A catered valentines day, p.13
A Catered Valentine's Day, page 13
Libby realized she was looking at his chest and averted her eyes. “Not yet. But we will be. How come I’ve never seen you here before?”
“That’s because I’m usually at Dafney’s Place.”
Dafney’s was across town.
“So what are you doing here?”
Tim Conner’s smile got bigger. “I’m on Dafney’s dart team and we’re going to whip everyone’s ass.”
Someone called his name and he turned and nodded toward them. “See you in the a.m.,” he told Libby.
Marvin tugged at her arm as she started walking again.
“Who is that?” he asked.
“My contractor.”
Marvin snorted.
“What’s the snort supposed to mean?”
“Nothing,” Marvin said.
Libby turned and studied his face. He’s jealous, she thought. The thought gave her a great deal of satisfaction. Maybe Bernie is wrong, she decided; maybe he really doesn’t care what I wear. She started to laugh.
“What are you laughing at?” Marvin asked her.
“Nothing,” Libby lied. “Nothing at all.”
When they got closer to where Bernie and Rob were seated, Libby could see that the place wasn’t as crowded as she thought. Most of the people were jammed up front. She sat down on the bar stool that Bernie had saved for her, while Marvin sat next to her. A moment later Brandon came over to get their order.
“The usual?” he asked them.
“Yes,” Libby said. Then she changed her mind. “No. Make mine a kir.”
She could see Bernie raising an eyebrow.
“For a change,” Libby explained to her sister.
“A kir sounds good to me,” she told Libby. “Make that two,” she said to Brandon.
“Two it is.” He nodded toward Marvin. “And for you?”
“What is a kir?” he asked.
“White wine and a crème de cassis,” Bernie explained.
“It’s a girl drink,” Rob said.
Bernie turned toward him. “Don’t be silly. It’s good,” she said to Marvin.
“That’s okay,” Marvin said. “I’m sure it’s great, but I’ll have a Brooklyn Brown instead.”
“Whatever you say,” Brandon told him. And he left to get their drinks.
Bernie pushed the bowl of peanuts over in Libby’s direction, while Rob took a sip of his beer. Libby decided that he looked slightly annoyed. A moment later Brandon was back with Marvin’s beer and Libby’s kir.
“Here you go,” he said as he set both their drinks down.
Bernie lifted her glass. “A toast,” she said. “To friends, food, and time to enjoy them both.”
“I’ll drink to that,” Rob said as he lifted his glass.
Libby and Marvin did the same. Everyone clinked their glasses and drank.
“So how’s everything going?” Brandon asked.
Marvin put his glass down. “Can’t complain.”
“Can you be any more generic?” Brandon commented.
“Not really,” Marvin said.
Brandon shrugged and moved away.
“Do you think he knows?” Marvin asked the group.
“Knows what?” Libby asked.
“About…the…you know…the mix-up.”
Bernie snickered. “Of course he knows. Brandon knows everything. This place is like Information Central.”
“You could have been nicer,” Libby told him.
Marvin’s face fell. “You’re right. I could have been.”
Libby felt a stab of guilt. Poor guy. He had his father on his back all the time. He didn’t need her as well. She was just about to say as much when she felt a tap on her shoulder. She turned around. Tim Conner was standing there.
“Can I get you guys the next round? Given the amount of money I’m about to extract from you it seems only fair.”
Bernie nodded. “I concur,” she said.
“Me too,” Libby replied. “I thought you were supposed to be playing darts,” she added.
“I’m not up yet,” he explained as he sat down next to Libby. He nodded to Rob. “Haven’t seen you for a while.”
“You two know each other?” Bernie asked.
Tim nodded. “He used to do framing for me.”
“You mounted pictures?” Libby asked Rob.
“No,” Rob said. “Framing as in framing houses.”
“He wasn’t bad either,” Tim said.
“Not bad?” Rob said. “I was great.”
