Chapter Three

Cans, tubes and shards of the ceiling hurtled past as the floor rushed up to greet me and the woman flailed beneath me, her eyes wide with fear. A scream accompanied us as we landed with a crunch and a squish.

Foam squirted from beneath us, billowing in a cloud of marshmallowey fluff.

A moment later, Maddox crashed through the ceiling, hanging onto a leg.

Lights flicked on, illuminating Jord and several uniformed police officers pointing their weapons at us. Beyond, standing just outside the salon was Solomon, his arms crossed, his face expressionless.

I pushed off the woman, flipping myself onto my back and landed like a starfish, another puff of foam shooting from under my shoulder. A small jar dropped through the ceiling and smashed open, leaking sundried tomatoes.

“Hey,” I said, lifting a hand to limply wave.

“I wondered when you’d drop in,” said Jord, a small smile playing on his lips.

“Ha ha.”

“My eyes!” cried the woman next to me. She curled up into a ball and the tubes under her squirted gel in every direction.

“Found a thief,” I said, limply flapping a finger towards her.

“Yep, got that,” said Jord. A can of olives rolled towards him and he stopped it with his toe. “I don’t think I’ve arrested anyone for stealing olives before.”

“Wait until you see everything else,” I said as several packets of imported pasta dropped to land at Jord’s feet.

“Let go!” shrieked the leg. Its pair kicked at Maddox. Maddox renewed his grip and glanced down. The legs’ pants began to slip until they were hanging around the knees, revealing Superman boxers.

Guns swung from us to them.

Maddox, clinging onto the man’s lower body, gave a hard tug. The ceiling cracked and whoomph! The two men fell through, landing in a heap on the floor.

“This can’t be the real caped crusader,” said Jord. “Someone cuff him before he flies outta here. I’ll take the sidekick.”

I wiggled my fingers and toes, then my limbs. Nothing seemed to be broken so I sat up, wincing. My pants were soaked with sticky substances and foam clung to my face. I brushed it off, saying, “That’s sexist. How do you know she’s not the boss and he’s not the sidekick?” I pointed between them.

“The crying is a clue,” said Jord. He reached for his radio and requested an ambulance before stooping to check the woman. She wriggled upright, holding her wrist, and crying louder.

I looked around for Solomon, finding him poised at the door, ready to run inside the moment Jord gave the okay. I caught his eye and grinned. He raised a single hand in return and turned his gaze to the ceiling. I followed his gaze, grimacing at the large holes we’d crashed through. Yet as we watched, all kinds of goods began to tumble down, giving us a few seconds of a very weird game of dodge.

Climbing gingerly to my feet, I rolled my shoulders, made a few more checks that I really was miraculously uninjured, and skidded through the leaking gels and foam to Solomon. “I think I solved my case and I need a shower,” I said.

“You smell like the salon,” he said, picking up a thickly coated clump of hair languishing over my shoulder. “And slightly tomatoey. You look like you’ve gone through a car wash.” He wrapped an arm around me, pulled me against him and hugged me hard. I rested my head against his chest, only mildly sorry that I was probably ruining his cotton sweater.

“I’m okay,” said Maddox, getting to his feet, one fist pumping the air like he’d won something.

Superman was wriggling and kicking, simultaneously trying to pull up his pants and escape the police. After a couple of minutes of skidding around, they dived on him, wrestling him into handcuffs before sitting him upright. He looked around, scowling.

“Meet the thieves of the block,” I said. “There’s more contraband up there and if you check his pockets, I’m pretty sure you’ll find drugs from the dental surgery.”

Jord passed off the sobbing woman to an officer and searched Superman. He held up several small vials, counting them into an evidence baggie that was handed to him. “Well, you two, it looks like we’re going downtown,” he said, grinning.

“I’d rather go home,” I said.

“And I’d rather not do any paperwork on this,” added Maddox.

