She finally got her certificates and Jackie offered her a job full time, since Rose had been working another job to earn extra money. Jackie decided to give her two of her clients, Tess Hardy and Cate Gillespie but Cate was unsure how her neighbour would take having a rival.
"You're asking for trouble," her husband warned her.
"Just because Claire lives next door doesn't mean I have to use her," Cate defended herself. "Claire never said anything when Jackie used to do it."
"You said someone else was taking over," Ricky replied.
"You would take notice of that," Cate complained as she heard her daughter calling her.
"Mum, can I go round to see Claire?" Pippa wanted to know.
"You spend too much time there," Ricky reminded her.
"Your father's right," Cate agreed. "Maybe at the weekend. Tomorrow night, I want you to get your hair trimmed, the new hairdresser's coming round."
"But Mum, I like Claire to do it," the young girl complained.
"I don't like it when she does it without asking me first," Cate told her.
"I want to be a hairdresser when I'm older," Pippa replied. "Do I have to get my hair cut?"
"Don't argue with your mother," Ricky raised his voice to her.
Over at the other side of town, Rose had just arrived at Tess Hardy's house, where Tess was trying to find out what time her husband would be home.
"Sorry about that," Tess apologised to Rose. "Anyway, can you show me some new hairstyles, I think I want a change."
"Yeah, I can show some to you," Rose agreed, going into her bag.
What Tess didn't want to say was it wasn't for her husband's benefit but one of the other male DS's on the team, who had been saying it was the same for him at home and that his wife took no notice of him.
"What do you think?" Rose was showing Tess the back of her head in the mirror.
"Yes, I like it," Tess agreed. "You're every bit as good as your mother."
"Thanks. So ya want me to come again?" Rose smiled.
Tess made another booking and Rose was about to leave as Alec opened the kitchen door, making Rose jump back as he reached the door handle at the same time.
"What?" Alec cursed as the handle flipped back up.
"Sorry," Rose mumbled as she saw a man standing there.
"Who are you?" he managed to ask.
"Really Alec, she's the hairdresser," Tess called to him as she puffed her hair up a bit more and hoped she'd be able to recreate the style in the morning.
"I have to get going," Rose reminded Tess as Alec was still in the way.
"Well let her out," Tess chastised him.
Without saying anything else apart from a rushed 'Bye', Rose made her retreat and got into her small car she'd managed to save up for after passing her driving test. Wondering what all that was about, she made her way to the new estate on the edge of town to visit another client, Cate Gillespie.
She really hoped her husband wasn't going to be there, he made her nervous, which wasn't good when you had a pair of scissors in your hand. It was young Pippa who answered the door as Cate was finishing a glass of wine.
"Hi Rose, come in," Pippa greeted her.
She did like Rose but there was something exciting about going next door, Lee always made a fuss over her when he was in.
"Rose, do you have time to trim Pippa's hair as well?" Cate asked her.
"Yeah, you're my last appointment today," Rose agreed.
"You should get a salon," Cate was telling her as they chatted.
"Mum and I decided against it," Rose laughed. "It's easier now I can drive though."
Pippa was getting impatient to know if she could go and see Claire. Why had her mother insisted Rose had cut her hair when she liked Claire to do it?
Rose was just clearing up when Pippa joined them in the kitchen.
"No Pippa, I don't want you going round there," Cate was telling the girl.
"But Mum," Pippa complained.
"Do you want to make another appointment now?" Rose spoke up before she left.
"Can I call you?" Cate replied, not wanting to keep Rose any longer.
"Yeah, if ya want?" Rose had to agree, wondering where the girl meant when she was told she couldn't go somewhere.
Cate was hoping Rose hadn't been taking any notice. When Rose opened the door, Pippa was sitting outside the house.
"Hi there, are ya okay?" Rose stopped to ask the girl.
"Yeah, my mum won't let me go next door," Pippa admitted.
"Maybe she has a reason?" Rose replied as she put her bag in the back of the car.
"She doesn't like me going there but she won't tell me why," Pippa admitted.
Rose wondered why the girl was telling her. Did Pippa think she could trust her?
"Well maybe she thinks ya might be disturbing them?" was all Rose could think of saying.
Pippa shook her head and looked up.
"I don't know. She doesn't mind me seeing them when they come to our house or we all go to theirs," Pippa told her. "Especially when Lee's there."
