She went home, unplugged the phone, slept late, took naps, and indulged herself in picking out a vintage pattern of Aunt Mimi’s and shopping for materials all weekend.
By the following Friday, the story on the Stylettos slayings was as dead as health-care reform. There would be more to come later, and Lacey might get to write about what to wear to testify, but for now her notoriety had faded like the cherry blossoms, downgraded to an old link on the DeadFed Web site. Mail was piling up in her box. Other reporters no longer demonstrated any interest in her fan mail. They had their own piles of press releases to wade through.
Lacey attacked her inbox after lunch and ripped open a puffy manila mailer. It held a videotape. No identification. No note. She checked the postmark: Virginia Beach. She glanced around. Johnson was on the Hill. Trujillo was on a story. Mac was at a meeting. Felicity was covering a Bake-Off. She was as good as invisible, so she headed to
The Eye
’s library, where a private room held a television and VCR, for news purposes only. Pleading deadline, she kicked out a couple of soap opera fans and shut the door. As she expected, the videotape quality was poor—it would never be a Sundance Film Festival finalist. But the players were there: Marcia Robinson, Boyd Radford, and a motley assortment of politicians, lobbyists, staffers, and teenage pages. And some surprises: Josephine Radford with some handsome boytoys, the attorney general dancing topless in a pink tutu while the “Waltz of the Hours” played in the background. No doubt, many people would want to see this. But who would be first?
Mac always says, ‘Trust your editor.’
Lacey smiled. She strolled past Mac’s desk and dropped the videotape on top with a note:
Thought you’d know what to do with this. Watch for the pink tutu. I’m taking the afternoon off. Lacey.
She canceled her date with Stella and went home. It was a perfect day for a walk, if your last Friday-afternoon stroll in the park hadn’t ended up with a death threat, a dip in a mud bath, and an unwanted change in hairstyle, Lacey thought. She ran her hands through her hair, mentally encouraging the shorter fringe in front to grow faster. She breathed in the blue sky, the slight dampness in the air from an overnight spring shower, and the hint of wood smoke. Her legs felt rubbery, but she forced one foot in front of the other, down the path that led to the trail into Dyke Marsh.
Don’t be crazy. He’s locked up now. It’s been two weeks since he attacked me here,
Lacey told herself. And the simple law of averages would rule out another such attack for ages, years, maybe forever. How many people could she really piss off to the degree that they would want to kill her? Again? Even writing “Crimes of Fashion”? After all, it was only fashion. As she walked, Lacey concentrated on the things that gave her pleasure: a great blue heron swallowing a fish and snowy egrets standing like royalty among the commoners, the flocks of lowly ducks and gulls. She slowed her pace and let others pass her.
Her legs complained, but this was something she had to do, or else Beau would succeed in stealing far more than that lock of hair, which was now in a pillowcase full of various hair samples in a police evidence locker somewhere in the District of Columbia.
She couldn’t tolerate the thought of being a victim. Once she completed this walk down the George Washington Memorial Parkway to the marsh, it would be easier to do it again. Someday she would reclaim the peace she had always found there.
The bulletin board at the entrance to Dyke Marsh still announced the early-morning bird walks in the wildlife preserve. Little had changed. It was quiet, with the occasional bird chirping its complaints. As always, it was comforting in its sameness. The sun sifted through the trees, creating a perfect blend of green light and golden haze. She hoped she would see a cardinal, Aunt Mimi’s omen of good fortune.
She knew why it was more important that she make peace with the incident in Dyke Marsh than with the bloody mess behind the scenes at the fashion show. In the Salon of Death, she had been the winner. But walking down the trail meant returning to the scene of a skirmish she had lost, lost on her own turf, and it might easily have been much worse.
She began at a slow stroll, but her heart started pounding and her throat went dry. She felt a chill and realized that she was shaking. That made her angry, angry at the infamous Shampoo Boy, angry at herself for being such a wimp. She gained speed.
