Read an Excerpt
The Damsel in This Dress
Chapter One
September
Seattle, Washington
Hold on while I get out my thesaurus; this review is going to require more words than my paltry vocabulary contains. Ah, here we go: junk, dross, rubbish, detritus (oh, that's a good one), baloney, claptrap, drivel . . .
To continue would require more space than this column allows, so let me simply conclude by saying that Strike Three for Death, J. Soldier McKennitt's latest so-called crime drama, is a waste of time and money. The plot is ludicrous, the characters stereotypical, the writing amateurish. What less could you ask for? This is the third installment in the Crimes of the Northwest series and while each entry has defied common sense and literary style, Strike Three for Death is the worst to date . . . "There's more. Wanna hear it?"
Soldier McKennitt sprawled on his brother's tanstriped couch, his long legs crossed at the ankles. Pinching his eyes closed, he rhythmically thumped his skull against the wall behind him. With each bump, the watercolor hanging above his head bounced.
Finally letting his head rest against the white plaster, he opened his eyes and stared at the ceiling. "I think I've suffered enough," he sighed. "Besides, something tells me it doesn't get any better."
Soldier sent his brother a pleading look. "What in the hell does this woman have against me, Taylor? Six weeks on the New York Times best-seller list, but this, this broad hates everything I write!"
Taylor McKennitt grinned as he handed Soldier the bottle of beer he'd just popped open. "Where have you been, sonny? 'Broad' is politically incorrect when referring to the female gender."
Taking a long swig of beer, Soldier swallowed, then offered, "Okay then, how about 'bitch'?"
"Bitch works. Have you ever met Ms. Whatsername?"
"Tremaine. Elizabeth Carlisle Tremaine, and no, I've never had the pleasure."
Taylor tossed the Sunday paper onto the coffee table. "You live in north Seattle. What are you doing subscribing to the Port Henry Ledger? It's way the hell up on the peninsula."
"I don't subscribe. The lovely Ms. Tremaine sends me an edition whenever she trashes one of my books.
She calls them reviews. I call them literary castration."
Taylor dropped down on the couch next to Soldier. Grabbing a note pad and colored pencils from his desk, he flipped to a clean page.
"Okay, Detective McKennitt. Let's do a little artist's rendering here. Describe this flower of womanhood to me."
Soldier sat back and relaxed, closing his eyes again. As he took another pull of beer, he formed a wicked smile on his lips.
"Okay. She has a long, thin face. Rather bony."
Taylor dutifully began sketching.
"She's really old, maybe sixty—"
"Hey, Mom's sixty."
"Okay, sixty-one. And she's got carrot-orange hair that sticks out all over like she shoved her finger in a light socket. Her eyes are evil and black and too close together, and she has only one eyebrow, sort of shaped like a big M across her heavily wrinkled forehead."
"That's good. What else?"
Soldier sucked on the bottle for a second. "Her nose is long and thin with a bulb on the end. Oh, and don't forget the wart," he said, gesturing toward the paper with his beer bottle.
"Does the wart have hair on it?"
"It wouldn't be wart-worthy if it didn't."
"Right. Hair on the wart." Taylor's pencil scratched the paper in broad strokes.
Soldier contemplated his nemesis once more. "She has a blunt chin and a thin, cruel mouth. All tight and puckered like she just licked the bottom of somebody's shoe." He grinned. "And she's never had sex."
Taylor arched a dark brow. "Not even when she was young and wartless?"
"Nah. I don't see Ms. Tremaine letting a man near her," Soldier said through a vicious grin. Swallowing another gulp of beer, he mumbled, "But I'll bet she owns stock in Eveready batteries, if you get my drift."
Leaning over the sketch pad, he examined what Taylor had created. Gesturing with his index finger, he said, "You've got her tah-tahs too big. They should be more like prunes."
Taylor smirked. "She's beginning to look like my ex-wife."
"I never saw your ex-wife's prunes."
"Well, God knows every other man in town did."
Turning once again to the dour effigy Taylor had created, Soldier tapped his finger on the paper. With the beer bottle poised at his lips, he said, "Chin needs to be more mannish. And don't forget the scar . . ."
Betsy Tremaine rubbed her chin. It felt odd, as though somebody were tickling it. She wished. The stanza of an old song ran through her head: Another Saturday night and I ain't got nobody . . . Except it was Sunday, but that didn't really matter, not when you were alone every night of the week.
Twenty-eight years old, and the only male in her life was Piddle, her mother's five-hundred-year-old Chihuahua. Even now, the ancient creature lay hairless and trembling at her feet beneath the kitchen table. She was careful to move slowly around him, for the slightest noise would shatter his tenuous control and he'd live up to his name all over her floor.
Scooping the last bite of chocolate mint chip ice cream into her mouth, Betsy tossed the empty container in the trash and her spoon into the sink. Gently lifting Piddle from the floor, she rose and padded toward the living room.
The Damsel in This Dress. Copyright © by Marianne Stillings. Reprinted by permission of HarperCollins Publishers, Inc. All rights reserved. Available now wherever books are sold.
