Died To Match Part 4

Buck, Betty, and Bonnie had done tasting after tasting- these folks just loved to eat cake-but none of my usual bakeries had really wowed them. So far, they'd rejected a traditional tiered cake with holly trim, a forty-pound brandied fruitcake, and a fantasy forest of fir-tree-shaped croques en bouche in a blizzard of spun sugar. Time was getting short. I had one more baker, deep in my Rolodex, who might just do the trick....

The doors swooshed open on the intensive care unit. Surprise, surprise: the police knew their job better than I did. At the end of the corridor I could see a brawny officer planted on a folding chair beside a door. Tommy's room. I made a beeline for it, past a waiting area full of family members with strained expressions, despondently doing jigsaw puzzles or rereading magazines. I tried not to see them, not to imagine who or what they were waiting for. A tiny, sharp-nosed black supervisor with bloodshot eyes intercepted me, demanding my full name and relationship to the patient.

"You're not Mr. Barry's daughter, then," she said. It sounded like an accusation. "Immediate family only at this time."

"Tommy has a daughter? Can I get her phone number? I'd like to help."

"We can't release that information."

"Can you at least tell me how he's doing? Or could I talk to his doctor?"

"The doctor would tell you that Mr. Barry's condition is critical," she said, glaring up at me, "and there are no visitors allowed except immediate family."

In another minute she'd call the cop over to evict me; he was already watching us suspiciously. Well, at least I knew Tommy was safe. I stopped in the hospital gift shop on my way out and tried to order a bouquet for his room, but they told me flowers weren't allowed in the ICU. As I bypa.s.sed the elevator and clattered down the fire stairs to the van, I vowed to myself that I'd bring an armful of blossoms when Tommy woke up. Surely he'd wake up soon. At the moment, I didn't even care if he could identify the murderer. I just wanted Tommy Barry back in the land of the living.

Preoccupied as I was, I must have pulled out of my parking s.p.a.ce too fast. A bang like a gunshot coincided with a shock that flung me forward against my shoulder belt. I sat still for a moment, unsure at first of what had happened. Then I realized and groaned aloud, not in pain but in sorrow. If my insurance goes up I'm screwed. I scrambled out. My fender was a mess, but the occupants of the other car, a Catholic priest and a drab young woman, seemed to be intact.

"I'm so sorry," I babbled as they climbed out of the shiny blue sedan. The priest, a burly man in his sixties, had been driving. "Honest, I thought I looked, but the pillar was blocking me. I'll pay for any-Corinne?"

Drab and washed-out, matted hair pulled back with a rubber band, lush figure bundled in an oversized parka, the pa.s.senger was indeed Corinne Campbell. I'd never seen her without her face painted and her hair styled, but those round, slightly bulging aquamarine eyes were unmistakable. Of course, the ambulance must have brought her here, and then they kept her overnight. She stood hugging herself as if she were cold, looking dazed and miserable, staring at nothing.

"Do you know each other?" the priest asked, in the rich, confident voice of a born public speaker. He held out his hand. "What a very small world. I'm Father Richard Barn-stable. And you're-?"

"Carnegie Kincaid." We shook hands and I nodded at Vanna's copper-colored Made in Heaven logo. Wedding professionals often do pink, so I try to stand out. "I'm an event planner. I was at the party last night where Corinne... that is, the party at the Aquarium. One of the guests had a car accident."

Corinne snapped to attention. "Who?"

"It was Tommy Barry. He's in critical condition, I couldn't get in to see him. Listen, Corinne, how are you? I mean, are you OK now, and are you all right from last night?"

And did you jump or fall? That's what I really wanted to ask, though I'd feel guilty about it either way. Either I failed her as a friend or I failed to spot a safety hazard at the party venue. Maybe I should call myself a disaster planner.

"I'm fine," she said absently, gnawing at a thumbnail. "Father Richard is taking me home. Father, you're not hurt, are you?"

"Not at all, not at all. And the car seems to be undamaged, though Ms. Kincaid's van looks the worse for the encounter."

"It's just a little body work," I said, bending down to inspect the fender. It wasn't quite sc.r.a.ping against the wheel, but it looked awful, with bare metal showing through the white paint. Poor old Vanna. Nothing like a dilapidated vehicle to make a really cla.s.sy impression. "It's drivable."

