Nabbed in the Nasturtiums by Dale Mayer

Author:Dale Mayer
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, Cozy, Mystery
ISBN: 9781773363677
Publisher: Valley Publishing Ltd.
Published: 2021-05-14T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter 16

The waitress dropped off the menus and took off again.

“She looked fairly distracted,” Mack noted.

“I wonder if there is something in the water,” Doreen said, “because Wendy looked upset too.”

“Wendy?”

“Yeah, Wendy, who gave me the check.”

“Hmm, did she say why?”

“No, but every time she went back into the store and came back out again, she looked a little more disturbed.”

He stopped and looked at her. “That doesn’t make any sense. Tell me again from the beginning what you saw.” And she did. He frowned and said, “As long as she is okay, and nobody was inside.”

“She came out every time, quite willingly.”

“Maybe I’ll stop by this afternoon,” he said. “No, let’s nip this in the bud now.”

She frowned. “I guess I should have asked her more.”

“You had something else on your mind.” He pulled out his phone and placed a call but put it on speaker so she could hear Wendy’s voice on the other end. She seemed to be fine and answered his questions without hesitation. “I’m just checking that all is okay,” he said smiling at Doreen. “Doreen was worried about you.”

After several assurances he ended the call.

“Oh dear,” she said. “Am I a terrible person?”

He looked at her, smiled, and grabbed her fingers. “No, you are not a terrible person.”

He said it so firmly that she relaxed slightly. “I mean, it was obvious she was upset, but I couldn’t really tell why,” she muttered to herself, trying to think back. “When she came out with the check and handed it to me, she looked the most visibly upset then. You know what? It never even occurred to me, but maybe she didn’t have the money to give me.” And then she glared. “And maybe that check will bounce. See? She shouldn’t have cut it, if it would bounce.”

“That’s good advice for anybody,” he said. “But you don’t know what’s going on, so let’s not jump to conclusions.”

But it was hard not to. But the phone call convinced her to ease off and to relax about it. She shrugged and sank back into her chair, and then Mugs started to bark. She immediately tried to shush him, but he wasn’t having anything to do with it. She looked around to see what the problem was and saw another big dog coming toward them at full speed.

“Oh my,” she said, just a small railing between her and the approaching dog. Mack immediately stood and looked around for the owner of the big dog, still racing toward Mugs, who, instead of being aggressive, was now under Doreen’s chair, staring out between her legs. She immediately reached a hand down and said, “Yeah, you stay safe.”

As the big dog jumped up against the railing, Goliath jumped up onto the table, then reached out and whacked the big dog across the face. Almost immediately it turned, howling, and it took off. Mack looked at her, looked at Goliath, looked at Mugs hiding under the table. “Wow.”

“Right,” she said, reaching over and petting Goliath.

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