Chapter 14

When I woke up the next morning, I had no idea what time it was. Gray clouds hung low, giving the effect of perpetual twilight.

The TV weatherperson droned on about lake-effect snow in the forecast, and Dad was still there when I stumbled out of my bed in my Wonder Woman pajamas and somehow made it to the kitchen.

“Why, Miss Prince,” he teased. “Coffee?”

I pulled out a chair at the table and buried my head in my hands. “Why am I so tired?”

“I don’t know,” he said as he put a large mug in front of me. “Sleuthing by day, gallivanting with rich playboys by night. It’ll wear a person out.” He sat in the adjacent seat next to his open newspaper. “And don’t think me insensitive, but what in the blazes happened to your hair?”

“Antoine,” I said. “Marya’s biggest competitor. Everybody said it looked amazing yesterday. I must have slept on it funny.”

“At least,” Dad said.

Finally my eyes focused on the numbers on the clock. Half past seven. “What are you still doing here?”

“I’m leaving in a few minutes. No hurry this morning.”

“That sounds ominous. Is the investigation slowing down?”

“Unfortunately, yes. Initial leads are drying up, one by one. We even looked into your new buddy, Antoine.”

I shook a finger at my father. “Don’t make fun of me. He had motive.”

Dad took a sip of his coffee. “You know what else he has? A clear alibi. He was out at some special Reiki certification class. Multiple people can verify it.” He folded up his paper and creased it with his thumb. “What I really need to do is talk with Ken Young.”

“He still missing?” I asked.

“Last night his sisters came in to fill out a missing persons report. As if we weren’t already looking for him.”

“Do you think something could have happened to him?”

Dad cocked his head. “You mean like whoever killed Marya came back for him, too?”

The thought tied knots in my stomach.

Dad scrubbed his face with his hands. “I’ll make sure we consider that angle. At least it will appease his staunch supporters in the department, especially if I end up having to put out a BOLO. It gives us a new question, though. Who might want both of them dead?”

“Ken’s not dead,” I said.

Dad nodded, but his face wasn’t all that convincing.

*   *   *

Dad was right about my hair looking awful, and traces of that lipstick were stuck in the cracks of my lips, giving the appearance of pink scales. I’m surprised he didn’t run away when he saw me.

A shower did little to improve things. I spent the whole time worrying about Ken. “Please don’t be dead,” I said a couple of times to my shampoo and conditioner bottles.

And when I finally blow-dried my hair, I’d made a new discovery. Straight and styled by a professional, the short cut might have made me look like a “sleek, beautiful woman,” as Antoine put it. But styled by me? It all curled up, making me resemble a poodle. I’d gone from ooh la la to oy vey. Was it truly a step up from a sheepdog?

Cathy’s eyes popped when I got down to the shop. “Tell me you didn’t go out like that.”

“Looked fine yesterday. At the stroke of midnight, apparently I turned into a pumpkin.” I pulled out my phone and showed her the selfie.

She looked at the picture, then at me, then at the phone again, then at me. “You want me to try to fix it?”

I swallowed hard. “It’s just going to have to grow out. My hair does what it wants, and I’ve made peace with that.”

Cathy continued to stare at my phone. “Great picture, though. If you ever join an online dating site, use this one.”

“Wouldn’t that be bait and switch?”

Cathy shook her head. “It’s still you.”

While she held my phone, it buzzed with an incoming text. I’d had one from Ian already, telling me he enjoyed our date last evening and inviting me to dinner later in the week at the nearby country club. This one came from Lionel Kelley.

“Lionel’s finally going to let me look at that video,” I said. “Can you spare me?”

“No problem,” Cathy said. “Amanda’s coming in later, so we should have everything covered.” She rolled a shoulder. “But about the doll.”

“Still up to her old tricks?”

Cathy nodded. “I wondered if you’d mind if I took her to see Althena.”

“Your psychic friend?”

“I know you’re a skeptic, but what if Marya’s still around and trying to send us a message through the doll?”

“So you’re suggesting it’s not the doll, but rather the spirit of my ex-boyfriend’s wife, and you thought I might find that comforting?”

“Forget I mentioned it,” she said. “But do you mind if I take the doll?”

“I’d be happy to see it leave the building. And if Althena should take an interest in it, feel free to leave it with her. Now I have to scoot.”

