Read Online Killer Image (An Allison Campbell Mystery) by Wendy Tyson - Free Book Online

seemed to think better of it, and fiddled instead with his keys. He smiled, but it was a humorless smile, one that made Allison ache to reassure him. Despite his bravado, she knew his parents’ hatred of one another tore at him. Rather than suffer from divided loyalties like many grown children of divorcees, Jason loathed his father and coddled his mother. Mia’s escape to that farm was something Jason still had trouble accepting. It worried him.
    Allison wrapped her arms around her chest and leaned against the door. Mia’s behavior worried her, too. She missed Mia. Sometimes desperately. Their relationship had been beyond that of in-laws. Mia had first been her mentor and boss, then her friend and, finally, her surrogate mother. But Allison’s divorce from Jason had been a rude reminder that Mia and Allison had no blood tie—and in the end, Bridget’s tragedy had been the undoing of their relationship, too.
    “Besides,” Jason said, breaking Allison’s train of thought.  “Vaughn called me this morning to find out what I knew, which was nothing, so I made some calls. It’s good to have friends in high places.”
    “Why would Vaughn call you about Arnie Feldman’s murder? Because of Helms?”
    Jason gave her a strange look. “You’re a funny lady, Al. Maybe Vaughn was just being nosey. You place him up on a pedestal, but he is human.”
    “I do forget that sometimes.” Allison shook her head. “This whole thing is bizarre. What else do you know about the murder?”
    “I know that my mother had nothing to do with it.”
    “Of course she didn’t, Jason. But aside from that.”
    “Just that you should keep your door locked and the alarm system on. You don’t pay enough attention to security.” He closed her front door, then opened it and jiggled the handle to check the lock. “I wish you’d get over that fear of yours and adopt a puppy. Then I wouldn’t have to worry about you so much.”
    “Not on your life. Puppies grow up to be dogs.”
    Allison balked at even the thought of owning a dog. Although she liked dogs in theory, in reality, they scared her. As a child, her father had kept an ornery wolf-dog mix named Thor as a guard animal. The dog lived in their backyard within the confines of a twenty-by-twenty pen. Even though Allison had been warned a thousand times to stay away from him, she’d thought—wrongly—that he’d never bite her . So one day, feeling sorry that he was all alone outside, she’d snuck in the pen with him. Thirty seconds later, he had her pinned up against the fence, his snarl so loud it echoed in her nightmares for weeks.
    Her dad dragged Thor away before the dog did any physical harm. But her disobedience brought about the bite of her father’s belt. She still had the scars to prove it.
    While logic told her not all dogs were like Thor, she’d decided not to take a chance. Handing Jason the keys that lay on the foyer table, she said, “Is there something in particular that has you worried?”
    Jason stepped outside, seemingly impervious to the sharp breeze that whipped through her lawn. “Just be careful,” he said again, making Allison wonder what he wasn’t telling her.
    Allison waved good-bye before closing the front door. She glanced at her clock. A half hour before she needed to leave. Enough time to make a call.
    She dialed Vaughn’s number. He answered on the first ring.
    “What’s up, Allison?”
    “Jason said you called him. About Arnie Feldman.”
    “I did.”
    “Then you know it was a murder.”
    “I do.”
    Baffled by Vaughn’s clipped answers, Allison said, “Is this a bad time?”
    “I’m at the gym.” Vaughn’s voice softened. “But that’s okay. What do you need?”
    “Can you do a little more digging? Make a few calls? I told Jason about the call from Detective Helms, and while Jason told me it was a murder, I got the sense he was holding out on me. I want to know what happened.”
    She heard him inhale, then a mumbled sound as