Beach Blanket Homicide (Lucy McGuffin, Psychic Amateur Detective 1)

“Positive. Sebastian specifically told me when he saw Abby she had the dog with her.”

“So someone else brought the dog into the rec center?

“Yep. And I’d bet a dozen of my best apple walnut cream cheese muffins that it’s the same person who unlocked the door. If we can find out who had the key, then we’ll know…well, we’ll know something important, that’s for sure.”

“Golly.” She glances nervously off to the side. “And you think maybe it was the brother?”

“He has a pretty good motive for wanting to get rid of Abby. She left him everything. And he certainly likes to wave a gun around. Plus, Officer Fontaine told me Derrick’s been arrested before. For assault.”

Cindy shudders. “I get so worried when Rusty has to deal with these criminal types.”

Since Rusty is a cop, I’m not sure what to say here.

“Rusty and Travis have been interrogating Derrick for a while now, huh?”

She nods. “At least thirty minutes.”

“I sure would love to know what’s going on in there.”

Cindy doesn’t say anything.

“You know, on T.V. they always show those interrogations taking place in one room while another cop is in the next room looking through one of those two-way mirrors and listening in through a speaker.”

“Oh yeah, isn’t that cool?”

“The Whispering Bay police department wouldn’t happen to have one of those rooms, would they?”

“Nah. We’re not big enough for anything that fancy.”

“Oh.” I can’t hide my disappointment.

“But we have an intercom system.”

“Really?”

“Sure. That way if someone in the room needs something they just have to call out for it. And vice versa. If I need to speak to the cop in the room, then I just call in.”

“So, you could also use the intercom to listen in?”

Cindy’s cheeks go red. “Technically, I suppose I could do that.”

Technically, my butt. Cindy has listened in before. And not just once or twice either.

“Thirty minutes seems like a long time to be interrogating someone about a simple trespassing case, doesn’t it?” I let that sink in. “You know, I would never tell anyone if you accidentally hit the intercom button.”

She wets her bottom lip. “If we make any noise, then they’ll know we’re listening.”

“I promise, I’ll be quiet as a mouse.”

She smiles coyly. “Okay.” She hits a button next to her phone.

Derrick’s voice is the first one we hear. “So I took the dog. Sue me.”

Well, this at least is the truth.

At the sound of Derrick’s voice, Paco’s body goes tense. Using my eyes, I plead with him to stay silent. Luckily, he seems to understand.

“The dog was being abused,” Derrick continues. “Left out in the yard with no food or water. The way I see it, I was doing the m