Robin Hardy Online

Book 6 of the Sammy Series

From the back cover:
The head of a modeling agency ropes Detective Sammy Kidman into investigating who's trying to ruin her business. Coincidentally, his ex-wife wants to restart her modeling career there. When he tries to make peace with her, she tells him that in college, he killed her best friend driving drunk. 

Being accused of a crime he can't remember paralyzes Sammy so that he can't even tell his loyal wife Marni about it. All she knows is that he's hiding something—and spending a lot of time with beautiful models. So Marni takes action, and Sammy is forced to confront the ghosts from his past.

Chapter 1

"Happy birthday to you . . . happy birthday to you . . . happy birthday, dear Sam; happy birthday to you," Marni sang softly, leaning down over the high chair while the baby gazed at the solitary candle on the chocolate cake she held.

 Samuel Senior, watching through the videocamera, muttered, "Say, 'Come a little closer, Mom, so I can test out this flame-retardant bib.'" Sure enough, Samuel Junior reached out curious fingers toward the pretty flame, and Marni quickly withdrew the cake.

 She set it on the table with a concerned glance at the clock. "Mom and Dad are late. That's not like them." Sammy only shrugged, and she added in a lower voice, "I wish your dad had stuck around for his grandson's first birthday, too."

 At that, Sammy looked up apprehensively. About six weeks ago his father Sam had bolted from a cushy chauffeur's job when his wealthy employer, a widow, began making wedding noises. Right now he was on a motorcycle somewhere in west Texas. With a cat.  

 The doorbell rang, and Sammy relaxed. His wife turned briskly out of the kitchen. "Oh good, that's them. I wonder why they're late?"

 "C'mon, Marni, it's not like they're missing his bar mitzvah or anything," Sammy murmured, evaluating the cake.

 Marni tossed an exasperated glance at him over her shoulder on her way to the front door: the little Kidman family attended a Bible church. She opened the door with a big smile which faded when she saw the stranger on her doorstep. It was an attractive woman in her early forties, wearing a crisp designer suit. Her sleek brown hair was tucked in a chignon.

 "Excuse me," the woman said slowly, "I hope I've not come at an inconvenient time." As she spoke, she took stock of Marni as well: a pretty, young mother with almond-shaped eyes and honey-blond hair—bleached, the woman noted accurately. "I was looking for Detective Sammy Kidman. Is he in?"

 "Yes, he is," Marni said softly, dropping her eyes. "Please come in." Concealing her irritation, Marni led her toward the kitchen, where their son's first birthday party was just getting underway. It must be related to a case he's working, Marni told herself in order to muffle the whisperings of jealousy. It's just that—for heaven's sake, they never left him alone. Black-haired, blue-eyed, with a pantherlike build, Sammy couldn't walk down the street unmolested by the opposite sex, and the harder he tried to avoid their attention, the more persistently they bestowed it.

 Just last week he had been followed a block and a half in downtown Dallas, Texas, by two women who insisted they had seen him on stage at Chippendale's the night before, only they couldn't agree whether he had done the Tarzan routine or the cop routine. When Sammy produced his badge, one woman had exclaimed to the other, "I told you he was the cop!" and asked for his autograph. Of course, Marni would not have heard about it at all had his partner Dave Pruett (who had been a smirking witness) not let it slip (in detail) to his wife Kerry, Marni's best friend.

 Passing through the den of the Kidmans' home now, the visitor noted the homey, modest furnishings, heavy on the Texas accent. The live Christmas tree was strung with chili pepper lights. As it was two days before Christmas, she felt all the more reluctant to approach Detective Kidman at home. But she had no idea where to reach him downtown—the new police building was finished, but numerous police personnel apparently continued to occupy the old Police and Courts Building, and—her situation had just about become intolerable. She required his help as soon as humanly possible.

 "Sammy!" his wife exclaimed, and the woman quickly looked ahead to the kitchen, where the enterprising detective was filming his son mashing a large piece of chocolate cake into his mouth. "I didn't want to cut the cake before Mom and Dad got here!" Marni protested, going to the sink for a dishrag.

 "Hang on, baby; it makes a great shot," he grinned, watching the viewer. "This'll be useful, see, when he starts dating. A little blackmail is great for keeping adolescent hormones in check—" he looked up when the woman entered the kitchen behind Marni.

 "Ms. Pinella," he said, his face draining of color.

