On the Hook Read online

  Just before we went outside, I made sure my scarf was tucked under the collar of my coat to keep it from getting wet. I had a particular affection for the one I was wearing. It was the first scarf I’d made from a pattern I’d designed myself. It turned out to be unnecessary, though. As we went outside, I saw that the rain had finally gone down to a drizzle for the moment. Not that it wasn’t still dreary and wet.

  “We’ll take my car,” Elise said, trying to appear professional. “That’s the way it’s done. The agent chauffeurs the client.” The three of us went toward her white Lexus, which was parked right in front of the restaurant.

  Adele commandeered the shotgun seat, saying that she was the client, leaving me to squeeze into the back of the two-door car.

  “If you’re going to make a business of this, you might want a different car,” I said as Adele flipped the front seat back and my leg room disappeared.

  Between the foggy windows and being in the back seat, it was hard to see where we were going. I recognized Wells Drive, the back road that wound around the base of the Santa Monica Mountains. At Serrania Park, Elise made a sharp turn and then another, and I figured we were on Dumetz. I’d driven the area often and never paid much attention to anything beyond the houses that faced the street. Elise bent low over the steering wheel as if looking for something and then abruptly made a turn. The road began to climb and twist. Of course, we were in Woodland Hills now, and “Hills” was in the community’s name. I just hadn’t realized what was beyond the houses I’d driven by.

  It was suddenly like a different world, as if we were in one of the canyons where the houses were built into the hillsides. The road was narrow and most of the houses hugged the street. The ones that were set back had driveways that seemed almost vertical. Elise pulled the car off the street onto a bricked area in front of a house that sat just feet from the curb.

  As I squeezed out of the car, I checked out the design of the house. It was very plain looking, almost like a long box with a roof. There was a double door and a couple of small windows.

  “Now, remember, no word to anyone we were here,” she said as she went up to the door. There was something hanging off the handle, and she punched in some numbers and extracted a key. Elise made a point of leading the way as she pushed open the door. She poked her head in first, called out “Hello!” a couple of times, and waited for a response. When there was only silence, she walked us inside. She stopped short on the mat just inside the door, and the two of us bumped into her.

  “We can’t drip all over and make a mess. You have to take off your shoes and coats.” She pointed to a coat tree next to the door.

  Adele kicked off her shoes and dropped her coat on a hook, and I did the same.

  “The bedrooms and the bonus room are downstairs,” Elise said, pointing out the stairway that was cut out of the floor. “I’ll just go down there and check that everything is shipshape.” She dropped her voice and seemed to be speaking to herself. “The agent should always check that everything is presentable before showing it to the client.” I thought I heard her squeal as she went down the stairs and figured it was part of her pep talk.

  The outside of the house hadn’t even hinted at what the inside was like. The upper floor was really one continuous space that included a living room, dining area, and kitchen. The ceilings were vaulted, making the space seem airy. The furniture was sparse, which only added to the open feeling. I was drawn to the far wall, which was all windows and sliding-glass doors. A patio ran the whole length of the place, but it was the view that entranced me. We were perched on the edge of a hill. There was no yard, but rather a sheer drop to the street below. I looked down on the flat area beyond and saw rooftops and backyard pools. In the distance, another hillside was dotted with houses. Turning another way, I could see all of the western part of the Valley to the Santa Susana mountains. I shivered as I felt a blast of cold air coming up from below and wished I’d been able to keep my coat on.

  “You can see the cars going around the bend at the top of Topanga Canyon,” I said to Adele, but she was too busy opening cabinets and doors.

  I was about to open the sliding door for a clear view—since the windows were splotched with water—when I heard a flurry of footsteps.

  “We have to go. We have to go now,” Elise said as she reached the top floor. “C’mon.” She waved her hands impatiently when neither of us moved right away. “I just got a text from Logan that he’s showing some properties to clients. He’s very anxious to sell this place, so I’m sure it will be his first stop.” I’d never seen her so unglued. All I could think of was that old saying about a chicken with its head cut off. She was already at the door with her shoes and coat on and fussing at us to hurry. She grabbed our coats off the rack and pushed them on us as we slid into our shoes and then herded us out.