Corinne wasn't interested in the state of my van. "What happened to Tommy?"

"He was drunk and he tried to drive himself home. He's still unconscious. Corinne, has anyone told you about Mercedes?"

She stared at me. Corinne never seemed to blink. "It was on the news this morning. What happened? They didn't really say."

I'm used to counseling hysterical brides and soothing their irate mothers, but explaining this kind of news to this kind of person was above and beyond. To complicate matters, a behemoth SUV full of teenagers came down the ramp and honked at us; the priest's car was blocking the aisle. He hastened to move it, and Corinne stepped aside with me.

"I can't say much either," I told her, remembering Graham's admonition. "She died some time during the party, or right after. I found her. The police are questioning everyone, so you'll probably get a phone call. They, um, know about your fall."

A hand shot out from the baggy sleeve of her parka and gripped my arm. "Carnegie, I didn't fall."

"Oh, Corinne, I'm so sorry. I knew you were upset about Boris, I should have come and found you so we could talk. Aaron feels really bad about it, too. Is Father Richard going to stay with you this afternoon? You can always call me, you know."

"What are you talkin' about?" Her Southern accent had grown stronger.

"Well, I don't want to b.u.t.t in, but if you're still feeling like you might harm yourself, you shouldn't be alone."

"Y'all think I jumped?" She shook my arm impatiently and her eyes got even rounder. "Carnegie, somebody tried to drown me."

Chapter Seven.

IT WAS MY TURN TO STARE, INTO THE AQUAMARINE SHALLOWS of Corinne's wide, wild eyes. The of Corinne's wide, wild eyes. The SUV SUV lumbered off, and we were left in echoing silence. lumbered off, and we were left in echoing silence.

"Are you sure? Maybe it was a joke. People were drinking a lot-"

"I don't know who did it, but it wasn't a joke. I was sitting on the edge of the pier, over where the guests weren't supposed to be, you know? I went around the barricade. I just wanted to be alone. Somebody in a black cape, or a cloak or something, came up behind me. He bunched it over my face and we wrestled around and then I hit my head. Next thing I knew, that guard was hauling me out of the water. I didn't jump, honestly. You believe me, don't you?"

Father Richard joined us at this point, and Corinne's demeanor changed abruptly. Her expression went blank, and she turned quickly away from us to get into his sedan and slam the door.

"I'll take her home," the priest told me, as I gazed after her in consternation. "We'll just forget the fender bender, shall we?"

"Father, has Corinne told the police she was attacked?"

He moved closer, his back to Corinne, and spoke softly.

"She plans to," he said. "Unfortunately."

"What do you mean?"

"You have to understand," he said, "she's told stories like this before. I've known Corinne since she came here to the university, and she's always had, well, call it a vivid imagination. She gets a bit dramatic when things aren't going well. There was a young man once, she was angry at him, and she made an accusation that wasn't quite true."

"An accusation?..." I couldn't quite say "rape" to a priest.

He nodded significantly. "We settled it quietly enough, but the police are unlikely to take her seriously a second time. Nor should they, I'm afraid. I think Corinne just needs a different way to explain what happened last night. Self-destruction is a sin against G.o.d's love, you know, and she's a very devout girl."

"I understand," I said, though I wasn't sure I did. "Well, here's my card, in case there's a problem about your car. Thanks for being so reasonable about it."

"You're welcome. G.o.d bless you."

They left, and I drove away with my thoughts spinning like a whirlpool. It was certainly possible that one woman tried to kill herself on the same night that another woman was murdered. Corinne might well have repented her suicide attempt, then gotten the idea for her "story" from the report of Mercedes' death on the news. She'd been all alone out there in the dark, beyond the barricade, with no witnesses. Simple enough, last night, to slip into the water in drunken despair. Simple enough, this morning, to pretend there was a killer stalking the party, and play the victim instead of the fool. Or the sinner.

But wasn't the boy who cried wolf devoured by one? Was Corinne's wolf in a black cloak imaginary, or all too real?

I needed time to think, and I wanted to give the Buckmeisters time to vacate the office, so I swung out of my way to do a drive-by of the Experience Music Project. Even if Paul and Elizabeth decided to postpone, I'd have to check off this ch.o.r.e eventually. For each of my weddings, I drive to the site pretending I'm a guest with no special knowledge of one-way streets or parking-lot entrances. It gives me a better sense of where to put signs or set up valet parking, and serves as a double check if we've put a map in with the invitation.

