Free The Final Arrangement by Annie Adams

to $8,000 hand-written under each day. 
    I turned the page and found a similar chart with the same titles and numbers, only, it was all typed; nothing was handwritten. 
    I was looking at the official version of the February sales figures.  To make sure it had the same date as the handwritten page, I compared the amounts in each column to the previous page.  On the typed page, there were several days with no sales at all.  In fact, on the days when sales should have said $4,000, it would say $500 or $250.  Not a single column matched up between the two pages. 
    Derrick had been keeping two sets of books.  I wondered if the L.D. Stanwyck who had signed the paychecks for Derrick’s loquacious designer got to see the typed or the handwritten version of the business records. 
    What kind of idiot keeps two different sets of financial books in the same binder?  I wondered.  The same idiot who found himself resting in a coffin in the mortuary .  Maybe Derrick’s not-so-fancy bookkeeping had ended up getting him killed somehow. 
    I turned to a page with the title “Extra Receivables***” written across the top.  Three columns were titled April, May and June.  Under each month was written $10,000.  What kind of ten thousand dollar jobs is he getting? 
    Another question popped into my mind.  It hadn’t been too difficult to find this little black book. You’d think with a murder investigation, the police would have searched the place. Maybe that’s why the desk had been so messy.  Perhaps the cops had already been there and found something they were looking for.
    The front door bell sounded, startling me.  I looked out of the little room to see if the designer had come back in yet.  She wasn’t there.  I moved over to the office, so I could look through the one-way glass that made it so you could watch the front of the store without leaving the office or being seen.  A tall man with a mustache walked in.  He wore dress slacks and a shirt and tie, and a badge with black leather backing hung from his belt.  I decided it probably would not bode well for me to be found by the police in a dead man’s office.  Especially a dead man I had been arguing with at the scene of his forthcoming murder, of which I might be a suspect. 
    I tucked the ledger into the back waistband of my pants and said an internal thank you for the one-way glass.  Then I made my way as quietly as I could to the back door which had been left open by Derrick’s employee.  I hadn’t ever asked her name, and now was not the time for pleasantries.  I started to jog once I hit the pavement outside and when I reached the woman smoking around the back corner I gave her a heads up.
    “Thanks for your help, I have one more question.  Haven’t the police been here?”
    She snorted and shook her head.  “Hell, some asshole detective called and said he would be here, but he never showed.”
    So I wasn’t the only one to experience the pleasure of talking with the asshole detective.  I didn’t want to have to repeat the experience if that’s who had just walked in.
    “Thanks again, I’ve got to get going now, but I thought I’d tell you there is a customer in the store.  Oh, and maybe you’ll forget that I was ever here.”  I pulled a twenty out of my pocket and put it in her hand.  She could buy at least a couple more packs of Camels with it. 
    “Give me a call,” she croaked then looked down at her palm.  “Now how did this get here?”  She looked at me and winked before she snuffed her cigarette out with her foot. 
    I peeked around the front corner of Derrick’s shop, and after making sure the guy from the police was otherwise engaged, I got into the car and got the heck out of there.

CHAPTER SEVEN
     
    The blacktop in the parking lot of Rosie’s Posies tugged at my shoes with every step.  The chatter of traffic came out muffled under the oppressive rays of the afternoon sun and my face felt like it was close to