Shop Till You Drop

Chapter 10

Helen stripped off her blouse and switched on the TV. She wanted to catch the news while she dressed for her date with Cal. As she unzipped her skirt, she caught the words “carjacking of a twenty-three-year-old Plantation woman.”

Helen stared at the screen in horror as the announcer said, “Desiree Easlee, who lived in a gated community in suburban Plantation, was shot and killed this morning in an attempted carjacking.”

Desiree? Niki’s rival was dead? No, it couldn’t be. She wasn’t the only woman in Florida named Desiree. Helen’s skirt slid unnoticed to the floor.

“Miss Easlee was engaged to be married to T-shirt entrepreneur James “Jimmy the Shirt” Dellamondo. The wedding was supposed to take place in Belize next Saturday,” the announcer said, and Helen’s last hope was as dead as Desiree.

On the screen was a photo of a luscious-lipped blonde in a tight black dress with a zipper up the front. In the next shot, Desiree was in a loose-fitting black body bag with a zipper up the front. Desiree’s enormous breasts created a mountain in the body bag.

A dead photogenic bride made good television, and the station had put extra effort into reporting this story. The announcer said the security guard did not have any record of a strange car being admitted to the gated community, and the police had no leads.

No leads, Helen thought. She felt sick and dizzy and guilty. Her head throbbed and pounded with the refrain: Desiree was dead. Desiree was dead. And she did nothing to stop it. Now she had a face to put with her crime of cowardice. An innocent young woman was dead a week before her wedding.

I could give the police a lead. I could tell them who set this up. I know who arranged the murder of Desiree. And why.

On the television, someone was saying that gated communities gave a false sense of security to residents. The people who lived there did not take the same precautions as residents who lived on public streets. A neighbor complained to the TV reporter that the security guard was an old man who frequently slept while on duty.

Another woman, who identified herself as a doctor’s wife, defended the gated community. “We have the guard for prestige, not security,” the woman said.

Helen could not figure out why a dozing senior citizen was prestigious. But it wasn’t fair that the poor gate guard was going to be the scapegoat for this crime. Helen knew this wasn’t a carjacking gone wrong. It was a murder for hire. Helen had heard the whole thing being planned and done nothing.

But what could she have told the police? See, officer, there’s this woman named Desiree. I don’t know her last name or where she lives, but Niki wants her dead before she marries her boyfriend. Niki went to the manager of a dress shop to hire a hit man. At least I think that’s what was going on. I couldn’t hear them talking too clearly. And I never saw any money change hands.

Helen would have looked like a fool. But Desiree might still be alive.

Now Desiree was dead. Before her wedding to Jimmy the T-shirt baron, just like Niki wanted. Christina had arranged the murder, but there was no way Helen could prove it.

She had a date with Cal in five minutes. She’d have to cancel. But what could she say? This woman I never met was killed, Cal. I should have stopped it, although I don’t know how.

There was nothing Helen could have done differently. There was nothing she could do now. She had to pull herself together and quit standing there like a statue wearing an underwire bra.

Helen pulled on some clothes. She had no idea what she put on. Only after she locked her front door did she notice she was wearing cutoffs and a Tweety Bird T-shirt. Well, Catfish Dewey’s was supposed to be casual.

She was almost to the pool when she heard Cal say, “Don’t you look beautiful?” He whistled appreciatively.

Unfortunately, Cal was whistling at Peggy, not Helen. Peggy was wearing a long, low-cut black dress that showed off her elegant figure and dark red hair. The dress was bare on one shoulder. Peggy didn’t have her parrot.

“Where’s Pete?” Helen asked.

“He’s home alone for the evening. I’m going to the opera, and Manon is not a sing-along. There’s my ride. Gotta run,” Peggy said, as a silver Lexus pulled into the Coronado parking lot.

Peggy didn’t run. She glided to the car like a runway model. A man in impeccable eveningwear greeted Peggy warmly and opened her door. He was theatrically handsome, with burnished blond hair hanging over one eye and cheekbones that looked like they’d been chiseled by a sculptor. Helen thought Peggy’s escort could be a Calvin Klein model or a member of the Hitler Youth.

And I could be a scrubwoman, Helen thought.

“I’ve always wanted to ask Peggy out,” Cal confided, as they climbed into his rattling Buick. “But she’s too expensive for me.”

“And I’m cheap?” Helen asked.

“No, no,” Cal said, soothingly, “you’re just ah-boot perfect.” This time, his “ah-boot” failed to charm Helen, and she kept a huffy silence on the ride to Catfish Dewey’s.

But she thawed when they got to the old restaurant. Catfish Dewey’s was as homey as a basement rathskeller. She felt instantly comfortable with its knotty pine paneling and red-checked tablecloths.

Cal wanted the all-you-can-eat catfish. Helen had no compunction about ordering stone crab claws, the most expensive item on the menu. They still cost less than dinner at Cap’s. It was the first time Helen had had stone crab, and she was fascinated. The claws really were hard as stones. Harder. They were like concrete.