  “Remember, none of us were here,” Elise said as she pulled the door shut behind us.

  Chapter Two

  “Do I ever need this,” Dinah Lyons said. It was just about five o’clock and time for our happy-hour gathering, and we were the first two at the table in the yarn department of the bookstore. Dinah was still going by Lyons despite having married Commander Blaine. Everybody knew her as Lyons and she wanted to leave it that way—even though Lyons wasn’t the last name she’d been born with but rather had come from her jerky ex, Jeremy.

  Originally, the Tarzana Hookers had met a couple of times a week during the day, but recently we’d changed our meetings to five PM and called it happy hour. Some people had a glass of wine to relax from their day; we did our relaxing with crochet.

  Shedd & Royal Books and More had a lot of space, so creating a yarn department had been no problem. From this back corner of the store, I could see the whole place. Aside from the main part of the store, which was all bookcases and display tables, there was an alcove for music and movies and another alcove that was the children’s department. We had set aside an area for events near a big window that faced Ventura Boulevard.

  “This is the perfect antidote to the stresses of the day,” Dinah said, watching me take out a pair of knitting needles and several balls of yarn. “You better not let Adele see those. What are you making?”

  I glanced around quickly and was relieved that Adele was nowhere in sight. “I’m making swatches of some new yarn we got in. Let me know when you see her coming and I’ll put them away.” We liked to have made-up samples of all of our yarns. There was no problem with the crocheted versions, but since we welcomed all yarn crafters, I thought we should have knitted ones as well. I had to do the knitted ones in secret or deal with a hissy fit from Adele. We all agreed that crochet was the better yarn craft, but she was over the top about it.

  But then, she had her reasons. It had to do with a story straight out of Cinderella. Adele had an unpleasant stepmother and stepsisters who were knitters and had mocked her crochet.

  As I began to cast on the stitches, Dinah pulled out her work and, as she did, the metal crochet hook came loose from the tangle of delft blue yarn and hit the table with a ping. She retrieved it and started crocheting. “Just when I think my students can’t surprise me, they do.”

  Dinah taught freshman English to reluctant students. She got them when they were still acting like goofy high school kids and did her best to whip them into real college students. It had always been a challenge but was even more so now thanks to all the new ways of communicating.

  “I tried to have them handwrite a letter.” Her eyes went skyward at the memory. “They couldn’t understand why ‘Hi’ wasn’t a proper salutation. They didn’t know how to write in cursive and could barely print. And they couldn’t spell without presumptive type. When I suggested a dictionary and held up my Merriam-Webster, they all gave me blank looks.”

  She finished a row and moved on to the next. “I think this group of students might be the one that breaks me. They might be totally hopeless.” She held up what she was making and showed me the rectangular shape. “Am
I really making place mats?” She let out a resigned sigh. “I knew it would be different once we got married. It’s always hard, but at our age, it’s even harder. He wants us to sit down to dinner every night at a whole setup. Candles, cloth napkins, the works. The place mats were his idea when I said I wanted to make something for him. I was thinking more along the lines of a scarf.” She moved down the row of crochet. “I liked the way we used to set up dinner on the coffee table. All casual and spontaneous. Now you see why I had cold feet about getting married.” She got to the end of the row and turned her work. “But enough about me. What happened after I left you this morning?”

  I knew I wasn’t supposed to tell anyone, but Dinah was my best friend, so it seemed as if it would be okay. Besides, she wasn’t likely to be talking to Adele’s Cutchykins or Elise’s Logan anytime soon. I told her about the whole episode. “We never even saw the whole place. Elise got a text that Logan was showing property and she was sure he was on his way there and she rushed us out.” I gave Dinah a brief description of what I’d seen of the house, spending most of the time on the view.

