The Scent of Murder Read online

  THE SCENT OF MURDER

  Jeffrey Marks

  Copyright © 2008 by Jeffrey Marks

  All rights reserved,

  including the right of reproduction

  in whole or in part in any form.

  Manufactured in the United States of America

  ISBN: ISBN 978-0-9765185-7-0

  Chapter 1

  "Is one day too much to ask?” Marissa muttered, knocking the snow from her shoes and stepping into the VW Rabbit. She tugged at the hem of her pants, knowing the managers at Kantor’s weren’t going to be happy with her attire. Not that she cared. Although she was fashionably dressed in beige pleated pants and a green silk blouse that matched her eyes, she hadn’t known she would be called into work. By security, no less. Her own salespeople didn’t need guidance. She hoped it wasn't another prank at Kantor’s. Boosting corporate morale didn't fall into her job description.

  The seminar had been shaping up nicely, too. Those shrink-wrapped baskets of perfume and the trays of lipstick and eyeliner had been invitingly stacked by the door. All free--just inside her budget. Marissa had slid a tray into her purse as she left, since she wouldn’t be there for the official presentation.

  Not that she thought this new perfume would sell. Paradise perfume was one of the new shared fragrances that had hit the market within the past year. Made for both sexes, Marissa typically found the scent pleased neither. Either one sex laid claim to it, or gays made the scent their own. The elusive one-size-fits-all could not be created in perfume.

  The daylong seminar at Northgate, a nearby mall, proved that Paradise had gone all out with its ad campaign. Their new jingle: “Throughout time, couples have been searching for Paradise.” Marissa had seen the posters of a Roman couple locked in an embrace, she in a form-fitting toga and he in what appeared to be washcloth. She knew enough history to know that the Romans used rose oil, sandalwood, and jasmine, not citrusy blends, to cover their body odor. Until bathing became popular in the 1800s, people hadn’t begun to equate scent with sex. However, Marissa doubted that an ad campaign would be built around ankle-length dresses. Unless Madonna agreed to pose in a bustle.

  She put her finger in the coin holder in the car and wiggled it around. A dollar thirty-seven. Not even enough for lunch. Ellen would have to fork over since she insisted on Marissa coming back here for this mysterious mission.

  The little white Rabbit shuddered and spit. She braced herself against the seat back, waiting for the bucking to subside. Someday she could afford a new car, but not with a three-year-old and bills to pay.

  Marissa felt the muscles in her shoulders bunch up as she made the ten-minute drive to the department store. One day off was all she’d wanted. Eight lousy hours. A chance to talk to her friends and maybe get some advice on . . . Well, at least, she could talk to Anne about the situation. Goodness knows Marissa hardly had time to think about anything other than the upcoming holiday, less than two weeks away.

  Valentine’s Day. Ugh. Even worse than Sweetest Day. Who exactly had come up with that idea of making this a romantic day? Probably Mr. Hallmark Marissa smiled.

  She'd never really understood the whole idea of setting aside one day to express your love. Wasn’t that something you were supposed to do every day? She thought back to Dan and how he’d proposed to her on that day eight years ago, which should have been an early indication of things to come. Express your love once and then take her for granted for the rest of your life. Of course, the day was coupled with a barrage of bridal events. Every January brought white dresses, rented tuxedos, and DJs who knew how to do the hokey-pokey like swallows know to return to Capistrano. Society encouraged every woman to search for a man, any man, and spend twelve months of her life planning a four-hour event that barely stood a chance of lasting another year.

  Even with Marissa’s glum attitude, the cosmetic’s department would be busy. Women buying new lipsticks and earrings and men looking lost, trying to remember what perfume their wives had worn for the last twenty years. The new store manager had assigned inexperienced sales clerks to cosmetics. They wouldn't make the customers any happier. Why did each new manager think a reorganization would make everything better?

  Marissa swung her Rabbit into the parking space and waited for the car to finish shaking. Silence eased over the car. She’d have to get that fixed one of these days, but not until she saved up some money. Maybe Dan would pay his back child support for Valentine’s Day this year as a token of his undying affection.

