DEAD AS a DOORNAIL

by Tonya Kappes

  Praise for the Kenni Lowry Mystery Series

  “Fabulous fun and fantastic fried food! Kappes nails small town mystery with another must-read hit. (Also, I want to live in Cottonwood, KY.) Don’t miss this one!”

  – Darynda Jones,

  New York Times Bestselling Author of Eighth Grave After Dark

  “Packed with clever plot twists, entertaining characters, and plenty of red herrings! Fixin’ To Die is a rollicking, delightful, down-home mystery.”

  – Ann Charles,

  USA Today Bestselling Author of the Deadwood Mystery Series

  “Southern and side-splitting funny! Fixin’ To Die has captivating characters, nosy neighbors, and is served up with a ghost and a side of murder.”

  – Duffy Brown,

  Author of the Consignment Shop Mysteries

  “This story offers up a small touch of paranormal activity that makes for a fun read…A definite “5-star,” this is a great mystery that doesn’t give up the culprit until the last few pages.”

  – Suspense Magazine

  “A Southern-fried mystery with a twist that’ll leave you positively breathless.”

  – Susan M. Boyer,

  USA Today Bestselling Author of Lowcountry Book Club

  “A wonderful series filled with adventure, a ghost, and of course some romance. This is a hard book to put down.”

  – Cozy Mystery Book Reviews

  “Kappes captures the charm and quirky characters of small-town Kentucky in her new mystery…a charming, funny story with exaggerated characters. The dialect-filled quirky sayings and comments bring those characters to life.”

  – Lesa’s Book Critiques

  “With a fantastic cast of characters and a story filled with humor and murder you won’t be able to put it down.”

  – Shelley’s Book Case

  “Funny and lively...Before you blink you’re three chapters down and you’re trying to peek ahead to see what happens next. Fast moving with great characters that you wish were real so that you might be able to visit with them more often.”

  – The Reading Room

  “Kappes is an incredible author who weaves fabulous stories…I can’t wait to see what she comes up next in this series.”

  – Community Bookstop

  “I am totally hooked. The people of Cottonwood feel like dear friends, and I enjoy reading about the latest happenings…The story is well-told, with plenty of action and suspense, along with just enough humor to take the edge off.”

  – Book Babble

  The Kenni Lowry Mystery Series

  by Tonya Kappes

  FIXIN’ TO DIE (#1)

  SOUTHERN FRIED (#2)

  AX TO GRIND (#3)

  SIX FEET UNDER (#4)

  DEAD AS A DOORNAIL (#5)

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  Copyright

  DEAD AS A DOORNAIL

  A Kenni Lowry Mystery

  Part of the Henery Press Mystery Collection

  First Edition | May 2018

  Henery Press, LLC

  www.henerypress.com

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever, including internet usage, without written permission from Henery Press, LLC, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

  Copyright © 2018 by Tonya Kappes

  This is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real locales are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Trade Paperback ISBN-13: 978-1-63511-334-1

  Digital epub ISBN-13: 978-1-63511-335-8

  Kindle ISBN-13: 978-1-63511-336-5

  Hardcover ISBN-13: 978-1-63511-337-2

  Printed in the United States of America

  To the Kappes Cozy Krew

  Chapter One

  “Hey, Tina,” Lucy Ellen Lowell greeted Tina Bowers, owner of Tiny Tina’s Salon and Spa, as she shimmied her robust chest in front of the pedicure chair where I was sitting.

  Tina was crouched down by my feet, slathering some sort of gritty lotion on my shins. “Hey, Kenni,” Lucy Ellen said in a breathy tone.

  Lucy’s beady green eyes focused on Tina from underneath the wide-brimmed hat on top of her head. Tina’s brown eyes were flat as she looked up at me from underneath her brows, not looking at Lucy Ellen at all. Slowly, Tina’s jaw moved from side to side with each chew of her gum.

