Free A Deadly Draught by Lesley A. Diehl

one more reasonable. I would talk to Claudia. Yes, I would, but not until I knew exactly what I wanted from her.
    I suspected the affair between my father and Claudia Ramford somehow figured into recent events, but I wasn’t certain how. Until I knew more I had to be careful. Whoever the brewer was concocting this murderous recipe, he or she was deft at stirring in a deadly product at just the right moment. So for once in my life, I decided to rein in my impulsive nature and hold my stubbornness in check.
    I grabbed cleaning supplies and headed for the small shed standing near the brew barn. Good, old-fashioned heavy labor might free up my overloaded brain and allow me to think my way through to some sensible action. If not, it would exhaust me enough that I could nap in the afternoon and count on a clear mind later.
    Dad had used the shed to store supplies, but since his death, I’d been throwing anything I couldn’t decide what to do with into it. There were old hoses, parts from brew kettles, gardening tools, buckets, and who knew what else. It had been years since I’d taken inventory of its contents. Now I needed the space to rent to Marni Henley, who was joining our Saturday tasting sessions with her herbs and flowers. The shed would be the perfect place for her to sell, display, and store her merchandise. She wouldn’t have to load everything in her van each Saturday and cart it to and from my place, and the area to the side and back of it would afford her room to grow some of her herbs. It would look pretty, too, I thought. She and I could share the responsibility for taking care of the small garden during the week. In fact, I said to myself, as I threw another rusty bucket out of the shed into the dump pile, maybe Marni would like to use a half-day on Wednesday to open the shed for business also.
    Ned Potter’s homemade sausages, which he was going to sell out of the back of his truck, Sally’s breads, Marni’s herbs and flowers, and my brews would provide summer tourists with a fun Saturday afternoon adventure. The other breweries—Rafe’s, Teddy’s and the Ramford facility—scheduled brewery tours every day between the months of May and October. If anyone wandered into my place on a weekday, I was happy to give them a walk through my small facility.
    What the Ramford brewery might do for tours under the new brew master’s and Michael’s direction remained a mystery. Francine was too new to the business to decide yet how she would manage her own marketing and publicity, but she’d better get something together, or she’d lose the summer tourist season. I should help her, I thought first, but then reminded myself, I should mind my own business and help myself by pushing for another meeting with the bank president.
    Money, money, money was the refrain foremost in my mind as I worked. In the background, my father’s relationship with Claudia Ramford provided dark undertones to a chorus of concerns about the financing with the bank. I closed out the noise by digging more deeply into the junk in the shed and pulled out a spade shoved into the pile of items at the back. It looked new, but I didn’t remember buying it or putting it in here. Could Jeremiah have gotten it? He usually told me if he needed new equipment. I’d have to ask him. It was too good to thrown in the discard pile, so I carried it outside and leaned it against the building. The spade would come in handy digging Marni a small herb bed.
    In the bright sunlight, I noticed something on its blade. Oh, damn. It wasn’t as good as I thought. It was covered with rust … or was it blood? I threw it on the ground and backed away as if it were a rabid animal about to attack me.
    *
    “You just found it in the shed? No idea who put it there? Do you keep the shed door locked?” asked Jake. I had dialed him as soon as I suspected the shovel could be the missing murder weapon, not that I wanted to call him, especially after our unpleasant parting.