 "Hello, Sammy," she smiled. "I should be very angry that you never told me you were back on the force. Or were you actually off it to begin with?"

 He was opening his mouth to reply when the doorbell rang. Marni said, "I'll get it. That's Mom and Dad." Head down, she turned to go answer the door.

 As expected, this time she found grandparents bearing gifts. "Hi, Mom. Dad," Marni said. Pam leaned forward to receive her daughter's kiss as Clayton entered with an armload of presents.

 "Hi, honey. How's our birthday boy?" Pam asked. She was a young grandmother with laugh lines and light brown hair brushed back from her face.

 "A chocolate-covered mess, I'm afraid," Marni smiled wryly, then sighed to see her dad unloading presents under the tree. "Daddy, Sammy said you've bought him too much already!"

 Clayton winked over his shoulder, "Well then, we'll just be real quiet about these."

 With a mild snort, Pam took Marni's arm to head for the kitchen, leaving Clayton to his task. "Somebody's here to see Sammy—" was all Marni had time to murmur before they saw Ms. Pinella in the kitchen with Sammy. He looked away, distinctly uncomfortable.

 When Sammy did not leap to introduce them, the woman said, "I am so sorry to disturb your family time. I am Allison Pinella." She extended a manicured hand toward Pam.

 "Pam Taylor. That is my husband Clayton, who is not doing anything around the Christmas tree, Sammy," Pam said. Sammy smiled weakly in response. Pam paused, then wondered, "You wouldn't be Allison Pinella of the modeling agency, would you?"

 "Yes, I am," Ms. Pinella smiled. "Sammy did some work for me about six months ago,—"

 "No need to go into all that," Sammy said quickly.

 "Yes, they were beautiful ads," Pam noted. Sammy looked at her with a sick expression. The only comfort he'd taken from that humiliating experience, besides the paltry five hundred dollars, was thinking that his in-laws had not recognized him as the underwear model. "Would you mind telling me who did the photography?" Pam asked.

 "Don Crenshaw of Meinhart Photography, in our building. He is especially adroit with black and white," Ms. Pinella replied.

 "They were superb," Pam admitted.

 "As a matter of fact, I do believe one was chosen for inclusion in this year's Best of Print Advertising," Ms. Pinella said proudly.

 "A book?" Sammy moaned.

 "With national circulation," Ms. Pinella confirmed, and Sammy slumped to the kitchen table.

 "Best of Print?" Clayton queried, entering the kitchen. "Yes, the company I consult for just got in several hundred copies of this year's issue. What about it?"

 Sammy put his head down on the table and quietly pounded his fist a couple of times. Regarding him, Clayton said, "Oh boy, that must mean your ad made the cut. But say, Sammy, at least the caption just mentioned that you're a Dallas cop—not your name. I know that for a fact."

 Sammy gaped at him. "They pegged me as a cop?" he whispered in horror. As any Christian did in a crisis, Sammy looked heavenward to murmur, "You're out to get me, aren't You?" Then he leveled a bemused gaze at Ms. Pinella to ask, "Did you come here just to share this wonderful news with me?"

 "No, not actually." Ms. Pinella drew out a chair to sit.

 Marni picked up the cake server to begin slicing on the side of the gaping hole Sammy had made. "Would you care for some birthday cake?" she asked, determined to carry on with the party.

 "No, thank you. And I do promise I won't take but a minute," Ms. Pinella smiled briefly, then turned to Sammy. "A little over a month ago, shortly after you came to see me, I saw the news reports about the recovery of the moving van and your being held hostage by that convict. I realized then that you were still with the police department. So that little episode, when you showed up out of the blue for an assignation—you weren't trying to make an arrest, were you?" she asked coyly, chin down.

 Sammy sighed heavily. "Yeah, it was an assignment. But just as soon as I ascertained that there was no illegal activity, I dropped the investigation the same day. I swear, Allison." Marni silently passed out pieces of birthday cake to Pam and Clayton.

 "Oh, I'm sure of that," Ms. Pinella said, smoothing her already sleek chignon. "Unfortunately, it ruined what had been a very profitable sideline for me. Is the department prepared to compensate me for my loss?"

 Sammy stiffened a little. "Allison, you'll have to talk to Lieutenant Kerr about that . . . but. . . ."

 "You'd really wish I wouldn't," she finished for him.

