A Motive Most Bitter (33rd Street Roastery Cozy Mysteries Book 2) by Summer Prescott

Author:Summer Prescott [Prescott, Summer]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Summer Prescott Books
Published: 2022-05-19T16:00:00+00:00

9

The Dunforth Exchange was never built with dreams of anything except pure pragmatism, but even in that regard, it had disappointed. Constructed in the late-70s as malls became a beacon of American commercialization, it had signed contracts to rent out each of its two-dozen spaces, and within a decade, lost them just as easily. The complex was an L-shaped structure of brick, with the shop fronts from the right leading to an entrance on the left. Most of the windows had FOR RENT signs on them, like letters on a tombstone.

Rohan and Paige stood at the front entrance, gawking at the spot where the flaps of the white tent fluttered in the wind, trying to spot something they might have missed the first time around. Rohan held Major’s leash, but Major didn’t exactly seem as though he was plotting an escape and just biding his time until he could dash off. He had rested his head on the sidewalk and fallen asleep.

“She’s lying,” Rohan commented, his eyes fixed somewhere in the space between the two Balsam firs. “Ruth is lying. Maybe covering for Theodore, but in some way, she’s involved. She obviously didn’t just forget that Rosalie had been with them in Portsmouth.”

Paige nodded.

“Rosalie could be lying, too,” she pointed out. “Or…maybe she just knows a little more than she’s letting on.”

Rohan frowned. “I wonder though, even if Rosalie had witnessed foul play, she may have been too young to know the significance of what she had seen. Then, as she grew up, she may have entirely forgotten about it. I would think it would be rather easy to implant false memories in a child’s mind if the same story was told to her over and over.”

Paige looked down at Major, still sleeping on the sidewalk. Then she turned around to survey the row of shopfronts running behind them, wondering if it was worth a shot to ask any of the employees if they had seen anything.

“I want to walk around a little,” Paige said. “Your sources wouldn’t happen to have mentioned anything about this mall, would they?”

Rohan shook his head but did mention that he had come here a few days before to look around more.

“I found some payphones,” he said. “You don’t see a lot of those these days, so maybe our not-quite-ordinary stranger chose to use one of them.”

“He may have called the police from there,” Paige said. “If his goal was to escalate the clues so that someone would catch on, he may have loved the daring aspect of that.” She brightened.

“Makes sense. I did some research on it, and payphones aren’t the best way to stay anonymous. Police probably figured out that the call came from here.” Rohan nodded.

“Probably?”

“Yes, probably. The police haven’t mentioned anything about who tipped them off, or from where, or whether anyone suspicious was reported by people working in the mall.”

“So, they either don’t have that information, or they aren’t disclosing it.” Paige pursed her lips. “But still, we’ve got something here.

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