Read Online Town in a Strawberry Swirl (Candy Holliday Mystery) by B.B. Haywood - Free Book Online

speeding back to town for another meeting. Any suspicions Candy had about her were purely circumstantial.
    Still . . .
    “Look, I’m not trying to get anyone in trouble, but I might have witnessed some suspicious activity on my way out here this morning.”
    The policewoman’s dark eyes narrowed. “Might have? What type of suspicious activity are we talking about?”
    “Well, I think I possibly saw someone fleeing the premises.”
    “The premises? You mean you saw someone leaving this farm? Who exactly are we talking about?”
    Again, a hesitation, but Candy took a deep breath and pressed on. “Lydia St. Graves.”
    Doc looked surprised. “You saw Lydia out here?”
    “Well, no, not out here at the farm. But I think I saw her driving away from it.” And Candy explained how Lydia, in her silver BMW convertible, had come blazing out of nowhere and run her right off the road.
    “And when did this happen? How long ago?”
    Candy told her.
    The policewoman checked her watch. “So about half an hour ago or so?”
    Candy nodded. “That sounds right.”
    “I’d better let the chief know.” Officer Prospect picked up a walkie-talkie sitting on the top of the dashboard, clicked a side button, and exchanged a few quick words with Chief Durr up at the hoophouse.
    “We’ll send a car over to her office to check it out,” the policewoman told Candy after she’d finished talking to the chief, “and I’ll need to fill out an incident report.”
    “Of course,” Candy said, and ten minutes later, with that complete, they turned back to the list of visitors to Blueberry Acres. “The chief wants us to remain focused on the shovel,” Officer Prospect informed Doc and Candy as she tapped the list, which was attached to a clipboard.
    They wound up with twenty-seven names, including Doc’s and Candy’s. That worried her, knowing they were suspects themselves. And even though she knew she could prove neither of them had anything to do with Miles’s murder, their shovel had been found at the crime scene, and as the chief had said, that meant they were involved. At the very least they were responsible for letting the shovel slip through their hands, whenever and however that had happened.
    As they reviewed the list again, Officer Prospect prodded Doc and Candy for additional information. “Can you think of anyone else who might have taken the shovel?” she asked in a coaxing tone. “Anyone out at the farm who might have looked suspicious? Anyone borrowing tools or asking odd questions? Or were there any strange incidents you can think of? Has something special or out of the ordinary happened over the past few months?”
    Doc considered the questions, rubbing his chin. “Well, there were a few milestones, of course. I turned seventy a few months ago, in April.”
    The policewoman brightened. “Oh, I didn’t know that! Happy birthday, Doc!”
    He grinned. “Why, thank you, Molly.”
    “Sure thing.” The policewoman’s expression turned serious again. “So did you have a party? Was it out at the farm?”
    “Yes, there was a party, but no, not at the farm.”
    “We held it at the Lightkeeper’s Inn,” Candy explained. “Maggie and I arranged it.”
    “How many people were there?”
    Candy shrugged. “Forty or fifty.”
    “Any of them out at Blueberry Acres?”
    “Other than the names on the list, no.”
    “Hmm.” The officer thought a moment, but sensing a dead end, she moved on. “So was there anything else? Any other unique or out-of-the-ordinary events? Some time when you might have used the shovel—when you might have done some digging or something like that?”
    Candy and Doc considered the question, and Doc looked like he was about to speak up, but before he could say anything, the walkie-talkie squawked to life. It was Chief Durr. “Molly, are you just about finished down there? I need you up here right away,” he said amid a crackle of static.
    Officer Prospect picked up the walkie-talkie