  Opening the door to the store, Marissa gazed at the department that had been hers for four months now. She still felt a small thrill seeing the glass and shiny brass trimmings. Her department. When the store first opened she wasn’t sure if she could last, but Marissa had always counted herself a survivor. A survivor of a bad marriage, a rambunctious toddler, and Kantor’s department store.

  As she walked back the main aisle, Marissa moved a bottle of Chanel from the Givenchy display and put it on the correct counter. If anybody found what they were looking for today without a map, it would be a miracle. Marissa saw Ellen standing by the display of bright red hearts with the mascara sticks through the middle of them. The idea had been Marissa's along with most of the other holiday decorations.

  The store had provided the creamy white tile floors and the ten octagonal islands of cosmetics that randomly punctuated the area. The cosmetics area was definitely bright enough to wake her up. Marissa looked across the sparkling milky white floor in amazement. How could someone get a tile to shine like that? At home, hers always looked like the mop was lost. The ten octagonal counters shone with brass trim and wide glass panels. All showed their wares that the store hoped customers would buy to allure the opposite sex. An impulse buyer's heaven. The cosmetics department covered the front of the store near the entrance to Westgate Mall and ran halfway across the length of the store. The walls that jutted up from the center of the store marked its end. Inside those walls were the elevator and Marissa’s office, hidden behind the brass-framed posters of colognes and couples.

  Ellen turned around and waved, anxiously motioning Marissa towards her. The head of security for Kantor’s, Ellen was dressed in a pair of blue jeans and a plaid shirt worn thin at the elbows. Her dumpy frame and frizzy blonde hair made her stand out among Marissa's employees. Marissa noticed the way Ellen’s make-up stopped at her chin, not blending onto her neck at all. The no-nonsense clothing allowed her to wear the tools of the trade on her belt. A walkie-talkie hung from her waist and squawked as she stood there. Looking good was a prerequisite only for the cosmetic women. Who would believe that you could be beautiful if the stuff didn’t work on the help?

  Marissa didn’t bother to quicken her stride. The day was ruined. Why get in a hurry about it? Despite their two-year friendship, she knew Ellen’s call wasn’t social. When Marissa had started at Kantor's two years ago, Ellen had been her first friend and constant companion at the two weeks of company training. Ellen had moved here from Boston, trying to escape the pace of the East Coast and high cost of living. They’d lost track of each other somewhat after Marissa was assigned to the downtown store and Ellen started at Tri-County. Westgate had brought them back together.

  A definite coolness had developed between them since Ellen’s engagement to Sergeant Bandarra of the county police. Marissa thought the man was too chauvinistic and rude for her friend and hadn’t bothered to mask her opinions. The man had a deep voice that sounded like it had been soaked in cigarettes and sarcasm. Marissa didn’t have to know him well to know that she had met him a thousand times in a thousand different men. The only thing they had in common was their superior attitude and Marissa’s reaction to them. Besides, Marissa served as a constant reminder that “
until death do us part” doesn’t mean forever anymore.

  “What is so critical that I had to leave the seminar?” Marissa asked.

  “You’ve been at the seminar all morning? Are there people who saw you? Talked to you?” Ellen’s eyes were wide as she scanned the customers frequently.

  “What now? David Harper doesn’t think that I’m going to the conferences? Does he think I sat at home in rollers trying to screw this place out of a penny?” Marissa glared at the woman as she thought about the new store manager. It would be just like him to drag her out of there to make sure she was really attending.

  “It’s nothing like that, Marissa. The police are going to want to talk to you. Bandarra’s furious. I just needed to make sure the store was covered and that you’d be okay.” The little furrows of her brow crept up into the curls on top of Ellen's head.

  “Why do the police want to talk to me? Has something happened to Gavin? He’s all right, isn’t he?” Marissa was surprised at the strength of her concern. She’d taken great pains to keep the relationship casual.

