“I’ll be waiting for your call,” he said, still grinning.

I had a feeling he wouldn’t have to wait long.

Chapter 25

“MUFFY GURCH?!” ABBY SCREECHED AS soon as we hit the street. “How could you saddle me with a stupid ugly name like that?! I was mortified!”

“Sorry,” I said, smiling. “It was the first moniker that came to mind. It just popped into my head like a weasel.”

“Well, it better pop right out again! I hate that name! Especially the Muffy part.” She wheeled around and started walking (okay, stomping) toward home. This being Christmas Eve day, all the stores were closed, and the sidewalks were practically deserted, so she was moving pretty fast.

“I don’t understand what you’re so upset about,” I hollered, running to catch up with her and tramping alongside. “It was just a temporary alias, you know. Nobody but Jimmy Birmingham will ever think of you as Muffy Gurch again… Or even Miss Muffet,” I added, unable to resist the temptation to tease. (When your real name is Paige Turner, you’ve got a license to make fun of other silly appellations, even when you’ve made them up yourself.)

“But I don’t want Jimmy to think of me with that name,” she whined. “I like him! He may not be the world’s best poet, but he’s damn good-looking. And he’s got a cute tushy. And he’s sexy as all get-out. And,” she added, almost as an afterthought, “I don’t think he’s a murderer, either.”

“But shouldn’t you be sure of that before you hop in the sack with him?” I asked, trying, but failing, to keep the sarcasm out of my tone.

Abby came to a dead stop on the sidewalk, in front of a store window full of ladies’ hats. “I resent that question!” she huffed. “Do you really think I’m so oversexed I’d go to bed with a possible killer?”

“Well, no, but…”

“Then why did you say it?”

“I don’t know, I just…”

“Something else must be bothering you,” Abby seethed, “something you don’t feel comfortable talking about. So what is it? You might as well say it and get it off your chest.”

“I really don’t know what you…”

“C’mon, out with it Paige! What’s going on in that meshugge twisty brain of yours?”

“Well… er… um… it’s really none of my business,” I stammered, staring at one of the hats in the window behind her. (In case you’re interested, it was a large pink and white cartwheel hat with a black net veil and a black satin streamer down the back. Pretty awful.) “But I can’t help wondering how you can be all wrapped up in Terry Catcher one minute, then wrapped around Jimmy Birmingham the next. I mean, Terry’s obviously crazy about you. And he’s such a great, really wonderful guy. Don’t you feel any loyalty to him at all?”

“Oh, Paige, you’re such a simpleton!” she said, linking her arm through mine and towing me on down the sidewalk. “You just don’t get it, do you? I’m as loyal to Whitey as he wants me to be-which means I won’t sleep with anybody else while I’m sleeping with him, and his concerns will be my concerns as long as he’s here in New York, living with me. But he’s not going to be here very much longer, Paige. We’ve discussed it at length. As soon as his sister’s murder is solved, he’s going back to Pittsburgh to take care of his father, and to start a new life in the city he knows and loves. And I’m going to stay right here in the city I know and love.

“So all Whitey and I have is the here and now,” she went on, walking and talking, her hot breath vaporizing in the arctic air. “And we plan to enjoy it as much as we can. And since we both know we’ll have no long-term future together, we’re each free to make contingency plans. And that’s all Jimmy Birmingham is, you dig? A contingency plan with an adorable ass.”

I laughed out loud. “You mean it wasn’t his soaring poetry that won you over?”

“Not a chance,” she said, chuckling. “I always keep my feet firmly planted on the rotted dizzy ground.”

TERRY WAS SITTING AT ABBY’S KITCHEN table-smoking a cigarette and reading a newspaper-when we got home. His white hair was glowing in the bright kitchen light. His blue eyes started glowing, too, when we walked in. (The gleam was mostly for Abby, of course, but I could tell one sweet, shiny shaft of it belonged to me.)

“Hello, baby,” Abby said, darting over to give him a tight hug around his neck. I wanted to hug him, too, but there wasn’t enough room. I settled for sitting across the table from him and lighting up one of his ciggies.

“How’d you make out today, Terry?” I asked. “Find out anything interesting?”

“Not really,” he said, blushing from the warmth of Abby’s embrace. “One of the two girls Judy used to live with wasn’t there. She went out to Long Island to spend Christmas with her family. And the one who was there-Angela Prickens-hadn’t seen or spoken to Judy since she moved out, and didn’t know anything about her subsequent life… Or her death,” he added sadly. “She had heard that Judy was murdered, but she didn’t seem to care very much.”

“That’s odd,” I said. “Why wouldn’t she care? Was she the one Judy had the hair-pulling fight with?”

“Yes, and she’s still upset about it.”

“Upset enough to kill?”

“No!” Terry insisted. “She’s just a young girl with her head in the clouds. All she thinks about is boys and romance and finding a good husband. She’s a lot like Judy was.”

“Did she know about the diamonds?”

“She says she didn’t, and I believe her.”

Abby took off her coat and sat down next to Terry. “Did you find out the name of the guy Judy and Angela were fighting over? Was it Birmingham?”

“The one and only.” Terry leaned back in his chair and took another puff on his Pall Mall. “Did you go to see him today as planned? Was he at home?”

“Yes, we did,” Abby said, smiling, “and, yes, he was.”

Terry gave her a teasing look. “Angela says he’s a real dreamboat-her word, not mine-and that every chick who sees him falls for him. Do you agree with that assessment?”

“Well, let me put it this way,” Abby said, giving him a teasing look in return. “He may be dreamboat material, but my ship’s already come in.” Adding weight (okay, heat) to her words, Abby snaked her hand across Terry’s shoulder and began stroking her fingertips up and down the side of his neck.

Aaaargh! It was time for me to leave again!

I really didn’t want to go. There were so many things that Abby and Terry and I needed to talk about. So many theories and clues to mull over. I hadn’t even told them that my apartment had been broken into! (I’d started to tell Abby earlier, but she’d been so focused on the time-and the need to get over to Jimmy’s place in a big fat hurry-that I’d finally decided to break the news later, when we were all three together, so I wouldn’t have to tell the story twice.)

And that was just the half of it. We still had tons of preparations to make for the party we were going to attend that night. We had to draw up a synchronized plan of attack-decide which of us should do what, and talk to whom, when-and then we had to go through Abby’s Vault of Illusions, looking for elegant, upper-crusty clothes to wear to the fancy uptown shindig.

Okay, I admit it. Those weren’t the only reasons I didn’t want to leave Abby’s right then. Truth was, I was scared to go back to my place alone.

But being an unwanted guest would cause me even more discomfort, I felt, so I bid my amorous friends a quick “catch you later,” and hopped across the hall to my own habitat. Either because of my stupid name or in spite of it, there’s one thing I’m pretty darn good at: knowing when to turn the page.

EVERYTHING WAS JUST AS I’D LEFT IT-specifically the flattened Duz detergent box, which was still taped over the broken door pane in the exact same position as before. I inspected it carefully, checking for rips in the tape or dents in the cardboard, finally deciding that the makeshift patch had in no way been disturbed. There’d been no drop in the indoor temperature, either, so-even though I still didn’t feel the slightest bit secure-I was, at least, warm.