by Leslie Kelly
At least, he hoped so.
Part of him wished his brother hadn’t left this morning. He wouldn’t mind having Nick do some investigating. It almost seemed worth giving him a call later, just to bounce some ideas around.
Their conversation in his office the other morning wouldn’t leave his head. Because of what Nick had revealed about Jimbo. Christ, the man had been a slime. He’d swindled Emma, seduced Daneen, who knew what else he was capable of? Not that he’d deserved the Dracula treatment. Still, he couldn’t say the world was gonna be a worse place without Jimbo Boyd in it.
A hint of concern about who had overheard him and Nick during their conversation flashed through his mind. He made a mental note to make sure Dan Brady had shown up at his luncheon Tuesday.
“You expecting company?” he asked when he saw the strange car parked in Emma’s driveway.
“It’s Claire. She’s probably checking to see if I’m okay.”
Johnny walked her inside, surprised to see Claire’s husband waiting with her. The two of them sat mighty close together on the couch. The sight brought an unexpected smile.
Claire got up to hug Emma, and Tim rose, watching, his hands thrust in his pockets.
When the women’s hug ended, Claire reached up and pulled a dry leaf from Emma’s hair. “Geez, if you two are going to go to the gazebo, you oughta at least bring a blanket.”
Johnny coughed into his fist as Emma turned red.
“That’s what Claire insists we do,” Tim interjected, giving his wife a quelling look.
This time, she was the one who flushed.
“So the gazebo’s not our little secret?” Emma asked.
“Hate to break it to you, guys,” Claire replied, “but you started your own lover’s lane on prom night.”
Johnny was suddenly very thankful he hadn’t known that before they’d gone to the gazebo. Otherwise he might not have been as comfortable getting bare-ass naked in broad daylight.
“Johnny,” Tim said, handing him a business card, “your brother was here. He wants you to call him on his cell.”
“He stayed in Joyful?”
Claire shook her head. “Your mom called him and he turned around and came right back.”
“Good,” he murmured as he thought of the ground work his brother, as a detective, could do. “He’ll be a big help.”
Then Claire looked at Emma, nibbling her lip and looking a bit sheepish. “You had a call, too. We didn’t mean to pry, but I turned up the answering machine, just in case it was…important.” Then she sighed. “I guess it was.”
“Oh? Who was it?”
Claire didn’t so much as glance toward Johnny as she answered. “Somebody from a company called Pierce Watson. They got your résumé and want to set up a meeting.”
Unable to help it, Johnny immediately stiffened.
“They’re one of the major brokerage houses in Manhattan,” Emma murmured, sounding subdued.
A brokerage house. A résumé. Christ, she was going back to New York. Not thinking about it, he snapped, “You can’t leave.”
She jerked her attention toward him. He didn’t know if she was surprised more by his words or his angry tone. Actually, he didn’t know which surprised him more, either.
All he knew was the response had come from a place deep inside that had panicked at the thought of Emma Jean flying out of his life again.
“I can’t, huh?”
Feeling like a controlling jerk, he backpedaled, lying to them both about what had prompted his instinctive response. “I mean,” he explained in an even tone which revealed nothing of his raging emotions, “if Brady or the state police are considering you a suspect in this murder, you can’t just leave town, Em. It wouldn’t look good.”
She nodded slowly, her eyes wide and searching as she held his stare. As if she expected him to say more.
Only he didn’t. He couldn’t. Because he had no idea what to say.
He was saved by the ringing of the phone. The sharp peal sounded three times before Emma finally pulled her attention off him—while he stood there trying to appear calm and noncommittal. Then she finally answered.
Please don’t be calling to offer her a job.
Not until he figured out how to keep her in his life.
“Hi, Doris,” Emma said, looking surprised when she realized who was on the other end of the line.
Johnny, Claire and Tim all listened to her side of the conversation, just waiting for a hint of concern in Emma’s expression. He’d personally go down to Let Your Hair Down and tell the gossiping hair salon crowd to ride their wave of rumors straight to hell if they hurt her again.
