Murder Read online

  Murder – A Chummy Affair

  Two Sisters and a Journalist #6

  by Maddie Cochere

  Copyright 2016 by Maddie Cochere

  Smashwords Edition

  All rights reserved, which includes the right to reproduce this book or portions therof in any form whatsoever except as provided by US copyright Law.

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons living or dead, is entirely coincidental and beyond the intent of either the author or the publisher.

  Breezy Books

  http://www.breezybooks.com/

  Cover design by Gillian Soltis of Columbus, Ohio

  Table of Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter One

  Falling out of a tree was more painful than I imagined it would be.

  I didn’t know if the loud crack I heard when I landed was from my back or from the tree branch that took a ride ten feet to the ground with me. I was leaner and more limber than I had been in ages, but the rotted tree branch gave up the ghost when I put my full weight on it.

  “Molasses on a cracker, Jo! Are you all right?” Pepper’s eyes conveyed her panic and concern as she leaned over to peer into my face. She grabbed my arm and hissed, “Get up before someone sees us.”

  Jackie quickly shoved her aside. “Don’t touch her. Her neck might be broken.”

  Pain filled every fiber of my being. The wind had been knocked out of me, and I was helpless to refill my lungs. I gasped for air.

  “Give her mouth to mouth rescue-tation,” Pepper whispered loudly.

  “She doesn’t need mouth to mouth anything,” Jackie whispered back even louder. “Just give her a minute.”

  I finally managed to draw air into my lungs, but it was difficult to speak.

  Jackie dropped to her knees. “Can you move your feet?”

  I tried to kick Pepper with one.

  “Oh, I get it,” Pepper said. “We’ll have her move body parts so we can find the broken ones.”

  A light came on at the front of the house. The voice we heard was female. “Who’s out there?”

  Pepper immediately bailed and took off at a run as if she was on fire. She was through the backyard and running down the alley lickety-split. Jackie looked in the direction of the voice and then back to me. I knew she didn’t want to leave me, but it would be big trouble for her at the newspaper if she was caught trespassing and attempting to spy on Barbie Cane.

  “Go,” I whispered. “I’m right behind you.”

  She didn’t wait for me to tell her again. She was in the alley and had probably passed Pepper before I was able to roll over and pull myself up onto my knees. I knew I only had a few seconds before Barbie found me in her yard. I managed to stand and push my way through the neighbor’s shrubs before flopping to the ground again.

  A few seconds later, Barbie muttered, “Stupid tree.”

  I held my position until I was certain she had gone back inside and was no longer concerned with what was happening outside. I sat up and took my time moving my neck, arms, and legs. I pushed on my ribs. Nothing was broken, but my elbow was going to have a nasty bruise from hitting the tree branch when I fell.

  Rain had fallen for the better part of the last three days, leaving the ground wet and spongy. Jackie and Pepper would have been calling for an ambulance, and Barbie would have been calling for her comrades at the police department if the ground had been dry and hard.

  I managed to stand and scurry along the shrubs to the alley. From there, I took my time walking, rubbing my elbow, and muttering under my breath how stupid we were to come so close to being caught.

  Barbie Cane was the newest member of the Buxley police force, and she had huge googly eyes for Glenn. She had only been on the force six weeks and had already told me no less than three times that I better be treating him right, or she’d do it for me. He insisted she was only teasing, but I didn’t buy it for a minute.

  She had sweet-talked Sergeant Rorski into letting her ride with Glenn on day shift, while moving their other new hire, Francine “Frankie” Heini, a bulldog of a woman in her fifties, to nights to ride with Clay Carpenter.

  I hated being jealous. I had gone through this before when my ex-husband cheated on me with a younger woman and eventually left me for her. I swore I would never allow it to happen again.

  When Glenn began acting squirrelly earlier in the week, and slipping out in the evenings for several hours without telling me where he was going, I couldn’t help being suspicious. Jackie and Pepper agreed to come with me to spy on Barbie’s house to find out if Glenn was with her.

  After we had peeked through the downstairs windows and didn’t see anyone, I volunteered to climb the tree. If anyone was going to find Glenn in bed with Barbie, it was going to be me.

  I winced loud enough to be heard when I gave my elbow more of a rub than I intended, but I no longer cared if anyone saw me on the street. I turned the corner and made my way down Emerson to Jackie’s car.

  I opened the back door and climbed in - literally. I didn’t even attempt to sit up. Pepper jumped out and shut the door behind me.

  “Are you ok?” she asked when she hopped back into the front seat. “Did you get caught? What took you so long? Do you need to go to the hospital?”

  I didn’t answer any of her questions, I simply grunted after each one.

  “Maybe you should give this up, Jo,” Jackie said. “If Glenn says he’s not interested in Barbie, you should probably trust him.”

  I mumbled from the back seat, “I tried that.”

  Pepper turned around and said loudly, “Sit up or speak up. We can’t hear you up here.”

