Read A Flicker of Doubt (Book 4 in the Candlemaking Mysteries) for Free Online

talking
about?”
    “ Think about it. She had to
pay bills, keep track of things like that, didn’t she? I don’t see
a computer around here. Did she have one?”
    “ No, I can guarantee you
that. Becka was a Luddite when it came to computers. She believed
the world was too dependent on technology.”
    He shrugged. “That’s easy enough to say, but a lot
harder to live by. So how did she keep track of her
life?”
    I scratched my nose, then said, “She had a
personal organizer in her purse. Did you see that, by the way?”
    “ It hasn’t been anywhere
I’ve looked so far. Maybe it was near the point where she went into
the water.”
    I shuddered at the thought. “The sheriff
thinks she went in near the overlook. I guess we could look around
there.”
    Markum put a hand on my shoulder. “That I
won’t put you through, my friend. After we leave here, I’ll - drop
you off at the candleshop and I’ll go look myself”
    I didn’t put up much of a fight, mainly
because I couldn’t stand the thought of going to the place where
Becka had spent the last seconds of her life. I said, “I just
remembered something. Becka kept her bills in one of those
accordion files. It should be around here somewhere. There’s surely
no reason she would have taken that with her.” We both finished
searching the living room and found the folder together. It was
pushed into ‘ the corner of the room under a chair, almost as if
she’d been working on her accounts the night before and hadn’t
returned it to its proper place.
    Markum picked the file up and said, ‘There’s
too much here to go through right now. I guess we’ll have to take
this with us, too. Let’s get going. We’ve got a lot more ground to
cover before we can go.”
    I was about to reply when I saw Becka’s
front door handle start to turn.

Chapter 4

    What should we do?” I whispered fiercely to
H Markum.
    “ You locked the door behind
us, didn’t you?”
    I thought back to the moment after I closed
the door. “Yes, I’m positive.”
    “ Then we’re all
right”
    “ Unless they have a key,” I
whispered, but at that moment I realized they would have already
been inside if they’d had one. .
    I was about to breathe a sigh of relief when
I heard a stranger’s voice outside the door say, “I knew it was too
easy. We should have paid off the super for the key first, just
like I said.”
    More words were spoken that I couldn’t make
out, then the nearer voice said, “Give him a hundred, he won’t
argue. If he does, just take it from him.” A pause, then he
replied, “Because somebody’s got to stay here and watch the
door.”
    Markum grabbed my arm, held a finger to his
lips, then he whispered, “We go out the back way.”
    He unlocked the sliding patio door and I
followed him outside. At least we’d be out of the line of sight of
whoever was trying to get in. I started around the side of the
apartment away from Becka’s door when Markum said, “Those aren’t
cops. I want to get a look at who’s trying to get in.”
    I nodded reluctantly and followed him around
the building the other way. A man in a nice suit was coming out of
one of the apartments, and I wondered if it was our guy. After a
minute, Markum followed him, with me close on his heels.
    We were almost to the door when there was a
police siren in the distance, coming closer by the second. I didn’t
know what to do, but Markum didn’t hesitate. He raced for my truck,
and I was half a step behind. I had the key in the ignition and was
ready to start it when he said, “Don’t”
    “ Are you crazy? They’ll
catch us.”
    “ We want them to. You might
want to take off your gloves before they get here,
though.”
    I hadn’t realized I was still wearing them.
“Sorry,” I said as I shoved them under the truck seat as he stashed
the accordion folder under his.
    “ Markum, why are we hanging
around here?”
    “ Our story is that we just
got here ourselves,” he explained. “Let