  “Here comes Adele,” Dinah said, nudging me. I stowed the knitting needles in my tote back and pulled out a crochet hook just as Adele came in to join us. She was followed by Lara-Ann Wilson, our new hire.

  “I’ll keep an eye on everything while you two are back here,” she said, picking up a skein of yarn that had fallen out of the row of cubbies along the back wall and replacing it. “I hope it wasn’t a problem that I had yesterday off.”

  I smiled and told her we’d managed okay.

  Now that I was assistant manager and the two owners of the bookstore, Mrs. Shedd and Mr. Royal, had finally gone public with their relationship and gotten married, we had hired some more help. Lara-Ann was perfect for the job. She loved books, particularly mysteries. She was divorced with a grown daughter, so working all kinds of hours wasn’t a problem. I was actually glad she wasn’t a crocheter so there was no chance she’d want to join the group instead of looking after the store.

  “She sure has great hair,” Dinah said as Lara-Ann went back into the main part of the bookstore.

  “It makes you want to have gray hair, if it can look like hers,” I said. Her hair was long and wavy and hung to her shoulders. I was sure the color was premature. Lara-Ann couldn’t have been older than her early forties.

  Eduardo Linnares passed Lara-Ann as he headed toward us. I watched as the few patrons in the bookstore stopped and looked at him as he walked by. As a former cover model for romance novels and later a commercial spokesperson, he had charismatic good looks. He was tall, and even his slacks and sport jacket couldn’t hide his nice build. His face had all the stereotypical features of a romantic hero, including the strong jaw and angular cheekbones. His lustrous black hair was pulled into a ponytail.

  When he’d started being cast as the cowboy’s father on book covers, he’d decided it was time to move on. These days, his time was spent running The Apothecary, a high-end drugstore and sundries shop in Encino.

  The Hookers mostly carried cloth totes or reusable bags from Trader Joe’s. He carried a tawny-colored leather tote.

  “Ladies,” he said with a warm smile and a bow of his head as he dropped the tote on a chair. He eased his large frame into his chair and then leaned back with a sigh. “I’m glad for this hour. Then I have to get back to my store. We’re having a special event. Tyler Penner is signing the silver hairbrushes she designed.” We all nodded, recognizing the name. She was the current hot model/reality star/social media influencer, and her name on any product made it a huge seller.

  He took out a ball of ecru thread and a thin silver hook and began working. His Irish grandmother had taught him Irish crochet when he was a child. He could turn out the lacy patterns with ease. He was currently making runners for the shelves in his store, thinking they would show off the high-end shaving and grooming items he sold. He understood better than most that presentation is everything.

  CeeCee and Sheila came in arm in arm. Our actress leader seemed to have forgotten all about the skirmish in the restaurant and appeared in high spirits. Sheila Altman was the youngest in our group. I think our happy-hour get-togethers were most important to her. She had anxiety issues that she kept at bay with crochet. She worked at Luxe, the lifestyle shop down the street. Lifestyle seemed to mean an eclectic and expensive selection of merchandise. I loved to look in there. It smelled wonderful from all the handmade soaps they sold, and there was always so much to look at—handmade shoes, dresses made of sari silk, the occasional piece of furniture fashioned from reclaimed wood. Sheila had developed her own style of crocheting and knitting as well, though she kept the knitting on the down-low from Adele. Her pieces were done in blues, greens, and purples and had the dreamy look of an Impressionist painting. She mostly stuck to wraps, blankets, and scarves and was able to sell them at Luxe, as they fit in perfectly with the other merchandise.

  “Tell this to those women who thought my career was in the toilet,” CeeCee said before she even sat down. It was a given that she sat on one end of the rectangular wood table and Adele sat on the other, giving the appearance that they were co-leaders of our group. We all still thought of CeeCee as our leader, but this kept the peace. “I had a meeting this afternoon with my agent and the representative of a dog food company. They want me to be the spokesperson. You all know how much I love animals,” she said in her musical voice. She had a sparkling smile as she spoke that seemed to pour out warmth.

