BERNIE JACKSON HELD A meeting on Monday, to bring everyone up to speed on the investigation. Charity spent the first few minutes doing her best not to let her newly discovered dislike of attractive redheads get in the way of paying attention. She reminded herself it wasn’t Bernie’s fault she had a more than passing resemblance to a barracuda-like reporter.
“We’ve tracked the money from the state to here,” Bernie explained. “We have copies of the cleared checks. They show the city stamp and apparently passed through the city account. However, there are no records of a deposit and even more troubling, no records of a withdrawal.”
“Do you think someone went back and removed the items from the computer?” Marsha asked. “The deposit and the withdrawal?”
“Possibly,” Bernie said. “But what about the bank? It doesn’t show the money going in or out, which means it went into another account.”
“Do we know if it even arrived here in town?” Charity asked. “The check could have been intercepted in Sacramento or before it physically arrived here. It was a paper check, wasn’t it?”
“Yes,” Bernie said. “If it never arrived here, then whoever is perpetrating the fraud is going to be harder to find. But based on what I know so far, that seems a fairly likely explanation. I’ve contacted other communities to find out if anyone else is having the same problem.”
“I don’t like it,” Chief Barns said. “I like criminals who do their dirty work out where someone can see.”
“That would make things simpler,” Bernie agreed.
She discussed the rest of her investigation, took a few more questions, then the meeting ended. Charity found herself walking with Robert back to their floor.
“How are you holding up?” she asked.
“Okay. People are still looking at me funny. I’m living with it. Bernie’s told me privately that she should have me completely cleared in a couple of weeks.” He grimaced. “I’ve given her complete access to my financial records. Checking and saving accounts, my retirement account. All of it.”
“I’m sorry you’re having to deal with all this,” she said.
“It’ll pass. Things will get back to normal.” He paused by her office. “I just want her to catch the bastard who’s doing this.”
“So does the chief.”
“I think she’s happiest when she’s arresting someone.”
“Everyone needs a moment of joy in his or her life.”
Robert shuffled his feet. “Are you… How are things going with Josh?”
Not a question she wanted to answer, she thought, wishing this were easier. “Good.”
“You really like him, don’t you?”
As she was sure being in love fell very close to “really liking” she had no problem nodding.
“Too bad.” He turned and walked away.
Another downside of small-town life, she thought. There was no way to escape seeing Robert. Working with him didn’t make matters easier. She could only hope he would find someone who could appreciate his niceness, along with his little quirks.
WEDNESDAY AFTER WORK, Charity headed out on an errand she’d been rescheduling for some time. She liked her new and improved wardrobe, which was great, but now she had to deal with her hair.
She’d been wearing it exactly the same way since she graduated from high school. Blown dry, so no hint of her natural waves showed, parted in the middle, hanging just below her shoulders. Some days she pulled it back in a French braid. Other days she wore it up. Occasionally it was loose. But there wasn’t anything stylish about it and the color was a boring medium brown. It was time for a change.
She’d asked around for recommendations and had been given two names. Sisters who were in competition with each other. Pia had warned her she would have to alternate between the two unless she wanted people to think she was taking sides. When Charity had asked what the fight was about, Pia couldn’t say for sure, which was part of the problem. No one really knew, which made staying out of trouble that much harder.
But they were the best hairstylists in town, so Charity had randomly chosen Julia’s salon—Chez Julia—not to be confused with her sister’s establishment, the House of Bella.
“You’re the one who wanted to live in a small town,” Charity reminded herself as she walked toward the bright blue building. There were posters of hair models in the window, a lush garden out front and a porch with a rocking chair.
She stepped into the surprisingly large salon. There were about ten stations lined up along two walls. The windows provided a lot of natural light. The main colors were a deep brown, from the wood at the stations, and turquoise. The walls were a rich blue-green up to the chair rail, then cream to the ceiling. The tile floor was done in a dozen shades of turquoise. Soft music played in the background, the place was spotless and had an air of relaxed elegance. Under any other circumstances, Charity would have been pleased with her find.
Instead she found herself feeling trapped as everyone in the salon turned to look at her, then didn’t look away. It was as if they knew who she was—which they probably did.
An attractive woman in her forties hurried toward her. “Charity,” she said. “You’re my four-thirty. I’m Julia. So nice to meet you.”
“Hi.”
Julia glanced behind and made a shooing motion, then returned her attention to Charity. “Ignore them. I do.”
Charity managed a smile. “Just like being the new girl in school.”
“I know. But it will get better, I promise.” Julia smiled. “Now, I have you down for highlights and a cut. Come have a seat and tell me what you were thinking of doing.”
Charity followed her to a station in the back. She sat in the padded chair and faced herself in the mirror. Julia stood behind her, waiting.
“I want something different,” Charity told her. “I’ve been wearing my hair at the same length, in relatively the same style, for years. The color needs help, too.”
Julia ran her hands through Charity’s hair. “Very thick,” she murmured. “Do you have a wave?”
“Sort of. I control it with blow drying.”
“About how much time are you willing to spend in the morning?”
“Not more than fifteen minutes. I don’t have the patience for it.”
“Good to know.” Julia tilted her head. “We’ll do subtle highlights? Nothing too obvious. Just enough to give you a little depth.”
“That sounds great.”
“And for the cut, I’m thinking a blunt longish bob, with bangs.”
Charity blinked. “Bangs?”
Julia dropped her hands to Charity’s shoulders and squeezed. “Trust me.”