 "I've filled my quota of trouble with the department for the next ten years. Any more is likely to sink me for good," he admitted. The Taylors listened quietly and Marni sat staring at the cake with the little dinosaurs rampaging across it.

 "I don't want to make trouble for you, Sammy. What I need is your help," Ms. Pinella said.

 "What can I do for you?" he asked guardedly.

 "The news reports mentioned that you've done extensive undercover work—at least you weren't lying about that part," she observed, and he shifted uneasily. "Someone who has contact with my agency is trying to ruin me. I need you to find out who."

 "I'll . . . have to clear it with my superiors, and get back with you," Sammy murmured.

 "Please do that. I'll be expecting you in my office at nine AM Monday morning, the twenty-seventh. How's that?" Ms. Pinella asked.

 "That'll probably work," he muttered.

 "Wonderful. Have a lovely Christmas," she directed to them generally, then paused over the high chair. Sam, with the bright blue eyes and black hair of his father, looked up at her. "What an adorable baby," Ms. Pinella noted, and Marni raised her eyes.

 "Sweetheart," Ms. Pinella said, sitting and scooting closer to the high chair, "as one Christmas baby to another—I was born on December twentieth—let me give you some advice: If I were you, I would make them celebrate my birthday in June. You get to do more things in the summer, and don't get stiffed on presents. Also, your mamaw and papaw can buy more for you without getting in trouble with your mean old daddy. And tell your mommy that if she will bring you down to my office, I would like to take some shots of you for our agency portfolio. You deserve every ounce of attention you get," she purred, depositing a set of coral pink lip prints on his forehead.

 Standing, she said, "I'll see myself out. Merry Christmas." And she turned on her coral pink heel and left.

 As Marni got up to resume serving the cake, she said, "You should do whatever you can to help her, Sammy."

 So on the Monday following Christmas, Sammy drove to the FirstPlace Bank Tower downtown. It seemed that he had accumulated a lifetime's worth of humiliation in this one upscale building. No telling what he was in for now, but Lieutenant Kerr was only too happy to okay this assignment to placate someone as influential as Allison Pinella. The lieutenant hadn't even minded coming in over Christmas weekend to facilitate the paperwork so Sammy could get started today.

 He hates my guts, Sammy suspicioned. Glumly, he parked in the multilevel parking garage and took the elevator to the sixth floor of the bank tower.

 When he entered through the elegant glass doors of the Allison Pinella Agency, the young receptionist looked up. Like everyone else who passed through these hallowed portals, she was quite attractive. "Hi, Sammy," she smiled.

 "Hi, Suzy. I have an appointment with Allison at nine," he smiled half-heartedly in return.

 "I know. I'm so excited," she said. He paused, one brow raised, and she explained, "That you'll be working for us again."

 "Yeah," he winced, turning down the corridor to Ms. Pinella's office.

 Approaching her open door, he saw that she was on the telephone. She waved him in, gesturing to the door and a chrome chair in front of her desk. Sammy shut the door and sat. While he waited, listening idly to her conversation with a client, he surveyed the high-dollar pink and black office decor; the enlarged photographs of successful models lining the walls; and the large window overlooking downtown Dallas. "Now, Cecil, that's impossible—Bridget's due in Milan for a shoot at the end of January. We can't possibly get her to Puerto Vallarta before February third. Well, I guess you'll just have to reschedule it, then, won't you? Ciao, darling." She hung up with a sigh, making a notation on her desk calendar.

 "Some people think you can drop whatever you're doing to accommodate them," she sniffed, and Sammy lowered his eyes, thinking about the counterfeiting detail he and Pruett had been poised to begin with the FBI. Now Chandler would get that plum assignment instead.

 Shifting in his chair, Sammy got right down to business. "You—mentioned that someone was out to ruin you. Can you tell me what leads you to that conclusion?" he asked.

 "Yes. Two of my top models have come to me with rumors that I'm about to go out of business. As you can see, that's ridiculous," she said, gesturing to her jam-packed calendar. "In addition, there are rumors circulating that I supply my models with drugs, which simply infuriates me."

 Sammy shrugged. "Rumors happen. I don't see how it's necessarily a conspiracy."

 "You don't understand this business," she said tightly. "Rumors don't just happen—they're deliberately planted by someone who appreciates the power of the grapevine. Careers are launched and dismantled over cocktails. But it's not just that. Someone posing as an employee is playing havoc with my schedules—canceling shoots and flights, rerouting photographers and models."