  I pulled myself into a sitting position. “I’ve tried to trust him. I want to trust him, but he thinks she’s adorable. He’s always laughing at things she says, and he comes home and tells me stories about his day with her. He never did that when he patrolled with Clay. I know how this works. I’ve been in this movie before. The unhappier I become with the situation, the unhappier Glenn will become with me, and Barbie will be right there to soothe and comfort him. She’s petite, she’s blonde, and she’s his age.”

  I hadn’t thought about the five-year age difference between Glenn and myself for ages, but with Barbie being so much younger and prettier, it was hard not to feel insecure.

  Neither Pepper nor Jackie had anything to say. They knew I had a difficult situation on my hands.

  Pepper finally asked, “What are you going to do?”

  “I don’t know. But I know I don’t want to feel like this anymore.”

  Jackie dropped me off at Glenn’s. We’d been living together for seven months now. Our relationship had been picture perfect until Barbie Cane arrived on the scene. Now it was tense, and I knew that was mostly my fault, but Glenn wasn’t helping the situation with his overly friendly attitude toward her.

  I walked through the house to the back door and looked out to see if his car was parked next to the garage. He was still out.

  It wasn’t long before I was pacing from room to room. Not knowing if he was at Barbie’s house was killing me, and jealousy was eating me alive.

  I forced myself to go into the basement t
o wait for him. The construction workers had just completed their work down here a week ago. The entire basement had been opened into one large room with bright lighting. Cement floors replaced dirt floors, and two thirds of the space was now carpeted.

  The new basement consisted of a family room, my murder room space, and Glenn’s workspace. A new furnace and water heater also shared Glenn’s work area. The plumbing for the downstairs bathroom and all throughout the basement had been replaced. There were no longer strange sounds to give me the creeps and make my skin crawl.

  I had been looking forward to spending time in the new room, but tonight, there was no joy in being down here.

  I flopped onto the love seat in front of my whiteboard. The only information on it was for a harrowing caper involving the Buxley Beaver. Pepper’s son, Keith, was helping his friend Jimmy Faust solve the crime of the missing school mascot costume. It was Keith’s handwriting that covered the board now.

  Most of my work as a private investigator these days consisted of background checks and paperwork. Not having anything exciting to work on didn’t help to keep my mind occupied, which only made the situation with Glenn and Barbie worse.

  I put my feet up, stretched out, and closed my eyes. When I opened them again, I smelled fresh coffee.

  It took me a few moments to realize Glenn was in the kitchen making coffee before work. I couldn’t believe he had come home and didn’t wake me. He left me in the basement all night.

  I was stiff and sore when I stood up. Not only did I hurt all over from the fall out of the tree, but I also had cricks in my crannies from sleeping on the loveseat. I walked in circles for a few minutes until I could walk without wincing. When I emerged from the basement, Glenn handed a cup of coffee to me.

  “Good morning,” he said. “Did you sleep ok down there? I tried to wake you, but you were dead to the world, so I let you be.”

  I didn’t believe him. Sure, I was tired. I hadn’t had much sleep lately, but he couldn’t have tried very hard to wake me.

  I sat down at the kitchen table. “Where were you last night?”

  “Nowhere. I had some business to take care of.”

  “Business with Barbie?”

  He stared at me with a look I had never seen before. I wasn’t certain what it meant.

  “Are you feeling ok today?” he asked. “No aches or pains to speak of?”

  I felt my face turn red. He knew something. “No. I’m fine.”

  He tossed the watch he had given to me at Christmas onto the table. The band was broken. It must have snapped when I fell from Barbie’s tree and my arm hit the branch.

  His voice took on a hard edge. “I’m going to work, but we’re going to have a talk when I get home.”

  He didn’t give me an opportunity to say anything. He turned and walked out the back door.

  I was heartsick. For him to have my watch, he had to have been at Barbie’s house last night, and I knew what he wanted to talk about tonight.

  I called Nancy at the office to tell her I wouldn’t be in. I was numb as I packed two suitcases and carried them to the front porch. Before leaving, I slipped my engagement ring off my finger and placed it beside the broken watch on the kitchen table. There was no way I was having the talk with him. I knew everyone would tell me I should fight for my man, but I didn’t want to. I couldn’t, and I shouldn’t have to.

  I stood on the porch and looked into the house one last time before closing the door. I brushed away the single tear that fell onto my cheek.

  Pepper had better be home, because I was moving in with her this morning.

  Chapter Two

  “Kids, take your books and go to your rooms, so I can talk with your Aunt Jo. You can do whatever you want after you read three chapters. I’ll call you down when it’s time for lunch.”

  When Kelly and Keith were out of earshot, Pepper turned on me. “What is wrong with you? You can’t just walk out like that – especially without leaving a note. He’s going to think this is permanent. He won’t come for you, Jo.”

  If I thought I was going to get sympathy from my sister, I was wrong. Her accusatory tone made me defensive.

  “I don’t want him to come for me, and this is permanent. I won’t compete with someone who’s younger, prettier, and has more personality in her little finger than I do in my entire body.” I ran my hands through my hair and felt as if I wanted to scream and pull it out at the same time. I looked her in the eye and said with certainty, “I fought as hard as I could to keep Alan. I will never do that again for any man. I won’t win.”

