Murder by Numbers by Kaye Morgan

be more willing to look into some places that the police wouldn’t think of.”
    â€œIt’s your neck on the line,” Kevin said. “I sure can’t stop you.”
    â€œExactly.” Liza looked down at Rusty, still pulling on the leash. “Somebody else has his neck on the line right now. I need to get this pup moving.”
    She set off up Main Street with Rusty, leaving an unhappy Kevin behind her. Soon she’d reached the tree-shaded residential part of the street. Two turnoffs and she’d almost be home.
    â€œSpeaking of puzzles,” she told Rusty as they walked along, “I’d better work up a couple more sudoku before I take off work to play detective.”
    Whatever Rusty thought of that idea, he was more intent on getting home and getting breakfast.
    Rusty bounded into the kitchen, eager for his appointment with a can of dog food to be consumed in the square of sunshine coming in through the window. While he chowed down, Liza fired up her computer.
    She called up a puzzle she had begun earlier but filed. “Now, what was I thinking when I started this?” she muttered. Soon she was lost in the throes of creation. She used the software to run a check—yes, only one possible solution!
    In the groove now, Liza retrieved another puzzle from the computer’s memory, but her concentration was shattered by the ringing phone.

    She picked it up to hear a shrill “I suppose it didn’t actually occur to you that you work for a newspaper, did it?” Ava Barnes was clearly in a state. Her childhood friend and boss at the Oregon Daily sounded torn between amusement and aggravation.
    â€œWhat do you mean? I write sudoku. And I just got home from talking with the police,” Liza said.
    â€œI run a newspaper. You work for me. So you should call me when you see news. Finding a dead guy up to his neck in sand on our beach definitely qualifies.”
    â€œAva, you know the Daily is a morning paper—today’s copies were already on trucks being delivered when I found Oliver Chissel. Besides, you bribe every dispatcher in the department with weekly donuts to keep you up on the gossip. You knew almost as soon as I did. And you always tell me no paper does extra editions anymore.”
    â€œYou could have called in and had me tell you again,” Ava said. “At least tell me you haven’t talked to any of those TV vultures. We can run a great first-person piece for tomorrow—”
    â€œSorry. Sheriff Clements asked me not to talk to anybody,” Liza said.
    That brought the usual flood of newsperson’s arguments from her managing editor, which Liza tried to deflect. She’d had enough practice the last time she found a body to be getting good at it. “Change of subject—have you got anything about the windows on Main Street being smashed?”
    â€œNothing. We’ve been asking around, but so far the theories include drunks, kids, and drunk kids from out of town.”
    â€œDo you think it could tie in with the sabotage on the movie that Chissel was complaining about?” Liza asked.
    â€œHuh.” That got her a moment’s silence. “Maybe. I had Murph talk to the movie crew.” Murph was one of Ava’s best local reporters.
    â€œI bet that was pretty easy to do with filming suspended.”
    â€œYeah, but it didn’t get me very far,” Ava said. “Besides the graffiti, most of the damage was annoying but not very technical. Cameras messed with, stuff out of place. Could have been internal, or it could have been local. Repairing things on a fishing boat would teach someone enough to disrepair the film equipment.”
    Ava sighed. “Lot of people around town these days are good with their hands and don’t have a lot of work.”
    â€œSo, if you had a job as an extra, say, and wanted the gravy train to hang around a little longer,” Liza began, “would you mess