Button Holed (18 page)

“You got that right.” He arrived just a couple minutes after my call, which was no easy thing considering late-afternoon Chicago traffic, and now, he bent to examine the scratches around the door lock. “It’s an amateur job, that’s for sure. Looks like he used a small screwdriver or a nail file. No big surprise.” He looked over his shoulder out to North Wells. “He wouldn’t have wanted anyone to see him try to pop the lock. He’d have to be standing close, see?” Nevin moved in and his hand hovered just about the door and the note I’d taped to it advising anyone who happened to stop by that I’d be on Estelle’s show that afternoon and that they should stop by later when I returned. “The door’s still locked?”

“I didn’t try it. I didn’t know if I should touch anything.”

My phone rang from inside the shop, and I reconsidered the wisdom of keeping my hands off the door. “If it’s somebody calling about the button . . .” I moaned, and didn’t elaborate. Nevin knew exactly what I was talking about.

He stepped out onto the sidewalk, pulled out his phone, and made a call of his own. “I’ll have a team come over and dust for prints,” he explained while he waited for someone to answer the phone. “But honestly, I don’t think they’ll find anything. It’s weird.” By this time of the afternoon, it was probably the end of Nevin’s shift, and it looked like he’d put in a hard day. He was wearing a lightweight khaki suit that had been rumpled by the heat, and his brown and beige plaid tie was cockeyed. I wondered if he realized there was a dry-cleaning tag on his jacket sleeve. It offended my sense of order but rather than mention it, I reached over, pulled off the tag, and tucked it in my pocket.

He didn’t bother to thank me. But then, I really didn’t expect him to.

He gave my shop address to the person on the other end of the phone. “That last burglary, that was done by pros,” he said when he was finished and tucking his phone back into his pocket. “No sign of forced entry. No fingerprints. No muss, no fuss.”

“Except the mess they left behind.” I peered in the window, but the way the sun was shining, it was hard to see much of anything aside from my own reflection. I prayed the thief hadn’t gotten in. As much as I love my buttons, I was getting sick and tired of picking them up off the floor.

“This is such a botched job,” he muttered. “It’s got to be someone different.”

“Two people who want to burglarize a button shop?” It sounded unlikely, even to me. “That’s what you meant when you said—”

“Weird.” He stared at the door awhile longer. I wasn’t sure what he was looking for, but I stared, too, just in case I was missing something.

Finally, he combed his fingers through his hair. It didn’t help; he still looked like a poorly groomed puppy. “You did a great job,” he said, his gaze on the door. “You know, on that TV show this afternoon.”

Not what I was expecting to hear, so of course, I was caught off guard. I covered by mumbling the standard, “Thank you.”

“No really. I mean it.” He stepped back and leaned against a lamppost next to the park bench where I’d sat the night of the murder. “If I had to be on TV, I’d be terrified.”

“Join the crowd.” I had stepped onto the sidewalk, too, and I maneuvered my way around a woman with a camera who was pointing at the shop and saying something to the man with her about, “That’s where it happened.”

“I thought for sure I was going to pass out,” I told Nevin.

“Really? You didn’t look nervous.” When I glanced his way, I saw that he was looking at me. At least until he saw that I was looking at him. Then he looked away. “You were cool and calm. You talked about that button of ours, but you were careful not to say too much. Just that it was beautiful and you were anxious to find the artist. You sounded like you really knew what you were talking about.”

He didn’t come right out and add
even though you obviously don’t
so technically, I shouldn’t have bristled. He must have realized it because he added, “I didn’t mean—”

“It’s true.” I shrugged. It was hot, so I took off my black jacket, folded it, and tucked it into my tote. “If I was the expert I’m supposed to be—”

“You’ve already told us more about that button than we could have found out on our own.” He pushed away from the lamppost. “I mean, think about it; we wouldn’t have known what it was made of or that it’s handmade. And we sure wouldn’t have had the connections to go on Estelle Marvin’s show to show it off to the world. You’ve been really helpful.”

“About everything but who made that button and how it ended up here and what it has to do with . . .” The woman with the camera was still nearby. I lowered my voice. “Kate’s murder.”

“Not to worry.” He frowned. “The part about what it has to do with Kate’s murder isn’t your responsibility. That’s my puzzle to figure out, and I haven’t been any more successful than you.”

Inside the Button Box, my phone rang again, and I screeched with frustration. “That could be someone calling right now with the information we need.”