 "How are they doing that?" Sammy asked.

 "They just pick up the phone and call! 'This is the Allison Pinella Agency; the Vogue cover has been rescheduled for three o'clock'—when it wasn't us at all! But it's someone who has  access to our schedule sheets," she said in rising exasperation.

 "Shouldn't you protect that information?" Sammy asked.

 "How in the world do you keep it confidential when so many people have to see it? Besides which, it changes by the hour anyway—flights are delayed, models don't show, cameras get stolen—we have to stay open and flexible. But some little demon somewhere wants to make life difficult for me, and I want you to find out who!" she said.

 Unhappily, he agreed, "I'll see what I can do. But here's a major problem, Allison—you know about my undercover work. Well, I still can't be photographed. The department will not put my life in jeopardy to assist you."

 "Oh, that's no problem," Allison replied. "You'll be my executive assistant. There'll be no need to photograph you at all."

 "Yeah, okay," he muttered, stroking his forehead.

 "First thing, you need to change," she began.

 His head shot up. "Whoa, now! Why? Into what?" All he could think of was the agony of those underwear shots.

 "Into some better clothes," she said, eyeing the sports coat that was the uniform of Dallas detectives. "What did you think, underwear? There are some good suits in your size in the fitting room, here," she said, nodding toward a doorway off her office. Warily, Sammy got up and poked his head into the large changing room, then he shut and locked the door before taking off so much as his coat. 

 After rifling through the six suits hanging on the rack, Sammy selected a safe blue one with an unfamiliar Italian label. He changed clothes, taking some perverse satisfaction in hanging up his plebeian sports coat and slacks alongside the haute couture. Then he transferred his wallet, badge, and cuffs into various pockets of the loaner suit. The Sig Sauer 226 was stuck into the back waistband. Inside the fancy threads, he was still a cop.

 When he emerged from the fitting room, Allison, again on the telephone, waved him over. She regarded him with a critical eye, then covered the mouthpiece to advise, "Lose the tie, Sammy." It also was part of the detective's uniform, being at least ten years old and sent to the cleaners no more than twice in its lifetime. He willingly removed it, stuffing it in the coat pocket. 

 Still talking over the phone, she reached out to fasten his top shirt button. He grimaced and started to unbutton it again, but she slapped his hand. Hanging up, she admonished, "Why are you being so difficult? You know you have to look the part."

 "Allison, everybody here already knows I'm a cop," he insisted.

 "Not any more. You belong to me, now," she said.

 "Just from nine to five," he replied with a cool gaze.

 Smiling, she exited the office with a beckoning finger. He followed grumpily. "Suzy, you know. I want to introduce you to my other staff." She stopped at the doorway of a small room where a man in an excellent hairpiece sat interviewing a teenager and her mother. "Excuse me. Weldon, I want you to meet my new executive assistant, Sammy Kidman. Sammy, Weldon Purcell."

 "How do." Weldon, wearing a black suit and bolo, half stood to extend his hand and Sammy shook it.

 "Weldon is my best scout. He discovered Bridget and Tamara in the same month," Allison said.

 "Congratulations," Sammy offered, glancing at the up-and-comer being interviewed. Weldon nodded and sat back down to business.

 "KC is my other set of eyes, but I don't believe she's here right now," Allison remarked, looking into another small room. "No, she's not. You'll just have to meet her later."

 "Uh huh," Sammy said, glancing around with slightly glazed eyes. All this reminded him too much of being Linda Threlkeld-Rains' "secretary." Add to that his literal brush with Ms. Bancroft in this building, and—Shee, these business women are more sexist than any guy I've known, with the possible exception of Hal "Hands On" Culbertson, he thought.

 "Don Crenshaw is the photographer who took your shots. Technically, he's employed by Meinhart, of course, but we use him a lot. Then we have a number of stylists—Margo!" Allison called, leaning into another doorway while Sammy gazed off.

 A very slender young woman with dark red hair falling almost to her waist came to the door to fix Sammy with her large gray eyes. "Margo, this is my executive assistant, Sammy Kidman."

 "How do you do," Margo breathed, stretching out a pale hand. Nodding, Sammy shook her hand, taking care to avoid her inch-long fingernails.

 "Who do you have working today?" Allison asked.

 "Umm. . . ." Margo raised her eyes to the ceiling and twined her bony fingers, thinking.

 "Check your sheet!" Allison snapped.

