Summer Walsh Mystery Series (3 complete cozy mystery novellas)

by Debby Mayne

  "I need you now."

  I chewed on my bottom lip as I thought about it. "What if I work part-time for a few days before I come in full-time?"

  He grimaced before he offered a clipped nod. "That'll be okay, I guess, but only for a few days."

  Ninety days could be a long time, I thought. But I reminded myself that I could gut it out at least that long. "The contract?"

  He made a face, his eyes shifting upward, and he let out a sigh of frustration. "Very well." He went back behind his desk, opened the top drawer, and pulled out a multipage document that he thrust toward me. "Here it is."

  So he had the contract drawn up, but he was hoping I wouldn't insist on executing it. Interesting. This told me more about his character than anything he could have said.

  As I read through the contract, I crossed through and initialed a few points. When I handed it back to him, I said, "Now all I need for you to do is initial all of these changes, make me a copy, and we're good to go."

  "You sure do drive a hard bargain, Ms. Walsh." He sat down, gave the document a cursory glance, and put his initials beside all of mine before heading toward the door. "Be right back. The copy machine is out there."

  I waited, and when he came back five minutes later, I checked to make sure all of the pages were there.

  "What's the matter?" he said. "Don't trust me?"

  I just smiled back.

  "Okay, so do you think you can handle it now?" He glanced at his watch.

  "I'm sure I can, but there are a few things we need to discuss." I watched as a pained expression came over his face. "You said there was an apartment, and I'd like to discuss some of the fine points of the job."

  He reached into his pocket and pulled out a key. "Here's the key to the apartment. You can access it from the back of the office or around back. There's a small, one-car garage that I'll need to clean out if you need to park your car in there. Otherwise, you can just park in front of it in the driveway."

  It was obvious that he was itching to leave, and I doubted he knew the answers to most of my questions. I figured I could find out soon enough what the problems were and what I needed to do. But I still needed to know a few things before he left.

  "That's fine. Now how about the job? What time do I need to come in, and who is my go-to person if I have questions?"

  He thought for a moment before saying, "Darla Moyer. She's in charge of the prekindergarten program."

  "Okay. How about my hours?"

  "Since we're not paying you hourly, you should be here whenever the facility is open."

  "I understand that, but I'm sure you want me here early."

  He shook his head. "That's really not necessary, but if you want to come in, you have to realize you're not getting overtime."

  Overtime had never crossed my mind. "I understand."

  "Your main responsibilities will be to collect fees, make sure all the teachers report their hours, get their paychecks and direct deposits ready, and handle problems as they come up." He tilted his head forward. "Now if that's all you need from me, I'm outta here."

  He so clearly wanted to leave I didn't want to hold him back. "I think that's about it." Before he got to the door, I added, "I need to unload my car. Is it okay if I do that now?"

  "Sure, but tell Darla where you'll be in case she needs you. Oh, and any time you go anywhere, have your cell phone on you at all times. I already gave the teachers your number."

  I cringed. I hated giving out my cell phone number, and I never gave it to anyone I didn't know. Oh well. I'd know all of the employees soon enough, and if it became a problem later, I could always change it.

  As soon as I opened the door to the apartment, I almost fell over from the musty smell. It clearly hadn't been touched in a very long time—perhaps years. At least it wasn't carpeted, so it wouldn't be too hard to clean the tile floors. The kitchen wasn't too bad, but the sink had a layer of dust in it that no doubt would turn to mud as soon as water hit it.

  Fortunately, I'd thought to bring a mop, broom, and rags. I spent an hour cleaning it before I brought any of my personal belongings in. The bed wasn't as bad as I expected, but I still sprayed it heavily with disinfectant and used the mattress cover before I put the sheets on it.

  I looked in the cupboards and saw two of everything: two dishes, two bowls, two glasses, and two mugs. One of the drawers had a small flatware set, and another had a spatula, ladle and slotted spoon. Beneath the sink, I found a frying pan and two pots but only one lid. The essentials were taken care of, but if I wanted more, I didn't mind picking up a few items from a thrift store.