  “Gavin’s fine. But there’s been a murder in the store.”

  Marissa waited for Ellen to continue, but the security person stayed mum, lips pressed together in a pale pink line and her hands resting on her pudgy hips. “So you think I killed someone? You brought me back here to check my alibi? I admit I have a temper at times, but I don’t kill people, Ellen. You know me. I thought we were friends.” Marissa’s voice rose slightly and Bonnie, one of the new clerks, turned to look at the pair. The clerk shrugged and went back to stocking a display.

  “I do trust you. It’s just that the circumstances were such that I wanted to make sure you wouldn’t be implicated. Bandarra let me call you to the store, instead of the police dragging you out of the seminar. I said it would be bad press for the store. Plus I thought I’d get a chance to warn you to be on your best behavior. This is serious.” Marissa recognized Ellen’s official tone of voice, usually reserved for reprimands and shoplifters. The situation must be grave to use it on her friend.

  “Who am I supposed to have murdered?”

  “Tiffany Wong.”

  Marissa shook her head, the black strands swishing slightly past her green eyes as she did. “I don’t know her.”

  “Dan’s Tiffany.”

  “Oh. I didn’t know her last name. I don’t think I was ever properly introduced.”

  “Well, it’s Wong.”

  “How appropriate. Ms. Wong for Mr. Right. “ Marissa tried to dredge up sympathy or sorrow, but they were not to be found. She took a deep breath to keep her composure and not let her friend see the impact of this revelation. Tiffany’s heritage intrigued Marissa though. She’d assumed that Dan had chosen some plain vanilla teenager to replace her.

  Ellen settled her hands on her hips and thrust her reddening face towards Marissa’s. “That’s the kind of attitude that made me call you here. One comment like that and the police are going to be searching your alibi with a mascara brush.”

  “Well, let them. It’s not like I have anything to hide. Let the police ask my ex about his mistress — the woman he said he wanted to marry. Maybe he killed her, but I didn’t. I don’t want any part of this. I had nothing to do with it.”

  “You don’t have a choice. Tiffany was stabbed to death at your desk.”

  Chapter 2

  “What?” Marissa asked for the third time. “Why my desk? What the hell was she doing in my office?” Marissa couldn’t tell if the burning in her stomach came from the news or from hunger. Hadn’t this woman-child disrupted her life enough without having the discourtesy to die here? In her office? The proximity both angered and scared her. At first, the girl had avoided Marissa at all costs. Over time, she’d grown more bold, like the bears at Yosemite become accustomed to tourists. But to enter Marissa’s office meant no place was free of her taint.

  “That’s one of the things that the police are going to ask. You didn’t have a rendezvous set up with her or anything like that did you?” Ellen continued to look at a ceiling tile over her friend’s shoulder, never quite meeting her eyes. Marissa worried. If her good friend thought her capable of murdering someone, the police would have no problem drawing the same conclusion. Marissa didn’t want the permanent stain of an unsolved murder over her head.

  Marissa pointed a finger to her head. “Think about it for a minute. I’m not supposed to be here today. I’m supposed to be at an all-day conference, remember?”

  “Then why would she be here?” Ellen met her gaze with a look that made Marissa’s perfume wilt. The question marks practically danced in her pupils. Maybe avoidance was better. “It makes you look so guilty. “

  “I didn’t kill her. I wasn’t crazy about her, but there’s a big difference between wishing someone dead and doing anything about it.”

  “Just remember, Marissa. I haven’t decided on the colors for my wedding, but it’s definitely not black and white stripes.”

  Marissa rolled her eyes. The announcement of Ellen’s wedding had taken her by surprise. The head of security had suddenly become a reader of bridal magazines with plans for a four-hundred-person reception, a limousine to the church, and all the trimmings. Marissa had agreed to be the maid of honor, thinking it would be a quick trip to City Hall on their lunch hour, not a three-ring circus. Now the thought of trying on expensive clothes that could never be worn again grated on Marissa’s nerves. How much more practical to spend that money on repairing the Rabbit — but weddings weren’t about practicality. They were the Barbie-doll fantasy of every young girl. Even tough security cops like Ellen Perrino.

