Chapter 21

The dates of the money transfer reached my phone long before I reached East Aurora. In fact, I think I heard my text notification ping several times while still circumnavigating Niagara Square.

The next part of my little, unofficial investigation wasn’t going to be nearly as pleasant. But when I got back to the shop I texted Ken Young anyway, asking if he had Marya’s appointment book.

He called me back a little later.

“I had her account book that has record of all her payments. But your father took that. The barber might have her appointment book.”

“What’s the difference?”

“They shared a phone number in the shop, and the stylist working that day would schedule all the appointments in the same book.”

“Do you think it’s locked up in the barber shop?” I asked.

“No idea,” he said. “Why? What are you working on?”

“Just a theory,” I said. “Probably won’t turn into anything.”

“I’ve seen you work those theories of yours. Let me know if you need anything.”

I assured him I would, told him to take care of himself, then deleted his number from my contact list.

“Goodbye, Ken.” I closed my phone.

I called Dad next.

“Not sure I want to talk with you right now,” he said.

‘What did I do?”

“Sent me chasing a few of those geese of yours. They sure don’t make little old ladies as nice as they used to. I swear one of them pinched me.”

“Little old … ohhh. You went to Senior Speed Dating. Did you … get many numbers?”

“Plenty. Let’s just say I gave your buddy Lance some serious competition. Unfortunately, that’s all I got.”

When I asked about the appointment book, he said, “Yeah, I think one of my guys brought that in. Wanted to run down the names of everybody who had an appointment the day Marya was killed.”

“May I see it?” I asked. “I can come in. I can wear gloves. I promise not to damage any evidence.”

There was a long pause. “Tell you what. How about I send you a PDF?”

“You’d do that?”

“Only for my favorite daughter. Just promise you won’t go brandishing it around. And if you have any brainstorms, don’t get in over your head.”

“I just want a peek at the appointment book.”

“Fine. Give me a few minutes and I’ll e-mail it to you.”

I must have checked my e-mail every thirty seconds after that. Finally the file came in. While Cathy dealt with customers, I was behind the counter, hunched over my laptop, staring at the almost illegible names. Some were scratched out. Others included more information, such as what kind of service the customer needed.

I set up a spreadsheet and typed in the names and times of everyone with an appointment on the days just prior to the two suspected money transfers, then looked for any customers on both lists. Because if Marya wasn’t selling drugs to get all that money she was alleged to have, then it might, just might, have come from one of her customers.

Why one of her customers would give her exorbitant sums of money was a mystery to me, but that’s what this was, anyway: a mystery that needed a solution.

“Huh,” I said, staring at the spreadsheet while Cathy worked nearby.

“What’s that?”

“Turns out, there were three women who saw Marya just before she apparently handed off money to …” I didn’t know what to call them. “The Russians?”

She came up behind me. “Anybody we know?”

“We know all three. At least I do.”

Cathy started to read over my shoulder. “Diana Oliveri, Joan Toscano, and … whoa. Valerie Browning? Your future mother-in-law?”

“Hah! In her son’s dreams.”

“So you think one of them might have killed Marya?”

“Or gave her the money. If we could figure out who and why, we might be a step closer.”

“Well, Diana and Mrs. B should both be here tomorrow night for our doll club meeting. Promise me you won’t make any accusations.”

“Give me some credit. I’m just going to poke around, as subtly as I can, and see what I can dig up. If I find out anything useful, I’ll pass it on to Dad. Now I just have to figure out how to bump into Joan.”

Cathy winced.

“What?” I asked warily.

“I know where she’s going to be tonight, but you’re not going to like it. At my last writers group at the bookstore I noticed a poster. Joan’s doing a reading and a signing tonight at the Monday night Between the Covers Book Club.”

“Won Ton Desire?” I said. “They allow her to read that in a public place?”

“They put up a sign saying that nobody under twenty-one would be admitted.”

I scrubbed my face with my hands. “She’s going to ask if I read it.” I peeked through my fingers. “Isn’t she?”

Cathy looked at her watch. “Book club doesn’t start until seven. You’d have time to start it.”

“Go with me?”

Cathy sighed. “Tell you what. If Drew is being good for Parker, I could probably sneak out for a little while.”

I hugged her. “Thank you!”

*   *   *

The Between the Covers Book Club shared quite a few members with the senior speed dating group. Cathy and I found seats in the last row behind a lot of white hair.

Our row filled up when Irene and Lenora claimed the last two seats.

“I told you we should have gotten here earlier,” Irene chided her sister.

Lenora poked me in the arm. “Should be a good one tonight.”

“You’re here for Won Ton Desire?” I asked. “I should warn you, it’s a bit steamy, and I’m only part way through it.”

Lenora waved me off. “You don’t have to warn me. I already read it.”

Irene leaned over her sister. “Don’t let her fool you. She read it twice!”

“And I don’t think it’s any steamier than last month’s book,” Lenora said. “The Swashbuckler’s Secret Soulmate.”

“You two come every month?” I gestured to the packed house. “Are meetings always this well attended?”

