Handcuffs in the Heather by Dale Mayer

Author:Dale Mayer
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, Cozy, Mystery
ISBN: 9781773362045
Publisher: Valley Publishing Ltd.
Published: 2020-01-30T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter 16

Sunday Late Afternoon …

Jeremiah’s face shifted as myriad emotions whispered across so fast it was almost hard to identify. Doreen still caught sadness and grief, anger and frustration, and then acceptance.

“Maybe I do know of a cold case then.” He sagged into the chair on the other side of the counter, his face sagging a bit too. “Is that all you came for, or did you come to buy something?” He motioned around the store. “Take a good look,” he said. “I need to make a sale today.”

Her heart lurched at that. “Is business that bad?”

He shrugged. “Well, it sure ain’t good.”

As luck would have it, she spied a couple mugs right in the front of the store. They were a matching set, nice for coffee, with a handmade pottery look to them. She picked them up and admired them. “How much for these?”

He looked over and said, “Fifty cents.”

She beamed and said, “I’ll take all four.” Then she picked up the four and put them on the counter. But now she was hooked, and she looked around, wanting to take some time and see if she needed anything else. Not that she needed much, but still …

“What can you tell me about Manny?” she asked, her voice pitched ever-so-slightly higher so she could continue to look around. Vases and all kinds of stuff were here. She didn’t think she had a vase at home. She couldn’t remember. Mack had helped her go through her entire kitchen stock, weeding it out to something much more manageable. There might have been a vase, but she didn’t remember and didn’t want to buy one if she had one.

She wandered through until she found a lovely serving bowl that would do for one of her salads. Thaddeus chirruped at her shoulders. She picked up the bowl, studied it carefully, checked it for chips, and contemplated its size.

Thaddeus’s head bobbed up and down as he looked at it beside her.

Jeremiah called out, “That one’s a dollar.”

And she grinned to herself, thinking what a steal that was. What a great shop. She was really getting into this. She took the glass bowl and placed it with the cups. “You didn’t answer the question.”

He looked at the items on the counter and said, “A big spender, aren’t you?”

“I inherited a houseful of stuff,” she said apologetically.

Understanding came into his gaze, and he nodded. “Forgot about that. Nan always was a bit of a collector, wasn’t she?” Then he rang up the sales and said, “You could continue to look around.”

“I could,” she said, “but you know what? I’m not getting any answers yet.”

She tried to put steel into her voice. If he wanted her to buy something, he also needed to answer her questions. Not that she wouldn’t have bought things but still. He stared at her glumly and said, “Manny was always welcome in my house. When Manny was Meredith, she was also welcome in my house too. I thought for a while she and my son would get married.

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