Pumpkin Spice Lies: A Pumpkin Hollow Mystery, book 16 by Kathleen Suzette (you can read anyone .txt) 📕

“So she was fond of his class?” I asked.

He nodded. “You better believe it. I had to listen to her talk about it every time we were together. She’d go on and on about what an awesome class he had, and why didn’t I go to college and take his class.” He shook his head. “No way. I couldn’t sit through that class and listen to all that garbage.”

“Lots of people like poetry,” Christy said. “But I can see where if your girlfriend was talking about some other guy all the time, even if it was her professor, it could get irritating.”

He turned to her. “Yeah, I just don’t trust the guy. There was something about him that was all wrong. He had a party at his house for his students back in April, and Hailey insisted that we go. She made me dress up in a suit and tie. Can you believe it?” He snorted again. “But I went. Only because she bugged me about it for so long. And it was all a bunch of snooty people sitting around reading poetry. I was bored out of my mind.”

“Did Gillespie pay special attention to Hailey while you were there?” I asked. I was beginning to get a picture of this professor, and I didn’t like it.

His mouth made a straight line. “Yeah, he did. He kept coming around her and complimenting her on her dress. She was wearing a really short dress, and it was all the guy could talk about. It was ridiculous. After we left, I told her we were not going to any other parties like that again. I told her she needed to find a job and drop out of school.”

I thought he was making a lot of assumptions by thinking he could tell his girlfriend to drop out of school and get a job, but I didn’t say so. “Did he behave that way around any of the other girls?”

He shrugged. “I don’t know. I guess I didn’t notice. I was more concerned with Hailey.” The bell over the door rang and an older couple walked into the shoe store. “Excuse me a minute.” He walked over to the couple to see if he could help them.

I looked at Christy. “It sounds like she was enamored with her college professor.”

“And I wonder if her college professor was just as enamored with her.”

I nodded. “Wouldn’t surprise me.”

She set the boot she was holding back on the display. “Frank Gillespie and his wife used to live next door to me when John and I were first married.”

I looked at her. “Really? Did he seem like a creep? Because the way Joey described him, it sounds like he might be.”

She shrugged. “I didn’t notice that about him, but he and his wife worked a lot. We didn’t see much of them.”

I put the shoe back onto the display. I had an idea that the college professor might be more interested in his students than he should have been.

Chapter Nine

We left the shoe store without buying a thing. If we waited another month, the fall boots and shoes would go on sale, and besides that, neither of us had money to throw away on shoes that we wouldn’t even wear for at least another month or so.

“Where to next?” I asked, looking at her.

She shrugged. “I guess we can go get some pizza. Or, why don’t we stop by Betty’s Closet and see what they’ve got in for the fall?”

I looked at her. “Why? They won’t run their sales for fall clothes for a while yet either.”

“I know, but Hailey Strong used to work there. I don’t know if she was still working there before she died, but she might have been.”

“Oh, I see.” I started my car, and we drove over to the clothing store.

When we walked through the doors of Betty’s Closet, I glanced around. Like the shoe store, they had a lot of their fall clothing out already. There were lots of sweaters, coats, scarves, and knit hats. The place smelled like cinnamon and new clothes, and made me wish for fall.

“Oh, look at this,” Christy said, heading over to a display of thick, chunky knit sweaters. They were folded up on shelves and came in a wide variety of colors. She picked up a pumpkin orange colored sweater and turned to look at me, holding it in front of herself. “Can’t you just imagine this with a pair of chocolate brown suede boots?”

I ran my fingers over the sweater. It was a thick cable knit and would be warm and cozy for the coming cold weather. “It’s adorable. I love the color.” I turned over the price tag and inhaled. “But that’s a not so adorable price. We really have to wait until the sales.”

“I know, I just can’t resist looking at things though. I swear, if I ever strike it rich, I’m not going to have a closet for my clothes. I’m going to have a separate bedroom. An entire bedroom. I’ll put rows and rows of racks so I can hang everything, or display them on shelves.”

I eyed her. “That sounds ambitious.”

“You better believe it. Go big or go home.” She picked up another sweater. It was hot pink, and she held it up in front of herself. “What do you think?”

“Hot pink goes well with your skin tone.”

She nodded. “It does. I might have to get one of these, too.”

I looked up as Betty Mays, the store owner, headed in our direction. She was wearing a silk dress in teal with black heels. No costume for her. I glanced down at my costume and then at Christy’s costume. There was something about Betty Mays that made me feel like she