“Stone crabs are pretty, don’t you think?” she asked Cal, as she dipped the sweet crabmeat in mustard sauce. “Most crabs look like boiled spiders, but stone crabs are pale yellow with flamingo pink splotches and black tips.”

“You look pretty cute with yellow on your lip,” Cal said, as he delicately removed a blob of mustard sauce with his napkin. Then he launched into a tale about the first time he ate a lobster that had Helen laughing again.

He was delightful, Helen thought, and her anger dissolved. So what if he complimented Peggy? She was getting touchy. That’s what happened when you lived alone too long. No, that’s what happened when you were rattled about Desiree. But her mind quickly skittered away from that. Catfish Dewey’s was overflowing with friends and families dredging fries in ketchup and dipping hush puppies in tartar sauce. There was no room here for carjackings and murders for hire.

Cal and Helen spent the next few hours chattering away, while their tired but efficient waitress hauled out basket after basket of cracked crab and fried catfish.

Finally, Helen had eaten herself into a stupor. She surveyed the mounds of empty crab claws and mustard sauce cups and said, “I think it’s time for the check.” Cal agreed and signaled the waitress.

The waitress produced that as quickly as the food. Cal grabbed for it and Helen let him. Then he patted his back pocket. Suddenly, he began slapping himself frantically. At first, Helen thought he’d been attacked by an invisible swarm of mosquitoes. Then she realized Cal was patting his empty pockets. Next, he turned his pants pockets inside out.

“I seem to have forgotten my wallet,” Cal said. “I’ll pay you back as soon as we get home, but would you mind picking up the check this time?”

Helen minded. A lot. But she had been warned by Margery not to dine with Cal, and she had not listened. On some level, she must have been expecting this, because she’d tucked seventy-five bucks into her purse. The bill came to forty- eight dollars and eight-six cents. The waitress returned with her change. Helen was seething, but she wasn’t sure if she was mad at herself or Cal.

She left a ten-dollar tip for the deserving waitress, and without a word to Cal, got up and headed toward the door. He could follow or not, she didn’t care. She felt strangely light after this decision. Then she realized it was because she’d left her purse back at the table. Helen turned around to retrieve it, just in time to see Cal filching the waitress’s ten spot.

“Put that money down!” Helen said. Heads turned, but she didn’t care who heard. “I can’t believe you’d sink to stealing a waitress’s tip.”

“I was taking it back for you,” Cal said. “If you tip too much, it spoils the help.” He was lying, and he knew she knew. The man actually cringed when she approached. Disgusting.

Helen yanked the ten-dollar bill out of his hand and marched over to the waitress, who was staring at them. “Here. This is yours,” she said. Helen thought about walking home but decided Cal could drive her. He owed her that much.

All the way home Cal railed about rich Americans who tossed around money in Florida, making life difficult for hardworking Canadians. The value of the Canadian dollar had sunk so low he couldn’t afford a decent life. As Cal ranted, he became the aggrieved party. The entire United States was personally depriving him.

Helen didn’t answer. She kept remembering her landlady Margery’s words: “Talk is cheap, and so is Cal.” She had nothing else to say. Her anger at Cal burned away the last thoughts of Desiree.

Back at the Coronado apartments, they both got out and slammed their car doors simultaneously. Cal stomped off to his apartment. He slammed that door, too, so hard the jalousie glass rattled.

Helen didn’t want to go inside yet. She was too upset. She hoped the soft, humid night would comfort her. She wandered over by the pool and saw Peggy sitting in a lounge chair by the water. She was still wearing her glamorous black dress, but now she had Pete on her shoulder. Pete looked ruffled and grumpy, but Peggy seemed complete with her parrot.

“Bad date?” Peggy said, sympathetically.

“Unbelievable,” Helen said, and gave her the details.

“Oh, I believe it,” Peggy said. “I’ve dated every bum in Broward County.”

“But you went to the opera tonight with a wonderful man,” Helen said. As soon as she’d said it, she realized Peggy was alone in the dark, just like she was.

“A wonderful gay man,” Peggy said. “Troy’s partner is in Paris on business. He knows I like opera and can’t afford tickets. Troy was kind enough to ask me to go with him. In South Florida, all the good men are either married or gay.”

“Is it really that bleak?”

“Yes. Pete’s my main man now.” The parrot hopped triumphantly back and forth on her smooth shoulder. Peggy, pale and beautiful in the moonlight, looked like a princess held prisoner by a green goblin.

“Then there’s no hope?” Helen said, although she already knew the answer.

“Sure there is,” Peggy said. “I buy lottery tickets. My plan is to win big and buy me a good man.”

Peggy’s sad laughter followed Helen all the way to her apartment. As she passed her neighbor Phil’s door, she was surrounded by a thick sinsemilla smog. The invisible pothead was burning some fine weed tonight.

Lucky Phil, she thought. He could fire up his dreams whenever he wanted.