Eddie harrumphs that people should fend for themselves, but I believe that your experience as a wedding guest begins when you walk out your front door. Inconvenient dates, unreasonable distances, or incomprehensible driving directions are just as bad as wilted flowers or a lackl.u.s.ter cake. So I drove through the thinning drizzle, and parked Vanna just as the faint, moist sunshine began to gleam on the vast curves of the Experience Music Project, where it reared up from the Seattle Center grounds.

I had mixed feelings about the EMP, at least the outside of it. Inside, the rock-and-roll museum was fabulous: 140,000 square feet of interactive exhibits, memorabilia from doo-wop to Hendrix to riot grrrls, and various innovative performance s.p.a.ces. And, of course, it made a hip venue for a wedding.

But the outrageous Frank Gehry design for the building itself gave new meaning to the phrase "You either hate it or you love it." Inspired by the shapes and colors of electric guitars, it's a multi-colored metal-skinned train wreck of dark gold, red, and silver sections, with rippling blue and green bands and iridescent pink bulges in between. I was leaning toward loving it, but mostly I found myself wondering how it was going to look covered with frosting.

Because, unlike the Buckmeisters, Elizabeth knew exactly what she wanted for her wedding cake: an architecturally perfect model of the EMP. The cake itself would be bitter chocolate, laced with raspberry liqueur and filled with mocha mousse and French b.u.t.tercream. Rolled fondant, carefully dyed to match the EMP's in-your-face colors, would form the sh.e.l.l of the building. And a tiny marzipan monorail would wend through it, heading for a chocolate-and-gum paste s.p.a.ce Needle. The price tag was exorbitant, but people would talk about it for weeks.

Before they could eat cake, though, they'd have to navigate their way to the wedding site.

I pulled out again and made three pa.s.ses, coming at the EMP across town from the freeway, then south from Queen Anne hill, and finally north from downtown on Alaskan Way.

Then I pulled over on Fifth Avenue to record my findings in the spiral notebook that's always in my tote bag. Eddie keeps suggesting some kind of digital gizmo, but paper works fine for me. And concentrating on practical matters helped me to keep from worrying about Corinne and Tommy.

"h.e.l.lo there!"

The voice, and the simultaneous tapping on my window, made me jump. My favorite pen leapt from my fingers and hid itself down near the pastry crumbs at the base of the gear shift. Swearing silently, I rolled down the window, and a matronly woman with a pleasant smile handed me a parking ticket.

"I wasn't parking!" I protested. "I was just sitting here thinking for a minute."

"Well," she chirped, "you should have thought about putting money in the meter. Have a nice day!"

A parking fine and body work both, on top of the overdue overhaul on the engine. Wonderful. If only my mechanic would plan his wedding, so I could trade for his services.

At least the Killer B's had left. They drove a purple Cadillac with, heaven help us, a pair of steer horns mounted on the grille, so you always knew if they were around. I went wearily upstairs to check in with Eddie. I owed him big time for taking them off my hands. I considered telling him what Corinne had said, but Eddie has this funny notion that I read too much into things, and see mysteries where there aren't any. Like the time I thought a guy courting Lily was married because he wouldn't show her his house, and it turned out he just never vacuumed the place. Eddie would tell me to mind my own business.

"Carnegie!" he bellowed from the workroom as soon as I cracked the door. "This boy's a genius! He's got this planning software working like a charm!" There were printout pages heaped around the room like snowdrifts: checklists, budget graphs, pie charts labeled "Bride's Expenses" and "RSVPs to Date."

Eddie was at his computer, with my erstwhile Robin Hood standing behind him, puffed up with the praise. He was awfully good-looking. Maybe I should have kissed him back. At least he didn't smoke.

"Zack!" I said. "I forgot you were coming, after what happened last night."

"You mean that thing with Corinne? b.u.mmer. She OK?"

"I haven't told him," Eddie said quietly, his hands still on the keyboard. "I didn't know if I should."

I moved a sheaf of pages and dropped into my desk chair. "Zack, you haven't seen the news today, have you? Or talked to anyone at the Sentinel?"

"Nah. My TV's dead anyway. I slept in and, like, d.i.n.ked around until now. What's going on?"

