A Talent for Murder (17 page)

Ped-Xing looked at Michael with smoldering eyes. Then he looked at Tim and shrugged. “I was just guessing, that’s all. It’s like I used my imagination and thought of what a dead body that had been strangled would look like. I never said I actually saw Danny all busted up and looking any special way. How could I? This is my first time in this ritzy crib.”

Michael drank the rest of his glass of champagne and said, “So now I look like a liar, ‘cause I believed what you said you saw.”

“Sweetums!” Polly interrupted. “Dead bodies in Bel Air look just like the ones found on Sunset Boulevard or in Laurel Canyon. They’re just dead people. You see them all the time on
CSI
, so what’s to imagine? I think it’s time that we all skedaddle into the dining room, that’s what I think. We’ll all feel less hostility with full tummies. I know I will!” Polly tapped her three-carat
pear-shaped diamond ring against her champagne flute. “Placenta has a very special menu planned for this evening. Hop to it, ladies and gentlemen,” she said, leading the way to the formal dining room.

Place cards at each setting identified where Polly had determined each guest would be seated. With Polly at the head of the table, Tim and Placenta pulled out chairs for Miranda and Amy and Taco Bell, while the men seated themselves, giving no indication that they knew anything about dinner table etiquette.

Tim joined Placenta in the kitchen and began serving the soup course. Polly was the first to be served, followed by the women, then the men. “Start, start, start,” Polly encouraged, before Tim and Placenta had finished placing all the bowls of squash soup before their guests. “You’ll die when you taste this,” Polly said.

As Ped-Xing slurped soup from his spoon, and Miranda looked around to make sure she was using the right utensil, Polly added, “Speaking of dying, I think we can all understand why Mr. Thane Cornwall came to his end, but why do you suppose our sweet Danny was done in?”

“Typical dinner table conversation at Pepper Plantation,” Taco Bell said as she patted her lips with her cloth napkin. “I’ve heard about your famous parties.”

“You aren’t far off,” Polly said, “but perhaps we should save such talk for dessert.”

As everyone oohed and aahed about the starter course, Michael asked his hosts, “What’d you think of the show last night?”

Polly took a sip of champagne and said, “I thought that Miss Jesus-in-the-Mirror motor mouth was actually quite acceptable as a judge.”

Taco Bell noisily dropped her spoon into her bowl. “She made fun of me!”

Amy Stout declared, “You got off a hell of a lot better than I did with Richard! What the hell was he doing making up such a vulgar quote from Thane? ‘The stench of my voice’? What was that all about?” She coughed into the palm of her hand and tried to smell her breath.

“He was just saying what he thought Thane might say,” Ped-Xing said. “I’m the one who got hit between the eyes by Brian! He said I was stupid!”

As Polly finished her soup and placed her spoon in the bowl, she looked up, rested her elbows on the table, and intertwined her fingers. Her diamonds shone under the light of the Waterford crystal chandelier. “You’re all reading negative ideas into the judges’ questions. I’ll admit their queries weren’t very good, but I don’t believe the judges were at all as hostile as you’ve led yourselves to believe. They don’t need to be analyzed like a dream in which you discover yourselves tying your honey-slathered mothers over a hive of African red ants. God knows I don’t give advice—” Placenta nearly spat up her soup. “—but I’ll tell you that in all my years as an international celebrity and icon, I’ve found it’s best to eliminate the negative and focus on the positive.”

Placenta wiped up the soup spittle from the front of her dress and said, “For instance, it would be negative of Polly to say she’s positive that there’s a connection between the deaths of Thane and Danny.”

“I think so too,” Ped-Xing said. “We all do. That there’s a connection, I mean. It’s too freaky that two people involved in the same show have died within days of each other. It’s been a whole week since the last one went, but that doesn’t mean that the killer is through with us. The show has bad karma, and you know what they say, everything comes down to money. I think there’s
a killer producer on the loose. Last night’s big ratings proved that the publicity from murders worked.”

“Hold that thought,” Placenta said as she stood up and retrieved the soup bowls. Tim joined her in the kitchen to serve the main course.

While placing chicken breasts stuffed with fontina, artichokes, and sun-dried tomatoes on eight plates, Placenta whispered, “That Ped-Xing isn’t as stupid as he looks. I think he’s on to something. The producer connection, that is.”

