by Angela Henry
“Where the hell were you? I thought you were going to follow us. We were here a good fifteen minutes before that detective called us in. Why weren’t you here?” Now everyone was looking at me. I couldn’t lie cause I’d already told Mama where I’d been. So once again I started to explain. And once again I didn’t get far.
“I find a dead body and have to come down here and get grilled by the police and have my good Calvin Klein suit and Ferragamo pumps taken into evidence. I could lose my job and your ass is more worried about some petty-ass problem Lynette is having? I’m your sister, Kendra. You should have been here for me!” She turned and buried her face into Carl’s chest and started sobbing.
I chalked it up to frustration over everything that had happened that day and struggled not to take it personally. But when I put a comforting hand on her shoulder she jerked away from me. Mama was nodding her head in agreement, and neither Carl nor Noelle would look me in the eye. Great.
“I’m sorry, Allie. I didn’t realize it would take so long,” I said meekly. She continued to ignore me.
“Well, there’s no need to be worried about your job just yet,” Noelle said, brushing past me to stand next to Allegra. “I just got off the phone with Bob McLean, the executive producer, and he’s consulting with Hollywood Vibe’s lawyers. He didn’t seem to think this was any reason for you to be let go.”
“Then why is he consulting the lawyers?” Allegra asked. She’d turned to face Noelle and I couldn’t help but notice that her big sobbing routine had produced no tears whatsoever. The big faker! Noelle didn’t seem to have an answer for her and turned a shade of red almost as bright as her hair.
“Oh, forget it! I just want to get out of here before anyone sees me looking like this.”
We all watched my sweat-suit-clad sister as she rushed across the lobby toward the police station’s revolving doors. Her flip flops slapped loudly against the linoleum floor. We started to follow her, but everyone froze when an older black woman, as short and squat as a fire hydrant, wearing a black suit and black-and-white spectator pumps, came charging into the lobby. Her hair was pulled back severely into a bun that was several shades darker than the rest of her hair and screamed hairpiece. When she spotted my sister, her already sour expression turned to sheer rage and she pointed a stubby finger at Allegra.
“You little bitch! You killed Vivianne! I know you did it!” shouted the woman I now recognized as Vivianne DeArmond’s assistant, Harriet Randall. She flew at Allegra and started swinging her big black patent-leather purse, catching my sister upside the head and knocking her to the floor.
“Why couldn’t you just leave her alone!” Harriet screamed and started to raise her purse again to hit my sister who was cowering on the floor in a fetal position with her arms raised over her head to shield herself.
Mama, Carl, Noelle and I all ran to Allegra’s aid. But it was my almost-seventy-three-year-old grandmother, who I never realized could move so fast, who got to Harriet first and yelled, “Now, hold up, heifer!” and tackled the woman to the ground. Mama and Harriet were rolling around on the floor slapping at each other. Harriet had Mama by her throat, but Mama grabbed Harriet’s hairpiece and gave it good tug. It came off in her hand and she tossed it over her shoulder where it landed at Noelle’s feet. She jumped back like it was a rat infected with cooties and stepped on my foot, causing me to yelp in pain and my eyes to water. Harriet wasn’t at all fazed about her altered hairdo and hadn’t forgotten her main target. She kept trying to crawl over to pummel Allegra some more, but Mama kept pulling her out of reach. I ran over and Carl and I tried to pry the two brawling women apart. Carl had Harriet under the armpits trying to pull her to her feet and I had Mama’s arm. Mama was still spitting mad but allowed me to help her to her feet. But Harriet fought Carl off like he was a mugger and slugged him hard in the stomach, causing him to double over. She’d raised her lethal purse again to bash him on the head when some police officers, who must have been on a doughnut break, finally ran over to subdue her.
“She’s crazy!” yelled Allegra, who had gotten up off the floor and was cowering behind Noelle.
“Murderer!” screamed Harriet, still lunging for Allegra. She bit the hand of one of the officers as they wrestled her to the floor and were attempting to cuff her.
“I didn’t kill her. We had an appointment for an interview! Why would I kill her?” Allegra screamed back.