  When I got back to my office, I sat in the chair behind the desk. I'd never been much of a desk person, so I hopped up and went out to where the action was. In the first class area I came to, one of the teachers sat in a small chair with the little ones in a circle around her as she read a story and showed them the pictures as she turned the pages. Everything was under control there.

  The next area was a little different. The kids were a little older, and they sat or stood around a table laden with paper, glue, and glitter. The teacher appeared more frazzled than the first one, but she smiled when she saw me. "We're making refrigerator magnets for their parents."

  I gave her a thumb's up before going to what appeared to be the oldest group. The woman who had let me in earlier left the children working on their alphabet to talk to me.

  "I'm Darla," she said. "Mr. Van Houghton told me that you'd probably have some questions."

  "I probably will when I knew enough to ask them."

  She frowned. "Have you ever worked in day care before?"

  I shook my head. "No, so I'm sure I'll be running to you a lot."

  "That's just not right," she mumbled.

  "What do you mean?"

  "I asked for your position when I found out it was open, and he said he'd already hired someone who was more qualified." Her scowl said a lot. "This place needs so many things, one of them being a competent person in charge. I've been in day care practically all my adult life."

  Now I had no doubt I'd gotten off on the wrong foot with this woman. "I was a police officer for a long time."

  She planted a fist on her hip and bobbed her head. "I guess that makes you an expert at day care." Her cheeks puffed as she blew out a breath. As she walked back toward the kids, I heard her mumbling something under her breath about how her loyalty wasn't appreciated.

  I didn't blame her for her feelings. I'd been passed over for enough promotions to know how it felt. But it still wasn't my fault Mr. Van Houghton chose me over her for the position. I made a mental note to give her extra kudos for anything she did. And if I ever decided to leave, I'd put in a plug for her … that is, if I saw that she deserved it.

  The rest of the day was uneventful. I stuck around until after the last child and teacher left, and then I went back to my apartment to change into some jeans and sneakers. I couldn't wait to start digging around the garden murder case.

  Since the crime scene was only a few blocks from the day care center, I decided to walk. I reached the house in less than ten minutes.

  Something appeared different about the place. I looked around and remembered that I'd taken a picture when I first saw the house. So I pulled out my phone, scrolled through the photos, and found the one I was looking for. I held it up to compare it to the house and realized that all of the blinds that were open when I first saw it had been closed.

  Chapter 7

  I called Vince and told him about the blinds. "Did you close them?" I asked.

  "No, and I don't think any of the forensics people did either. We generally leave things as they are until we have everything we need from the crime scene."

  "You know what that means, right?" I asked.

  "Yeah. It means someone has been in there tampering with stuff. Wait right there, and I'll see you in a few minutes."

  After we hung up, I walked around to the side of the house to see if anything was different
there. I was about to head back to the front when a voice from behind startled me. I spun around and saw a familiar face from the crowd on the day I discovered the body.

  "Are you looking for someone?" the woman asked.

  "I …" It wasn't like me to be tongue-tied, but she caught me off guard.

  "You're one of the detectives, aren't you?" she asked. Before I had a chance to set her straight, she continued. "I'm Janelle Bradford, and I live next door."

  "Nice to meet you, Janelle." I extended a hand, but she just looked at it, so I pulled back. "I'm sorry about what happened to your neighbor."

  She tilted her head and studied my face before shrugging. "No one liked Essie very much. She seemed to think she could do whatever she wanted, regardless of how everyone else felt."

  "Really?" I asked. "Like what?"

  "I already told one of the other detectives some of this, so you probably already know. She used to drive her Corvette up and down the street way too fast for a residential neighborhood. We told her to slow down, but she basically thumbed her nose at us."

  I blinked. "She drove a Corvette?" That didn't match the image I had of the little old lady I'd found. But I did know she had desirable wheels based on some of the information I'd heard from Vince.

