Final Sentence by Daryl Wood Gerber Page B

She grew up with a bit of a chip on her shoulder. She hung out with the wrong crowd, got in trouble.”
    “What kind of trouble?”
    My aunt dismissed the question with a wave of her hand. “Your father befriended her when she was a teen. At the time, he was participating in the Big Brother program. He took her under his wing. Got her focused on the future. After college, she considered going into social service work in San Francisco to help girls like herself, but then her mother suffered an illness. Not grievous, but it scared Cinnamon. She sought your father’s advice. He supported her decision to return home to Crystal Cove. The police department needed a deputy. She climbed the ranks quickly.” My aunt studied her fingernails. I felt as if there were more she wanted to say, but she didn’t.
    I gazed at my father, in quiet consultation with Cinnamon. How could I not have known about his mentor-student relationship with her? What else didn’t I know about him? I regarded Pepper Pritchett, who was staring daggers at my father. She caught me spying and snarled. I was about to tell her to back off, but the deputy returned.
    “Chief. I found something beside the palm tree.” He revealed an array of tools.
    “Aha.” Pepper pointed. “Look right there. See that trowel? I saw that trowel in Jenna Hart’s display window at the shop. That proves she is the killer.”
    Cinnamon whirled on me. “Is that true?”
    “No. It can’t be the same,” I said then gulped. The trowel—pie-shaped with a wood handle—did look like one of the antique tools I had used in our display. I said, “Why would the killer leave them there, in plain sight?”
    The deputy said, “They were buried. I think Old Jake might have scooped them up with his machine.”
    “Arrest her, Cinn.”
    Cinnamon drew taller, shoulders back. “Miss Hart, I’d like you to come to the precinct. We’ll get out of the sun, and we can chat some more.”
    My parched skin was thankful, but my insides twisted into a knot. Did our competent police chief think I was guilty, after all?
     

Chapter 5

    B IDING MY TIME in the beige Crystal Cove Precinct, sitting in a hardback chair, and sipping lukewarm tea while three sergeants listened to the police chief’s mother trying to convince them that I was a murderer, I pondered how I had arrived there in the first place. Not there, in the precinct, but there— here —this quiet, seaside town. David died and life turned sour. A job that had been riotously fun for the first five years out of college became lackluster, the rewards empty. Out of the blue, my easygoing boss became exacting, even about the most soulless campaigns. I found myself grumping about paying city parking rates with no view of the ocean. I had few real friends. My idea of an adventure was going to a new restaurant, not on a hike. And then Aunt Vera called. Cajoled. Wooed me to Crystal Cove. And my spirit had lightened . . . until now.
    I pinched my thigh to end the pity party and yanked myself back to the present. To the gossip. To the lingering fingerprint ink on my fingertips. To the horror of finding my friend dead. Who did it? The killer had to be someone in her entourage. Who else in our touristy town would have a motive, unless a rabid Desiree Divine fan had come to Crystal Cove? But other than the creepy guy with the tackle box in the parking lot, I hadn’t seen anyone malicious looking hanging around The Cookbook Nook awaiting Desiree’s arrival. That wasn’t to say that I had the best powers of observation. When I was a child, Dad, in his role of FBI analyst, challenged my siblings and me to note the particulars of a street scene: the number of people, the ratio of men to women, the primary color the people wore. My sister did the best. She also aced college, read five nonfiction books a week without fail, and had a home crafting business. Her wares were selling like hotcakes over the Internet. I came in second in what we called the