Page 139 of It Runs in the Family

“Yep, but I nearly missed her. She left around six, slippin’ out of the house and walkin’ down the street. I didn’t see how she arrived last night, but I didn’t hear a car, so she might have arrived on foot too.”

I couldn’t believe Selena would walk a long distance. It wasn’t like her. Maybe she’d parked her car down the street? But what had she been looking for? Had Eddie been looking for something too? Had they been looking for the same thing?

My phone vibrated with a text. I glanced at the screen and saw a message from Boone.

Your cousin just left. Meet you at the truck in a few minutes.

“My gentleman friend is ready to go,” I said using her phrasing.

She sighed. “Leaving before I could make you a cup of tea. How disappointing.”

“I can try to come back in a day or two,” I said. “In fact, Miss Loretta, maybe you should let us take you somewhere.”

She waved a hand in disgust as she said, “Pfft. Where would I go? This is my home.”

“But your grandson⁠—”

“And I told you I have him under control. I’ll be just fine. But don’t forget to come back and see me.”

“I won’t.” I noticed a notepad on her kitchen table and reached for a pen. “I’m gonna leave my phone number. If you change your mind about gettin’ help, just call me and I’ll come get you.” I quickly wrote my name and number.

“I won’t be needin’ that, but maybe I’ll call if I need someone to take me to bingo,” she said as she leaned over to look at the notepad. “But Iris, be careful. The homeowner of the next house you’re skulking around next to might not be so understanding. Plenty of Stand Your Ground people in these parts if you get what I’m sayin’.”

I frowned. “I do.”

“Good. Now run along with your gentleman friend. And feel free to bring him with you when you come for tea.”

If I was still alive in a few days, then maybe I’d make him come.

Chapter Thirty-Three

Boone was heading toward his truck when I walked out the front door. Garrett’s patrol car was no longer in front of Deanna’s house.

Boone did a double take when he saw me walking down the short path from the porch to the sidewalk. “Do I want to know how you ended up in that house?”

“I’ll fill you in on that—and on plenty more—but first I need to know what happened in Deanna’s house. Did Garrett find you?”

“No. I hid in the closet. He looked around the house and took a call outside the open bedroom door so I couldn’t go out the window. Then he left, and I waited a few minutes to make sure he was really gone. But he’s coming back to knock on doors and find out if anyone saw anything. He got called somewhere else first.”

“Did you learn anything from his phone call?” I asked as we walked over to the truck.

“Not much. He let the detective know he had gotten into the house and didn’t see anything suspicious. They’ll need a search warrant to do any real digging through her things.”

I opened the truck door and turned to look at him. “Did he say anything about Deanna?”

“No, but if someone at the Dollar General called the sheriff’s department—and I can’t believe they wouldn’t—it’s bound to hit someone’s radar that Rebecca was Deanna’s roommate.”

I got inside the truck as Boone walked around and slid behind the steering wheel.

“Now explain how you ended up in that house,” he said as he started the engine and pulled away from the curb.

“I didn’t want to stand on the side street, so I decided to head back toward the truck. I was hanging out between two houses, watching for Garrett to leave, when a woman called out from an upstairs window, asking me to let her out of her room.”

“Had she gotten locked in?”

“Turns out her grandson locks her in every morning when he goes to work so she won’t spend all his inheritance,” I said. He looked alarmed, understandably, so I said, “I know. I told her I’d call the sheriff or take her somewhere safe, but she claimed she had it under control. But being locked away gives her plenty of time to spy on the neighborhood. She saw things going on with Rebecca.”

I told him about Eddie slapping Rebecca in the car a couple of weeks ago and grabbing her arms and then walked him through what had happened last night—Eddie sneaking in through the garage, followed by Selena showing up in the middle of the night and searching for something in Rebecca’s room.