Girl in the Shadows (Cozy Mystery) (Diamond Files Mysteries Book 1) Read online

  Girl in the Shadows

  Diamond Files Mystery #1

  Angela Pepper

  WWW.ANGELAPEPPER.COM | FIRST EDITION

  Chapter 1

  MONDAY

  9:20 a.m.

  Maggie's Diner, Norfolk, VA

  “Have you ever wanted to strangle a man with his own belt?”

  I didn't know how to answer the question. Was my new boss, a sixty-five-year-old man named Derek Diamond, mocking me? Rather than answer his question, I pretended to be fascinated by the old-lady-pink lipstick clinging to the rim of my chipped coffee cup.

  He continued, “Men can be pesky. Especially for a young gal like you, Legally Blonde. I bet you have to beat them away with a stick.”

  That was the second time he'd called me Legally Blonde. If he said it a third time, I would get up and walk out of the diner. I needed the cash, but I sure as heck didn't need another jerk in my life.

  He leaned in and asked, “Have you got a fella?” It was the most interest he'd shown in me so far, and the last thing I wanted to talk about, especially with a gray-haired man who was old enough to be my grandfather.

  “Mr. Diamond, why are you asking?” I gave him a friendly-yet-professional smile. “Does this have anything to do with your case? The temp agency didn't tell me much, except that you're an investigator of some kind.”

  He leaned back and stretched his arms along the back of the booth, broadening his chest and revealing the roundness of his belly under his dark-blue, waffle-texture shirt. His clothing was firmly on the casual side of business casual. He wasn't in bad shape for a man in his sixties, but there was a reason the fashion world had invented men's suits and ties. The garments were designed to hide your humanity and your love of pancakes.

  He tilted his head to the side and said, “Ally, you're what? Twenty-two?”

  “Twenty-five. And it's Abby.”

  “What did I say?” The man looked shocked, like he'd never gotten a name wrong in his adult life and this was some strange new development. It was hard to believe this was the first time, given how little attention he'd given me during our introduction ten minutes earlier.

  As he blinked at me, his brown eyes wide and bewildered, my feelings toward the man began to change. Derek Diamond was one of those guys who is so excited about the next nugget of wisdom they're about to drop, they forget the world doesn't revolve around them.

  He wasn't necessarily evil. Just oblivious. And if I wanted to have a career in this city, I needed to lighten up and give people the benefit of the doubt. On the plus side, he hadn't looked at me anywhere except my eyes.

  I waved my hand. “It doesn't matter. You can call me whatever name you want. It's only a week, anyway. Call me Legally Blonde if it's all you can remember.”

  He drew himself up taller on the bench seat, one eye twitching. I'd touched on a sore spot.

  “Abby,” he said, slowly and clearly. “Abby. Say it three times and a name is yours forever.” He paused for drama. “Abby.” He grinned, revealing a row of perfectly square, perfectly white teeth across the top of his mouth and funky little yellow matchsticks across the bottom row.

  “You got it,” I said.

  “You got it, Pontiac,” he said. “That's from an old car commercial, before your time. It was a very popular slogan.” He pointed to his temple. “My brain's gotten filled up with so much stuff over the years, sometimes it takes me a minute to shove things around to make room.” He took a deep breath with his upper chest, visibly sucking in his potbelly. “But that's why I have you, Abby. You're young and sharp, and you help just by being near me. There's nothing like having a young person around to put the ol' brain on high alert.”

  “I'll do what I can, Mr. Diamond, but you should know I have zero exper—”

  He cut me off with a hand wave. “Just Derek. None of this Mr. Diamond stuff. It makes me feel old, and I'm not old. I've just been around a while.”

  The waitress came to refill our coffee. She said, “Food won't be more'n a minute, folks.”

  I rotated my cup so she could see the lipstick on the rim. “May I have a fresh one?”

  She apologized and took away the dirty cup.

  Once we were alone, I nodded at the stack of papers sitting on the table in front of Derek.

