Accessories to Die For Read online

  “Yes, she does,” Irene said. She didn’t add that Juanita actually came into the store more frequently than Adelle did. Her mother claimed to be embarrassed by the fact that her daughter ran what she called a “secondhand store.” Never mind that she often came in after hours on Tuesdays, the day Irene took in consignment stock. She wanted to be the first to look through the upscale designer brands to find something she could pass off as an outfit she’d had in her closet for a while, but only, of course, if it was an item she didn’t recognize as having belonged to one of her wealthy friends. And only if she could convince Irene to discount the price.

  Irene indulged her mother, since it was her wealthy friends who supplied most of her merchandise.

  “Juanita something or other, isn’t it?” Adelle said, still looking at the paper. “Now she’s in jail! You should choose your friends more carefully, Irene.”

  “You’re probably right,” Irene said. She dropped the entire paper on the table and stood to swallow the last of her coffee. She was thinking that P.J. knew more about the events they’d discussed the day before than he had revealed. She wondered if he’d had something to do with Juanita’s arrest. “I’ve got to go to work,” she said, giving Adelle a quick kiss on her forehead. “See you tonight.”

  “Today’s Tuesday, isn’t it?” Adelle said. “I’ll be in after you close to have a look.”

  “Yeah, sure,” Irene said on her way out of the kitchen. There was no enthusiasm in her voice. The thought of P.J. possibly having something to do with Juanita getting arrested was depressing. Especially since she counted P.J., unorthodox as he was, among her friends. Maybe it was partly because he was so out of the ordinary that she’d grown to like him so much. Still, she’d like to ask him about the connection between his client and the stolen artifacts and, above all, what part he might have played in Juanita’s arrest.

  Irene didn’t have to wait long. He was standing at the back door of her store when she arrived to park her car in the lot.

  She didn’t acknowledge him as she got out of the car and walked toward the back entrance, keys in hand, ready to unlock the door.

  “Hey!” he said.

  She didn’t respond.

  “You’re mad, aren’t you?”

  “Why should I be?” she asked without turning around.

  “I left you in a kind of hurry.”

  She opened her purse and pulled out the credit card he’d left with her. “Here. You may need this.”

  He looked at the card and for a moment seemed reluctant to take it. “I know you used your own money to pay the check. I checked online. Nothing on my bill. I didn’t mean for you to do that.”

  “Don’t worry about it,” she said, walking away from him again. “You paid last time. Now we’re even.”

  “Even? No, we’re not.” He walked behind her, following her into the store. “That makes it sound like there won’t be another time. We can’t be even. We’ll see each other again and again, won’t we? I hope we will. Listen, I’m sorry. It was rude of me to leave like that, I know, but I had to…Never mind, there’s no good excuse. I’m sorry I left so abruptly.”

  “No need to apologize.” She was still walking away from him, still not looking at him as she made her way to the front door to open it. “I understand how demanding a law practice can be.”

  “You do? Of course you do. You’re a former…But that’s no excuse. I shouldn’t have…How come you’re so mad if you understand?”

  She turned around suddenly and spoke, cutting him off. “What did you do to get Juanita Calabaza arrested?”

  He opened his mouth as if he was about to answer, but he said nothing for several seconds. “I didn’t get her arrested,” he said finally.

  Irene gave him a disgusted I-can’t-believe-you-said-that look and rolled her eyes.

  “Okay!” P.J. said quickly. “I can see why you suspect I’m complicit. I get that. You must have made the connection. I know you made the connection between the Fairchild case and Armaud, and you must be aware of how upset Juanita Calabaza is about her son, so…”

  Irene folded her arms and looked at him, waiting for him to continue.

  “It’s complicated,” he said.

  “Of course it is.” Her arms were still folded.

  “Look, can we talk about it over—”

  “No!”

  There was another pause, and P.J. looked more than a little uncomfortable. “Okay,” he said. “It’s like this: The Fairchild case has to do with money owed them from an auction house in—”

  “I read that much in the paper. Why did you have Juanita arrested?”

