“Cosmetology student,” Neesa said. “I been doing hair since I was twelve. Soon as I get my license, I’m gonna open my own salon. Hair, nails, eyelashes, all of it. How ’bout you?”

Drue made a face. “I work for my dad. Nothing very exciting. What’d you do before you started cosmetology school?”

“You know. Whatever. I was working at a dry cleaner’s, but me and the owner didn’t see eye to eye. Before that, I worked at a hotel, out at Sunset Beach.”

“I live at the beach,” Drue said. “Which hotel?”

“Gulf Vista. You know the place?”

“It’s right down the street from my place,” Drue said. She’d been waiting for this moment, hoping for an opening. “Hey, isn’t that where that girl was killed a couple years ago?”

Neesa toyed with a tiny gold cross that hung from a thin chain around her neck. “Mmm-hmm. That was my friend. Jazmin. Real sad.”

“I’m so sorry,” Drue said. “I lost my best friend in April.”

Not exactly a lie. Her mother really was her best friend.

“Ooh. I’m sorry. What happened to her?” Neesa asked.

“Hit-and-run accident,” Drue lied. “She died on the way to the hospital.”

“That’s terrible,” Neesa said indignantly. “Did they ever catch the guy?”

Drue shook her head sadly, silently begging her mother’s forgiveness.

“No. Did they ever find out who killed your friend?”

Neesa stared down into her drink. “No. It was probably some freak. You get a lot of freaks staying in hotels, you know.”

“What kind of work did you do at the hotel?” Drue asked.

“I was a housekeeper. Jazmin was too. That’s how we met. I miss that girl, you know? I mean, we fussed at each other sometimes, but ain’t nobody could stay mad with that girl for long. Jaz, she had a way about her. Always laughing and cutting up.”

“She sounds like she was fun,” Drue said.

“Mmm-hmm.” Neesa tossed back half of her drink, leaving faint traces of the creamy Kahlúa on her vividly painted lips, which she dabbed with her fingertip. “You know, I was working that night.”

“The night she was killed?” Drue tried to sound uninterested, but wasn’t sure she could pull it off.

“We always took our dinner breaks together, if we could. We met up that night, I guess it was around seven. So hot that night. September, you know? Neither of us felt like eating, so we just got a couple of Dr Peppers from the Coke machine and sat around talking, until it was time to get back to work.”

“Was that the last time you saw her alive?”

“Yeah,” Neesa said. She drained the rest of her glass, then suddenly stood up, grasping the edge of the bar with both hands to steady herself. “I gotta go. Got class tomorrow morning, and we’re doing razor cuts.”