Plateful of Murder Read Online Free

security guards as anything but cast-offs. So we play respectful, but it ain’t what any of us feel.”
    It was obvious he didn’t like the police. That could make it easier for me to get some information he didn’t give up to them. Besides, this guy had underdog written all over him. I could identify with that. “Yeah, they don’t always pick up on what a guy on the inside, like you, knows.”
    “Got that right. Take Miss Adler. Why’d anyone want her dead?”
    Not knowing if it was a rhetorical question or not, I waited.
    He leaned on the wall with his foot flat against it. “Could be some folks think her latest lover got possessive. My money, though, is on a bigwig’s missus.”
    “Really? Did you see something that night?” Had he noticed Eagleton’s wife stomp out of the building after she’d confronted me?
    “Nah. I’m just shootin’ the breeze.” He pitched the toothpick into the trashcan. “Anyway, I gotta go make my rounds.” He ambled off.
    I followed and handed him my business card. “If anything you think is important comes to mind, please call me.”
    He shot me a look that told me not to hold my breath. But he did take the card.
    I got back in my car and called Michael. The picture he’d painted of Constance didn’t match the one everyone else gave me. Either he didn’t really know his sister or he’d purposely left out the more colorful aspects of her life. Which was which? I’d worked with untrustworthy clients before, but those were on he-said-she-said cheating spouse cases. Dishonesty was the basis for those situations. I had only taken on this case because Michael seemed so needy and alone. Now I realized he may not be what he appeared to be. Nor so alone. Lies about his sister could be keeping him company.
    Needing to dig into the facts of the real Constance, I headed back to my office. My computer was firing up when my phone rang. I checked to see who it was, hoping the guard, Ed, had a revelation.
    No such luck. It was my Aunt Lena. Why now?
    “Claire, honey. Did you forget? You were supposed to come help me at the cafe. Your father’s here, but he keeps trying to dip a spoon into the whipped cream. I can’t hold him off forever.”
    I pushed my hair away from my forehead. “No, I didn’t.” I did . “I’m in the middle of a client’s case but I can wrap it up and be there before you know it.”
    My aunt sighed. “Hurry. I need you here. We’re crazy with customers.” Her voice got louder, “Frank, put that spoon down.”
    Like the rest of the women in my family, my aunt thinks nothing of having two or three conversations at once, so before she got involved with my dad, I looked at my watch. “Give me twenty minutes.” I hung up and frowned, realizing my miscalculation. It’d take me at least twenty-five minutes to get there.
    All the way to my aunt’s bakery, Cannoli’s , I tried to fit everything about Constance’s murder and what she was really like, together. It was a puzzle where you have the border pieces, but none of the inside ones. Impossible to make out the picture.
    I drove past the bakery’s front window and noticed my father standing there. No doubt assigned by Aunt Lena to watch for me.
    Before I got through the restaurant’s kitchen door, my aunt confronted me, waving a mixing paddle around. Dots of cream flew everywhere. “Your father’s gonna eat me out of business.”
    I kissed her flushed cheek. “Sorry.”
    She sniffed, which meant I wasn’t totally forgiven. “Everything’s going crazy. Kiss your father hello, then take over at the counter.”
    I rang up enough cakes and pastries to give half of Ohio diabetes. My feet screamed for mercy. Aunt Lena was the official owner of C annoli’ s but the whole family had agreed to pitch in while her niece Josie, daughter of her deceased husband’s brother and her kitchen assistant, was nearing the end of her second pregnancy. A twinge of guilt plucked at my heart when I realized so far, my