"Well, you'll just have to ask your mum why," Rose concluded. "Sorry I can't help ya."
"She might let me go if Lisa goes with me," Pippa then told her. "She's my older cousin."
"Yeah, maybe?" Rose smiled at the girl. "See ya."
As Rose was driving off, Cate went to see where Pippa was.
"Were you just talking to someone?" she asked the girl as she saw Rose going off.
"Just the hairdresser," Pippa admitted.
"I hope it was nothing, she doesn't need to know anything," Cate replied.
Rose thought nothing off it until Cate called her for her hair doing for a wedding.
"Are ya sure ya want me to do it?" Rose wanted to make sure.
"I don't talk to the woman next door much," Cate replied. "If that's what you're thinking? Can you come on Friday?"
Rose checked her appointments and noticed Tess had also booked but she would be able to squeeze them both in, they were turning out to be her best clients. She went to visit Tess first and asked how she'd got on with the last style.
"Fine, the girls at the station liked it," Tess told her as Rose was getting set up.
Tess didn't want to say it had done no good trying to dress up a bit for Alec, she was about to give up trying to impress him. Dave had asked her out that evening for a drink and since Daisy was staying with a friend, she could make up the excuse she was going to her mother's.
"I want something different this time," Tess added.
"I got the impression your husband wasn't expecting me to be here the last time," Rose told her as she put some clips in Tess's hair.
"Take no notice of him Rose," Tess laughed. "What does he know? How does he expect me to fit things in when I'm at work?"
Rose knew she was a detective, other than that, she had no idea what her husband did.
"So, does your daughter want to follow ya into the police?" Rose carried on chatting.
"She hasn't decided yet," Tess replied. "She may be put off with us both being in it."
Well that answered that question, Rose supposed. She finished in good time to get to Cate's and wondered if the young girl had got her own way since her last visit. When Rose got there, an older girl answered the door. Lisa was staying over since she was looking after Pippa for the weekend.
"Hi, you must be Rose?" Lisa greeted Rose.
"Oh, are you Pippa's cousin?" Rose asked.
"Yeah, I'm looking after her, no kids allowed at the wedding," Lisa told her. "She doesn't trust them next door."
"Lisa, that's enough," Cate warned her as she entered the kitchen. "Rose isn't interested. Thanks for fitting me in Rose."
"Lisa, I want to go out on my bike," Pippa called from the hallway, where Rose had passed a bike.
"If you go out, don't you take her next door Lisa," Cate warned her as she sat where Rose indicated.
"I never said I was going to," Lisa complained.
"Make sure you keep away while we're gone," Cate reminded her.
Rose was sure she shouldn't even be listening and what would the younger girl's mother think if she found out she'd talked to Pippa outside a few weeks ago? She couldn't get involved, not if she wanted to keep Cate as a client but did she want to keep coming back if she was going to keep hearing more of the same?
"So, are ya looking forward to this wedding?" Rose asked Cate when Lisa had disappeared.
"Yes and no," Cate admitted, not wanting to say Ricky would be up to his usual tricks. "It's the first time we've left Pippa overnight with her cousin."
"Well I'm sure you'll enjoy it once there," Rose replied, stuck for something to say. "It's ages since I went to a wedding."
"I don't know why we have to stay overnight," Cate then complained.
"Better than gettin' caught driving if ya want to have a drink?" Rose thought.
"I suppose so?" Cate agreed, wanting to get another glass of wine.
"Well, hope ya have a good time then. So, is your hair okay?" Rose asked her.
Cate looked in the mirrors and nodded her approval. She got up and went to the drawer where she had saved the money to pay and handed it to Rose.
"I'll call when I want another appointment," Cate told her. "I won't be going next door."
Rose was sure the woman had said that last time. She gathered her things but dared to ask Cate if she could use the bathroom.
"Sure, top of the stairs," Cate told her as she headed for the living room.
As Rose went upstairs, one of the bedroom doors was open, looking like it was Pippa's judging by the pile of clothes on top of the bed. Then she saw a pendant lying in the doorway and debated whether to pick it up but thought better of it, in case she was accused of something.
She went back downstairs, seeing Cate sitting in a chair with a glass in her hand.
"Bye then," Rose called to her.
She got no reply so she went to the front door and saw Pippa in the street as she opened it.
"Did you leave my aunt with a glass in her hand?" Lisa asked Rose.
"It's not my place to say anything," Rose replied.
