The irregular
thump-thump
of Aunt Weeby’s walking cast comes up behind me. She wraps her arm around my waist. “What happened, sugarplum?”
That’s when I realize my teeth are chattering so hard I can’t even form an answer. The trembling spreads down through my body. I feel chilled, colder than I have ever felt before. My head spins. My knees go watery and my stomach turns into a vast pit.
A rumble of furniture pierces the fog in my brain. Then, “Here,” Max says.
Next thing I know, I’m in the armchair that usually sits in the left corner, just inside the ladies’ room door. Miss Mona is kneeling in front of me, her hands rubbing mine. Aunt Weeby stands behind me, her hands on my shoulders.
“Is he . . . dead?” Sally whispers.
I try to draw in enough breath to answer, but my body still refuses to cooperate, not that I know what to say. The best I come up with is a weak shrug.
“Hush!” Miss Mona admonishes. “Andie’s in no kind of shape to chitchat right now. Besides, Julie’s checking out the . . . the person. Did anyone call the police?”
“I’m on it, Miss Mona,” Max says. Despite my earlier anger toward him, all I feel right now is a swell of gratitude.
The room, eerily still and silent, then resonates with Max’s beautiful voice. What he says isn’t so beautiful.
“. . . We have a person in the vault. Security is with him, so I can’t tell you much about his condition. What I did see is blood under his head, and he’s not moving. Please send us help—and fast.”
Somewhere in the gray desert that my mind has become, I register his calm demeanor. How can he pull that off? I’ve been aware of . . .
it
, the man on the floor, longer than he has, I’m sitting, and I still feel as though I’m going to shatter into a million pieces.
I don’t want to hear about gender differences, okay?
A very green-around-the-gills Julie steps out of the vault and pushes the steel door back a bit. I’m glad to not have to see that broken body on the floor anymore.
“He’s dead,” she says, her voice strained. “But I don’t know who he is. Of course, he doesn’t work here, and shouldn’t have been in the building at all. But I do know something about how he got in here.”
I draw on all my determination and push myself to the edge of the chair. Everyone stares at me.
“Does it . . .” My voice fails me, and while they all make comforting noises, I’m not willing to play the wilting lily any longer. I suck in a rough breath and square my shoulders. “Is that why you weren’t here when I walked in?”
Julie nods. “Davina called to tell me she saw a stranger walking around the building. She asked me to check it out, since I’m better equipped”—she pats the pistol she’s sheathed again— “to handle an intruder than she is. Now we know he came inside and slipped in here while I was looking out there.”
Miss Mona stands. “Too bad you didn’t find him.”
The bathroom door bangs open. “What is going on here?” Danni asks, her voice shrill.
My feathered friend makes his . . . her . . . its arrival known.
“Squawk! Shriek, shriek!”
Everyone jumps. I gulp and a nervous giggle pops out. “Uh-oh.”
Miss Mona, white as a sheet, draws herself up to her full, statuesque height. “
What
is that?”
I point to the cage in Danni’s hand. “That’s what I found when I went to my dressing room for my purse. I grabbed my bag and came here to return the diamond Max dropped during the show. I never gave the bird another thought. Anybody ever seen it before? Danni?”
She shakes her head. “I just went to my dressing room— minding
my
business—the noise was just awful, so I went to see what you were up to. I’ve never seen the bird before. And you know I’d never forget something like”—she lifts the cage for all to see—“
this
.”
This time, I’m not the only one with a nervous laugh; everyone seems to welcome the chance to diffuse some of the tension in the room.
I recover first. “Anybody else think our flashy little visitor has something to do with the guy in the vault?”
From somewhere far away, the sound of a siren approaches. “Thank you, Lord,” I whisper. I lace my hands together and hold on tight. Even though I’m glad the police are nearly here, something tells me I’m in for a wild and wooly ride.
Julie heads for the door. “I’ll go get the officer . . . officers. I’m sure they’ll have sent more than one patrol car.”
Again, everyone falls silent. The only sound in the room comes from the bird’s claws skittering across a bar in the cage. When the bathroom door opens again and Julie leads in a middle-aged uniformed man, the bird lets out its now-familiar
“Squawk! Shriek, shriek!”
The startled cop shakes his head and narrows his eyes, but doesn’t get a chance to say a word.
“Oh, Donald, dear!” Aunt Weeby hurries to his side as fast as her klutzy cast will let her. “I’m so glad you’re the one who’s come. Something so very, very nasty has happened here. I . . . I’ve never seen anything like this before.”
