Tressed to Kill (2 page)

“Highlights,” I said. “She needs to spiff up for the town hall meeting, and her snooty salon outside of town couldn’t work her in. So, she’s taking advantage of Mom’s good nature.”
“And not for the first time,” Althea observed.
As if she heard us, Constance DuBois looked over. She seemed to hesitate at sight of Althea, but she nodded and said, “Hello, Althea.”
“Connie,” Althea acknowledged her.
“Don’t call me—” A ping indicated an incoming message and she broke off to read it.
“Constance,” my mom said, trying to pry her client’s attention from her electronic gadget. “I’ve been trying to tell you. Your hair is overprocessed, and I’m not sure—”
“When I want your opinion, I’ll ask for it,” Constance said without looking up from her BlackBerry. “Just do the highlights, Violetta. God knows that shouldn’t be too difficult, even for you. Or, if you’re not up to it, let Grace take care of it. At least she has a license.”
Anger made the palms of my hands itch. My mother was the best stylist east of the Mississippi, even if she’d never had any formal training. Did Van Gogh have a license to practice his art? Did Shakespeare? The fact that I had logged the fifteen hundred hours in a beauty school per Georgia state law and earned my cosmetology license didn’t mean I was half the beautician my mom was. Althea’s hand on my shoulder restrained me from giving Mrs. High-and-Mighty DuBois what for.
“Violetta can handle this,” she whispered.
“On your head be it, Constance,” Mom said mildly. “So to speak.”
Punching numbers into her phone, Constance let herself be led to the shampoo area. Rachel massaged her head while Violetta mixed the highlights. When Constance interrupted the shampoo for the third time to take a phone call, Rachel gave me a speaking look. I gave her a thumb’s up for her restraint, and she grinned, showing braces with black bands to match her goth hair and makeup. Wrapping a towel around Constance’s head, she held her hand to her ear like she was making a phone call. I nodded. Cell phone in hand, Rachel slipped out the side door.
Constance settled in at Mom’s station, looking frailer with wet hair outlining her skull and her thin neck exposed. “Let’s get on with it,” she said. “I cannot be late for the town hall meeting. There is critical business to conduct this evening.”
“And the town would up and disappear from the map if she wasn’t there,” Althea whispered. In a normal voice she said, “Come on back, Willa. I’m ready to do your facial now. My, have you found a new night cream? You look fresh as a magnolia blossom.”
Since Willa Catherton was eighty-three if she was a day, likening her complexion to a flower petal was a bit over the top, but it made Miss Willa beam as she nudged her walker toward the spa room. “It’s very kind of you to say so, Althea,” she said.
I busied myself with end-of-day activities at the counter, inventorying supplies, checking the cash register receipts, and reviewing the next day’s appointments. Mom finished applying Constance’s highlights and was tucking her under the heat lamp when Vivaldi played again. Constance glanced at the number, and her brows twitched together. She took the call, sounding less autocratic than usual. “Hello? But I’m—You’re here? Well, okay.” She cinched the tie belt of her cape more firmly about her waist and headed for the door.
“Constance,” my mom objected. “Those highlights are very time-sensitive. You can’t—”
“I’ll be right back,” Constance said. “Surely a minute or two can’t make that much difference.” And as she stepped out the door, shutting it firmly behind her, a man’s footsteps could be heard on the porch. Everyone left in the shop, including Stella and her nail clients and two women in the waiting area, edged a couple of steps closer to the front windows, trying to hear Constance’s conversation on the veranda. The sun was setting at such an angle that Constance and her companion—it was clearly a man of above-average height—were nothing but silhouettes against the wooden blinds. His unintelligible voice came through as a dark grumble, while hers was higher, tinged with anger and maybe a bit of fear. That seemed completely out of character, so I dismissed the idea.
Constance slipped back in so suddenly she caught us by surprise. She marched back to her seat, twisting the pearl ring on her pinkie.
“You know, at Chez Pierre they offer the clients beverages,” she said, looking around as if expecting a mint julep to appear, or at least a tall iced tea loaded with sugar.
My mom gripped her lips together and began sliding the foils from Constance’s hair.
“And their décor is so modern and clean,” she added. “You should take a run out there, Violetta, and take notes on their decorating scheme. It’s got an Asian feel to it that’s very twenty-first century. This place feels more like . . . like a frumpy hotel lobby.”