  She suspected that Ellen had been hiding one too many romance novels in her desk drawer. Danielle Steel run amok. “I didn’t kill anyone so I won’t be going to jail. Unless Bandarra has another choice for maid of honor.”

  Sergeant Bandarra was no favorite of Marissa’s, nor she of his. She had met him before she knew her friend's interest in him and had expressed her opinion of his Cro-Magnon tendencies. A fragile peace had developed over the past few months which allowed them to co-exist in a room without open verbal warfare, but a murder in which Marissa Scott played a leading role could end the cease-fire.

  “I’m going back to my office. I’ll wait there for the police to interview me.”

  Ellen grabbed her friend’s arm. “You can’t go in there. It’s a crime scene. The technicians just finished up a few minutes ago and the police have secured the area. Even if you could go back there, think of the practical aspects. Tiffany was stabbed five times. There’s blood everywhere and you can’t be too careful about dealing with blood-born diseases these days...HIV, hepatitis. Even the techs wear latex.”

  “So tell me more about her death,” Marissa said as she squinted and tried to act unconcerned. If using her office was a setup, who disliked her enough to do this? Not many people at the store knew she had attended the seminar. Carly Spenser of Paradise had only called three days ago with the invitation to the seminar. A chance to escape. Marissa was impressed with a personal call from the woman rumored to be up for a vice president’s job at the perfume company. David Harper, Marissa’s boss, had been the only person at the store who had been informed of the date besides a few of her friends and the cosmetics clerks.

  “I don’t know all that much yet. I got a call from Shawn who found her in your office at about ten-thirty this morning. I came downstairs and she was sitting at your desk slumped over with a knife in her back.”

  Marissa’s brow wrinkled. “Shawn found her? He has to be devastated. Where is he now?” She found more compassion for her friend than for Dan’s late love.

  Ellen shrugged. “He’s probably still in my office. He didn’t take the situation too well. His type tends to get a little emotional. Where do you think you’re going?”

  “What type is that — human?” Marissa threw the words over her shoulder as she headed to the escalators. She strode through the aisles of maternity and linens back to the sec
urity office. She knocked on the door to the office and stuck her head in the stark cement-walled room. Spartan as a prison cell. Shawn Huxley sat with his head down at one of the two metal desks with his blond buzz-cut hair showing between his arms.

  Shawn didn’t stir. “Are you okay?” Marissa took a step into the room and pulled the door shut behind her. Now was not the time for Ellen to barge in with more questions, especially when Marissa had a list of her own.

  “Marissa, I — I thought . . .” Shawn came across the room and pulled her into a hug, squeezing Marissa so tight that she could feel the man’s well-developed chest muscles. A little tighter and she could count ribs. “I’ve never been so happy to see anyone in my life.”

  Marissa made a face that Shawn couldn’t see since they stood so close. Being hugged by people at work, even good friends, was not something Marissa enjoyed. Besides, it reminded her of her terrible mistake when she started work. Marissa remembered only too well how she has flirted with Shawn when she first met him. Trying to prove herself an independent woman, she had even gone far enough to ask him out. However, it turned out that the tall, thin, and very attractive potential date was unavailable. Gay, actually. They had developed into good friends, but sometimes physical contact made Marissa remember her earlier gaffe.

  “Ellen said you were up here and that you’d found Tiffany. I wanted to make sure you were okay.”

  The designer wore a white shirt, patchwork vest, and dark dress pants. He hadn’t dressed differently from any other day to find a corpse. Shawn ran a hand through his hair and Marissa thought she caught the sight of red stains on his cuff of his white shirt. Tiffany's blood? The impact of the situation began to sink in and she slid down into one of the chairs. Tiffany had been killed at her desk, which pointed directly to Marissa as the murderer. Who would want to frame her? Who did this killer want to be rid of, Tiffany or Marissa?