All In The Family Read Online Free Page B

spare William the need for a response. She reached her car door and footsteps sounded behind her.
    “Callie, wait.” William said as he followed closely behind Berry.
    “You didn’t give us a chance to invite you to dinner,” Berry said.
    Callie opened her car door and slid inside. Poor William . Berry wasn’t about to give up.
    “How about Saturday evening – say around six, six thirty?” William looked down at her.
    “I...” what the heck, what did she have to lose? Besides, she liked him. “Sure, Saturday is fine. Where should I meet you?”
    “How about we pick you up?”
    “Okay, listen I really have to run.” Callie pulled the car door closed. “See you Saturday.” She started the car and pulled away before she realized they didn’t know where she lived. Oh well. They could call the station and find out. Right now, she had a missing person’s case to deal with.
     
     
    Chapter 4
     
     
    Callie pulled up in front of Shirley’s house, got out of her car, and walked up the path. Nice house. Small , but typical for most of the houses in this town. Well-kept yard, lawn recently mowed, leaves raked. She went inside.
    “What’s going on, Peters?”
    “Like I told you on the phone – missing person. Sister says she hasn’t seen or heard from Shirley in three days.”
    “Yeah I got that. She called me too.” When the call came in from Shirley’s sister, Misty, Callie didn’t take it seriously. After all Shirley’s a grown woman free to come and go as she pleased. “Maybe Shirley took a last minute trip.”
    “Misty insisted that she and Shirley talked everyday – sometimes two or three times a day. She knows something bad happened to Shirley.”
    “So why do you think it’s something different?” This wasn’t making a lot of sense to Callie. Something just didn’t feel right about it all.
    “Misty said she talked to Shirley’s neighbors and no one has seen her, and the car’s gone too.”  Officer Peters ran his fingers under his collar and squirmed.
    “All that proves is she took the car.”
    “Yeah but Misty and Shirley were close. She wouldn’t have gone off on a trip without telling her sister.”
    “Maybe, maybe not. I’ve heard Shirley and Misty didn’t always get along.”
    Officer Peters shrugged. “True, but three days. They never went that long without talking. Misty came over tonight to check things out. She hesitated about going in for fear of messing up a crime scene. So she called me.”
    “Okay. Let’s check it out.” Callie went inside and looked around. Small, neat living room and kitchen. Few dirty dishes on the sink. That wasn’t like Shirley. Everything else was meticulous. A place for everything and everything in its place. That was Shirley. She headed toward the bedroom.  
    Something didn’t look right. Something out of place? Missing? Or maybe moved around?  Nothing appeared out of the ordinary, but something wasn’t right.  Callie looked around the room again. Did that lamp always sit at an angle like that? Had the table been moved? Darn, what was it? Maybe the jewelry.  Did Shirley always leave her jewelry scattered about like that? It almost looked as if she came home late, removed her earrings, necklace, and watch and threw it on the dresser without a care as to how it landed.
    “That’s it, the watch!”
    “What?” Officer Peters looked up.
    “Huh, oh sorry, talking to myself.” Darn, she hadn’t meant to speak aloud. But the watch told her Shirley hadn’t left voluntarily. Shirley treasured that watch. Her grandparents gave it to her over twenty years ago when she graduated high school. She even had it repaired a few times.
    Shirley said it was the last thing they gave her before their fatal car accident. Shirley’s grandparents had raised her, and though the watch wasn’t expensive, Shirley rarely took it off.  Nope, she’d never leave home without it. Shirley wouldn’t have thrown it so carelessly on the dresser either. She