Tim took a handful of peanuts from the bowl in front of Libby and popped them in his mouth. “So what have you been up to lately?” he asked Rob.
“I’ve been busy helping my mom run her business.”
Tim nodded.
“Heard you had some trouble,” Rob said.
Libby watched Tim frown.
“Not to my knowledge,” he replied.
“Heard someone ran off with your backhoe.”
Tim laughed. “Yeah. But they brought it back.”
“How can anyone run off with a backhoe?” Libby asked.
“Simple,” “Tim said. “You put the keys in the ignition and drive it away.”
“But how could you get the keys?”
“Easy,” Rob replied before Tim could. “People usually keep them on a Peg-Board. All you have to do is reach over and take them.”
Tim reached over and took another handful of peanuts. “No dinner,” he explained.
“I think you’re on,” Rob said to him.
Rob looked to the front. “I think you’re right.” And he got up and walked away.
“I didn’t know you did construction,” Bernie said to Rob after Tim left.
“For a little while,” he said. “But I got tired of being sore every night so I quit.”
Libby took another sip of her kir and set the glass down.
“You look sad,” Marvin said to her.
“Not sad, just puzzled.”
“About what?” Marvin asked.
Libby took another sip of her drink and told Marvin and Rob about what Clyde had told her concerning Marnie.
“I don’t believe it,” Marvin said. “Not Marnie and Ted Gorman.”
“See? That’s my reaction too,” Libby said.
“So the guy was a player,” Rob interjected. “What’s so unusual about that?”
Bernie hit him.
“Why’d you do that?” Rob demanded.
“Because of what you said.”
Rob rubbed his shoulder. “Most men play around. It’s a fact of life, right, Marvin?”
“Er…” Marvin said. “Ah…not really.”
Rob took a sip of his beer. “You’re not telling the truth, my man.”
“So you’re saying that you fool around?” Bernie demanded.
Libby noted there was a dangerous glint in her eye.
“Not at all,” Rob said. “I was talking in generalities. You know what that is?”
“Yes. I’m familiar with the term.”
Bernie’s voice was tinged with ice. Libby decided it was a good time to change the subject. Redirect as her father always said.
“I don’t know,” she said. “I still can’t believe it. Ted and Marnie seemed so happy together.”
“They probably were,” Rob interjected. “Ted just wanted a little variety.”
Bernie shot him a dirty look.
“More to the point,” she said, “who was the girl?”
Libby shook her head. “I already told you that Clyde didn’t know.”
Bernie tapped her fingernail against the glass and sighed. “Yeah. I remember.”
Marvin leaned forward. “So she wasn’t someone local,” he said.
“Not necessarily,” Bernie replied. “She could just be someone who no one would miss. Like a prostitute or a drug addict…”
“Or someone who travels a lot,” Libby suggested.
“Or that,” Bernie agreed.
“So who would know?” Libby asked.
Bernie thought for a moment. Then she said, “Didn’t Clyde say that Ted Gorman’s mom was still alive?”
“Yeah. She lives near Albany. But what difference does that make? She wouldn’t know.”
Bernie twisted her silver and onyx ring around her finger. “You’re right. I was just thinking out loud,” she explained.
Libby took another sip of her kir. She decided that although she really liked it, she liked chocolate better. She was just about to ask her sister what chocolate she thought would go well with a kir when a new thought popped into her head. “Maybe he wrote to her.”
Everyone turned to her.
She explained, “Actually I meant maybe she wrote him a note or something.” When she got tired she had a tendency to reverse things.
“Who? Ted’s mom?”
“No. The girl.”
Rob shot a peanut down the bar. “Not these days. These days everyone uses e-mail. No one uses snail mail.”
Bernie smoothed her hair back down with the palm of her hand. “I don’t know. Everyone isn’t as technologically advanced as you are. Maybe she sent him a card. Or maybe there’s something else. Like a receipt from the motel they stayed at.”
