I thought back to the conversation I had with the young airplane mechanic. “As a matter of fact …”
“Pensacola! Look right here.” She pulled out another paper from her stack. “Suzanne Sutton. Her husband, Max Sutton, owned a midsize airport just outside of Pensacola—before the poor guy died, that is.”
“She owns two airports from two different husbands? Talk about taking the good with the bad,” I said. “Is there any mention of how these guys died?”
Meredith pulled out a few sheets of paper from one of her piles. “I printed these out for you. Her last husband, Alexander Jeffries, died in a horrible accident. It seems he walked face-first into a moving propeller.”
“Dear God! How gross is that?” I took the printout and read the article.
“The one before Jeffries, Max Sutton, died as the result of a little skydiving mishap. Any guesses about who might have packed his parachute?”
“I have a pretty good idea,” I told her.
“Did Drake Tuttle happen to mention any other places Sue Jeffries used to fly to?”
I tried to remember. “Well, he did say she used to fly to upstate New York to see her sister, but she hasn’t done that in over a year … dear God! Trina Cranford is from Albany! That’s upstate New York. Do you think they’re related?”
Meredith typed in Trina Cranford, Albany, New York.
And there it was, as plain as day. Trina Cranford and Suzanne Cranford. Their parents were listed as John and Alicia Cranford, also of Albany. There were high school links and college notations—various accomplishments, including a pilot’s license for Suzanne and a beautician’s license for Trina. I should have known, should have seen it all along. Their bone structure, body type, even their height was so similar. They had an out-of-the-area accent—Trina’s more noticeable, but Sue had a slight accent, too. They had both used the same annoying, condescending phrase when they addressed me—my dear.
“Sisters,” Meredith agreed.
“So, Sue Jeffries is a black widow,” I told Meredith, who nodded in agreement. “She marries men and takes over their businesses for herself. She’s a good business woman. She turns the companies around if they’re marginal, and works to improve them if they’re lucrative.
“Trina moved down here a little over a year ago and opened Trina’s Tresses. It’s not an airport, but she’s not a pilot. She likes hair, and she’s following in her big sister’s footsteps. But why kill the wives this time? Why not coax Matthew and Hank to leave their wives, marry them, and then knock them off? They’d be the beneficiaries in the wills after they were married. The businesses would be left to them—and it sounds like those two sure know how to turn a business around to make it profitable.”
Meredith appeared to think it over. “Divorce is iffy, Colleen. Suppose the businesses had to be split fifty-fifty in a divorce settlement? Or maybe it’s something else. Maybe Hank Barber and Matthew Oliver weren’t looking for more romantic greener pastures. Maybe they actually loved their wives. The sisters needed Dizzie and Leona out of the way—permanently!”
“These girls would be willing to wait for the guys’ broken hearts to heal if there was enough money involved. I get the feeling if Matthew and Hank walked into a propeller after nuptials to those two, there would be plenty of cash to pay off any gambling losses, with enough left over to live comfortably ever after.”
I reached inside my purse and found my cell phone.
“Who are you calling?” Meredith asked.
“Trina Cranford. I’m making her work on my hair tonight. I think I’ve got her! We’ve got her! And we’re getting her highbrow sister, too.”
A stylist picked up the phone at Trina’s Tresses. I insisted on speaking directly to Trina.
“You have to do something with my hair, Trina,” I told her when she came on the phone, making myself sound irritated and exasperated by the impossible straightness of my locks. “It has to be tonight! People are making fun of me everywhere I go! I can’t take it anymore!”
I detected the insulted tone of her voice. “Your hair is lovely. There’s nothing wrong with it.”
“Fine. Next time someone jokes about it, I’m telling them exactly where I had my hair done,” I threatened.
I was told come by at 8:00 p.m.—closing time. Trina assured me she would work on me personally. I hung up and turned to Meredith.
“You’re not going to confront her alone, are you?” Meredith asked, concerned.
“Not alone. I’ll make a few more calls. Ron Haver, for sure. Maybe I’ll call Willy Rojas for good measure. But first, I’m calling Ken Rhodes.”
