Do You Hear What I Hear?

“It sounds like a lot of cutting for just a small trim.” Libby tried to turn and catch a glimpse in the mirror of what Pearly was up to, but Pearly grabbed her head.

“Well, there was that slip, remember.” Clip. “But don’t worry, you’re going to love it.” Snip.

“I already do,” Josie piped in.

Libby groaned.

And when Pearly finally turned the chair so she could look at her trim, she groaned even louder. “Pearly!”

“I told you I slipped.”

Muttering about scissor-slipping stylists, Libby toyed with her now-shoulder-length hair. It wasn’t so bad, but she wasn’t about to tell her sneaky, snipping, conniving employees that. She gave her head a small shake and watched in delight as the brunette curls, freed from the weight of her hair and her ever-present braid, bounced.

Despite the fact she didn’t hate the cut, might even like it a bit, she wasn’t about to admit a thing. She was just about to read them both a riot act when the bell over the door chimed merrily.

“Ready?” Dr. Gardner, the hunky reason for Pearly’s slippage, asked as he walked through the door.

“Just let me get my coat.” She grabbed it off the hook in the back room. Before she walked out the door she turned to the two haircut cohorts. “And don’t forget to get in an hour early tomorrow for that little meeting we’re going to have.”

“What little meeting?” Pearly asked.

“The one where we discuss professionalism, honesty and nonslip scissors.”

The phone rang and Josie practically vaulted over the chair to get it and escape the lecture.

“Nonslip scissors?” Dr. Gardner—Libby refused to think of him as Joshua—asked.

“Snips and Snaps,” Josie said into the receiver.

“Private joke.” Libby trudged after him toward the door. “Where are we going?”

“My place? I’ve got an apartment at Lovell Place, so it’s close.”

There was no way she was going to Joshua Gardner’s home, no way at all. This was a professional association, and professional associations didn’t get all chummy at each other’s homes—dates did. And this wasn’t a date.

“I was thinking maybe a restaurant, or—”

“Libby,” Josie called. “It’s Mrs. Henderson.”

“Meg?” A sense of dread crept into Libby’s heart. “Is something wrong with Meg?”

“She said there was a small accident.”

A helpless feeling washed over Josh as the color totally deserted Libby. She raced for the phone, and he followed. Who the hell was Meg? A sister? A friend?

As she spoke in hushed tones to this Mrs. Henderson, some of the color returned to her face. By the time she hung up she looked better, though obviously still concerned. “Listen, I hate to cancel on you, but I’ve got to go.”

“Who’s Meg?” he asked.

“My daughter.” With that she was gone and all Joshua could do was watch her leave.

Her daughter?

A hand touched her shoulder. “There’s no husband to go with that daughter, if that’s what you’re wondering, boy.”

He turned and looked into the graying stylist’s warm eyes. “I’m sorry?”

“No, you won’t be if you stick around. Libby’s a woman no man would be sorry to have. And I said, she doesn’t have a husband, leastwise, not anymore, so you don’t have to look so puppy-dog sad.”

“Miss—” Joshua left the word hanging, realizing he didn’t know the woman’s name.

“Missed a man, that’s the only Miss I’ve got. And the name’s Pearly. Pearly Gates. You see, the day I was born my mother—God rest her soul—took one look at me and said she was looking on a piece of heaven. She named me Pearly, Pearly Gates, to remind herself—and me, too—what I was.”

Josh couldn’t help but smile. Before he could make his escape, Pearly added, “And Mama used to say it was a good thing she named me Pearly ’cause she needed all the remindin’ she could get. Seems I might have come from heaven, but the devil put his two cents in my makeup. I was always gettin’ in one piece of trouble after another. Mama said the gray hairs on her head were all mine. I figure this—” she ran her fingers through her short gray hair “—is her way of getting even with me.”