Slay Belles (2 page)

“Hey!” She stiff-armed me out of her personal space. “Watch where you’re— Oh, it’s you.”

As tiny and snappish as a terrier with a toothache, Popo glared at me. With one arm raised, she carried several dresses on hangers—enough couture to settle the national debt. In her other hand she held one of the jumbo water bottles she was never seen without, and from one finger dangled a ring of keys—no doubt her access to all the inventory storerooms in Haymaker’s. She wore a pair of trim, black Italian jeans and a loose black Dolce & Gabbana cotton shirt printed with vintage travel posters. On her feet she proudly wore running shoes—proof that she never stopped hustling.

“Hello, Popo. I was just on my way to see you.”

“Oh?” Popo’s small eyes narrowed on me through the white-blond spikes of her signature punk hairdo. Her unspoken question was, “Can you afford Popo now?”

Before my family nest egg got scrambled, I had been one of the first clients to use Popo’s services as a personal shopper. For me, Popo had been a big time-saver. Oh, I’ll admit I could pull out my credit card just as fast as any shopaholic in town, but I had more interesting things to do than poke through hangers at the YSL sale rack. It had been easy to phone Popo and pick up a few pretty things before jetting off to London for a weekend of museums. I’d recommended her to many friends.

But when my parents took the money and ran, and my husband quit doing cocaine long enough to be murdered by his drug dealer, I’d discontinued my relationship with Popo. I couldn’t afford her anymore. Nothing like a dose of the real world to set a girl straight.

Popo’s hostile expression reminded me that she not only resented my departure as a client, but also that I’d known her when she first got started and needed my help—before she started referring to herself in the third person.

She certainly didn’t need anyone’s help anymore. I’d recently heard that Popo’s work with wealthy clients raked in tens of millions of dollars for the department store every year—far exceeding any other Haymaker’s employee. To better facilitate her sales, she had been given her own boutique, a private salon tucked in a corner of the store where she plied her clients with light salads, chilled bottles of Cristal, and plenty of personalized salesmanship.

Popo’s expert gaze swept over my ensemble—my faithful Calvin Klein skirt and a well-cut jacket that had seen me through many examinations by fashion Nazis. Although I told myself I didn’t care what anyone thought of my clothes, I suddenly hoped I didn’t look threadbare.

Unwillingly, Popo said, “You don’t look bad, Nora. Is that jacket Carolina Herrera?”

“Yes, as a matter of fact. You have an amazing eye, Popo.”

“Popo is the best,” she corrected. She flicked through the hangers in her hand and pulled out a long wisp of beaded chiffon. “You should buy this Alberta Ferretti dress. Just the thing for a Christmas party. Good with your coloring. Only twenty-four hundred.”

“Thanks.” I swallowed hard and tried not to calculate how many rolls of generic toilet paper I could buy with twenty-four hundred dollars. “It’s . . . gorgeous.”

Popo dangled the dress in front of me like juicy bait at the end of a sharp hook. The garment probably weighed as much as a handkerchief and looked as if it might cling to my curves like melted butter. Popo smirked. “You could make your boyfriend crazy with this dress.”

“Uhm . . .”

“Maybe he’d buy it for you. I hear he’s a rich bad boy. C’mon. Only takes a minute to try it on.”

I gave myself a mental slap. What was I thinking? Even a Kathie Lee Casual from Wal-Mart was beyond my budget. “I can’t,” I said firmly. “I’m here to pick up a package for Lexie Paine.”

Popo immediately snatched the dress back, and gave up trying to tempt me. “Lexie’s box is inside.” She jerked her head toward the glass door of her salon. “Check with Darwin. He’ll find it for you. Just duck before you ask for the package.”

“Duck?”

“Yeah. Darwin’s not your biggest fan. He might throw something at you.”

I couldn’t imagine why Popo’s assistant could possibly care about me. “Why should Darwin want to hit me?”

Her grin was more of a death-mask grimace than a smile. “He heard about your recommendation.”

“My—”

“You told Alan Rutledge not to promote Darwin.”

“I never—”

I stopped myself. At the intermission of a benefit performance of a Broadway show months ago, Alan and I had spoken briefly on the subject of Darwin Osdack, Popo’s assistant. With a flush, I remembered Alan asking if I thought Darwin was ready to become a personal shopper and start taking clients of his own. My response had been guarded—definitely lacking in enthusiasm. I suddenly realized now that Alan had taken my lukewarm answer as a negative comment on Darwin’s abilities.