"I won't say anything," Lisa promised. "I don't get on with her, I only come round to see Pippa, it's not her fault if her mother acts like she does. Cate's only staying out overnight because she won't be in any state to get home."
"Everyone gets totalled at a wedding," Rose joked as Pippa came over to join them.
"Bye Rose," Pippa called to her. "Did I say I want to be a hairdresser when I get older?"
"Ya might have done," Rose smiled at the girl. "That's a great bike, I had a red one when I was younger. My mum thought I was mad wanting one when we lived in a block of flats. She wasn't gonna get me one but then there it was, on the balcony."
"That was lucky then," Pippa laughed.
As Rose drove off, she wondered why that had suddenly come to mind after all that time. Neither herself or her mother had known where it had come from, her mother denying she had anything to do with its appearance. The next day, the pair of them went shopping and compared the clients they'd each had during the past week.
"How are ya getting on with Cate and Tess?" Jackie wanted to know as they'd stopped in a store's café.
"Well Tess doesn't say much," Rose admitted. "Cate's a bit funny though, she keeps going on about the woman next door and telling her daughter to keep away."
"I was always telling you to stay away from people," Jackie recalled. "Well until I got to know them."
They both laughed and thought no more about it until the middle of the following afternoon, when the news came on the radio as they were clearing up after Sunday lunch.
"Shush Mum," Rose urged Jackie as she heard a police appeal for information about two girls being missing.
Tess's morning had been interrupted as she was on callout for any emergencies over the weekend and she was complaining once again to Alec.
"Well, are you coming with me?" Tess wanted to know. "I'll call my mother, see if Daisy can be dropped off."
"Can't deal with on your own?" Alec was annoyed she needed him to go with her.
"Alec, it will look better, we're talking about two young girls being missing," Tess reminded him.
"Fine, Daisy may not be pleased," Alec reluctantly agreed.
Daisy was complaining on the short journey to Tess's mother's house that her parents were always leaving her when something came up.
"Why do you both have to go?" Daisy wanted to know.
"Because a girl around your age has gone missing," Alec replied as they stopped outside the house. "Stay here until we call you. Don't go calling for any of your friends, understand?"
"Did you have to talk like that Alec?" Tess asked when she got back in the car after seeing Daisy inside.
"It's best she knows Tess," Alec told her as he drove off to the estate just outside town.
As they got nearer, Tess wondered if it was the same estate as Rose, her hairdresser sometimes went to but it could be any of the new ones that were springing up all over the place. She forgot all about it as they began to talk to the distraught parents, Cate and Ricky Gillespie, Ricky immediately blaming the girls being missing on their next door neighbours.
"Ricky went round, when we came back," Cate admitted to Tess tearfully. "I said I'd told Lisa not to take Pippa round there."
"Is there any reason Lisa would defy you?" Tess asked. "Cate, I have an almost teenager as well, I know how you feel."
"Lisa has a 'thing' about Lee," Cate admitted, not wanting to say she herself had got involved with him but it had ended badly.
"Well, tell me again where Lisa might have taken her either last night or before you got home," Tess tried to take Cate's mind off the neighbours.
"You think Lisa took her off last night?" Ricky overheard as Alec followed him.
Alec was trying to keep them separated, for now.
"Stop it Ricky, Lisa wouldn't go off with Pippa," Cate told him. "Someone took them."
"Because the patio door was open?" Alec wanted to know. "The girls may have been outside themselves, is there any way around the back?"
"Only a gate to next door," Ricky admitted. "It had to be the Ashworths."
Alec had seen the report from next door, which basically said the couple knew nothing about the girls being missing until Ricky had knocked loudly on the door when they had got back. As time went on, the less likely it was the girls had just wandered off, Alec thought.
Rose was listening carefully, recognising the Scottish voice giving short details and for anyone with information to call a number. She'd only heard him talk briefly before but she recognised it none the less. Should she say anything about what she'd heard at the Gillespie house?
"Hey, I remember there was a young girl called Pippa," Jackie spoke up after the newsreader had moved onto another item. "You'll have seen her Rose."
"She might have just been going out when I got there Mum, I don't remember," Rose bluffed.
She had to think carefully before getting involved in the disappearance of her client's daughter, especially since she'd last seen both girls on Friday night. Surely the police wouldn't be interested in what she'd heard and what Cate had said to her? Cate wouldn't thank her for interfering. Some choice.