 Sighing but unoffended, Margo turned to scrounge on a lighted makeup table. She freed a paper from under a set of hot rollers and studied it. "What's today?" she asked, childlike.

 Allison uttered, "It's the twenty-seventh, darling."

 "The twenty-seventh. Okay, we're doing Dominique at the DMA at ten-thirty," Margo said.

 "Ten-thirty—!" Allison caught herself and uttered, "Then don't you think you'd better get down there, Margo, darling? Have you called Dominique to confirm it with her?"

 "That's not my job," Margo said, twisting a lock of hair as she stared off in unconcern.

 Sammy looked at Allison, whose slender neck was taut with suppressed vexation. "Margo, darling—just for today, let's make that little extra effort toward earning our paycheck for the week, shall we? Call Dominique and then get your precious little tail to the DMA." 

 Turning back down the hall, Allison gripped Sammy's arm to pull him along behind her. "You won't find out anything hanging around here with me," she muttered, "so I'm going to send you off on this shoot with Margo." Pausing over her desk, she picked up a business card to hand him. "If you find out anything, call my cell phone directly. Don't go through Suzy."

 Sammy took the card, placing it in his coat pocket. Withholding comment, he turned out of the office to collect Margo.

 He found her by the front desk while Suzy rang Dominique. "Okay," Suzy said, hanging up, "I woke her, but she's gonna get her boyfriend to bring her on down to the DMA right away."

 "I'm supposed to go with you," Sammy said, drawing alongside the desk.

 As Margo turned her gray eyes up to him, Suzy giggled to Margo, "Lucky you. Um, don't forget your tote."

 "Oh, yeah," Margo breathed. "Wait a sec." She disappeared back in the offices, then returned shortly with a large tote bag crammed with cosmetics, rollers, brushes, and other mysterious beauty paraphernalia.

 Margo was such a little thing, and looked so overwhelmed by this huge tote, that Sammy automatically reached over and took it off her shoulder. "Let's take my car," he suggested on their way out. Without knowing what she drove or if she even had a car, he did not want to risk getting into a vehicle with a space cadet behind the wheel.

 In the parking garage, he directed her to his car. As he unlocked the driver's side door to lower the top, she breathed, "Is this yours? What a cool car! This is the coolest car I have ever experienced in my life!"

 Sammy smugly agreed. This 1966 Mustang, lime green, with a white interior and V-8 engine, was his most treasured possession. The only other vehicle he knew of that even approached it in coolness was the department's black Harley-Davidson FXR. He sat, depositing her tote bag in the back seat, then reached over to unlock her door. "We're supposed to go to the Dallas Museum of Art," she said seriously.

 "Yeah, I heard," he said, starting the engine and throwing an arm across the back of the seat to look behind him.

 "Do you know where it is?" she asked.

 He glanced at her. "Sure, Margo; it's right downtown here, about three blocks over. We could probably walk there faster." The reason they were not was that Sammy refused to be seen walking around downtown with a large tote full of cosmetics. Half the police department would probably see him, so that he'd never live it down. He could always let Margo carry it, of course, but he wasn't sure she'd make it three blocks.

 "That's right. I remember now. I just hate to drive anywhere downtown. I get so rattled—everybody pushing and honking. It makes me so nervous," she said in her breathy voice.

 "Yeah, I know," he said sympathetically, turning out of the garage into the December haze. "But it's really no big deal—everybody else is just as lost and disoriented as you are. See, days that our exalted City Fathers aren't throwing clipboards and screaming at each other, they have to do something for entertainment, so they schedule construction on any number of downtown intersections at random. Then they sit up there in their offices and watch the fenders fly. If you think of it as low-impact bumper cars, it's really kinda fun." 

 Margo turned her serious gray eyes on him. "You're rather amusing," she said, without cracking a smile.

 "Yeah, I know," he said in satisfaction. Stopping at a jumble of cars around a construction site blockaded with temporary orange fencing, he casually observed, "Boy, Ms. Pinella runs a tight ship. I bet she's made her share of enemies."

 Margo blinked. "Everybody hates everybody. The models hate Ms. Pinella and the photographers hate the models and all the models for sure hate each other. I just try not to get caught in between."

 Turning into the DMA parking garage, Sammy thought glumly, Great. With an industry full of suspects, I could be working this wonderful case for the rest of my life.

copyright 2007 Robin Hardy

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