“He wouldn’t keep anything like that,” Rob sneered. “He wouldn’t be that stupid.”
“Well, maybe he was,” Bernie countered. “Lots of men are. That’s how they get caught.”
“None that I know.”
Bernie raised an eyebrow. “Really?”
Libby decided that another diversion was called for.
“But where would he keep something like that if it existed?” she asked.
“In his dresser drawers?” Marvin suggested.
“I don’t think so,” Bernie commented.
“But why not?” Marvin asked.
“Because,” Libby said, “most women do the laundry, so they’re the ones who put the clothes in drawers.”
“So where else would it be?” Marvin said.
“If it exists,” Rob said.
“I don’t know,” Libby confessed.
“How about the garage?” Bernie suggested. “That’s guy territory. Most women don’t go mucking around in there.”
“True.” Libby nodded. “We should look.”
“Yes, we should,” Bernie agreed.
“Why?” Rob asked.
Bernie turned toward him. “Are you serious?”
“Yes, I am,” he replied.
“Well, for openers, because it’s a lead, and since we don’t have anything else, we should, as my dad says, explore every avenue of opportunity.”
“I still don’t get it.”
While Libby listened to Bernie explain things to Rob she realized there was another problem.
“What do we say to Marnie?” she asked. “How are we going to explain why we want to do this?”
The thought made her shudder.
“We don’t,” Bernie said. “We look around when she’s not there.”
“That should be easy enough. She’s not there most of the time.”
“Exactly,” Bernie said.
Libby thought Marnie’s situation was the disadvantage of having your shop away from your living quarters. At least she and Bernie could go upstairs whenever they had a spare minute or two. The other way they’d never be home at all.
Bernie started tapping her fingers on the table. Then she picked up her cell and dialed.
“Marnie, sorry to bother you this late…Oh, it’s no problem…Good, because I have some ideas for the benefit. I thought if you were free I’d come by the shop and talk to you—that’s if you have a moment. Great. How long are you going to be there?” She nodded and hung up. “Okay, guys,” she said. “We’re in luck. She’s going to be there for another hour or so. What do you say?”
Rob picked up his glass, took a big swallow, and put it down. “I say I have better things to do. This is ridiculous.”
“What do you have to do that’s so important?” Bernie demanded.
“I thought we were supposed to go to the movies,” Rob told her.
“We can go tomorrow,” Bernie said.
“I’d like to go tonight.”
“It’s okay,” Marvin interjected. “Really. This isn’t necessary. We can wait until tomorrow. It’ll be fine.”
Bernie chewed on the inside of her cheek. “Maybe. Maybe not. But we have an opportunity now. We should take advantage of it. Since we don’t have any information, anything we get will be great.”
“Why can’t you do this some other time?” Rob asked.
“Because Marnie is at the shop now,” Bernie said. “We can pick up some DVDs for later and go to the movies tomorrow night.”
“Fine.” Rob finished his drink, threw a couple of dollars on the bar, and walked out.
“Boy,” Libby said to Bernie, “you said you guys weren’t getting along, but I hadn’t realized it was this bad.”
“Neither did I,” Bernie said. “I think Venus is retrograde in his sign. I should check his chart.”
Libby raised an eyebrow. “Now, that’s a new excuse for bad behavior.”
Bernie shrugged. “If it’s good enough for the ancients it should be good enough for us.”
“So were leeches.”
“They’re making a comeback too.”
Marvin leaned in. “This is my fault.”
Bernie patted his arm. “Don’t be ridiculous. This has nothing to do with you.”
“Maybe you should go after Rob,” Marvin suggested.
Bernie shook her head. “I don’t think so.” She smiled. “I think I should visit Marnie while you and Libby should go visit her house.”
“What if something goes wrong?” Libby asked.
“That’s why God invented cell phones. Just call and tell me you have a kitchen emergency. If you can’t get in tell me…” Bernie paused for a second. “Say the pantry is locked. And we’ll go from there.”
