Kendra Clayton Mystery Box Set

by Angela Henry

  However, I couldn’t work up much enthusiasm for the one I was being fitted for. Lynette was already there when I arrived. She still hadn’t found a wedding gown and flipped through bridal magazines while I was being fitted. Even though we’d put what had happened at the party behind us, there was still a little bit of tension bubbling under the surface. I already had enough to worry about so I played nice. Besides, Lynette was looking completely stressed out. Working full-time, raising two kids basically on her own, living with her well-meaning though exasperating mother, and planning her own wedding, complete with insane bridesmaids, had my best friend ready to pull her hair out.

  “Now, see, there’s nothing wrong with that dress. It looks good on you,” claimed Lynette encouragingly as she tossed a magazine into the pile by her chair and picked up another one.

  I didn’t agree. I looked at myself in the fitting room’s long mirror and suppressed a shudder.

  The dress was fitted in the waist and bodice with a boatneck, three-quarter sleeves, and a flared calf-length skirt that made my legs look stumpy. The lace at the neckline was itching me and I pulled at it irritably. The sash around the middle ended in back with a large bow that, instead of being on my back, was designed to hang down over my behind, making me feel like I had wings on my ass. And if that wasn’t enough, the dress was covered in so many sequins that I bet Liberace would have drooled with envy. I didn’t dare complain. Lynette kept glancing at me with a half-crazed look in her eyes. I didn’t want to find out what happens when a stressed-out bride snaps.

  “Hold still. I almost pinned my finger to the hem,” said Mona. Mona Carter was a tiny woman in her late forties who, despite the fact that she’d sold thousands of wedding gowns, had never married. She seemed to enjoy living vicariously through the brides she fitted for gowns.

  “There,” said Mona, standing to survey her work, “all done.” Mona and Lynette were watching me, waiting for some kind of positive response. I had to dig deep.

  “I guess it’s not so bad now that I’ve had a chance to see it again.” I turned slowly, looking at myself in the mirror, and even managed a halfhearted smile. I was afraid that Georgette and the twins were going to jump out and get me if I didn’t make a good show of liking the dress.

  “Told you so,” said Lynette, looking so happy that I was glad I’d lied. But I still couldn’t wait ‘til it was my turn and I got to pick out something ugly for her to wear. I had visions of big polka dots to go along with the neon pink tulle and bugle beads.

  I headed into the changing room and quickly changed out of the dress. Mona had instructed me to hang it on the rack outside the room along with the other dresses that she was currently altering. There were several dresses on the rack ranging from a simple cotton sundress to evening gowns. One dress in particular caught my eye and I picked it up. It was a gold, silk Oriental-style dress with cap sleeves, a high Mandarin collar, and black frog closures in the front. The dress was actually pretty tame-looking from the front. But the back was another story. The dress was completely open in the back from the neck to the waist. I looked inside and saw that it was a size four. I tried hard to remember if there was ever a time in my life when I could wear a size four and concluded that it had possibly been when I was four years old.

  “It’s sharp, isn’t it?” said Mona, who’d walked up on me while I was holding the dress up in front of me.

  “Now, this is a dress,” I said to Mona. “Whose is it?”

  “Nicole Rollins. She’s a tiny little thing and it was way too long for her. I had to hem it. It’s been finished for a couple of weeks but she hasn’t been back to get it. I’m not surprised, though, with what happened to Inez.”

  “This is a pretty racy dress for a minister’s wife, isn’t it?”

  “To be honest, I don’t think she ever planned to actually wear it. Nicole was here shopping one day and saw Inez try on the dress. Inez really wanted this dress but she couldn’t afford it. Nicole just bought it to spite her,” said Mona, shaking her head.

  “That wasn’t very nice,” I said, hanging the dress back on the rack.

  “Yeah, well that’s Nicole for you. She always wanted everything Inez had, including her daddy. Now, she’s got him and Inez is dead. I tell you, it’s just such a shame.”

  “Didn’t they used to be best friends?”

