An Affair to Dismember (7 page)

“I had crazy dreams last night,” I explained. “I was an ice skater, and my partner kept dropping me on my head, but I didn’t mind because he promised me he would take off his shirt. How’s that for weird?”

Grandma smeared cream cheese on a bagel and handed it to me.

“Then I was riding around town on a scooter with a police siren attached to my head. Dogs were chasing me down the street, and my siren was blaring, giving me a huge headache. Just when the dogs were about to get me, they turned into James Bond in a bathing suit with a spear gun. I pleaded with him to help, but he laughed and said he didn’t help women who wore sweatpants.”

Grandma nodded. “So, you met our neighbor last night? What did you think of him?” she asked.

“How did you know …? Never mind. Yes, I met him.” I squirmed in my chair and took a bite of my bagel. “I haven’t found a match for him yet.”

“You will. He’ll be around for a while. You’ve got time. You’ve got the gift. I was just telling that to one of those no-good neighbors across the street.”

“One of the Ternses?” I asked.

“Yes, they have strange notions, those no-goodniks.
The boy wants me to do them a favor. I told him I do love. I don’t have time for their nonsense. And I told him you have the gift. You do love and maybe more.”

“I’m not so sure,” I said. I didn’t do love, and I wasn’t sure I did anything else.

“You’ll see. It will grab you. You’ll smell out those in need. Unfinished business. It will eat at you until it’s done. You won’t rest until you solve the problem. You and me, we like happy endings. We like justice. And we’ve got the gifts to make it happen. You understand, dolly?”

I didn’t understand. I thought Grandma was way off base for once, but I nodded anyway, and she pinched my cheek.

“I want to get my hair done,” I said. “I can’t walk around like this anymore.” I was filled with resolve to turn myself around. The next time Mr. Perfect jumped out of a bush, I would be ready with highlights and long layers.

Grandma patted my hand. “That’s what I figured. I made an appointment for you with Bird in an hour. Don’t take the car. Bad day for driving.”

Bird Gonzalez owned the beauty shop up the street. Everybody who was anybody in Cannes went to her for their cut and color. There were three other hairdressers in her salon, but Bird was the star. She was crazy fast, able to shuffle clients around so that she worked on three heads at once. She had memorized the hair color of every local woman over the age of twenty-five and could mix up a batch of dye at a moment’s notice without consulting notes.

It was Saturday morning, and Bird’s place was packed. I didn’t know how Grandma had managed to get me an appointment, but she and Bird went way back. Bird made regular house calls for Grandma on Mondays.

“Hi, Gladie. It’s about time you came in.” Bird waved
me over to her chair with a big smile. “Where have you been hiding? Oh, my.” Bird studied my roots. From the expression on her face, they didn’t look good.

“Just make me look natural,” I told her. “Like a natural Angelina Jolie or something.”

Bird snorted. “Angelina Jolie is out of the question, but with a few highlights you’ll be a dark blond Kate Hudson with boobs.”

While Bird gathered her foils, I scanned the room. There were at least three viable women for Arthur Holden, my new perfect neighbor. I could kill two birds with one stone. I would get my much-needed makeover and get contacts for Arthur’s match. I slouched in the chair, proud of the new proactive me.

“Bird, is it weird that all of a sudden I’m noticing a lot of attractive men?” I asked.

“In this town? That
is
weird.”

“I’ve got a new neighbor,” I mumbled. “And there was this policeman …”

Bird clutched her chest. “Police Chief Spencer Bolton! Yum
-my
!”

The salon erupted in appreciative murmuring. The new police chief had gotten a lot of attention. “Get in line, honey,” said one of the hairdressers. “He’s gone through half the town already, and he’s only been here a year.”

“Nine months,” corrected one of the clients. “I put in hair extensions and bought a new wardrobe the day he arrived.”

“He’s been a boon for business,” said the other hairdresser. “There’s been a lot of upgrading going on.”

Bird tapped the end of a comb against her lips. “You say you only just noticed him? You must be going through a libido thaw.”

“Uh,” I said, “I’m not sure what that is.”

“You were in a libido freeze for some reason. You
didn’t care about men, good-looking or not. Usually a libido freeze is caused by divorce or death.”

“Or commitment issues,” said one of the hairdressers.

“That’s a laugh. Zelda Burger’s granddaughter with commitment issues,” piped up one of the customers. The salon broke out in giggles.

“Anyway,” Bird continued as she put the final foil wraps in my hair, “you’re thawing out. You’re probably emitting pheromones right now. It comes with the thaw. Men will be flocking to you and your pheromones. Soon you’ll be losing weight, too.”

I wondered if Bird smelled something on me that I didn’t. Unless pheromones smelled like the drugstore’s generic antiperspirant, I didn’t think I was emitting them. As for men, I had no idea what I would do if they started flocking to me.

“I can’t lose weight. My grandmother’s house is junk food central,” I said.

“There’s only one good diet,” Bird said. “The Spit It Out Diet. It’s not bulimia. It’s safe and effective.”

She stepped back from my chair and did a dramatic turn. Her point was taken. She was slender and fit. She was a poster child for the Spit It Out Diet, whatever that was.

“You put it in your mouth for a taste, and if it’s not worth the calories, you spit it out,” she explained.

I tried to hold back a look of disgust.

“She does it all the time,” said one of the hairdressers.

“Here, let me show you,” Bird said. She took a bite of a doughnut and spit it out in the trash can. “Ta-da!” she shouted triumphantly.

I tried to hold back my gag reflex.

