Black and Blueberry Die (A Fresh-Baked Mystery Book 11) Page 4

  As Phyllis pulled the Lincoln into the driveway back home, the first thing she noticed was that the front door was closed. They had been leaving the wooden door open and hooking the screen door while the central unit wasn’t working so that air would circulate better through the house. The sight of the closed door raised her hopes, and as she and Sam walked through the garage entrance into the kitchen, she felt cool air blowing from the vents in the ceiling.

  A big grin appeared on Sam’s face as he said, “Doesn’t that feel nice?”

  Carolyn came down the hall from the living room to meet them. She waved a hand and said, “I guess you can tell the air conditioning man has been here.”

  “He got it fixed that quickly?” Phyllis said.

  “He just had to replace two little parts. A solarnoid and a capacitater, I think he called them.”

  “You mean a solenoid and a capacitor,” Sam said.

  “Isn’t that what I said?” Carolyn responded with a glare.

  A quick glance from Phyllis told Sam he would be wise not to pursue this line of conversation. He smiled and nodded and said, “Well, I’m sure glad it’s fixed, that’s all I got to say.”

  “So am I,” Phyllis said. “Is he going to send me a bill?”

  “That’s right. I would have paid him myself, but you said to do it the other way.” Carolyn paused. “How did it go at the lawyer’s office?”

  “Interesting,” Phyllis said.

  Carolyn gave her a look. “You’re going to investigate that poor young woman’s murder, aren’t you?”

  “I want to see justice done,” Phyllis said, “and I have a feeling that so far, maybe it hasn’t been.”

  ••●••

  Carolyn had already started lunch, bacon tomato pie, along with a spinach salad that included chunks of pear, bleu cheese crumbles, walnuts, and a refreshing lime dressing.

  As they sat down to eat before Phyllis and Sam pondered their next move in the case, Carolyn said, “I’ve been thinking about that magazine you work for, Phyllis.”

  “A Taste of Texas? What about it?”

  “Well, you know, I haven’t entered any of their recipe contests since you started writing your column.”

  Phyllis thought about it and realized her friend was right. If Carolyn had come up with a recipe she liked well enough to enter in a contest, she would have said something about it, and she hadn’t.

  “I’m sorry,” Phyllis said instantly, feeling a bit guilty because she hadn’t noticed. “You haven’t stopped entering because of me, have you?”

  “Well, I thought it would look bad and probably wouldn’t even be allowed. You know, all sorts of contests and sweepstakes have fine print about how employees of the company sponsoring them, and even relatives of employees, are prohibited from entering. I think it may even be a law.”

  Phyllis shook her head and said, “I don’t think it’s a law. More like a policy. And we’re not related.”

  “I know that, of course. But we’re friends, and for goodness’ sake, I live in your house. If I entered a contest and won, and the connection between us got back to the magazine, we might both get in trouble.”

  “My editor knows you and I are friends,” Phyllis pointed out. “I’ve mentioned you several times in the column and used some of your recipes.”

  “I know, and I appreciate that. But I miss the competition. I like the feeling of sending something in and hoping that I might win.”

  Phyllis could understand that. For a long time, she had entered her recipes in various contests, and it was always exciting. The thrill of competition, they called it, and there was a lot of truth to that old saying.

  “After lunch—which is delicious, by the way—I’ll get one of the issues of the magazine and look at it. I really don’t think you should have to give up entering their contests because of me.”

  “Neither do I,” Sam said. “And these hot dog tacos are mighty good, by the way. I like how you can put two things together you don’t normally think of that way, and it turns out to taste great.”

  “Fusion,” Carolyn said. “Although this is a rather down to earth version of it.”

  “Whatever you call it, I like it.”

  The most recent issue of A Taste of Texas was in the living room. After cleaning up the lunch dishes, Phyllis found it and turned to the pages containing information about the current contest, which was looking for fruit pie recipes. She couldn’t find anything about friends of the magazine’s employees being prohibited from entering, or even relatives of employees.

