A Corpse in a Teacup (2 page)

Tuesday climbed the hills above Hollywood to the 1930’s bungalows of Silver Lake. She was too busy looking for Holley’s house number to admire the sweeping vistas of downtown Los Angeles peeking between the renovated cottages. She came to 1417, a good address, but the wrong side of the street for a decent view. She tried out her new Tibetan numerology course, adding and dividing the house numbers in her head. Hmm. Holley had a strong future in needle arts and she should take care of her teeth and gums? What was up with that? Maybe she better look at her notes again.

Tuesday pulled into the driveway behind Holley’s white Mercedes SUV. Holley wasn’t married and didn’t have kids
. What was she doing with such a big boat? It outshone the small house, like filet mignon on a paper plate. She saw Holley peeking through the Jalousie shades. Before Tuesday could get out of her timeworn Civic, Holley was hiding behind her front door waving her in. “Come quick, hurry.”

It was the anxiety in Holley’s voice, not the com
mand that made Tuesday rush inside.

Tuesday gave Holley a hug, the fragrance from her neck and hair fruity and refreshing. Tuesday cringed a bit. She was not exactly bandbox fresh. She really needed a shower after her early commute from northern California. The aroma of coffee wafted from the living room. When she looked up to find the source, she was staring into the brilliant blue eyes of Holley’s father. At least that’s who she assumed he was, with his expansive smile, lanky frame and sliver fox hair.

Holley did the introductions. “Miss Tuesday, this is Mr. Gregory, my next door neighbor.”

Guessed that wrong. She stuck out her hand. “How do you do, Mr. Gregory. Nice to meet you.”

She was shocked Holley had company this early in the morning and on this particular occasion.
They needed to talk about her threatening phone calls. Mr. Gregory had a demeanor that made Tuesday feel a little ill at ease. The man’s regal presence made her question her manners; worry if she had anything caught in her front teeth.

He returned
her handshake, smiling still, all charm on a stick. “Just Gregory. Greg, actually. I didn’t realize Holley was expecting a guest.”

Once she was fully inside the living room,
Tuesday smelled the seductive cinnamon and caramel fragrance of baked goods. The delicious aromas made her salivate while Greg explained his presence.

“My little neighbor here
did me a great favor yesterday. I locked myself out of my house when I was gardening and she let me use her phone to call the security company so I could get back in.”

He tapped his head. “Brain cells, you know. They do a hasty retreat after a certain age. An
yway, picked up a breakfast treat for her this morning while I was getting mine.”

Greg held up his eco friendly
cardboard coffee cup, identical to one on the table. A paper sack rested next to it, a grease stain on top signaling the pastry inside. Tuesday scowled when she realized that the naughty treat was meant for Holley. In addition to tea leaf readings, Holley consulted her for nutritional guidance. Tuesday was trying to wean her off sugar.

He continued.
“It’s my way of saying thank you.”

“Nice,” she said,
a little perplexed by the scene. Her neighbors never dragged themselves out of bed before noon. It wasn’t nine a.m. yet. He looked bright and cheery enough, though his shorts and tee shirt were grungy and mud caked his toes and rubber flip flops. Something oily about him, as well, Tuesday decided. Wouldn’t an apple at lunchtime have been more appropriate? He’d caught Holley still in her pajamas and robe.

Holley just smiled uncertainly at both of them. Greg took the cue. “
Well, lily calls. I’d better get going.”

The tension in
Tuesday’s shoulders relaxed. Now she could give him a warmer smile. There was a woman at home. “Lily? Your wife?”

He laughed, discouraging that possibility. “Married? Me? No, I’m a gard
ener. Lily’s are my specialty.”

Holley came to life. “He has more speciments of lily’s than anyone,” she looked at him uncertainly
, “in the world maybe?” She shrugged her confusion, then gave a charming but puzzled smile. “I don’t know. But he’s an expert.”

