The Brush Off (18 page)

“Okay. What’s our next move?”

I considered our options. We could go systematically down the list, paying visits one by one. But first, I thought we needed to go to Ricardo’s house. Perhaps there was something the police missed that a friend would see as odd or out of place. But surely it was still sealed as an extension of the crime scene, and I doubted the cops would invite us in. Unless we had an official reason to be there. Perhaps on an errand for the man who was running Ricardo’s salons? “Let’s go see Ricardo’s right-hand man,” I told Trudy. “Then we’ll tackle the rest of the list.”

Gerald told me on the phone that he was working from home since the police wouldn’t let him back in his office located at the rear of the Broadway salon. We followed his directions to a tiny but well-kept gray asbestos-siding house in a lower-middle -class neighborhood built in the fifties off Vance Jackson Road. As we pulled into the concrete driveway, I decided my first act as head of Ricardo’s, Inc., would be to give Gerald a raise, because he was either grossly underpaid or was socking away a ton of money.

He met us as the door wearing a navy-blue suit, white shirt, conservative tie, and that deep side-parted, Ward Cleaver hairstyle he used Dippity Do on to keep motionless. The hand that shook mine was damp with perspiration. He flashed a shy smile. Poor guy was nervous. I wondered if the attorney had passed along my message. I wanted to reassure him but remembered I had to be careful because I still didn’t want Trudy to know. “How are you holding up, Gerald?”

“Great, just great,” he stuttered, then caught himself, obviously wondering if that sounded too crass. “I mean, I have so much work to do that I haven’t had time to really think about losing him. I mean, there’s just so much to get arranged, and there’s the daily crises that crop up that take my attention. I mean—”

I put a hand on his shoulder. “We know what you mean. It’s easier to keep busy. I imagine it will really hit you hard once you get back to work at your Broadway office and he’s not there.”

It sounded a little awkward, but he got my message—he wouldn’t be fired. His eyes brightened, and he smiled a little more confidently. “Thank you, Reyn.”

Trudy’s eyebrows drew together. She knew she was missing something but wasn’t sure what. I moved out of the small foyer and into the living room, choosing the worn but clean plaid love seat. Gerald had to be on Scythe and Crandall’s suspect list, but I didn’t see him ever having the balls to bury a brush in his boss’s back. I knew from reading enough true crime that a meek personality often hid homicidal tendencies, but I couldn’t make the stretch in Gerald’s case. Ricardo’s murder was obviously a murder of the moment, using a weapon of convenience. What would have tripped Gerald’s temper? Love or money? I couldn’t see him harboring a secret crush on Ricardo all these years, then finally coming out with it. Even if he had, Ricardo was the kind of man who, despite his machismo, would’ve dealt with it kindly. He genuinely liked and respected Gerald. I’d seen it every day at work for years. On the other hand, if Ricardo had made an unwanted pass at Gerald, I saw Gerald being embarrassed, not bloodthirsty. If it had been a money issue, Gerald finally having enough of his millionaire boss taking advantage of him, I saw Ricardo not realizing how cheap he was being and easily increasing Gerald’s salary. Ricardo had such tunnel vision that I doubted it ever occurred to him that he was underpaying the man who was keeping his business running on a daily basis. No, I’d bet Gerald had never asked for a raise in his life.

I just couldn’t make it fit. Or maybe I didn’t want to.

Trudy and Gerald were making their way slowly into the living room. Trudy was asking him how he had found out about Ricardo’s murder.

“I went into work that morning, and the police stopped me.” He sat on a recliner while Trudy sat down next to me.

“I’m sorry, Gerald, I didn’t see you there,” I said, racking my memory for something other than the sight of Ricardo’s bloody body.

“I was sitting in a police car when you came out of the salon. I knew when I saw your face how bad it must be. The police wouldn’t tell me. I guess they think I might have done it.”

Gerald stared at his hands, which he’d clasped between his knees.

