Ed Lynskey - Isabel and Alma Trumbo 01 - Quiet Anchorage by Ed Lynskey

family, and I’m drop-dead serious, too.”
    “Bad pun,” Alma had said.
    Now smiling at Sheriff Fox’s unintentional pun, Isabel propped up on her pillows, and she felt the glow spread liquid warmth through her. She recognized it as confidence. Despite the ominous turn of affairs, her optimistic nature foresaw a positive outcome where Megan soon returned home. Just as fast a fresh insight struck Isabel.
    “Motive,” she said. “Sheriff Fox harped on the means and opportunity, but he didn’t say boo on why he contends Megan shot and murdered Jake.”
    Isabel patted the folds to the sheet as her pulse drummed in its new excitement. She found the cell phone snagged in the pillowcase. Her signal beamed from her bedroom through the house to the other wing.
    “Hallo,” said Alma, a fellow insomniac.
    “It’s just me. Say, did you notice how Sheriff Fox disregarded something significant earlier?”
    Alma stifled a yawn. “No, but it’s put you in a tizzy so just tell me.”
    “Did he hint at why he believes Megan killed Jake?”
    “He never came within a country mile of touching on a motive.”
    “I’m sure he’s diligent at building a motive to stand up his case, and we should concentrate our efforts there, too. By the way, did you soak the grease stain in your new blouse?”
    “No, I put it in the rag bag since it brings bad luck, and we’ve already had our fill.”
    “I see. Well, good night then.”
    Isabel hung up and stretching her legs under the bed sheets, she recalled leaving Sheriff Fox at the prison and driving to the drugstore on Main Street. It’d been rather late, almost nine o’clock, but the glints of light peeped through the plate-glass front. They trooped inside and hailed Vernon Spitzer straightening the comic books and graphic novels racked in the wire display carousel.
    “Ladies, it’s one minute until I close,” he said, striding over to the cash register to wait on them.
    “We came in the nick of time,” said Alma. “How are you doing on my prescription refill?”
    “Oh. Sorry. I forgot it.” Vernon wrinkling his forehead propped his elbows on a Bible. “My grasshopper mind seems to jump in so many directions, but I’ll refill it by tomorrow. Promise.”
    Isabel’s frank gaze sized up the slim, suave, and athletic Vernon. His pencil-thin mustache reminded her of the actor Gig Young, and she found Vernon amiable enough.
    “What keeps a young man like yourself so busy?” she asked.
    “Running a small business is mayhem,” replied Vernon. “I don’t know if you’ve had any experience in retail.”
    Isabel nodded. “A fair bit. I worked for forty-eight years at the home office of a major grocery chain. They’re still going strong, so I suppose we did something right.”
    “Is that a fact?” His eyebrows tilted, and his mustache twitched at her. “I would’ve never guessed you for a business lady.”
    “It now seems like a long time ago.”
    “Did you retain Dwight to defend Megan?” asked Vernon.
    Alma looked at him. “Why do you ask?”
    He shrugged. “No reason. Dwight seems competent and meticulous enough to do a good job for her.”
    Alma and she had left the drugstore and returned home.
    Now sighing to try and rest, Isabel mashed the pillow flat on her bed. She snuggled to get more comfortable in the pillow and pulled up the sheets, but sleep didn’t overtake her. Desperate to relax, she thought of drinking a glass of warm milk, but the traditional folk remedy had never left her drowsy. Instead, her thoughts turned to Megan’s first harrowing night spent in prison, but that was a useless worry so she dismissed it.
    Isabel put on the light, sat up, and conjured up their graveyard caper. In her cozy bedroom she could smile over it, but their midnight stakeout spent in the dank, murky graveyard in April hadn’t been so funny. The obelisk gravestones in the Trumbo family plot had toppled to the soggy ground. Alma and she lobbied the part-time groundskeeper