A Needle and a Haystack (An Addicted to the Arts Mystery)

B. W. Wrighthard

Description

In River City, Indiana, local cake baker Charly Angell thinks she has her hands full dealing with the new dynamic of her long marriage to a husband turned rocker wannabe, her teenage son's bedroom, which resembles the local dump, and the absence of her sweet daughter, newly installed at an out-of-town university.

But those things pale when there's a murder in town and Charly's son becomes a person of interest in the case. She and new friend Violet Shades, aka "Boots," a divorcee, freelance advertising agent, and California transplant, join forces to investigate the crime.

As they eat cake, drink wine, and fumble their way through the investigation, the two women uncover shocking secrets and lies in the city that's home to Addicted to the Arts Co-op. While they try to absolve Charly's son of any involvement in the murder, another murder, related to the first one, occurs, escalating their sleuthing to new and more dangerous heights.

Sujets

• Women Sleuths
• Detective
• Mystery
• Fiction

Informations

• Publié par: eBookIt.com
• Date de parution: 14 août 2013
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781456619534
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

A Needle and a Haystack (An Addicted to the Arts Mystery)

by B. W. Wrighthard

Copyright 2013 B. W. Wrighthard, All rights reserved.

Published in eBook format by eBookIt.com http://www.eBookIt.com

ISBN-13: 978-1-4566-1953-4

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the author. The only exception is by a reviewer, who may quote short excerpts in a review.

This novel is a work of fiction. All names, places, characters, and incidents are fictitious, and any resemblance to real people (living or deceased), places, events, locations, and establishments is coincidental.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER ONE Knit One, Hurl One CHAPTER TWO To Bake or Not to Bake CHAPTER THREE The More Things Change the More Vic Gets Blamed CHAPTER FOUR Hop-along Placidly CHAPTER FIVE The Stalk About Town CHAPTER SIX Nerves of Squeal CHAPTER SEVEN Tour de Foot CHAPTER EIGHT Days of Wine and Hoses CHAPTER NINE Murder is the First Decree CHAPTER TEN Lullaby and Good Fright CHAPTER ELEVEN Nightmare on Plum Street CHAPTER TWELVE Sugar and Spice and Everything Not Nice CHAPTER THIRTEEN No Fun Intended CHAPTER FOURTEEN Dancing the Fright Away CHAPTER FIFTEEN Working on Her Night Proofs

CHAPTER SIXTEEN I Glean Business CHAPTER SEVENTEEN Tell Me Yo Secrets CHAPTER EIGHTEEN No Weddings and a Funeral CHAPTER NINETEEN Accident Wanting to Happen CHAPTER TWENTY Rock ‘n Goal CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE Busy Hands are the Baker’s Tools CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO The House of the Dead’s Living CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE Day of Wine and Rosie’s Clothes CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR What’s on the Venue? CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE Whine and Woes CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX Learned it Through the Grapevine CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN Shake ‘n Cake CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT Twitching the Night Away CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE Long Day’s Journey into Fright CHAPTER THIRTY Churn and Face the Change CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE Gift of the Murdered

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO Home is Where the Jolt is CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE Home Revulsion CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR Hang on Snoopy CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE Strangers on a Street CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX Glue Factor CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN The Crimes They are ‘a Changing CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT Maybelline, You Can be True CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE Shake Your Bu-tay CHAPTER FORTY Taking Care of Business CHAPTER FORTY-ONE House Call CHAPTER FORTY-TWO Tie Up the Noose Ends Author Bio

After I saw the chain saw, I saw the body. Stiff. Blue. Before I looked at the face, I saw the knitting needle and the blood. I listened to my son vomiting outside. Had their argument escalated to murder?

CHAPTER ONE

Knit One, Hurl One

“A stitch in time makes me a dime,” I heard our neighbor Rosie shouting at my sixteen-year-old son Barry as soon as I jumped out of my van. When I had turned onto our street, she was wagging a finger at him. It was a wonder I hadn’t

slammed into my garage door. What was going on? Rosie’s face was red, and Barry had just thrown our snow shovel toward our yard as he huffed his way home. Rosie shot me a dirty look then slammed her door. Icicles plummeted to the

ground. I pressed the remote to open the garage door and pulled in until the tennis ball hanging from a string hit my windshield, and I knew I’d stopped before running into the shelves my husband had built. I knew I should storm up to Barry’s bedroom and make him go get the shovel, but that voice in the back of my

head that always said Oh-Charly-Do-It made me go get it myself. After I wiped the shovel with an old towel and hung it on its hook, I moved Barry’s boots away from the steps leading into the kitchen, lined up my own next to his on the mat, and headed for his room. I knocked but when he didn’t answer, I walked in and pulled the ear buds from his ears. “Want to tell me what that was all about?” “She said she wasn’t going to pay me for shoveling.” “Why not?”

“It’s coming off what she thinks I owe her for her broken garage window and stolen tools.”

“I thought we already settled all that.” “No kidding. How many times do I have to tell her it wasn’t me?” “And what was that about a stitch in time?”

“Who knows? But she didn’t tell me she wasn’t paying me until I got done. The witch.” He fumbled with his iPod. Rosie’s stitch in time made me want wine. I shrugged. I couldn’t really argue with Barry even though I didn’t condone his actions. “I’ll have a talk with her. But I doubt it’ll be this weekend because of the knitting convention.” Barry wrinkled his nose. “Knitting convention? You quit doing cakes?” “No, I volunteered my cakes in the hopes of getting some new customers.” Barry nodded and put his ear buds back in. I closed his door, went to the kitchen, and ordered a large pepperoni pizza, our favorite. I wasn’t doing much

cooking these days what with my daughter Natalie away at college and my husband Phil on the road again with his band. Most days the house was too quiet. As much as I hated the typical sibling fights between Barry and Natalie, no noise

seemed worse, and lately Phil’s absences had been more frequent since the band had fired their business manager, and Phil decided it was up to him to find gigs. I was cutting up lettuce for salad when Barry came charging down the

stairs and headed to the front door. A minute later I heard Chad’s voice and knew there’d be three for dinner. Barry poked his head in the kitchen doorway. “Hey, Ma, okay if Chad stays over?” “Hey, Mrs. Angell,” Chad said from behind Barry.

“Hi Chad. Pizza’s on the way. Anyone want salad?” I said, hoping the answer would be yes but expecting a resounding no. “Nah, pizza’s fine,” the boys said in unison as they headed upstairs. I pulled out one large salad bowl. Take two teenage boys, add one pepperoni pizza, and you’re left with an empty box.

I was emptying the dishwasher when the doorbell rang, and I ran to get money. I opened the door and paid for the pizza. But as the delivery guy headed to

his car, I heard yelling at Rosie’s, so I hollered for Barry to come and get it then grabbed my coat and stepped out onto the porch. The homeless man from Rosie’s church, who’d been living in her basement, was standing in her driveway behind his beat-up van. He opened one of the back doors, and I saw a makeshift bed piled high with clothing. As he was throwing a duffle bag on top of it all, he hollered, “You just include me as part of your Christian family, so you can boast about your good works. Then you kick me out when your blood family needs a home even though I’ll bet no one’s going to use my room.” He slammed the back door, got in the driver’s side and squealed away. Rosie was standing at her back door with a sour look. I yelled, “Everything okay, Rosie?”

“I told him last weekend he’d need to find someplace else to stay and to

check with Pastor, but he didn’t do it. That’s what I get for being charitable.” Before I could reply, Rosie marched inside and slammed her door.