Dim Sum Dead by Jerrilyn Farmer

God, you have found it at last. May I have it?”
    “Well, there is just one small problem.”
    “What problem?”
    “We don’t actually have the set Wes called you about. Not right here.”
    “What is this? Are you two shaking me down or something?”Quita’s vague gray eyes glistened with a certain sharpness.
    “Of course not!” Wes was shocked.
    “I don’t understand,” she said, her voice shrill. “You called me this morning, Wesley. You woke me up! You told me I could come pick my things up if I wanted to. Tonight!”
    “Well, actually, I offered to bring the mah-jongg set to the Sweet and Sour club party tonight,” Wes corrected. “You said you would rather pick it up early.”
    “Of course I did!” She was getting more upset. “Actually, I made a few phone calls about that old set. Now where the hell is it?”
    “Look, Quita,” I said, “someone attacked me this morning. I was supposed to be taking the mah-jongg set back to our office. It’s a long story, but the book was in the mah-jongg case, and we were mugged.”
    “What are you talking about? What happened?” She looked frantic. “All this time you were just talking and talking and…Why didn’t you tell me all of this before? When I first got here? What are you two doing to me?”
    “I was going to tell you, but…” Wes said. It sounded lame.
    “ Where?” Quita screamed. Really, she should be mad. Sure. But this was getting strange now. “ Where was this?”
    “In Santa Monica,” Wes answered. “Madeline chased the guy but…”
    “But WHAT?” Quita screamed at us again.
    It hadn’t been a random theft at all. It wasn’t a street mugging. Quita was much too upset for that. Someone was after that case because they wanted that book. And it sure as hell

Chapter 6
    Q uita stood outside her old mansion on Wetherbee and began breathing irregularly, hyperventilating.
    “This man…” she said, between trying to slow down her breaths, “…who stole the case and the book…he…” She tried again. “Who was he?”
    The chard guy. I knew there was a problem with the chard guy.
    “That’s the trouble,” I said. “He ran off. The police have the mah-jongg case, now, and they’re going to do a fingerprint test.”
    “Oh my God! Oh my God!” Quita had gone extremely white beneath her deep tan. “Tell me this isn’t happening. What did he look like?”
    “A smallish man, dark complexion. Late forties, early fifties maybe.”
    And then, right on the front step, Quita sat down hard, buckling into a heap, her purple dress hiking up, revealing long shapely legs.
    “What’s wrong? What’s the matter?” I sat down next to the woman, trying to see if this was one of those situations that required an ambulance.
    “Please…” Quita gulped. “Please, help me…”
    Wesley had run down the lawn to his car and fetched back a bottle of Deja Blue water. He untwisted the cap and held it out to the stricken woman seated on the pavement.
    “Do you happen…to have…any Xanax?” She looked up at us, still hyperventilating.
    “Sorry,” I said.
    Wesley and I were probably the only two people in the L.A. basin who didn’t, but that’s us.
    “Valium?”
    “Sorry, no.”
    “Zoloft? Wellbutrin?”
    We looked apologetic.
    She gasped for breath. “Maybe…a shot of Scotch?”
    Wes gestured to the water bottle in her hand. “That’s the strongest stuff I’ve got.”
    “Wes!” I felt a little stressed that we could do nothing to help. Now if I’d had a chance to bake, at least I could be offering her a cookie. But, no.
    “I’m sorry,” Wes said again. “Would you like us to call you an ambulance?”
    “No…no, thanks. I’m all right.” Quita stood up, shakily, and steadied herself against the exterior wall to the right of the open entrance door.
    “Quita,” I said, “exactly what happened to us this morning?”
    Wes and I stood there, waiting.
    “Dickey’s book. There’s a fortune that could be made as soon as