“Liar! I handled all of Vivianne’s publicity. If she had granted you an interview, it would have been through me!”
The officers finally got the cuffs on Harriet and dragged the enraged old broad to her feet.
“Get her out of here,” said the unfortunate officer with Harriet’s teeth marks in his hand gesturing toward Allegra.
Mama grabbed Allegra and started to march out of the police station with me, Noelle and Carl in tow. When we reached the revolving doors we were met by a barrage of flashbulbs going off in our faces as a dozen or so reporters confronted us, hurling questions at Allegra.
“Were you the one who found Vivianne DeArmond’s body?” asked a sweaty fat guy with in a too-tight suit.
“Is it true that she was stabbed?” asked Channel Four’s star news reporter, Tracy Ripkey, whose big blond bouffant do looked a little dented as she tried to squeeze through the crowd to stick her microphone in Allegra’s face.
“Can you still do the Freaky Deaky?” asked a smarmy-looking guy in dirty jeans and a T-shirt who wasn’t a member of the press, just some fool trying to be funny.
At the sight of the cameras, Allegra instantly perked up and opened her mouth to speak before Mama glared her into silence.
Noelle yelled, “No comment,” and gathered protectively around Allegra, who looked longingly at the reporters, and hustled her into Carl’s car.
Later that evening, Carl and I were soaking in my tub. It was a tight fit with the two of us and we’d sloshed water on the bathroom floor, but I wasn’t complaining. Allegra had gone back to stay with Mama. This was the closest I’d felt to Carl since before my sister arrived in town, and I had started to feel a little neglected.
“You never did give the police your statement. How much do you want to bet Harmon and Mercer come knocking on your door?”
I groaned. They were the last two people, besides my sister, that I wanted to talk about. I didn’t have much of a problem with Detective Charles Mercer. He was a nice enough guy and usually pleasant to me. But his partner, Trish Harmon, had about as much charm and warmth as a head of iceberg lettuce. Hermits have more people skills than she does.
“I’ll go talk to them tomorrow. I’ve had enough drama for one day.”
“Poor Vivianne DeArmond. The woman was supposed to get an award and ended up with a letter opener in her back. Damn, that’s a shame,” Carl said, massaging my sore foot. There was still a faint impression from where Noelle had stepped on me.
“A letter opener? I figured she’d been stabbed with a knife.”
“No. It was a letter opener.”
“That’s weird. I mean, if you’re planning to stab someone, you don’t plan on doing it with a letter opener. You’d use a knife.”
“I know I would. But what who said the murder was planned? It could have been a crime of passion.”
“I wonder if it was Vivianne’s letter opener?”
“Does it matter? Dead is dead whether she was killed with a knife, a letter opener or a pitchfork.”
“No. I was just thinking out loud.”
“It’s too bad your sister wiped that message off her hood. It could have backed up her story about the interview. The fact that Harriet Randall is claiming she knew nothing about the interview adds a new wrinkle to Allegra’s story.”
“Can’t they check phone records to see that Allie really did call Vivianne?”
“Yes, but there will only be a record that a phone call was made and how long it lasted, not what they talked about. The police could think she was calling to harass Vivianne.”<
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“It’s going to kill Allie if she ends up losing her job over this mess.”
“Once the results on her clothes come back showing they’re blood-spatter free, she should be in the clear,” Carl said confidently.
I lowered myself farther into the hot sudsy water and wished I shared his confidence.
CHAPTER 4
I dreamt that I was running through the halls of Cartwright Auditorium in my Mickey Mouse nightshirt. A hooded shadowy figure was chasing me with a sharp knife. The halls of the auditorium were mazelike with twists and turns like a serpent’s back. I couldn’t find my way out and felt myself panicking. The shadowy figure was gaining on me. Then a loud ringing fire alarm echoed through the halls, and my pursuer stopped abruptly and pulled off the hood. It was Allegra. She covered her ears as the ringing got louder and louder. I woke suddenly, tangled up in my sheets, sweating and very much alone. Carl was gone. I could still hear the ringing. But as I slowly came fully awake, I realized it wasn’t a fire alarm—it was my phone. I untangled myself and answered it.
