Hide nor Hair (A Jersey Girl Cozy Mystery Book 2) (3 page)

“It’ll grow back.”

Frustrated as usual after an exchange with Rhodes, I left his office and returned to Meredith’s cubicle. “I guess Dizzie Oliver will be your next column?” she asked.

“I’ll write up something tonight and get it to Ken in the morning. But he did say I can do a feature on Trina’s Tresses for your Special Section next week.”

“The folks in advertising are going to love you guys for this. We’re going to need Trina Cranford to take out bigger ads. God knows Dizzie’s advertising days are over.”

I hadn’t even thought of that. “We’re nothing but a bunch of mercenaries,” I mumbled. “Meanwhile, a few more stories wouldn’t hurt the old bank balance.”

Meredith flipped through a small stack of papers on her desk and pulled one out from the middle of the pile. “In that case, I have an interesting assignment for you.”

I read the paper and felt all the color drain from my face.

“Oh, come on! We’ve postponed this story for months. It’s only flying lessons,” Meredith said. “You don’t have to actually fly the plane, for God’s sake! Just go for the ride and take some notes. The kids around here are itching to get their wings, and half their parents are, too. You’ll be supplying our readership with practical, invaluable information, and you’ll make a paying advertiser extremely happy—not to mention the money-obsessed androids across the room in accounting.”

“I can’t do this,” I told her, trying to give the paper back. “Really. I just can’t. The idea of being up in the sky in a tiny little plane scares me to death. Please. Give this to someone else—anyone else.”

“There is no one else,” Meredith told me, refusing to take back the assignment. “The three other stringers are all busy. You’re it, Colleen. Sorry.”

I shoved the paper into my purse. “Fine. Great. I want flowers at my wake. Lots of them. I’m partial to pink carnations.”

“Will do,” Meredith said, waving me off.

There was no need to hang around the office. I headed for my car and met up with Ken Rhodes out in the parking lot.

“Where are you off to?” I asked, eyeing the new, extravagant silver BMW X5 SUV he was about to climb into with more than a touch of envy.

“Lunch with the publishers. I hate these things. They start early, end late, and I always have indigestion by the time I get back to the office,” he told me.

Poor guy
, I thought,
rushing off in a gorgeous new car for a freebie lunch
. I’d sell one of my kids for his troubles.

I got into my mother’s red Nissan and drove straight to one of the few people in the world I knew I could vent to and depend on—my best friend.

* * *

“I found a body today,” I told Bevin Thompson, my best friend and across-the-street neighbor.

“Who was it this time?” she asked, as if I routinely found bodies.

“Dizzie Oliver. I told you I was going there with Kate to get my hair straightened. We walked into the salon early this morning and found Dizzie floating in a sink filled with water.”

“I heard about it on
News 12
,” Bevin said. “That was you? They said two patrons discovered a stylist dead inside an exclusive hair salon in Tranquil Harbor. I figured it was either Dizzie’s salon or Trina’s. Too bad it turned out to be Dizzie. At least she knew her way around a head of hair. Dear Lord! What’s this world coming to?”

“I’m writing it up for my column. I have two other assignments, then that’s about it until the end of the month. If I don’t go full time pretty soon, you’ll see me sitting outside the train station in Matawan selling chewed-up pencils to commuters.”

“You got a nice settlement from the divorce,” she reminded me. “Where’s all the money going?”

“I’m trying to live within my means,” I explained. “Unfortunately my means seem to come up a little short now and then.”

My divorce had been finalized only two months before. My ex had been in charge of the finances throughout our marriage, which left me completely clueless about budgeting and bill paying. Though I was far from destitute, a good portion of the settlement money was tied up in stocks, bonds, and retirement accounts. I had felt a cash-flow crunch on several occasions over the past few weeks.

“There are plenty of ways to make more money if you’re strapped for funds,” she told me.

We sat inside her sunroom, where Bevin did most of her work. She was a good enough artist to actually make a comfortable living selling her landscapes. Her work differed from most artists in that the scenes she painted were more melancholy than serene. That air of despondency attracted interest in her work and, more importantly, buyers. Bevin’s easel stood at an angle to catch the last of the morning light coming from the east. She wore a smock splotched with dots and dribbles of color, Jackson Pollock-like, though the canvas only revealed a dull gray sky and what looked like a dirt floor toward the bottom. She kept referring to a photograph shoved between tubes of Van Dyke brown and titanium white.