The officer—Donald—takes Aunt Weeby’s hand, tucks it into his elbow, and with his other hand, gives it a pat. “It’s going to be okay, Miz Weeby. We’ll just get to the bottom of this . . . whatever it is, right quick here.”
He gestures to the two officers in the doorway, and the man and woman enter the bathroom. It’s getting mighty crowded in here all of a sudden. And to think that before today no male had breached the doors of the Shop-Til-U-Drop Network’s headquarters. Now we have three of ’em in the building—four, if you count the dead one—and they’re all in the ladies’ room, no less!
I have to admit, I don’t mind. The more the . . . well, not merrier, considering the circumstances, but it’s much better to have company at a time like this.
Officer Donald—since I don’t know his full name—goes into the vault, followed by the other two cops and Julie. The rest of us wait, the silence again thick and heavy. Until the bird does its thing again.
I shoot it a glare, and realize he—she?—is growing more restless, or maybe frantic’s more like it, by the moment. It crabs along the rough white perch attached to the right side of the cage, then bites one of the slim steel wire bars and, fireman-like, slides down to the floor. There it waddles from wire bar to wire bar until it reaches the back of the enclosure, where with beak and claws it climbs back up high enough to reach the almost empty water bowl. It dips its beak into the water, throws back its colorful head, and swallows. Then it looks to either side, flaps its wings furiously, and lets out another series of screams.
As the little critter does all this, I notice what looks like a piece of paper stuck to the back of the cage. How I didn’t spot it when I first found it in my dressing room, I don’t know.
Well, I do know. I was too busy worrying about how embarrassed
I
felt, and how little
I
wanted to accept responsibility for
my
hot temper. But enough about that for the moment. I’ll deal with that—me—later.
The piece of paper turns out to be a small envelope with a card inside. My midlength nail comes in handy to open it, and from my right side Miss Mona says, “What do you have there?”
“It’s a card—oh! It’s addressed to me. But how could that be?”
“If you read it,” Max says, a hint of humor in his voice, “we might all find out.”
What I read breaks my heart. “I can’t believe this.” A tear rolls down my cheek. “I know who the man in the vault is— was. And he’s nice, the nicest vendor I worked with in New York. I’m so, so sorry . . .”
“A vendor?” Aunt Weeby looks confused.
Can’t say I blame her. I’m pretty confused too. “Mr. Pak deals in the most fabulous rubies, Burmese material, the finest in the world. Roger and I met with him at least four times a year to buy stock.”
Miss Mona steps closer. “Did he come here to see you? Did you know he was coming?”
“I had no idea he’d be here, even though he says in his card that he came to wish me luck in my new job.”
“Squawk! Shriek, shriek!”
“What about the bird?” Sally asks, her eyes big dark pools of questions.
“That’s what’s so crazy.” I shove a bunch of hair that’s come loose from my chic on-screen updo off my forehead. “The bird’s supposed to be a gift for me. What would make Mr. Pak think I’d want a noisy bird?”
“Tsk, tsk, tsk!”
Did I tell you Aunt Weeby tsk-tsks better than anyone else? Do I need this? Now?
“Andrea Autumn Adams! You know better than that, young lady. Why, it’s not one bit polite to question a present. I don’t know what’s come over you since you left for that Sodom and Gomorrah city a’ yours.”
Stunned by my aunt’s outburst, I notice the crease between her brows, the white line around her lips, and the tight grip of one hand on the other. A swell of sympathy rises in me. And then I realize she’s still talking to me.
“. . . I’m so thankful the Lord saw fit to let you get yourself all rusted up while you were out there. I reckon you wouldn’t’ve come home otherwise. And you do need yourself a good dose a’ Great-Grandma Willetta’s wisdom—and maybe some a’ her fish oil too.”
Heaven help me—and my stressed-out aunt. “I’m not questioning a present, and I’m not being ungrateful, Aunt Weeby. But I never said anything to Mr. Pak to make him think I’d want a parrot—”
“A parrot?” she asks. “That bitty thing there’s a parrot? I thought they were big ol’ things with can-opener beaks.”
I hand the card to Aunt Weeby. “See for yourself. According to Mr. Pak, this is a Sun Conure, a small breed of parrot.”
“Hmm . . . ,” Aunt Weeby murmurs.
Sally leans over my aunt’s shoulder. “Oh! Look here. He says the bird’s name is Rio, Rio de Janeiro, like the city in Brazil. How cute!”