Holley had wandered over to his side and he put a hand on her shoulder, the bare one, the
one revealed when her robe slid down after she and Tuesday hugged it out. Now alarm bells went off again about this guy. He was good looking in an old guy kind of way. More than a few wrinkles in that charming face. Tuesday didn’t go in for old guys, but maybe Holley did.

Greg laughed again. “Holley should be my press agent. I belong to a local garden club and I’ve cornered the market on lilies. Not as exotic as heirloom roses
or African violets, but for some reason they call to me.”

Tuesday was trying to recall what a lily looked like. Spikey and
orange was all that came to mind. Greg shook her hand again. “Nice to meet you, Miss Tuesday. I’ve enjoyed meeting some of Holley’s friends. Maybe we’ll do it again.”

Tuesday thought,
I hope not
, smiled and said goodbye.

Holley seemed to have forgotten about him before she had
even shut the door. “I’ve already made the tea, Miss Tuesday.” She shook her robe. “Let me get dressed and then you can read the leaves and tell me what’s going on.”

Tuesday called down the hall to protest, but Holley had disappeared into the bathroom.

While she waited, Tuesday looked around the renovated bungalow.
Holley’s house didn’t reveal much. No furniture or knickknacks to speak of. Walls bare except for a poster of her last movie, she in a space age skimpy costume shooting thunderbolts out of a weapon that Tuesday thought resembled the bright fluorescent plastic water canons kids used in pool fights.

But Holley was tid
y. Kitchen counters, which Tuesday could see from the living room, were spotless, no dishes in the sink and the chrome shone like a restored Corvette. She spotted a teapot, cup and saucer on a Formica table in a corner of the breakfast nook.

This was a new experience for Tuesday.
She never visited her clients at home. Oh, she’d lassoed her friends into acting as guinea pigs when she was learning to read tea leaves, palms, pendulums, any method of divination that promised to lead her to a higher truth, to teach her how to connect with her true self, how to convince herself her life was okay, that she was okay.

But she believed that what manifested in the bottom of a teacup was a reflection of the client’s psyche. The tea leaves only revealed what the person was ready to see. Walki
ng cold into someone’s home exposed so much more about them, and Tuesday liked to respect boundaries. Some boundaries anyway, the one that said stay out of your clients’ lives. Let them show you what they want you to see. She had, after all, invited herself to Holley’s house. This visit felt a bit intrusive.

Holley returned a
few minutes later tugging yoga tights into place. “What were we saying, Miss Tuesday?”

Tuesday looked up. Holley was a girl after her own heart
. Even in the midst of a life or death crisis, she had taken the time to do her blond hair in a side pony with her bangs heavily sprayed in place and apply her usual half-inch of makeup. Tuesday liked her cosmos, too, her cosmetics, but she wondered how Holley could speak with all that lip gloss.

“Can we get started, Miss Tuesday?”

Tuesday forced herself to stop staring. “Slow down a minute, Honey Bunny. First, who is that guy?”

“Mr. Gregory? He told you. He’s my neighbor. He’s very nice to me, brings me things from his garden. Flowers and some vegetables. You should taste a salad from his greens. You just feel wholesome and healthy after eating them right from the ground. Washed of course.”

If Tuesday felt she was intruding, Holley didn’t seem to see it that way. She was her natural self, chirping away, stretching and gesturing wildly with her arms. Your every day Holley. Enough nervous energy to power downtown LA.

“So he knows your friends?” Tuesday noticed happily that Holley was ignoring the breakfast gifts from Greg, though she could have easily slipped them into her tote if no one was looking.

“Well, I wouldn’t say he knows them. He was watering one time when some people came over for a pizza and movie night. I introduced them to him
before we came inside. He told me the next day he was excited because he’d never met celebrities before. He’d recognized one of the guys who was in a TV show a while back. I guess he’s a little,” she rolled her eyes and posed as though she were on the red carpet, “star struck. I think that’s why he likes me, because I’m an actress. He doesn’t give his flowers to anyone else on the street. I know that.”

