Beach Town Trouble (A Port Grace Cozy Mystery Book 2) by Emily Page Read Free Book Online Page A

with me.”
    “Be my guest, honey,” said Crimbleton with a shake of her head. “That dog’s got too much energy for me. Hold on good and tight to his leash.”
    “You got it.”
    “You actually like that slobbering thing?” said Rutherford through a mouthful of cheese Danish.
    “He’s a heck of a lot cuter than you, Rutherford,” said Georgia, making Peak choke on his coffee. As he hacked and sputtered through his laughter, Georgia knelt down to unlatch Cupcake’s cage. “You want to go for a walk, sweet boy?”
    Cupcake barked and wagged his tail. As soon as Georgia freed the latch, Cupcake flew out and jumped on Georgia, knocking her out of her crouch and onto her butt. He covered her face in kisses.
    “All right, all right. Down, boy,” she said in as stern a voice as she could muster through her smile as she pushed him off and hooked on his leash.
    The front door to the station opened and a gray-haired man in a white lab coat came in, looking flushed. Cupcake’s tail went crazy at the sight of a visitor, and he lunged against the leash. Georgia was ready for him, though, and kept him in place.
    “Cupcake, sit,” she said, snapping and pointing a finger at the floor.
    Cupcake looked back at her and whined, but his butt plopped onto the floor.
    “Good dog.”
    “I need to speak to the chief right now,” said the man.
    “Coroner Jenkins?” said Crimbleton, coming out of her office. “What is it?”
    “Tim Skimmerhorn’s body is missing! His son came to collect it for the funeral—did you know he had a son?—and I pulled open the drawer and it was empty! I looked everywhere.”
    “Somebody stole the body?” said Crimbleton, looking like she might puke.
    “Yes, I think so.”
    “Rutherford, you go down to the—”
    The wail of a fire engine right outside the station cut Crimbleton off. She watched it go past, and before she could recover, the phone rang. Peak answered.
    “Good Lord,” he said into the phone. “You know what started it? Yeah, okay.”
    He hung up and turned to Crimbleton.
    “The woods are on fire just off Blair Road. Fire department is asking for assistance.”
    “Let me guess,” said Georgia. “There are only three firefighters around here, too?”
    “Five, actually,” said Crimbleton.
    “Chief, that’s not all,” said Peak. “The motorist who called it in said they saw a crazy old lady dancing around in the woods near the fire.”
    “Oh my God,” said Georgia. “Camila! Chief, I’m coming with you.”
    “Then put the dog back and hurry your skinny butt up.”
    Georgia coaxed Cupcake back into his crate with pats and sweet words.
    “I’m so sorry, buddy,” she said as she closed the cage door. “I’ll be back, don’t worry. We’ll go on a walk.”
    Instead of taking multiple cars to the scene of a fire, they all crammed into the police cruiser—Georgia up front with Crimbleton and the two deputies in the back. They could see the smoke almost as soon as they pulled out of the lot. Crimbleton followed it, and soon the fire engine came into sight. They parked next to it and got out.
    “I still don’t see the fire,” said Georgia.
    Crimbleton got in contact with the firefighters on her car radio.
    “This way,” she said, rejoining them. “They said follow the path. Hanson said to get our handcuffs ready.”
    The path led them to a clearing in the woods with a couple picnic benches set up in it. In the center was an ugly, makeshift pyre spouting up flames almost as high as the trees. Something was in the center, wrapped in blackened, smoking cloth. Georgia squinted into the flames and made out a hand. She looked away with her hands on her knees, feeling queasy.
    “Oh my God! She’s burning his body,” she said.
    Camila was dancing around the pyre, or at least she was doing what passed for dancing at eighty years old, seemingly oblivious to the commotion she was causing.
    “She acts like she can’t hear us,” said the fire chief. The name on his