  She pointed that out to Carolyn and said, “I promise you, I’m just a tiny fish in this pond. I couldn’t pull any strings to help you win even if I wanted to.”

  “And you don’t,” Carolyn said.

  “Of course not. We’ve both always competed fair and square.”

  “That’s the only way winning means anything.” Carolyn took another look at the magazine. “There’s still a week until the deadline for sending in entries. I’d better get busy!”

  “Do you have anything in mind?”

  “As a matter of fact, I do,” Carolyn said, but she didn’t elaborate. She’d always been tight-lipped about recipes when she was working on them, and Phyllis knew she wasn’t going to change at this late date.

  When Carolyn had gone back into the kitchen, Sam joined Phyllis in the living room.

  “Get it all squared away?” he asked.

  “I think so. She’s going to enter the current contest. I’m sorry she felt like she couldn’t do that until now.”

  “You didn’t know she’d stopped on account of you writin’ for the magazine.”

  “That’s just it. I should have known.”

  “Well, it’s settled now,” Sam said. “How do you reckon we ought to start on the other chore that we’re lookin’ at?”

  Phyllis knew he was talking about investigating Roxanne Jackson’s murder. She thought about it for a moment and then said, “I want to take a look at the crime scene.”

  ••●••

  Paul’s Beauty Salon, located on Camp Bowie Boulevard in west Fort Worth, was about a thirty-minute drive away from Phyllis’s house in Weatherford, and a significant part of that time was spent navigating through the traffic that clogged South Main Street where it crossed Interstate 20. Phyllis remembered quite well when there hadn’t been anything past Tin Top Road except a pleasant drive through the country to Granbury, but huge shopping centers and tons of traffic were part of the price of progress, she supposed.

  Although sometimes she wondered if maybe that price was a little too high.

  But by two o’clock in the afternoon, she and Sam were on Camp Bowie, this time in Sam’s pickup with him at the wheel, as they looked for the beauty salon where Roxanne Jackson had been killed. Phyllis had looked up the address before they left and programmed it into the GPS app on her phone, even though Sam had assured her he could find the place. He really was a bit of a “livin’, breathin’ GPS”, as he sometimes claimed, but he wasn’t infallible.

  Camp Bowie Boulevard was named for the Army camp established on the west side of Fort Worth during World War I, Phyllis knew. It had been a sprawling base covering much of the area where the Botanic Gardens were now located, and its establishment had sparked a housing boom that had extended the town for miles in that direction. A lot of wealthy people had flocked to the area, and many of those old-money families still lived on the west side. The boulevard wasn’t as ritzy as it once had been—nowhere was, Phyllis thought—but there were still quite a few stretches of high-end establishments that catered to the wealthy.

  Paul’s Beauty Salon was located in one of those shopping centers, although it was in its own brick building at one end of the center. The nearest business was an expensive dress shop, flanked on the other side by a jewelry store. All the businesses shared the same parking lot, and there were quite a few cars in it this afternoon, mostly luxury sedans but also a few crossovers and SUVs.

 
“We didn’t think this through,” Sam said as he pulled into the parking lot. “This ol’ pickup of mine is gonna stand out like the proverbial sore thumb. We should’ve brought your car.”

  “That’s all right. I don’t much like driving in a lot of traffic anymore. If people want to be snooty and look down their noses at your pickup, let them go ahead and do it. It doesn’t mean anything to me except that they’re stuck-up, and that’s their problem.”

  “That’s sorta the way I feel about it,” Sam said with a smile. He parked between a Lexus and a Cadillac Escalade. “Do you want me to come in with you or stay out here?”

  Phyllis thought about it for a moment, then said, “Why don’t you stay out here, if you don’t mind? I’m going to try to get an appointment to have my hair done, so right now all I’ll be doing is glancing around the place, just to get it in my head so I can see if everything matches up with the transcript we read.”

  “Fine with me. I’ll have a look around the shoppin’ center, see if there’s anything that strikes me as funny.”

  Phyllis nodded and said, “That’s a good idea. We’ll meet back here.”