“You were right, of course.” Popo slugged some water from her enormous plastic bottle. “That goes without saying. Darwin’s not ready. But he decided it was you who tipped off Alan about the shrinkage problem.”

“Shrinkage problem?”

“You know—employees walking off with merchandise. Darwin thought he was getting away with it, but you must have sharper eyes than Popo does. Nobody suspected Darwin was the thief.”

“But I didn’t know anything,” I said. “If Alan inferred that I believed Darwin was doing anything wrong—”

“Store security couldn’t prove anything,” Popo assured me. “If they had, Darwin would have been history right away. But he’s definitely on probation, and he didn’t get the promotion.”

“Because of me.”

Again, Popo gave one of her ghastly smiles. “Yep. So duck when you pick up the package.”

“Thanks for the warning,” I said. “And for the package. I’m sure Lexie will appreciate the work you’ve—”

“Popo, darling!” A trilling voice interrupted us.

From around a rack of Gucci belts came a tall, skinny woman wearing a mink coat and enough gold jewelry to sink a pirate ship. She carried two Haymaker’s shopping bags that bulged with her booty.

“Sage, darling,” Popo cried, giving double air-kisses. “Just in time to see the David Yurman necklaces before they’re all gone!”

“You kept a few back for me, right, Popo? You’re the best!”

In the presence of a paying customer, Popo was instantly a different person. Her eyes sparkled with enthusiasm, and her energy level spiked to match her client’s. She seized Sage’s arm and guided her toward the escalator. “Let’s run down to Fine Jewelry this instant. I found the most perfect diamond pendant, just the thing to go with that Valentino for New Year’s Eve. And earrings to match!”

“What would I do without you, Popo?” Sage gushed.

Popo never looked back at me. She had work to do for worthier customers.

“Merry Christmas,” I murmured after their departing figures.

I stood for a dreadful moment, thinking about Darwin Osdack’s situation. About how my stupidly unenthusiastic comment in a social situation to Alan may have spoiled Darwin’s chances for advancement.

From my handbag emerged my dog, Spike, awakened perhaps by the proximity of a creature with even fewer appealing qualities than himself. He snarled sleepily.

Spike had been a gift from my driver’s mother, and I’d been struggling to adjust to coping with a pet ever since. He was ten pounds of pure dynamite with many bad habits, and I had taken to carrying him around in an old Balenciaga handbag to keep him from destroying my home while I was out. Trouble was, he’d been badly injured a few weeks earlier, and his recovery involved plaster casts and sometimes a little wheeled cart to support his hindquarters. Mostly, however, he seemed content to snooze in my bag. But with a flicker of his old bad temperament, he glared after Popo’s departing figure and growled.

“Don’t let her bother you,” I said, patting his bristly head. “There’s no chance I’ll be doing business with Popo anytime soon.”

Spike, an ugly little fiend on his best day, gallantly suggested he pee on her foot.

“Go back to sleep.” I stuffed his head back into my bag.

Outside Popo’s salon stood a headless mannequin wearing a spectacular Oscar de la Renta gown—a fountain of ruffles, and cut on the bias, too—enough camouflage to hide the figure flaws of a camel. No doubt Popo had placed the dress there to entice one of her customers needing a last-minute grand entrance to a holiday party. Popo was smart that way—she always knew what her clients needed before they did. But looking at the Oscar, all I could think about was the beaded dress Popo had shown me. It was even more beautiful than the one on display.

But now I had to face Darwin.

I took a deep breath for courage and pushed through the door to Popo’s private enclave, and found myself in a wonderland of the most expensive goods sold under Haymaker’s roof. Piles of handbags designed by celebrity wives, mounds of featherlight lingerie, racks of sequined party dresses—all evidence that Popo continued to do what she did best: push the priciest products on very willing customers.

But not all her customers were happy.

As I stepped into the salon, a female voice snarled, “There’s only one thing we can do. We’ll have to kill Popo together.”

Chapter 2

Behind Popo’s cluttered desk, Darwin Osdack clutched a tiny leather handbag protectively against his puny chest and brandished a silver letter opener. “What, are you crazy?”

