Lacey glanced over at Mac. He was leaning back in his chair, feet on his desk, wearing a wrinkled plaid shirt, loosened Jerry Garcia tie, and rumpled khakis that bore stains from this morning’s coffee, upset during an editorial meeting. Mac was reading
The Wall Street Journal
, dreaming of the career he might have had.
The late afternoon brought an air of quiet melancholy that drifted through the newsroom. Spring lay in wait outside, bursting with blossoms and the curious ability to wring despair in newshounds who had ignored too many beautiful afternoons. The azaleas abounded in passionate colors, and roses were exploding up and down climbing vines. But in their accursed climate-controlled cubicles,
The Eye’s
reporters could not even open a window to breathe in the warm air, redolent with the aroma of new grass. Soon keyboards started clicking again. Deadlines. Even in springtime there were deadlines.
Lacey tried Sherri Gold’s number again. To her surprise the woman picked up. “I have nothing to say to you,” Sherri said.
Caller ID strikes again,
Lacey thought. “And just so you know, this conversation is off the record. It isn’t background, or deep background. In fact, we’re not even having it.”
We would have to play this game. Washingtonians!
“How about I call you a source and leave out any identifying information, if I happen to use any information I may get from you?”
“Yeah, whatever.”
“What were you doing in Virginia Beach?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Sure you do. I saw you. You saw me.”
“You’re wrong,” Sherri insisted. Lacey felt she was stonewalling.
“Outside of Stylettos, the one near the boardwalk.”
“You don’t know anything.”
“You were wearing sunglasses and split as soon as you saw me. Really, Sherri, two women are dead and you’re the last person to see at least one of them alive.”
“What are you insinuating? Maybe I was there looking for a job. Maybe I have to go somewhere they don’t know me.”
“Maybe you went to confront Marcia Robinson about the videotape.” Lacey heard Sherri suck in her breath.
“You think you’re smart, don’t you? You’re not so clever, Lacey. Besides, the person who should die is Marcia.”
“Haven’t enough people died already?”
“She wrecked my life! She said I’d be important, I’d make money. Then I got fired!”
“Marcia’s not in such a good position herself.”
“Are you kidding? She’s famous! That’s what you did, you and all the bloodsuckers in the media. You made her a star!”
“She’s the butt of jokes. It’ll never go away.”
“Yeah, so what? Everyone knows who she is. And she even got a great makeover. She looks better than she ever did in her life. I went to Angie and I didn’t come out looking like Ms. American Pop Star.”
“More like Ms. American Porn Star. Is that what you want, Sherri, a makeover?” Even though she said it facetiously, Lacey knew it wouldn’t help. The woman was irrational. Sherri ignored her.
“Next thing, she’ll be getting paid to be interviewed. Barbara Walters will be moaning about her hard luck and her great hair,” she yelled in a high staccato voice. Lacey could imagine the veins popping in Sherri’s neck as her face got redder and redder and her voice got tighter and tighter. “Marcia will probably write a book! Marcia will have a talk show! She’ll have a future. And I’m a nobody. She ought to be dead, and I mean that sincerely!” Sherri slammed down the phone.
Lacey looked at the receiver before putting it down. The woman had issues, major issues. Could she kill a hairstylist? Lacey had no doubt. Sherri made her skin crawl.
Lacey felt she was getting nowhere and her deadline was pressing in on her. She thought of another approach.
Egging a killer on—dangerous, stupid, or both? Both.
Maybe he, or she, would give her more to go on. “Okay, Hair Ball, here goes.”
CRIMES OF FASHION
It Was a Hostile Makeover
by Lacey Smithsonian
The worst haircutter in the area has just doubled his clientele. By one. This razor-cut specialist may look like anyone else, but he’s got a dirty little secret: His clients don’t leave the salon alive. “Suicide” is the usual ruling. But these suicides are assisted. Brutally.
He thinks his secret is safe. He thinks nobody knows. But I know and others know. This sleazy slasher has killed two women in the beauty trade. He’s made their deaths look like suicides, and he thinks he’s pretty clever. But he’s not. He wants to brag about it. He’s stolen their hair. And he sent me a message care of this newspaper.