  “Should I prepare by reading the case files?” I asked. “I've already signed the nondisclosure agreement.”

  “Sure thing, Abby,” he said loudly. “I hope you like reading about strangulation!”

  The buzz of voices around us in the diner all but disappeared. The word strangulation, said loudly, will have that effect on people.

  For good measure, he added in an equally loud voice, “But of course you're interested in strangulation. I've got a feeling you're a bit of an oddball!”

  Tersely, I replied, “Takes one to know one.”

  He pushed the paperwork toward me but kept his hand on top of the pile. He had attractive, well-formed hands, with long fingers like my own, and shiny, buffed fingernails.

  In a quieter voice, he said, “Before you look at this, tell me one thing. What emotion would motivate you to strangle a man?”

  Without hesitation, I replied, “Anger.”

  He smiled and lifted his hand from the papers. “Exactly,” he said. “Which is why this police homicide report is a work of fiction.”

  I sucked in my breath over my teeth. “You're investigating a homicide?”

  “We, Abby. We are investigating a homicide.”

  “And what's my job, exactly? Taking notes? Typing reports?”

  “Your duties will vary from day to day.” He clapped his hands together. “Ah, here comes the food.”

  The waitress set our breakfast on the table and poured me a fresh coffee. I'd been hungry a moment earlier, but suddenly the smell of food disgusted me. I slid along the booth bench to a clear spot on the table, and started reading the homicide report.

  At 9:00 p.m. on April 5th, Mr. Brock Kensington was discovered dead on his kitchen floor. He'd apparently been the victim of a burglary that had taken a violent turn. He'd been struck on the back of the head with a blunt object and then strangled with his own belt.

  I paused on the fifth page and looked up at Derek Diamond.

  “What's going on here?” I asked. “If he was hit on the back of the head, someone was sneaking up on him. This doesn't sound at all like a burglary gone wrong.”

  “Exactly,” Derek said. He had a glint in his eye, like someone thrilled to find another human with a curiosity similar to his own.

  “Someone killed this guy on purpose.”

  “You got it, Pontiac.”

  Chapter 2

  10:00 a.m.

  As we left the diner, Derek handed me a set of keys with an Avis Rental Car tag.

  “You can drive, since this is your city,” he said.

  He was right. Norfolk, Virginia, was my city and had been for all of my twenty-five years. With a population of around a quarter million, Norfolk is plenty big... unless you get tangled up with the wrong people. Then it can feel too small.

  I scanned the diner's parking lot for the rental car, locating it by pressing the key fob to make the lights flash. Derek was still near the entrance to the diner, talking to some teenage girls walking a dog. I used my free hand to shield my eyes from the sun and watched them. It was the beginning of June, so the girls were delighting in one of their first Mondays free of school. While the weather was humid and hot, we hadn't reached sweltering levels just yet.

  Derek pulled his wallet from the back pocket of his jeans, tur
ned to give me a wave, and then handed some bills to the older of the two girls. She gave him the leash for a small dog with a white, tan, and black coat. Derek picked up the dog and walked toward the rental car with the dog cradled in his arms. Without a word, he climbed into the passenger seat and set the contented dog on his lap. It was a beagle, either a puppy or on the small side for the breed.

  I settled into the driver's seat and started the engine.

  “Where to?” I asked as I turned toward my strange boss-for-the-week.

  He met my gaze with a taken-aback look. “Aren't you going to say something? About how I bought a beagle from two little girls?”

  “That's your dog,” I said.

  He chuckled. “What makes you say that?”

  “You've got white hairs all over the front of your dark shirt, which I had a view of all through breakfast. Plus there's a plastic margarine container on the back seat, probably full of water for him. You paid those girls to watch the dog while you went into the diner because if you'd left him behind, he would have overheated or howled the roof off.”

  “Very good, except you're completely wrong.”

  “Oh, am I?” I reached into the back seat, grabbed the margarine container, and removed the lid to reveal the beagle's water.

