“He had some men friends. Ziggy Garvey and Benny Colucci. And a couple others.”

“Anyone who drove a white Cadillac?”

“Eddie's been driving a white Cadillac. His car's been on the fritz and he borrowed a Cadillac from someone. I don't know who. He kept it parked in the alley behind the garage.”

“Did Loretta Ricci visit often?”

“So far as I know that was the first time she visited Eddie. Loretta was a volunteer with that Meals-on-Wheels program for seniors. I saw her go in with a box about suppertime. I figure someone told her Eddie was depressed and not eating right. Or maybe Eddie signed up. Although I can't see Eddie doing something like that.”

“Did you see Loretta leave?”

“I didn't exactly see her leave, but I noticed the car was gone. She must have been in there for about an hour.”

“How about gunshots?” Lula asked. “Did you hear her get whacked? Did you hear screaming?”

“I didn't hear any screaming,” Angela said. “Mom's deaf as a post. Once Mom puts the television on you can't hear anything in here. And the television is on from six to eleven. Would you like some coffee cake? I got a nice almond ring from the bakery.”

I thanked Angela for the coffee cake offer but told her Lula and Bob and I had to keep on the job.

We exited the Marguchi house and stepped next door to the DeChooch half. The DeChooch half was off limits, of course, ringed with crime-scene tape, still part of an ongoing investigation. There were no cops guarding the integrity of the house or shed, so I assumed they'd worked hard yesterday to finish the collection of evidence.

“We probably shouldn't go in here, being that the tape's still up,” Lula said.

I agreed. “The police wouldn't like it.”

“Of course, we were in there yesterday. We probably got prints all over the place.”

“So you're thinking it wouldn't matter if we went in today?”

“Well, it wouldn't matter if nobody found out about it,” Lula said.

“And I have a key so it isn't actually breaking and entering.” Problem is, I sort of stole the key.

As a bond enforcement officer I also have the right to enter the fugitive's house if I have good reason to suspect he's there. And if push came to shove, I'm sure I could come up with a good reason. I might be lacking a bunch of bounty hunter skills, but I can fib with the best of them.

“Maybe you should see if that's really Eddie's house key,” Lula said. “You know, test it out.”

I inserted the key into the lock and the door swung open. “Damn,” Lula said. “Look at what happened now. The door's open.”

We scooted into the dark foyer and I closed and locked the door behind us.

“You take lookout,” I said to Lula. “I don't want to be surprised by the police or by Eddie.”

“You can count on me,” Lula said. “Lookout's my middle name.”

I started in the kitchen, going through the cabinets and drawers, thumbing through the papers on the counter. I was doing the Hansel and Gretel thing, looking for a bread crumb that would start me on a trail. I was hoping for a phone number scribbled on a napkin, or maybe a map with a big orange arrow pointing to a local motel. What I found was the usual flotsam that collects in all kitchens. Eddie had knives and forks and dishes and soup bowls that had been bought by Mrs. DeChooch and used for the life of her marriage. There were no dirty dishes left on the counter. Everything was neatly stacked in the cupboards. Not a lot of food in the refrigerator, but it was better stocked than mine. A small carton of milk, some sliced turkey breast from Giovichinni's Meat Market, eggs, a stick of butter, condiments.

I prowled through a small downstairs powder room, the dining room, and living room. I peered into the coat closet and searched coat pockets while Lula watched the street through a break in the living room drape.

I climbed the stairs and searched the bedrooms, still hoping to find a bread crumb. The beds were all neatly made. There was a crossword book on the nightstand in the master bedroom. No bread crumbs. I moved on to the bathroom. Clean sink. Clean tub. Medicine chest filled to bursting with Darvon, aspirin, seventeen different kinds of antacids, sleeping pills, a jar of Vicks, denture cleaner, hemorrhoid cream.

The window over the tub was unlocked. I climbed into the tub and looked out. DeChooch's escape seemed possible. I got out of the tub and out of the bathroom. I stood in the hall and thought about Loretta Ricci. There was no sign of her in this house. No bloodstains. No indication of struggle. The house was unusually clean and tidy. I'd noticed this yesterday, too, when I'd gone through looking for DeChooch.

No notes scribbled on the pad by the phone. No matchbooks from restaurants tossed on the kitchen counter. No socks on the floor. No laundry in the bathroom hamper. Hey, what do I know? Maybe depressed old men get obsessively neat. Or maybe DeChooch spent the entire night scrubbing the blood from his floors and then did the laundry. Bottom line is no bread crumbs.

I returned to the living room and made an effort not to grimace. There was one place left to look. The cellar. Yuck. Cellars in houses like this were always dark and creepy, with rumbly oil burners and cobwebby rafters.

“Well, I suppose I should look in the cellar now,” I said to Lula.

Tags: Janet Evanovich Stephanie Plum Mystery
Source: readsnovelonline.net