Home Repair is Homicide 4 - Repair to Her Grave by Sarah Graves

Author:Sarah Graves [Graves, Sarah]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
ISBN: 9780307490148
Publisher: BANTAM BOOKS
Published: 2001-03-07T05:00:00+00:00

“Funny how his clothes keep showing up, but not him,” said Wade Sorenson. He was disassembling a Remington shotgun in his workshop in the upstairs ell. It was the only modern place in the house and I came here sometimes when I needed to see what a shipshape building looked like: square corners, level floors.

“Yeah.” I sat on a milk crate by the steps leading up to the storage area. Wade had installed overhead lighting, benches for the big tools that did the metal-grinding and stock-cutting procedures, and the new Lyman shotgun-shell reloading press.

“But the thing is this,” I said. “Bob Arnold hasn’t got a clue how cutthroat the antiques business can be. And he's got a soft spot, for some reason, for that pack rat Wilbur Mapes.”

“Who you think is involved?” Wade wound bubble-wrap around the shotgun parts, in preparation for shipping the weapon back to its owner.

“Well, how could he not be?” I asked impatiently. “Bob would think so, too, if he knew how much money might be at stake. That is, he does know. But that kind of money just isn’t real to him. He feels fat and happy on thirty-four grand a year, plus the money Clarissa earns.”

Bob's wife is a defense attorney. But around here, that job's no ticket to the higher tax brackets, either, since for big-time white-collar criminal cases that produce big attorney's fees, first of all you need some white collars.

Wade sealed the box up, slapped the label on it. “He's no slouch in the character assessment department, you know. Tends to pick out bad apples.”

“I know. Another reason I’m so confused.”

“Well. You could just let it all go by.” His tone, and the amused crinkles around his eyes, expressed just how likely he thought that was.

He put the box in the bin with the others he’d readied for FedEx. “What strikes me, though, is what people from away know that you don’t.”

He pulled up another milk crate, sat beside me. Being up in the workshop with Wade always made me feel I’d been invited into his tree house.

“Because, look: Mapes and Raines already had something going. And obviously Charmian Cartwright knew about it, too. Enough, I mean, to know where he lives, and that she should talk to him.”

“Uh-huh.” Outside the high windows the clouds faded abruptly from rose-red to lavender as the sun dropped below the horizon, and fog moved in.

“But she didn’t tell you,” he went on. “Which means she was in on what was going on all along, or—”

“Or whatever it was, maybe she wants in on it now.”

Wade nodded. “Or maybe she just doesn’t know who to trust. The problem is, you don’t know how much of any of their stories is true. You don’t know she's on the outs with the old uncle. For all you know, they could be in on it together, and Mapes could just be a fall guy. Maybe she stuck those boots out there herself.”

Brr. That was a bad thought. And she was an awfully capable young woman.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.