Color Me Dead

by Constance Barker

  “What a corny line,” I said.

  “One that Betina is eating up,” Nellie said. “It’s the guy she’s responding to, not the brilliant pitch.”

  They made quite a hot looking couple and they were aware of the attention they were getting. “She is enjoying having eyes on her,” I said.

  Nellie was smiling. “Hey, with guys like the hunk among her admirers, what girl wouldn’t?”

  “You think he’s an admirer?”

  “I think he’s a pursuer.”

  After a time, Leander wandered in, fresh from playing at the blacksmith shop. He caught my eye as he walked in. I smiled and nodded toward where Pete was sitting. He waved at Nellie and I and went to join them.

  Nellie made a grunt. “While do I feel like I am sitting in the old fogey booth?”

  “Because, relatively speaking, you are. The young crowd is just getting a second wind and I’m getting a second winding down. Please, Nellie, feel free to show your inner child and join them. You won’t hurt my feelings.”

  “Being an old fogey, relatively speaking, has its advantages,” she said. “I know that my darling husband is at home sound asleep. Aubrey says that the burns on his arm shouldn’t scar badly.”

  “I didn’t know he got burned.”

  “It happened during the spaghetti crisis, but no one seemed to think it merited mentioning until they could also say that the doctor had treated it and the stupid man will live.”

  “That part is good.”

  She smiled. “Actually, and strangely, yes.” She looked at me. “Tired?”

  I nodded. “But also wired.”

  “Energized or concerned?”

  “Some of each, I guess. Since we talked about it, the thought keeps popping up, without me wanting it to, that until we know the motive for the murder, we have no idea if Victoria was the only target.”

  “You know… I’m not so keen on walking down deserted hallways right now either,” she said. “And it’s so comfy here.”

  “And they have table service.”

  “They do.”

  Nellie ordered a martini. “I’ll have the same,” I said.

  “You never drink martinis,” Nellie said as the waitress left.

  “They sound wicked and here we are in the evil city.”

  “And?”

  “And while I am probably surrounded by decadence here I am being a good girl—as always.”

  Nellie winked. “I know. How tiresome.”

  “So at least I can drink a martini.”

  She grinned. “I suppose it’s a start. Shows the right attitude.”

  When the martini came I had to agree that it seemed to be the right drink to have in a hotel bar in New Orleans while wondering if we’d find another body in the morning. “Good choice,” I told Nellie as I sipped the martini.

  “I watch the right television programs,” she said. “You learn these things.”

  After a time, we saw Betina and Pete huddled in conference. “Something is going on,” I said.

  “Well, do you see that the black-haired hunk is watching them?” Nellie asked.

  Naturally I did. He was eye candy and I’d glanced at him periodically as he’d sat with Betina. “Of course I see him.”

  “That’s what’s going on.”

  “You think…?” I let the question hang there.

  “Pete’s her roommate. She’s making arrangements with Pete about the evening. Do I think she has something romantic in mind? I do indeed,” Nellie said. “It’s a lot better idea than sitting around hoping you aren’t killed for some unknown reason.”

  “True enough.”

  Shortly after, Betina took the guy’s arm and they strolled out of the bar, with Betina waving goodnight to us.

  “You were right,” I said.

  “And that’s a wickedly happy smile she has on her face,” Nellie said.

  “Is that your nostalgia again? Wistful thinking?”

  “There is some of that,” she said. “I gotta be honest… if I was here, single and as hot as Betina… with all these good looking guys around, I would have zero interest in sharing a room with you, my dear friend.”

  I knew what she meant. When, I wondered, did I stop being a lost young woman and become a village elder watching the children?

  A bit later Leander and Pete came by to say goodnight. Leander chuckled. “Betina seems to have plans for the evening.”

  “So we noticed,” Nellie said. “Good for her. Apparently you two do as well.”

  Pete turned red. “Well, she said…”

  “She told you she wouldn’t need her bed for the night,” Nellie said.