  Derek stuck his nose in the air and said loftily, “You're wrong about the dog's gender. He's a she, and her name is Chewie.”

  I turned my head so Derek wouldn't see me rolling my eyes. I returned the water to the back seat, and turned back, leaning over to shake the dog's paw.

  “Nice to meet you, Chewie,” I said to her. “Is that short for Chewbacca, or do you chew on everything?”

  “A bit of both,” Derek said. “Let's just say you shouldn't leave your shoes unattended around her.”

  Chewie gave me a hound-dog look of innocence and shook my hand. Her paw pads were as rough as her lovely pancake ears were velvety soft.

  “Are you a good detective?” I asked Chewie. “With that nose of yours, I'll bet you can find anything.”

  Derek asked, “What do you know about a beagle's sense of smell?”

  “Humans have about five million scent receptors, whereas beagles have two hundred and twenty million. The Department of Agriculture uses them at the ports, and at the airport, where they're less disruptive than larger dogs like German Shepherds.” I patted Chewie's ears.

  “You're a smart girl, Abby,” Derek said.

  My skin crawled with displeasure, for as much as I longed for people to notice I was smarter than the stereotypical “dumb blonde,” I hated actually hearing it. A compliment paired with my name always stung like sarcasm, even when it wasn't. Perhaps if I'd been raised in a more nurturing environment, I wouldn't be so hair-trigger defensive.

  I gave Chewie one more pet before fastening my seat belt and looking straight ahead. The air conditioning clicked down a level with a soft whir.

  “Are you okay driving, Legally Blonde?” Derek asked.

  “More than okay,” I said through gritted teeth. “Just name the destination.”

  “Salon Ronaldo. You're going to get those dark roots of yours touched up.”

  Yeah, right, I thought. Salon Ronaldo was only the most exclusive and expensive salon in all of Norfolk, and possibly the entire Eastern Seaboard. All the rich ladies and their spoiled daughters went there. I couldn't afford a quick trim at Salon Ronaldo, let alone a coloring job.

  But I was this guy's secretary for a week, and I'd need to roll with his requests if I was to stay employed until Friday. If he wanted to play games, pretending to buy dogs and go for swanky hair treatments, I could play along. At least it was more mentally stimulating than the other gigs I'd worked over the last six months.

  * * *

  My new boss wasn't joking about the hair appointment.

  Before I could talk my way out of it, a squad of black-clad Salon Ronaldo employees had swept me up in their luxurious embrace.

  Fifteen minutes later, I'd been shampooed, and installed in a comfortable chair at what was the fourth-best station in the salon, according to my stylist, Richie. He was thin and compact in stature, and dressed in black like the other stylists, with one flash of color—an orange scarf tied around his neck. Richie's hair was a perfectly circular afro projecting at least six inches from his head. When Richie turned his head, he jerked it quickly, which made his voluminous hair ripple and quiver.

  “You have amazing cheekbones,” Richie said as he combed out my damp waves. “I know everyone probably asks you this question, so just go ahead and slap me if you feel outraged by someone asking the millionth time, but I'm going to do it anyway. How tall are you?”

  “Six glorious feet.” I gave him a weak smile to show I wasn't outraged. It wasn't the question that irritated me nearly as much as whatever people were bound to say next—usually a comment about how hard it must be for me to get a date.

  Richie, however, put one hand on his hip and said, “Must be nice! I can't even reach the good towels in the upper cupboards here.”

  My smile strengthened. “At the grocery store near my apartment, I'm always helping elderly ladies get things from the top shelves. It makes me feel good. If I were a man, I'd say I felt chivalrous or gallant, but there's no word for when a woman does that sort of thing.”

  Richie gave me a playful head bob. “Girl, you be chivalrous if you want. The world is changing.”

  I gripped the armrests of my chair and pressed my lips together. What was it about the hairdresser's chair that caused confessions? It had to be the cape. With the cape swirled around both chair and body, all that remains visible is the face. Without bodily gestures to communicate, our endless human desire to connect comes out through our voices.