  “Are you sure you want to do that?” Adele said from the other end of the table. “One minute you’re known as an Academy Award–nominated actress, and the next minute everybody sees you and thinks of the smell of dog food. Are they giving you some kind of catchy line to say, like, ‘Where’s the beef?’”

  “My, but you know how to poke a hole in my balloon of happiness,” CeeCee said. Her expression had dimmed, and I knew she was not only thinking over what Adele had said but also considering if it might be true.

  “If it was me, I’d want something with a yarn company. Maybe a whole line with my name on it.” Adele had gotten a dreamy look.

  “You should really think it over carefully. You don’t want to be so defined by dog food that you get passed over for a real role,” Lara-Ann said. I was surprised to see she had come back into the yarn department. “That’s what happened to my daughter, Paisley.” Then she looked embarrassed. “Sorry, I couldn’t help but overhear.”

  CeeCee went back to addressing Adele’s comment. “I had my own sitcom, and there were all the guest shots in other shows, and then the part of Ophelia in the Anthony movie. I even hosted a reality show. The public isn’t going to connect me with the dog food. It’s because of who I am that the dog food company wants me. The point is they’ll connect the dog food with me, which incidentally is really a super product. I’m feeding it to Talulah and Marlena now,” she said, referring to her two tiny Yorkies.

  “You forgot the skin cream infomercial,” Adele said, and CeeCee gave her a sharp look. She had deliberately not mentioned it, as it had turned out badly and was ancient history now.

  Finally, Lara-Ann was able to get a word in to tell me she was having trouble finding a book someone had ordered. It was easier for me to go with her and find it than it would have been to explain where it might be.

  When I returned to the group, Rhoda Klein was sitting at the table with an unfamiliar man next to her. Even though she’d lived in Southern California for twenty years or more, Rhoda had a thick New York accent. The best way to describe her personality was blunt. She always got right to the point of a situation. That was how she looked as well, with a solid build, no-nonsense short brown hair, and comfortable clothes.

  “That’s Molly,” she said, turning to the man as I returned to my seat. “She’s the one I told you about.” The man leaned forward to get a better look at me. I took the opportunity to check him out as well. He was ordinary looking, with plain brown hair that seemed a
little uneven.

  “This is Leo Klein, my brother-in-law,” Rhoda said. She turned to him. “Well, you’ve met everyone now. You can go look around and I’ll find you when I’m ready to go. Molly can tell you about the other activities they have going on here then.”

  Leo pushed away from the table reluctantly and then wandered off toward the main part of the store. She waited until he was out of earshot. “Whew.” She leaned back in relief and let her arms drop to her sides. “You have no idea.” She took another breath. “His wife died six months ago. He was living in Newark, but he decided that he ought to get a change, and so he came to stay with us while he figures out what to do.” She took out a lapghan she was working on and began to crochet. “His wife did everything for him. Cooked his dinner, picked out his clothes, and handled all the money. Now he’s like a lost puppy. He’s lonely and he wants to find someone else.” She rocked her head with dismay. “I tried fixing him up with a woman in the book circle I belong to.” Her eyes went skyward. “It was a disaster. He showed up at her house expecting her to cook dinner, and she was expecting to go out. He finally took her to McDonald’s and was reluctant to get her one of their ice cream cones, saying something about how she ought to skip dessert. He came home thinking she’d had a good time, but she called me and told me to make sure he never contacted her again. He is clueless that he’s clueless.”

  We all looked toward the main part of the store, where he was wandering among the bookcases. Rhoda had mentioned that he was just about my age, but he looked older somehow. Since Rhoda had said Leo’s wife had picked out his clothes, I wondered who had chosen his current outfit. The navy-blue sweater seemed baggy over the navy-blue pleated cotton pants. And he wore white sneakers that were definitely not the current style.

  “Pink can help him,” Adele said. “Her husband died and she had to deal with the whole older people dating thing.”