  “More or less. She did say I shouldn’t bother waiting up for her.”

  “And you need to get your beauty sleep so you look good when they announce the winner tomorrow,” I said.

  “Or at least enough rest so you can fake looking rested,” Nellie said. “Satisfied works too.”

  Pete blushed. “He’ll get some rest,” Leander said. “Some.” Then he led Pete out of the bar.

  “Maybe we should adjourn to the coffee shop,” I said. “If I stay here I might keep drinking. That martini tasted like more, but it also made me a little blurry.”

  Nellie scowled. “How would that be a bad thing? The blurrier the better.”

  “Good for tonight, bad for tomorrow.”

  She stretched. “I’ll tell you what… I’ve got zero interest in coffee, but I’m thinking we should go up to the room. Anyone willing to take both of us on could find us here just as easily, and suddenly my bed is calling me. My inner old fogey is exerting itself.”

  I laughed and felt the tiredness crashing in on me. “As usual, you are right. Off we go.”

  As we stood I saw a wistful look in her eyes. “What?”

  She laughed. “I was wondering if that hunk has a friend with his own room,” she said softly.

  “He probably does, but…”

  She tightened her grip on my arm. “Yeah, but. Damn that but.”

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  “Well, Savannah, now we can rest easy—the last of the crew is showing herself,” Nellie said as Betina came into the coffee shop looking mightily pleased with herself. “Assuming we can take Pete’s word for the fact that Leander is sleeping peacefully, everyone is accounted for, so it seems that everyone survived the night.”

  “Of course they did,” I said in my cheerful voice. I didn’t want to admit I was relieved, but Nellie knew. She always knows.

  “Good morning everyone,” Betina said.

  “How can you look so fresh?” Pete asked. “That’s totally unfair.” Even after coffee he was looking a bit droopy.

  “I need to be bright and cheerful for the ceremony, so I am.”

  “It doesn’t start until noon, right?” Nellie asked.

  I handed her the brochure. “Here, you can look it up yourself.”

  “Why? They’ll announce it in plenty of time. I was curious, but not enough to read the program. I was just thinking that once it’s done we can head home.”

  “Right after,” I promised. “The hotel has an express checkout, so we can bring our bags down and go back out through the front doors and head home.

  “Betina and I have to be in the ballroom half an hour before the ceremony,” Pete said. “They walk us through what will happen, except for who won.”

  Just then Gloria and her clipboard peeked in the coffee shop. She saw us and came to the table. “Mr. Dawson, the judges would like for you to come to the ballroom.”

  “Now? I thought…”

  “I know this is odd and not at all according to my program, but they’ve requested that you come see them as soon as possible.”

  Pete looked puzzled. “Did they say…”

  She looked upset. “No. They didn’t say anything. I have no idea at all what this is about and I apologize for interrupting your breakfast, but I would appreciate it if you could come along now.”

  Pete smiled. “Su
re.” He got up. “I’ll catch up with you later… I guess.”

  “If you don’t get free from whatever this is, we will see you at the awards ceremony,” I told him.

  And with that, Pete followed in Gloria’s wake into the lobby.

  “That was odd,” I said. “What’s your guess about that little twist in events?”

  Nellie and Betina looked at each other, then Nellie picked up her coffee. “All I can think is that the judges have questions about the cut.”

  “But if it was about the cut, wouldn’t they want me there as well?”

  I considered that. “They do have the video.”

  Betina nodded. “I suppose they do.”

  “And what questions would they ask? They either like it or they don’t. It’s either better than the others or it isn’t.”

  That was my feeling too.

  Betina frowned. “You don’t think Pete’s in some kind of trouble, do you?”

  Nellie put her cup down. “For the way he cuts hair? Who knows? This is the city. So far I can barely figure up from down here, much less right from wrong.”