“Hello.”
“Kendra?”
“Yeah. Who is this?” I mumbled, looking at the clock on my bedside table. It was nine o’clock in the morning. It was Sunday. The day of rest. I take that rest part very seriously.
“It’s Greg, Kendra. I’m sorry to wake you, but is Lynette over there with you?” I sat straight up in bed.
“She’s not over here, why?”
“Apparently, she told her mother she was spending the night with me. I haven’t seen Lynette since before her bridal shower Friday night. If she’s not at home, and she’s not with either of us, then where the hell is she?”
Should I tell him about the conversation I had with his soon-to-be-wife yesterday? It really wasn’t my place to tell him about Lynette’s sexual hang-ups. He’d find out about that himself soon enough. At least, I hoped he would. Lynette must have been more upset than I realized. I felt awful. If I hadn’t had my hands full with the Allegra situation, or been getting my freak on with Carl last night, it would have dawned on me that Lynette had never come by for the pizza and wine I’d suggested. Where in the world could she be? I finally told Greg an edited version of my conversation with Lynette, leaving out any mention of the sex issue, and told him his fiancée was experiencing a case of stress-induced wedding-day jitters. I was hoping he’d buy it and I could track Lynette down and slap some sense into her. He did buy it, but it didn’t make him any less worried.
“I can’t believe she’s getting so freaked out about our wedding. We’ve been going to church counseling and everything.”
“Really? I didn’t know that.” If Lynette was still having doubts even after going through counseling, she must really be in a bad way.
“It’s mandatory. The minister who’s marrying us wouldn’t do it until we completed these mandatory counseling sessions. We had our last one last week.”
“I thought Reverend Merriman was marrying you guys?” Robert Merriman was the pastor of St. Luke’s Baptist Church, the church Mama still attended regularly and that I’d grown up in but rarely attended anymore. If Reverend Merriman wasn’t marrying them then that could only leave a couple of other people.
“Reverend Merriman had a conflict and couldn’t do it on the date we picked out. Morris Rollins is marrying us at Holy Cross.”
Uh-oh!
Morris Rollins was the very attractive, popular, charming and charismatic minister of Holy Cross Church, a towering testament to modern architecture that many older folks in town thought was an eyesore. Rollins and I had made each other’s acquaintance last year when a student of mine at Clark Literacy Center was wrongly accused of murdering one of Rollins’s loved ones. Despite the fact that he was old enough to be my father and had buried his second wife last year, there was an undeniable attraction between us that I found to be very disturbing. Carl knew Morris Rollins, too, and occasionally did legal aid work for Holy Cross Ministries, which made my attraction to the good reverend even more annoying.
“Kendra, are you still there?” Greg asked, snapping me back to attention.
“Sorry, Greg. What did you say?”
“I was wondering if Reverend Rollins might have heard from Lynette. I mean, if she’s stressing about the wedding, maybe she called Reverend Rollins to talk.”
“I guess it’s a possibility. Why don’t you call and ask him?” I said, even though I was pretty sure Lynette wouldn’t have called Morris Rollins.
“See, here’s the thing, Kendra,” Greg said in a tone that indicated he was about to ask me to do something I wasn’t going to want to do. “I never let on to Justine that Lynette wasn’t with me. Justine’s on her way over to drop off Monty and India because she’s going to Columbus to visit her sister. I don’t want the kids, and especially Justine, to know there might be a problem with Lynette.” He paused and I knew it was coming. “Would you be able to go over to Holy Cross sometime today and talk to Reverend Rollins and see if he’s heard anything from Lynette?”
Damn. What could I say? I sure as hell wasn’t about to tell him I was afraid I’d end up naked and sweaty with Morris Rollins if I lingered in his presence too long. Not that the thought wasn’t extremely appealing. I’d never felt the need to confide my lust for Rollins to anyone, not even Lynette, who knew about most of the men I’d lusted after, and I wasn’t about to confess now.
“Of course, I’ll—” Greg cut me off when I heard the faint sound of his doorbell in the background.
“Thanks, Kendra. Gotta go. Call me.” He hung up before I could finish lying to him about how it would be my pleasure to grill Morris Rollins about Greg’s runaway bride.
