Али Брэндон - Double Booked For Death

The photo she kept returning to was the one where the four caped figures stood in close proximity to each other. It was interesting, she thought, how such a simple garment gave such anonymity to such a varied group. Even knowing who they were, she had to look closely to distinguish them from each other—all of which demonstrated that a disguise didn’t need to be elaborate to be effective. Hadn’t the Scarf Lady who’d hired Janie made do with only a pair of oversized sunglasses and a length of cloth around her head, when even Callie had recognized Morris underneath the elaborate masquerade that was Mavis?

Mavis!

A thought occurred to Darla as she stared again at the picture on the computer screen. Had they overlooked another, perhaps even more obvious possibility? Could Janie’s Scarf Lady actually have been Morris? Had Valerie’s own brother planned an entire secret campaign against her . . . which might or might not have culminated in his deliberately throwing her in front of the Lord’s Blessing Church’s van?

The more she thought about it, the more likely her theory seemed. But given that she’d not been able to get any sort of admission from Morris regarding his Mavis alter ego, it seemed unlikely he would spontaneously confess to the Scarf Lady masquerade should she confront him with that accusation. But perhaps she could try a more subtle tactic.

According to Reese, Janie’s contact with her mysterious employer had initially been via email. Doubtless, whoever had contacted her would have used one of those free email address services to hide her—or his!—identity. From what Reese had indicated, however, he’d passed on that address to the police department’s IT group, which could then backtrack it to its true owner. But would the police even bother to pursue that lead now?

Nothing was stopping her from doing a bit of cybersleuth-ing herself, she decided.

She gave a thoughtful frown. A cleverly worded email to the Scarf Lady’s address might prompt its owner to inadvertently reveal his or her identity. Unfortunately, she had no idea where Janie had sent her messages.

She shut down the computer’s photo viewer and took another look at the page with Morris’s email address. It was straightforward: Morris@VicksonEnterprises.com. No guesswork there, she wryly thought. Had that been the address Janie supplied to Reese in her statement, Morris might well have been behind bars by now. And since she doubted Reese would share what he likely considered to be confidential police information, what she needed was to find the ad that Janie had answered and get the poster’s email address that way.

Her frown deepened. Jake had said that the Lone Protester had found her so-called performance-art job by trolling TheEverythingList. If she was lucky—or the poster had been careless—perhaps the ad was still there. Mentally crossing her fingers, Darla swiftly logged onto the site and plugged in a few keywords to search.

“Valerie Baylor” didn’t do it . . . nor did “book signing” or even “performance art.” She was about to give it up, assuming the unknown poster had taken down the ad already, when as a last resort she finally typed in the word “protester.” To her surprise, an ad popped up titled “Professional Protester.” That had to be it!

Professional protester needed for worthwhile cause. Must be willing to picket popular literary figure while dressed in costume. $50 per appearance, one week only. Email to prettywoman-ny@theeverythinglist.com.

Darla rolled her eyes. You would think Mavis would be more subtle , she told herself, even as a small thrill of anticipation swept her. It looked like her theory was about to be proven correct. Now, all she had to do was send a message to that address and see if Mavis—or, rather, Morris—replied.

She thought a moment, and then swiftly typed, Sorry that our last conversation ended on an unpleasant note. Please let me know if there’s anything I can do for you. Darla.

She hit “Send” before she could change her mind. As the email vanished off the screen, she stepped back from the computer and let her breath out in a whoosh. Just doing a little trolling, as they say back home , she told herself, hoping she didn’t regret this spontaneous attempt at undercover work. Her email address had the Pettistone’s Fine Books web address in it, which along with her signature file made it obvious that she was the sender. With luck, that blatant announcement as to her identity would give the impression that she simply was making casual contact in her role as store owner.

She stared at the screen for a few moments, waiting to see if a reply would pop up. None did. Darla shook her head. She couldn’t stand there for the rest of the afternoon hoping for a return message. Despite the customer slowdown, there was still work to be done around the store.

“Like right now,” she muttered at the now-familiar clatter of a book hitting the floor. Hamlet, at it again!

“I’ll take care of it,” she called to James, who nodded back from his perch on the ladder where he was pulling down some overstock to fill a few gaps in the inventory.

She stalked back to the classics shelf, which seemed to be the feline’s current choice of playground. At least this time, he had limited himself to a single volume instead of half a dozen. Even so, she shot him an annoyed look and threatened, “If you keep this up, I’m going to trot your furry butt down to the vet and get you declawed.”

Not at all dismayed by her ire—no way would she do that, and he knew it—Hamlet sat boldly in the middle of the aisle beside his latest literary victim. Maybe she should get some of that canned air like Ted had used and try a little aversion therapy with him. Snag a book, and hear a nasty hiss. To be quite honest, however, his mischief was far less destructive than that of some of her customers.

Particularly the children.

She still shuddered at the memory of finding a half-eaten lollipop stuck between the pages of one of her most expensive art books a few weeks earlier. She’d had to mark it down to half price and put it on the “hurt book” table. There it still sat along with other vandalized volumes, including a popular bestseller where some high-minded customer had thoughtfully used a black marker to obliterate all references to male and female anatomy.

“All right, Hamlet. What say we give this little game a break until tomorrow,” she declared as she bent to retrieve the volume.

A glimpse at the title gave her momentary pause.

“So you like Russian literature, do you?” she asked with a quirk of a brow as she read the title, Crime and Punishment . Giving him a stern look, she added, “Or are you trying to tell me something?”

The feline did not bother to respond to either question. Instead, with a dismissive flick of his whiskers, he turned tail and headed for the stairway leading to the second floor. Darla watched him go and then returned her attention to the book she held. Coincidence, or . . .

“Coincidence,” she firmly said and returned the volume to its spot.

She checked her email twice more during the course of the afternoon, only to find each time that “prettywoman-ny” had made no reply to her earlier message. But at least she had tried, which she suspected was more than the police IT department had done.

It was closing time, and James had already left for the day when she pulled up her store email one final time. And there, sandwiched among a few end-of-day announcements from various publishers and distributors, she saw it: a return email from prettywoman-ny.

Success! came her first triumphant thought, followed immediately by a wave of nervousness. She had found the Scarf Lady . . . now, what was she going to do about it?