“And if they are, they’ll leave a message or call back.”

“But—”

“The crime-scene techs, they said they’re looking into a robbery a couple blocks away. But they’re going to be at least an hour.”

An hour with my ringing phone teasing me from inside the shop. And me locked outside.

I grumbled some more.

“You want to . . .” Nevin took a couple steps in the direction of the trendy bistro across the street and a couple shops down. “You know, get something to eat or something?”

Déjà vu all over again, and I was too exhausted from my moment in the spotlight.

“I don’t think so,” I told him.

“I haven’t had anything since a bagel at seven this morning.” He pressed a hand to his flat-as-a-pancake stomach. “I’m starving.”

I made a little shooing motion. “You go. I’ll wait here.”

“I promise not to take any phone calls from the office while we’re there.”

I bit my lower lip so he wouldn’t see my smile.

“Honest.” He fished his phone out of his pocket and held it out to me. “If it rings, you’ve got strict orders not to give it to me.”

As concessions went, it was fairly generous, but there is that whole once burned, twice shy thing. Staring at his phone, I considered my options.

“I suppose we could do coffee,” I suggested.

He plopped the phone into my hand. “Coffee, it is.”

AS IT TURNED out, me holding on to his phone wasn’t much of a test of Nevin’s resolve. It never rang, at least not until we were almost back at the Button Box. By then I figured it didn’t matter, and when it rang, I handed the phone right over to him.

“Team’s there,” he said, listening to the person on the other end of the phone at the same time he told me what was going on. “That burglar never popped the lock and got the door open.”

“Thank goodness.” I didn’t even realize how nervous I’d been until I heard the news and felt the tension drain out of me. “I can get in and retrieve those phone messages?”

“Only if I come with you.”

The hour we spent together had been less awkward than our first date but not exactly scintillating. Nevin talked police work because, apparently, it was the only thing he was comfortable talking about. I didn’t want to come across as a boring nerd, so I refused to talk about buttons, and that was the only subject I was comfortable talking about. Long silences are us. I doubted Nevin’s offer of accompanying me back to the shop was a come-on.

He didn’t want me to think it was, either. That’s why he piped up with, “That wasn’t supposed to sound like what it sounded like. What I meant is that I don’t feel comfortable with you walking into the store alone. Not with everything that’s been happening.”

“Of course that’s what you meant. I knew that.” I did. I guess that’s why I was disappointed.

We arrived back at the shop just as the crime-scene techs were leaving. My phone was ringing again.

I already had my keys out, and I bounced from foot to foot, anxious to get the door open. The last of the technicians did not share my sense of urgency. She was on her knees smack-dab in front of the door, and she took her time packing her fingerprint powder and her brushes. Maybe it had been a long day for her, too. She looked over her shoulder at Nevin. “No harm, no foul on this one, Riley. No breaking and entering, so obviously, nothing taken. And by the way, no fingerprints, either. I can’t imagine why you called us for something this trivial.”

Nevin’s shrug was noncommittal. “Let’s just say it’s something I’m doing for a friend.”

She responded with one of those
whatever
looks, and as soon as she moved away from the door, I had it unlocked and opened. I looked around my perfect, orderly, wonderful shop and breathed a sigh of relief.

“You were right,” I told Nevin. “They never got in. Nothing’s been touched.”

“I’m glad.” He did a quick turn around the shop, anyway, and when he was satisfied that nothing had been touched—and that no one was hiding out in the back room—he flopped into one of my guest chairs and pointed to the phone. “Why don’t you—”

I was way ahead of him. I’d already dialed into voice mail, put in my password, and set the phone on speaker.

“Message number one,” the computer voice informed me.

“Josie? Adele here. Adele Cruikshank. Don’t worry, I’m not calling to harass you about firing that no-good granddaughter of mine. She’s already got another job at some tattoo place down on West Lawrence. Honey, I just called to tell you I heard from Frank. You remember Frank. He’s my nephew. He saw you on the TV this afternoon, and he says you looked so much better than you did in those pictures of you I showed him a couple months ago, and—”

I would have hit the delete button if I wasn’t trying to move so fast. The way it was, I hit the wrong button and saved the message. I’d give it a more permanent end later.

“Message number two.”

“Josie, it’s Stan. You looked good, kiddo. We’ll celebrate when you get home. Ice cream sundaes at my place.”