  “I didn’t—”

  “The truth, P.J.”

  P.J. took a deep breath, and she could see perspiration beading on his forehead. “When you mentioned that name—Louis Armaud—and the fact that he dealt in artifacts, I put two and two together and realized he could be the one who was pocketing the money that should have gone to the Fairchild estate. I wanted to talk to him because I thought he might be helping out those people my client is opposing. You know, hiding the money so it looked like there was nothing to share. You mentioned that Juanita Calabaza knew him, so this morning I went to her spot in front of the Palace of the Governors to try to talk to her. I thought I had to do it right away, before it was too late. Turns out I was already too late. I couldn’t find Juanita. Apparently she’d already been arrested.”

  Irene looked at him with silent suspicion. “You’re lying,” she said.

  “What?”

  “You’re the one who got her arrested. I can’t prove it. I just know it.”

  “No!” P.J. shook his head with vigor. “I did not intentionally—”

  “Maybe not intentionally,” Irene said. “But my guess is you started asking around about her and about what she knew about Armaud. Someone told you she thinks he killed her son, and someone must have told you she said he had to die. But did you have to tell the police?”

  “I did not say anything to the police. I give you my word.”

  “Then who…?”

  “I don’t know. Someone I talked to, maybe.” He took a deep breath and looked into Irene’s eyes. “I probably spread suspicion. I can see that possibility, but I did not intentionally get her arrested. I didn’t want her arrested. I want to talk to her.”

  A cauldron of emotions bubbled inside Irene. Reason wanted her to believe, but fear for Juanita and resentment of the circumstances the woman had found herself in threatened to boil over.

  “Well…” Irene began, but before she could say more Angel walked in from the back, ready to begin his shift.

  “Uh-oh,” he said, glancing from one to the other. “I think I’m interrupting something.”

  “And just in the nick of time,” P.J. said. “I was about to get clobbered. Again, I mean.”

  “That is not at all true,” Irene said. “I was simply trying to absorb what you said, and I…I’m inclined to—”

  Angel interrupted her. “Juanita. You were discussing Juanita Calabaza getting arrested on suspicion of killing that guy. Just like everybody else in town.”

  “Oh, really?” P.J. asked. “What is everybody saying?”

  “Most people can’t believe she’d kill someone, not even to avenge her son.”

  “Of course no one can believe it,” Irene said. “That’s no surprise.”

  “Yeah, but there’s this rumor. You know, kind of going around the underground…”

  “What rumor? What underground?” P.J. asked.

  “Word’s out that maybe she could have done it. Or at least hired somebody to do it for her.”

  Irene gasped. “Hired someone? You can’t be serious. Who would she hire?”

  Angel looked at her but didn’t answer before he turned away to straighten a display of silk scarves on a counter next to him. “These aren’t selling so well,” he said. “I think we should—”

  “Angel!” Irene’s voice was sharp.

  “What?�
�� Angel appeared to be trying hard to look innocent.

  “Answer my question.”

  He drew in his breath. “I can’t,” he said. “I mean, I’m not at liberty to say.”

  Irene pressed him. “But you know! You know the person she hired.”

  “Of course not.”

  “What are you holding back, Angel?” P.J. asked.

  “Nothing! I’m not holding anything back. I don’t know who she hired or even if she hired someone.” There was a hint of fear in his voice. “It’s just that…well, you must know, there are people who do that kind of thing.”

  “Who have you been talking to?” Irene asked a little louder than she’d meant to.

  “What you mean is To whom have you been speaking? You don’t want to end your sentence with a preposition.” Irene turned around to see Harriet Baumgarten entering the store. Harriet was Adelle’s friend and a former high school English teacher.

  “Hello, Harriet,” Irene said. “You’re right. I get careless with the rules sometimes. I think we all do.” Her eyes shot arrows of accusation toward Angel. He deflected the shots by walking toward another customer who had just entered.

