Deadly Blessings (12 page)

I opened my hands. “I’m a good
listener.”

“
Some other time, perhaps.”
His blue eyes seemed to intensify, almost as though he was gauging
my trustworthiness.

“
Okay, then. Whenever
you’re ready.”

“
Thank you,” he said with a
nod. And then, he smiled.

When he did, his entire
face transformed. Tiny crinkles near his eyes and around his mouth
deepened. I could tell these were lines that got lots of use; it
just so happened that I was seeing them for the first time. I felt
my stomach flip-flop as my face began to warm. Yowza. I’d better
hope he didn’t smile at me too often or I’d never get anything
done.

“
About
this hair story,” he said, his eyes traveling down to the manila
folder on his lap. “I thought maybe you could bring me up to speed?
Give me an idea of what else is coming? I have
some
information. Not a
lot.”

I wondered that he had any at all. I hadn’t
done my homework on Wilda Lassiter’s interview, yet. “What do you
have?”

“
Let’s see.” He dug out a
sheet of paper, and placed it at the edge of my desk. “Ah, yes …
Ms. Tammy Larken.”

“
Tammy Larken?”

“
The name rings a bell with
you?”

I couldn’t tell if he was making a joke, or
slamming me. His face was back to being devoid of expression, so I
decided to tread with caution. “How do you know her?”

“
She came to visit me
yesterday—around noon. Apparently she made a trip down to the
studio to see Gabriela, based on your suggestion.” I cringed; I
could tell this anecdote wasn’t going to have a happy ending. “What
you didn’t know when you sent her, was that Gabriela had
rescheduled the shoot. Nobody there but a couple of
techs.”

“
Ouch.”

“
Yeah. Ouch.”

William let the words sink in. I
half-dreaded what he might say next, but I had to know.

“
She came back to see you?”
I asked, a gentle prod.

“
Actually, she came to see
you
. But you were long gone by then,
so the staff directed her to me.”

“
I’m so sorry.”

“
Don’t be. Once she calmed
down, she really was a good interview. Had a terrible experience
and is quite … animated … when she speaks.”

“
I’ll
bet. I really
am
sorry. She was just so—”

“
Incorrigible?”

“
Pretty much.”

“
And is that how you
usually treat incorrigible guests?”

I was certain his lips twitched that time.
It was a gentle rebuke, one I deserved. “No,” I said, genuinely
sorry now. “That was unprofessional of me. It’s just—” I stopped
myself.

The truth was I’d been frustrated with my
failure to find my adoption records, with losing the Milla story to
creepy little Fenton, with bad hair issues, with Dan, and with
knowing I still had to disappoint my sister. It all weighed heavily
on my mind, but William didn’t need to hear the history of my sorry
life. I wasn’t making a very good impression on this fellow and yet
a niggling feeling in the back of my brain was telling me I ought
to try and remedy that. “Just a bad day,” I finished. Wow, that
sounded lame. Bet I impressed him.

He gave a short nod, as though in
absolution.

“
So … Alex.” It was the
first time he’d used my name to address me. Hearing it gave me a
tiny wave of pleasure. As unexpected as my reaction to his earlier
grin. “Is that a nickname?”

“
Yep. Short for
Alexandrine.”

“
That’s an unusual name. I
like it.”

“
Thanks, I do too,” I said,
smiling myself, hoping to coax another one out of him. I was a
glutton for punishment.

“
In any case, about Tammy
Larken …”

I heaved a mental sigh. Back to business so
soon.

“
She told me her story. And
it was pretty intense.” He glanced down at his notes. “She seemed
like a good candidate for the camera, too,” he added, answering my
next question. “But I thought you might want to make that
assessment yourself. I didn’t want to step on your toes.” He looked
at me. “Although I almost did that out in the hall just
now.”

Tiny smile that time. My heart gave a little
lurch in response. He did have a sense of humor.

“
Thanks. I appreciate that.
More than you know. I’ll give her a call.”

“
Actually, she’s stopping
by again today. If you’re free around one-thirty, I’ll walk her
over.”