Two customers faced the desk, their backs to me. One was a slim young blonde wearing a black satin corset over spandex pants that clung to her body like the skin of a greyhound fresh off the racetrack. The heels of her tight boots were too high and stiletto-thin. Her hair cascaded around her shoulders like yellow cotton candy. She leaned over the desk and presented her perfect butt to me for admiration while jamming her finger into Darwin’s solar plexus. “I want that handbag, Darwin. Yesterday I told Popo I’d strangle her with my bare hands to get it. You’re not man enough to keep that bag away from me now.”

“I can’t give it to you!” Darwin’s foxy face puckered with the effort to keep from weeping. “Popo already promised it to somebody else!”

“I’m here now, and I want it.”

“But Popo says—”

“Dammit, my fiancé owns this dump!” The blonde slapped a clear spot on the desk so hard the platoon of Popo’s various beverage bottles jumped. “That means I get anything I want!”

Maybe because I felt guilty about Darwin, I suddenly found myself protecting him.

“Excuse me,” I said.

Cindie Rae Smith spun around. Her flawless, Botoxed face was flushed, but uncreased despite her rage. Platinum hoops danced furiously in her ears. A vein throbbed in her throat. Her bosom—two astonishing monuments to modern surgical technique—quivered with suppressed fury.

“Who the hell are you?”

“Hello, I’m Nora Blackbird.” I put out my hand to her.

She ignored my hand and tried to narrow her eyes, but the Botox did its duty. “Is that supposed to mean something to me?”

“I’m an old friend of Alan’s. I just spoke with him. He’s looking forward to seeing a play with you tonight.”

“Let him wait. That damn
Titanic
takes longer to sink on stage than it did in the ocean.” Cindie Rae’s lips—unnaturally puffed with collagen—curled into a distorted smile that had to be painful. “Darwin’s about to give me the Lettitia McGraw handbag I want.”

“No,” said the other customer. “Darwin’s going to give it to me.”

The aristocratic woman who towered over the desk was none other than Pinky Pinkerton, the elderly heiress to the Jiffy Kitty Litter Box fortune. Although Pinky lived in splendor on Philadelphia’s Main Line with a tennis court, swimming pool, and golf and archery greens to keep her fit and feisty, she wore a threadbare Burberry coat and a pair of faded khaki trousers that belied her tax bracket. With a stubborn Hepburn jaw and white, boyish haircut, Pinky generally radiated patrician disapproval, but tonight she appeared to be appalled to find herself in the presence of the infamous Cindie Rae.

“Hello, Pinky,” I said. “I haven’t seen you since last year’s tennis finals.”

Although bruised from heaven only knew what kind of sporting accidents, Pinky still looked capable of whipping the youngsters who dared set their pretty white sneakers on her tennis court. At the very least she seemed ready to flatten Darwin with the ratty umbrella gripped in her right hand.

“Hello, Nora,” she said, stiffly summoning her composure. “I’m sorry you walked in on this ugly scene.”

“Oh, my gawd!” Darwin put the letter opener to his own throat. “As if my day wasn’t crappy enough! First these two harridans, and now you! I might as well kill myself.”

“Do it,” Cindie Rae said. “And I’ll get the handbag.”

“You’ll do no such thing, Mr. Osdack,” Pinky snapped. “I was promised that bag for my granddaughter’s Christmas gift, and you’re going to hand it over immediately.”

Cindie Rae thrust out her armored chest. “You’ll have to go through me to get the bag, you old battle-ax. So back off—unless you want to try shoving a pillow over my face like you smothered all your husbands.”

Darwin gasped. I nearly swallowed my own tongue.

Upon hearing the long-whispered accusation spoken aloud, Pinky drew herself up to her full rangy height and sent a lightning bolt of a glare down at Cindie Rae. “You, young lady, are a tramp, pure and simple. I won’t listen to that kind of talk.”

“So hit the road,” Cindie Rae said. “And good riddance.”

Pinky skewered Darwin with an equally electric glare. “If I hear you’ve given that bag to this gold digger, young man, I’ll do worse than murder you. I’ll make sure you never work in this city again.”

I thought Pinky might sweep out of the salon with her head high, but no such luck.

With her umbrella, she whacked the letter opener from Darwin’s grip and made one last grab for the handbag. Darwin shrieked, but he was trapped behind the desk and couldn’t escape. He whipped the bag over his head to keep it from Pinky’s long-armed grasp.

