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Yikes.
Third, Stevie.
“Well? How’d it go? Don’t forget Chowleena. I’ll be leaving just before noon. Tod will be home tomorrow, early, so if you still have her for a sleepover, just leave a note. Kisses.”
Fourth, Duke, who obviously was talking before being given the beep.
“…ass in here or I’m gonna kill him.”
I poked myself in the eye with the mascara wand.
“Holy crap,” I said.
“That looked like it hurt.”
I was blinking fiercely. My eye was tearing up, making my other eye tear up, and I was trying to see my phone to replay Duke’s message.
Lee tore off some toilet paper, handed it to me and took the phone.
“Listen!” I told him. “The last message.”
I opened my mouth as far as it would go, which was a feminine mechanism that one had to use to open one’s eyes as far as they would go. I dabbed at the tears and blotches of mascara, trying to avert a cosmetics disaster.
“Who does he want to kill?” Lee asked.
“I don’t know. It’s Duke. He has the patience of a gnat and a three-centimeter fuse. Do you think it could be Rosie?”
“Where is he?”
“I don’t know! It’s Duke!” I cried, exasperated. “He refuses to buy a cell phone or answering machine. He’s a fucking caveman.”
Lee was scrolling down my phonebook and he punched a button.
“Dolores? It’s Lee. Can I talk to Duke?”
Quick Thinker Lee decided to call Duke and Dolores’s home phone. Simple. I hated it when I was an idiot. Thank God he was the private eye in the family.
Oh jeez, did I just think “in the family?”
Must…stop…brain.
I reapplied some shadow and fixed the mascara while Lee was talking, and then he said, “Yeah? Got it. Thanks.”
I screwed on the cap to the mascara and threw it in the drawer while Lee flipped shut the cell and slid it on the counter. Then he calmly went back to shaving. I slid the drawer shut with my hip.
“Well?” I prompted.
“The police took the tape down at the store. Willie called you to let you know and when he couldn’t get you, he called Duke. Apparently, there’s a crazy Italian guy at Fortnum’s saying he’s your new coffee guy. Jane called Dolores because Duke was getting heated. Dolores called the cops. They’re handling it.”
“What crazy Italian guy?”
Lee tilted his head to see his jaw and slid his razor up his neck. “Don’t know.”
“I didn’t even know we were open today!” I stated loudly then announced, “We have to get down there.”
“Dolores didn’t seem upset.”
“Dolores lives with Duke and thinks he’s cuddly. She works at The Little Bear where people throw around their underwear. Dolores isn’t a good judge of when to get upset!”