“You mean, you really want me to come to work today?” Emma said into the receiver. “I figured…no, no, I’m sorry, I thought you wouldn’t be willing…yes, sure, I’ll be there. Give me a half hour.”
When she hung up, a pleased smile was evident on her lips. She seemed, for the time being, to have forgotten that heavy, question-filled moment they’d shared before the phone call.
“It was Doris. She said the sheriff is a moron, and for me to get myself to work.” Then she grinned. “She also ordered me to bring my calculator…and a pie.”
Johnny liked seeing the frown disappear from Emma’s brow, and damn sure wanted to keep a smile on her face. So, after chatting with Claire and Tim, he insisted on taking her to get her car, then following her to the beauty salon. He walked her inside, his arm draped over her shoulders, to make sure everybody in the place got the message, loud and clear.
That she was his. And that he supported her.
Doris waved him off. “Get on outta here, boy, we got some questions for your girlie.”
He tensed, wondering if Doris and the handful of women in the place were going to ask for lurid details on Jimbo’s murder.
“Emma, Mary-Anne here says she saw something on MS-NBC today about second quarter earnings being low for the big three automakers. What’s that gonna do to the market? Should I get out of the mutual funds?” Doris asked, not pausing for a second as she continued to clip away at Mary-Anne Tucker’s hair.
Johnny almost laughed as Emma launched into a detailed answer. She paused only long enough to give him a quick kiss before striding to the wash sink. Grabbing an apron, she began to explain things like quarterly earnings, faulty predictions and market hedging to the attentive women.
Feeling sure she was among friends, he left, wishing his next stop could be as pleasant. He somehow suspected it wouldn’t.
Because he was on his way to find Daneen.
EMMA WOULD NEVER have believed anything could take her mind off the horror of her morning, or the sultry perfection of her early afternoon. But over the next hour, the ladies of Let Your Hair Down somehow managed to do exactly that.
“Mrs. Walker, you just got a cut on Tuesday. You can’t tell me you really need another trim,” Emma said as she and Johnny’s mother stood in the back of the salon, near the wash basins.
Jane Walker, a pretty, petite woman who looked younger now than she had a decade ago when her husband had been alive managed an earnest look. “I do. I’m not so sure about this length.”
Emma raised a brow, looking at Mrs. Walker’s barely more than an inch long hair. The pixie cut suited her. Baldness wouldn’t. If anyone knew, it was Emma. “You don’t have to get your hair done to come in and ask me for financial advice.”
“Oh, honey,” said Susie, one of the stylists Emma had met Tuesday—the gum-chewer with the black and blue hair. “They’re not coming in for advice.”
Doris chimed in. “They’re coming in for support.”
Emma’s mouth dropped open and she looked around to see two women getting cuts and two more waiting up front. All of them wore looks ranging from fondness to amusement.
“You’re…”
“This town did enough damage when you showed up. Not one person here believes you killed anybody,” Jane Walker said.
“Even,” a new voice added, “if
he might have deserved it.”
Mona Harding. The redhead who’d been at Jimbo’s house the other night entered the salon, letting the door swing shut behind her as she strode toward Emma. “I didn’t hear you threaten him. Even though if I suspected what you suspected, I woulda gone over there armed and ready to go medieval on that man’s ass.”
All the other women in the room were now paying careful attention to Mrs. Harding. The woman had that kind of presence—large, flamboyant and ballsy.
“Thank you. Maybe you could tell the chief that.”
Mona nodded once. “I already did.” Lowering her voice a bit, and inhaling a shaky breath, she added, “He confessed some things to me.” At Emma’s surprised look, she clarified. “No, he wasn’t in on anything he thought was really wrong. Jimbo convinced him your grandma had signed the contract and agreed to everything, but she up’n died before the deal could go to closing.”
Emma knew better, but wasn’t about to argue.
“He figured you were gone forever. So he helped Jimbo set up an illegitimate closing with a buddy of his who does title work.”
