Cadbury Creme Murder by Susan Gillard Page A

outside cleaning up my yard.  I guess I forgot to take my phone out with
me.”
     
    “As
long as you’re okay,” he said.
     
    “I’m
fine.  Amy was here with me, so we hid in the closet together.  She went home
to check out the damage at her place.”
    “Looks
like most of Hillside got off pretty light,” he said.
     
    “Have
you been out looking around?”
     
    “No. 
I’ve been listening to the radio,” he said, referring to his police radio. 
“Not too many calls.”
     
    “That’s
good,” she said.  “At least, hopefully, no one was out murdering anybody in the
storm, so maybe you won’t get called out.”
     
    Ryan
was a detective on the Hillside Police Department.  Their first date had been a
little over two months ago, and they’d seen each other several times since
then.  Their relationship was moving slowly, but she was okay with that.  Ryan
was a widower, and she didn’t want to rush him into anything if he wasn’t
ready.  She had been married for 5 years, then divorced.  If she ever got into
a serious relationship again, she wanted to make sure it was with the right
person this time.
     
    “Yeah,
hopefully not,” he said.  “So do you—”  He paused, and she could hear radio
chatter in the background.
     
    “I
may have spoken too soon,” he said suddenly.  “I’ll call you back.”  Then he
was gone.
     
    She
sighed.  That was the problem with dating a police detective.  You never knew
when duty might call. 
     
    Oh,
well.  He was worth it.
     
    ***
     
    She
checked her text messages and found one from Amy that read, Everything’s ok.
Yard’s a mess.  No major damage.  
     
    She
texted back, Good.   Then she flipped on the TV to one of the major
networks to see if whatever call Ryan had just gotten was on the news.  It
wasn’t—not yet, at least—so she went to the kitchen to scrounge around in the
fridge and see what she could find for supper.
     
    Supper
wound up being a salad.  She put the last of a tub of lettuce into a large
bowl, added some olive oil and balsamic vinaigrette, and tossed it all
together.  A few croutons and some sunflower seeds gave the salad some crunch.
     
    She
ate it as she sat on the couch watching TV, but there was nothing about Ryan’s
call.  Just as she forked the last bite of salad into her mouth, her phone
rang, and the screen showed his name.  “Hello?” she mumbled around a mouthful
of lettuce.
     
    “Heather,
you’re not going to like this,” he said.
     
    Sometimes,
his way of getting right to the point was endearing.  Other times, like now, it
made the bottom drop out of her stomach.  “What happened?” she asked.
     
    “There
was one fatality due to the storm.  It’s Verna Dixon.”
     
    “Verna
Dixon?  Isn’t she the lady who lives out on the edge of town?  Who serves on
the library board and works at the hospital and serves on about a thousand
committees?”
     
    “Yes,
that Verna.”
    “That’s
a shame.  What happened to her?”
     
    “She
was found halfway between her home and the chicken coop she had out back. 
Apparently a piece of wood from the chicken coop was torn off by the wind.  It
caught Verna in the chest.  Straight in.”
     
    “Oh,
no,” Heather sighed.  “That’s too bad.  Poor Verna.”
     
    “I’m
on my way out there right now.  Told patrol not to touch anything until I get
there.”
     
    “Why? 
If her death was due to the storm, I mean.”
     
    “I
just want to make sure.”
     
    “Well,
either way, it’s sad,” she said.  “I’m going to miss Verna.  I didn’t know her
very well, but I had met her and talked with her several times.  She was always
friendly.”
     
    “I’ll
let you know what I find out.”
     
    ***
     
    As
Heather was brushing her teeth before bed, having already slipped into a cotton
t-shirt-and-capris pajama set, she heard the notification tone from her phone
indicating that she had received a text.
     
    She
rinsed her mouth and