Grave Undertaking Read Online Free Page B

Might be the murder weapon. They also found a wallet. Samuel E. Calhoun, assuming the wallet belonged to the skeleton.”
    “Never heard of him,” said Tommy Lee.
    “Ewbanks had. New York P.I. evidently trying to get work down here. Had a North Carolina driver’s license recently issued.”
    “Recently?”
    “I mean recently related to when Ewbanks thinks Calhoun’s body was buried. The original grave had been dug in the spring of ’97. It would make sense that whoever shot Calhoun put the body in a fresh grave where no one would notice turned earth. The driver’s license was dated February ’97.”
    “That’s good. Gives Horace a point to backtrack.”
    “There was also a picture in the wallet the sheriff will backtrack.”
    Tommy Lee stared at me through the wire. A few flakes rested on his black patch, but his good eye was clear and curious. He sensed we had come to the reason we were standing out in the snow. “Whose picture?”
    “Susan Miller.”
    For a few seconds, all I heard was the cooing of the pigeons. Tommy Lee stood as frozen as the snow around us.
    “I haven’t said anything to her,” I added.
    “Well, you’re going to have to. I take it you didn’t tell Ewbanks.”
    “No. He didn’t know who she was. Reverend Pace was there for the grave transfer, but he’d gone up to talk to the reporters before the photograph was discovered.”
    “Reporters?”
    “A NEWSCHANNEL-8 crew arrived. I doubt if Ewbanks told them much of anything. The lab men took the photo along with the other evidence. Then I came here. The sheriff wants to sift all the dirt before we move the vault. That might be after the storm.”
    Tommy Lee looked up at the sky. “Could be a couple days. Now that we’ve broken the ice, let’s get by that fire. I want to hear everything that happened.”

Chapter 4
    Susan opened the door before I had a chance to ring the bell.
    “I’m so glad you came over.” She stood smiling on the threshold wearing a long-sleeved denim shirt hanging over black jeans. Her brown hair was pulled back in a ponytail, and her face glowed with a vitality impossible to capture in any makeup bottle. She held up her hands and puckered her lips, a kiss-but-don’t-touch gesture. Tufts of white feathers sprouted from her fingers.
    “Are you molting?” I asked, giving her a quick peck on the mouth.
    “I’m feathering my nest.” She looked past me to the swirling snowflakes visible in the light spilling from her open door. “Isn’t it wonderful? I couldn’t help myself. I had to stop.”
    She was giddy. I felt sick to my stomach. My news would melt her joy faster than an August sun. “Stop from what?”
    “You used to be a cop,” she teased. “Figure it out.” She pointed to her Subaru Forester in her parking space and then down at the ground.
    I could see a depression scooped in the snow from the rear of the Subaru to her front door.
    “I’ll give you a hint,” she said. “It’s not a body.”
    She didn’t know I had a body on my mind. But, that was what it looked like—a body dragged up the sidewalk and into her condo. Then I noticed scattered green needles peeking through the white powder.
    “You got a Christmas tree.”
    She clapped her feathered hands together like a six-year-old. “Lying on a sheet in front of the fireplace. That’s how I dragged it in. Old lady Grimshaw across the way was peering from her window. Probably thought it was a victim of my surgical skills. She’s as much as told me women should have babies, not careers.”
    I looked back across the parking lot to the opposite condo. A sliver of light winked out as the nosey neighbor yanked closed the crack in her drapes. “And now the undertaker shows up,” I said. “Well, let’s hope she stays awake all night wondering if she’s next.”
    Susan stepped back and beckoned me into her living room. “Come on. I want to introduce you to a Miller tradition.”
    I stomped my feet on her welcome mat and followed her