“Now just a cotton-picking minute—” my mom started.
I interrupted her before she could assault a paying client, no matter how obnoxious. “Our customers like the homey feel, Constance,” I said.
“Homey,” she sneered. “What would you know about homemaking, Grace Ann? You couldn’t hold your marriage together long enough to save for a house, never mind have children and turn it into a home. My mother, may she rest in peace, always said that when a man strays, you know that he’s not getting his needs met at home.” She ended with a pious sniff.
My face burned like she’d slapped me. “Why you—”
“Ow!” Constance yelped as my mom started rinsing her hair.
“Oh, pardon me, Constance, was that too warm?” Mom asked sweetly.
Yay, Mom!
Constance glared at her through narrowed eyes but settled back against the sink without saying anything more.
I stalked to the counter, and a frozen silence pervaded the usually cheerful salon as Mom trimmed Constance’s hair and pulled out her dryer. The silence was broken by a collective gasp. I cut my eyes toward the women and stifled my own gasp as the first dried strands floated to Constance’s shoulders.
“Oh, Constance, I am so sorry,” my mother said, barely able to control her distress.
“Sorry? About what?” Constance looked up from her BlackBerry and stared at her reflection for one frozen minute. “Orange! My hair has orange stripes. You did this on purpose, Violetta Terhune.” She surged to her feet.
“No! I’m sure it’s because you spent that time on the veranda—”
“It is not
my
fault that you are an incompetent beautician, Violetta,” Constance said, tearing the cape from around her neck with the ripping sound of outraged Velcro.
“I can fix it—”
“Fix it! The town hall meeting starts in twenty minutes. Besides, I wouldn’t let you touch my hair again if you were the last beautician between here and Richmond. My gardener could do a better job with his pruning shears.” Tears of rage glinted in her eyes.
“I like the orange,” Rachel said, offering a thumb’s up from near the sink. “It’s got a cool vibe.”
A new voice sounded above the babble. “What’s going on? Mother, what’s the matter?”
The small crowd parted to let the newcomer through. Simone DuBois, a younger, dark-haired version of Constance who’d gone to high school with Vonda and me, let out a small shriek. “Mother! Oh my God, your hair is orange!”
“I noticed that, thank you, Simone.” Constance’s tone had gone from near hysterical to frigid.
“I’m sure we can sue,” Simone offered, setting down her burgundy tote to pull out a notebook. I spotted the pointy nose and silky topknot of a Yorkshire terrier, tucked in with her wallet and keys and Kotex, no doubt. Dog as accessory—must be some fashion habit she’d picked up while working in New York, along with the black pencil skirt and stiletto heels. The dog glared at me with its pop eyes. “Mental distress, negligence . . .”
Just like a lawyer: when in doubt, sue somebody.
“I’ve got a better idea,” Constance said. “Give me that.” She grabbed the notebook. “I’m going to make sure this place is shut down and stays that way. My Chi O sorority sister, Barbara Mayhew, is a member of the State Board of Cosmetology licensing, if I’m not mistaken. I’m sure she’d be appalled to hear about the violations that abound in this . . . this collection of misfits masquerading as a legitimate salon. First and foremost, the ‘proprietor’ ”—she sneered—“doesn’t have a cosmetology license.”
She scribbled on the pad and moved farther into the room, Simone trailing behind her. “That cord is a hazard,” she noted, “and I’m sure those toxic chemicals should be secured in some way.” She gestured with her pen at the hair-coloring supplies peeking from an overhead cabinet. “No illuminated emergency exit sign. And—”
A
rrrrowf
interrupted her as the Yorkie struggled out of Simone’s tote and beelined for Beauty, who was observing the proceedings with a total lack of interest from beneath Stella’s table. As the tiny dog approached, yapping in what it no doubt thought was a menacing way, Beauty sat up, licked a paw, and smoothed the whiskers to one side of her pushed-in Persian nose. The bundle of black and tan fur launched itself at her, and Beauty dispatched it with one swipe of her paw. Then she leaped gracefully onto Stella’s lap and looked down her nose at the Yorkie, who was yipping and whining, a single drop of blood on its nose.