  Janelle nodded and continued as though someone had turned on her faucet full blast. "And that tree in her backyard." She pointed. "She didn't care that it was overgrown and needed pruning. Lester Astaire started out asking her nicely if she'd cut her tree back because overhanging fruit fell into his yard and rotted. But she just laughed at him and told him he should be thankful for free peaches. That made him mad, and he told her if she didn't do something about it, he would."

  "Did he say it in a nice way?"

  Janelle shook her head. "At that point, no. And it only got worse. One day they really went at it. I overheard them arguing, and after he said he was going to come over there and cut the tree down, she said, 'Over my dead body.'"

  "Did you tell the detective that?"

  "Not all of it. He didn't seem as interested as you." She smiled at me. "You're much nicer than the other detective."

  "Thank you," I said. It felt awkward letting her think I worked for the Atlanta Police Department, but at this point, it didn't feel right to tell her she was mistaken.

  "Has anyone told you about the guy who wanted to buy her car?" she asked.

  I didn't say anything. I just lifted my eyebrows to encourage her to continue. And she did.

  "There's this guy who fell in love with her car. Apparently, her Corvette is a collectible, in high demand." She paused and added, "And worth a small fortune."

  "Aren't most Corvettes expensive?" I'd never even thought about checking them out, but I'd heard other cops talk about what they'd do if they had money, and several of them mentioned 'Vettes.

  "Yes, but hers is special. I think someone said it was limited edition from twenty years ago. Her husband bought it just to keep in the garage … you know, to look at and tinker with like some guys do, but after he passed, she started driving it."

  That explained what she was doing with it. "Sounds like she enjoyed it."

  Janelle nodded. "She enjoyed it, all right. A little too much. Anyway, when that guy stopped by and made an offer, she turned him down. He started talking to some of the neighbors who encouraged him to keep making offers, so he did. Finally, she told him he'd have to pry the keys from her cold, dead hands before he'd ever be able to drive her car."

  That was startling. "Did you actually hear him say that?"

  "No, but news travels fast around here."

  "How about her children?" I asked. "Have you met any of them?"

  "I have." She glanced down at the ground.

  "Have you seen any of them around here lately?"

  She shook her head. "Her sons are supposed to be on a cruise … at least that's what I heard, and her daughter—" She glanced at something behind me. "Your partner just arrived." She leaned over and whispered, "If I were you, I'd concentrate on Lester, the guy in the house behind Essie's. He's the one who I think did it."

  I narrowed my gaze at her for a second before glancing over my shoulder and spotted Vince. "Hey, thanks for talking to me, Janelle. You've been a huge help."

  Vince grinned at me as I joined him on the sidewalk in front of Ms. McClure's house. "Make a new friend?"

  "Yes, and a very talkative friend at that."

  "What did she say?"

  I told him almost everything from what she said about Ms. McClure driving too fast to the run-ins she'd had with other neighbors. However I left out Janelle's conjecture about Lester Astaire. She didn't seem to be the sharpest tack in the box. "Sounds like Essie McClure wasn't such a sweet little old lady."

  "Yeah." Vince sucked in a breath between his teeth, creating an annoying, shrill whistling sound. He looked at me and shook his head. "Sorry about that. Bad habit I need to break."

  "So what do you think about what we have so far?" I asked.

  He lifted an eyebrow. "What we have?"

  "You know what I mean."

  He looked at the house. "You said you had a picture of the place with the blinds open. Can you show it to me?"

  I showed it to him, and he nodded. "Do me a favor and text it to me. Someone besides us has been in the house. Now all we need to do is figure out who it was. I called John, and he said he'd be here in a little while." He took a step back and looked me up and down. "So how was your first day on the new job?"

  "Okay, I guess."

  He chuckled. "Nothing like police work, though, right?"

  "There are some similarities."

  "Name some."