“I’m going with you,” Meredith said.
“No you’re not,” I told her as I punched in Ken’s number.
“But you can’t just walk in there …” Meredith protested.
I held up a finger to quiet her when Ken answered his phone. “It’s Colleen,” I said quickly, knowing I sounded awfully clandestine. I checked Meredith’s computer for the time. “I need you to go inside Trina’s Tresses at exactly 8:05 tonight. Can I absolutely depend on you to be there? I have your story!”
21
I pulled into the side lot at Trina’s Tresses at ten to eight and parked next to the only other vehicle there—Trina’s car, I supposed. The last of the sunlight had vanished for the day, though it wasn’t as completely dark as it would be in less than two weeks, when the clocks would fall back to standard time. The streetlights popped on one by one out on Bay Boulevard. There was plenty of street parking, as most of the businesses along the tony street had closed at six.
Further on down the block, I heard the laughter and chatter of the young people who gathered in the outdoor seating area of a new, trendy eatery, Food For Thought, hoping to fit in the last of sidewalk dining before the cold fall days began. Their presence comforted me, making me feel like I wasn’t alone.
I sat in the car for a few minutes to gather my courage, then rolled up the window, slung the strap of my pocketbook over my shoulder, and stepped outside. According to my watch, it was nearing 8:00 p.m. I knew I could rely on the timepiece. My mother had made such a fuss about it when she gave it to me last Christmas. It was expensive, jeweled, waterproof, and supposedly gave the right time down to the nanosecond. Best of all, it was small enough not to appear too gaudy. I generally checked the time on my cell phone and had no real need for a wristwatch. In that parking lot, however, I was glad I had stopped by my house to retrieve it.
I walked toward the salon’s street entrance. Half a block down, I spotted an unmarked county car and caught sight of a man with well-cut hair gazing in his rearview mirror from within. Though it was too dark outside to make a positive ID, I knew the man was Ron Haver. He had promised he would be at Trina’s, even if I didn’t share my reasons why I wanted him to be there.
Three doors down, a man idled in front of Applegarth’s Antiques, checking out the various vintage collectables behind a pane of glass decorated with cardboard pumpkins and witches on broomsticks—a very tall, well-built, dark-haired man with streaks of gleaming silver that caught the light from a nearby lamppost. My muscles un-tensed at once. Ken Rhodes was on the scene.
Inside Trina’s Tresses, the lights were low, and the salon looked closed for the day. I pushed open the unlocked door and stepped inside. There was no clink from an overhead bell as in Dizzie’s salon. I was greeted with total silence.
“Trina?” I called out. “It’s Colleen Caruso!”
A muffled, “Over here,” came from the back of the salon, where the sinks for rinsing and shampooing were located.
I didn’t want to go back there. It felt too much like déjà vu. Dizzie’s Salon. The sink filled with water. I made myself take a step, then another. Ken Rhodes had my back, I reminded myself. By now, Ron Haver was probably right outside the door. I turned to look behind me. I knew it had to be 8:05, but Ron was nowhere in sight.
“Trina?” I repeated.
“Come on back,” she said, and I
knew it was Trina because of her accent. “Let’s put a few curls in that super-straight hair of yours.”
I took a few more steps, more confidently this time. Could I be wrong? Could Meredith and I both have been wrong? Maybe Trina was nothing more than an honest hairdresser wanting to correct a styling mistake. Had we jumped to the wrong conclusion?
I passed the spiral staircase, the one that led to the room above where Trina’s artisans of beauty did makeup, waxing, and facials. I spotted the hairdresser just beyond, standing by one of the styling station’s swivel chairs.
The sound of a creak behind me made me stop. Before I could turn, arms wrapped around me—slender, yet powerful arms. Caught in a bear hug, I couldn’t break free. My helplessness infuriated me.
“Hello, my dear,” the woman whispered in my ear.
