Baltimore Noir

yet.

He gave himself away reminiscing about the old-style hairdos he used to craft. He had cornered me more than once during the weeks before the show to chat about his glory days, clutching his little two-ounce Chihuahua, Bouf (short for bouffant). “We really must figure out a way to get national coverage of the absolutely fabulous salons we have here. Baltimore is the place to go for the latest styles and no one seems to know it. Forget New York and L.A., honey. We set the trends when it comes to black hair! Was I not the first to do the asymmetrical cut with the deep finger waves and the glittery bangs? Tell me that wasn’t fierce!”

It did no good to explain to him that we were lucky enough to get any coverage for Hair Dynasty, and I had only managed to pull that off because I convinced the photographers that they would get colorful shots of creations like the “Domestic Goddess,” which entailed a model with a hairsculptured kitchen sink on her head complete with wet and wavy hair coming out of the “faucet” to simulate running water. And unless Oprah or Halle Berry started jetting to B-more to get their hair done, I doubted that the national media was going to pay much attention to us.

Although, now they would. Death by scissors, buried in hair Miles had a shot at the cover of his beloved Weekly World News

U raised her hand and made a come-here motion, but when I started that way she shook her head vigorously and mouthed “Ahmad.” I stepped around the divider again and tapped him on the shoulder. “She who must be obeyed beckons,” I said. But I was right behind him. My sister was out of her mind if she thought I wasn’t going to listen in on what C.P. had to say. Jennifer had spotted me tailing Ahmad and she caught up with me, linking her arm with mine.

“Yes, we argued, but we always argued,” C.P. was whining as Ahmad, Jennifer, and I strode over. “Ask anyone. He was very jealous of my business.” He motioned to the large black banner on the booth which contained the name of his salon, Isn’t She Lovely, in gold letters. “But I wouldn’t have killed the man.” He shifted his dog under his arm and held him like a purse while he looked to two of his employees who were doing hair at the booth for confirmation.

“We have information that you threatened Mr. Henry just a few hours ago,” U said calmly.

“Me?” C.P. asked incredulously. “Why in the world would I threaten Miles?”

“Remember, you said you would slit his throat if he kept coming over here stealing your hair spray,” piped up one of C.P.’s employees, a petite honey-colored woman with chunky fuschia highlights in her hair. C.P. shot her a venomous look over his shoulder.

“Figure of speech, Mona,” C.P. said, a little louder than necessary. “I am a nonviolent animal lover.” He patted Bouf for emphasis.

“We were also told that you changed clothes, Mr. Murray,” U further explained. “Now why would you do that?”

C.P. whipped around to face Mona. “You are deliberately trying to destroy me!” he screeched. “It’s because I wouldn’t give you last Friday off, isn’t it?”

“Calm down, Mr. Murray,” Ahmad intoned. “No one is accusing you of anything… yet.”

“Do you own a pair of ivory inlay scissors?” U asked, studying C.P.’s face closely.

“I do, and I can show them to you,” C.P. said quickly, walking over to his work station where he dug through his many supplies. “They were right here this morning. Mona! Did you steal my scissors? I swear, when this is over we are having a very long talk, you and I.”

At that moment, a uniformed officer with a name tag that read “A. Jenkins” escorted a visibly distraught Kylani over to where we were. “Detectives, this is the victim’s sister and she’s demanding to see the persons in charge of the investigation,” the officer said.

“Arrest this man!” Kylani screamed. “He killed my brother.”

C.P. paled and opened and shut his mouth so hard that I thought his teeth were going to shatter. He sputtered and managed to choke out, “I have no idea what she is talking about.”

“They argued this morning,” Kylani continued. She was actually wringing her hands, holding one fist tight inside the other. Given the length of her nails, it had to hurt, but she seemed too distraught to notice.

“I was standing right here when it happened. C.P. said Miles had stolen the last client he was ever going to take from him. He promised he would get even. I’ll never see my brother again!” she wailed, then collapsed against the police officer.

“Where’s the shirt you were wearing earlier, Mr. Murray?” my sister asked.

“I got some dye and perm on it so I asked my assistant to wash it with the last load of towels,” C.P. stammered. “She left an hour ago to go to the laundry. I swear to you, I would never hurt Miles. I was one of his mentors.”

“I think we should continue this discussion at the station,” U stated, all business.

“How could you, C.P.?” Kylani cried, as the officer propped her back up on her feet. “How could you stab my little brother with your special scissors after pretending all this time to be his friend?” She threw her hands up to her face and tilted backwards as if she were about to swoon again.

“U, wait,” I said. “Officer Jenkins, did you take Kylani to see her brother’s body?”

“No ma’am,” Jenkins replied. “The crime scene is still being processed.”

“Kylani,” I tried to boom in my most authoritative voice. “Give it up. Once the police review the security tapes, they will know that you killed Miles.”

Her head shot up and the tears magically disappeared. “Are you nuts?”

“The jig is up, girlfriend,” I said. “You stole C.P.’s scissors and stabbed your brother. Either you lured him to the storage area or he was already back there, but you shoved him in that box of hair and covered him up, probably because he was too heavy to drag someplace else and you couldn’t chance somebody seeing you.”

“Why would I do such a thing??” She was good at mock indignation, I’ll give her that. But then, the whole performance had been top-notch, undone by only one little detail.

“I have no idea,” I said confidently. “But I can assure you that the police will find evidence on his body that connects you to the murder. You messed up and left something behind.”

With that, I grabbed her right hand and held it up to her face.

She wrenched away from me and tried to run, but both Ahmad and the uniformed officer grabbed an arm and snatched her back. She rained down curses on me as they cuffed her and led her away. Jennifer gave me a high- five and C.P. reached out and hugged me, squeezing Bouf between us. He promptly yelped and nipped me. Bouf, not C.P.

“Well, little sister,” U smiled, “that was quite a bit of investigative work. How did you figure it out?”

“I got suspicious when she mentioned the scissors,” I said. “How did she know that? Even if someone had said he had been stabbed, she wouldn’t necessarily know that it had happened with a pair of scissors. But the clincher was her nails.”

“Her nails?” U questioned.

“Yeah. Two of her tips were broken off. She probably snagged them in Miles’s sweater dragging his body into that box of hair. I thought I saw something stuck in the crochet. Her nails were her calling card and there is no way she’d be at a hair show with them looking a hot mess like that.”

Jennifer started giggling, C.P. guffawed, and U rolled her eyes. Bouf even gave a high-pitched bark of amusement.

“Well,” U said, “good thing you knew about the tape from the security cameras.”

“Umm, yeah,” I grinned sheepishly. “If that even exists. I was bluffing. It always works on the TV shows.”

My sister actually cracked a smile and said, “Okay. But next time, find a show with better dialogue. ‘The jig is up, girlfriend’ was a bit much, even for you.”

Before I could respond, I felt a tap on my shoulder. I turned around to find Olive, my vice-chair for publicity, wringing her hands and looking distraught.

“Jordan, you’ve got to come,” she said in a rush. “We have, um, a situation.”

“A situation other than a murder?”

“Yeah,” she said. “See, I was being proactive and I thought we should do something to take folks’ minds off this mess, so I made an executive decision. I mean, I couldn’t find you and you are always saying, ‘Be empowered,’ so I thought, ‘WWJD. What would Jordan do?’ People are here to have a good time as well as network and show off their skills, and I started thinking, We need to refocus