Free Sally Berneathy - Death by Chocolate 01 - Death by Chocolate by Sally Berneathy Page B

distract her from the problem at hand. Okay, I’d give Trent one point for that, but he was still about fifty points in the hole.
    “I’ll go with you,” Creighton offered.
    Paula didn’t look too happy about that, but Fred jumped into the breach. “Me, too. I could use a cup of coffee.”
    Fred never drank coffee after noon. He was pulling out all the stops in his effort to help Paula.
    As soon as the three of them were out of the room, Trent turned to me. “What did you want to talk to me about?”
    “Let’s go out on the porch.”
    Trent nodded and I followed him outside.
    “First,” I said, folding my arms and trying to look authoritative…not an easy task in cut-offs and sneakers, “I want to know what the deal is with the aspirin. You’re going to have it analyzed, aren’t you? It’s aspirin, that’s all! I bought it. I put the pills in that old vitamin bottle with my own hands and then gave it to Paula.”
    “I thought you had something you wanted to talk to me about, something besides harassing me about doing my job.”
    “I do, but I’m not going to tell you until you tell me why you want to have those aspirins analyzed.”
    “Not going to tell me? I believe that’s withholding evidence. You could get in a lot of trouble for that.”
    “Yeah, like you could get in trouble for taking evidence from the scene of the crime without proper judicial authorization.” I’ve found if you throw in enough multi-syllabic words when you don’t know what you’re talking about, people usually assume you do.
    Trent didn’t. “Your friend voluntarily gave me the aspirin.”
    “She didn’t say you could have it analyzed.”
    “She didn’t say I couldn’t.”
    “So you admit you’re going to have it analyzed.”
    With a sigh, he pulled the tablets from his shirt pocket and held them in the palm of his hand. “Do these look like the pills in that bottle you have at work?”
    I peered closely. “Well, they’re small, white and round. I admit, I don’t spend a lot of time looking at aspirins.”
    With the tip of one wide, blunt finger, he flipped over one tablet. “It doesn’t say aspirin on either side, and it’s scored to break in half.”
    “Who knew when I was spending all that time in college studying the Pythagorean theorem and the influence of Puritanism on early American literature, I should have been studying the proper appearance of aspirin?”
    Trent closed his fingers over the pills and stuck them back into his pocket. “The chances are very slim that these are aspirin,” he snapped. “Now, if you don’t have anything to tell me about this case, I need to get back in there.”
    “No way would Paula take drugs!” I protested.
    “Is that all you wanted to tell me?”
    “No.” I sighed and pointed to the vacant house across the street, explaining about the hole in the hedge. I halfway expected him to tell me I was being silly, but he didn’t.
    Instead he peered intently at the house for a moment then said, “Show me.”
    We went over , and I indicated the flattened grass and the hole. “Somebody was smoking here,” I added, poking in the grass with one foot. “I found a tiny bit of filter. I don’t see it now, but it really was there.”
    Again he didn’t dismiss my dubious findings. I was wearing shoes today instead of being barefoot as I’d been when he’d seen me yesterday…dirty sneakers, but shoes nevertheless. Maybe shoes gave me more credibility.
    “You might want to get your foot out of the evidence,” he said, squatting down for a closer look.
    Okay, he wasn’t impressed with the shoes.
    He rose and went up on the porch to try the door. It was locked. He walked slowly along the side of the house, inspecting every window. When we got to the back yard, I mentioned the broken twigs and leaves around the gate. I knew he’d find them, but I just wanted him to know that I’d noticed, too. Credibility.
    As I watched him climb the steps to the porch, I thought