I showered and headed over to Mama’s to see how things were going with my sister, the suspect. I certainly didn’t want Allegra or Mama to accuse me again of not being supportive. Plus, I was hoping to snag a couple of Mama’s homemade waffles. I was putting off my trip to Holy Cross. I’d started to call the church to talk to Rollins over the phone instead, but then realized he was probably delivering his Sunday sermon.
I had turned onto Orchard Lane and was headed for Mama’s driveway when I noticed a man and a woman sitting in a green Honda parked three doors down from Mama’s house. I wouldn’t have given them a second glance if it hadn’t been for the woman’s hair: short, red and spiky. It was Allegra’s producer, Noelle Delaney. The man she was with was a very light-skinned black man with short dreads. I drove past slowly and could hear them screaming at each other through the Honda’s rolled-up windows. They didn’t notice me at all. It wasn’t any of my business, so drove on, pulled into the driveway and parked behind Allegra’s rental.
When I walked into the kitchen, Mama was sitting at the table drinking a cup of tea with the Sunday paper spread out in front of her. She was still dressed in her church clothes. She attended St. Luke’s sunrise service at six-thirty every Sunday morning. I thought back to what I’d been doing at six-thirty that morning. Oh yeah, being chased through my dreams by her knife-wielding granddaughter. I knew she wouldn’t appreciate me sharing that dream with her.
“Why are you here so early? I haven’t even started dinner yet.” She was referring to the fact that I eat at her house every Sunday.
“Just came by to see how Allie’s doing. She up yet?” I asked, heading toward the stairway that led to the second-floor bedrooms. Mama looked up from her paper and gave me a slightly confused look.
“Allie’s not here. Carl came by and took her out to breakfast to cheer her up.” My head whipped around so fast I almost got whiplash.
“I figured you knew and just didn’t want to get up. I know how you like to lay around in the bed all morning,” she said quickly, getting up from the table.
I couldn’t speak. Allie was my sister, not his. If she needed cheering up, I’d be the one to do it. And why hadn’t Carl asked me to go? Don’t I need breakfast just like the next person? And just when was this little rendezvous planned? He didn’t leave me a note or an
ything. Just rolled out of my bed that morning to take Miss Hollywood Vibe to breakfast. I know I was asleep, but he could have at least left me a note.
Then a vision suddenly flashed in my mind of Allegra calling Carl and sounding pitiful. I bet she even cried a little, and Carl, being the kind of man he is, probably suggested getting together to discuss her legal options. I’d be willing to bet my next paycheck that it was Allegra who wanted to go to breakfast and told Carl not to wake me. Priceless.
“Why don’t I fix you some waffles?” Mama walked into the pantry and I could hear her opening and closing cabinets while I stood and fumed. My sister was after my man, and all my grandmother could do was offer me food? How well she knew me. But not this time. I’d suddenly lost my appetite.
“No, thanks,” I said through gritted teeth. I walked out the back door. Mama called out after me.
“And don’t go bothering Carl and Allie, Kendra. I’m sure they have some serious business to discuss and your sister needs to focus on getting herself out of this mess, you hear me?” she said to my retreating back. I didn’t bother answering her.
Instead, I hopped in my car and backed out of the driveway. I drove by the green Honda, which was still parked in the same spot. Only this time, Noelle and Mr. Dreads were kissing passionately. I only caught a glimpse of them before the Honda’s windows fogged up. Well, at least someone’s having fun, I thought miserably.
I arrived back at my apartment close to eleven o’clock. I wrestled with the idea of trying to track Carl and Allegra down but decided in my current mood it would be a very bad idea. I had at least an hour to kill before services at Holy Cross were over and I could talk to Morris Rollins. Given the murderous feelings I was harboring toward my sister, I decided I was in need of a little spiritual healing. I changed out of my jeans and T-shirt and put on the green silk wrap dress that I’d worn to Lynette’s shower along with a pair of strappy high-heeled sandals, sprayed on my favorite vanilla-scented cologne and headed off to church. As usual, Holy Cross’s parking lot was packed, and I had to park a block away.