  “Tina, you have to do my nails. I have to have them done for the upcoming wedding.” Lucy Ellen paused. “I called to make an appointment, but Cheree told me that you weren’t taking appointments and I have to get my nails done before Saturday and today is the only day I got open.” Lucy Ellen gave Cheree Rath, Tina’s employee, an ungrateful raised brow and scowl before she flung her fingers in the air. She was right. Her nails were chipped and in desperate need of painting. “Look here. These are awful. You ain’t working, Kenni?” Lucy Ellen continued to show spirit hands, nail side out to Tina.

  “I’m actually having a day off.” I forced a smile.

  It was difficult to take a day off since I was sheriff of our small town of Cottonwood, Kentucky.

  “Betty and Finn are holding down the fort,” I assured her when I saw from her contorted face that her brain was flipping through names like a Rolodex for who was at the sheriff’s department. Betty Murphy was the department dispatch operator and secretary. Finn Vincent was the only sheriff’s deputy in the department outside of my four-legged deputy, Duke, my hound dog.

  “Finn gave Kenni the gift card. They’re an item now.” Tina winked. “That’s why she’s getting extra special love.” She kneaded and massaged my calves with her thumbs.

  “Sweet.” Lucy’s face pinched. “Now.” Her hands plunged in front of Tina’s face. “What about my nails?”

  The bell over the salon door dinged.

  Everyone in the salon stopped when Polly Parker and four of her friends, along with her mother, nearly fell over themselves as they pushed through the door, giggling.

  “We’ll be right with you.” Cheree said over her shoulder with her fingers stuck in a customer’s shampooed hair in the black rinsing sink.

  Polly’s friends were no doubt here for her wedding that was only five days away, if you included today.

  “Go on and pick out some colors if you want color,” Tina followed up, ignoring Lucy. “They’re here for what’s called a preview party.”

  I smiled and nodded, feeling a wee bit sorry for Tina. Polly was high maintenance even outside of being a bride. I’d imagined she was a bridezilla. Her wedding to Mayor Ryland was the talk of the town. All the small boutiques in town were selling out of dresses and knick-knacks the happy couple registered for. It was actually an event I was looking forward to as well.

  “Well?” Lucy Ellen pulled the towel off of the arm of my pedicure chair and wiped the dripping sweat from her brow. I looked between her and Tina.

  “Well?” Lucy Ellen asked again and cocked her leg to the side, her curvy bottom following, almost smacking into Jolee Fischer, my best friend, who was sitting in the pedicure chair next to me.

  Tina’s hands felt like a Brillo P
ad as she rapidly rubbed them up and down my legs.

  Lucy Ellen pulled her diamond-encrusted gold watch up to her round face and checked out the time. “I’ve got time now. And...” Her mouth formed an “O” as if she’d just remembered something very important. “Dr. Shively said you could do my toes, but don’t put them in the tub since I’ve been nursing that big bunion and all.”

  “Lucy, I don’t have time today.” Tina chomped her gum like a cow chewing the cud as she splashed water on my shins to get the gritty stuff off, not giving even a looksie toward Lucy Ellen.

  Cheree put her client under one of those big umbrella hair dryers and plopped herself down in front of Jolee to finish up.

  “We are booked solid.” Tina took my feet out of the water and patted them dry before picking up a bottle of natural-colored nail polish that I’d picked out, giving the bottle a couple of good whacks against the palm of her hand.

  “What do you mean, Tina? I even brought my own flip flops.” Lucy Ellen let an exhausted sigh and patted her purse that was slung over her shoulder. “I’ve been coming here for two years,” she cried out. “Today is the only day I’ve got open before the wedding.” Lucy Ellen looked over at Polly. Her eyes squinted and she nodded her head once the fake smile was across her lips. “You’ve always taken me when I come in.”

  Lucy Ellen wasn’t letting up. She jerked the floppy hat off her head. Her black hair sprang out like coils. Tina choked back a laugh. I kept my eyes on her and didn’t dare look at Lucy.

