Kate Collins - Sleeping with Anemone

He took the phone from the shelf and hit REDIAL, then held it up high when I tried to get it from him. He turned his back on me to say, “Jillian. Hey, it’s Marco. Would you come down to Bloomers? It won’t take long. Yep, it’s about the brooch. Thank you.”

He hit END and gave me the phone.

I blinked rapidly, trying to fire up my stunned brain cells. “You asked Jillian to come here?”

“It’s always better to confront in person.”

“But here? Where I am?”

“And where I am.”

Where I wished he wasn’t at that moment.

I sank onto the wicker settee next to the armoire and leaned my head back with a groan. Marco was going to confront drama queen Jillian Ophelia Knight-Osborne. In my shop. I would pay for this forever.

When Jillian breezed in fifteen minutes later, Lottie came to let us know, then said, “Grace is cleaning the coffeepots in the parlor and I’ll be in the kitchen… hiding.”

Marco got up. “Let me handle it.”

“No problem,” I said. “I’ll just retire to the cooler until the furor dies down.”

“There’s not going to be a furor. I know how to deal with your cousin.”

“Right. Thaw me gently.”

Marco shook his head and stepped through the curtain into the shop. I eyed the cooler, then sighed and followed him. It wasn’t often I got to witness someone self-destruct.

Jillian was standing in front of the counter, arms folded, wearing a short black-and-white leopard print swing coat, red cashmere beret, shiny red tote bag, and black patent boots. She glanced from Marco to me. “Where’s the brooch? Do you have it wrapped yet? I’m in a hurry.”

“Nice beret,” Marco said, leaning his hip against the counter.

I stared at him, trying to get him to see the pleading look in my eyes: Don’t do this, Marco. He ignored me.

Unable to resist a compliment, Jillian took off her beret and patted it. “Thanks. I got it to replace the one that was stolen.”

“Reminds me of Abby’s,” Marco said.

She glanced at me. “You have a beret?”

There was my opening to firm up our cousin bond and possibly salvage Marco’s standing with my family. I gave her a playful punch. “Come on, Jilly,” I said, using the nickname I’d given her when we were little. “You remember my Kelly green wool beret that we got last St. Patrick’s Day at Target.”

“Stop,” she cried, looking horrified. She hated to admit to shopping anywhere but on Chicago’s Magnificent Mile. “I remember, okay?”

“Abby was wearing the brooch on her beret before her mom borrowed it to make copies,” Marco added, watching her closely. “Remember now?”

Jillian studied my head. “S.O.R’ing.”

Wonderful. She was making up words again. “Translate,” I snapped, then quickly added with a smile, “please?”

She huffed. “S.O.R. Sort of remembering. Don’t you text?”

“Sort of remember more,” I said.

She pressed her fingertips to her temples and closed her eyes. “Okay, I think I remember seeing you wearing your green beret when you were on the news after someone hurled that brick through the door. And yes, I do remember seeing the brooch on it. You were standing outside the shop, right? Holding a press conference or something?”

Marco gave me a scowl. “Yeah, an impromptu press conference just after she was told to keep a low profile.”

Jillian’s eyes opened. “There. Satisfied?”

“That certainly does it for me,” I said. “Thank you for being so helpful!”

“I have a question,” Marco said.

“Can’t you save that for another time?” I asked him. “Sweetheart?”

“Can you describe the beret that was stolen from you?” Marco asked.

“Why?” Jillian asked skeptically. “Don’t tell me the cops actually found it.”

“This is for my own investigation,” he replied.

“Oh. Well, it’s hand-stitched black Italian leather, and I hope you have better luck than the police, because my dad brought it back from Naples, Italy, for my twenty-first birthday, and I’m very attached to it.”

“Your twenty-first birthday,” I said, “which was five years ago, whereas I bought my beret last year.” I gave Marco a pointed look. “So Jillian had hers first.”

He tipped his head, acknowledging my point.

Jillian glanced at her watch. “Okay, it’s been fun reminiscing, but I really need to pay for the brooch and go.”

“Just one more question,” he said, giving her a hint of a smile.

I groaned inwardly. Couldn’t Marco let well enough alone? “Who are you buying the brooch for today?” he asked.

“Me,” she said. “The way Abby’s mom has been raving about them, I decided I should have one. Why? Does it matter?”

“If the brooch is for you,” Marco asked, neatly sidestepping her question, “why do you want it wrapped?”

Jillian sighed, as if the answer was obvious. “Because Claymore is giving it to me as a surprise.”

I smiled at Marco. From the bemused look on his face, I could tell he was ready to call it quits. I was vindicated!

“Now, can I have my brooch, please?” Jillian said. “I want to open my present at dinner.” She pulled a credit card from her wallet and held it out. “Use this. I just paid it off.”

Marco moved aside. “That’s Abby’s department.”

What? Leave me to clean up his mess? I scowled at him. Some bodyguard he was.

Trying to portray abject wretchedness, I said to my cousin, “I am so sorry to tell you this, Jilly, but it seems we don’t have any brooches after all. They were stolen.”

All sounds from the coffee-and-tea parlor ceased. Obviously Grace was eavesdropping. Only the ticking of an anniversary clock on the shelf behind me could be heard as my cousin absorbed the news, as if the shop itself were holding its breath.

Suddenly, Jillian’s nostrils flared, her hands curled at her sides, and her lips pressed into a hard line. “Then what am I doing here?”

“Well,” I said slowly, trying to think of how to pacify her, “you’re here because…”

“I asked you here,” Marco said, fixing her with his most sincere gaze.

What was he doing? He wasn’t going to tell her his real reason, was he? Never mind; I couldn’t take any chances. “That’s right-Marco asked you here because I need your help.”

Jillian’s lips plumped into a perplexed pout. “Let me see if I understand this. Marco asked me to come over because you need my help?”

“Yes! Knowing how enlightened you are about fashion,” I continued, “and how socially connected you are, we-I mean I-thought you’d be the perfect person to keep an eye out for someone wearing one of the stolen brooches.”

Jillian tapped the toe of her high-heeled boot on the floor. “Is that so? And you couldn’t tell me this on the phone? I had to drive here through snowdrifts, in this subarctic cold?”

Three inches of snow did not constitute a drift, and the temperature was thirty-three degrees Fahrenheit. Still, I was in no position to debate it. I shrugged. “But then we wouldn’t have had this chance to visit.”

Jillian drew in a deep breath. She let it out slowly, as though composing herself. Or maybe she was sending me up in a balloon. Whatever it was, she managed to say in a civil tone, “While it may be true about my fashion expertise and well-fixed social position, if you will remember, except for that one blurry image of your beret on the news, I have yet to see any of the missing brooches! Every time I’ve come here, they’ve been gone.

“But wait,” she cried dramatically, “not just gone. Stolen! Filched! Purloined! Right out from under your nose! And not once but three-count them- three times. I mean, come on, people. Buy a security camera. This is getting tiresome!”