Seams Like Murder by Betty Hechtman Page B

what was behind the fence. I was busy checking out the exterior of the huge beige stucco house and the surrounding yard when I heard Babs making a tsking sound. I followed her gaze and saw two women standing over two toddlers who were being instructed on how to kick a soccer ball.
    “I know my son has his own financial management company and his wife is a dermatologist, but really, two nannies? There’s one for each kid. I don’t know why my son even wanted me to come here.” Her open, friendly face appeared distressed. “Those kids are so overprogrammed. I can’t believe that my son doesn’t want them to have the time for fun and imagination that he had. When he was that age, he could spend hours with a cardboard box.” She composed herself. “I have so much time on my hands. Other than the one night when they let me babysit, I might as well not be here.”
    I put my hand on her shoulder in a supportive gesture. “I don’t know if you’re interested in crochet, but you’re welcome to join the Hookers. I’m not really qualified to teach you how to crochet, but I’m sure one of the others would be happy to do it.”
    “I know how to knit,” she said.
    “You might want to keep that to yourself,” I said, thinking of how Adele twitched when Babs had mentioned it earlier.
    “Okay, then. When do I start?”
    “You sort of already have. You volunteered to be a student at Sheila’s rehearsal.” As I said it, the whole situation came back into focus, and I realized that not only had we not had the rehearsal, but Sheila was probably traumatized by the whole event. I was sorry about what had happened, and I wanted to know who the person was and how they got there, but I had the success of Yarn University to think about.
    “Are you busy tonight?” I asked Babs.

C HAPTER 7
    When I returned to get my car, the Channel 3 news van was set up in the street in front of CeeCee’s, and the anchor, Kimberly Wang Diaz, was adjusting her skirt, getting ready to go live. She saw me and started walking toward me. We’d met numerous times under similar circumstances, and she seemed to think of me as being a crime scene groupie, which was a totally absurd term. It had certainly never been my choice to deal with dead bodies. They just seem to keep showing up. I waved her off, yelling, “No comment,” before jumping into my blue green vintage Mercedes. I’d like to say I sped off, but
vintage
is another word for
old
, and the greenmobile, as I called it, had lost some of its zip over the years.
    When I finally got to the bookstore, Mrs. Shedd was in the front of the store helping a customer pay for some yarn. As the woman walked out of the store, Mrs. Shedd cameover to me. “Oh good, you’re finally here. We had to make do without you—the woman that just left signed up for the beginning crochet class and bought her supplies. Just before her a woman came in to buy the supplies for Sheila’s class. I’m glad she knew what kid mohair yarn was. I didn’t realize how expensive that yarn is.” She paused as several customers came in the door and walked past us. “Sheila’s class is getting a lot of interest. She’s all ready to teach it, right?”
    “She’ll be fine,” I said with a confident smile. Had somebody said something to my boss? I was relieved when Mrs. Shedd seemed okay with my answer. I hadn’t told her the real reason the group was meeting at CeeCee’s, and I was hoping to keep her in the dark about Sheila’s problems with the class until I’d solved them. As far as Mrs. Shedd knew, the group wanted to get together outside of the bookstore to go over our plans for all of the classes.
    “I didn’t realize you were going to take so long,” my boss said. “And with Adele gone, it was difficult.”
    “I’m sorry,” I said, leaving out the reason for our delay. It’s not that I wanted to lie. I just thought the truth would make her uncomfortable. But I should have known it would come out anyway.