  “I think I’d better leave while I have the opportunity,” P.J. said, “but I’ll be back. I want to talk to Angel again.”

  “You’re not the only one,” Irene said.

  P.J. leaned close and whispered, “See you tonight.” He walked toward the door but hesitated, turning around slowly to listen to the rest of the conversation.

  “So, what brings you in today, Harriet?” Irene asked without responding to P.J.

  “I had a meeting of the Altar Guild at the church, so I thought I’d just pop in and say hello,” Harriet said. The church where she was an active member was the Basilica of Saint Francis, just east of the plaza. Irene could see part of the old church from the front window of her store.

  “That’s nice of you, Harriet,” Irene said.

  Harriet fingered one of the silk scarves Angel had just tried to straighten. “Actually, I was hoping Adelle might be here. I tried to call her at home and on her mobile phone, but she didn’t answer.”

  “I’m surprised she’s not home,” Irene said. “I guess she must be playing bridge. She’s been doing a lot of that lately.”

  “I didn’t know she was interested in bridge,” Harriet said. “She never wanted to join my group.” She picked up one of the folded scarves, turned it over, then put it back in its place, giving no indication that she was about to leave. “Actually, I wanted to speak with you as well,” she added.

  “At your service,” Irene said.

  Harriet leaned toward her and whispered, “It’s about that Native American woman they arrested.”

  Irene took Harriet’s arm. “Come with me. We’ll talk in the back.”

  “Oh, no.” Harriet resisted the tug on her arm. “I can’t do that. I’ll come back later,” she added, looking around at the customers who were filling the store.

  “Damn, this is getting interesting,” P.J. said. “I’ll be back later myself. Have to get to the office now, but obviously this place has more going on.”

  “I thought you’d already left,” Irene said, but before P.J. could respond, she had to turn her attention to a customer wanting to know if she’d take twenty percent off the already reduced Armani suit she was looking at.

  A steady flow of customers came in and out of the store for the rest of the day. It was difficult for Irene to find the time to speak to Angel about anything unrelated to business. Finally, she caught him between customers. “Don’t go home without talking to me,” she said. “Even if we have to wait until we close the store.”

  Angel gave her a look of dread, but when the store was closed and he walked to the back, where Irene was finishing some bookkeeping, he was full of pretended good humor.

  “Really good day, huh? A few more like that and you can give us both a raise.”

  Irene looked up from her work. “You deserve a raise, all right. You’re a good salesman, Angel. The customers love you.”

  Angel tried to maintain his fake smile, but it faded quickly. “But what? I know there’s a but. What is it?”

  “You know what it is.”

  Angel seemed about to turn away before he spoke. Finally he said, “You want to know who told me that rumor about Juanita.”

  “I think I know who told you, but I hope I’m wrong.” She waited for Angel to confess, but when he said nothing more, she added, “I told you to stay away from the Capitolistas.”

  “I have stayed away from them,” Angel said. He knew she was referring to a local gang he’d come close to joining when he was a young teen, before Harriet Baumgarten had rescued him, paid his tuition to Santa Fe Catholic High School, and helped him get a scholarship to the art school. By that time, both of his parents, as well as the grandmother who’d raised him from the age of five, had died.

  “Then how did you hear that rumor about Juanita hiring someone to kill Mr. Armaud?”

  Angel appeared for a moment to be ready to deny he’d heard it from the gang members. He took a deep breath and sat down at the small table where he and Irene took their coffee breaks. “My hood’s not exactly Las Campanas,” he said, referring to the upscale country club neighborhood where Harriet and her husband lived. “It’s a poor area. The kind of place gang members live. I see them when I go to the store to buy eggs. Or at the gas station. I see them everywhere.”

  “Uh-huh,” Irene said. “You still run into them even though you say you’re no longer a member.” Irene’s experience as a criminal prosecutor in New York had taught her that there was no such thing as a “former” gang member. Once a person had been associated with a gang, he was not likely to be left alone. That would-be dropout would be hounded, suspected of ratting on some or all of them, and sometimes even killed.

