Pay the Price (Harmony Grove Book 3) by Carol Post (which ebook reader txt) 📕

the floor. Over the next minute, he located a wallet, checkbook, and notepad, along with several scattered receipts and pens.

Jessica frowned. “No cell phone?”

“Not so far.”

“Are you taking her keys?” There were only three on the ring. One was the key to the Lotus, and another likely went to wherever she worked. The other had to be her house key.

“I’ll try dusting them for prints, but it’s not likely I’ll get anything useable. Since they were still hooked to her purse and obviously her personal keys, it’s not likely that whoever ransacked the house used them to get in.”

“No, I’m sure they came in through the sliding glass door. That’s a pretty easy way in.” But not for long. One of the first things on her to-do list was picking up a Charley bar. And now that she had Prissy’s keys, both the doorknob and deadbolt would be in the locked position when she left the house.

“Where did my sister work?”

“Pappy’s Pizzeria. She was a waitress.”

A Lotus Exige on a waitress’s pay? Not likely. Priscilla did more than wait tables. Was whoever ransacked the house trying to gather information or hoping to keep secrets?

Alan finished inside the house, then focused his efforts on the front door. Jessica glanced beyond him, to Yesteryear Antiques across the street. A familiar figure made his way down the wrought iron steps and through the small parking area. With his well-fitting dress jeans, black leather jacket and sunglasses hiding his eyes, he looked more like a male model than…whatever it was he did.

Her pulse rate picked up a notch, and her stomach did a little flip. She put the brakes on both. Yeah, he was probably coming to see her, since he’d just stepped into the road and was headed in her direction, but he was just being neighborly. If he had anything more in mind, she would put the brakes on that, too. She knew his type too well.

Alan made his way around the exterior of the house as Shane started up the driveway. Branch lingered on the porch.

“You know,” Branch said as soon as Alan was out of ear shot, “Harmony Grove has done just fine without you all these years. So don’t think you’re going to come back here and stir up trouble, or life won’t be pleasant for you.”

She plastered on a phony smile as Shane climbed the two steps. His frown said he’d heard the veiled threat. He stopped next to Branch. “She wouldn’t dream of it.”

Branch spun, mouth agape and jowls jiggling. He’d been caught being the jerk that he was. “Who are you?”

“Shane Dalton. And you are?”

Branch recovered almost immediately. “Chief Stanley Branch.” He emphasized the word chief, even stood straighter as he said it. “Are you a friend of this woman?”

“This woman is Jess Parker. And yes, as of two o’clock this morning, I’d like to think so. At least once she finished beating me up.”

Branch looked from Shane to her and back to Shane before lumbering away to find Alan. She pinched her lips against the burst of laughter charging up her throat. Just as Branch disappeared around the corner of the house, she lost the battle, and it bubbled over anyway.

“Thank you for that,” she said, still laughing. “I’ll cherish the memory of that look of stunned surprise as long as I live.”

“Glad I could oblige. It looks like you’ve done something to tick off your chief of police.”

“Not lately. I sort of gave him a lot of grief as a teen. I guess old grudges die hard.”

“Have they found anything yet?”

“I’m not sure.” She crossed her arms and leaned back against one of the two flat decorative columns that supported the porch roof. “Alan lifted lots of prints. Of course, they may all belong to Priscilla.”

“That’s always a possibility, especially if whoever did this wore gloves.”

She nodded. “Her hard drive’s gone. They took her computer apart to remove it. If she had a laptop, it’s gone, too. All the contents of her purse were dumped, and if her cell phone’s still here, we haven’t found it.”

“She must have had some kind of dirt on somebody.”

“Apparently, it weighed on her so heavily, she couldn’t handle it anymore.” Except that didn’t sound like Priscilla. She was all about Priscilla and no one else. Not one to feel regret or any sense of responsibility for her actions.

Movement in her peripheral vision drew her attention, and Jessica turned to see an elderly woman making her way across the yard next door, a shaggy white dog cuddled in her arms. Mrs. Silverton had lived there as long as Jessica could remember. She’d always loved Priscilla. Of course, everyone had loved Priscilla.

Jessica straightened her shoulders while watery gray eyes swept over her. The judgment reserved for the teenage Jessica was absent. All the adult Jessica got was a thorough sizing up.

“Hello, dear. I’m so sorry about your sister.”

“Thanks.”

She dipped her head. “This is Buttons, Priscilla’s dog. She got him as a puppy five or six years ago. I think he’s a mix between some kind of terrier and a schnauzer.”

Jessica looked down at the shaggy ball of fur studying her with those round, dark eyes. Her stomach tightened. She knew where this conversation was headed.

Mrs. Silverton brushed the hair out of Buttons’s eyes, then ran her hand over his head and down his back. “When they found Priscilla, he was inside, sitting next to the bed, just waiting. Chief Branch brought him over here.” She stopped petting him to cup his face in her hand. “I can tell he really misses her. He’s done nothing but cry. I think he’d be happier in his own home.”

Mrs. Silverton held Buttons out, clearly expecting Jessica to take him.

Wonderful. Not only did she have to dispose of Priscilla’s things, now she was stuck finding a home for her dog. Keeping him was out of the question. She wasn’t the nurturing type. If she ever decided to have a pet, it would be a