“Not you two,” said Jord, shaking his head. “Just as soon as we get these two checked over, they’re getting booked. As for you two, stick around. I want you to get checked out too. That was quite a fall you took, especially you,” he added, giving me a pointed look.

“I’m fine. Just sticky.”

Maddox looked at me and laughed, then he plucked a sliver of plaster from his hair and brushed out a plume of dust.

“Do I want to know?” asked Solomon.

I looked around at the oozing mess on the floor, the sobbing woman, and the handcuffed man whose pants were currently being pulled into a more gentlemanly position, and shrugged. “I think you can get the gist,” I said.

An ambulance pulled up, cutting out its wailing siren but leaving the lights flashing. As we stepped outside, the usually sparse evening crowd growing, a man holding up a phone gave us the thumbs up. “I got all that on camera,” he exclaimed. “That was awesome! It’s going to go viral for sure!”

I deflated and Solomon guided me to the ambulance. A few minutes later, our vitals checked and with a confirmation of no broken bones, both Maddox and I were cleared to go. We hung around to give statements to Jord, then Maddox took off with a cheerful wave, announcing his intent to pick up his takeout at last.

“He’s remarkably happy,” said Solomon, glancing from Maddox’s retreating back to the disastrous salon.

“I don’t know if it’s his superpower or a fatal flaw,” I said, seeing a white Mercedes sail past Maddox and park. “My client just arrived.”

She pushed her way through the crowd, gaped at the destruction inside the salon and gaped again as the two perpetrators were loaded into police cars. Then she saw me and made a beeline in our direction.

“Hi, Marie,” I said.

“What happened?” she asked. “I thought you were going to conduct surveillance?”

“I did, and your thieves have been arrested.”

“What happened to my salon? Why are there cans and jars and things all over? What happened to the ceiling?” Her voice rose with every question.

“You weren’t the only one being robbed. It looks like they were stealing from the whole strip. Did you know there’s a crawl space above the salon? It spans all the shops. They found hatches to drop into the shops and set up a winch to lower and raise them and everything they stole, out again.”

“You have got to be kidding me,” she said, turning to gape again.

“We fell through the ceiling,” I added. “Sorry about that.”

“I can see that. I’ve never been more thankful for my business insurance.”

“You should see if your repairers can open up the ceiling. The rafters look in good condition and you’ll get a lot of extra ceiling height,” said Solomon.

“That would look great,” I agreed. “Very chic too.”

“I suppose I could ask the eventual contractors if that’s possible. I don’t like the idea of anyone being able to access the salon like that again.” Marie gazed at the salon in disbelief. “I think the shops were all one big home improvement store at one time. They must have left the winch mechanisms behind when the store was turned into smaller shops. My gosh, is that what’s been happening all along?”

“It appears so but once the police get into the crawl space and find all the stolen goods, they’ll have a better picture.”

“Do you know who they are?”

“No, but I think one or both of them worked for one of the other shops. For someone called Liv.”

“Liv owns the pet store. I feel so ashamed that I thought one of my employees might be stealing from me.” Marie’s lower lip quivered.

“You did say you couldn’t imagine it was any of them,” I reminded her, “and now there’s proof. I just wish I didn’t have to leave you with all this mess.”

“You really fell through the ceiling?” she asked, looking me over from head to toe. The last time she’d seen me was when I left the salon, gorgeously coiffed. Now I looked like a sewer rat.

“Four people to be precise,” I said, “but I’ll put it all in a report for you and send it to you in the next day or two.”

“I look forward to reading it.”

“This is Detective Graves,” I said as Jord walked over. “He’s in charge.”

I left Marie with my brother and Solomon walked me to my car. “I can follow you home or we can take my car and I’ll send someone to pick up yours,” he said.

“Follow me home. I can drive.” Foam dripped off me and I attempted to wipe the last remaining plumes from my shoulder. I had a picnic blanket in the car that I threw over the driver’s seat, then I hopped in and headed home, entirely unsure whether I’d had a weirder evening recently. Then another thought hit me: Lily would be so disappointed to have missed this.