  “I told you, I was never really a member,” Angel said, as if he had read her thoughts. “I just kind of hung out with them once in a while when I was a kid.”

  Irene resisted the urge to remind him again that he would likely always be vulnerable. “So when you ran into some of them, they told you that Juanita hired a hit man.”

  Angel shrugged. “More or less.”

  “Don’t give me that bullshit, Angel. Either they told you or they didn’t.”

  “Well, nobody came out and said she hired Hacha, but everybody said he’s the one that offed the guy. So you put two and two together, you know, Mrs. Calabaza’s in jail for murder and Hacha’s got the bragging rights.”

  “Have you talked to this guy Hacha?” The name, she knew, meant hatchet in Spanish. She didn’t want to know how he’d acquired it.

  Angel got up and poured a cup of coffee. “No, and I have no intention of doing that.”

  He set the cup in front of Irene and poured one for himself.

  “So why were they telling you all of this?” Irene took a sip of the coffee. It had been in the pot all day and was now thick and bitter.

  “Just talk. Bragging maybe. You know, Capitolistas made a score. That kind of thing. Besides, they know Danny Calabaza.”

  Irene pushed the coffee away from her. “How do they know him? He wasn’t—isn’t—a member, is he?”

  “I don’t know if he’s a member, but he’s been a pretty good customer.”

  “Customer? You mean he bought—”

  “Yeah, drugs. At least he used to. I don’t know if he’s still doing it.”

  Irene brought her head down to rest on her hand. Thinking of Danny Calabaza doing drugs and being mixed up with a gang was more than a little distressing.

  “Some people can get off the stuff, you know.”

  “Oh, yeah, sure.”

  Angel got up and poured his coffee down the sink drain, then sat down again. “I know.” His voice was quiet. “It doesn’t look good, does it?”

  Irene raised her eyes to look at him. “It doesn’t look good. I’m really worried about Juanita. And Danny, too.”

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p; Angel nodded, his expression sad. He turned his eyes quickly toward the door when they both heard a knocking at the front door.

  “That’s probably Adelle. Or Harriet. Or both,” Irene said, standing.

  When she opened the locked door, Adelle and Harriet were engaged in a conversation.

  “Of course I never buy anything when I come here,” Adelle said. “I’m just curious about what she might have taken in to sell.”

  “You don’t?” Harriet said as the two of them stepped inside the door. “I should think you’d take advantage of a good discount.”

  Adelle gave her an incredulous frown. “Discount? Ha! I don’t get a discount. I have to pay full price.”

  “So you have shopped here,” Harriet said.

  “Of course not!” Adelle was adamant. “I only meant—”

  “I don’t know why not. Joanna Redman says she’s gotten some wonderful bargains here.”

  Adelle’s eyes widened. “Joanna? Shops here? At a secondhand store? She’s got more money than God.”

  “Is there something I can do for the two of you?” Irene asked, sounding only slightly sarcastic.

  Adelle turned her eyes to Irene as if she was surprised to see her there. “Oh, hello, Irene. I just stopped by to say hello.”

  “And to look at the new consignment stock I took in today,” Irene said.

  “Of course not, I—”

  “Go ahead,” Irene said. “It’s there in the storage closet. Angel won’t put it out in the showroom until tomorrow.”

  Adelle hesitated a moment. “Oh, well, if you insist.” She tried to sound reluctant. “Come on, Harriet. You may as well have a look, too.”

  “No, actually, I came to see Irene about another matter,” Harriet said.

  Irene noticed the worried look on her face. “Yes, you mentioned you wanted to talk to me,” Irene said. “Should I ask Adelle and Angel to leave?”

  “Oh…no, I think it’s all right if they’re here.” She hesitated again, glancing at both of them. “It’s about that Native American woman who was arrested.”