stage presence that could rival Mick Jagger's. Her juicy red smear of a mouth was unmistakable, her solar flare of hair was white-hot, and her deep-set eyes were still as fierce as those of a feral cat. Rock fans knew her as Viper, and in many ways she lived up her to name.

A troubled wild child, Verbena had left home early and struck out into the world to make her own way. Never really a musician, she'd first been a camp follower of an Irish band, then shot to fame when their singer got sick and Viper stepped onstage in Germany. She started yelling song lyrics in her distinctive rasp, and a star was born. She bounced from band to band for a while and ended up with Harass, cutting at least one important rock-and-roll album. Fans adored her hard-bitten, working-class style and never guessed she'd come from a wealthy Philadelphia family.

Viper didn't burn out like a comet or fade away into a drug-addled twilight like so many rockers. Instead, she abruptly left Harass and returned to Philadelphia. Her family paid for media silence, I'd heard, and the Old Money crowd had closed ranks to bury her past. At long last, she reappeared with a baby daughter. Lots of people in my social circle knew about her rock star days, but it was considered bad taste to bring it up. Anyone who did was promptly shunned by powerful Fitch family friends.

To reinvent herself, Verbena went to culinary school, of all choices, and she eventually opened an upscale bakery and tea shop on a leafy Philadelphia neighborhood corner where rich young socialites dropped in for occasional afternoon indulgences. Her angelic blond daughter grew up playing with a rolling pin in the window of the shop. When Verbena's decorated cupcakes became her trademark and nearly as popular as cheesesteak sandwiches in the city, Verbena had successfully made herself over on behalf of her own little girl.

But today, she was Viper all over again.

“Boy, go find Zell right now,” she commanded. “Where's that chickenshit son of a bitch hiding? He was here an hour ago. Go get him!”

“I tried reasoning with him already, Verbena, but he wouldn't listen.”

“Then punch him in the gut or something! Anything!”

I said, “Look, Boy, we're intruding. This is a family problem, and Emma and I are only in the way—”

Verbena finally became aware of the need to be civil. “Hello, Nora,” she said shortly. “I'm sorry you had to see this. I suppose you'll print the whole story in that newspaper column of yours, won't you?”

“Nora's not going to betray anyone,” Boy said. “Let's keep our anger focused where it will do the most good.”

“Yeah,” said Emma. “Keep your eye on the ball, cupcake.” Emma had extended her hand down to the moaning security guard on the ground. He appeared to forget his injuries as she hauled him to his feet.

“Cupcake,” Verbena said, narrowing her glare on my sister. “Very clever. You're Emma, aren't you? The youngest Blackbird widow?”

“That's me,” Emma said. “And you're the cupcake lady.”

Em was probably too young to remember Viper.

“Don't talk to me about cake today, all right?” Verbena snapped. “I've had quite enough cupcakes for a while.”

“Fine, we'll get out of here. As soon as we find Delilah Fairweather. Is she around?”

“I saw her a while ago,” Boy said. “She was with Zell.”

“Big surprise,” Verbena snapped.

“Now, now, Verbena.”

“What's going on?” I asked.

“She's helping him!” Verbena sputtered. “To start that disgusting restaurant of his!”

Mystified, I asked, “Restaurant? Zell's opening a restaurant?”

Boy looked uncomfortable. “It's not exactly your kind of establishment, Nora. It's—well, have you ever been to Hooters?”

“To—?”

“Zell's venture is called Cupcakes, but it's the same principle. It's pretty sordid. Tonight's the grand opening.”

Verbena trembled with rage. “I should go over right now and throw a firebomb through the window.”

Boy put his arm around his cousin's shoulder. “Let's find Delilah for Nora, and then we'll get out of here. There's no sense prolonging the pain.”

They turned away, and I hesitated on the walk. Boykin cast a glance over his shoulder, though, and gestured for us to follow. The four of us walked around the moving van and up several steps to a smaller garden where Verbena's mother had once planted herbs and vegetables for the household kitchen.