  It was a stretch, but I could come up with at least one. "Like when the parents blame the teachers for their kids' bad behavior."

  He nodded. "I can see that."

  The forensics SUV arrived, so we turned our attention to John, who got out of the car with his bag. "Let's go check it out."

  I followed right behind the guys, but John stopped at the door and stared at me. "What?" I asked.

  "You need to wait here," he replied.

  "But the chief said—"

  Vince put his hand on John's shoulder. "She can go in with us. I'll take full responsibility if anything happens." He looked at me, smiled, and winked. "And I'm sure she won't do anything she shouldn't do."

  John looked extremely uncomfortable, but he acquiesced. As we walked through the house, all three of us were speechless. Doors had been pulled off the frames, cabinets were open, broken glass covered the floor, and everything was in a total state of disarray.

  "This is not good," John said. "So where do we start?"

  "Right here," Vince said as he pointed to a back window that had been opened. The screen had been kicked out, which indicated someone had used it as a quick exit.

  John dusted for fingerprints, while Vince and I walked toward the bedrooms. The master bedroom had been ransacked as badly as the kitchen and living room, but the guest room appeared to have remained untouched.

  "Must have gotten spooked," Vince said.

  "Could be that," I agreed, "or they found what they were looking for."

  John joined us a few minutes later, a big grin plastered across his face. "I got a bunch of fingerprints that appear fresh."

  "Excellent," Vince said with over-the-top enthusiasm that made me wince. "Let's just hope you can find a match in the system."

  "If it's there, we'll find it," John said. "I gotta run. See y'all later."

  After John left, Vince shuffled his feet for a few seconds before looking back up into my eyes. "Have you had dinner yet?"

  I shook my head. "Have you?" The awkwardness between us reminded me of the first time I'd talked to a boy I liked in middle school.

  "No. Would you like to go somewhere?"

  "Sounds good. It's my turn to treat."

  "I—" He stopped himself and smiled. "Okay."

  We wound up going for hamburgers at Five Guys. I'd only
been to the chain restaurant once in Nashville, and what I remembered was the abundance of delicious fries in the bottom of the bag. My mouth watered.

  As we sat in the fluorescent-lit, overcrowded restaurant, we brainstormed as much as we could in public. No one paid much attention to us, and we were by a window, so we probably didn't need to be as cautious as we were, but it was always good form.

  Talking about the case brought back so many memories of the days when I did this for a living. At the moment, I envied Vince. Tomorrow he'd get to jump right into detective work, while I walked from my apartment with the bare essentials to the building where dozens of little people would arrive half asleep from just rolling out of bed and leave wired from exhaustion. I twirled a French fry around in the puddle of ketchup I'd poured on the brown paper bag.

  "Summer? Are you okay?"

  I slowly looked up and forced a smile. "I'm fine. Why?"

  "What are you thinking about?"

  I started to tell him a half-truth, but I knew he'd be able to see right though that. "Just that I wish I had more time to help y'all."

  "You know what to do. I already told you—"

  "I can't, Vince. When I worked for the Nashville Police Department, my entire life revolved around my work."

  "And the problem with that is?" He gave me a teasing smile, letting me know he understood. "Look, Summer, this is not only what we do, it's who we are. Police work gets in your blood, and I don't know that it ever leaves."

  "Maybe so, but I've already told you, I have to at least try other things."

  Vince nodded. "I understand. So what do you think about the information the neighbor told you? Any chance she might be trying to deflect our attention from her?"

  "I've thought about that," I said. "We need to keep an eye on her."

  "I would like to find out more about the guy who wanted to buy her car, which, by the way, is an amazing machine."

  "Where is it?" I asked.

  "It's still in that little garage behind the house." A smile tweaked the corners of Vince's lips. "I just happen to know that a couple of the guys at the station are salivating over it and can't wait until it goes up for auction."

  "I can imagine." I'd never been much of a car person. All I cared about was reliability, and most recently, comfort.