Shop Till You Drop

could be a killer. She looked at the gorgeous women laughing and sipping champagne. She wondered which one murdered Christina and let her rot in Biscayne Bay.

She also wondered why she was trying to trap this killer. Was she nuts? The fear began crawling in her guts again. I’m playing Nero Wolfe, she thought, but I forgot he had Archie Goodwin when he sat in a room with a killer. Not me. I’m getting them drunk. I’m unarmed and desperate.

Helen stood at the cash register like a soldier at her post, ringing up one purchase after another, until Juliana’s profited more than a hundredfold on the investment of three bottles of champagne. After the buying fever was over, the five women sat on the loveseats. Spent was the only word to describe them.

They were now deep into the third bottle of champagne. Niki had hiccups. She sent out a wave of perfume with each hic. Helen thought she’d better pop the question before it was too late.

“I’d like to propose a toast to Christina,” Helen said, lifting a champagne flute.

“She would have loved this,” Tiffany said, sounding the least bit teary. She finished the glass in one gulp.

“Don’t the police know anything about her . . . ”—Niki couldn’t bring herself to say “murder”—“passing?”

“They know the time of death,” Helen said. “They think she died sometime between Saturday evening and Monday morning.”

“That’s so sad,” Niki said. She gave an enormous hic and then a delicate belch. “I didn’t come back until Saturday. I mean the Thursday after she passed.” And interesting slip, Helen thought. Was the date of the carjacking and Christina’s murder on her mind? Or did she just say too much?

“I was in Greece,” Niki said. It sounded like Griss. “I was having a wonderful time while Christina was getting murdered.”

I’d better get a cab for Niki, Helen thought.

“I spent the whole time with Paulie, but I can’t say it was all that wonderful,” Tara said. The word came out “wunnerful.” She moved her head abruptly and slapped herself in the face with her long dark hair.

No way to prove that, Helen thought. And Tara was tipsy, too.

“A girl’s gotta do what a girl’s gotta do,” Tiffany said, and finished off another glass. The champagne should have made her eyelids droop, but surgery had stretched them too tight. Instead, she looked slightly bug-eyed.

“Too bad they don’t give Oscars for best performance in bed,” Tara said. “Then the world would know what a good actress I am.”

Tara wasn’t tipsy. She was sloshed. Two cabs, thought Helen.

Brittney adroitly steered the conversation away from the slippery subject of sheets. “Where were you, Sharmayne?” she whispered. “Some place glamorous, I’m sure.”

“I was at the Frances Sneed Memorial Scholarship benefit in New York.”

“I saw your picture in the New York Times,” Tiffany said. “You wore your black Vera Wang. It looked super.”

“And where was—hic—your hic— your little puppy, Big Boy, while you were in New York?” Niki said.

Helen felt herself blush at the mention of the dog’s name. Sharmayne must have seen her face redden. She stared right at Helen and said, “I took him with me. I never board him at the vet’s. Big Boy doesn’t know he’s a dog. We stayed over until Monday.”

Sharmayne knows I’ve seen those blackmail photos, Helen thought. And she’s absolutely sober. The fear snakes in the pit of her stomach slithered nervously.

“How about you, Brittney?” Sharmayne said.

“I was at the Kensington art and jewelry sale in Boca,” Brittney whispered. She looked rather like a work of art herself. One of those lifelike people sculptures so popular a few years back.

“Ooh, that’s the three-day sale by invitation only,” Tara said.

“Right,” Brittney breathed. “I stayed at a hotel from Saturday night until Monday morning and shopped till I dropped.”

“Lucky you,” Tara said. “Three days of bargains.”

“Don’t you usually go to the Kensington sale, Tiffany?” Brittney said.

Tiffany’s eyes bulged like an ornamental goldfish’s. She tossed off another flute of champagne before she said, “No, my boyfriend, Burt, was out of town. His big saltwater aquarium broke Friday right after he left. Cracked right down the middle. I spent the whole weekend running around getting new saltwater fish and a new tank and everything. Took me till Monday to get things back together. It was awful. Flish fopping all over the carpet . . .”

The phrase “fish flopping” had defeated her pierced tongue.

“Did you go to Deep Blue Sea for your saltwater fish?” Brittney asked.

“No,” Tiffany hiccupped.

“Funny,” Brittney said, softly. “They have the best selection.”

“Well, I didn’t think so,” Tiffany said. She sounded flustered, and for a moment Helen caught a glimpse of the straggly-haired girl who swiped jewelry at the old folks home.

“So where did you buy your fish?” Brittney asked. The woman would have made a good prosecuting attorney.

“I don’t wanna talk about it,” Tiffany said, slurring her words.

She’s lying, Helen thought. And she doesn’t have an alibi.

At two o’clock, the champagne was drunk, and so were at least three customers.

“Time for me to reopen the store,” Helen said. “And your cabs are here. Tara, ready to go?”

“How am I going to explain to Paulie why I’m coming home in the middle of the day?” Tara said.

“Tell him you got the flu,” Helen said.

“The wine flu,” Niki giggled. Her perfume seemed to be getting stronger as she got drunker. “Gotta queshun. Christina leave anything for me?”

“Some papers?” Helen said, thinking of Niki’s arrest record squirreled away in the CD case.

“No, a tape. Wedding songs. I’d like it for sennimen—for stentimen—for pers’nal reasons.”

“I haven’t found any tapes,” Helen said.

“You wouldn’t lie to little Niki?” Her face crumpled like a wet Kleenex, and Helen was afraid she might cry. Time to go. Helen loaded Tara, Tiffany, and Niki into cabs, along with their mountains of purchases. Brittney said she could drive herself home. Helen had not seen her drink more than half a glass of champagne.

Sharmayne was completely sober. She was also the last to leave. She stood at the door, hip cocked at an aggressive angle, voice lowered to an icy threat.

“I know what you were doing,” Sharmayne said.

Then she slammed the green door in Helen’s face.

Chapter 27

Sharmayne was furious. Tiffany was lying. And nobody seemed to have a decent alibi. The champagne showing was a smashing success.

As soon as Sharmayne stalked out the door, Helen called Sarah. After all, this had been her idea. Helen wedged the phone between her ear and her shoulder so she could talk while she cleaned up.

“I’m not sure what I learned, but I’ve certainly stirred things up,” Helen said.

She was enjoying this. Helen was a natural detective—or busybody. That’s what they called women back home who watched the neighbors through their miniblinds and pumped the unwary for personal information.

“There’s hardly an alibi in the whole bunch. I can’t prove if Tara was with her boyfriend the whole time,” Helen said. “Brittney doesn’t have an alibi, either. She spent the weekend at an invitation-only sale in Boca. She