Read Online A Disguise to Die For by Diane Vallere - Free Book Online

moment, I kept it to myself.
    â€œDid you look inside the car?” he asked.
    â€œNo. You arrived right when I first saw the damage. Why? Did you look?”
    He hesitated. “No,” he finally said. I remembered seeing him crouched by the side of the car taking pictures with his phone, and immediately knew he was lying. I just didn’t know why.
    â€œI’ll finish this up out here if you want to get your store opened,” he said.
    â€œThat’s okay. I’ll stay and help you.” I moved to the far end of the Twister-mat tarp and waited for him to finish taping the last ends together. When he was done, we each picked up a corner and carried the patchworked plastic to the Cadillac. I went behind the car and he went to the front.
    The makeshift tarp barely covered the enormous vehicle. I peeled off two short strips of tape and secured the back corners to the undercarriage next to the wheel wells and then did the same for the front. I didn’t want anybody—Tak included—poking around Ebony’s car before she arrived.
    â€œThanks for your help,” I said with a small wave. I opened the shop door, but Tak called out behind me.
    â€œMargo—hold up.” He caught the door with his hand. “Were you here last night? All night?”
    â€œOf course I was,” I said. And then added, more tentatively, “Why?”
    â€œI was wondering why you didn’t hear this.”
    In the section of Vegas where I lived, I’d learned to hear the questions that people often wouldn’t ask out loud. Myself-protection walls went up. It didn’t seem like a good idea to tell Tak or anybody that I was staying at the shop alone. It also seemed as though I needed to convince Ebony that maybe there was a very good reason for reporting the vandalism to the police.
    â€œMy dad’s a heavy sleeper,” I said, which was true. I was sure wherever he was sleeping in the middle of the desert, he hadn’t woken up once. “And I fell asleep in front of the TV.”
    â€œI guess that explains it,” he said. “But still, you should be careful. Whoever did this might come back, and the next time they might do more than vandalize a car.”
    Tak drove off. I propped the front door open, wheeled a rack of fringed ponchos onto the sidewalk, and went back inside to open the register. A petite woman in tennis clothes followed me. A canvas tote, weighed down by something bulky, hung over her shoulder.
    â€œAre you open yet?” she asked.
    I glanced at the clock. “Close enough,” I said.
    â€œOh good. I wanted to get here before I hit the courts.” She went to the counter and pulled a bunched-up garment bag from the tote. “I want to have this appraised.”
    I stepped around the back of the counter. “What is it?”
    â€œIt’s a costume,” she said. She studied me out of the corner of her eyes. “You do buy costumes, don’t you? You don’t make everything yourself, right?”
    â€œRight.” I hung the garment bag on an empty hook that was mounted to the wall. I’d watched my dad inspect potential costumes hundreds of times, and I’d learned how to back into an offer based on how much we could rent the costume for. I unzipped the garment bag and looked inside.
    It was the sweater vest, shirt, and pants from one of the Charlie’s Angels costumes at Blitz’s party. Judging from theshoulder-length brown wig that was clipped to the hanger and the large pinkish glasses, I guessed it was Kate Jackson.
    â€œYou and your friends did a great job with the Charlie’s Angels costumes,” I said. “Do the other women plan to bring theirs in too?”
    â€œWe didn’t talk about it. After what happened, we haven’t talked about much.” She pulled her bobbed brown hair off her face. A sparkling diamond on her left hand caught the light and glittered. It was bigger than any