“—and a cat!” Constance wrote triumphantly as Simone wailed, “Peaches!”
She did her best to squat in the tight skirt, and the dog scooted toward her, whimpering. She gathered it into her arms and found a tissue to blot its nose. “Are you okay, my little dumpling?” She nuzzled the dog to her cheek. Apparently deciding her little dumpling would survive, she spun on her heel. “Come on, Mother. We’re going to be late to the meeting.”
“Your salon is done for, Violetta,” Constance spat, reluctantly following her daughter. “Just wait—”
“Wait for what?” Althea appeared in the door of the spa room, Miss Willa hovering behind her.
Constance narrowed her eyes at the sight of Althea’s still figure and the calmness in her deep voice. Then, catching a glimpse of her orange-striped hair in a mirror, passion overcame caution and she said, “Wait for what’s coming to her. She’s going to get her just desserts!”
“I don’t think you want to be talking about ‘just desserts, ’ Connie,” Althea said.
Something in her voice glued my eyes to her face. It revealed nothing.
A line of tension connected the two women, and I don’t know what would have happened if my mother hadn’t said with dignity, “Violetta’s is closed. It’s time for the town hall meeting.” She made a shooing motion, and everyone drifted toward the doors.
The customers left first, twittering with excitement, and I knew the whole of St. Elizabeth would have the garbled details of Constance Dubois’s visit to Violetta’s before the town hall meeting was over. Althea helped Miss Willa down the stairs and returned to hug my mom.
“Don’t you fret, Vi,” she said, studying my mom’s face. “Things’ll work out. Have faith.”
“I do,” Mom said with a real smile.
Stella left next, moaning and apologizing that Beauty’s presence had gotten Violetta in trouble. “I wouldn’t have had it happen for the world, you know I wouldn’t,” she said, Beauty cradled in her arms.
“I know. Don’t worry about it. We like having Beauty around,” Violetta comforted her. “She adds a note of class.”
With a glance at her watch and another mumbled apology, Stella took off down the stairs, anxious to pick up her daughter from band practice.
“Well, I think that woman was a real . . . witch,” Rachel announced, changing her word choice at the last moment when she felt my mom’s eyes on her. The multiple piercings in the seventeen-year-old’s ears glinted against the unrelieved black of her tee shirt and jeans. Even her high-top sneakers kept with the goth theme. “All that fuss over an orange stripe or two in her hair. Why, I know kids who would pay to have you do their hair like that.”
“You okay, Mom?” I asked, helping her lock up after Rachel disappeared down the stairs, hopped on her pink scooter, and motored away.
She smiled wearily. “I’ve been better, but this, too, shall pass.”
“Not if Constance DuBois has anything to say about it,” I said, punching a throw pillow into shape on one of the waiting-room chairs.
“We can talk about this in the morning, Grace. Let’s get over to the hall.”
“Wouldn’t want to miss the fireworks,” I agreed.

Chapter Two

FIREWORKS DIDN’T COME CLOSE TO DESCRIBING the town hall meeting. Vesuvian explosion, maybe. Constance DuBois sat on the stage with the mayor and a few other key players, including a Morestuf vice president. She wore a beigey blond wig in a shag style that would have been right at home in a 1980s disco. Heaven knows where she dug it up at such short notice, but I seemed to remember that her mother had died of lung cancer. After one searing glare at my mom and me when we took our seats, she avoided looking in our direction.
The evening started with a knock-down-drag-out between Vonda’s vociferous group supporting funding for school computers and Constance and her cronies lobbying for PRAM monies. After the vote, Vonda sat with her arms crossed over her chest, scowling. Next on the evening’s fight card—I mean agenda—was a face-off between the Morestuf contingent and the Save Our Downtown Supporters (SODS). The crowd seemed to be about fifty-fifty on the issue, with the Morestuf lobbyists touting the cheap price of goods and the convenience of everything-in-one-place shopping, and the SODS citing statistics about how much money tourism brought into St. Elizabeth and holding up the idol of tradition.
The Morestuf VP turned puce when Constance DuBois informed him that “St. Elizabeth doesn’t need or want the cheap goods made in some sweat shop that you sell to the undiscriminating.” He retaliated with something about “elitist snob” and “foe of capitalist competition” and “out of touch with the reality of most of the area’s demographic.” I think he meant we had some poor people in town who couldn’t afford the downtown shops. He was right about that; my budget was more in line with Morestuf prices than those in Filomena’s Fashion Cove across the square from Violetta’s.
