Free Hollywood Blood: A Hollywood Alphabet Series Thriller by M.Z. Kelly Page B

at me. “Maybe I should get some of that hair fertilizer.”
    “You mean like, Miracle Grow.”
    “Something like that, only I probably need to get a prescription. They’ve got a bunch of stuff on the Internet, but I don’t trust it.”
    “Why all the concern ?” We stopped at our cars.
    “I’m not getting any younger and I’ve been thinking about asking that clerk out.”
    “You mean, Dorothy, your friend who works in administration?”
    He shook his head. “No, the one I met when we stopped by the records division the other day and you gave her that birthday card.”
    “Wilma?” I asked, not believing what he’d said.
    Wilma Bibby was a records clerk who had helped me out on our l ast case. She’d had an emotional break-down, dyed her short, spiky hair red, and started wearing tons of makeup. The makeover had left her looking like a scary, middle-aged clown—she might even give Vee a run for her money.
    “Yeah, Wilma,” Charlie said. “I think maybe she liked me.”
    “Charlie, go kiss some chocolate. Go try to regrow your hair. Go home to your daughter. Go eat a box of donuts.” Of course, I didn’t say any of those things. I just walked away, thinking about how some of us spend our lives looking for love, some of us find it, and some of us wonder if we can hold onto it.

 
    Chapter Thirteen
     
    When Myra arrives the deep shadows of afternoon have reached the park. Her two sisters approach her on the sidewalk.
    “We saw her,” Rose says, trying to catch her breath.
    “Chloe’s near the trees that border the other side of the park,” Henna adds, pointing in that direction. “She didn’t see us.”
    Myra ’s anger shifts into high gear. The burning desire to kill pushes everything else from her mind. She moves out, a hunter stalking its prey. “Let’s get her now. She must die.”
    Myra imagines she’s soaring above the park, her dark eyes sweeping over the fields below. Her anger and rage are now channeled and locked in, ready to deliver a death sentence.
    Her vision narrows. There are children tossing rocks into a stream. A dog strains on his leash, pulling a man down a path. There ’s a couple lying on a blanket that’s spread out on the grass sharing a laugh. A kite soars overhead. Then she sees a lone figure in the shadow of the trees. It’s Chloe.
    The traitor is sitting on a bench. She looks vulnerable, almost childlike. Her hair is unkempt and she’s wearing the same clothes she had on last night. Myra knows the park is home to Chloe, the place where they’ve spent hours together. Now it will be the place where she dies.
    Myra , the hunter, closes in, moving swiftly and silently toward her victim. Chloe’s eyes come up to her. It’s a moment that Myra knows well. That instant when predator and prey become one, joined in the awareness this is a fight for survival. A beat later, Chloe is off sprinting away from her.
    Rose and Henna move along the park’s perimeter, flanking Chloe. They also begin to hone in on their target. Myra’s adrenaline surges. She and her sisters are the lionesses, Chloe is the antelope.
    S uddenly, up ahead, she sees that Chloe has slowed down and then stops. What’s happening?
    Myra ’s gaze moves over to the street where she sees the police car. It stops and the officers are getting out. Chloe is walking now, moving closer to the car, closer to the cops. Is she going to tell the officers what’s happening, ask them for help? The hunter stops abruptly and turns away, nodding to Rose and Henna to do the same.
    Chloe turns and moves off, walking past the police officers who are now doing a foot patrol through the park. This doesn’t surprise Myra. She and her sisters have encountered the police here before. They always take care to avoid them, leaving the area until they are gone. Myra gives the cops a wide berth, watches them from the sidewalk as they do their sweep through the park.
    Ahead, Myra sees that Rose and Henna are picking up their pace