Rum and Choke by Patti Larsen

Author:Patti Larsen [Larsen, Patti]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 0000000000000
Published: 2023-08-17T04:00:07+00:00

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Chapter Ten

By the time we’d munched out way through burgers and fries and I’d emptied my second diet coke while Allie slurped her chocolate milkshake, we’d talked through the entire list of research to death. Yeah, I know, choice of words, but kinda literally, so.

“I have to admit, Cinnamon Omal is looking like an excellent suspect,” she said. “I hate that Pika’s friend is at the top of the list and as much as you’re worried about her, Becks, you did the right thing sharing with me. You know that, don’t you?”

I nodded, no longer hungry and with my food sitting heavily in my stomach. “I do,” I said. “If she’s lying to Pika, maybe she’ll figure it out.”

“It’s not up to you to make Pika’s mind up about Cinnamon. And we can’t do much until Carter comes back with COD.” Allie sat back with a sigh, her milkshake glass thunking on the tabletop as one of the servers swept in to take our plates and cutlery. She waited until the girl was gone before she spoke again, staring out the window into the humid darkness I knew waited for me beyond the glass and air conditioning. “Go home, Becks.” She turned to smile at me. “Stop by the office, pick up your dog, and go home. Get a good night’s sleep and see what tomorrow brings.”

I nodded, though I didn’t feel like sleep was going to be something that came easily. “You’ll keep me posted?”

“Of course.” She stood, patting her flat stomach. “Thanks for dinner.”

I met up with her at the office, Bruno bounding out to see me, so excited at our reunion he half-howled before hopping up into the back of the Jeep while Allie laughed at the sight of him hanging over the Off and Low Key wrap on my giant pink vehicle. I still winced sometimes at the lift kit and knobby tires, the obvious advertisement pasted all over the rambling thing I loved to drive, but I knew it got me the kind of attention that marketers dreamed off, one of my best sources of new clients, especially when I left Canary Key for other parts of the archipelago. Besides, Bruno loved it and never failed to take over the back seat all to himself as though the king of the castle that was my business.

The fact he didn’t hold his captivity against me only had me all the more guilty over Pika and Cinnamon, the loving heart of the mastiff mix one of the constants of my life, as much as my time behind the bar had become. I wasn’t wrong about sleep eluding me, either, and I eventually gave up the bed to Bruno entirely to curl up on the sofa and watch late-night television, though an advertisement for Mix Master Challenge had me switching it off almost immediately with a cold sensation washing over me like someone poured ice water across my grave.

I went for a run in the dark and yes,

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