Nefarious Doings by Ilsa Evans Read Free Book Online Page B

out. ‘Well, well, well.’
    ‘I’m confused.’ Lucy leant forward. ‘Does that mean Grandma
did
kill him? How?’
    ‘Exactly,’ said Ruby. ‘It’s impossible. I know she can be, well, a bit of a bitch, but she just doesn’t have the physical strength to kill a grown man … does she?’
    ‘It was the wife,’ said Quinn emphatically. ‘Not that I blame her. But then … how did she get the body over the fence? She’s not very big.’
    ‘Unless she had outside help.’ I recalled the earlier conversations at the house. ‘They had an argument last night. Dustin and his wife. Apparently he had a fight with your grandmother too. The police even came and spoke to them.’
    Scarlet nodded. ‘Aha! That also means there was no-one else there, not then. So unless someone else came along later, to give the wife a hand, then one of the neighbours must have helped. Or she wasn’t involved and the neighbour did it all. Get it?’
    ‘Wait … what?’
    ‘Otherwise it makes no sense,’ continued Scarlet. ‘I mean, some random wouldn’t kill a bloke and then cart his body into his
neighbour’s
garage and set it alight. For starters they wouldn’t even know the area, or that only an old woman lived there, or that the garage had a back door which was open.’
    Ruby asked the question for us all. ‘But then, which neighbour?’
    ‘That I don’t know. Perhaps one who also had a grudge against Grandma. But …’ Scarlet scrambled to her feet, pushing the pizza box aside. ‘We can narrow it down. Back in a sec.’
    On the television the newsreader was now flirting with the weather girl. I wondered if he had a middle-aged wife at home, watching this. I reached for the remote control and turned the TV off just as Scarlet returned, along with the large whiteboard from the wall of her room and a handful of markers. She propped the board in front of the television and then drew what looked like two large penises.
    ‘Vomit,’ said Quinn succinctly.
    ‘Is that one on the left circumcised?’ asked Ruby, leaning closer. ‘It’s got a helluva –’
    ‘Shut up, you idiots.’ Scarlet drew a connecting line between the two penises. ‘This is McIvor Highway and these two are Lincoln Court and Small Dairy Lane. And now we’re going to fill in the houses with occupants and motives. We’ll have this solved in no time.’
    I sat forward. ‘Good idea. Let’s start with Lincoln Court, because it’s least likely.’
    ‘Not necessarily.’ Scarlet swapped the black marker for a green one and then drew the plant nursery on the corner of Lincoln Court and the highway, which went almost all the way up the left-hand side of the court. ‘Okay, next?’
    ‘Next is a vacant block, I think it belongs to the nursery, and then at the top of the court is the Russo place. Michael and Lyn. Do you remember the eldest, Jackson, went out with Red a few times?’
    ‘And Griffin’s in my year,’ put in Quinn.
    ‘Okay, so that’s Quinn’s boyfriend’s place then.’ Scarlet filled in the outline of the house with tiny writing. ‘Next!’
    ‘He’s not my boyfriend!’
    ‘Next door is Kat Caldwell and she has kids as well. I think the eldest is a friend of Quinn.’
    ‘No he’s not! And Griffin Russo isn’t my boyfriend!’
    ‘So far we can mark these houses by their relationship to Quinn,’ said Ruby. ‘A boyfriend here, a boyfriend there. Which means Quinn is moving up the list of suspects. What’s next?’
    ‘Mum! Make her stop!’
    ‘Enough.’ I spoke without taking my eyes off the board. ‘Now here’s where it gets interesting, because these next three all back on to houses on Small Dairy Lane. First is Berry Pembroke. She lives alone, bit older than me. Remember the lady we bought guinea pigs off when you were little? Her house backs on to Jim and Rita Hurley. Then there’s Leon Chaucer, who owns Majic Art Gallery in town.’
    ‘Yum,’ said Scarlet.
    ‘Gay,’ said Ruby.
    ‘Could be. Besides, I'd prefer you