"It's Mercedes Montoya." How do I say this? "I was walking through the exhibits last night, after everyone left, and... Zack, she's dead. I don't know if you knew her very well- Zack? Eddie, catch him!"

Zack had gone white to the lips, as if every last ounce of his blood had been drained away, and then he began to tremble and sway. Eddie leapt from his chair and guided Zack into it, then pushed his head down between his knees.

"Slow breaths," he said gruffly. Eddie has different degrees of gruff, though, and it stuck out a mile that he liked this youngster. "Carnegie, for G.o.d's sake, get a gla.s.s of water."

Zack had to sip at it for a minute before he could speak. "What happened? Did she drown?"

"I'm not supposed to talk about it until the police say I can. Sorry." He nodded vaguely. "Listen, maybe you should go home. Eddie can show me what you've been working on, and we'll get back to it later. Did you drive over?"

"I took the bus," he said hollowly. "Yeah, I think I'll go home. Sorry."

"Don't worry about it," Eddie told him. He walked Zack to the door, then came back to his desk and began to gather the printouts into stacks.

"I wondered if he had worked with the Montoya girl," he said. All females under fifty were girls to Eddie. "Must have liked her a lot. They're all in an uproar over at the Sentinel, according to your boyfriend."

"Eddie, I asked you before. Please don't call Aaron my boyfriend."

"Well, then, your 'acquaintance' called, to tell you the Campbell girl is all right. He tried to see her at Harborview but she'd already gone home." He sat at his desk and laid the paperwork aside. "How's the best man? Sobered up?"

"He's in a coma, Eddie!" My partner had never met the Sentinel's sportswriter, so I couldn't expect any serious sympathy, but still I bridled. "They don't even know if he's going to live."

He winced. "Sorry. Well, there goes the wedding. Shall we divvy up the cancellation calls?"

"Not yet, not till I talk to Elizabeth and Paul. I told you about Paul's great-aunt, didn't I? She's ninety-eight, and apparently she's been hanging on just to see him get married. I don't know what they'll want to do. We have a meeting scheduled for tomorrow, so I a.s.sume we'll decide then."

"Good enough." He glanced at his watch, a racy silver affair below his crisply turned-back cuff. Eddie wore a white shirt every day, starched rigid, and you could slice bread with the creases in his khakis. "Well, get going. You've still got time to change before dinner. Did you ever eat lunch?"

"I wasn't hungry. Why should I change for the movies?" Every few weeks Eddie and I went to a big-budget flick and ate junk food. I was looking forward to it tonight, though I planned to insist on a comedy, or even a cartoon-anything without blood.

"Rain check," said Eddie. "Aaron's coming for you in half an hour. I told him you needed cheering up."

"Eddie, who asked you to set up my social life?"

"You're welcome," he said. "Now scoot. Put on something pretty."

"I will not! He just wants an interview."

"He told me he wouldn't pester you with any questions."

I snorted. "Fat chance."

"Now, don't get on your high horse. Aaron just didn't think you should be alone tonight."

"I wasn't going to be alone, I was going to be with you!"

"Scoot."

Boy, do I hate a matchmaker, I thought as I descended the stairs. If Eddie nudged me any harder, I'd fall overboard myself. I wasn't even sure if he liked Aaron, or if he just wanted me settled with a man, any man.

No, that wasn't fair. Eddie had made his distaste for Boris Nevsky quite plain right from the first date. And before that there was Wayne, the hot-looking videographer. Eddie had him pegged for the self-centered type within ten minutes. It took me two weeks.

Holt Walker had been another matter. Smitten, I'd kept Holt to myself, away from Eddie and his opinions. And then my handsome and successful suitor had turned out to be a particularly unsavory sort of criminal. I sure can pick 'em.

I was still getting over Holt, in more ways than one. Maybe that was the real reason I was hanging back with Aaron. That and the fact that all he really wanted now was some juicy quotes about a murdered corpse. I dumped my jacket on a chair and did what I always do when I'm tangled up inside my own brain: I poured a gla.s.s of cheap white wine and, ignoring the message light on my phone, I called Lily.

"Hey, you caught me just coming in," she said. "I took the boys to their friend Dylan's for a campout."

"A campout? Lily, it's raining again, or hadn't you noticed?"