  “This isn’t the sort of place where you can just walk in and they’ll take care of you right away, though, is it?”

  “I doubt it. But I’ll see how long it’ll be before I can make an appointment.”

  “And while they’re doin’ your hair, you can do a little gossipin’ about the murder that took place here, right?”

  “That’s the idea,” Phyllis said. She got out of the pickup and walked toward the building.

  Chapter 6

  Phyllis had been in many beauty shops over the years, and to one extent or another, they all smelled the same, similar to chemical factories, with pungent fumes. The combination of excessive heat from all the hair dryers with chemicals used in hair dyes, hair straightening, permanent waves, and hairsprays created some interesting fumes. Paul’s Beauty Salon, being the upscale establishment it was, was obviously well ventilated and tried to mask that distinctive mixture of chemical scents with a pleasant peppermint aroma, but to Phyllis, as soon as she stepped into the place it still smelled like a beauty shop.

  The heavy wooden door with a double layer of stained glass slowly swung shut behind her. The floor was brilliantly polished wood as well. The lighting in the entrance foyer was subdued, although Phyllis could see through double glass doors into a much larger and better lit area where the beauticians’ chairs, wash stands, and hair dryers were arranged around the room. To Phyllis’s right in the reception area were a comfortable-looking leather loveseat and a pair of matching armchairs. To the left was a desk with a computer on it and a young woman with blue and purple hair behind it.

  She wore a small, floppy-brimmed hat that looked Sixties vintage to Phyllis. The hair on the left side of her head was blue, long, and straight, and hung down over her shoulder. The purple hair on the right side of her head was done in tightly braided corn rows. Her left nostril was pierced and had a tiny stud in it. A tattoo of some sort serpentined down her bare, muscular right arm. Despite all those things, which just looked odd to Phyllis, the young woman had a pretty face, beautiful brown eyes, and a friendly smile as she looked up from the computer monitor and said, “Hello. Can I help you?”

  “Yes, I’ve heard wonderful things about this salon and was hoping I could make an appointment to have my hair styled.”

  “Of course.” A look of concern appeared on the young woman’s face. “But I’m afraid we’re booked solid for the next two weeks.”

  Phyllis’s glance through the double glass doors had told her the salon was busy, with clients at most of the stations. Being the scene of a murder might have hurt business for a while, but that crime had taken place long enough ago that the effect had worn off. Anyway, as morbid as most people were these days, it was entirely possible the grisly notoriety might have been good for business.

  “I can put you on our cancellation list if you’d like,” the receptionist went on.

  “That would be very nice, dear.”

  The young woman tapped a few keys on the computer and asked, “What’s that name?”

  “Phyllis Newsom.” Phyllis wasn’t the sort to go incognito. Keeping up with a false identity would have been too much trouble, too difficult to remember.

  “And the phone number?”

  Phyllis gave the receptionist her cell phone number.

  “We’ll give you a call right away if something opens up. My name is Aurora, by the way.”

  “Why, that’s a lovely name.”

  “Thanks.” She grinned. “It’s kind of a hippy-dippy name, I know, but you can blame my grandma for it. My grandparents were hippies, I guess. Grandma insisted my parents call me Aurora. She said the name came to her in a vision from another spiritual plane.” Aurora lowered her voice to a conspiratorial tone. “I think she may have been dropping some acid back then, though.”

  This conversation was starting to make Phyllis feel old. Her own grandson was still a pre-schooler, and yet this young woman with her multi-colored hair was the granddaughter of someone who had to be roughly the same age as Phyllis.

  “You said you’d heard good things about the salon,” Aurora went on. “Do you mind me asking who told you about us?”

  Phyllis didn’t have an answer ready for that question. She said, “Oh, goodness, I don’t really remember, one of my friends who lives over here, it must have been. This has been a while back.” She paused. “But I do recall her mentioning that her favorite stylist was named Roxanne. If it would be possible to have her take care of me...”