I grimaced. She’d have to watch the rerun on the bystander’s video.

At home, I stripped off my clothes and stuffed them and the picnic blanket in the washing machine. After attempting to wipe away the puddle on the floor, I hopped in the shower. By the time I dressed, sadly putting aside my fairy-winged kittens-in-crowns pajamas, in favor of yoga pants and a t-shirt, I was squeaky clean, dry and still smelled like a salon. Plus, the cut I’d been given was so good, it stood the rewash and home-dry test.

I was in a good mood when I joined Solomon in the kitchen where he was making sandwiches. He pushed a bowl of salty chips towards me and a glass of wine.

“Any news?” I asked.

“None. I assume Jord is busy interviewing the thieves. Your parents don’t seem to have caught wind of this yet.”

“Good.” I thought about the guy filming on his phone. It was only a matter of time before that got out. “Mom can’t complain. I was barely in any danger.”

“Are you sure?”

“They didn’t have any weapons.”

“You crashed through a ceiling.”

“Accidentally.”

“You could have been seriously hurt.”

“The thief broke my fall.”

Solomon laid down the knife, walked around the island and pulled me into a hug. “Why do the weirdest things happen to you?” he asked, his breath ruffling strands of my hair.

“Hard to say but I did solve the case. After I’ve delivered the report, can I take the day off?” I asked.

“Of course. What’re you going to do?”

“Absolutely nothing.”

“Take the whole week if that’s the case. It’ll stop me wondering what the heck you’re doing if I know you’re actively doing nothing.”

“Maybe we can get back on that baby making thing?”

Solomon pulled away and smiled down at me. “I wasn’t aware we’d stopped.”

“We could not stop tonight too? Tonight could be our lucky night. Maybe I’ll buy a lottery ticket too.” It hadn’t been our lucky night since we’d started trying but apparently, these things took time. I wasn’t sure how much time but I was committed to the cause. Practice, after all, made perfect.

Then my phone buzzed in my jeans’ pocket. I fished it out, entirely intending to ignore it when I saw it was my mom. As soon as the call ended, a text message flashed up: 911!

“It’s my mom.”

“Ignore it.”

“She texted 911.”

“Take it.”

“I’ll be as quick as I can.”

“Then I’ll be as slow as I can,” said Solomon, a gradual smile spreading across his lips.

Oh boy.

“What’s up, Mom?” I asked, the phone next to my ear as I pressed one hand to Solomon’s chest, weakly holding him at bay. I could imagine the onslaught about to come: I should be more careful! What was I thinking! Was I hurt?

Instead, Mom said, “I need you back at the house.”

“Why? What’s happened? Is it Dad?”

“No, he’s had the best evening. His team made second place in his golf tournament. I’m not sure what I’ll do now he’ll be home more often and not practicing his swings. Or, even worse, at home, practicing his swings. I might have a case for you.”

“Really?” Skepticism leaked from my tone. I did not want a lost cat case, or a lost headphones case, or even a lost spouse, although the latter would be the most interesting. Unfortunately for me, it would probably be as simple as a neighbor grousing that his wife couldn’t be found when all she was probably doing was taking a few hours to herself. The chances of my mom stumbling across an actual crime was… medium likely. Also, there was the potential that she had committed the unknown crime. “Did you do something?” I asked, suspicion lacing my words.

“Don’t take that tone with me, young lady!”

“Sorry… Did you?” I couldn’t help myself.

“No!”

“Is anyone injured?”

“Well… not exactly.”

I narrowed my eyes. “What does that mean?”

“If you came over, you’d see!”

I frowned. “Are you sure you shouldn’t call the police?”

“Someone probably already did, but this has you written all over it.”

“What do you mean ‘someone probably already did’? They either did or didn’t.”

“Well, I don’t know but I’m standing outside and there’s a lot of commotion going on inside. Well, outside but inside there, ” she hissed.

“Where are you?” I asked, my frown deepening. “What’s happening at your house?”