Sue Jeffries’s pursuit of a perfectly toned body had certainly paid off. A vise would have been less constricting. She was so much taller than me and so very strong, there was no way to break free. I promised myself I would get in shape, take up kickboxing, even resume jogging, regardless of how much I hated to sweat. If only I could get out of this, I swore a silent oath to transform myself into Wonder Woman.
“My friends are right outside,” I told the sisters. “They know I’m here. They know everything. They’ll be here any minute.”
“Right,” Trina laughed. She went to the door and engaged the deadbolt, then punched in the code for the alarm system. “The cavalry will come to save the day. Give it a rest, Colleen. We’re not that stupid.”
I decided to stall for time and did what I would normally do to avert danger. I started talking.
“Why Dizzie’s salon, Trina? Your salon is doing great. Did you really need another one? And Sue, do you really need another airport? Don’t you think the authorities might be getting a little suspicious of you after leaving a trail of dead husbands? Apparently, you are both that stupid.”
Sue dragged me along toward the shampoo sinks. I noticed the sink on the end had been filled to the top with water. I thought of poor Dizzie. Had she guessed the sisters’ plan when they came through the door she had left open for Kate and me on that hot September morning?
“They can’t prove anything,” Sue Jeffries said. “No fingerprints. Thank God for those latex gloves the stylists use. We had no unusual contact with the victims—just occasional working contact. There isn’t a shred of physical evidence anywhere to connect either of us to any of those murders. Who would suspect two killers? And nobody ever thinks women are capable of such things.”
I felt Trina’s hand close around my arm to guide the three of us over to the water-filled sink. Sue was right. Two women. Two beautiful, stylish women with their perfect clothes, tight bodies, magnificent hair, and enviable jewelry. They were prosperous and pampered, and no one in town had even suspected they were sisters.
I did my best to stall them. “Don’t you think it’s gonna look suspicious? Dizzie died this way. The cops will finger Trina for sure, you know!”
“My dear,” Sue whispered. “Did you think the police would find you here? Did you forget about Leona Barber? I’m a pilot. But we won’t make the same mistake twice. That mousy, stupid woman actually put up a fight and fell out of the plane. You won’t be able to struggle the way Leona did. You’re going to be dead long before we take you up. Then you’re getting dumped in the ocean. With a good, strong current and a little luck, they’ll never find you.”
I fought for time. “The tide will come in, Sue. My body will wash up and get caught in the pilings under the piers. They’ll know I didn’t drown in the ocean! There’ll be tap water in my lungs, not salt water! The medical examiner will make the connection! He’ll know, Sue!”
Sue loosened her bear hug and took hold of my right arm.
“Maybe. Maybe not,” Sue said. “And there’s still nothing to connect either of us with anyone’s murder.”
I felt the sisters’ free hands on the back of my head. Before I knew it, they forced me down and pushed my head beneath the water. I managed to take a deep breath and hold it before going under. The reality of my predicament made me open my mouth to scream, and some of my air escaped. I thrashed about. Rocked myself from side to side. Strained to stand against the strong, unyielding hands that were trying to drown me. I thought, this is what Dizzie felt like! This is the helplessness, the hopelessness the stylist felt as her lungs filled with water.
From beneath the water, I heard faint, distant pounding. My only hope was that the cavalry had arrived.
22
Everything seemed to happen in slow motion, although I knew it could only have been a matter of mere seconds. There was muffled gunfire, sounding so far off from where I was below the water. Glass shattered. A shrill, eardrum-piercing whine emitted from the security system. Heavy shoes pounded across the hard tile floor. The hands holding my head down let go, and I drifted up in the water. Strong arms encircled my waist and hoisted me out of the sink.
I choked so long and hard, it felt like I had coughed up a lung. I silently blessed my bossy mother for forcing me to give up smoking. I hadn’t drowned. I had held my breath just long enough to survive.
“Ken,” I whispered. “Ken, I’m alive!”
Ken Rhodes lifted me off my feet and carried me to a swivel chair at one of the styling stations. He grabbed a few towels and draped them across my shoulders then wrapped his arms around me, squeezing tightly. “Thank God,” he whispered. “Thank God you’re okay.”