“Of course there are ways to make extra cash. But it’s not like I could go out on the street to sell my body. We both know I’d probably starve to death.” I smiled. “The only talent I have to depend on is writing.”

Bevin put her palette aside and awkwardly pushed her stunning red hair away from her face with the heel of her hand. Her fingers, I noticed, were smeared with paint.

“You seem to be forgetting you only freelance for the
Town Crier
. You’re not a permanent employee. Try some of the other newspapers and a few magazines. Query them. Send out feelers.”

“Is that ethical?”

“Ethical?” Bevin frowned and tossed her brush in a can of something that smelled like turpentine. I knew she considered the question absurd. “Is it ethical that you were promised a full-time position and it didn’t happen? Or that you’re broke by the end of the month and you’re newly single, with two kids to feed and a house to run? Stop with the loyalty crap. Try the
Crier
’s competition. It’s not like you’re selling government secrets. You need to take care of yourself!”

Married three times, divorced twice, and with her present marriage in ruins, Bevin considered ethical behavior a complete waste of time. She believed in making her own opportunities, occasional drunkenness, and, when necessary, doing whatever it took to get ahead. Bevin caught on fast when it came to life lessons. I had always been more of a slow learner.

“I’m not like you, Bev. It wouldn’t seem fair.”

She grabbed a rag off her supply table and scrubbed at her stained fingers. Even smudged with paint, her fingers looked delicate and refined. What came out of her mouth was anything but ladylike. “I never saw anyone who bends over backwards to do the right thing the way you do, Colleen. All you’ve ever gotten for it is a good, swift kick in the butt! For God’s sake, break some rules!”

“As if I know what the rules are,” I said.

“Think back to when you were a kid. Everything your mother told you not to do, go out and do it.”

“I’ll consider it,” I lied, knowing I never would. It wasn’t only loyalty to the newspaper. I knew I would miss interacting with my colleagues: Meredith Mancini, Willy Rojas, and Ken Rhodes—most especially Rhodes. “Meanwhile, I have to write up a column tonight about Dizzie. I can’t imagine what I’m going to say. Does anyone really want to read about my pitiful attempt at mouth-to-mouth resuscitation?”

“I would,” Bev said. “I should think everyone in town would. The follow-up on this will be fantastic! People will be asking how Dizzie died and under what circumstances. You’ll get a month’s worth of columns out of this alone. And your position at the paper is bound to improve because of it. Of course, you’ll have to interview that cretin husband of hers.”

“And just how am I going to do that?”

“You need to talk to him one-on-one. Use your imagination. How about a bad air conditioner? How’s your condenser?”

“Fine, thank you,” I said. “How’s yours? What, exactly, is a condenser anyway?”

“It’s the thing that cools down your house,” Bevin said.

The air inside Bev’s house felt cool and dry, as opposed to my own house, which felt like south Florida in August. “It’s a steam bath over at my place.”

“I thought Neil was supposed to get that fixed as part of your settlement.”

“He’s been a little slow on the follow-through.”

“So first we call your lawyer. She’ll squeeze the money out of Neil to fix your central air. They don’t call her Nut Cracker Maynard for nothing.”

I just nodded. I’ve never been comfortable with confrontations, especially with my ex.

“Then we’ll call the Hot Air King,” she continued.

“Won’t Matthew Oliver be a little busy burying Dizzie?” I reasoned.

“He’s an Oliver. Money means more to them than grief.” Bevin pulled off her smock and tossed it over the tall stool she sat on when she painted. “Let’s do it right now before you wimp out.”

* * *

Lucinda Maynard’s office décor reminded me of a 1930s cartoon. Black, gray, and white appeared to be her favorite color scheme—gray carpeting, a black desk, and white trim around the door and windows. On her gray walls hung lovely Ansel Adams lithographs, which were outrageously expensive and resplendent in—
what else?
—black, white, and gray. She even dressed in her preferred shades—a severely cut black suit with a light gray shirt and gray heels. Her blunt-cut hair was, of course, black. She wore black-framed glasses to match.

“Have a seat, ladies,” Lucinda said, motioning to the strange little ultra-modern sofa in front of her desk.