“I told you already!” huffed Mom in exasperation. “I’m at the end house. The one with all the construction work. Oh, my! Come quick!”

“No, you didn’t tell… Mom? Hello? Mom? She hung up!” I squeaked, staring at the blank phone screen.

“I got the gist of the conversation.”

“I’m glad one of us did.” I paused, irritated and puzzled. “We should probably go,” I said, the decision reluctantly made. “But if it’s a fool’s errand, I’m going to tell my mom how irritated I am.”

“A fair exchange.” Solomon reached for his keys. “Let’s go.”

Since my mother hadn’t made it appear like a life or death situation, we took our time driving to my parents’ place, eating the sandwiches on the way, and although the evening commuter traffic had long since died down, construction work on the roads burdened us with crawling slowly through a half mile section before we could break free.

By the time we turned onto my parents’ street, it was twilight. I’d consulted my phone repeatedly, both puzzled and relieved that Mom hadn’t called again, and somewhat furious that she hadn’t picked up any of my three calls. Nor had my dad until he’d finally texted: No point asking me. I’m the last person to ever know what goes on in my own house. Love, Dad.

Before Solomon slowed the car to pull in, I pointed ahead where a blue and white cruiser was parked next to the corner house, its lights emitting a steady flash.

“We’ll leave the car at your parents’ and jog over,” said Solomon. “I don’t want the car to get stuck with no way out if more emergency vehicles arrive. Clearly, something happened over there.”

“Okay,” I gulped, my heart thudding, more concerned than ever at what my mother had become involved in.

As we jogged over, curtains twitched in the neighboring houses, yet only a couple of households had moved to their porches to unashamedly watch.

We slowed to a walk when we reached the house and followed the sounds of voices around the side. My mom stood with a couple about my age, nodding as the younger woman waved towards the partially fallen fencing, and said something we were too far away to hear.

“Mom!” I called out as we approached and my mother whipped around.

“There you are!” said Mom, beckoning us, then, “This is my daughter, the investigator. Not the one that went to Harvard. That’s my older daughter, Serena. This is the younger one. She did go to college though and now she fights crime as a private citizen. The rest of the family fight crime legally on the police force.”

“Thanks for the introduction,” I said, holding in the internal sigh that threatened to break forth every time my overachieving older sister was mentioned. “I’m Lexi. This is my husband, John Solomon. We’re both PIs.”

“Thanks for coming,” said the younger woman. She wrung her hands, alternating between looking at us and back toward the yard. “Your mom said you’d be able to help and I just don’t know what to do.”

“Do you live here?” I asked, pulling her attention back. The “For Sale” sign had disappeared a couple months back but I hadn’t kept tabs on who had bought it. My mom had mentioned construction work had started but I couldn’t remember when that was.

“Oh, yes, we do. I’m sorry. Where are my manners? I’m Carrie Dugan and this is my husband, Pete Dugan. We own the house.” She nodded towards the house that occupied the end lot.

Solomon had stepped away momentarily, monitoring the yard and when he returned, he asked, “Did you call the police?”

“Yes, it seemed the right thing to do,” said Carrie. “We showed them the yard and they’ve been in there ever since.”

“I’m not sure how we can help in a way the police can’t but perhaps you can tell us why you called them and we can figure something out,” I suggested, glancing around for sight of the police officers.

Carrie eyed my mom, who nodded encouragingly, and grimaced. “We were just doing a little light evening work. It’s too late to use any power tools at this time, but Pete wanted to get started with the landscaping so that our little girl can play in the backyard. She’s at my mom’s tonight so Pete was just excavating—”

“By hand,” chipped in Pete. “That is, with a shovel. I wanted to get the foundation dug out for a small retaining wall around the patio area since the lawn slopes a little on our plot.”

“Exactly,” agreed Carrie, nodding along. “So Pete was digging and well…” she trailed off, looking at her husband.

He took a deep breath, paling. “That’s when I found the body,” he said.