  Betina smiled. “Well, we know Pete is the best cutter around. If the judges want to see him, maybe they just want some background on where he learned or how he developed the style.” She glanced at herself in the mirror. “It is stunning.”

  It was.

  # # #

  “I found it,” James said. He barged into the coffee shop carrying a laptop and sat down in the booth. He didn’t look quite as pleased as Betina had, but close to it.

  “That’s a relief,” Nellie said. “We were sitting here worrying ourselves sick. Now what exactly did you find?”

  He grinned. “I found the video of Sabrina that Savannah told me to look for. Savannah mentioned that the old guys told you that the video of Sabrina at the awards ceremony was on the news. I was trying to get a copy of it when Barker discovered that it was popular enough to be uploaded to a video sharing site.”

  “They do that?” I’m not much with computers, so don’t stay up on such things.

  “Sure. They’ve got everything there,” Betina said. “My high school graduation is there. I don’t know why, but there it is.”

  “They put it all online for blackmail purposes when you are all old and gray,” Nellie said. “It’s all the rage. A variation on revenge porn.”

  “Show us,” I told James. Sometimes it was best to ignore Nellie. She wouldn’t go away, but she might change subjects.

  The actual video was far more interesting than we expected.

  “Apparently Victoria was the big winner that year,” James said.

  I hadn’t known that, but there she was, smiling and waiting to be announced. We watched her come to the microphone to accept the award. Just then we saw the woman who had to be Sabrina. She rushed up dragging a frightened looking girl by the arm. She grabbed the microphone and began shouting that she’d been sabotaged and that her model had been injured.

  “The poor thing,” Betina moaned. I knew she meant that model. I felt sorry for her too. Half her hair seemed to have been burned off by chemicals. Apparently the crowning achievement of the saboteur wasn’t replacing styling gel with epoxy, as Ernie remembered, but with something caustic.

  “That could’ve been truly serious,” James said. “From the look of what it did to her hair, if that stuff had gotten in her eyes, she could’ve been blinded.”

  “It probably wasn’t too good on Sabrina’s hands either,” I pointed out. She had gross looking blisters on her fingers.

  We watched up to the point where the security people removed her and the model. Then the television announcer summarized what we knew, and added that the venue and the promoters of the competition were sorry for Sabrina who was obviously distressed.

  “They didn’t press charges,” James said.

  “How big of them,” Nellie said with even larger than normal dollops of sarcasm thick in her voice. I didn’t think the sarcasm was overdone, this time. The woman had obviously been cheated out of a chance to show her stuff.

  “No one in charge seemed to care that she was sabotaged,” I said.

  “I think that made her angrier than the actual sabotage itself,” James said. “She wanted some kind of justice and they hauled her out of the venue like a criminal.”

  “I think if that happened to me I might want revenge,” Nellie said. “Payback in kind is a satisfying way to go.”

  “You wonder how much bitterness it stirred up,” I said. “Maybe enough to kill the person that stole the prize away.”

  “That’s a big jump,” James said.

  “Some people make it,” I said.

  “They do indeed.”

  “And she gave Victoria some rather nasty looks,” Nellie said.

  “I noticed that myself,” James said. “We are running a check on her whereabouts now.”

  # # #

  We sat around the table, letting this new information sink in. I tapped on the screen. “I thought knowing what she looked like would help, but I don’t remember seeing that woman around here,” I said. “That video gives her a juicy motive for killing Victoria, but she’d have to actually show up to do anything.”

  Betina pointed to the screen. “Can you stop it so I can see Sabrina’s face?”

  “Sure,” James said. He let the video play until Sabrina’s face filled the center of the screen and then he stopped it. The picture was pretty clear. “I don’t recognize her either,” Nellie said.

  “Now zoom in,” Betina said.

  When he did, Betina pulled the laptop close and stared at the screen. “I know those eyebrows,” she said.

  I peeked over her shoulder. “You know her eyebrows? Who recognizes people’s eyebrows?”

