Gone Crazy by Shannon Hill Read Free Book Online Page B

got no first impression. Davis was not a guy you’d get to know if he had anything to say about it. The man was walking camouflage. The tan pants, buff shirt, dark colorless tie were just like his generic haircut, meant to keep people from looking twice. He took me back to his office, a rigidly organized cubicle, and eyed Boris with misgiving. “There are health regulations.”
    “Boris already used his litter box,” I said. I sat down on a hard plastic chair. Boris perched on the paperwork. Davis flicked a single eyelash, then folded his hands. “You wanted to ask about my mother?”
    “I’d like to ask how things work in your family, that you are all so convinced one of you killed her.”
    That didn’t faze him at all. Without changing expression, he ran down his siblings. Ken was an ass, and so was Beau; Eileen was hopeless, Honey vicious, and Laura sanctimonious. Army was “waiting to die” and Rob lacked personality, while Jeff was “harmless”, but Buck and Marilee were “okay”. Then he asked, politely, “Is this over now?”
    It wasn’t. I prodded, “And what did you think of your mother?”
    He tipped his head to one side. He smiled thinly. “Mama was a hard woman. We had our differences. But she did her best with what she had. That’s all anyone can ask.”
    It was rehearsed. I recognized it as the same kind of spiel I’d give people who asked me how I felt about the Ellers and Littlepages.
    “But to be honest, Sheriff,” he went on, getting up to show me out, “every family has its problems. Ours weren’t enough to kill over.”
    Boris’s tail switched hard, twice. I glanced at the daily specials as I left. One was a sautéed veggie sandwich that included mushrooms. Call me paranoid but a guy who ran a restaurant might just know about toxic fungi.
    ***^***
    After all those Colliers, what I wanted was to put up my feet, watch TV, and sulk. But I had to go back to Aunt Marge’s, where TV was for news and education and DVDs and PBS, not getting over a bad day. I went to the office instead, and put my feet up on my desk, dangling Boris’s favorite toy, a squirrel tail. He leapt up, grabbed it in his teeth, and flung it into the air, to pounce on it again. Then he bit it, held it to himself with his forelegs, and went into a mock disembowelment. He looked up wildly, mouth open on a snarl, and then rolled over before he sprang to his feet and charged up his cat condo. I tossed the squirrel tail after him, and he settled down to groom it. I envied him. I needed a squirrel tail.
    I got Tom Hutchins, coming in for a break. “Hey,” he said genially. “Get the message?”
    I read the pink slip. Marilee couldn’t call; her youngest was in the ER. “Thank God,” I said, glad to be off that hook for now. “You get Harry’s call?”
    “Yep. I had a couple ideas. About the inventory, I mean. Why not get Kim in to help?”
    Tom’s crush was an open secret, except to Kim, who managed to remain oblivious. But he had a good point. “Good idea. We need an army, though.”
    “Well, what about Punk Sims?”
    Punk Sims was a county police officer, or had been until he’d lost control of his car during an ice storm and lost his leg from the knee down. No idea how he got the nickname, but since his given name was Purdy, Punk was a step up.
    “Good idea,” I said.
    Tom’s face went hard. “Yeah, well, y’know he doesn’t need two legs to be useful.”
    “We should see if we can sign him on as a deputy, help fill in some shifts now and then,” I suggested, mostly to make Tom happy. I knew Maury wouldn’t have the budget. “He got a prosthesis?”
    “Yeah. Ain’t much but he gets around fine with a cane these days.”
    One problem solved, a million to go. I updated him on the Collier situation, and he winced along with me a few times. “Damn.” He sighed. “Mushrooms. Hey!”
    I jumped. Boris jumped.
    “I got a cousin, he’s a what-you-call-it, mushroom expert. Does botany at Tech. We