“I already warned you to leave my staff alone. Now, you’re welcome to come to the memorial today. Everybody in Proper is invited. But don’t come if you plan to show up and spread rumors.” She pinched the postcard with her shiny red-tipped fingernails and slid it out of my hand. “You said you already had one, so I’ll take this back.”
She put the postcard on top of the stack she had in her hand and walked away, leaving me on the sidewalk. Her short pink skirt swished back and forth while she teetered on turquoise platform sling-backs. For all I knew, she was policing the rest of the storefronts for signs that other business owners had talked to me and were planning to open as well.
It was a few minutes before ten. I slipped back inside and called Bobbie.
“Is this whole Blitz memorial for real?”
“A lot of people aren’t happy about the loss of business, but once they heard that Candy Girls had the blessing of Blitz’s family, they agreed to stay closed. If I were you, I wouldn’t try to stop it from happening. It’ll draw attention to you in a negative way.”
“Okay, fine. I have one more question,” I said.
“What’s that?”
“Do you mind if we show up together?”
*
CARS lined the perimeter of the park. Bobbie circled around the block twice before giving up and handing her keys to a valet attendant. I stepped out of the car and smoothed the creases out of the black cotton dress that I’d changed into. Ladies of the ’80s suspenders and red Converse sneakers hadn’t felt appropriate for a memorial service, but I was surprised to discover that I was one of only a few people who had chosen to wear black.
“There’s a valet attendant at a memorial service at a public park?” I whispered.
Bobbie shrugged. “Everybody has to make a living.”
The Proper City Park, or PCP as it had inevitably been nicknamed, was a large, flat stretch of public property that was a combination of dirt and patches of yellow grass. It would have taken our entire water supply to grow the kind of lush grass that was popular in less-arid states, so a group of community gardeners had banded together in the ’90s and leveled the ground, created a two-foot-tall rock border, and built small shaded areas out of tall tree trunks and corrugated aluminum.
Picnic tables filled the area under the aluminum roofs. Small fire pits, blacked with soot, sat at ten-foot intervals, smoking with freshly lit charcoal. Clusters of people stood talking to one another while looking around as if trying to figure out what they should be doing. I kept my round, black plastic sunglasses on and scanned the crowd for familiar faces. Linda and Black Jack Cannon talked to Gina Cassavogli next to a four-foot-tall picture of Blitz that rested on a wooden easel.
It wasn’t until I spotted Detective Nichols standing off to the side taking note of those who arrived that I realized what I’d overlooked about the occasion. If everybody who was tangentially connected to Blitz was here, then it stood to reason that the person responsible for his death might be here too.
Detective Nichols caught me looking at her. I looked away too quickly, which I’m sure made it obvious that I’d been watching her. She started toward me and I turned to Bobbie.
“I don’t want to talk to Detective Nichols,” I said. “Do you mind running interference?”
“No problem,” she said. She met Nichols halfway while I went in the opposite direction. “Hi, Detective,” I heard Bobbie say. “I’ve been meaning to talk to you about a fund-raiser for the police force. Do you have a minute?”
When I was clearly out of her line of vision, I stood back and scanned the crowd again. Grady O’Toole waved. I waved back. He said something to the men he was with and then joined me.
“I was hoping to see you today,” he said. “I have something for you.”
He put his hand on my waist and guided me away from the crowd. “Grady,” I said. “I don’t think it’s the best idea to sneak off in the middle of a memorial.”
He reached into his suit jacket and pulled out a sheet of paper. “You asked me about the costumes at the party,” he said. “I made you a list like the one I gave the detective.” He smiled, less thousand-watt smile like before and more aw-shucks. “This seemed kind of important to you the other day. I know you got some bad news and I thought—well, I thought you might rather have this than a bunch of flowers.”
“Thank you,” I said. I unfolded the papers. His pen must have died halfway through the list because the color of the ink switched between Veronica Mars and Jupiter Jones. The crime scene cleanup crew had said that they found a wadded-up trench coat in the back of the oven, and that trench coat went to one very specific costume. I scanned over the names—including Sherlocks #1–#4—but didn’t see Columbo listed.
“This list isn’t complete.”
“Sure it is. I put everybody on there.”
“What about Columbo?”
Grady looked surprised. “Why are you asking about him?”
“I specifically remember making the Columbo costume. He was one of my favorites. It struck me as odd that he’s not on here.”
“I thought you already knew.” He shoved his hands in his pockets and looked at me sheepishly. “The guy in the Columbo costume was me.”
Chapter 19