I shivered, though I didn’t feel particularly chilled. The trembling was the result of my nerves kicking in.
The sisters stood side by side with their hands held high over their heads. Sue Jeffries, the bolder of the two, offered a plausible excuse to Ron Haver.
“I was just helping Trina give her a shampoo.”
“Of course you were,” Ron said, not fooled for a minute by the lie.
“You have nothing on me! Nothing at all,” she told him.
Trina Cranford, emboldened by her older sister, added her two cents’ worth. “You’re paying for that broken door.”
Officer O’Reilly entered the salon. He gave me a thumbs-up when he saw me, a gesture that told me all was okay, I’d be fine, he was here, and he’d take care of everything.
“Can someone cut off that alarm?” Ron yelled out.
O’Reilly reached out and ripped the keypad off the wall.
“What kind of door is that anyway?” Ken asked, directing his question at Trina. He’d released his grip on me, but still kept a hand pressed against my back. It was comforting, which was strange, but nice. I wasn’t used to being comforted.
“It gets dark down here at night. Sometimes the business owners have break-ins. I needed a strong door to ward off crime.”
O’Reilly laughed. “Yeah, you two need to ward off crime. Like there isn’t plenty of that happening inside the shop!”
“There’s been no crime committed here,” Sue Jeffries insisted.
“There’s an attempted murder in here and two murders that happened out there. We know all about you, Sue. One of the editors at the Crier sent me an interesting email with all kinds of information about your various husbands—well, dead husbands, I should say,” Ron told her.
“There isn’t a shred of proof for any of it,” Sue told him. “Not one iota. And there’s no way you can connect me or my sister to either of the murders here in Tranquil Harbor. You’re not on the right track, detective.” She lowered her hand and rested one on her slender hip. “You’re no more than guessing that we were involved.”
I got up off the chair and grabbed another towel to wrap around my dripping head. Then I walked up to Sue and took hold of her wrist. “Oh, really?”
Her jewelry slid on her wet arm, an amazing gold bracelet consisting of nine distinctive bangles that was worth a small fortune. It was the most expensive trinket I had ever seen in person.
“Leave me alone,” Sue said, trying to pull away from me.
I held on tight and fingered the shining bangle that was so prominent on Sue Jeffries’s wrist. “I believe this is an 18-karat gold Paloma Picasso Calife bangle from Tiffany’s,” I told her. “And unless you can produce an eleven thousand dollar receipt for it, my guess is this particular bracelet belonged to Dizzie Oliver.”
Ron Haver put Sue Jeffries in handcuffs. Officer O’Reilly ordered Trina to lower her arms and cuffed her wrists behind her back.
“You just couldn’t resist this, could you?” I told Sue.
“It looks so much better on me,” she replied.
Ron began his Miranda warning. “You have the right to remain silent …”
Outside the shop, another uniformed officer busily strung yellow crime scene tape around the entrance. The lights atop three squad cars flashed brightly, breaking the darkness on the boulevard. A truck from the public works department pulled up. Two workers jumped out and began to unload sheets of plywood from the bed to secure the front door of the salon. I stepped outside to get a breath of the crisp night air. A News 12 van passed me and pulled into an empty space halfway to the corner. Staff photographer Willy Rojas, who I had called earlier but hadn’t seen before entering the salon, snapped shot after shot of the goings-on from across the street.
Ken Rhodes came over and put an arm around me. “You did good, kid,” he said. “Really good.”
“I guess I should be writing this down. I don’t know what happened to my pocketbook.”
Ken tugged the strap, which had been dangling from my shoulder the entire time I was inside the salon. In all the commotion, I never even knew my purse was there. I unzipped the top and felt inside. My notebook was soaked.
I turned to Ken. “Where were you guys anyway? I told you to come in at five after eight. What happened?”
“Nothing happened,” he said. “We were at that door at exactly 8:05.”
“You weren’t! I checked my watch. I was only supposed to be there for three minutes before you guys came in. You were late!”
Hide nor Hair (A Jersey Girl Cozy Mystery Book 2) Page 18