“Message number three.”

“Ms. Giancola, Bernie Hoffman here. Literary agent with Hoffman, Brightly, and Briggs. I saw you with Estelle Marvin, and it occurred to me that you have quite an interesting story to tell. Oh, not about those silly buttons. But Estelle, she mentioned that you know Hugh Weaver, and of course, I know about your connection with Kate Franciscus, and I was just thinking, a book about Hollywood stars and their buttons, that just might be quirky enough to catch an editor’s attention. Give me a call. I’m in New York, and the number here is—”

This time, I did manage to find the delete button.

“Message number four.”

“It’s Mrs. Newman, Josie. From the third floor. You know, Adele’s friend from the beauty shop. My grandson was with me when I watched you on TV today. He’s just about your age. Well, he will be in a few years, and he’ll be out of school by then and—”

“Oh good gracious!” I groaned, and hit delete again. “One more offer from an old lady trying to fix me up, and I’m going to scream.”

Not to worry. Message number five, as it turned out, was from Kaz.

He got as far as “Hello” before I deleted him.

“Message number six.”

By this time, I was grumbling. “I might as well give up,” I moaned. “It’s not going to be anyone interesting or helpful, or—”

“Ms. Giancola?” The voice wasn’t one I recognized. A man’s, the accent somewhere between English public school and that little German car in the commercials. “We must talk,” he said, only when he did, it sounded like “Vee must talk.”

“This is Roland. Prince Roland of Ruritania.”

Nevin sat up fast, and together, we bent over the phone, neither one of us wanting to miss one high-class syllable.

“You will understand, my schedule, it is quite constrained,” Roland said. “I arrived from my country just in time for my darling Kate’s memorial service in Los Angeles yesterday, and I must leave again soon. I will speak to the police, of course. But you, Ms. Giancola, you were the one who found my dear Kate, and I must . . . I must speak to you about this. I will meet you this evening at seven o’clock. The Ferris wheel at Navy Pier.”

He didn’t ask if I was available. Or willing. Or if it was convenient.

I guess when you’re a prince, you don’t worry about things like that.

“What do you think?” I slid Nevin a look.

“I think you’re getting way too involved.” He tapped a finger against the arm of the wingback chair. “I think you’re not a professional, and you have no business getting dragged into this investigation. You’re a button expert, and buttons are the only things you should be worried about.”

He was right. So I shouldn’t have felt like arguing. Except that whether it made any sense or not (and I was smart enough to know it didn’t), this case was feeling more and more like mine. I was already involved. Whether I wanted to be or not. And now, I had a chance nobody else was likely to get, an up-close-and-personal with Kate’s fiancé, and not one encumbered by some formal setting or diplomatic hubbub. I wasn’t sure what Roland wanted from me or what I was likely to find out from him. I only knew I had to try.

I wasn’t sure how I was going to support my position. I only knew I had to try that, too. I turned to Nevin, crossed my arms over my chest, lifted my chin, and started in. “But—”

“But nothing. I know what you’re going to say. You’re going to say this is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity and that this prince might open up more with you than he’s going to when I finally talk to him. And me? I’m going to say that you don’t know what you’re doing and you shouldn’t be involved and . . .” His sigh said it all. Nevin checked his watch. “You’d better get a move on,” he said, getting to his feet. “You’ve got a date with a prince.”

I’VE HEARD PEOPLE say that Navy Pier is the most popular tourist spot in Chicago. No wonder. When it comes to things to do, the pier is a lollapalooza. There’s miniature golf, a carousel, shops, restaurants. All built onto a gigantic pier that sticks out about three thousand feet into Lake Michigan. In summer, even a Monday evening means swarms of people on the pier.

It would be easy for anyone to get lost in the crowd of jostling, noisy tourists, but I wasn’t worried. For one thing, I was looking for a prince, and believe me, I—along with a couple billion other people—knew exactly what Roland looked like. All anyone had to do was see the news, or a tabloid, or an issue of
People
or
Time
or
Newsweek
. A few times a week (more since Kate’s death), there was the prince—all six-foot-two gorgeousness of him—making an appearance at some swanky gala, or off to play polo, or heading up one deserving charity fund-raiser or another. Roland had a lock on the whole tall, dark, and incredibly handsome thing. Just for good measure, throw in a little richer than just about anybody on the planet, more stylish than the cover of
GQ
, and sex appeal galore.