Braking for Bodies (5 page)

“Let me get you some ice for your eye,” I offered.

“My eye's fine. Tell me about Fiona and this Peep guy, and you know plenty because you were on the dock when he and Zo landed.”

Here was the tricky part. I had to tell Sutter something and it had to sound convincing, contain an element of truth so Sutter wouldn't wring my neck later on, and most important what I said could not implicate Fiona. There was enough info out there to do that deed. “Peep, Zo and Fiona all knew each other in L.A., and I guess they missed each other and—”

“They be doing the reunion thing,” Irish Donna added. “You know, where you be catching up and getting those T-shirts that look alike and taking pictures.”

Sutter leaned back in the little chair and folded his arms. “According to the porters down at the ferry dock, this nostalgic reunion had Fiona throwing garlic at Peep as he rode off into the sunset. And for some reason she had a bottle of olive oil that she dropped in her yellow
Crier
tote bag. Some coincidence that a bottle just like it winds up as the murder weapon over at the Grand.”

“A lot of people buy olive oil,” I ventured. “And there weren't any fingerprints.”

“How do you know there weren't fingerprints?”

Well, crap. Some people did great under pressure. Then there was me. “Just a guess, and you really need something for that eye, and if you ask me Zo probably did in Peep.” I stood up, looking for a distraction. I needed something to get Sutter's attention so I could snag the hat and get his mind off the fingerprint blunder. Where was a mouse running across the floor when you really needed one?

“Think about it,” I went on. “Zo had to be pissed at Peep when wifey Madonna came along. Or it could have been Madonna doing the whacking when she caught up with Peep. Having him here shacked up with Zo had to toast her cookies, and oh look, there's an ice bucket. You need ice for that eye.” Before Sutter could stop me I reached for the bucket, praying for anything but empty. I pulled off the lid and knocked the bucket with my hand, sending cold water into Sutter's lap. Not a mouse, but not bad.

Sutter jumped up, and I scooted back and snagged the hat from beside the bed. Donna caught me, her eyes huge as she spied the hat.

“Blessed saints, 'tis a mess you are, you'll be needing something to dry off with. Here,” Donna said, tossing Sutter a pink towel that landed over his head and down his face, giving me a chance to stuff the hat in my jacket.

Sutter yanked off the towel; his shirt and pants were
soaked clear through. “To think some people come here for a vacation.”

“We should go.” I gave a little salute, Donna picked up the box and we scurried toward the door.

Sutter's big hand landed heavy on my shoulder. “What did you find here?”

“Zo's a slob and the geranium shampoo is incredible?”

The hand got heavier. “When you find Fiona, tell her to be at my office at noon. And she better get to me before I get to her, and if you're hiding something, that makes you an accessory.”

And it makes me pretty darn clever
, I added to myself, but thought it best not to poke the soaking wet bear. The door closed behind us, and Irish Donna and I trotted down the hall. “Bless the saints, Fiona was there in that very room. Ye think she found that phone you been talking about? What has the girl gotten herself into?”

We stopped at the top of the grand red-carpeted staircase; hotel guests milled around below. “We've got to find Fiona and let her know the local cop's hot on her trail.” I pulled out Sheldon and held him up in one direction, then another, trying for reception. “No bars. How can we have no bars in the middle of the Grand?”

“'Tis a hotel on an island, me dear, not Verizon.” Donna handed me the white box. “Ye best be settling the wedding dress situation first, then have a go at Fiona. My guess is that Rudy is opening up the bike
shop for you, but I need to be getting to the Blarney Scone for the morning rush. Shamus is most likely making more passes than a quarterback if I'm not there giving him the evil eye, not that it be doing much good.”

“There she is,” a guy in a purple T-shirt called, pointing to me from the bottom of the staircase. Four other purple-shirted people gathered around him, all of them looking right at me. “It's that girl who was with the dead guy last night. I bet she has some clues for us.”

They galloped up the steps, and Donna took a step back. “Great day in the morning, they all be daft in the head, they are.”

“You're leaving me?”

“In a New York minute, me dear. They got a wild look in their eyes, they do.” Donna scurried off toward the back stairs that led to where we'd left Paddy. The Murder Marauders—or so their T-shirts proclaimed—surrounded me, pencils and notepads poised for action.

“How did you know this Peep person?” a gray-haired guy with a goatee asked. “Did you live with him in L.A.?”

“I've never been to L.A.”

Everyone scribbled in the notepads, and a lady with bottle-blonde hair asked, “Were you jealous he was with another woman? Is that why you pushed him over the porch, then whacked him over the head with the bottle?”

“I'm not a suspect! I just discovered the body.”

“Likely story.” The blonde gave me a surly look. “You found the body, you're a suspect and I think you look guilty. Your left eye twitches.”