The room remained so silent, the sound of one of Doris’s bobby pins dropping would likely have sent them all leaping out of their seats as they realized the importance of what Mona had revealed.
“The sheriff has confessed to doing something illegal,” Emma said.
The woman nodded. “He’ll have to resign and face the music.” Then she put her hand on her hip and tilted her chin up in challenge. “I’ll stand by him. Because he’s seeing things differently today. Definitely about his former buddy, the mayor. Do you know that bastard fired Daneen last night? The slime.”
Emma’s brow shot up, particularly because of what Johnny had told her earlier, regarding Daneen and Jimbo’s personal relationship. “Slime indeed.”
“Yeah. Dan was pretty upset.”
She could imagine. And a trickle of suspicion coursed through her. How upset?
“He’s with Daneen now. Poor girl was sitting in her car in the parking lot of the jail bawling her eyes out when I left.”
The image brought an unexpected hint of empathy. Emma didn’t like Daneen. She never had. But she ached a little for the woman, who’d apparently also been used, though in a different way, just as Emma had. The image of her unable to get out of her car as she sobbed over a man who wasn’t worth anyone’s tears got to Emma more than she’d ever have expected.
“Well,” she said to Mona, “thank you very much for backing me up, and for coming here to tell me what you found out. You didn’t have to involve yourself, and I do appreciate it.”
Even as she spoke, part of her wondered why Mona had done it. Not only standing up to her boyfriend, but also confessing the truth of the matter to Emma, especially so publicly.
“It was the least I could do.” Then Mona quirked a brow, fully aware she was in the spotlight. “After all, I feel partly responsible for what happened to your grandma’s land.”
“Why? It wasn’t you, it was Jimbo and this MLH Enterprises.”
Oh, my God. An unbelievable possibility flickered through her mind.
A half smile lifted the woman’s bright red lips “Have we ever been fully introduced?” She extended one heavily ringed, perfectly manicured hand. “My name’s Mona Lisa Harding.”
A few of the women tittered at the flamboyant name, probably thinking that it suited the woman. Emma was the only one who fully absorbed the implications.
Mona Lisa Harding. MLH Enterprises. In the flesh.
“I understand,” Emma murmured.
“I don’t think anybody else does,” Mona said with an exaggerated sigh. “What’s it take to get a public confession across around here, self-flagellation and a hair shirt? What I’m saying is, I’m the one building the club, Joyful Interludes.”
Every other woman in the room shot straight up. With dropped jaws, they stared at Mona, who’d been one of them a moment ago, and who was now admitting to…all kinds of things.
“I like this place,” the woman said with an unrepentant shrug. “I have money squirreled away from my, um, career. I wanted to open a business, get some of those highway drivers to get off the exit and maybe give Joyful a try.”
Naked dancers. That’d get ’em off the highway all right. Emma didn’t argue the woman’s motives, since she obviously believed them legitimate. “How’d the pecan grove come into this?”
“I got together with Jimbo, who suggested some property that might be suitable for the kind of establishment I had in mind.”
“What establishment?” someone said from the front of the room.
“She’s talking about the hootchie-cootchie girl place,” a woman in the waiting area explained—loudly—to another. Then she looked up at Mona. “Sorry, she’s hard of hearing. Go on.”
Eyes twinkling with amusement, Mona did. “I looked at the site and loved the idea of building my club in the middle of a beautiful place, classy-like, leaving a lot of the trees intact.”
Not a lot. But Emma wasn’t going to interrupt.
“Jimbo handled everything. He told me the offer was accepted and took the deal from contract to closing, so I could stay out of it.” Mona shook her head, looking regretful. “It was right here in this room where I first heard Emmajean had owned the land I’d bought. I wondered if I had all the facts, because, though I didn’t know her well, I knew your grandma a little. I couldn’t believe she’d really wanted to part with the land. But it was too late to ask her, obviously. And Jimbo swore it was true.”
“Bastard,” Emma muttered, unable to help it.