But now I’ve found out the killer may really be interested in something else the victims had. A videotape that may or may not be linked to the ongoing congressional follies. . . .
Lacey was way over the line on this one. She didn’t care. She added a note at the bottom:
Confidential to “George.” You wanted the hair. You got it. What else were you looking for? Contact “Crimes of Fashion,”
The Eye Street Observer.
Mac read it. He rubbed his eyes, held his chin in his hands the way he did when he thought about the reaction from publisher Claudia Darnell, and studied Lacey.
“A hot videotape? Got a couple predictions for you, Smithsonian. I see another visit from the FBI in your future. And we’re going to have another little chat about telling your editor the whole story.”
It turned out to be a long evening. Later, she got an e-mail from Trujillo, who did a second read for Mac.
Let me know when the Demon Barber of Dupont Circle comes calling,
was all he wrote.
Chapter 21
She wasn’t surprised to see FBI Agent Jim Thorn sitting by her desk Friday morning when she arrived at work. But she couldn’t stop herself from sighing deeply.
Call Claudia, or Mac, or just wing it?
“Sorry to wring so much pathos out of you this morning.” He had a copy of the day’s column in his lap.
Agent of Doom
passed through her mind. He looked very clean and neat, as if his mother had dressed him. “Can we just chat without turning it into a summit conference?”
Wing it.
“What can I do for you?” Lacey asked.
“Nice decor you have here.” He was sipping a cup of coffee, no doubt supplied by Felicity, who was making cow eyes at him.
They had a polite discussion that didn’t last long. The column had told Thorn most of what he wanted to know: that a scandalous videotape did indeed exist and it was traveling.
“And your sources are? . . .” Thorn inquired.
“My sources are unnamed and shall remain so.”
“It was worth a try.” Thorn smiled. “I’ll be in touch.” On his way out he turned. “You seem to have a knack for encouraging people to talk.”
“Just lucky, I guess.”
“Maybe you could give me some pointers.” She laughed at that. “Lots of people just clam up when they meet me,” he said.
“Imagine that.”
“How about dinner?”
“I don’t think so. Thanks.”
“Perhaps some other time.” He left. Lacey gave him points for not pushing it.
She checked DeadFed dot com. Sure enough, there was a flashy headline: “Sex, Death and Videotape: Fashion Reporter Traces Pattern,” and a link to her “Hostile Makeover” column.
Her voice mail carried a message from Detective Harding in Virginia Beach. He reported that Tammi White’s death had not yet been ruled suspicious, but her column allowed him to get a search warrant for the salon. “One step ahead of the FBI,” Harding said. He also mentioned that he had lectured the stylists at Stylettos on taking extra security measures. “Just so you’d know we do care about crime down here in Virginia Beach.” Harding sighed. “I wish you’d leave that nasty scandal of yours up north.”
Another message came from Nan, the spunky stylist with the big Bronze Bomber. “Lots of excitement today. Cops showed up with a search warrant and snatched all our videotapes. A little bird says they aren’t going to find what they’re looking for.”
So Nan knows the videotape isn’t in the salon.
No doubt, she had already searched for it. Maybe Tammi White destroyed it? Or maybe the killer had it? “I’ll see what I can find out,” Nan promised.
Stella also weighed in with a plea to be careful, and she swore she knew nothing about a sleazy videotape: “I must be slipping. Usually I’d know all about stuff like that.”
Brooke’s message was comforting. “Lacey, what on earth do you think you’re doing? Call me, I know where you can get a Kevlar vest.”
Kevlar: Bulletproof, but is it style proof?
It was still early when Lacey left the office that afternoon with a copy of the latest “Crimes of Fashion” column in her hand. She crossed the alley to reach the parking garage where her car sat, finally fitted with new battery, starter, and alternator. She did not notice the silver-gray Jaguar waiting for her. The Jag’s engine roared and she caught sight of Boyd Radford. She groaned. She was sick of everything about him. If she never wrote another word about a hair salon or hair or dead stylists, it was okay with her.
Radford stepped out of the Jag and waved a copy of the paper as if it were a cudgel. “I told you not to write about this!”
“You can’t tell me what to write.”
“You don’t know anything about it.”
