Read Online Murder Talks Turkey by Deb Baker - Free Book Online Page B

to wait around for any more shoes to drop.
    __________

    After feeding Fred a piece of George’s bacon, I headed toward June Hopala’s place over on Peter Road. June wasn’t inside the credit union during the holdup, but she worked there part-time and I wanted to ask her some questions about Dave Nenonen, the manager, before I interrogated him.
    At the moment, he was on my short list for criminal involvement. Money was missing from the vault, and Dave had the easiest access.
    I’d run the scenario through my head enough times. I had a theory of my own, and it was holding water.
    Somebody took the money before the robber even entered the building, took it days, maybe weeks or months before. That Somebody started getting worried. Eventually the money would be discovered missing, which the mastermind should have thought of in the first place. So Somebody planned a fake robbery. Kent Miller was supposed to escape with the pillowcase filled with play money. Everyone in town would think the thief had taken the hundred thousand dollars, when really Somebody had taken it.
    Except the plan went south. Everything was working out fine until Dickey’s deputy squad showed up. Then the rooftop shooter plugged poor Kent, and the hoax was up. Somebody must be really worried by now. The money was discovered missing and dead bodies were falling like meteor showers.
    The real thief couldn’t be Kent or the guy in the parking lot. They were pawns. The king, or queen, still was on the move. The little guys had been extirpated. How convenient was that?
    Yes, Dave was on my suspect list, but I had a small problem with that. Why would Dave leave Angie behind the counter with her finger right next to the alarm button? If he stole the money, he’d want the robber to get away with the hoax. He would have made sure Angie didn’t use her lethal finger. Yet she had. He hadn’t tried to stop her.
    And why would a stranger on the roof take out the robber instead of letting Dickey handle it? Unless he was afraid his frantic partner inside would finger him. Did Kromer man have the loot? Was he killed for it?
    I hoped I’d have a clearer picture after talking to June.
    Fred and I pulled into June’s driveway. Fred started howling as I walked up to her neat and tidy little house—whitewashed with a cute picket fence and daffodils poking through the thawing ground.
    I’d called ahead, so she was expecting me.
    “Come on in,” she called out with a warm welcome. “Have some taffy. I can’t thank you enough for giving me your recipe. It’s a family favorite. Hope you write your cookbook soon.”
    I wanted to say I’d have plenty of time to work on it from prison.
    June seated me in her living room. That meant I was special company. A plate of taffy waited for me on the coffee table.
    I peeled waxed paper from a piece and plopped the taffy in my mouth while June watched with a smile. I couldn’t help humming, a family trait we had no control over. The hum just happened on its own when we sampled something really delicious.
    June took a piece.
    We chewed for awhile.
    “My daughter-in-law brought her kids over,” June said after finishing her taffy. She rolled her tongue along the front of her teeth to dislodge the last sticky morsel. “They got a kick out of making it. They pulled and pulled.”
    “It’s great family fun,” I agreed.
    I made taffy when the kids were growing up. We’d cook it to the right temperature, cool it slightly in long slabs, then grease our hands with butter and tag-team pull it. The first pull involved the entire taffy batch and two strong pullers, then later we broke it down into smaller strands so everyone could have their own. The longer we pulled, the creamier it got.
    “When are you coming out with your cookbook?” she asked.
    “My new business is keeping me real busy, but I’m slowly putting it together.”
    We took seconds and chewed some more.
    It gave me time to study June. She was past retirement age,