  “Yeah, they ran around together all through school. They both got their prom dresses here. But, you know, even when they were friends, Nicole wasn’t always very nice to Inez. I was good friends with Inez’s mother and she used to tell me some of the mean things Nicole used to do to Inez,” Mona said, shaking her head.

  “Really? Why did Inez put up with her?”

  “Inez was always kinda shy and Nicole was very charming and outgoing. She could be a lot of fun, especially when she was getting her way. Inez just adored her. But that sure changed. When Inez’s mother died and Reverend Rollins married Nicole, Inez was heartbroken. Jeanne and Morris were having their huge house built. I think what really got to Inez was that her mother didn’t even get to live in that house. She died before it was finished. Inez herself only lived there for a few months. Then, when she found out about her father and Nicole, all hell broke loose and she moved out. Nicole is the lady of the manor now.”

  “Sounds like Nicole’s a real piece of work.”

  “As long as you were on Nicole’s good side, you were okay. If not, look out!”

  “What do you mean? Was she violent?”

  “Well,” Mona said, looking around and lowering her voice. “My nephew Lonnie went to high school with Nicole and made the mistake of lying to his friends about feeling up Nicole behind the bleachers after a football game. She found out and attacked him. Scratched up his face and arms real good. He was a mess. Little Miss Nicole takes her reputation very seriously.”

  That certainly answered my question. I decided to find out what else Mona knew. “You know, I heard a rumor that Reverend Rollins and Nicole were fooling around before Inez’s mom died. That can’t be true, can it?”

  “It is as far as a lot of people in this town are concerned. But, I’m not so sure. I mean, no, Rollins is no saint. And I know he and Jeanne had problems early in their marriage, but they always managed to work it out. I was at the hospital a lot during those final weeks and he never left her side. If he was cheating with Nicole, he sure hid it well. But, I think Inez might have eventually gotten over her father’s marriage to Nicole if Nicole had treated her right. She never could resist rubbing Inez’s nose in the fact that she was married to her daddy.”

  I watched as Mona hurried off to help another customer and I thought back to Inez’s funeral. Nicole had been in bad shape. Obviously she was regretting her treatment of Inez. Then I remembered something else. Nicole Rollins wore her hair in long braids. Could she have been the woman seen at the shop around the time of Inez’s murder? Did she witness something, or was it more sinister than that? There was bad blood between the former best friends. Had it escalated to murder? Was that why Nicole was so distraught? Now that I knew that she also had a violent streak, I intended to find out.

  It rained all the next day and my mood matched the gloom outside. Not wanting to deal with Noreen, I called off sick from work and slept in. As I lay in bed, I tried to decide how to go about approaching Nicole Rollins. Going to Holy Cross would be the obvious answer but I really didn’t want to see Morris Rollins. I found my attraction to him very unsettling. Mama’s story about Vera Maynard had me wondering just what would happen if I took Rollins up on his offer to visit him in his office. I didn’t want to become the subject of anybody’s cautionary tale. It was Thursday and I remembered that Rollins taped his show The Light and the Way on Thursday evenings. Surely attending a taping would be safe enough. Nicole was bound to be there. I just had to figure out a way to get her talking about Inez.

  Late that afternoon, I worked at Estelle’s. Gwen was also working and managed to cheer me up, that is until Timmy’s mother arri
ved looking for Alex. Olivia and Gwen were cordial to each other and Gwen was sympathetic to what Olivia was going through with Timmy. However, Gwen never missed an opportunity to subtly remind Olivia that Alex was her man now and she intended to keep him.

  “Olivia, how you holdin’ up, girl?” Gwen had emerged from the hostess station to put a comforting arm around Olivia’s shoulders.

  Gwen was taller than Olivia by several inches. The two women were at the opposite ends of the personality spectrum. Gwen was statuesque, loud, fun-loving, and a flashy dresser. Olivia was quiet, petite, conservative, and‚ while she was actually better looking than Gwen‚ didn’t have the self-confidence and fashion sense that Gwen did. Olivia had been a stay-at-home mom while her husband Jesse was alive. Gwen had worked since she was sixteen. There were probably things about both women that Alex found very appealing.