The town voted to postpone a decision on the Morestuf store until a committee could generate a report about potential impacts to the environment and the economy. When my mom jabbed me with her elbow, I raised my hand to volunteer for the committee, noticing that Simone was waving her hand, too, like the spring-butt she had been in high-school. I hoped she wouldn’t bring the rabid Yorkie to committee meetings.
The crowd started dispersing shortly afterward, even though a few agenda items remained. Mom insisted on staying because she wanted to chat with a couple of the SODS and set up a strategy-planning meeting. I told her I’d wait and walk back with her. My apartment was only two blocks past her house. With the crowd having dwindled to a handful of people, and my mom in the center of a cluster of agitated business owners near the stage, I ducked out to find the restroom.
I took the stairs to the third floor in an attempt to get a little exercise. I never quite seem to make it to the gym, but I do leg lifts while waiting in line and triceps presses with cans of tomato sauce during commercial breaks on
Desperate Housewives
, and that keeps me in reasonable shape. The stairwells were vaguely depressing in the way of uncared-for spaces, and smelled faintly of cigarette smoke. Was it new, illicit smoke, I wondered, or had it permeated the walls in the 1950s and ’60s when every town employee probably had a pack-a-day habit?
Stepping out of the stairwell into a narrow side corridor, I heard arguing. I slowed, caught by the tension in the raised voices coming from one of the small offices across from the restrooms. A line of light snuck out from between the not-quite-closed door and the jamb.
“Your opposition is costing us time and money,” a man said.
I recognized the Texas accent: Mr. Morestuf.
“Our shareholders want profits, not lawsuits. We can make it worth your while if you persuade these Save Our Downtown loonies to pipe down. A bank can turn a huge profit with a project of this size.”
“You can stuff your profit. This town values its heritage and will never vote to approve a Morestuf Mart. I’ll see to it.”
The woman’s voice was even more familiar. It had the same steely edge as when she told Violetta the salon was done for. I wondered if her enmity rattled Mr. Morestuf the way it did me. Apparently not.
He said meaningfully, “You’d be smarter to throw in with us. You might not like the consequences if you don’t.”
“Is that a threat?” Constance’s voice was incredulous.
I heard a smile in the man’s reply. “Why Mrs. DuBois, we are the largest and most powerful retailer in the United States. We don’t need to threaten anyone.”
His words said one thing, but his tone of voice said another.
“I don’t like being threatened, Mr. Richardson, and I make you a solemn promise here and now that you will never build a Morestuf in St. Elizabeth.”
Footsteps approached the door, and I hastily ducked into the nearest bathroom, missing his last words and Constance’s retort. My heart hammered at having nearly been caught eavesdropping, and I leaned against the door for a moment until Mr. Morestuf’s heavy tread receded. Turning, I was momentarily confused by the bank of gleaming urinals on the wall. Oops. The room smelled strongly of disinfectant. I jerked open the door and hustled out, walking smash into Constance coming out of the ladies’ room. I put out a hand to steady her, and she wrenched away.
“Watch where you’re—” She broke off as she recognized me. “Oh, it’s you.”
Her eyes seemed puffy, and foundation had rubbed off the tip of her nose. Had she been crying? “I’m sorry—” I started.
Not even pausing to say something scathing about my presence in the men’s room, she wheeled and tip-tapped down the hall in her tan pumps. The ladies’ room door swung open again, and Cathy Finnegan, a local judge I knew slightly from church, emerged, wiping her hands down the side of her jeans to dry them.
“What was that all about?” she asked, staring after Constance.
“Heck if I know,” I said.
We chatted for ten minutes or so about her upcoming trip to do missionary work in Haiti before she said her farewells and I finally made it into the ladies’ room.
WHEN I RETURNED TO THE AUDITORIUM, MY MOM was alone and ready to leave.
“Thanks for waiting,” she said. She draped a white cardigan around her shoulders and gathered up her tote, stuffed with her knitting and files for the SODS project.