I’d made it halfway to the door when she called after me. “Maybe you should consider a hat?”

I took her advice on the hat and added a scarf to prevent frostbite on the back of my neck.

Lionel Kelley was waiting for me. He pushed open the door to his office and welcomed me in as if he hadn’t been ducking me for the last few days.

“So you have the tape?” I asked.

“About that,” he said.

“Come on, Lionel. We had an agreement.”

“Yes, but—”

“Before you finish, I should remind you that I review on Yelp.”

He closed his eyes then stood up a little straighter. “Liz, my first duty is to my client, and he’s agreed to allow you to watch the video.”

I reached out my hand.

“But he asked that it not leave the premises.”

He gestured to two chairs sitting in front of a television screen.

“I have to watch it here?” I reluctantly pulled off my hat and headed to the chair. I was surprised when Kelley joined me. “You’re watching, too?”

“I’ve been through it several times, but I’m curious to see if perhaps your fresh eyes and different point of view might cast new light on it.” He picked up the remote. “I’ll go through it pretty quickly. Let me know if you need me to slow it down.”

Soon the video began playing. I noticed with some relief that the focus of the camera was clearly the entrance to the barber shop and not the toyshop, but I wondered about the connection to the pharmacist, if he was the client that hired Kelley to begin this particular surveillance.

Within a minute or two, I had a hard time keeping a straight face. The black-and-white footage, especially at the speed Kelley played it, gave the effect of watching a Charlie Chaplin movie. Only these were mostly very old women going in and out of the barber shop at breakneck speed. By the time a darling little white-haired woman speed-walked her walker into the building, I lost it.

Kelley paused the video. “What is so funny?”

I pulled off my glasses and wiped tears away with the back of my hand. Kelley was still staring at me.

“You don’t find it mildly amusing?” I said, mimicking the quick speed of the woman with her walker.

Kelley shook his head.

“Is the whole video like this?” I asked. “Customers going in and out of the barber shop?”

“Yes.”

“And you showed this to your client?” I asked.

Kelley stretched his neck. “Yes. But don’t ask me who that is. You know I can’t tell you.”

“Did anything in the video help you in your investigation?”

Kelley folded his arms across his chest and drummed his fingers on his upper arm. “It was another place where the subjects of my investigation frequented. So, yes.”

I leaned forward. “You weren’t watching Marya. You were trailing the old people?”

Kelley clammed up tight.

“That’s why you sent me to senior speed dating. Why are you watching old people?”

“Will you quit saying old people? It’s not like I was watching all of them.”

I squinted at him. “Some of them, then?”

He gave a brief, hesitant nod.

“So you were trailing certain old … you were trailing the subjects of you investigation and happened to notice them frequenting the barber shop, especially when Marya was working there.”

“Yes,” he said. “That, and the mysterious group at the library we now know is senior speed dating. And I apologized about that.”

“Anywhere else?” I asked.

“A few of them go to bingo night at the fire hall, but not all, so I focused on the other two.”

“And you can’t tell me which ones are your subjects of interest?” I gave him my best pouty look, since Antoine had suggested it was my strength.

“No dice, Liz,” he said. “Do you want to see the rest of it, or no?”

“Yeah,” I said, pulling an old envelope and pen out of my purse. While I watched the rest, I did my best to stifle any residue of laughter and jotted down the names of various women that I’d recognized. A couple I’d met at senior speed dating. Others I knew from game nights and from just living in the town for much of my life. If I were to talk to all of them, I suspected a substantial amount of tea in my future.

The video continued up until the day that Marya was killed. When people stopped going in and out, the tape stopped too.

“You don’t have that evening?”

Kelley waved off the question. “Nobody else was coming. I didn’t see the point.”

I had him replay the last bit. Marya never left, but neither did anyone else go in. At least not until after his tape had ended.

“If you’d only let it run a few hours longer.”

*   *   *

As I headed back to the shop, I spotted the ancient barber standing in front of the barber shop, its crime scene tape still intact. I wasn’t sure anyone knew his name. The barber shop was called Ed’s, but it had borne the name since the 1800s. That Ed was surely dead and buried. But everybody called the barber Ed by default, and he seemed fine with it.

“Ed” wagged his head as I approached. “You’ve been through this,” he said. “How long can they keep me shut down?”