  “I’m okay, Gwen. Is Alex around?” She sounded slightly annoyed and pulled away from Gwen, who rolled her eyes behind Olivia’s back.

  “He’s in his office,” Gwen replied. “You just go on back,” she said to Olivia’s retreating back as she headed to Alex’s office.

  I wondered if anything was wrong since Olivia hadn’t even acknowledged my presence. Gwen was doing a slow burn.

  “You know, I feel for the woman ‘cause of what she’s goin’ through. But if that stuck-up chick thinks that she’s gonna be cryin’ on my man’s shoulder every damn day, she can think again. I don’t play that shit.”

  “She doesn’t have any friends and her family is gone. Alex is the only one she can talk to,” I said, trying to put Gwen s mind at ease. Thinking back on that tender moment I’d witnessed between Alex and Olivia, I wasn’t so sure that she had nothing to be worried about.

  “Yeah, I know. But you know what? That ain’t my problem,” she said as she pulled a tray out from behind the hostess station and set coffee cups and plates on it.

  “What are you doing?”

  “I’m going to get some coffee and cookies to take back to Alex and Olivia, of course,” she replied, opening her eyes wide with mock innocence.

  “You mean, you’re going to check up on them?”

  “Damn straight,” she said, heading to the kitchen for the food. I hoped Olivia didn’t end up poisoned.

  “Be nice,” I called after her. She responded with a devious smile.

  It was slow so I folded napkins while I waited for the next customers to come in. I felt the hair on the back of my neck stand up and looked up to see Noreen Reardon’s wrinkled face staring at me through the restaurant’s large picture window. With her lips pressed together in disapproval and her eyes slightly magnified by the window, she looked like an elderly fish with its face pressed against the side of a fishbowl. I couldn’t figure out why she was looking so pissed off until I realized I was supposed to be home sick. My heart sank as she walked into the restaurant and made a beeline straight for the hostess station.

  “Kendra, I’m so glad to see you’re feeling better.” Her words were dripping with so much sarcasm and distaste that you’d have thought she’d just caught me picking my nose.

  “Actually, Noreen, I am feeling much better, thank you. I was really in pain this morning.”

  “Come on now, Kendra. I’m an old lady and I suffer from arthritis and a variety of other ailments. I find that aspirin works wonders for pain. You’ll have to come up with a better excuse than that.”

  If she wanted a better excuse, then far be it from me to deprive her of one. “You caught me, Noreen. I just didn’t want to say what was really wrong with me. It’s kind of embarrassing.” I leaned forward, looked around dramatically, and gestured for her to come closer. She leaned in, eyes gleaming in anticipation.

  “Actually, Noreen,” I whispered, placing my hand on hers and looking her straight in the eye,” I’ve been having a terrible bout of ringworm. I just can’t seem to get rid of it. You understand, don’t you?” I squeezed her hand. She quickly pulled away from me in horror, tossed me a venomous look, and hurried out the door without looking back. I knew I was going to pay for my moment of fun at Noreen’s expense, but at the moment I couldn’t have cared less.

  After about a half an hour, Alex emerged from his office with Olivia. I could tell that she’d been crying. She gave me a weak smile as Alex guided her past the hostess station and out the door. Gwen was right behind them and stood at the door watching as Alex walked Olivia to her car. She looked at me and shook her head.

  “What’s wrong?” I asked.

  “Boy, when it rains, it pours,” Gwen replied, still shaking her head.

  “What?” I demanded.

  “Olivia has breast cancer. She found out this morning.”

  “You have got to be kidding me!” I couldn’t believe it. Talk about bad luck.

  Alex came back into the restaurant. He could tell by my expression that Gwen had told me the news.

  “It’s just a small lump and she probably won’t even have to undergo chemo if it hasn’t spread to her lymph nodes,” Alex said. I could tell he was upset all the same. I instantly thought about Timmy. When had he last talked to his mother? Did he know?

  “Well, that’s good news, right?” I asked them, confused by the grim looks on their faces.

