Death Takes a Ride (The Cate Kinkaid Files Book #3): A Novel by Lorena McCourtney Read Free Book Online Page A

between the hospital and river.
    “I don’t see any man stuff around, so I guess you’re not married?” Shirley asked.
    The unexpected question momentarily jolted Cate. No subtle small talk before getting right into the nosy stuff for Shirley.
    “No, not married.”
    “Boyfriend?”
    Answering that question was a little more complicated. Cate and Mitch had a steady relationship, but he was still uncomfortable with her being a private investigator and kept offering her a job at his Computer Solutions Dudes company. Although he’d given her a special pen that was really a video camera, great for the possibility of undercover work, plus a voice-activated wrist cell phone, and he’d several times helped with her PI cases. He was closer to boyfriend than non boyfriend. “Um, yeah, I guess I have a boyfriend.”
    “Of course you do.” Shirley’s hazel eyes appraised Cate. “You’re nowhere near fifty, and you’re definitely fit and fabulous.”
    “I don’t know about that . . . though I thank you for the compliment. You know, you can still go to the Fit and Fabulous sessions even if you missed that first one,” Cate said. “There’s more to it than just the fitness stuff.”
    “I’ve never been much on churchgoing. Will this woman, uh, preach at us?” Shirley’s eyebrows scrunched, as if this might be a deal breaker.
    “I don’t think there will be any actual sermons, but the speaker is supposed to have some good insights on connecting faith with being fit and fabulous.” Now, given Shirley’s blunt questions and comments, Cate shot back a few of her own. “How about you? Married?”
    “I was. Thirty-six years. But Hatch got killed three years ago.”
    “I’m sorry to hear that.” Impulsively Cate added, “I’ll bet he thought you were fabulous.”
    Shirley looked surprised, then smiled and nodded. “I think he did. Though that word would never have occurred to him.”
    “You lived over on the coast?”
    “Hatch and I had a commercial fishing boat for years, and he always bragged that I could clean a fish as fast as he could, and a crab even faster.” Shirley’s smile turned rueful. “But, yeah, I need the fabulous stuff. You don’t see anyone bragging about fish- and crab-cleaning talents on those internet dating sites.”
    Cate hadn’t visited any of them, but she figured Shirley’s statement was probably accurate. “Boyfriend?”
    “Before Mr. Blakely came down from Salem, he asked me to go to dinner with him after his meeting with Mr. Halliday last night. He told me to call him Kane too. We have a larger inventory of parts here than in the Salem branch, so Kane and I often talk on the phone or email back and forth.”
    “More than business talk?”
    Shirley’s ruddy cheeks reddened further. “Sometimes.”
    “I’m assuming you said you’d go to dinner with him?”
    “No, I told him I couldn’t go, because I’d already promised Rebecca I’d be at the meeting. She sounded so friendly and nice. I think she was concerned that not many women had signed up, and I told her I’d be there for sure.”
    So, if Shirley made a commitment, she kept it. Even if it meant missing dinner with an attractive man who interested her. Admirable.
    “But then I got up my nerve and suggested, since he was spending the night in Eugene, maybe we could go out for breakfast. And he said great.”
    “Good for you! He probably thinks you’re fabulous already.”
    Shirley shook her head. “When he got here, he said hewouldn’t be able to make breakfast after all because he had to meet with a client.” Shirley brushed a finger over her right eyebrow, which, in some misguided attempt at taming, she’d plucked to the skinny line of a road to nowhere on a map. “Maybe that was true. But I think, after he met me in person, he just changed his mind.” Her throat moved in a hard swallow.
    “So he gave you his dog to babysit for the evening.” Cate couldn’t keep the indignation out of her