“Well, if it’s any consolation, you’re below me on the suspect list.”

“I suppose you have more of a motive than I do,” he commented.

Uh-oh.
Trudy looked at him sharply, then questioningly at me. I forced a smile. “You’re right. I was well known for locking horns with Ricardo a lot more times than you ever did. I suppose the cops would look there first, huh?”

“But that’s not what I mean—” Gerald drew his eyebrows together in confusion. He must have assumed I’d told my best friend about my inheritance.

“Oh, don’t try to excuse my bad temper.” I waved my hand at him, hoping to wave away any more that he might say. “You saw it enough times when I worked at Ricardo’s.”

Gerald smiled then. “It was good entertainment.”

Oh, swell. If I ever got tired of styling hair, I could just sign on as entertainer on my prickly personality alone.

“Maybe they’ll hire you at Illusions,” Trudy put in with a cruel grin. She was mad at me.

“I think Ricardo really missed you when you left. He’d comment on how calm and quiet it was every day for nearly a year,” Gerald reminisced.

A lump rose unexpectedly in my throat. Tears welled up in my eyes. Why this would make me want to cry when his dead body didn’t, don’t ask me. A forgiving Trudy patted me on the shoulder. That took care of it. I hated to show weakness, and crying was weak in my book. I blinked the tears away, then focused back on how I could get the key to Ricardo’s house from Gerald without letting Trudy in on the inheritance deal.

Trudy did it for me. “We’re trying to find out who killed Ricardo,” she said to steer the subject away from emotions to action. Every now and then, I was glad I dragged her along.

“Really?” Gerald moved his hands to his knees and leaned forward. “Isn’t that dangerous?”

“I’d call it defensive,” Trudy put in smartly. “Since they really think Reyn did it.”

Oh, good, Trude.
Now Gerald was really going to want to slip me the key so I could cover up my murder tracks. My gratitude toward her dissolved.

“Why? What evidence do they have besides the obvious motive of—”

“Professional jealousy? None, really.”

Gerald looked terribly confused now. “But you weren’t jealous.”

“How right you are. Besides which, they’d have to draw a list of the hundreds of salon owners who were professionally jealous of Ricardo.”

“But don’t the police know that you—”

“Used to work for Ricardo? Of course, that’s why I’m first on the list.”

He opened his mouth, but I jumped in before he could say anything more.

“Gerald, did Ricardo ever mention pudding to you?”

“Pudding?” Poor man’s head was about to start spinning on his shoulders, I was jerking him in so many different directions. He glanced at the bottle of Mylanta on the kitchen counter we could just see through the doorway. “What flavor?”

“Any flavor.”

Gerald shook his head, completely dumbfounded by my nonsensical line of questioning. “I don’t recall him ever eating pudding or talking about it.”

“How about political races?”

“Pudding in political races?”

“No, just any political races.”

Gerald paused to think. I appreciated that. Maybe I should do more of it. The pausing, that is. Suddenly, he brightened. “As a matter of fact, lately he’d been a little worked up over the race for the state representative’s position that’s going to open now that Juan Sifuentes announced he’s going to resign due to illness. It surprised me, because Ricardo never really cared about politics. As a small-businessman, he donated to some races when his customers or acquaintances were running, but it was very hands-off. He’d tell me to send a modest check here or there. He’d attend the parties for his own PR but he never actively campaigned for anyone.”

“What makes you think this state rep’s race was different?”

“He just talked about it a lot. Asked me and people around the salon questions, like what kind of person they’d vote for. Now that you’re making me think about it, he tried to make it sound casual, but there was something urgent underlying it all.”

“Who’s running in that race?”

“I don’t think anyone has declared yet.”

“None of his clients was getting ready to run, were they?” I racked my brain for anyone on the list who might be a potential candidate.

“Not that I know of. But you know, Reyn, Ricardo kept his client list private. No one really knew it. They went in and out the back door and often were there after hours.”

