Read Online Killer Commute by Marlys Millhiser - Free Book Online

pretense of control over her only child, she’d sort of given in to the exhaustion besieging her on the return trip and risked drowsiness and death from inattention.
    But in Charlie’s crazy world, this day had become special suddenly, and she spooned up the rest of the warmed eggy milk with a satisfied sigh. Three whole zits that weren’t there yesterday. What more could the mother of a teenaged girl ask? Libby Abigail Greene was about to have her period.

CHAPTER 9
    CHARLIE UNLOCKED HER mailbox, one of four silver doors in a black metal casing on a pole carefully lettered with a number of crude suggestions. It stood outside the compound, and she had to step aside when the gate swung open and Officer Mason strode out to the street and her car.
    Before the gate could close, Libby and her Wrangler roared out, too. Thankfully, the cars headed in opposite directions. Neither female saw Charlie, or pretended they didn’t. Both looked royally pissed. Charlie figured Doug Esterhazie had lost his anonymity with the Long Beach PD.
    Maggie slipped out her front door as if she’d been watching for them to leave. She opened her box and Mrs. Beesom’s. Whoever got to the mailboxes first usually brought in everybody else’s mail and left it on their doormats. It had been Jeremy’s idea, so anyone coming home after dark wouldn’t be exposed to mugging. The same key worked for all four boxes. Charlie and her best friend stood looking at Jeremy’s box.
    â€œI don’t remember ever bringing in his mail,” Charlie said.
    â€œYou’re usually the last one home. I took his in when he went on trips.” Which wasn’t very often.
    â€œHe must not have picked his up Friday, either, if he didn’t pick up ours. Maggie, when you took in his mail, was it addressed to Jeremy Fiedler?”
    â€œI’d think I’d have noticed if it wasn’t, don’t you?”
    â€œYou don’t remember.” They stood talking to each other but looking at Jeremy’s mailbox, like they were talking to it. Neither wanted to admit what both knew they were about to do. “If he got mail, he had to have an identity recorded with the post office. I mean, they won’t just deliver to an address. Will they?”
    â€œWe better hurry before someone sees us.”
    Charlie emptied the last mailbox and both of them rushed to her front door. She’d blocked open the security grate that guarded it from a surprise visit from the big bad wolf.
    â€œWhat happened to your key? You’re going to lock yourself out again.”
    â€œIt’s just easier to block it open. You know, there’d be one way for sure to prove Jeremy had no identity—if he didn’t get any offers from credit-card companies to lend him buckets of cash at twenty-two percent after six months.” Charlie rummaged through her mail, all junk, not even a doxy magazine for her teen, and threw it at the pile already overloading her dining room table. They settled at the breakfast nook with the rest.
    â€œWe should be wearing gloves,” Maggie said.
    â€œToo late now.” Charlie helped her best friend sort through their dead neighbor’s mail and then looked up, astonished. “God, they actually send credit-card stuff to Occupant?”
    â€œDo you suppose they have those phony checks made out that way? There’s no bank statement or bills.”
    â€œMine and Libby’s was all junk the last two days, too. Even Edwina e-mails now or calls. What did you get?”
    â€œHardly anything of importance comes through the U.S. Post Office anymore, when you think about it.” But Maggie fanned out her mail on the table, too. Two mail-order catalogs and her ten-million-dollar winnings from Publishers Clearing House came to Maggie—the rest came to Occupant or to Resident.
    â€œYou didn’t get a bank statement, either.”
    â€œMy bank’s gone