Cindie Rae saw her chance and lunged.

“Ow!”

“No!”

When all three sets of hands latched onto the Lettitia McGraw handbag, Pinky began beating Darwin’s head with her umbrella, and I saw Cindie Rae grab a handful of his hair. Darwin shrieked. The three of them crashed down on the desk in a grunting tangle. Popo’s water bottles and carefully organized merchandise flew off the desk in a whirling hurricane of debris. I was hit by a Jimmy Choo and dodged the splashing contents of one of Popo’s cans of Slim-Fast. The can clattered to the floor, spraying chocolate glop in all directions, and a six-pack of water bottles tumbled down into the mess.

The melee woke Spike, who muscled his way out of my bag with an unholy snarl. Quicker than an angry rattlesnake, he flashed his teeth at the nearest target—Darwin’s protruding left ear. I heard the sickening crunch of cartilage, then Darwin’s scream. Spike—startled by his success—immediately released his prey. But the tantalizing scent of Slim-Fast caught his attention. Before I could grab him, the dog made a dive out of my bag. He hit the floor and splashed into a sticky chocolate lake at my feet.

“A rat!” Darwin snatched his feet off the floor. Pinky leaped onto the desk, too, pinning Darwin under her knee, but hanging on to the handbag for dear life. Somehow Cindie Rae had commandeered the umbrella, and she began beating Pinky’s shoulder with it.

I bent and grabbed a bottle of water from the floor. With a snap, I opened the cap. “Stop it! Stop it, all of you!”

I splashed water on the writhing heap of humanity as if breaking up a vicious dogfight.

Cindie Rae reeled back first. “My hair!”

Darwin scrambled out of danger. “This shirt is pure silk—dry clean only!”

Only Pinky had the composure to stand back in rigid silence, straightening her coat with the last vestiges of her dignity.

“That’s enough,” I snapped. “You’re all behaving like crazy people. Darwin, give me the bag.”

His hand trembling, Darwin obediently placed the Lettitia McGraw bag in my upturned palm. I took possession calmly.

“Now,” I said. “We’ve had quite enough violence for one night. We’re going to let Popo decide who gets this bag. It’s her job, and she does it extremely well.”

Darwin made a rude noise with his lips.

Cindie Rae was still rearranging the mane of her hair. “We’ll see about that. If I have any say in the matter, Popo is history!”

Pinky said, “I think I know how to solve this impasse. Here, young man. Surely you can spend this wisely.”

She placed a crisp one-hundred-dollar bill on Popo’s desk, but Darwin recoiled from the money as if it might be contaminated. “Take that back! Do you want to get me fired? I’m not taking bribes!”

“Since when?” Pinky demanded. “Popo makes no bones about it.”

“Take it back, take it back!”

“Oh, stop screaming.” Pinky snatched up her money. “I’m going to find Popo this minute. I’ll get this straightened out one way or another.”

She made a stalking exit, the hem of her Burberry coat flying out behind her skinny frame.

“That woman is a menace!” Cindie Rae went to the mirror and checked her hair. “Why hasn’t she been convicted and electrocuted by now? Everybody knows she killed both her husbands.”

“That’s enough,” I said.

“Who do you think you are? And you,” she said to Darwin. “If you breathe a word of this catfight, you’ll regret it. I’ll tell Alan everything that happened here.”

Satisfied with her hair, she gathered up a shopping bag and followed Pinky out of the salon with a hip swivel that would have done spinal damage to a person with less muscle tone.

“There,” I said, handing the Lettitia McGraw back to Darwin. “You’d better put this bag in a safe place.”

He sniffed. “I’ll take it down to the store safe in the security office.”

“Good idea.”

“What a mess!” He rubbed his bitten ear as he surveyed the chaos of Popo’s carefully arranged merchandise. Hysteria threatened again, but Darwin bravely gathered his courage. “I have to get this cleaned up before Popo gets back.”

“Let me help.”

“God, no.” He shuddered at the thought of spending another instant in my company. “I’ll manage somehow. It’s past closing time. All customers should be out of the store by now. Including you.”

“Listen, Darwin, I’d like to talk with you.”

Still standing stiff and wounded behind the desk, he said, “About what?”

