Corpse Suzette

back seat. “And a little scary.”
    “And don’t you forget it,”
Savannah reminded her.
    “Yeah, don’t mess with a
fat chick,” Abby added. “You never know when we might act out one of those
violent fantasies of ours. You could wind up headless and under a subway
train.” Savannah lifted a militant fist. “Amen, sister.”
     
    The moment Savannah pulled
into Emerge’s parking lot, her cell phone rang.
    “You ladies go on in,”
Savannah told Tammy and Abigail. “I’ll take this and follow in a few minutes.”
    As they got out of the car
and headed inside, Savannah answered the call. It was Dirk.
    “What’s the news?” she
asked. It was safe to assume there was some sort of business to discuss; Dirk
never called just to shoot the breeze.
    “Lab just called me about
that bottle and syringe we dropped off,” he said. “They found something good.”
    “Fingerprints?”
    “Yeah, but they’re just
his. No big deal there.”
    “Anything suspicious in the
vial?”
    “Nothing. It was clean. Not
even residue from the vitamins that should have been in it. Like somebody
washed it out really good before they pitched it. Same with the syringe.
Nothing but water inside.”
    “So what’s the good word?”
    “The cap. It had a trace of
something else on the inside.”
    “Oh yeah? What?”
    “The gal at the lab wasn’t
sure, but she said it looked like botulism.”
    “Botulism?” Savannah
started to grin. “You mean like Botox, the stuff they use at plastic surgeons’
clinics?”
    “No, she said she checked
that and it isn’t Botox. Similar, but not the same. She said that Botox is
relatively safe. In order to kill somebody with Botox, you’d have to inject
them with something like thirty-five vials of the stuff. And at four hundred and
fifty bucks a vial, the cost alone would be prohibitive.”
    “Not to mention trying to
hold a victim down long enough to inject them with thirty-five vials of
anything.”
    “Right. But this stuff she
found, she said it’s a lot more concentrated than Botox. She’s not sure what it
is.”
    Savannah looked up at the
brass sign and its fancy “Emerge” logo. “Well,” she said, “I just happen to be
sitting in the clinic’s parking lot. Let me go inside and see what I can find.
I’ll get back to you.”
    “Thanks, babe. I owe you
one.”
    “Oh, sugar, you owe me way more than one.”
     
    * * *
     
    Once inside, Savannah found
Myrna alone at her desk. She looked tired and bored, but happy to see Savannah.
    “Hey, girlfriend,” she said
as Savannah walked over to her and stuck out her hand. “You about ready to go
out for another drink?”
    “Any time,” Savannah
replied, shaking her hand heartily. “For you, any time at all.” She looked
around at the clean desk, the bottle of red nail polish and file, the hand
cream. “Not much going on, huh?”
    “Nothing. Nothing at all.
But I guess that’s to be expected. With one owner missing and the other one
dead, what do you expect? I’m just going through the motions. We all are.”
    “Like having Abigail come
in for her meeting with Jeremy?” Savannah asked.
    Myrna smiled sweetly. “That
was Jeremy’s idea. He likes Abby, thinks he can be of help to her. He asked me
to call her this morning and have her come in for a stylist consult.”
    “Where are they?”
    “He just took her and Tammy
out to the patio for a nice lunch. You can join them if you like.”
    “No, I’d rather talk to
you.”
    Myrna seemed pleased.
Savannah got the idea that the receptionist might not have a lot of friends.
The woman had an air of loneliness about her.
    “Good. Pull up a chair and
let’s chat.”
    Savannah settled herself in
the offered chair and glanced around to see if they were alone. There was no
one in earshot except the butterflies.
    “How much do you know about
the medicines they use here?” she asked.
    Myrna looked a bit sad.
“Probably more than I should... personal experience and all. Why? Which meds do
you want to know about?”
    “Botox.”
    “Botox? Why? Are you
considering some injections for those forehead wrinkles of yours?”
    “No. I like my wrinkles. I
earned every one of them. I was just wondering if they use Botox here... or
something like it.”
    “They used to use Botox.
But lately Suzette had switched to something else, a new product she was raving
about.”
    “Do you know the name of
it?”
    “No, but I can look it up
for you.” She turned to the computer on her desk.