Chapter 19
M arvin squinted as he tried to read the street sign. “I think we’re lost.”
“No, we’re not,” Libby told him. “This is Woodcrest.”
Marvin pushed his glasses back up the bridge of his nose with his finger. “You could be right.”
“I know I’m right. Just take a left and go halfway down the block. It’s there,” Libby said as she pointed to the little white Colonial. “Pull into the driveway.”
As Marvin did, Libby noticed with a degree of satisfaction that Marnie’s Christmas lights were still up. Of course she and Bernie had just taken theirs down a couple of weeks ago. Still, it was always nice to know that someone was even later than she was.
Marvin stomped on the brake. “Are you sure this is it?”
“Of course I’m sure. This is 1407. It says it on the mailbox.”
“So it does.” Marvin lifted his glasses up, looked through them, and put them back down. “Maybe I need to get my prescription checked.”
“Well, it wouldn’t hurt.” And with that Libby reached into her backpack, took out two of her butterscotch cashew cookies, and handed one to Marvin.
He put his car in park and took a bite. “These are great.”
“Thanks. I think so too.”
In her humble opinion this cookie was as close to perfection as you could get. It balanced the sweet against the salty and the crunch against the soft crust. Of course, when she’d said as much to Bernie, Bernie had replied that the Muslims believed that only Allah could be perfect. Everything that was human has to have some imperfections. Maybe so. But if this cookie had imperfections she couldn’t see what they were.
As Libby took another bite of her cookie she decided Marnie’s house was the smallest and plainest one on the block. This area of town was fairly ritzy. Most of the other houses in the area were made out of stone, brick, or stucco and had things like verandas, slate roofs, and inground pools attached to them. Libby was trying to estimate how much Marnie’s house was worth when Marvin turned toward her.
“Do you think this is safe?” he asked.
“Bernie will call if there’s a problem.”
Marvin pulled at the collar of his turtleneck. “Maybe we shouldn’t do this.”
Works for me, Libby thought.
Bernie should be doing this while she should be talking to Marnie. Her sister was better at this kind of thing. With her luck, she and Marvin would probably get caught. Scratch that. She knew she and Marvin would get caught.
Back at R.J.’s it had seemed like a good idea—at least not a bad idea—but now that she was out here…well…the whole idea made her nervous. Very nervous. She should be at the shop making pastry dough, not thinking about breaking and entering. Marvin cleared his throat and she turned toward him.
“I’ve changed my mind,” he said.
“Hey, I totally understand if you don’t want to.”
Marvin waited a second before replying. “No,” he told her. “I think we have to. After all, this is my father’s livelihood we’re talking about.”
And good riddance to it, Libby wanted to say. But she didn’t. Mostly because she remembered what her mother always told her and her sister: “If you can’t say anything nice don’t say anything at all.”
To which Bernie had always replied, “Fine. I’ll be quiet.” Well, she felt like that now.
Marvin swallowed. “What happens if the neighbors see us?”
“The neighbors can’t see us.” Libby pointed to the evergreens on either side of the driveway. “Those cedars provide a perfect screen. That’s probably why they were planted in the first place.”
“But what if they do?” Marvin insisted. “What if they hear us and call the police?”
“Well, we could always say we’re dropping off some cookies for her if anyone asks.”
“But what if they want to see them?”
Libby gave up. “I guess then we’ll get arrested.”
Marvin pushed his glasses back up the bridge of his nose again. “That wouldn’t be good.”
“Not at all. Your father wouldn’t be pleased.”
Marvin shuddered. “I don’t even want to think about that.”
“Well, sitting here isn’t helping anything,” Libby pointed out.
“You’re right.” Marvin reached over and turned off the radio.
“Why did you do that?” Libby asked.
Marvin shrugged. “I don’t know. It seemed like the right thing to do. No use making more noise than we have to,” he observed.
