BAD PICK by Linda Lovely

Author:Linda Lovely
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: cozy mystery series;amateur sleuth;Southern mysteries;Henery Press
Publisher: Henery Press
Published: 2019-01-24T20:34:42+00:00

TWENTY-SIX

When I returned to Summer Place with five more bags of cooking staples, my driveway was filled to capacity—Ursula’s rental plus two trucks.

Why were Andy and Paint both here? I parked on the street careful to ensure I was more than ten feet from the Medley driveway. I’d witnessed Janice’s back-out skills. Though she maneuvered her car at a snail’s pace, she still had an uncanny knack for bumping into stationary objects like mailboxes and parked cars.

“Hey, how about some help with the groceries?” I called as I headed to the sunporch toting two of my canvas grocery bags. Andy looked up and grinned. He was busy screwing something into the porch frame near the door.

“Be right there,” he said.

“What gives? Are we double-dating tonight?” I asked as he abandoned whatever he was up to and hurried to my car.

“I wish,” he answered as he grabbed the remaining three bags and headed toward the porch.

“Paint and I went in together on a little surprise.” He beamed. “Follow me inside and all will be revealed.”

“Uh, okay.” I could see Paint through one of the sunporch’s glass panels. He was hunched over, concentrating on a laptop. I wasn’t shocked at seeing either Andy or Paint inside a room I’d carefully locked. Since the men helped with renovation chores and hauled supplies in their trucks, they both had keys to the substantial lock on Summer Place’s front door as well as skeleton keys for the porch.

“You’re too early for dinner,” I commented as Paint looked up.

“I heard the early-bird gets the—” he started.

Andy interrupted. “Best not finish. I know you’re a worm.”

“So what gives?” I repeated.

“Those idiots breaking in to trash your kitchen worried us,” Paint said. “So we bought you a real deadbolt lock for this side door and—”

“And a combo doorbell camera and motion sensor,” Andy finished. “Now if you’re in the kitchen and someone comes to the door, you’ll get an alert on your phone.”

“Yep, and you can see who’s there,” Paint added. “The motion sensor activates the camera even if the troublemaker doesn’t ring the doorbell.”

“Since the place is empty a lot, we’ll put an app on your phone—our phones, too. We’ll all get alerts,” Andy said. “Whoever is closest can check it out.”

“So you think you’re entitled to know about every Tom and Dick who comes calling?” I tried for a sly smile.

“Yeah, right, like you have secrets,” Paint laughed. “Sorry, Brie, your love life’s an open book. Between the two of us and Eva, you have about a minute a day that’s not accounted for.”

“I might surprise you,” I quipped.

A loud knock prompted the three of us to turn in unison. We’d been so busy oohing and ahhing over the technology and ribbing each other, we failed to notice the arrival of visitors—and they were in plain view less than six feet away. I opened the door with its new dead bolt and invited Ursula and Amber inside. My “beaus” weren’t shy about checking out the curvy young arrival.

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