Drue removed the towel and before she had a chance to protest, Neesa grabbed a pair of scissors, flipped up the back of Drue’s hair and cut a long strand.

“What the hell!” Drue said, when she saw the hunk of hair Neesa was clutching. “What did you do that for? I didn’t want my hair cut.”

“This is for the test strand,” Neesa explained. She laid the hair on some paper towels, dipped a flat plastic brush into the bleach mixture, then painted it onto the test hair. She turned to Drue. “This way we see how long it takes the bleach to lighten up your hair like we want. You got an oven timer? Let’s give it fifteen minutes.”

Drue started the timer and noticed that the Mountain Dew bottle was now empty and in the trash, along with the Tito’s bottle.

“Did you say you have some wine?” Neesa asked, seating herself at the dinette table.

Drue retrieved the bottle of prosecco she’d bought earlier in the day and held it up.

“Ooh, perfect,” Neesa said. “Bubbles.”

“Are your nerves getting settled any better?” Drue asked, after Neesa drained her first glass of wine.

“A little,” Neesa said. “Being out here, you know, so close to the hotel where I used to work, it kinda does a number on my head.”

“That’s right,” Drue said innocently. “The Gulf Vista. And you knew the girl who got killed, right?”

“Jaz. My best friend.” Neesa looked over at the hair strand. “Me and that girl, we went through some crazy stuff together. I tell you the truth, I ain’t been back out here to the beach since I left that place.”

“Kinda sucks that they let you go, huh?” Drue said.

Neesa gave her a sharp look. “They didn’t fire me. I quit.”

“What about your boss? The one you told me about, Herman the Munster?”

Neesa giggled. “Yeah, old Herman the Munster. Now, he did get his ass fired, or so I heard.”

“Why did he get fired?”

The hairdresser looked at her over the rim of her wineglass. “How should I know?”

“More wine?” Drue asked.

Neesa nodded and Drue poured.

“You know, it’s too bad old Herman did get fired,” Neesa said, after a second glass of prosecco. “They shoulda locked his ass up for the way he did me and Jaz.”

“Because he was pressuring both of you for sex?” Drue asked.

“That and all the rest of it,” Neesa said, gesturing grandly. “Like, if I ever told what all I know? That old perv would prob’ly get the chair or something.”

“Instead he just walks away like nothing happened,” Drue encouraged her.

“And my poor ‘lil Jaz is dead and her baby ain’t never gonna see her mama again.” Neesa dabbed at her eyes with the hem of her shirt. She held out her empty glass and Drue refilled it.