We left as a janitor with string mop in hand waved at us from the stage and shut off the lights in the auditorium. Eerie exit lighting illuminated the hall as we made our way to the front entrance. The stone floors glistened wetly, so rather than dirty the clean floor, we headed for the back door that opened to the parking lot. Night air, fragrant with gardenia and jasmine, washed over us in a warm gust.
“We’re in for a storm,” Violetta announced, massaging her left shoulder, famous town-wide as a predictor of bad weather.
I caught a hint of ozone in the air and breathed deeply, feeling like I’d been holding my breath ever since Constance DuBois entered the salon. “We need the rain.” Browning lawns and wilting shrubs testified to an unusually dry spring. The town’s gardeners—and they were legion—had probably gotten together for a quick rain dance ceremony.
We started across the parking lot, the rising wind pushing us. Even though it was after nine, the asphalt still retained the heat of a sultry May day, and its tackiness grabbed at our shoes. Yuck. Only a handful of cars remained.
“You doing okay?” I asked Mom, giving her a sideways look.
The sodium-vapor lights in the parking lot cast an orangey glow that softened her outline. Her glasses had settled halfway down her nose, and her cardigan sat askew on her shoulders. With her hair worked into tufty spikes with styling product, she looked like a cozy Beatrix Potter hedgehog.
“I think we can beat Morestuf,” she said, dodging the real issue. “The SODS are going to circulate a petition, and we’re all going to review our pricing policies. Something that Morestuf man said stuck with me. We shouldn’t be setting our prices to earn as much as we can from the tourists. We’ve got to remember the people who live here year-round, especially the ones less fortunate than we are.”
“Mom, you already—” A sound that was half-groan, half-gargle caught my attention. I looked around. We had reached the far edge of the parking lot where it butted up against Carver Square, a small plot of grass and shrubs with ornamental benches. A lone car, a dark Jaguar, was parked across two spaces in an attempt, I guessed, to avoid door dings. The sound seemed to come from the driver’s side of the car.
Mom and I glanced at each other and, with one accord, leaned to see around the trunk. The first thing I noticed was a shoe, a pump, lying by the rear tire. As my eyes scanned the ground, I picked out a bare foot and then a glimmer of paleness that must be a leg.
“Someone’s hurt,” Mom said. She started toward the supine figure, dropped to her knees, and put a hand on its shoulder. “Are you okay? Can you hear me? Ooh!”
A crack of thunder made me jump as lightning illuminated the waxy face of Constance DuBois and my mother kneeling beside the body, staring at her uplifted hand coated with blood. Before my vision returned to normal, I had my cell phone out and was dialing 911.
MOM INSISTED ON DRAPING HER CARDIGAN OVER Constance’s face once I ascertained that she was gone by feeling for a pulse on her neck. Then, she let me put an arm around her shoulders and lead her to the closest bench in Carver Square while we waited for the police to arrive. She was shivering. When she couldn’t find a tissue in her tote, she wiped her bloodied hand on the grass, dragging it back and forth numerous times. Lightning came more often now, although the rain held off, and the look of confusion and sadness on her face made me ache.
“Poor Constance,” she said.
“Poor Simone.” I thought how devastated I’d be if something happened to Mom and conjured up real sympathy for Constance’s daughter.
“I wonder what happened? It wasn’t a heart attack.”
Not with all that blood. “Maybe she tripped and banged her head.”
“Mmm.”
A brief silence fell, broken only by the barrage of thunder, and then Mom said what we’d both been thinking. “If only we’d been a few minutes earlier.”
If only. Two of the saddest words in the English language. What if we’d come out five minutes earlier? I watched the wind dance an empty plastic bag across the park until my ears picked up the sound of sirens drawing closer. I stood and waved my arm as a police car skidded into the town hall parking lot, followed by a second car driving more cautiously. The first fat raindrops plopped onto my head as the blue and red lights swirled around me and then the skies opened up. Within seconds, before the policeman even opened his door, I was drenched.
Just great. Could this day get any worse?
Apparently it could.
“Grace, darlin’,” a deep voice drawled as a tall figure stepped out of the police car. “You know I’m always happy to get together for dinner, shug. Or breakfast.” The voice leered. “You don’t have to make 911 calls to have an excuse to see me.”
Hank. My ex-husband. One of St. Elizabeth’s finest.