“You know,” I added in a serious tone, “that cop, Nate Sutter, knows more than anyone what this is all about.”

“Heck yeah, the police.” Goatee guy nodded, and the rest joined in. “Great idea. Thanks for the tip.”

“Don't tell him I sent you,” I called after the Marauders. I doubted if they heard me, and Sutter was going to blow his top, but the way I figured it, if I sent other groups his way it would keep the guy busy and let me look for Fiona and the killer.

The Marauders reached the bottom of the grand staircase just as Penelope started up. She looked worse than before, with her auburn hair falling out of its neat bun and her blouse untucked. She took my arm, pulled me to the side and leaned against the stair railing for support. “Please tell me you found the killer, that this nightmare is over, that those two lunatic women are not coming back here ever again to drive me nuts and make a scene. The Grand Hotel does not do scenes; we do peace and quiet and elegance and overcharge guests for the experience. This is not tinsel-town Hollywood.” She stifled a sob.

I patted Penelope's back. “It's going to take more than one trip to a room to figure this all out; you gotta get a grip.”

“I can't afford a grip; I need action now. We'll all be in the unemployment line by the end of the week and
have our condos repossessed and have to return the new Coach bag we just bought in four easy installments on QVC. Last year my cousin worked here at the Grand and the Clintons stopped by and Bill played the sax. I work here and get the L.A. loonies playing murder and mayhem.”

“Do you know where I can find Idle Summers?”

“And there's another nut bar, but she's nice and she's a darn good performer. She sure packs 'em in at the Cupola Bar, I can tell you that. It's tough to get name entertainment out here, but she enjoys the place, especially today for some reason. Why, she was singing show tunes at the grand piano in the lobby just a few minutes ago. Now she's got her yoga mat and doing downward dog on the front porch, her skinny butt pointing due east, and the male population around here is having heart palpitations.”

Penelope held my hand tight, her eyes pleading. “You are going to fix this, right? You're going to make this all go away and get my life back to normal, right? I can't lose my job. I have bills to pay and we need customers coming to the Grand Hotel, not packing up and leaving.”

P
enelope tramped off and I headed across the lobby. It was crowded with guests perched on green brocade couches drinking tea in lovely china cups and eating little pastries as sunlight streamed in through the clerestory windows. I stepped out onto the porch; nearly every seat was taken. Waiters bustled about serving coffee and the best Bloody Marys on earth . . . so I'd been told. At the far end, which was mostly empty, I spotted a human triangle.

“Miss Summers,” I said, as I got closer. I bent down to talk to her face and not her hindquarters. “I think you have a dress that belongs to—”

“Not now, you're ruining my chi. Go away.”

“I need the wedding dress that you have that you
got by mistake, and I've got your yellow rhinestone dress here in this box that I got by mistake, and—”

Idle's face jerked around to face me. She wobbled and the triangle toppled over, trapping me under it, both of us on the floor. “You got my dress? This day just keeps getting better and better.”

I tapped the box wedged under my arm. “Right here.”

Idle Summers was probably midforties and had enough lifts and tucks to look ten years younger to an audience. She had big boobs and curly blonde hair cut with hedge trimmers. That she could do downward dog wasn't a surprise. That she could overcome gravity and right her voluptuousness from the upside-down position was nothing short of a miracle.

Idle scooted to one side and I took the other. She sat on the porch floor Indian style and tore into the box, then held up the yellow dress. “Isn't it fantastic? Perfect for my ‘Ain't No Sunshine When She's Gone' number. I had no idea where to buy some fancy outfits, and then I talked to this nice lady at a fudge shop in town and she put me on to Brides and Bliss, where she bought a lovely wedding dress. Maybe that's how the orders got mixed up.” Idle looked a little closer at the dress. “It's got a spot here on the bottom.”

“It tangled with a lilac bush.”

“Oh, I just love lilacs, don't you? I swear they smell like heaven. My granny had them in her garden in Ohio: pink, purple, white, all kinds. I plan on getting to as many of those lilac tours as I can; they have an
amazing schedule of events. I can just have the dress spot-cleaned, so it's not a problem.” Idle smiled, or came as close to it as Botox and injected whatever would allow. “The box you're after is in my room. I haven't even opened it. Yesterday was such a stressful day and everything was going wrong, but then my problem just sort of . . . well, it just died away and today is so much better. Isn't that the best news ever?”

I followed Idle into the lobby and she stopped at the grand piano. She tucked her yoga mat under her arm, tossed her curls, squared her shoulders and belted out that song about the sun coming out tomorrow. In seconds she had the whole lobby, kids to grandparents, joining in. Penelope was right in that Idle Summers was a terrific performer and sure knew how to work a crowd.