We three sat in silence for a moment, not knowing what all that meant, if anything.

“Did Ricardo ever mention two big mistakes he made in his life?”

Gerald laughed at that. “Ricardo didn’t have any flaws, much less did he ever make a mistake.”

I smiled. That was the Ricardo we knew and loved. Gerald clearly wasn’t Ricardo’s confidant, but I remembered what Janice said about
mi cara
and thought I’d give it a shot. “Gerald, did Ricardo have any woman who was special to him?”

Gerald didn’t even pause. “Not ever. He dated, as you know, but he never got serious with any woman. If she tried to, that was the end of her.”

“You don’t think that he might have been secretive about a woman, taking her only to out-of-the-way places and his home? He could’ve been in a passionate affair and no one would know?”

“No. He dated, sure, lots. But there was no special woman now. I think he gave his heart away a long, long time ago and never got it back. Never wanted it back, really.”

“Why do you think this?”

He shrugged. “An impression. An instinct.”

“Or experience,” Trudy put in after remaining uncharacteristically silent through my interrogation. Now she smiled gently at Gerald. “You know because you gave your heart away a long time ago, too, didn’t you?”

Oh, my Lord, now my romantic friend was going to turn this into
True Confessions.
Gag.

“Maybe,” he answered, reclasping his hands at his knees.

I had to get out of there before they got too mushy. I excused myself to go to the bathroom, and they barely noticed. After I’d washed up in the bathroom that was tiled from floor to ceiling in 1970s avocado green, I ambled through the kitchen, taking my time to avoid the lovey-dovey conversation. The kitchen was extremely organized; even the sugar, coffee, and flour canisters were labeled. Each copper canister was marked with electrical tape regarding its fullness level. It made my cozy kitchen seem haphazard and cluttered. In my peripheral vision, I took in the keys on a rack by the garage door, a rack for baseball caps, and a rack for umbrellas. Keys? I felt temptation drawing me to the wall. If the flour was labeled, wouldn’t he label keys, too? The concept seemed foreign to me. I had reams of keys, and if I didn’t know what they went to, well, too bad. Sometimes when I had to let myself into my sister’s house, I had to try a dozen different keys first.

I listened for their conversation and heard that he went to the same church and saw his long-held love and her family of four every Sunday. What torture.
Why do that to yourself, Gerald?
How would I know, I’d never been in love, and from the sounds of it, I didn’t want to be.

Those keys were calling me from the rack. I ambled back there and looked from afar. I saw each key had a colored tag. Maybe they were just color-coded, with Gerald being the only one who could break the code. I squinted. I saw words. I took a step forward. I saw “Broadway salon,” “Thousand Oaks salon,” “1604 salon” on red tags. “Ricardo’s office” was attached to a silver tag.
Hmm.
I looked for another silver tag.
Bingo.
“Ricardo’s house, back door.” My fingers wiggled. This had to be a sign. It was meant to be.

Should I?

This way, Gerald wouldn’t be implicated if we were caught, I reasoned. I was doing a humanitarian thing by borrowing the key.

Okay.
I snatched it and tucked it into the front pocket of my blouse, buttoning it carefully.

They were quiet in the living room.
Uh-oh.
I walked back into the room, probably too quickly. They both looked up.

“What took you so long?” Trudy asked.

“Just giving y’all time for your love talk. You know I don’t know anything about that stuff.”

They shared a wiggly eyebrow look.

“What?” I demanded. They both shook their heads in pity. I cleared my throat. “We’ll let you get back to work, Gerald.”

Trudy was looking at my chest. She cocked her head. “Reyn, why are you lopsided?”

Big mouth.
My hands flew to the pockets that did ride right over my barely-B-cups. “Uh…”

“Did you just stuff your bra?” Trudy asked, voice of experience, apparently, although why she’d ever have to stuff hers with the puppies she possessed, I had no idea.