She and Elgin had met many years before when the recently widowed Wanda had agreed to do the struggling author’s hair in return for newspaper ads and flyers. Copies of all of them hung on the shop’s walls along with autographed covers of all of Gillian Shelby’s books. Wanda never missed an opportunity to let people know that she’d “discovered” Gillian Shelby.
“You don’t actually have to go in,” Elgin teased, seeing the look of discomfort on Fowler’s face. “There’s a wonderful little coffee shop down on the corner. Breakfast all day long. The homemade waffles with blueberry syrup are to die for. Read the paper and have a second cup of coffee and I should be finished about one.”
“Thanks,” he grinned, obviously relieved that he wouldn’t have to venture into no-man’s land. “I’ll be back at one.”
Inside, Wanda listened on the telephone at the front counter. Seeing Elgin, she immediately smiled, nodded and pointed to an empty chair as she listened intently.
“Uh-uh, Hon,” she replied into the receiver. “Just can’t squeeze you in Friday. Prom season.”
She listened a few moments longer, running her finger down the pages. “Not a chance. I’m booked solid. Why don’t you try Missy’s…”
More silence as the other party spoke. Wanda turned toward Elgin and shrugged helplessly.
“Look,” she cut in firmly, “I can’t do it. You know I would if I could, but I just don’t have any time. You call over to Missy’s and talk to Joan. Tell her I sent you and that it’s an emergency. She’ll do right by you and Olivia. And I promise I’ll call you first thing if I get a cancellation. I’ve got to go now. I’ve got a client under the dryer who’s going to cook if I don’t get her out. Yes. I promise. Okay. Good-bye.”
Wanda put down the phone and sighed as she reached the back of Elgin’s chair.
“Connie Armstrong,” she explained, taking a large pink cape and settling it over Elgin. “Daughter Olivia’s got a date for the prom Saturday night and her mother’s desperate for me to ‘give ‘er the works.’” A hearty chuckle rumbled through her big body. “Child doesn’t need a beautician, she needs a magician.
“Me? I’m tickled pink for her although I can’t imagine any boy being that hard up for a date.
“Don’t get me wrong. She’s sweet as homemade apple pie and bless her heart, with parents who look like Ed and Connie, the girl can’t help being homely as a mud fence. But Lord, she doesn’t have to make things worse by eating like food’s going out of style. Poor thing looks like a hippopotamus after a three-day bender.”
“You’re terrible,” Elgin laughed.
“No, just honest. I guess, though, sometimes it’s a gnat’s whisker between the two. By the way, speaking of truth as we were, who’s that good-looking man I saw you getting out of the cab with? Any good gossip I can spread?”
“Put away your trowel, Wanda dear. Strictly business.”
“That’s how Pat and I started out,” Wanda nodded knowingly. “He delivered genuine Egyptian Henna to that fancy salon I worked at right out of school. We ended up with five kids and twenty-six too short years.”
“Well, for one thing, he’s already got a wife and kids so could we please change the subject?”
“Oh, all right,” Wanda agreed reaching for a comb and her spritz bottle. “How’s the new book coming? Lots of hot sex I hope.”
At one straight up, Pete appeared on the sidewalk outside The Beauty Spot. He seemed relieved once more after Elgin had paid the bill and came out a moment later.
“I don’t see much of a difference,” he remarked, examining her hair from several angles.
“Good. You’re not supposed to. That’s the whole point of spending all this money to have it done once a week. People are supposed to think I’m naturally gorgeous.” Elgin put a hand to head and pretended to strike a pose.
“I can definitely vouch for the gorgeous part. Inside and out.”
Elgin blushed bright red and glanced down at her feet. She and Pete had spent the last ten days together and they’d grown very friendly, discovering a mutual love of horse racing and Italian food.
“Well, thank you,” she smiled shyly. “It’s nice of you to say, even it isn’t true. But don’t let your boss catch you saying something like that or he may fire you for poor eyesight.”
Pete grinned. “Okay, it’ll be just our secret. You want me to hail a cab?”
“No, I called from the salon. I told the dispatcher we’d meet the cab across the street. That way, he won’t have to go ‘round the block to get back to Grant.”
“Speaking of which, that must be him now.” He nodded to his left and Elgin turned to look. A cab pulled around a corner two blocks up.
“We better get over there.”
Gently, he took her elbow and they stepped off the curb.
They’d just reached the yellow line in the middle of the asphalt when she heard it.
The roar of a powerful engine being gunned caught their attention. Following the sound, she turned her head to the right in time to see a huge dark blur careen out of the alley just on the other side of the salon.
Later, in her nightmares, Elgin saw headlights glowing like pale eyes and a wide evil chrome smirk of bumper. But in that split second as it happened, sound and sensation collided and ran together, the pieces knotted in a smashed jumble.
Pete’s frantic cry, “Look out!” Something pushing fiercely in her back and the asphalt biting her hands and knees and head as she fell. A loud “thump” and wind rushing past her. A door slamming and a woman screaming.
Somewhere, the engine faded and with it, the warm spring sunshine, disappearing above her as she tumbled down a dark well. For a moment, her mind tried to rouse her and slow her descent but her body rebelled, suddenly too tired to resist the onrushing night. Closing her eyes and feeling her muscles go limp, Elgin gave up the struggle and surrendered to the blackness.
Chapter Five
“Wake up dear,” Elgin heard her mother’s muffled voice. “You’ve slept enough. It’s time to wake up.”
But she hadn’t slept enough. Not nearly. Her head still seemed fuzzy and her body exhausted. A few more minutes.
“Wake up,” the voice called again and while it sounded female, she now recognized that it didn’t belong to her mother. Or Martha. Kind but firm, it kept insisting.
So finally, Elgin opened her eyes. Or at least she tried to. But the overhead light flashed unexpectedly bright and she shut them immediately. Too late. It shot past her eyes and exploded in her brain, setting off a chain reaction of pain that filled her skull with a mushroom cloud.
“Doctor,” the voice called, “she’s coming around.”
Footsteps and movement and a large hand picked up her wrist. Cautiously, she opened her eyes a fraction.
“Hello,” boomed an entirely too loud, too cheerful male voice. “Glad you decided to rejoin us. We were beginning to worry.”
Her eyes, growing accustomed to the light, opened a little more. The voice came from a kindly looking old man in a white coat. He seemed very tall, looming over her like an NBA center. It took several seconds for her to realize she was lying down and he was standing up.
“What’s your name?”
“Elgin Collier.”
“Do you know what day it is?”
“Wednesday the last time I checked.”
The room started to materialize out of the muddle in her mind. Propped up a little on a narrow bed with a thin sheet and cream colored blanket laid loosely over her, her shirt and jeans gone, replaced with a shapeless cotton bag with armholes and covered in tiny blue dots. Metal rails stood at attention on either side of her.
“Do you know where you are?”
“A hospital, I think,” Elgin mumbled. Thinking made the nuclear holocaust in her head worse.
“How many fingers?”
“Three.”
“Tell me the last thing you remember.”
Elgin squeezed her eyes tightly shut again, the light and the pain becoming unbearable. Thought lay beyond her, mired somewhere in the wreckage of what had been her brain.