Aretha Moon and the Dead Hairdresser: Aretha Moon Book 2 (Aretha Moon Mysteries) by Linda Ross (pdf to ebook reader txt) 📕

He smiled without humor.  “I can imagine.  She and Paul were quite the team.”

“Paul?” Thelma asked.

“Her knife.  That’s what she called it.  Like some people name their car or truck.  She’d talk as though it was her pet. ‘Paul and I don’t like it when you do that,’ she’d say,” he said, mimicking a woman’s voice.  “’Paul needs to give you a talking to.’”

“Wow, that’s creepy,” I said.

“Especially if you’re in bed naked,” he said dryly.

“I know this is sensitive, and I apologize, but we need to know everything about her.  I understand that she carved her initials on you.”

I didn’t think he was going to answer at first, but then he sat up in his chair and said, “Oh, what the hell.  Might as well tell you.”  He stared down at the desk as he talked.  “We were having an affair when we were both living in Arnold.  We used to drink at the bar I owned, then get a room somewhere.  As you probably heard, we used toys.” He shrugged.  “I suppose some people would find it disgusting, but I’ve always known my tastes were different.”

“And Kara’s were too,” I guessed.

“We were perfect together,” he said, a faint smile on his face.  “For a man of my inclinations it’s difficult to find a woman who likes to play the opposite part, for lack of a better description.”  He looked at us, and I guess both Thelma and I must have appeared baffled.  “In terms of our sexual relationship, I was a bottom and she was a top,” he said.  “It’s something my wife isn’t into, and she’s never expressed any interest in learning.  In fact, she finds it depraved.”

Thelma cleared her throat.  “So you had to keep the relationship hidden from everyone.”

“I’m sure several people guessed.  I don’t think we were that careful.  A joke or a personal remark at work.”  He shrugged.  “But mostly they just laughed behind my back or rolled their eyes.  Most people don’t understand.  The sex can be a tremendous release.”

I didn’t want to go there, so I tried to steer the subject back to the breakup.

“But Kara ended the relationship?”

“I think she got bored.  Women like Kara need a lot of excitement in their lives.  They’re always looking for the next thrill.   Which suited me fine, but she wanted to escalate things a bit much.”

“Like carving her initials on you?” I asked.  I know it wasn’t tactful, but we were discussing sex, for heaven’s sake.  Tact had no place in the conversation.

His hand went to his neck again.  “We’d had a fight, and I was drunk.  We were at a motel, and she wanted to do more than our usual. . . routine.”

I wasn’t going to ask for details, so I waited for him to continue.

“I wasn’t open to what she wanted, even drunk, so she kept getting me more to drink.  I guess I passed out at some point, and I woke up with a throbbing pain in my neck and blood on the bed.  With the blood and my drunken state, I couldn’t see that there were letters on my neck when I looked in the mirror.  I thought she’d just made her usual cuts.  She liked to do an X or a cross.  I wrapped my shirt around my neck and went home.  I told my wife I’d been mugged, but they hadn’t gotten anything.”

“And then the cuts healed,” Thelma prodded when he fell silent.

“I suspected what it was when the cuts scabbed over, but I wasn’t sure.  Then when the scabs came off and I saw the scars, well, there was no denying it.  KK.  A perfect scar.”  He pulled down his collar on the left side, and I saw the two letters, a perfect brand of scar tissue on his white skin.

“But you still followed her when she left town,” I said.

Jeffrey sighed.  “I thought I’d found the one woman who understood me.”

“Even after she cut you like that?”

“I know it’s crazy, but sometimes sex is like a drug.  You want more and more.  And you get to the point you’ll pay any price, even getting her initials carved on your neck.”  He shook his head.  “I knew I was throwing away my marriage.  I was damn lucky Cindy didn’t toss me out when she realized I had Kara’s initials carved on my neck.  We were going to start over, but I just couldn’t let go of Kara.  When I heard she was in Hannibal I convinced Cindy we needed to start over in a new place.  I thought maybe she wouldn’t find out Kara was close by if we didn’t live in the same town.”

“But she found out anyway?” Thelma asked.

“I heard about the B and D club where Kara was going, and I showed up there.  I hooked up with her again, and for a while everything was great.  But one night she was different.  I don’t know.  Maybe she’d been doing drugs.  We started our usual session, but this time she went after me with a crop.  I was handcuffed and couldn’t get away.  She was cursing at me and hitting me as hard as she could everywhere.  I couldn’t stand it anymore and started screaming.  She stuffed a gag in my mouth and kept hitting me.  I think I finally passed out.”

He fell silent, and I realized I’d been holding my breath.  “I heard that’s why she got kicked out of the B and D club.”

He nodded.  “That night she walked out of the room and left me bleeding on the couch.  I had to be taken to the hospital.  David told her to get out and never come back.  She left, but she came back long enough to slash some tires and try to