Carla, who’s been silent up to now, chuckles. “Would you look at that? He just pooped.”
Max laughs.
Miss Mona leans over to look at Rio. “He is beautiful, Andie. And I’ll bet you very, very expensive. It’s mighty . . . unusual to have a parrot for a pet. I never met a parrot owner before, you know. I’m sure it’s going to be real interesting too.”
The vise that took hold around my forehead when I first saw the bird—Rio—squeezes harder. I’d thought I’d be leaving my troubles behind in the Big Apple. Instead, I seem to be attracting new ones here faster than my little black dress does lint.
I mean, think about it. First, I agree to work for Miss Mona, trouble if anything. Then, Aunt Weeby and Miss Mona decide I’m a paper doll in need of a makeover. Next, Max the Magnificent and his gemstone ignorance blindsides me. And that’s when things really get . . . what did Miss Mona call it? Oh yeah. Interesting.
Right.
Can we agree that finding a dead ruby vendor in the vault is trouble?
Big
trouble.
Someone somewhere must be laughing. But it sure isn’t me. My heart aches for Mr. Pak. Plus there’s a Mrs. Pak in Thailand, one who’ll mourn the loss of a truly nice man.
And what am I supposed to do with a screaming, molting, pooping machine?
I’m in trouble all right.
Which fact permeates every corner of my being when Officer Donald comes out of the vault, locks his gaze with mine, and heads right for me, a piece of paper—yeah, another troublesome piece of paper in less than five minutes—in hand. “Any idea, Miss Andie, why this dead fellow would have your name and the address of the network in his hand?”
Dorothy’s tornado seems to have lost its way. Instead of Kansas, it’s decided to strike Kentucky this time. And instead of a cute little mutt named Toto, it’s decided to pick me up, spin-cycle me to bits, and then spit me out in the middle of yet another episode of
The Twilight Zone
.
And right into trouble with the law.
I gotta get a life. For real.
Oh, wait. That’s what I thought I was doing when I came back home. Where did I go wrong?
The next morning, when the alarm clock goes off, I force one eye open a crack, reach a hand out from under the comfy down comforter, and smack the beeping bully silent. But for some strange reason, the alarm screams again a second later.
My head pounds in response. “Why . . . ? Why today?”
After the day I had yesterday, I don’t want to wake up, much less deal with a dysfunctional alarm clock. Miss Mona had said I didn’t have to do today’s show, but after everything that went wrong during that disaster of a launch, I don’t think it’s in my best interest—or the network’s—for me to pull a no-show. I do need sleep, though, before I can face that camera—and the whole wide world—again.
What Max the Magnificent does is his business.
The relentless alarm continues to rattle my brain.
“Aaarrgh!”
There’s no two ways about it. I have to do something about that noise. Inch by inch, I drag my exhausted body upright, and rub my eyes to clear them of their early morning sleep fog. And then I notice that the clock isn’t beeping at all. But the screams haven’t let up one bit.
“What on earth—” I tap my forehead between my brows. “Ugh. Rio!” I wish he was a nightmare. If he were, now that I’m awake, he’d just—
poof!
—disappear.
No such luck.
“Pipe down! It’s too early for this. Go back to sleep.”
A wild batting of his wings against the cage bars accompanies another barrage of shrieks. I slump down onto the bed again, my back against the padded headboard. Sure, he’s a beautiful animal, but I can’t stand his racket, and I don’t know a thing about birds. What does one do with a parrot for a pet?
At the very least, I know he needs water, so it’s good I refilled his bowl before I went to sleep last night.
I shudder. What a night . . . day! Donald Clark—
Chief
Donald Clark—raked me over the interrogatory coals until late into the night. If nothing else, he’s thorough and determined.
In that whole time he never let his eyes drift away from my face. “And you say you didn’t come up with some kinda plan to have him meet you here at the network?” he asked me for what must’ve been the thousandth time.
“Oh, for goodness sake, Donald!” Aunt Weeby finally burst out. “The girl’s told you and told you she doesn’t know a thing about this here Pak man’s trip to Louisville. If she doesn’t know, she doesn’t know, and it doesn’t make no never mind how many times you ask or how many different ways you ask it. Why, I’m about ready to swing my purse at your fat head and give you what-for. Ten thirty came and waved us good-bye, and you’re still asking her the same ol’ thing. I’m tired, she’s tired, and we want to go home.”