“About what? The deaths or the videotape? You should be thankful I left out your starring role.”
“You can’t write this shit! I don’t know anything about a videotape!” he screamed.
Radford looked bad. His eyes bugged out and a vein throbbed over his right eye. His hair was slick with sweat and stuck down over his shiny forehead. He waved the paper; her column had been circled with a big black pen.
“Those women did not kill themselves and you know it.”
“I don’t know why they’re dead! It’s not my fault.” His voice was hoarse.
“What are you hiding, Boyd?”
He grabbed her arm roughly. “You keep your nose out of it. Or you’ll get it cut off.”
“Are you threatening me, Radford?” At this close range she smelled alcohol on his breath. Lacey pulled away, but she stood her ground.
“I’m promising you trouble.” She pushed past him. He threw the paper at her. “You mention my salons in this piece of garbage again, and there’ll be hell to pay. Do you understand me? Hell to pay!” He slid back into the gleaming Jag and shot away, his tires squealing.
She was shaking. She had to sit in her car for fifteen minutes listening to Mozart and breathing deeply before she trusted herself to drive. She thought about telling Vic. Maybe Vic could joke about it, make her forget her troubles. Or deck Ratboy. After all, that’s what friends are for, right? Maybe Tony, but he’d already left for the day. She had other friends, but they would only freak out and tell her useless things, like to remember to lock her doors or complain to the Better Business Bureau. Brooke would suggest a restraining order. Anyone at
The Eye
would tell her to grow up. You’re not a real reporter if you don’t piss people off, she reasoned.
When she got home, there were four messages on her machine, three hang-ups and one call from Vic Donovan, from whom she had not heard more than a grunt since their amateur science project with luminol. Of course that was only a little more than a day ago. It just seemed like a lifetime had passed since then.
“Lacey, just what the hell do you think you’re doing with that column?” Donovan sounded pissed off, like he was chief of police again.
Wow. I can’t believe men read my column. First Radford, now Vic. How embarrassing.
“You’re setting yourself up as a target for this nut, and it’s a damn stupid thing to do. Did you really do this on purpose? We’ve got to talk. Now. It’s Vic. I mean it, Lacey. Call me.”
She needed to get out of the apartment. It felt stuffy and confining. She needed to be somewhere without a phone. She changed her clothes, hurling what she’d worn that day onto the bed. She threw on some comfortable light blue cotton slacks and a soft white V-neck sweater, and new white sneakers that she hoped would not blister her feet.
She headed down the bike path alongside the George Washington Memorial Parkway toward Mount Vernon, heart pumping. All her disjointed thoughts settled while she marched at a steady pace. The rhythm of her footsteps put a comforting distance between her familiar surroundings and the world of Stylettos, full of possible killers.
She strode through Belle Haven Park, past the marina, and turned off the main path into Dyke Marsh, a wetland wildlife preserve. Small waterways wound through the marsh, opening up vistas on the Potomac, where trim sailboats were anchored waiting for their absent owners. The path was green and quiet. The panic that had set in with Ratboy’s rant was easing. Damp earth smells tickled her nose and she felt lighter and lighter the more she walked.
Farther down into the green woods, signs of the last storm were still evident. Nature had waged a small war on itself. Two huge oaks were uprooted and they lay angled across the path, their roots splayed out in sunbursts reaching heights of eight and ten feet, their trunks three feet and more across. Park rangers had yet to clear the path with chain saws, forcing walkers and joggers to climb over or go around them. Lacey could see rough new trails, but she chose to climb over the first of several large limbs. In spite of the damage, blossoms still clung to some of the bushes, scenting the air with honeysuckle. Lacey drank it in, ignoring everything else in her need to forget the menace of Radford’s angry threat.
She heard a twig snap behind her as she climbed over the damaged tree. A leather-gloved hand abruptly closed over her mouth and another, the right, grabbed her around the waist. Lacey struggled as she was dragged backwards toward the dense woods. She assumed it was a man, but not a huge man. Her first thought was that it was Boyd Radford, but she didn’t think he had the courage. Maybe he had sent a henchman? The stranger spoke in a raspy growl, obviously trying to disguise his or her voice.