“That was fantastic.” Idle and I took the staircase to the second floor and headed to one of the expensive rooms facing the front of the hotel and the lake.

“I just love to sing,” she gushed. “Always have. You know, I was up for a Tony a few years back . . . when things were really getting good for me and then suddenly things got . . . complicated.” She fished around in her lush cleavage, which was straining under the electric-pink workout top, and plucked out the key card. Any male with a heartbeat would kill to be that key card. She jabbed it into the slot on the door and pushed it open.

“Home sweet home. They let me stay here as part of my singing gig. Isn't it amazing?”

And it was amazing, with yellow floral wallpaper, coordinating bedspread and curtains, a hooked area rug and a little alcove for reading. I could only imagine what this room went for a night.

“Look at this adorable antique writing desk.” Idle nodded across the room. “I just love it. I'm going to try to buy it and take it back to L.A. with me when I go. It'll be a little memento of things gone right.”

“You're going back to L.A. soon?”

A smile split her face. “I intended to stay here all summer and just hang low, but things have changed . . . for the better, the much better, who would have thought. I wasn't sure I'd ever perform again, and now . . . I'm going to be singing ‘Happy Days Are Here Again' tonight and lots of nights to come.” She handed me the white Brides and Bliss box. “Here you go.”

I sat the box on the antique desk and whipped off the top to see a blue dress with sequined flowers. But what grabbed my attention most wasn't the fact that Idle Summers did not have Irma's wedding dress and who knew where it was, but that Idle did have a yellow flyer on the desk. It was the schedule for the lilac tours. The only person she could have gotten that schedule from was Fiona.

Okay, what was going on? What was the connection between Fiona and Idle? They had obviously met up for some reason last night. They knew each other in L.A., and now the Peepster was dead here on Mackinac Island of all places. Where in the heck was Fiona, and what were she and Idle Summers up to?

*   *   *

“Well, hot diggity
dog. You got the dress,” Rudy said to me as I came into Rudy's Rides with the white box tucked under my arm. Rudy was perched on a stool at the workbench and had on his Mark Twain uniform: a wrinkled white shirt, gray vest hanging open and bow tie skewed to one side. His hair looked as if he'd stuck his finger in a socket, and his blue eyes were sparkling and kind as always.

Rudy was Twain on this island of God, mother and apple pie that relied on tourism to stay afloat, at least financially. The island regulars of about five hundred assumed multiple roles in parades, pageants and exhibits. Rudy always dressed the Twain part. He said it made it easy to figure out what to put on every day and it gave him license to swill whiskey, smoke cigars and spout such things as
Go to heaven for the climate and hell for the company
.

Irma was Martha Washington in celebrated events, and she had the character down pat. I was the new Betsy Ross since old Betsy retired to Lauderdale and bequeathed me the costume, the flag and the sewing basket. I wasn't great on the sewing angle, but the basket made a great place to stash KitKats to toss to the kids along the parade route.

I went over to the workbench and plopped the Brides and Bliss box between a bike seat waiting to get attached and Bambino and Cleveland, who were named after original Twain cats.

“Whoa,” Rudy said as I slipped off the top of the box. He put his hands over his face, covering his eyes. “Isn't there something about seeing the wedding dress before the wedding being bad luck?”

“True enough,
if
this were Irma's wedding dress.”

Rudy parted his fingers, looking out at me. “I don't much like the sound of
if
. Usually my little fudge morsel is calm and serene and the picture of rational behavior and tranquillity and beloved by one and all. Then this wedding dress business started up and she's been . . .”

“Distracted?”

“Completely off her nut.” Rudy was a mechanic in his other life; he'd decided he'd had enough of looking under hoods at carburetors and fuel pumps and retired to Mackinac, where there were no cars and lots of bikes and euchre tournaments. Rudy kicked some major euchre butt down at the Mustang Lounge, called the Stang. The trophies on the shelf over the workbench were proof of the kicking-butt part.

“You know,” Rudy said. He held up the blue sequined dress and tilted his head, a smile tipping his mustache. “I like this dress. I like the sparkle. Always been a sucker for sequins. Not exactly a traditional wedding dress, I'll give you that, but like Twain says,
Life's short, break the rules
.”

I sat down on the second stool beside Rudy's where we spent many hours together working on bikes, Rudy fixing them and me painting. “I don't know if Irma would agree, but getting rid of the sequins and
bringing back your bride's dress of her dreams is my problem, not yours.”

“Dear girl.” Rudy put his arm around me. “When Irma sees this dress, pots will be thrown, cans kicked, colorful words will fill the air around us and customers will dive for cover. I'm the one who lives with the disconcerted bride. Trust me, it's my problem.”

