“Patricia wondered what happened to you,” a male voice said behind me. I flinched in surprise and a little embarrassment. I hadn’t meant to snoop; I’d just gotten carried away. I certainly hadn’t intended to get caught, especially not by Benjamin.
“I was looking for the powder room and I made a wrong turn.” I raved on about the room to try to cover my nosiness. “Patricia is a wizard,” I said, gesturing toward all her hints stuff.
Benjamin nodded, but his eyes weren’t crinkly and friendly. He was covering it pretty well, but he seemed irritated. “Patricia was looking for you. We want to ask you about something.”
I felt nervous and flustered and started to babble. “Is it a good something or a bad something?” I asked, realizing as I did that I sounded pretty stupid. “Of course, it must be a good something.”
I grabbed a photo sitting on the desk. “Are these Kimmee and Demetrius?” I asked. Even if they were his stepchildren, talking about kids always seemed to smooth everything over. They were in Old West outfits, standing next to a stagecoach. “This must be from the PTA carnival the year she did the old-fashioned pictures.” I was really rambling now. “It was probably before you knew her. You should have seen all the costumes she brought.”
He nodded, and I kept going on about how they’d grown, how fast kids grew, how my sons had just been babies what seemed like five minutes ago and now they were men and so on. He stood in the doorway until I walked out, and then he followed me back to the living room.
“Here she is, honey. I found her admiring your hints room.” If he was annoyed, any trace of it had disappeared from his voice. A number of the guests had already left, and I began to wonder if the tall, bald Byron was really going to show. Patricia took me off into a corner. The
She apologized for keeping me waiting and explained that the couple who had arrived were generous contributors. “Let me get to the point,” she began. “We’re collecting people now. When Benjamin gets elected we’re going to need a much bigger team, and the people who show themselves to be our friends now are going to be the ones we want on it.” She leveled her gaze at me. “I’m sure you realize this council seat is just a stepping stone to bigger things.”
“I’ve been getting that impression.” I was talking to her but checking the crowd for Mr. Nederman.
“I told Benjamin how underused you are at the bookstore. I mean, with your public relations background, you could be invaluable to us.”
Okay, so she was getting to me. Who doesn’t like to be told how great and underappreciated they are? She had all my attention now, and for a second I forgot that what I was really after was getting a chance to question the illusive bald guy.
I smiled and listened attentively while she rambled on about what an exciting future lay ahead for the team. Then she leaned in toward me, a sure sign she was getting to the important part.
“Of course, all of that depends on Benjamin getting elected. That’s our job right now, isn’t it?” She nodded, and I nodded with her. “I need your help on a few little things.”
Someone came into the room and called good-bye to her, and she smiled and waved in response. Her face grew serious as she turned her attention back to me.
“We need to change the date of the event.”
“Event?” I said, wondering if I’d missed something.
“My book signing for
I shrugged and said I didn’t think it would be a problem. If need be, I’d switch somebody else. Before I could ask her if she had a preferred date, she handed me a piece of paper with a date on it, so I’d be sure to get it right. Okay. Not a surprise since Patricia was such a micromanager.
“And there’s something more. I’d like to incorporate Benjamin into the program. Instead of taking someone from the crowd, I’d like to use him for the demonstration.”
Again, I told her it was no problem. If Benjamin wanted to be the one she poured red wine on, far be it from me to stand in his way. I started to move away. “At the next crochet meeting, I’ll confirm the date.”
Patricia put her hand on my arm, stopping my retreat. “There’s one more thing. You’d don’t mind if we bring along someone to videotape it, do you?”
Whoa. Now I got it. Patricia was good. She had played me like a cello. First, the whole thing about making me sound like I ran the bookstore and raving on about my underappreciated skills and hinting that if I was a good soldier, I’d end up an important part of the team. Then getting me to keep saying yes to little things until she got to what she really wanted.
“That might be a problem. You should really talk to Mrs. Shedd about it,” I said.
“You are in charge of events, aren’t you? Besides, other people have videotaped their book signings and demonstrations.” When I gave her a blank look, she helped my memory. “Don’t you remember that Brenda Rochner? She’s the author of
It was coming back to me now. “That’s right. Her uncle almost got burned when he went in for a close-up of Brenda dropping the dough circles in the vat of boiling water.”
“If Brenda could do it, why can’t I?”
“They just showed up with video cameras,” I said, realizing Patricia was backing me into a corner.
“So, you’re going to penalize me for asking first?” she said with her hand still on my arm.
She had me. What could I say? As soon as I agreed, her face brightened and she made an okay sign with her fingers. When I turned, Benjamin was standing in the doorway.
The next thing I knew, she’d shoved a piece of paper in front of me. I tried to read it, but she kept moving it around so it jiggled and the words were just black squiggles.
“It’s nothing important. It just says you said it was okay. Benjamin is such a stickler about doing things one hundred percent right.” She handed me a pen and pointed to a line on the bottom. I scribbled my name and she pulled it away.
“Don’t I get a copy?” I asked, but Patricia had already handed it off to Benjamin, who promptly disappeared.
“Molly, you’re a dear. We really mean it about you being part of the team.” She hugged me and kissed the air next to my cheek. “I really appreciate how you came at the last minute, but I don’t want to keep you from whatever important thing you tore yourself away from to come.”
I was moving before I realized it. Patricia had her arm linked with mine, and we were heading toward the door. She had almost ushered me outside when I remembered I’d had an agenda, too. I didn’t have time for the soft-soap technique and had to get right to the point.
“But I didn’t meet Byron Nederman yet.”
Patricia’s expression darkened, and she talked under her breath. “Molly, I told you he’s gay. Go to some bar if you’re looking to pick up men.” Someone came up behind her and she did a complete about-face in the expression department as her eyes lit up with a warm smile. “I’m so glad you finally made it, Byron. We were just talking about you. All good things. Go on in and have a martini. I’ll be with you in a minute.”
She held tightly onto me as we advanced toward the door. I turned, but all I could see was Byron’s back as he walked across the room. He certainly looked like the man I’d seen at the Cottage Shoppe.
Omigod, this was my chance. I pulled away from Patricia’s grasp and moved toward him. She was not going to keep me from having my little chat with Byron. As I approached him, I racked my memory for what
I was going to follow the book’s advice, so touched his arm to get his attention. “Byron, it’s so good to see you again,” I said. “I saw you at the Cottage Shoppe the day Drew Brooks was murdered. I guess you didn’t see me. It was just horrible what happened. So, how did you know Drew Brooks? Were you, like, dating?” The man had turned completely toward me by now and was looking at me as though I were totally out of my mind. As I took in his features, I suddenly had a bad feeling—a really bad feeling. So, maybe he wasn’t the bald man I was looking for after all.
It got worse when I heard some woman introduce herself as his girlfriend.
Oops!