“They're up here somewhere,” Boy said, drawing his cousin by the hand.

“If I see that asshole,” Verbena muttered, “I'll probably kill him.”

I'm not sure which one of us spotted him first, but in just a few steps we all stopped on the flagstones, frozen by the sight in front of us. Then Boy let out a startled curse and dropped Verbena's hand. He took two quick paces forward. Automatically, Emma followed him, but they both stopped again, in shock.

Verbena clapped both hands over her mouth to stifle another of her screams.

A person lay sprawled in a patch of dried lavender, as if making snow angels without the snow. An elderly man with a barrel-shaped beer gut, and wearing a fringed pony skin jacket. I could see his long grizzled hair shivering in the breeze, the only visible movement. His face was half turned away from me, but I recognized his profile.

Zell Orcutt.

Dead.

The feathered tip of an arrow stood stiffly upright on his chest, the shaft buried deep in his flesh as if shot there by the stone huntress in the fountain. With one gnarled hand, he had obviously tried to pull it out before death seized him.

Verbena gave a long, keening howl and shoved past Boy. She threw herself down next to her stepfather, and for an instant I thought she intended to strike him. She clenched her fists and drew back, but inches from hitting him, she froze again, her face a mask of shock. She opened both hands and began to sob. “You bastard,” she said. “You horrible, rotten bastard!”

She sounded frightened, I thought.

“Oh, God.” Boy fumbled for his cell phone. “Oh, my God.”

I stepped back and felt the sky spin around us. The air began to twinkle with thousands of tiny stars. Emma turned and saw my face. “Oh, shit,” she said in a voice that sounded very far away. “Don't faint.”

“This is not a good idea,” Emma said several hours later when we arrived in a suburban parking lot not far from the King of Prussia Mall. “Even the coroner said you looked bad, and that can't be good.”

“I'm okay.”

I wasn't okay, but the last place I wanted to be was home alone right now, with the image of Zell Orcutt's body in my head and memories of my husband's shooting death flashing back as if it had happened yesterday. Tonight's nightmare was too vivid to bear by myself. I wanted to be with people. I wanted to feel alive.

I said, “I need to find Delilah. Then I'll go home.”

“And just where the hell was she?” Emma asked. “I thought she was supposed to meet you at Fitch's Fancy.”

We exchanged a glance.

“Delilah must have forgotten about me, that's all. She's so busy.”

“Doing what?” Emma muttered.

I said, “Let's go into Cupcakes and find out.”

“I still say it's a dumb idea.”

“You don't need to come.”

“The hell I don't.” Emma grinned suddenly. “Cupcakes may not be your kind of place, but it's certainly mine.”

Cars and SUVs jammed the parking lot, and a crowd flocked toward the entrance—mostly men, mostly drunk. Rock-and-roll music roared from speakers hidden in the shrubbery. On the sidewalk, we passed a mob of teenagers held at bay by adults checking identification. Emma poked her chin at one of the doormen, and he nodded us inside.

Two blond hostesses with perky smiles and equally perky nipples greeted us. “Welcome to Cupcakes!”

“Save it for the boys,” Emma said.

Cupcakes was bedlam fueled by testosterone and rock and roll. One glance told me that Cupcakes planned to lure its customers with the promise of barbecued hot wings and big-screen televisions tuned to sports, but primarily with the Cupcake Girls.

Carrying a tray of drinks over her shoulder, a very young woman in short shorts and a T-shirt snug enough to have been sprayed on her body tottered past us in spike-heeled shoes so high her ankles wobbled. Strategically printed on her shirt was the company logo—twin cupcakes that looked more like bare breasts than dessert.

Emma took one look around and said coolly, “Think I could get a burger? Or do they only wait on people with the Y chromosome?”

I almost couldn't hear her over the cacophony of hard rock and the blare of dozens of televisions shouting various basketball games. A roar of male laughter erupted from a table where a simpering waitress brandished menus like a fan dancer. The air was heavy with the smell of fried food and beer.