  She stood firm in her disapproval. “What do you want me to tell him if he shows up here?”

  “You aren’t telling him anything. Let me put my truck in your garage. He doesn’t need to know I’m here.”

  She softened a little. “You know you can stay here as long as you want. You can sleep on the couch, or you can sleep in the family room in the basement.”

  “I’ll stay in the basement. That way I’ll be out of your hair when you and the kids are having school, and you won’t even know I’m here. I’m going to evict Clay, so I can move back into my house. It’s a good thing I didn’t sell it.”

  Pepper’s mouth fell open. “I don’t understand you. Now you’re going to make things difficult for Clay? Barbie’s only been on the force for a few weeks, and it’s all in your head that she’s after Glenn. It’s not like he’s sleeping with her.”

  “You don’t know that. This morning, he gave my watch back to me. It broke when I fell out of the tree. He was obviously at her house to find it on the ground. You don’t see how he talks about her, and how they share everything. He talks to her a million times more than he talks to me. And the way she looks at him.” I rolled my eyes in disgust. “She isn’t going to stop until she has him.”

  Pepper raised her voice. “Well, you’re handing him to her on a silver platter.”

  “I’m not going to argue with you about this. What would you do if Buck rode with a female truck driver for a month, and you thought she was more attractive than you in every way? What if Buck came home on weekends, smiling and talking practically non-stop about their week together? And what if, when you saw her, she let you know she wanted your man? What would you do, Pepper? Tell me you wouldn’t care.”

  “I’d throw a bitch fit and tell him he couldn’t ride with her any more. I’d put my foot down and tell him if he wanted to stay married to me, he’d make changes and put her out of his life. Did you do any of that? Did you give him any ultimatums?”

  “We’re not married,” I yelled at her. “I’m in no position to give him ultimatums. If he finds someone he wants more than me, he’s still a free man and can move on. If I forced him to make a choice, he’d only end up resenting me.”

  “You had a ring on your finger,” she countered. “Of course, you had a right to make him choose.”

  “As far as I’m concerned, he made his choice. He knows I’m unhappy with the situation, and he hasn’t done anything to change it. Can I put my truck in your garage or not?”

  She grumbled for a few more minutes, but we eventually switched vehicles. I dragged my suitcases downstairs.

  For the next three days, I barely moved. The television became my best friend, but I wasn’t able to concentrate on anything I watched. There was a full bath in the basement, but I didn’t shower. I may have brushed my teeth once. I tortured myself with thoughts of Alan’s lying, cheating, and our eventual divorce - and the same familiar pattern brewing with Glenn. Thoughts of him and Barbie together caused my chest to tighten and ache. I didn’t know how to shake any of the thoughts or feelings as they played over and over and over in my mind.

  Pepper had come down several times to let me know Glenn had called or come by, but she said she always told him she didn’t know where I was. I didn’t believe her. Knowing Pepper, she had probably discussed our situation at great length. I insisted she leave me alone. She brought food, but I refused to eat.

 
; On day four of my becoming a member of the zombie race, I had confirmation that Pepper had told Glenn of my whereabouts. It wasn’t quite midnight when officers Patterson and Heini came barreling down the stairs.

  The look in Clay’s eyes when he saw me was one of shock, and he seemed uncomfortable. Officer Heini had no problem with the situation.

  “Jo Ravens, you’re under arrest for the attempted murder of Barbie Cane,” she said and instructed me to stand up. She cuffed me and proceeded to read me my rights.

  Pepper wasn’t in the kitchen or the living room when Frankie led me upstairs. Kelly stood in her pajamas at the bottom of the staircase by the front door. She looked sad.

  “They made me let them in,” she said softly.

  I didn’t speak. I nodded and attempted a smile to let her know it was ok. Clay hung back, but Frankie pushed me, in just my t-shirt, sweats, and fuzzy orange slippers, out to the cruiser.

  A tiny spark of life surfaced in my brain. I didn’t try to kill Barbie Cane, so who did? … She had an enemy.

  Glenn wasn’t at the station when we arrived. I was used to going into the first interrogation room to write statements. I never expected to be there for an actual interrogation.

  I waited nearly an hour before Sergeant Rorski came in.

  He took one look at me and asked, “What the hell happened to you?”

  I looked up at him and said, “You did. You happened to me. You’re the one who hired Barbie and partnered her with Glenn. My life has gone to shit because of you.”

  He actually looked shocked by my words. “Jo, I’m going to do you a favor and not talk to you right now. What you just said is as good as a confession in my book, and you need a lawyer.” He turned and stormed out of the room, slamming the door behind him.

  I muttered a few good swear words under my breath. I didn’t care if he was mad. I never left Pepper’s basement, and she would vouch for me. They didn’t have anything on me.

  Frankie opened the door and stuck her head through the doorway. “Jackie Ryder called. Her husband, Matt, is on his way over. She said he’s your attorney.”