“There’s been a misunderstanding, and if I was part of it, I need to make things right.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Spike stopped lapping up the spilled Slim-Fast and began scrambling around underfoot, dragging his hindquarters and panting with excitement. He tracked chocolate paw prints all over Popo’s floor.

I picked up Spike and held him away from my clothing. He dripped with Slim-Fast. “First let me clean up the dog in the lavatory. Then we’ll have a discussion.”

Silently, Darwin pointed.

I ducked into the bathroom at the back of the small salon and plunked Spike in the sink. At once he sensed what was coming and tried to climb out, but I was too quick for him. Pinning the dog in place, I carefully scooped warm water over his rough coat to avoid soaking his casts.

“You are a menace,” I told him.

At last I turned off the water and held Spike down with one hand as I stretched to yank a handful of paper towels from the dispenser.

Which was when the lights went out.

“What in the world . . . ?”

Silence. The lavatory had no window, so the darkness was complete. Spike gave a nervous yap.

“Quiet,” I told him, and blindly tried to dry him off with the towels. Over my shoulder, I called, “Darwin?”

I heard someone jiggle the locked doorknob.

“Darwin? What’s going on?”

No response. I put Spike on the floor and felt my way to the door. I grabbed the knob and twisted to disengage the lock, but when I tried to pull the door inward, it didn’t budge. “Darwin!” I called. “I’m locked in here!”

Still no answer. And no lights. Panting and whining with excitement, Spike hobbled around my feet in the small bathroom.

The bathroom lock was on the inside of the door, I reasoned. So why couldn’t I let myself out? It was as if the door had been dead-bolted from the outside.

In total darkness, I rapped my knuckles on the door. Then I pounded. I shouted. I kicked the door as loudly as I could. To accompany me, Spike barked and finally began to howl.

But Darwin didn’t come to open the door.

Nobody did.

“That little bastard locked us in here for the night,” I said to Spike.

The puppy sat down on my foot and whined.

After five minutes of fuming, I finally got an idea. I went to the door and felt around the edges to locate the hinges. “Aha.”

Groping in my handbag for something to use as a tool, I poked myself with a metal nail file. I pulled it out and tested its strength. It was flimsy, but it would have to get the job done. Cautiously, I wedged the nail file up into the hinge and pushed. I felt the bolt give way, but only slightly. Getting the door off the hinges was going to be a tedious process.

When the first hinge was disassembled and the second bolt nearly wiggled out, the lights suddenly came on again. I checked my watch. Nearly forty-five minutes had passed, and I’d broken three fingernails. The palms of my hands were going to be bruised. I ran cold water into the sink to soak them for a minute, then went back to inching the hinge apart.

I let out a cry of relief when the second bolt fell out and hit the tile floor with a musical
ding
. Wrestling the door out of position was harder than I imagined. It didn’t just fall into my arms. I had to shove and wiggle and heave to inch the heavy door out of place.

At last, the weight of it fell sideways. A rush of cool air entered the lavatory. I looked out and realized that someone had tied one length of a rope around the doorknob and fastened the other end to a sturdy coatrack on the opposite wall.

“Darwin, you little fink!” I said to the empty salon.

No sign of the weasel.

I gathered up the contents of my bag and shoved it back where it belonged. Then I stepped over the rope and picked up Spike. “Let’s get out of here.”

Just as eager to leave as I was, Spike let himself be dumped into my bag. I pushed out of the salon and into the darkened department store.

It was eerie, deserted and quiet. The usual rumble of escalators, heating system, and muffled music had been silenced. I didn’t see a single person. Even the reindeer in Santa’s Wonderland were still. I headed for the escalator.

At the edge of the luxury bedding department stood the display bed I’d noticed earlier. But something was different this time.

I stopped still at the foot of the bed. “Popo?”

The sprawled body of Popo Prentiss lay in the bedclothes, the sheets wildly twisted around her. Popo didn’t move. Her eyes were half-open and unfocused. One of her hands lay upturned and flaccid. The other still gripped her plastic water bottle, now empty and dented. I realized I was standing in a splashed puddle of water.

“No,” I said, already feeling the floor begin to tilt around me.

I didn’t need to touch her to know she was dead. Her stillness was complete. I could see that a plump needlepoint pillow with a Ralph Lauren tag had been abandoned beside her head. A thin line of foamy drool ran from the corner of her mouth. The blond spikes of her hair were damp. She had tried to fight off her killer with the water bottle.