We sat down and Bevin took the lead. “Colleen needs her central air fixed and she’s absolutely broke. Neil was supposed to pay for it, but it never happened. What are we going to do for her?”

“
We?
” Lucinda asked. She used her index finger to push her glasses further up her hawk-like nose.

“We,” Bevin said firmly, secure in the knowledge that her previous divorces had paid for several of those lithographs up on the wall. Her current divorce from Franklin Thompson would most likely finance Lucinda’s next BMW—gray, naturally, with black interior. “Come on, Lucinda. This girl is wallowing in poverty while her husband gets an ocean view from his condo up in the clouds. She and the kids are wilting away inside her house—which generally hits a nice, comfy eighty-nine degrees by midday.”

“Okay. I get it. I can’t take the heat, either. Tell you what. Give me two days. Then call someone to come over and fix the air. I’ll get the money for you.”

“How?” I asked.

“I’ll put in a call to Neil’s lawyer. Neil’s responsible for this under the terms of your divorce. Good old Lucas Harmon will have to force Neil to part with some of his stash.”

“Again.
How
?” The only thing my ex-husband was better at than hiding his cash was holding on to it.

“I know Lucas.”

Big deal. Everyone in the county knew Neil’s lawyer. Lucas Harmon wasn’t as scary as Lucinda, but he was a scoundrel and was very successful. His clothes cost a small fortune. The guy always looked tan, even in the dead of winter. He lived, conveniently, in the same waterfront condo complex as Neil and his bimbo business partner, Theda Oates. It was a wealthy building. The
Town Crier
’s executive editor, Ken Rhodes, also lived there, though how a newspaper editor could afford such extravagant digs, I couldn’t say. Apparently the rich had their secrets, and the mysterious Ken Rhodes had more than his share of them.

3

It was too hot inside my house for coffee, but I made a pot anyway. The kids were still at school, poor things, in classrooms that I felt certain were nearly as sweltering as conditions were at home. Lucinda Maynard had assured me my air conditioner would be fixed, so at least we were due to get some relief.

“I guess you didn’t get your hair straightened after all,” my mother said, standing outside my patio door. She had come through the backyard shortcut that linked our two properties and slid the screen open.

“Obviously, Ma. I feel like Shirley Temple. I guess you heard about Dizzie.” I poured two cups of coffee and looked around for something to eat. There was fruit in a bowl on the kitchen table, but I wasn’t that desperate yet.

“Everyone heard about Dizzie. It’s a shame. She was awfully young. Screwy, but funny. I guess they’ll close down the salon now. Without Dizzie, it really isn’t worth going there. Kate said you tried CPR.”

“What little CPR I could remember. What else did Kate say?” I asked.

“Just that Dizzie died.”

“Did she mention the circumstances?”

My mother nodded and took a sip of coffee. “Your sister told me a little about it. She said Ron was interested in the pictures she took on her cell phone, particularly the water on the floor and on the chair next to the one you girls found Dizzie kneeling on.”

At the time, I didn’t notice the water on the chair, but I remembered slipping on the wet floor. If Dizzie had hit her head and fell headfirst into the filled sink, some of the water could have splashed out onto the tiles. I tried to recall if Dizzie’s arms were wet, too. I was certain her arms were outside the sink—not that it mattered. She could have splashed her arms when her head hit the water.

“Mom, did Kate say if anything else was wet in the shop?”

“As a matter of fact, she said the cabinets were wet and there were big puddles beneath the sinks. She got a shot of the cabinets before you yanked Dizzie out of the water.”

I had a feeling the entire area where Dizzie drowned, not to mention Dizzie herself, was saturated. I thought that would probably be the result of Dizzie thrashing about—which meant Dizzie was most likely fighting off an assailant and did not have a stroke or an accident.

“I think she was killed, Mom,” I said.

“I wouldn’t be the least bit surprised,” my mother agreed.

Ordinarily, my mother’s comment would have been absurd. Tranquil Harbor wasn’t exactly the crime capital of the East Coast, yet lately things had gotten a little funky in our small New Jersey shore community. A murder wasn’t exactly out of the question.

“Well, expect someone else to get killed if Lucinda Maynard can’t get Neil to cough up the money to fix the air unit,” I said. “I can’t tell you what it’s like sleeping upstairs with hot air coming out of the vents.”