  I didn't want to talk about my awkward height anymore, even though Richie was being sweet about it. I focused my attention on the unobstructed water view beyond the window, my gaze fixed even as I turned my head left and right as the stylist prodded me with one finger on my chin. I had questions to ask Richie—questions regarding the Kensington homicide—but I had to warm up first.

  I asked him, “Is this really only the fourth-best chair in the salon? I can't imagine how you could improve on this.”

  Richie leaned over my shoulder, his puffy hair soft against my ear, and said softly, “I'm not one to gossip, but the top-level station hardly ever gets used. It's in another room, upstairs. We tell everyone the second-level station is the top, so they think they're VIPs, but they're not.” He straightened up and fluffed my damp hair playfully. “Ivanka Trump goes to the real VIP room.”

  I made a nonverbal sound to show my interest in more gossip. If I did nothing but keep my ears open for my multistep hair coloring, Mr. Chatty Pants could gush out the information I needed without even being prompted.

  Or so I hoped.

  Ninety minutes later, I'd had no such luck.

  Richie was telling me about his toy poodle's obsession with paper bags. The stories were enjoyable, especially when he used a squeaky voice to describe his poodle's innermost thoughts, but I had a job to do.

  I'd read through the entire police homicide report over breakfast at the diner, so I was familiar with the details. Then, on the drive to the hair salon, Derek had given me my mission, along with a cover story.

  For this morning's investigative work, I wasn't plain and tall Abby Silver, born and raised in Norfolk, Virginia. I was Deborah O'Dare of Tallahassee, Florida, passing through the city on my way to a family wedding in Connecticut. Since Deborah wasn't a local, people would be more willing to share secrets. And since Salon Ronaldo was the homicide victim's wife's hair salon of choice, I was in the right place to collect gossip about Mrs. Mitzi Kensington, widow of the late Brock Kensington.

  There was just one problem. I was a secretary, not a detective. And I was barely a secretary. Even though Derek had given me sample questions to probe Richie, I couldn't get my lips to form the words.

  Another thirty minutes flew by. I silently cursed my
nerves. I knew the case details. I had the questions. I'd been in the chair for two hours and three cups of coffee, and desperately needed to use the facilities. Why couldn't I ask Richie the questions Derek had given me? Or make up my own? Or even admit to him that I needed to use the washroom?

  Richie leaned over my shoulder again, leveled his chin with mine, and grinned at me in the mirror while his fuzzy hair tickled my right cheek. All of the bleaching chemicals had been washed from my hair, so he was no longer in danger of getting white tips on his afro.

  “Do we love it?” Richie asked. “We love it, right?”

  I swallowed hard. I needed more time. My employer had invested a significant amount of money in getting me access to potentially helpful information, and I was blowing it. I'd get fired, plus it would take a future week's earnings to pay back the fees for the Salon Ronaldo treatment.

  “You hate it,” Richie said with an exaggerated frown. “You don't have to say a word, ma cherie. Your face tells me your pain.”

  I bit my lip and nodded. My face didn't lie, but it didn't tell the whole truth. “I was hoping it would be lighter in the front.”

  His expression brightened immediately. “Yes! Of course! It's too even now. Too matchy-matchy, like an older, more conservative woman. We must make it brighter at the front, where the sun has kissed your beautiful head.”

  I squirmed in my seat, partly because the complimentary lies felt uncomfortable, but mostly because of the liquid in my bladder.

  “Another round,” Richie said, clapping his hands like he was buying everyone drinks. “This one will be faster because the hair follicles are already open.” He gave my damp locks another playful flick and excused himself to get more supplies.

  I hoisted myself from the chair and went in search of the washroom, too desperate to wait for Richie's return.

  I found an unmarked door. Behind the door were simple, utilitarian facilities. I took care of business and quickly washed my hands, as eager to get out as I'd been to get in. Judging by the quality of the finishing inside the washroom, it was intended for staff use only. My heart thumped. Breaking rules, even minor ones, always made me nervous.