Chapter Nine
Max closed the front door, but didn’t lock it.
Ariel had left a cover-up draped over Tiffany’s chair. Specks of gray-black dust dotted the counter where no one had bothered to clean up before leaving. A pair of scissors lay open next to abandoned clippers.
Max twirled the chair slowly and sat down. Without being pumped up—so to speak—she could see herself in the mirror only from the neck up, as though she’d been decapitated. Talking heads. She swallowed. The mirror itself, a large oval, was surrounded by six bright ceramic masks. Magenta. Teal. Purple. Bronze. Feathers, lace, and ribbons. Smooth porcelain skin. Red-painted lips.
And empty holes where the eyes should have been.
A chill raced up her spine to her scalp.
Tiffany had loved those masks. She’d worn a mask for most of her life. Her eyes had been empty, too.
Sitting in the chair, Max didn’t touch a thing, not the masks, not the bottles nor the cans of goop, not the curling iron nor the shears. Not even the small, gray Beanie Baby mouse sitting on the edge of the shelf. Nothing.
She should touch something. She might get vibes. Psychic emanations.
But Max couldn’t even reach out. Maybe this job wasn’t such a hot idea. Filling a dead woman’s shoes had worked before; she’d just assumed it would again.
But Tiffany frightened her. Tiffany was strong. Tiffany was sexual. Tiffany was ...
Something ... something. Max couldn’t put her finger on it. But it had very much to do with her death. The psychic powers Cameron had struggled so diligently for Max to accept seemed to have deserted her.
“They haven’t deserted you. You’re just afraid to use them.” Cameron’s voice echoed in the now empty shop.
“Isn’t that what I just thought?”
“You said you were afraid of Tiffany.”
“Same diff.” She looked in the mirror as if she could see him, but there was only her disembodied head.
“Not the same at all, Maxi—”
“I swear, if you start calling me that again, I’ll—” She shook her fist at him. She hated that pet name.
“Tell me why she frightens you.”
Max swallowed. “She ... ” She stopped. “She’s way too attracted to Witt.”
“You mean you’re attracted to him.”
She hastily answered, “That’s not it at all. I’ve decided I’m going cold turkey on men. No one-night stands. No casual sexual relationships. And she’s putting a stick in my spokes with all her catting around.”
Cameron laughed. The sound boomed around the room, roared through her ears so hard that she thought the drums would burst.
“Just when I think there’s hope for you, my darling, you start lying again.”
“That’s no lie.”
“You don’t like that she’s taken control. You don’t like that she’s made you acknowledge the things you both feel.”
She jumped to her feet, rounded on him, ready to do battle—with him, with Tiffany, with all the ghosts trying to take a bite out of her ass. “I don’t want to touch her things. I don’t want to live her life. I don’t want to feel her emotions. I don’t want her inside me.”
“It’s too late for that. She’s already there. The only way you’ll get rid of her is by finding her killer.”
“Then that’s just what I’ll do.” As soon as she’d done that, she stand under a hot shower and scrub her skin until Tiffany’s dirt washed off.
She stalked behind the counter and scanned the list of clients. A new date, time, and stylist’s initials were written by those clients of Tiffany’s who’d been rescheduled.
“All the answers are there, Max. You just haven’t listened to yourself. You never did have a quiet mind.”
Quiet minds allowed for too much introspection. “Fine. I’ll listen tonight.” Like hell, she would. Tiffany wasn’t going to get a foothold in her psyche.
“What does the book say?”
“What?” Damn, he switched topics so fast she couldn’t even follow.
“Remember, the appointment rescheduling?”
God, yes. He was referring to yesterday’s speculation that Tiffany’s appointments had been reassigned much more quickly than possible. “What about it?”
“How many are left?”
She ran a finger down the list. “One for today.” She flipped a page over. “Friday’s are okay.” Another page. “Saturday, one.” A few more pages. The list of clients not yet rescheduled was relatively small.
“Way too small,” Cameron pushed.
He had a good point. But it still didn’t prove anything. Right now, it was little more than suspicious.
“Why didn’t you go to the funeral with them?” Cameron asked, again changing subjects abruptly.
Attending Tiffany’s funeral was the last thing she wanted. Funerals were depressing. She’d done one the week before. It was more than enough for a lifetime. “I want to search the place while they’re gone.”