“If it's any help, I called Brides and Bliss to see what was going on. Seems a clerk had a little too much bliss, came in drunk as a skunk and screwed up the orders. A bunch of brides are on the warpath and the clerk is now living in Peru under an assumed name. Your old recliner is still in the back room if you need a hideout till this gets fixed, and since we're on the subject of hiding, have you seen Fiona?”

Rudy picked up a wrench and added the new seat to the Sesame Street bike that I'd painted with Oscar the Grouch, Cookie Monster, Big Bird and the gang. “You don't really think Fiona had anything to do with this Peep guy being dead?”

“Do you?”

I pulled the purple sequined hat from my jacket and dropped it next to the white box. “I found this in that Peep guy's room. This means Fiona was there, and my guess is she was looking for his cell phone. There's something on that phone she wants kept quiet. Do you have any idea what happened while she was out in L.A.?”

Rudy picked up a socket wrench. “None of us knows, and she never talks about it. Her daddy went
to see her a few times when she was on the coast and always came back in a bad mood. Maybe giving her the
Crier
was Walt's way of getting her out of that place. She refused at first, and then suddenly she gave in. All I know is that Walt is mighty protective of her and she's the same, always wanting to please him. That's half the reason she went to L.A. in the first place, to be a big-time reporter and make her daddy proud. I think Walt feels responsible for her being out there.”

“OMG, it is you!” came an earsplitting squeal from the doorway. It was the lady from last night, flanked by four others, all wearing yellow T-shirts. “You were the one standing over the body last night.” She held out her hand as she came my way. “I'm Gabi and we're the Corpse Crusaders.” She pointed to her shirt, stenciled in blue. “It's so much fun to meet one of the actors. Love that they just worked you all right into the town as if you belonged here for real.”

“Yeah, it's freaking amazing,” I added.

“So,” asked one of the men, whose blond hair was cut short, “how did you know the dead man?” As if on cue they all pulled out matching yellow notebooks and pens, poised for action.

Rudy gave me a
the spaceship has landed and the aliens have disembarked
look as I said, “I'm not exactly an actor, but—”

“Were you having an affair with that Peep guy?” an elderly man asked. “Did he come to the island to see you? Are you going to do in his mistress next and then his wife?”

The blond guy let out a long-suffering sigh. “If you are going to knock off someone else, please, for the love of all that's holy, let it be that Zo girl. If I hear one more
like
come out of her mouth, I'll do her in myself.”

“For the record,” I rushed in, “I didn't kill anyone.”

“But you were standing over the body, so that makes you a suspect.” Gabi scribbled in her notebook. “And what about that girl in the purple hat who was in the bushes? We saw her hiding there, and look, you've got her hat on the workbench. Is she the killer? Who is she and why was she there? Are you trying to frame her for the murder? That's a great plot twist you got going on. I love it!”

“No framing,” I said as the Crusaders scribbled madly. “I don't know why Fiona was there in the bushes or in the dead guy's room.”

“Fiona?” Gabi squealed, proving once again that I totally sucked when under pressure. “Now we've got a name. This is fantastic. And she was in that Peep guy's room!” They all scribbled again.

Rudy did the
keep your mouth shut
gesture of slicing his hand across his throat, and he was so right. “You know,” I offered, “the guy who has the skinny on all this is that police officer you saw last night.”

“He's so handsome.” Gabi batted her lashes, sighed and looked a little faint as the blond guy added, “We tried talking to him and he's really crabby. He threatened to throw us in jail if we harassed him.”

“See, that's all just part of the game.” I flashed my
best reassuring smile. “He's supposed to be that way, and the jail part was added for color. What you need to do is go see him again and be persistent, just keep going back. He knows what's going on, and he had Zo and that wife, Madonna, down at the station, questioning them. Now he knows even more than before. But whatever you do, don't say anything about seeing the girl in the purple hat. Keep that to yourself and find out what he knows first. You all were really clever to have noticed the purple hat, and you don't want that important clue to get around to the other groups.”

“You're right.” Gabi nodded, and the rest joined in. “We have to keep our information quiet if we intend to win the free weekend at the Grand Hotel. The hotel is giving the prize to the whole team that solves the case; isn't that fantastic? Thanks for your help, and we'll be sure and tell the police officer you sent us over so he cooperates this time around.”

Before I could tell her
Oh, please don't do that
, Gabi and her followers trotted out the door. Rudy leaned against the workbench, his mustache curved in an even bigger smile than before. “Nate Sutter will make you the next victim after sending these people over to him; you know that, don't you?”

“I was desperate to get rid of them, and they will keep Nate busy for a while till I can find out where in the world Fiona is.” I did a little innocent shrug. “And I sort of already sent another group his way. If Sutter's going to make me a victim, I might as well really deserve it.”