I shrugged. “Until they think they’ve processed the whole crime scene. It helps to show up at the police station every now and then and put a little pressure on them.”

His eyes lit up under those thick, bushy white brows. “Will you talk to your father? I had a new stylist come by to see if she wanted to rent Marya’s old space, and she had to peek through the windows. Not a very good impression.”

“That’s pretty quick,” I said.

He rubbed his neck. “I’ve had to postpone my flight to Florida. I’d like to get this all wrapped up before I go.”

“I wanted to ask about Marya,” I said. “She seemed to have quite a large clientele.”

“She kept busy,” the barber said. “And she paid her rent, so I have no complaints. But that woman, she didn’t listen to reason. No business sense. Senior discount.” He shuddered. Or shivered. Hard to tell.

“You don’t think she managed her business well?”

“Discounts,” he said with an emphatic wag of his finger, “bring in new customers. You manage a business. You know these things. But senior discounts? They’re on limited income. Social security. Have you ever met an old woman who tipped well?” He shook his head. “I don’t get it.” The barber jerked his head toward the road and whistled. “Well, will you look at that!”

I did, then wished I hadn’t. The salt-splattered red pickup cruising down Main Street had a large multi-point deer lying in the bed.

Then it was my turn to shiver, just as a few stray flakes began to fall and swirl in the breeze.

I had a vague suspicion I knew where Ken Young might be.

*   *   *

I’m not a total idiot.

I texted Dad to let him know where I was going, and I stopped in at the shop to check on Cathy and let her know, too.

Then I changed into warm casual clothes, my chunky boots with the best traction, and took along my heaviest gloves, hat, and scarf. I even thought to grab a couple packs of those little hand warmers to stuff into my gloves.

Ken had pointed out his hunting spot to me on a drive during the summer we were dating. I’d only been half paying attention. He thought he’d negotiated a great deal on a bit of land to maybe put up a nice log cabin home, only to find out it was landlocked. It had no easement for a road, just a walking trail about a quarter of a mile long to get there. So he’d decided to keep the existing rundown cabin and just use it for hunting.

With no access road, the property would probably be appraised for about half of what he paid for it, and since he was embarrassed to be snookered by his own shrewd business move, he hadn’t told a lot of people. I doubted Dad knew about it.

But Ken went up there to hunt when he needed to think. And with his wife dead and his home invaded by Cujo and Mad Max, I can imagine he craved the solitude of the place.

The potholed county route looked different now, coated in white, from how it did in the summer months, and I traversed the stretch of road several times, windshield wipers slapping, before I caught the entrance to the trail. Moments later I spotted the graveled parking area where his truck was camouflaged in a layer of snow.

I pulled up next to it, climbed out, and soon found the trail. It was hard walking. As a kid, I always enjoyed playing in the snow, and Parker and I would trample the whole lawn. We were supposed to be making snow angels and snowmen, but when our parents weren’t looking, we’d been known to chuck a few snowballs—and ice balls—at each other. But that ill-fated day when we played Princess Bride using icicles as swords? That got both of us grounded.

As an adult, though, trudging through the heavy snow took more effort than I recalled, and I was huffing a bit by the time the cabin came into view.

And I use the term “cabin” a bit loosely.

Even by tiny house standards, this thing was small. And rickety. There were no windows, just a solid door at the front. The green shingles might have been asbestos, and the roof was snow covered in spots, bare in others, with large icicles hanging down, a sign of poor or no insulation. But that also meant someone was heating it, and a bit of smoke wisped from the decrepit chimney.

I texted Dad again then slipped my phone into my coat pocket.

After climbing a set of rough steps, which looked like they’d been hastily constructed from two-by-fours, I took a fortifying breath and knocked.

No answer.

I tried again, and still no answer. Finally, feeling a little brave—or perhaps a little cold—I tried the knob and the door swung open.

Once my eyes adjusted to the dim light, I could see it was clearly no palace on the inside, either. Blankets were bunched up on a twin mattress on the rough plank floor. The only other furnishings were a folding camp chair, a small collapsible table—that looked on the verge of collapse—and, in the corner, a plastic bucket with a toilet seat attached to the top.

I’d found Hooverville.

I did an about-face and marched straight to the door, determined to leave. But when I pulled open the door, there was Ken Young. Carrying a chainsaw.