“
One-thirty?”

“
I offered to take her to
lunch,” he said, getting up. “Figured it might help to smooth her
ruffled feathers.”

“
Oh. Sure. Lunch was
probably a good idea.” I nodded to William as he left, and wondered
why all of a sudden I felt a whole lot less ebullient than I had
just a moment before.

Jordan popped her head inside the doorway.
“Angela Cucio’s here.”

* * * * *

With the name Angela Cucio, I’d expected a
raven-haired Italian beauty. I wasn’t even close. She turned out to
be short and stocky, like someone had jammed a full-grown woman
into a kid-size body. Her frizzy strawberry-blonde hair hung past
her shoulders, an unusual style for a woman in her mid-fifties.
Everything about her gave me the impression she hadn’t had an easy
go of life. As she came in and took a seat, I caught the
unmistakable scent of stale cigarettes. Judging from the wrinkles
around her mouth and the yellow of her teeth when she smiled, I
would have to guess she nailed at least three packs a day.

Where the other two women had been dressed
to the nines, accessorized and polished, Angela wore snakeskin
cowboy boots, low-slung jeans and a peasant blouse. When she
shifted in her seat, the hem of her shirt came up enough to let a
roll from her belly hang over her silver “Harley” belt buckle.

Jordan brought in two bottled waters and set
them on the desk, held up from walking out again by Angela’s hand
on her arm. She looked up at Jordan, “Don’t forget to call now,
y’hear?”

While she didn’t have anything even remotely
resembling a southern drawl, the “y’hear,” suited her. Jordan gave
the woman a solemn nod, then headed back to her desk. I’d have to
find out later what that was all about.

“
I really appreciate you
rescheduling on such short notice,” I said, by way of an
opening.

She brushed aside my thanks. “Not a
problem,” she said, the word coming out “prollem.”

She seemed so unlike the other two that I
couldn’t help myself asking. “So, how do you know Gabriela?”

“
Gabby? She’s my
niece.”

“
Really?” I said,
astonishment apparent in my voice. “She didn’t mention
that.”

“
Yeah, well, I’ll betcha
she didn’t want me to mention it neither.”

“
No?”

She uncapped the water bottle. “Nah … you
know Gabby. She knows I’d get a kick out of being on TV even if it
is for something like this. And she prolly’d figure that if it got
out I was her Auntie, then everybody’d start accusing her of
playing favorites.” Grinning at me, she recapped the bottle,
without having taken a drink.

“
Auntie Angela—” I had to
say it out loud.

“
Call me Angie. Everybody
does. Haven’t been called Angela since I was a little plaid-skirted
brat back in grammar school. And back then it was Angela
O’Toole.”

“
Cucio’s your married
name?”

“
Well, yeah. My last one.
Been married twice. Won’t likely do it again, but both were fun.
While they lasted.” She took a deep breath as she sat back in her
chair and I worried for a moment that I was about to be treated to
a play by play of her love life.

“
So Angie,” I said, easing
back into interview mode, knowing I’d have a hard time keeping the
unbelievable idea that she was related to Gabriela out of my mind,
“you had a bad experience in a hair salon?”

“
Oh yeah,” she said, her
voice taking on an amused growl. She uncapped the water bottle
again, and took a long drink, making a glugging sound as she downed
the liquid. I waited till she finished. “Happened a long time ago,”
she said.

“
I gathered. Your hair
seems to be a good length …”

“
Yup.”

She put the bottle on my desk and skooched
herself forward, close enough to lean her forearms against the edge
and to look comfortable doing it. “Fifteen years ago last August I
decided to try a new place everybody was saying was the best. It
was real high-priced, real chi-chi pooh-pooh, you know what I mean?
They didn’t just cut your hair, they ‘designed’ it. I know
everybody uses that term nowadays but back then it was still like
some big deal.”

The fifteen years ago
caveat troubled me. While a hair emergency is a hair emergency, I
didn’t know if the distance of time would be an issue. Maybe
Gabriela
was
playing favorites by putting Auntie Angie up here. But the
woman oozed genuineness. I liked her already. A rough and tumble
woman, you could see her participating in an athletic event, not
winning, but having the biggest cheering section in the
stands.