She ran over to the
dining table and lifted the lid from the teapot. “The tea is cold. Let me make some more.”

“
Whoa, honey. I can’t do a reading for you here. It would violate my contract with the Café. You found me there so if I do a reading for you anyplace other than The Mulberry Cat, I’ll get fired. They don’t want me siphoning off their clients for my private practice.”

Tuesday wasn’t sure Holley understood
, but she did get the message that the tea leaf reader was not going to solve her problem just yet.

Tuesday need
ed to get the full story. “Tell me what’s been going on and then, if we have to, we can go to the Café. Take it from top. Who threatened you and why?”

Holley threw up her hands, mystified.
“But that’s just it. I don’t know.” She did a stress-relieving stretch and then folded herself into an impossible yoga pose. Tuesday shut her eyes, as though watching something obscene. She tried to force down the envy she felt at the yoga porn. It was bad karma to be jealous of a client. She had an admirable set of abs herself, but one look at Holley’s ripped midriff in her hip hugging tights and sports bra made Tuesday feel like she was lugging around a baseball player’s beer belly.

She got her mind off comparing herself to Holley by continuing her interrogation. “Tell me about this new gig. How’d you hear about it? Who’s working on it?”

Holley
still hadn’t offered her a seat, so Tuesday slipped off her shoes and helped herself to one of the two fashionably weathered leather club chairs, the only items of trendy décor in the room. She tucked her feet under her legs and waited for Holley to relate her bizarre story. Holley seemed almost unaware of Tuesday’s presence as she gathered her thoughts. She uncorkscrewed herself and collapsed on the couch, speaking to the ceiling.

“Well, I told you that I read for the lead
. I want this part, Miss Tuesday. It could make my career. See there’s this pilot and she . . . “

Tuesday loved Holley, and usually had patience for her
wild-eyed exuberance, but sometimes it was work to keep her on track.

“Lovey, I don’t mean to be rude, but could you cut to the chase
? Maybe we’ll track the script later?”

“If you say so, Miss Tuesday
. Well my agent told me about the part. Said EVERYONE had to read. The director didn’t care how many blockbusters they had done. Not that I’ve had a blockbuster. Not like Angelina Jolie or anything, but close. You know my last film, if I’d had the lead . . .”

Tuesday was on Orange alert. Ten minutes had passed and she still didn’t know what had upset Holley
. While Holley blathered on about her career, Tuesday remembered that Holley had once told her that she wore her wealth on her back. That seemed to be true, judging from the sparse furnishings, and the fact that Holley told her she was making decent money. She wore mostly H&M off the set, cheap designer knockoffs, but she must have a lot of it if that’s where she spent her money.

Whoops. Tuesday
caught herself. She was letting her mind wander while Holley prattled on, losing focus. She snapped her fingers and Holley seemed to come out of a trance. “Names, Holley. Who’d you read for?”

“
Goren Vitale. He did that movie about . . .

Tuesday jumped in
before she was off on another tangent. “Who else was there?”

“A
bunch of other people.”

Tuesday slowed down her voice as though talking to a child.
“Do you know their names?”

Holley sat up and twirled her side pony to hel
p her think. “Well, there was Zora Slade, his personal assistant. I’ve heard that Mr. Vitale doesn’t make a move without consulting her.” Holley rolled her eyes. “She’s such a big deal she has her own PA.”

Tuesday rolled
her
eyes, thinking,
I could do with a PA.

Holley continued
.
“And Gray Star, this ambidextrous actress who’s in all of Mr.Vitale’s movies. I think because her costumes can be worn by men and women and it saves money.”

“Um, do you mean
androgynous?”

“Right.
That’s what I said. And Ariel Cuthbert. She read for the part, too. My agent told me to watch out for her. She’ll do anything to get a role. One time, I heard she put cayenne pepper in a rival’s tea. The poor girl’s mouth was burning so much she couldn’t read for the part, so Ariel got it. She’s always been nice to me, but I didn’t let her get near my drink.”