The entire shop remained quiet as all the women in the place digested Mona’s words. Emma focused primarily on Jimbo and the grove. She imagined the other women in the salon had quickly moved past those issues and were now wondering how to tactfully ask Mrs. Harding whether or not she’d really made porn movies. Whether she’d liked it. And if the bountiful breasts gracing the billboard were hers.
Judging by the woman’s more than generous bustline, Emma suspected they might be…or might have been, back in her heyday.
“So,” Doris finally said as she slowly lifted her shears and again started clipping at her customer’s dark brown hair, “what’s all this mean? Is Joyful Interludes gonna open or not?”
Mona and Emma stared at each other. The legal implications were obvious. With the information Mona had just handed her, Emma could prove she was the rightful owner of the land on which Mona’s club had been built. She was no lawyer, but as far as she knew, improvements belonged to the owner of the land.
Not to the person who’d paid for them.
Mona’s suspiciously bright eyes told her she’d reached the same conclusion. Realizing how much the woman stood to lose, Emma wanted to reach out and take her hand, but wasn’t sure the gesture would be appreciated. The redhead appeared to be hanging on to her bawdy bravado by a loose thread.
“I hope Jimbo’s professional liability insurance was paid up,” the other woman finally said with a toss of her head. “I invested my life savings in that place. If there’s anybody to sue, I’ll sure do it.”
Emma wanted to cry for the woman, who’d been duped, as Emma had, by Jimbo Boyd. “Mrs. Harding…”
The other woman held up a hand. “You don’t have to say anything. We were both used.” Then she turned to look at the others. “I didn’t realize how much everybody around here would hate the idea of, uh, that kind of business. So I’m thinking if I get my money back, maybe Bradenton might be a better place for it.” With a sigh, she added, “But I gotta admit, Bradenton Interludes doesn’t work the way Joyful did.” Her voice lowering the tiniest bit, she added, “I didn’t mean to hurt anyone.”
Doris immediately murmured assurances and Susie stepped close to give Mona a hug. “I woulda liked your place. I was thinking about trying to get a job there.”
Mona looked her over. “You coulda, kid. You got the body.”
“But she dances like Elmer F
udd on Prozac,” Doris cracked, immediately lightening the tension. Then she added, “You know, maybe you could answer a question for me. Is it true the, uh, biggest ones pass out if they get a real woody because all their blood rushes to their little head insteada their big one?”
Mona didn’t bat a lash. “Quite true.”
A few shocked titters greeted the response, then Doris sighed. “I know I’ll never have that worry. The only way my Donald’d pass out during sex is if he had to last longer’n ninety seconds. Or if I made him turn off the TV.”
This time the laughter was loud and cleansing.
As a more comfortable silence descended, the normal clicks of shears and hiss of hairspray gradually resumed. Mona, deciding she wanted a change of look to go with her change of status from respectable widow to former porn queen, took a seat up front, secure in the knowledge that the women in this room, at least, weren’t turning their backs on her. Kinda gave Emma a renewed sense of faith in Joyful.
Though she intended to get right to work, Emma had a hard time getting refocused. Something was tickling the back of her mind. Mona had given her a lot to think about, and at first she figured the thought whizzing around, un-catchable, in her brain, was somehow related. But she didn’t think so. There was something else, something that had put her on edge as soon as she’d started thinking about Daneen. Even more so than thoughts of Daneen usually put her on edge. For the life of her, though, she couldn’t figure out what it was.
Finally, knowing she’d never grab the thought if she continued to hunt it down inside her head, she forced herself to focus on her work. “Mrs. Walker? Ready for your completely unnecessary wash and cut? Want a perm to go with it?”
But the woman wasn’t listening. She was staring into the air, her lips moving, though she didn’t speak aloud. Then, finally, she smiled. An “aha” look which usually accompanied a good idea got Emma curious. “Mrs. Walker?”
“I think,” Jane Walker slowly replied, “I have a possible solution.” She patted Emma on the shoulder. “Of course, nothing can put those trees back, honey. Your grandma’s place is never gonna be able to be the way it was. But you know, when life hands you pecans…sometimes, you just gotta make some pie.”