Free The Helium Murder by Camille Minichino

this has officially become a murder investigation.”
    My pleasure at finally being brought in on the case overcame any disappointment I felt that Matt hadn’t just dropped in for a casual social visit.
    We sat in the rockers with our coffees, a plate of cheese and crackers and fruit on the low table in front of us. I liked the idea that for once I had something to serve an unannounced guest, and resolved to stop and shop more often.
    I wasn’t sure whether I was going to say anything about Rocky. Certainly Matt’s presence in my living room had made the event seem far away and insignificant.
    In any case, there seemed to be more tangible connections to pursue in the Hurley case.
    “I called Carey in Texas,” Matt said, “since he was on Hurley’s calendar for next week. I assumed she wasgoing to travel there, but I learned that their meeting was here. Carey’s at the new Beach Inn.”
    “Here in town?”
    “Here in town.”
    “He was in Revere on Sunday evening?”
    “He was.”
    I settled back in my rocker and took a sip of foam. Matt had shaken a generous amount of chocolate on it, just as I liked it. He was looking at me as if we were playing Twenty Questions and it was my turn.
    “Did you talk to him?”
    “I did.”
    “Did he have a rental car?” I asked, and his body language told me that was the right question.
    “Yes.”
    “Something big and heavy, not a compact?”
    “Yes.”
    “Did you track it down?” Now we were both smiling at the course of the conversation.
    “Yes.”
    “And what shape is it in?”
    “It had a busted front bumper. Carey said he’s not used to driving in snow and he ran into a tree.”

Chapter Nine
    F or a while, I felt like Matt’s partner. He asked me to accompany him when he went to talk to Carey at his Chelsea plant on Wednesday afternoon. He’d be asking questions about CompTech’s helium contracts, and thought it would be useful to have me there as a technical consultant. So did I.
    “Can’t your lab people tell if Carey’s car hit a tree or another car?” I asked.
    “We’re looking at it, but Carey brought the car in right away, so that trail is dead. The Revere Rents mechanic wasn’t paying attention to details like that. He just straightened the car out and painted over the problems. We’re lucky anyone remembered that Carey turned in a damage report.”
    “That was fast. I wish my mechanics were that swift and thorough.”
    Matt laughed and took out his notebook, apparentlystill up for business conversation. He flipped through the pages, densely packed with writing and doodles.
    “I assume you’re ready to ask Carey some specifics about the contracts?”
    “Absolutely,” I said, calculating how many hours were left to do a bit of cramming. The meeting wasn’t until one o’clock. Plenty of time, I thought.
    In the spirit of our partnership, I asked Matt about the alibis of the likely suspects. Not that physics gives you any better training in logic than detective work, but I knew Matt liked to bounce his reasoning off me. In the last two months, I’d often thought that my timing couldn’t have been better—I showed up just as he was losing his partner, at least temporarily.
    I got a notepad of my own, ready for Matt’s briefing.
    “Carey says he was in his room at the Beach Inn all evening. Ate a room-service dinner. So far, that checks out, but we can’t be sure he didn’t leave for a while to drive over to Oxford Park.”
    The inn was near the overpass on the Revere/Chelsea line, so, with icy roads, I figured Carey would have needed close to forty-five minutes for the round trip. I made some columns on my notepad, and started filling in data, feeling the rush I always got from collecting and organizing information.
    “Patrick Gallagher, the ex-boyfriend,” Matt continued. “Said he was at the Northgate mall shopping by himself until it closed at nine, then home to watch television. Turns out that although it was Sunday, the mall was