“If he’s right, and the ratings do reflect all the freebie publicity, then we’re looking at Richard Dartmouth as a possible killer. Oh, but please, dear God, don’t let Polly catch on. She’ll have another potential murderer over and we’ll have to play this same game with him.”

“Polly’s not a complete idiot,” Placenta said. “She’ll add two and two and at least come up with three.” She picked up two plates and moved toward the door to the dining room. “I’ll take these to Michael and Ped. Don’t forget to add the sodium pentothal béarnaise sauce.”

When once again everyone was seated, and with each forkful of food making yummy sounds, Polly announced, “I’d like to propose a toast,” raising her champagne flute. When everyone else had set their silverware down and lifted their own glasses, Polly closed her eyes as if in prayer. “To dear Thane Cornwall and lovely Danny Castillo. Your friends and fans miss you. We, at this table, are particularly sad that you aren’t here to join us, but we know that you’re both in a better place than Hollywood, which isn’t exactly all that’s it’s cracked up to be anyway, especially if you’re just a tart-tongued judge and a minimally talented contestant on a bottom-of-the-barrel television show that takes advantage of youthful dreams and capitalizes on America’s
thirst for blood, and challengers’ devotion to winning a competition at all costs.”

Polly drew a breath and continued. “I remember how Lana Turner tried to sabotage me when I had my first screen test at Metro. I was supposed to play her precocious stepdaughter in a movie that never got made. She wanted an established actress for the role. So Lana, dear killer Lana, in her inimitable way, made sure that the cinematographer didn’t light me well. She also made certain that I had the wrong script pages. But did I take my anger out on that luminous legend? I did not. And when the morbidly obese but still darling star who played Perry Mason, and that crippled Ironside guy on television, came on my show and refused to learn the choreography for a sketch about wheelchair waltz competitions that my darling writers had spent weeks perfecting, did I expose one iota of his secret gay life to any of my friends in the media? Assuredly not!”

Polly waited just long enough for the guests to think that the sermon might be over. Wrong. “So, you two darling men of the theater, or at least of pop culture and television, I propose a toast to you and send our most powerful thought vibrations for your killers to be identified, and brought to justice. I am doing all that I can in my limited capacity as a living legend to ferret out the loathsome creature or creatures who perpetrated these crimes and deprived both of your beautiful bodies from drawing another breath and being with us at this fine and expensive antique dining room table with the professionally starched and ironed linen tablecloth that was given to me by Rosalind Russell on the occasion of my marriage to Mr. Pepper number one. You’d love the food and drink, I’m sure, and the company of others here who are just as determined to succeed in show business as both of you were.

“When we all meet in heaven, I’ll be sure to bring along a case of my favorite bubbly, and we’ll have our own little celebratory reunion and I’ll regale you with reports of all that you missed out on just because someone decided you were dispensable. Trust me, dearest dear men, the planet is not the same without you. We miss Thane and his cruel behavior, which led everyone who didn’t know the real Thane Cornwall, the one that lived way deep down a couple hundred layers beneath the surface of your strident exterior, to misunderstand you and to not know that you were just a human being with the same frailties as Caligula, and with just as much obvious need for attention. Your lack of a bridle on your tongue was a wonderful thing that most people couldn’t tolerate, but that didn’t stop you from being exactly who you were. As inconsiderate and spiteful as you appeared to be, I know that at your core was a volcano that wanted very much to be smothered out with cotton candy and lemonade, and to no longer cause pain and suffering among the masses.”

Polly dismissed her guests’ yawning and continued. “Oh, Danny. Dear, sweet, all those tattoos and piercings, Danny. Your bravery, at standing up to those who dismissed you as untalented and tried to beat you down with hurtful words, was no match for the real Danny Castillo. Yes, like Thane, on the surface you appeared to be a tough cookie. But on the inside you were a marshmallow. I think we all know this.

