Read Online Spicy Lasagna Murder: Book 13 in The Darling Deli Series by Patti Benning - Free Book Online Page B

don’t even have their eyes open yet, though.”
    Misty Pines did allow the residents to have pets as long as the resident in question could reliably handle most of the care for the animal. Unfortunately, Reggie did not fall into that category. He was prone to forgetfulness and confusion, and the nurses would have had to be completely in charge of feeding and watering his cat or dog as well as cleaning up after it.
    “That will have to do,” he said reluctantly. Eli reached out and patted his hand before changing the subject.
    “I showed my grandfather that video of you running into the burning barn to save somebody,” he said. This perked the old man right up.
    “That’s right, you did,” he said. “That was quite heroic, I must say. Did you do it? Did you save someone?”
    Moira was reluctant to look into his hopeful eyes and tell him the truth, but lying to him would be even worse.
    “No,” she told him sadly. “I was too late.”
    The old man’s expression faded into a sad, faraway look, and Moira sighed. Even though she knew that she shouldn’t, and knew that she had tried her hardest to save the men, she couldn’t get rid of the guilty feeling. She kept wondering if there was something she could have done to save them. Would it have made a difference if she had run straight in without hesitating? She would never know, but she knew she would torture herself with it for weeks and months to come.
    “I knew Samwell,” Reggie said suddenly, surprising all of them.
    “I didn’t know that,” Eli said.
    “I’ve got lots of friends you don’t know about, boy,” he said, in a matter-of-fact, not annoyed tone. “And Luke was one of them. He used to come by for lunch sometimes. We got to know each other back when I first took over the ice cream shop. It was milk from his cow that I used for the ice cream, back when his focus was still on dairy.”
    The old man had a lost expression on his face as he relived his memories.
    “He had some of the best dairy cows around, and the best prices, too. It was too bad about the cancer. Even if he wasn’t murdered, he wouldn’t have been much longer on this earth.”
    Moira blinked. This was new. Could she trust Reggie to have his wits about him enough to be a reliable source of information?
    “He had cancer?” she asked.
    He nodded. “Pancreatic. He told me about it just the week before he died.”
    Moira remembered how unusual it was for him to be driving around in such bad weather, and his comment about having a doctor’s appointment he could no longer put off. Was that what he had been talking about? Does this change anything? she wondered. Surely if he had been diagnosed with a cancer with such a high mortality rate, the killer would have been better off just waiting for him to pass away naturally. Unless the killer didn’t know , she thought. He probably hadn’t told many people about his diagnosis; he didn’t seem like the type to go around talking about his medical issues publicly. Somehow this just makes his death that much sadder.
    “I’m sorry about the loss of your friend,” she told the old man. “It must have been shocking news.”
    “That sort of news isn’t very shocking by the time you reach my age,” he said matter-of-factly. “Once you’re this old, every time you see an old friend, you act as if it’s the last time, because it just might be.”
    Moira bit her lip and took a sip of water to hide her emotions. She hoped that when she was his age, she had someone like David by her side to keep her from getting so lonely and fatalistic. She never wanted to be used to old friends dying.
     

CHAPTER THIRTEEN
    With only a couple of months left before the farmers’ market closed down for the winter, the stalls were busier than ever. Squashes, melons, and even some early pumpkins were piled high, and bushels of apples gave the entire open air market a fresh scent. A mule from the team of one of the hobby farmers blinked at Moira as she