Paging the Dead by Brynn Bonner

Street before that. I’m sure they have cameras, too. Fact, I know they do. I was there when they were installing them a few months ago. Guy that runs the place told me he was having trouble with drive-offs since the price of gas got so high and he’d finally decided to pony up for cameras.”
    â€œUnfortunately, Miss Sabatier,” Carlson said, lifting an eyebrow, “he put in dummy cams; as effective a deterrent as real cameras but at a fraction of the cost. Course, I probably shouldn’t let that cat out of the bag; let’s keep that just between us.” He gave her a smile, but she wasn’t having any of it.
    She crossed her arms. Never a good sign.
    â€œI’m sure we have the receipt somewhere,” I said quickly, “or that the clerk will remember. Her name’s Cindy, she knows me, I used to babysit her. She was looking out the window and I waved to her.”
    â€œThat’s fine,” Carlson said.
    â€œOther people saw Dorothy after we left,” Esme said, getting snippy now. “Doesn’t that clear us?”
    â€œNot really,” Carlson said, putting his notebook away. “You could have come back. But I’ll follow up,” he said, pointing to my receipts. “And I appreciate you ladies being so helpful. I apologize if the rumors are distressing you, but as I say, we don’t have any control over that. If you think of anythingelse, please don’t hesitate to call.” He pulled out a card, then wrote on the back and handed it to Esme, even though I was standing closer. “Day or night. That’s my personal cell on the back.”
    â€œOne more thing,” Esme said, taking the card and tossing it onto the side table. “Mrs. Porter’s great-niece, Cassidy, came to see us this morning. She and her grandmother Ingrid, Dorothy’s sister. That little girl is just purely heartbroken about Mrs. Porter’s death. I gave her a promise you’d find who did this. Are you going to make a liar out of me?”
    â€œNo, ma’am,” Carlson said. “I intend to track this person down and see they get what’s coming to them, no matter who the culprit turns out to be,” he added, his voice grave. He gave her a long, penetrating look, but Esme’s gaze didn’t waver.
    The soundtrack from a gunfight scene in a spaghetti western started playing in my head.

seven
    E SME DROPPED ME BY THE DEALERSHIP TO PICK UP MY CAR , then she was off to her gig as a volunteer in a summer tutoring program at her church. I was on my own for the meeting with Joe Porter. Just as well. I love Esme dearly, but she can be a loose cannon when dealing with clients. Once she forms an opinion sometimes she can’t help but say it out loud.
    I had nearly an hour to kill so I stopped by Keepsake Corner to leave a book I’d promised to loan Marydale. She was doing brisk business for a weekday morning. I tried not to groan when I saw a young woman checking out a stack of decorative stickers and factory-made embellishments. I appreciate an attractive scrapbook page as much as the next person, but this trend of using embellishments at the expense of documentation makes me sad. Fifty years from now those pretty stickers won’t mean a thing, and family members will be left pining for more information about the photos. What was the occasion? When was it? Who are those people? What happened that day?
    But whenever I preach the importance of journaling inscrapbooking workshops people claim they can’t think of what to say or their handwriting isn’t pretty or some other lame excuse not to document. To which I say Pfft!
    I browsed while I waited for Marydale to get a free moment. She’d gotten in some beautiful handmade papers that would be perfect for Dorothy’s heritage scrapbooks if we got to do them.
    Two older women were perusing the stationery section. They were relative newcomers to Morningside and I recognized