Love Can Be Murder

blonde glory.
    "Hello, Sammy."
    Sammy's gaze landed on Jolie's lapel badge, and her eyes rounded. "Are you working here?"
    "Yes."
    Sammy made a distressed noise, as if she were stepping over a homeless person, and touched the arm of Jolie's jacket with a manicured hand. "Jolie, it doesn't have to be like this. Come back to the Sanders Agency and we'll let bygones be bygones."
    Jolie glanced down at Sammy's hand, then pulled away. "Excuse me while I clean up the mess I made."
    Sammy's face reddened, then she tossed her pale hair. "While you're in the back, Jolie, fetch me this little number in a size seven, will you?"
    Fetch ...like a dog. Sammy had been having her fetch things for years—would she never be able to get one up on the woman?
    The man she'd plowed into stepped in. "I believe the lady was helping me."
    Sammy flicked her gaze over him, then conjured up an ingratiating smile. "I'll wait."
    He looked around and picked up the nearest men's shoe, a lustrous Cole Haan loafer, quite a contrast to the battered tennis shoes he wore. "Do you have this in size eleven?"
    Jolie gave him a grateful look. "I'll check." She stooped to grab an armful of shoes, lids, and boxes, and scrambled toward the stockroom.
    Michael was on her heels with a second armload. "Do you know who that is?"
    "My former boss, Sammy Sanders."
    "I mean the man ."
    "No. Should I?"
    "That's Beck Under wood."
    She dropped her load on a table. "Of Underwood Broadcasting?"
    "The same. His family owns more media outlets and production companies than anyone on the East Coast."
    Egad—she subscribed to their movie channel. "I've seen his father and sister on the news," she said, suddenly realizing why the woman with him seemed familiar, "but I don't remember him."
    "He's been away from Atlanta for a few years, living in Costa Rica, I believe."
    Which explained the longish hair and the deep tan.
    "Carlotta told me he was back in town."
    "Carlotta?"
    "Carlotta Wren—she works upstairs, usually in the Prada department. Hard-core celebrity groupie, knows everyone who's anyone in Atlanta. She'd wet her capris if she knew Beck Underwood was in the store."
    Jolie held out the requested size-eleven loafer. "Maybe you should handle this sale."
    "I'm handling the sister," Michael reminded her, pulling Jimmy Choo boxes from the shelf by twos. "I'm counting on you to keep him busy while I sell her the entire fall line."
    "Will you cut me in on your commission?"
    "No, but I won't fire you."
    She swallowed. "Deal."
    "Besides," Michael said with a wry grin, "the man probably owns nothing but jungle footwear—maybe you can sell him some civilized shoes." He gave her the once-over, then squinted. "You might want to... fluff or something." Then he walked out, laden with enough shoes to shod the Rockettes.
    Jolie glanced into the mirror on the door of the employee bathroom and groaned. Her short dishwater-blonde hair, curly and fine textured, was unruly under the best of circumstances. But after a confrontation with the carpet, the stuff was a staticky, high-flying nest. Her dark jacket and skirt were lint covered, and the makeup she'd applied so carefully this morning had vanished. She resembled one of the mannequins in sportswear—prominent eyes and knees, with a chalk white pallor—and she felt as insubstantial as she looked. For someone who prided herself on her fortitude, she conceded that six hours on her feet, plus the false sighting of Gary, plus the scene she'd created, plus the run-in with Sammy Sanders...well, it was enough to wear a girl down.
    Weighing her options, she glanced at the doorway leading back to the showroom, then to the fire-exit door leading to a loading dock. She had the most outrageous urge to walk out...and keep walking.
    Is that what Gary had done? Reached some kind of personal crisis that he couldn't share with her, and simply walked away from everything—from his job, from his friends, from her? As bad as it sounded, she almost preferred to believe that he had suffered some kind of breakdown rather than consider other possible explanations—that he'd met with foul play, or that she had indeed been scammed by the man who'd professed to care about her.
    The exit sign beckoned, but she glanced at the shoe box in her hands and decided that since the man had been kind enough to intercept Sammy, he deserved to be waited on, even if he didn't spend a cent.
    Even if people with vulgar amounts of money did make her nervous.
    She