Now she moved faster and faster, walking with purpose. Her arms were swinging and her fists were clenched. The fallen trees had been cleared off the main path, huge trunks had been sawn into logs and piled off to the sides, and Lacey walked right past the place where Beau Radford attacked her, pausing only a moment to look behind her and take a deep breath. It was important, she thought, to get past it. To reach the end of the trail.
She turned left at the bend up to a small footbridge and realized she wasn’t alone. He was sitting on a post, his face warmed by the sun. Blue work shirt and cowboy hat. Blue jeans that fit like temptation. His eyes seemed to be closed. She decided just to walk on by. He had left a few messages, but she hadn’t returned them.
Probably just wanted his gun back.
“Nice day for a walk, Lacey.”
She stopped. “Walk? Vic, you never walk! Where’d you hide the damn Jeep?”
“Thought I might catch up with you here. You know, not everyone would come back here after a tussle in the woods.”
“I had to. And I’ll do it again and again, till it doesn’t scare me anymore.”
“That’s what I figured. You never were a sissy. Crazy, but no sissy.”
“Thanks. Same to you.” Vic smiled at her. Heat spread through her limbs. “How did you know I would come here?”
“Little bird said you might be by. Said you canceled on her and took the afternoon off.”
“A little Stella-bird?”
“That was a wicked-looking wound you gave Shampoo Boy.”
“I should have aimed lower. They’d be calling him Soprano Boy.”
“And it looked like someone took a chunk out of young Radford’s hair. Like a souvenir. Sliced it off with a razor blade or something like that. Beau swears he can’t remember. You wouldn’t know anything about that, would you?”
Ignoring the question, she leaned against one post of the planked bridge.
“Why are you here, Vic? Your client Ratboy is dead. Shampoo Boy is locked up until he can go to trial or the nuthouse.” Young Radford—who threatened to commit suicide when the cops took his hair extensions for evidence—had been “MOd” for a thirty-day mental observation. “And the grieving ex-widow . . . Well, what about the widow? Doesn’t she require your personal services anymore?”
Josephine was in seclusion. The widow was torn, it seemed. She loved her son and had hated her ex-husband, but couldn’t reconcile herself to the entire nightmare. All because she had asked Beau to retrieve Marcia’s videotape from Angie. And when Beau failed, she put Leo on the job. Josephine had given him carte blanche to find the tapes. She told him to do whatever it took, including burglary. And now Lacey knew why.
“She wanted me to join Beau’s defense team as lead investigator. I passed. Besides, I’m on your side. We’re friends. Aren’t we friends, Lacey?”
Lacey stared at him, not trusting herself to speak, although of course she would. She would probably stick her foot in her mouth at the same time.
“The truth is, Vic, I don’t want to be your friend. It’s too hard. I can’t deal with just being your friend and watching you waltz off with that barracuda, Josephine.”
“We aren’t waltzing off anywhere. We aren’t even waltzing. And we’ve never waltzed.”
“You’re sure? Not even a quick two-step?”
“I swear. Not even once.”
“Not that you’ve ever asked me for a dance. Or anything.”
“I see,” Vic said.
“Is that all you can say? ‘I see’? That’s it. Fine. I am done with humiliating myself.” She took a step backward. “I have swallowed a boatload of humiliation lately, including unburdening my soul to you. Thanks for everything, Vic, but I don’t need a baby-sitter. I can take this walk by myself, okay?” She straightened up, took a deep breath, and turned toward the end of the marsh. “Go away.”
He slid off his post and stood in front of her.
“I was just waiting for you to say it, Lacey. That’s all.”
“Say what?”
“That you want to waltz off with me.”
“I want to waltz off with you?”
“Well, I guess that’ll do.” He held her, kissed her hard and long. Here was a man who knew what he was doing. He was just the right height and his arms felt damn good around her. She melted a little, not that she’d let it show. He pulled her into a slow waltz right there on the bridge.
“You’re going to drive me crazy, Victor Donovan.”
“Don’t worry, honey. It’s a short drive.”