  Betina looked at me in surprise. “Eyebrows are important and I’ve absolutely seen her before,” she said. “She’s here at the show. She’s changed her hair so it’s quite different — it’s cut a lot differently and she’s darkened it.” She closed her eyes and scowled. “I can picture her. She’s darkened her skin too and wearing different makeup, for sure. But it’s her.”

  Nellie smiled at James’ look of incredulity. “This girl has a heck of an eye for detail.”

  She did. When it came to something like the shape of an eyebrow, our Betina missed nothing.

  “So who is it?” I asked.

  “I’m trying to remember where I saw her,” she said. She closed her eyes. “Okay, we were setting up… no, there was some commotion going on and we headed toward it. People were shouting.”

  “She was shouting?”

  “Not her. She was off to the side, staying out of the way. I didn’t really pay her a lot of attention at the time, but she looked at me for a moment. That’s when I noticed that her eyebrows didn’t go with the rest of her look.” She smiled. “Sometimes people will get a makeover but either they don’t change their eyebrows, or just fall into the habit of doing them the way they always have.”

  “That’s true,” Nellie said. “Sometimes a client wants a complete makeover but they get upset if you want to change the line of the eyebrow, or even make them thicker or thinner.”

  It made sense—to a beautician. Unless you were staring at your face, say putting on makeup, eyebrows were not your main focus unless you were unhappy with them.

  James shrugged. “I’ll take your word for it. So who is this woman?”

  “That commotion was going on,” she said. She was talking to herself now. “She tried to stay out of the way.” She snapped her fingers. “It was at Manus’s booth.”

  “When Victoria blew her cork?”

  “Right. That was the commotion.”

  “And she was there?”

  Betina smiled. “She was the one who sold Victoria the defective scissors. She’s the one who had to give her a refund. She is Manus’s assistant. He called her Jane, I think.”

  Pete shook his head. “That’s clever. What a perfect cover. She gets herself hired to help out a
t the booth. That lets her keep a low profile but gives her access to the competitors’ stations so she can sabotage things. She even sells them sabotaged goods and Manus gets the blame. It must’ve been sweet for her to see Victoria in hysterics and Manus looking crooked.”

  Betina got up from her seat, looking like she had an idea. “I’ll be right back,” she said. “I want to check something.”

  “Why would Sabrina care about Manus?” I asked as she left. “Why would she frame him for the murder?”

  James grinned. “Didn’t you watch the video?”

  He started it from the beginning and in the opening shot I saw what James was thinking about. I pointed to his smiling face. “He was the other category winner. Victoria won the women’s styling competition and Manus won the men’s, but she was the overall winner.”

  “That was the year Manus and Victoria had their falling out.”

  “And Sabrina might not be sure which one of them sabotaged her,” Nellie said. “She could just figure that one of those two had to be the culprit.”

  That made sense to me. “There is also the possibility that Manus might think Victoria won because she sabotaged Sabrina. Maybe he thinks his style would’ve trumped Sabrina’s.” It made a certain amount of sense. “I keep forgetting that Manus was a stylist before he started the business.”

  Betina came in waving a piece of paper. “Okay, according to his brochure I got from his booth, Manus started his company the year after being the runner up,” she said. “His bio claims he was the lead stylist at a premier salon until then.”

  Nellie made a sour face. “If he thinks Victoria beat him because she cheated…”

  “So much bad blood,” James said. “And over a haircut.”

  “More than that. It’s over being the premier stylist in the state,” Nellie said.

  “Running a salon isn’t a high profit business,” I said. “Especially in the cities where the rents are high and everything costs more… Any free advertising might actually be the difference between succeeding and failing. Victoria enters every year hoping that winning will get her product endorsements. Of course she likes the visibility too. Almost everyone has some ulterior motive for wanting to win and most are about money.” Suddenly I could see what a toxic situation these competitions could create.