  “And my hair needs a treatment awfully bad. And only you can do it, Tina. Only you.” Lucy Ellen made a desperate attempt to jam the hair back under the hat, but the hair wasn’t having it. With another failed attempt, the hair won and Lucy Ellen shoved the hat underneath her armpit.

  “I’m the only one in town,” Tina muttered under her breath while she started painting my toes. “That’s why I’m her only one.” Tina made a good point.

  “You can do my hair treatment and let it sit while you paint my toes and then shampoo the treatment out. My hair can air dry while you give me a manicure.” Lucy Ellen had it all figured out. “I’ve got cash.”

  She reached in her purse and pulled out a fistful of cash.

  “Today isn’t good. After Kenni and Jolee, we’re have Polly’s entire wedding party in for a preview look.” Tina made it very clear she didn’t have time for Lucy Ellen.

  Any time I’d ask her about the rocks, she’d swear up one end and down the next that she’d bought the rocks from a beauty supply shop. It was a known fact that Tina Bowers hadn’t bought the rocks because I’d received several phone calls from dispatch that Tina was down at the Kentucky River taking rocks off the side of the road when in fact it was against the law to pillage the limestone. Sure as shinola, the rocks under my piggies at the moment were jagged pieces of limestone.

  “Preview look?” Lucy’s head jerked toward the front of the salon and stared at Polly. “What on earth is that?” Her nose curled. She didn’t give Polly a second to respond until she said, “I’m looking forward to seeing the mayor. I’ve not seen him in months.”

  “Mmhm.” Polly Parker’s chin lifted up and down with pride. Her lips parted into a smile that showed off her bright white veneers—a smile that reminded me of a horse’s mouth. “Tina is going to paint all my bridesmaids’ nails to make sure the color will match their dresses.” Polly’s shoulders lifted to her ears as her sweet Southern voice escalated. “Each dress is a different color. Gone with the Wind style.” She lifted the back of her hand to her forehead as if she were going to faint. “I didn’t want any surprises when we come back for the real manicures and pedicures.”

  Jolee and I looked at each other when Polly said Gone with the Wind and bit back our laughter.

  “I’ve never heard of such a thing.” Lucy Ellen tsked. “This is taking too much of Tina’s time. Cheree, can’t you take Tina’s clients? I’ve got to get my hair and nails done.” Lucy Ellen stormed over to Cheree, who was finishing up painting Jolee’s toenails.

  “I’m sorry, Lucy. We are booked to the gills and we just can’t fit you in.” Cheree pushed back a stray strand of her long red hair that had found a way out of her low ponytail. Her freckles deepened as the anger swelled up in her. She made it perfectly clear to Lucy, but Lucy Ellen just wasn’t having it.

  “You can squeeze me into a wee little spot.” Lucy Ellen continued to look around the shop. “I’ve been coming here for two years.” She held up two fingers in the air and flip-flopped them around saying it for a second time as if they didn’t hear her the first or they didn’t realize she’d been coming that long.

  “And in those two years,” Cheree sounded as if she’d had enough, “you’ve cancelled at least a dozen times.” She looked up over the rim of her glasses from the stool in front of Jolee and stared at Lucy. She had a bottle of open polish in one hand and the nail brush in the other. “Did you ever think of the financial bind you put us in when you don’t show up? How are we gonna pay our bills? Did you ever think of that?”

  “Then I’ll buy the Perfectly Posh.” Lucy Ellen picked up the bottle from Tina’s nail station and looked at it. “This isn’t Perfectly Posh. Where is it?”

  She gripped a much lighter pink version in her hand that clearly didn’t match her chipped up fingernails.

  “You know I don’t sell my polish to no one.” Tina sprayed down the foot tub and gave it a couple of scrubs to clean it out.