Lenora bobbed her head. “There’s a few more here than normal. We don’t always have an author come.”

“Usually we just all sit in a circle and trash the book,” Irene said. “But I guess you can’t do that when the author is here. And I had some choice comments about this one.”

“You didn’t care for it?” I asked.

Irene winced. “Haven’t been able to stomach Chinese food since.”

Lenora sighed. “And we had a coupon.”

By this time the room had quieted down, and Irene’s comment kind of hung out there. If Joan heard it, she was gracious enough not to respond. She went to the podium and began her reading. It didn’t take me long to realize that she’d picked the part about the orange chicken sauce. I did my best to let my mind wander anywhere.

I began to mentally review what I knew about Marya’s activities, just before her death.

She’d been stealing pills from her clients’ purses. Perhaps she’d targeted the senior crowd because they have more aches and pains than the general population. She gleaned just enough not to be noticed, she thought, but enough to help slowly wean her sister off the drugs she’d been force fed.

“… pushed all the food off the table with a mighty crash, and turned and stared at her with those deep, piercing eyes.”

I shivered—it reminded me of the deep, piercing Russian eyes Lionel Kelley claimed he saw under that ski mask. Someone had come back to the barber shop looking for something. Drugs? Money? Large sums had apparently crossed Marya’s hands. Money that Mark had theorized she needed to procure Anechka’s full freedom. Marya had met with a representative twice, presumably passing these funds. But killing her would be like killing the goose that laid the golden egg.

“He dipped his finger in the orange chicken sauce …”

And that money had to come from somewhere. If Marya didn’t sell drugs, then where did it come from? Was she stealing it like she stole the pills, from customer wallets?”

And who would carry that much cash? Valerie might, despite her thrifty choice of stylists.

“She watched in rapt expectation as the sauce trickled down his finger.”

Of course, Diana owned her own business. From my own experience, I knew that didn’t always mean you were awash in cash, but her store had been there for decades and enjoyed a regular clientele. She might have had a deposit in her purse, for all I knew.

“He flipped on the radio, and Vanilla Ice began to play.”

And then there was Joan. How much did authors make, anyhow? I’d bet Cathy would have some idea.

“His eyes twinkled mischievously, and he winked. ‘Rice, rice, baby.’ ”

Irene elbowed her sister. “She stole that from Weird Al.”

Of course, this sent up a stir of murmurs, but Joan raised her voice and continued her reading, undaunted.

I went back to active avoidance. One thought stopped me cold. If Marya had stolen money from any of these three ladies, why wouldn’t they have reported it? I was still missing something.

“She never did find her shoe.” With that, Joan stopped her reading and closed the book.

The group applauded.

“Now I have time for questions,” she said.

One woman’s hand went up. “That part on page ninety-seven—is that even physically possible?”

“Oh, yeah,” Joan said. “But I don’t think we’ll demonstrate it.”

Cathy and I waited until everyone else had lined up for the signing before we joined the end of the queue. The store had pretty much cleared out. Everybody was leaving with their books and a small gift from Joan: fortune cookies.

Joan looked up from the table. “You already have my book,” she said to me. “How are you enjoying it?”

“It’s certainly eye-opening,” I said.

“But I don’t have your book,” Cathy said, sliding a copy across the table.

“How sweet,” Joan said. “I remember you from writers group.” She paused with her pen suspended above the page. “That’s …”

“Cathy, with a C.”

“That’s right. I had to stop coming to that group. They weren’t friendly to what I was writing.” She looked over her glasses. “But then again, the group met in a public place. I can understand why those parents complained. How’s your book coming along?”

“Still revising,” she said, “although I have a little one at home now, and he’s rather demanding of my time.”

Joan set down her Sharpie. “Don’t be hard on yourself. It’s more important to raise your family. I didn’t even begin to write until after all my kids were out of the house. By then I had more … life experience to draw from, if you get my meaning.” Just in case we hadn’t, she punctuated that statement with a sly wink.

“I wanted to ask you something,” I said.

“If it’s about page ninety-seven, I’ll be honest with you. I don’t know if it’s possible or not.”

“Not sure I’m there yet.”

“You’ll know when you get there,” Joan said.

“Something to look forward to. But I really wanted to ask you about Marya Young.”

“What about her?”

“One of the things the investigation revealed is that Marya may have dipped into a few clients’ purses while they were distracted. Did you ever think you were missing anything from your purse after an appointment?”

“Like money, you mean?” she said. “Well, once I thought I had another five in my purse, but that could be me. I’m a little scatterbrained when it comes to finances. Using the whole creative side of the brain, I think.”

“Five dollars?”

“And if she took it, the joke was on her, because that was her tip anyhow. But from the tone of your voice, you were thinking something more?”

“Do you carry prescription medications with you?”

“Never,” she said. “Maybe the occasional essential oil. Jasmine. Sandalwood. Ylang-ylang.”

I’d never heard of Ylang-ylang, but from her tone I figured it might be wise to end the conversation before she enlightened me. But not before I snagged a few of her remaining fortune cookies.