By now conversation had resumed around them. Charity decided to simply go with the flow. Hair grew. If she didn’t like the new style, eventually she could go back to what she’d been doing before.
Julia left her with a couple of magazines and went off to mix color. A few minutes later, Charity was covered in a plastic cape while Julia expertly applied color to a few strands of hair, then carefully wrapped them in foil.
“How are you settling in to living here?” Julia asked. “It’s been a few months.”
“I really like it. I’ve never lived in a small town before. The adjustment has been fun.”
“What’s Josh like in bed?” a woman in pink curlers yelled from across the room.Conversation stopped. For a second there was only the sound of the soft music. Once again everyone was staring at Charity.
Julia sighed. “You don’t have to answer that,” she said. “Not that we’re not interested,” she added with a wink.
She turned to the salon. “She’s new, remember. Everyone back off.”
“But I want to know,” another woman insisted. “I’m sixty-two. The odds of me finding out for myself are slim.”
Charity laughed. “He’s everything you could imagine and more.”
The woman in curlers sighed. “I knew it,” she said dreamily.
“I saw him riding his bike the other day,” another client said. “What that man does for those bicycle shorts. It was the highlight of my day.” She glanced at Charity. “No offense.”
“None taken.”
“You’ve been dating for a while now,” Julia said. “How’s that working out?”
The questions weren’t subtle, Charity thought, more amused than offended.
“He’s a great guy. I like spending time with him.”
“Josh is one of the good ones. That first wife of his was a total bitch.”
“I remember her,” another client said with a sniff. “She came to town once. Walked around like she was afraid of getting dog poop on her shoes. She was beautiful, but what a bitch.”
There was a murmur of agreement.
Charity would have loved to ask questions about Angelique but wasn’t sure how. After all, she was fairly confident that anything she said would be reported to the entire town, not to mention get back to Josh.
“You came from Henderson, didn’t you?” Julia asked. “I thought I heard that.”
“Yes.”
“Leave anyone special behind?”
Charity met Julia’s interested gaze in the mirror. “No.”
“I’m surprised. A pretty girl like you. There had to be someone.”
Not a topic Charity wanted to discuss. Not with this crowd. “Not really.”
“My first husband was a total loser,” Julia said. “He cheated, which I could live with, but then lied about it, which I couldn’t. I chased him out of the house with a frying pan. He never came back. Good riddance.”
“All men cheat,” one of the customers said.
“Not all,” another protested. “Some don’t.”
“Name one.”
“My Arnie. He’s a good man.”
Julia leaned close to Charity. “And butt ugly. A sweetheart, but the lights would have to be off all the time.”
Charity did her best not to respond to any part of the conversation.
“Josh ever cheated?” someone asked.
“Not that I’ve heard. He was faithful to that wife of his, not that she deserved it. Stupid cow.”
Josh had claimed to be faithful and Charity had believed him. Which might make her a fool, but she was tired of trying to be sure. After her first two disastrous relationships, she hadn’t been taking any chances with her third. She’d run a credit check and had a friend on the police force get her a DMV report. He’d been clean. Engaged to someone else living in Los Angeles, but clean.
Hurt but determined to learn from yet another mistake, Charity had accepted the job in Fool’s Gold as a way to start over. Maybe having such a public history was part of Josh’s appeal, she thought. She didn’t have to worry about any secrets. Everyone in town knew everything important about him.
She went under the hair dryer for about twenty minutes, then enjoyed a very lovely massage with her wash. When she got back into Julia’s chair, the stylist turned her away from the mirror.
“I don’t want you to see anything until I’m done.”
Charity felt a tiny knot of fear in her stomach. “I guess that means I’m going to have to trust you.”
“You’ll be happy, I promise.”
“That’s a big promise.”
One of the older ladies had finished. With her silver hair all neatly teased and sprayed, she slipped on her jacket, but instead of leaving, she walked over to Charity.
“I remember Josh when he first came here,” she said. “That mother of his was awful. He’d been in a bad fall and walked on crutches. He was about the most pitiful thing I’d ever seen. It took him nearly fifteen minutes to go a single block. How he struggled to get to school every day. That poor boy. His clothes were ragged and he was skinny as an alley cat. It about broke my heart. Then one day she was gone.”
Charity knew the general story of Josh’s past, but she’d never heard it told with such clarity.
“None of us knew what to do,” another woman added. “We didn’t want to send him to a state home, but there wasn’t much choice. Then Denise Hendrix offered to take him in. The rest of us contributed to the family, helping pay for Josh’s medical expenses.”
The first woman nodded. “He needed surgery to repair how his legs had healed wrong, then physical therapy. That’s why he started riding a bike. To strengthen his legs. Ethan rode, too.” She patted Charity’s arm. “So Josh is special to us. Always has been. You’ve got yourself a good man there.”
“Thank you.”
The old woman started to leave, then paused. Her expression turned sly. “He proposed yet?”
Charity felt the color flooding her face. Anywhere but here, she thought grimly. She wanted to be anywhere but here.
“We’re still dating. Getting to know each other.”
“I wouldn’t be as concerned about him proposing. There’s a bigger danger.”
Several of the women laughed. Charity didn’t get it until one of them added, “Feeling any cravings, hon?”
“No. I’m good. But thanks for asking.”
“Leave her alone,” Julia said firmly. “All of you. You’ll scare her off and we’ll never see her again.”
The old woman waved and left. The conversation shifted to more comfortable topics. Julia got out a blow dryer. Once she turned it on, Charity couldn’t hear anything that was being said—probably a good thing.