  Phyllis knew that mentioning Roxanne’s name was a bit of a risk, but she thought she could chance it, as friendly and innocuous as the conversation had been so far.

  Aurora’s smile disappeared instantly, though. Her tone was professionally polite and nothing more as she said, “I’m afraid that won’t be possible. Roxanne doesn’t work here anymore.”

  “Did she go to another salon? My friend was really fond of her.”

  “I thought you said you couldn’t remember which friend recommended us.”

  “Well, I’m not sure—”

  Aurora cut her off with a curt head shake.

  “It doesn’t matter. Roxanne is dead.”

  Phyllis opened her eyes wider and tried to look shocked. She said, “Oh, I’m so sorry. I had no idea. I don’t know what happened, but I’m sorry if I upset you by mentioning your friend—”

  Aurora interrupted her again by saying, “Roxanne wasn’t my friend. She just worked here. Anyway, it was a while back. If anybody was upset, they’re over it by now.”

  The way she phrased it made it sound as if Roxanne’s murder hadn’t really bothered anyone at Paul’s Beauty Salon, Phyllis thought. There hadn’t been anything in what she had read to indicate that Roxanne wasn’t well-liked at the salon, but if that was true, it made things a bit more interesting. Someone must have had a good reason for killing Roxanne, and if it wasn’t Danny, the next most likely suspects were the people she worked with.

  “So, I’ve got your name on the cancellation list,” Aurora went on briskly. “If there’s nothing else I can do for you...”

  Phyllis knew she was being dismissed. She didn’t like the feeling, especially when it came from someone so much younger than her. She controlled that reaction, though, and said, “Really, again, I’m sorry—”

  Aurora stood up, revealing that she was a couple of inches taller than Phyllis. The jeans she wore, fashionably snug and torn at the knees, and her t-shirt hugged the trim body of an athlete. The muscles in her arms showed that she worked out. She said, “It’s all right. I have to go—”

  Phyllis wasn’t sure where she was going, since her job was to sit at this reception desk, but before either of them could do anything else, one of the glass doors swung open and a woman stepped into the foyer.

  “Anything wrong out here, Aurora?” she asked.

  The newcomer was in her forties, m
aybe close to fifty, Phyllis estimated, but still attractive with fluffy red hair cut fairly short around her head. Unlike the stylists, who were younger and wore snug black pants under their salon smocks, this woman had on a nice black dress, nylons, and sensible heels. Her voice had an unmistakable Southern accent, much more Georgia or Alabama than Texas.

  “No, Pauline, it’s fine,” Aurora answered. “I was just adding this lady’s name to the cancellation list.”

  The redhead smiled at Phyllis and said, “I don’t recall seeing you in here before.”

  “First time,” Phyllis said.

  “A friend of hers recommended us to her, but she doesn’t remember who,” Aurora said, making the comment sound vaguely accusatory.

  “Well, I’m not surprised, we have so many ladies coming through here,” the redhead said. She held out her hand to Phyllis. “I’m Pauline Gibbs. This is my salon.”

  Phyllis took the woman’s hand and said, “Phyllis Newsom. There’s no Paul of Paul’s Beauty Salon?”

  Pauline Gibbs laughed and shook her head.

  “No, I’m afraid poor ol’ Paul is a figment of my imagination. Some ladies like the idea of a male stylist. All the superstars in the field are men, you know. Startin’ out, I used to pretend that there really was a Paul and he owned the place, but as our clients came to know and trust us and rely on us, I gradually dropped that fiction. There wasn’t really any need for it.” She changed the subject by continuing, “I hope Aurora here took good care of you, Phyllis.”

  Clearly, she was one of those women who was on a first-name basis with everybody right away.

  “She certainly did,” Phyllis replied. Aurora still stood there, arms crossed over her chest now, not actually glaring but looking none too friendly. Phyllis thought about letting things go for the moment, but instinct told her to push just a little more. “I’m afraid I upset her, though.”

  “Oh?” Pauline arched perfectly plucked eyebrows. “How did you manage to do that?”

  “She asked about Roxanne,” Aurora said.