  “Yeah, it is,” said Gwen. “Her doctor wants her to have the surgery right away. But Olivia is refusing to be treated until Timmy turns himself in. She hasn’t heard from him and doesn’t know where he is. And she’s also startin’ to have doubts about his innocence. She can’t understand why he won’t turn himself in. She’s worried that he may have skipped town.”

  “I’ve been wondering about that myself,” said Alex, running a hand over his head.

  I wanted to tell them the truth so badly, and I might have if I knew where Timmy was. But until I had some kind of solid proof of his innocence, the fewer people who knew what was going on, the better. After what had happened to Aretha, I didn’t want anything else to happen, especially to anyone I loved. I kept my mouth shut and continued to fold napkins.

  The parking lot of Holy Cross Church was almost as crowded on that Thursday evening as it had been for Inez’s funeral. I parked and, not knowing where the taping was being held, followed a group of people I assumed were there for the same reason. I had chosen my outfit very carefully and was dressed in a conservative lavender cowl neck sweater, black slacks, leather boots and coat. I didn’t want to give Reverend Rollins any ideas about why I was there by dressing provocatively. I wasn’t even wearing perfume. I just hoped his wife Nicole was around so I could talk to her and leave.

  I pulled my coat around me as I walked across the lot. The unseasonably warm weather that had hung on through September and into October had finally left and the cold fall air had me digging into the back of my closet for warmer clothes, namely my prized black leather trench coat. I considered the coat, which I’d stumbled upon at Deja Vu a few years ago, to be a tribute to my tenacity and extreme thrift. I got in the only fight I’d ever been in when I spotted the coat at the same time as another bargain-loving shopper. We got into a tug-of-war right in the middle of the store. The other woman, a rail skinny chick who looked like she needed a good meal more than a coat, head-butted me and busted my lip. I grabbed a handful of her hair and almost ripped it out of her head but I still managed to hang on to my prize. Once blood from my split lip dripped on the coat, the other woman abruptly let go and I went flying into a rack of shoes. It was undignified and not one of my proudest moments. I didn’t care. Where else was I going to find a black leather trench coat in pristine condition for seventy-five dollars?

  Once inside, I followed the others down into the church’s cavernous basement, which had been turned into a television studio. There was a stage set up talk-show style with a desk for the host and an uncomfortable-looking couch for guests. The backdrop on the wall behind the desk and couch was painted to look like clouds with rays of sun shining through. There were about a hundred folding chairs set up for the audience. E
ach seat had a white gift bag sitting on it. Two television cameras were set up in front of the stage at opposite ends and a large microphone dangled from above. To the right of the stage was a piano and about two dozen more folding chairs. Another microphone hung down over this area, as well.

  The seats in the audience were filling up fast and I grabbed one in the back. The gift bag contained a CD made by the Holy Cross Choir called Divine Intervention; a novel entitled I Will Follow Him, depicting a young woman in a dress with a plunging neckline stretched out in a grassy field with her face and one arm stretched heavenward; a small bible; and an ink pen with Holy Cross Ministries spelled out in gold letters. The choir filed in and sat in the seats to the right of the stage. Shanda wasn’t with them but her father, Rondell Kidd, dressed in a too-tight argyle sweater tucked into equally tight navy blue dress pants, sat down at the piano. I sure hoped he didn’t have gas or it would be the end of his pants.

  Rondell’s wife, Bonita, was rushing around with a clipboard, making sure everybody was in the right place and generally bossing everyone around. I noticed more than a few people giving her very unchristian-like looks behind her back. She was dressed just as dowdily as she had been when I met her. Her plaid skirt and twin set looked straight out of the fifties, and not in the stylish, retro kind of way, either.

  Morris Rollins emerged from behind the curtains on the stage and started talking to the camera crew. One of the cameramen must have made a joke because Rollins laughed and when he did, his smile lit up the entire room. I felt my stomach do a little flip-flop. I’ve always been a sucker for a man with a killer smile. I suddenly missed Carl even more. Rollins was dressed casually in tan slacks, a red crewneck sweater, and loafers. I could see the diamond stud sparkling in his ear from all the way in the back row.