“Everyone is a skeptic,” she said. “Try it. You’ll see.” Bird shampooed me and started on my trim. There was no jiggle in her upper arms as she wielded the scissors, and it made me think that maybe she had a point.
Maybe there was something to her Spit It Out Diet. If I was going to give myself a makeover, shouldn’t I try her diet?

“Hey, don’t you live next to that guy who was murdered?” Bird asked.

The back of my neck tingled, and I sat up straighter in the chair. “I live across the street from an old man who died after he slipped and hit his head on the kitchen table,” I said.

“That’s weird. I heard he was murdered. Hey, Joyce, wasn’t that guy murdered?”

Joyce, the manicurist, nodded.

“Where did you hear he was murdered?” I asked.

“Here.” Bird scanned the salon. “It wasn’t my client. Whose client was it?”

Joyce shrugged.

“I think it was Sandy’s client,” said Bird. “I don’t know her name. But Sandy isn’t here today.”

“She was the dead guy’s daughter,” said one of the hairdressers.

“Yes, the blond one,” said Bird. “The blond daughter said her father was murdered. She said it matter-of-factly. You say it was an accident?”

“SO WHAT do you want me to do?”

“Talk me down. Talk me out of this. At least talk me out of the bushes.”

“How did you get in the bushes in the first place?”

That was a complicated question. I had wandered home in a haze. I couldn’t remember my haircut, the blow-dry, or paying Bird. My brain was working overtime, trying to recall which of Randy Terns’ daughters was blond, and it had no room to think of anything else.

Walking down my street, I had seen movement in
front of the Ternses’ house. I had ducked into the bushes in order to stake them out without being seen, just as Rob’s car drove by and slammed into Peter’s Porsche. Peter ran screaming out of the house toward his car. I waited for nearly an hour for the sisters to come out of the house, but there was no sign of them. Instead, the brothers continued to study the damage and yell at each other. I had no graceful way of exiting the bushes without revealing myself as the buttinsky spy that I was.

I sat with my cellphone glued to my face. Bridget had few words of wisdom.

“Gladie, why are you staking out the Ternses’ house?” she asked.

“I don’t know. I can’t remember which daughter was blond. I want to find out. I want to know why she thinks her father was murdered. For some reason, Randy Terns’ death has wormed its way into my psyche. I’m on the precipice of obsession. Help.”

“Couldn’t you just have knocked on their door to see if they needed anything? That way you could see who was blond,” Bridget said in her usual logical manner.

“I don’t want them to know I’m curious. I don’t want to get involved.”

Peter stood by his Porsche, taking a break from yelling at his brother. He focused his attention on my grandmother’s house. He looked like he was deciding on something.

“I definitely don’t want to get involved,” I hissed into the cellphone. “I don’t like death. I don’t like dead people. They creep me out.”

“Gladie, you used to work in a funeral home.”

“Only as the receptionist. And I didn’t actually make it to work. I passed out on the steps to the building. I saw a wreath of black flowers being delivered and lost consciousness. Does that sound like the kind of person who should get involved in a possible murder?”

“Well, Gladie, you know you don’t actually have to get involved,” she said reasonably.

I thought about that for a few moments.

“Oh, crap,” said Bridget, breaking the silence. “Lucy was right. You’re just like your grandma. You can’t stop yourself. But instead of love, it’s crime. Murder. You’re a nosey parker. You’re Curious George. Gladie, you’re a yenta.”

Rob returned to his car and drove off with Peter following in his Porsche.

“I’m taking your advice,” I told Bridget. “I’m going in.”

And I climbed out of the bushes, dusted the leaves off me, and headed across the street to the Ternses’ house.

THE DOOR opened before I had a chance to knock. Betty Terns, her slight body draped in tweed slacks and a burgundy sweater set despite the heat, went for the
mail in her mailbox but stopped in surprise when she saw me.

“I came over to see how you were getting along and if you needed anything,” I lied.

“Oh. Isn’t that nice.” Her eye twitched, and she pursed her lips. I suspected my presence wasn’t nice at all. In fact, she looked put out. Nevertheless, she waved me in. “Come in. We were just about to sit down to some cake and coffee.”

The kitchen was a swirl of cigarette smoke. There wasn’t a window open. Any fresh air left in the house had been sucked out long before. I coughed into my sleeve and dabbed my watering eyes. I dimly made out Betty with a small plate in her hand. She motioned me to sit and handed me a piece of cake.

“Jane and Christy are around here somewhere. I don’t know where the boys are.” She lit a cigarette and fiddled with her bedazzled lighter. She motioned at my cake. “Eat. I made it myself. Everyone just loves my coconut cake. Randy used to beg me to make it every week.”

The cake was white with two inches of white frosting. It was calling me to eat it, but I hesitated. It didn’t fit in with my makeover program. I had the hair. Now I wanted my flat stomach back. On the other hand, Betty was the skinniest woman I had ever seen, and she made the cake every week. Surely one piece of cake wouldn’t do me any harm. Maybe Betty’s coconut cake was the secret to beauty and flat stomachs.

I dipped the side of my fork into the thick, oozy frosting just as all three of Betty’s daughters tumbled into the kitchen.

“If you won’t take me, I don’t see why you won’t lend me your car so I can drive myself,” Christy whined. She came in behind Jane, screaming at the back of her head. Jane kept her cool. She sat across from me, lit up one of
Betty’s cigarettes, and took a long drag. There was the teensiest of smirks on her face, the same expression a cat wore when it played with a mouse.