  She stood up, tugged the scrunchie from her wrist, and pulled her brown hair in a top knot on her head. She stretched her neck into a slow roll and strolled over to Lucy Ellen like she was gearing up for a confrontation.

  “If you ain’t gonna do my nails for Polly’s wedding, then I’ll have someone else do them with your polish,” Lucy Ellen said through gritted teeth with another polish in her grips. “You are the only person who knows how to make your own polish that no one else has and I can’t have the same polish as the other girls from the Hunt Club at the wedding. I just can’t,” she cried, clutching the polish to her chest.

  Tina plucked the bottle of homemade nail polish right out of Lucy’s hand.

  “I don’t even have any Perfectly Posh made up. Get out of here.” Tina’s tone meant business. Lucy Ellen slid her eyes past Tina’s shoulders and looked at me. I offered a pinched smile.

  It was probably time for me to step in even though I wasn’t on duty. I went to stand up, but Jolee caught my attention. She shook her head for me to stay out of it.

  She whispered, “This is the best part about coming to the beauty shop.” Jolee laughed. “All the crazy comes out of people.”

  The tension crept up my back and into my shoulders. Wasn’t this supposed to be a relaxing experience? I thought and continued to look down.

  “Well, I never. You’ll regret this, Tina Bowers.” Lucy Ellen twirled her finger around the shop. “Tiny Tina’s will no longer be in business once it gets out in all the gossip circles how you treated me here today.” Lucy Ellen brought her hands up to her chest. “I’m sending in a bad review to the Chronicle as soon as I get home.”

  “Lucy,” Cheree called after her before she left, “you might oughta try a wet comb on that cowlick of yours.”

  Lucy Ellen huffed and puffed before she turned on the balls of her feet and trotted out the door. Bouncy hair and all.

  “Good riddance.” Tina snapped her fingers and pointed for me to move over to the nail station for my manicure. “She’s always sending bad reviews to the Chronicle.”

  I walked on the heels of my feet, careful not to smear the fresh polish on my toes.

  “Geez, I can’t believe the gall of that woman.” Tina jerked my hand over the puffy brown pillow and adjusted the miniature light over my hand. “Scoot up,” she instructed me.

  “If she had another wrinkle on that body, she’d be able to screw on that hat,” Cheree said u
nder her breath as she finished up painting Jolee’s toenails and moved her to a manicure station next to me, sticking Jolee’s fingers in a bowl of water for her cuticles to soften.

  She walked over to the client under the dryer and felt around her head before she started the dryer back up.

  “Lucy’s an awful woman. She had the nerve to order from my food truck and bring the food back half eaten with a fly in it saying I cooked the fly in the food when I know good and well the fly flew into her food after she sat down at the picnic table because she’d spent the first few minutes batting them away.” Jolee curled her nose. “While stuffing her face the whole time.”

  Cheree busied herself cleaning out the foot tub where Jolee had been and filled it right back up, motioning for Polly to come on over.

  “My mama made me invite her to the wedding. I didn’t want to.” Polly gave her mom a sideways look. “I didn’t want to invite any of them hunting club women, but Mama insisted since I’m gonna be the first lady and all. Plus, Chance is a member of the club. Not that he goes all that much, but it’s good for his position as mayor.”

  Polly fanned her face with her fingers.

  “I sure hope the weather is good next weekend.” Polly looked over at her mother.

  Paula Parker didn’t pay her daughter any attention. She just continued to sit in the plastic chair in the front of the shop flipping through the five-year-old beauty magazines.

  “You obviously invited them.” Cheree turned the cold water on a little more after Polly sat down and stuck her big toe in and pulled it right back out.

  “I told Tibbie Bell to go ahead and invite them all.” Polly referred to another friend of mine who was the only wedding planner in Cottonwood. “Chance told me not to worry my pretty little head because this week is their annual gun show, which means the men have taken off work the next couple of weeks to get their cabins ready for the first week of hunting season.” Polly sucked in a deep breath and slowly let it out with a humming sound.