“So why, dear boy, did you have to invade my home and get yourself murdered? Oh, you sweet thing, with the voice of… well, a better voice than Alvin the Chipmunk… why did you get into this trouble? Did you know something about the murder of Thane Cornwall that you were trying to prove? Did you suspect that there was something at Pepper Plantation that
might claim the innocence of Lisa Marrs? Oh, my dear Danny, if only you could come back for an hour and tell us everything you know about the case, and your last day, hour, and minute of life. Oh, to be in a position to offer you a glass of champagne and a hug. I’m among those who will always miss you. Thankfully, after a few days and no more than a month, you’ll fade dead away. Still, I know that whenever I see a nipple ring on a man, or a lovely wall that’s been defaced with graffiti, I’ll think of you and the way you chose to decorate your living temple of the Lord.”

Polly stopped for a breath. Then she sighed and said, “I’m not hungry anymore.”

By now, the food was cold, but the guests were fired up. “I’d say cheers and amen, but I wasn’t a fan of either Thane’s or Danny’s,” Miranda said. “Thane’s death wasn’t a bad thing. Danny, I’m not too sure about. But the fact that he got himself killed while trespassing at Pepper Plantation, well, he was obviously up to no good.”

Amy Stout raised her glass. “I, too, would like to propose a toast.”

As groans issued from the other contestants, Polly smiled at Amy. “Of course, dear. If Thane and Danny are paying attention, they’ll certainly appreciate your thoughtful words.”

Amy cleared her throat. “My toast is to Richard Dartmouth, for selecting me for this competition in the first place, and to Steven Benjamin, who has given me a lot of encouragement.” She paused. “I also hope that Thane and Danny suffered horribly when they got murdered! The knife couldn’t have gone deep enough to find Thane’s nonexistent heart! And, if what I heard is true, that Danny choked to death on his own body-piercing studs, it wouldn’t have tasted metallic enough for him! We all get what we have coming to us.”

Everybody at the table appeared stunned. Amy took a long swallow from her glass of champagne, smiled, and said, “What’s for dessert?”

“A double scoop of acrimony with a venom glaze,” Placenta cracked.

Polly, astonished, looked at Amy and asked, “How did you know that the cause of Danny’s death was from choking?”

Amy shrugged. “Someone said so.”

“L
et the maid clear the table,” Polly said to Placenta as soon as their guests had left the house. “Oh, wait,” she sniggered, “you’re the maid! Timmy, give Placenta a hand.”

With a harrumph from Placenta, and a roll of the eyes from Tim, the two began their chores. “Indentured servitude,” Placenta griped.

When the dining room was once again in perfect order, and the dishwasher filled with china and silverware, Tim and Placenta joined Polly in the great room where she was engrossed in her favorite HGTV program,
I’ll Murder My Way Too Sexy Decorator
. Polly was comfortably seated on the sofa, with her legs outstretched and her back resting against the padded arm of the couch. “It’s curious,” she said when a Lowe’s home improvement store commercial interrupted a homeowner who had booby-trapped his dining room with a carpet over a wide hole in the floor and was lying in wait for his designer.

“What? That Amy knew so much about the death of Danny Castillo? I had that thought too,” Tim said.

“No. Well, that too,” Polly said. “I was remembering
the video clip they showed of Danny on last night’s show.”

“That was one sick-looking swayback pony he was photographed on as a kid,” Placenta said.

“Hmm,” Polly agreed. “No, I mean, where did they find that footage of his dressing room tantrum? He wouldn’t have done that if a cameraman was present. A hidden camera? If there was one in Danny’s room, there must be one in every dressing room.”

Tim rubbed his tired eyes. “That would be totally unfair and probably illegal. It’s a dressing room, for crying out loud. Things go on there that you wouldn’t want Peeping Toms to see, let alone viewed by the entire world.”

“Hell, they’ll throw anything up on YouTube these days,” Placenta said. “Remember those bully teen cheerleaders who videoed themselves dismembering a rival cheerleader, specifically to play on the Net?”

“I’d be mortified if a camera was trained on my lace and frills,” Polly said. Then she put her hand to her mouth. “Suppose my dressing room had a hidden camera, too! Jeepers creepers! I don’t think privacy exists anymore!”

Placenta poured herself a glass of Veuve and plopped down on the twin sofa opposite Polly’s. “Wait a darned minute! I think we’re all missing the bigger picture. If each dressing room had a hidden camera, there’s a chance that if one of the show’s contestants is responsible for Thane’s or Danny’s deaths, we might find some clues on the tapes.”

Tim nodded. “Maybe a tape or two captured someone plotting beforehand, or confessing after the fact.”