Her eyes were so light, I couldn’t tell if
they were green or blue. I imagined that could change depending on
what she was wearing. All earnestness, she continued, “This place
was known for its ‘different’ approach to styling hair. They didn’t
use hairspray or mousse. Too common. They used seaweed and mud and
the essences of exotic plants … whatever that means. I thought it
was a bunch of hooey, of course. Just a creative way to milk more
money out of gullible people, you know?”

“
So why did you go
there?”

“
Honestly? I can’t
remember. Been too long. But I think I had a mind to show all those
folks who raved about the place what goofs they were for falling
for such crap. I got the money, so high prices didn’t bother me
none. I wanted to come out and say, hey, I been there, I done that,
and I don’t want the T-shirt.”

She smiled at that, amused by some sort of
private joke.

“
Did you have a bad
reaction to some of their unique methods?”

“
Bad reaction? Not exactly.
This place, they’re a franchise now—believe it or not—they also
specialized in advanced techniques, and shit like that. Well, they
didn’t use scissors, not much at least. They were ‘artistes’ and
they only cut using razors. Gave me the worst cut of my
life.”

“
But it grew out,” I
said.

Angela smiled, and her face went all craggy
as she did, but I sensed she was amused. “Nope,” she said. “Never
grew back. Never will.”

With that, she lifted up one side of her
hair and showed me her perfectly slashed right ear. The entire
curved top was missing.

She laughed. “Not exactly Van Gogh,
huh?”

Chapter Eight

I grinned at the expression on Dan’s face
when he answered the door. All of a sudden the long trek up Lake
Shore Drive with a senior citizen behind the wheel didn’t seem such
a bad way to have spent the morning. I’d had second thoughts about
the ride, knowing Uncle Moose’s proclivity for hanging in the right
lane doing twenty miles under the speed limit. But I felt like I
was going into hostile territory and I wanted him there, both for
moral support and for the use of his big-trunked Cadillac. Even
though that meant I had to ride shotgun to Mr. Magoo.

“
Hey, Dan,” my Uncle Moose
said, fairly bulldozing his way into the condo, using the empty
boxes in his arms as a battering ram.

“
Joe,” he said, and I swear
he stammered the single word. “What’s up?”

I followed Uncle Moose in, enjoying myself.
Though they’d only met a couple of times, Dan, Mr. Schmooze
himself, never seemed entirely comfortable with my former wrestling
champ uncle.

Standing dead center in the living room,
Uncle Moose affected a look of pained curiosity. Working at it, I
could tell. Trying to look as obvious as possible.

Still in relatively good shape despite his
advanced years, he was just short of six feet tall, with broad
shoulders and a full head of hair that he kept dark by working used
coffee grounds through it every night before bedtime. I wondered
how my aunt handled it. No wonder she could doze off in a
heartbeat. Smell that every night of your married life and boom,
caffeine ain’t gonna bother you anymore. “How long you lived here?”
he asked Dan.

“
Five years.”

“
Five, huh.” Uncle Moose
wandered through the spacious area, his head swiveling this way and
that, taking it all in. Dressed in his old blue jeans with bright
red topstitching—a popular trend back in the seventies—he scratched
the side of his head. Total affectation. I had to admit, I was
enjoying the show. “The place look like this when you moved
in?”

I saw the condo through my uncle’s eyes. He
of the patterned fuzzy rocker that reclined with the touch of a
button and accompanying mechanical “thunk.” Dan’s home, with
buttery brown leather sofas imported from Italy, and jacquard
draperies whose precise fringes framed the room-width windows, was
a little out of my uncle’s league. Far below, Lake Michigan rolled
in with tiny white-tipped waves and I could see north up the Drive.
For just a moment, I remembered how much I enjoyed the movement of
headlights and taillights shimmering below on rainy nights.
Raindrops would glisten against the glass, blurring the view till
it looked like a Tom Lynch watercolor.