Read Doubled Up (Imogene Museum Mystery #2) for Free Online Page B

want the sling.”
    I exhaled and smiled. “Good news.”
    “ You’re free to go. Get some rest.”
    “ Aye, aye.”
    I swung my arms as I walked back to my pickup. The freedom felt good, energizing. Sun broke through the thick overcast cloud layer for a minute — long enough to warm my back.
    I hadn ’t realized how much Terry’s parole problems were weighing on me. And the questions about the wood statues.
    My mood lightened as I thought about Pete ’s invitation to Thanksgiving dinner aboard his tugboat. It wouldn’t be too awkward since he’d invited Pastor Mort and Sally Levine and their two teenagers as well.
    The spot where the little blue Datsun pickup had parked was empty.
    I had a lot to be thankful for.
     
    o0o
     
    “Better late than never,” I announced as I stepped into the museum gift shop.
    “ How’d it go — oh, you’re sling-free,” Lindsay Smith, the cashier and official greeter, said as she rose from behind the counter with a stack of trail maps in her hand. Her face was flushed from bending over, and she pushed her long blond hair back into place. “Feel good?”
    “ Even better than I imagined. Sorry about yesterday.”
    “ No problem. It was nice to have the day off. I went shopping with my mom to get the potatoes, celery and black olives we still needed for Thanksgiving.”
    “ Have Sheriff Marge or Terry been by?”
    “ No to Sheriff Marge. Terry’s the truck driver, right? I saw the truck parked out there, but I haven’t seen him.”
    I absently spun a postcard carousel rack.
    “Somebody else is here to see you, though. A Hamilton—” Lindsay checked a note beside the cash register. “—Wexler. He said you knew him. He wasn’t interested in looking around the museum while he waited, so I put him in your office.”
    Black spots appeared before my eyes, and a swirling buzz — the noise of a maddened hive — filled my ears. I forgot to breathe.
    “ I hope you don’t mind. I didn’t know what else to do. You’ve never had a visitor before.”
    I pressed my hands onto the glass countertop, hoping they ’d act as suction cups and somehow hold me upright.
    “ Are you okay? Did you have blood drawn this morning?” Lindsay placed a warm hand on my cold one.
    I waved her off. “Fine. I’m fine.” I staggered into the grand ballroom. Right. Left. Right. Left. Breathe in. Out.
    He wasn ’t supposed to be here. That’s why I moved to the middle of almost nowhere. To get away from him, the memories, the family pressure. My own quiet spot far, far away. And now he’d invaded it. Why was he always taking what wasn’t his?
    I climbed the stairs carefully, slowly, like a rickety old man. I needed time to think, put on my polite face, hide the roiling emotions.
    I thought the confusion, anger and frustration he caused were gone, died out like campfire embers. Oh no. All it took was the mention of his name, and my insides sparked into a wildfire with no warning.
    Well, he wouldn ’t stick around long. He never did. He had the attention span of a fruit fly.
    Through the half-open door to my office, I saw his legs. He was sitting in my chair — granted, the only chair in the room — an ankle propped on the opposite knee, the custom-made loafer clad foot jiggling allegrissimo . Yep, there was only one Ham Wexler.
    I took a deep breath and pushed the door open.
    The wood statue he’d been tossing from hand to hand clunked on the hardwood floor. “Ooops. Sorry. Wow, you look great.” He bent to retrieve the statue. “These things are scary. It would be hard to wake up next to this every morning.” He held up the female figure.
    The lopsided grin and tiny cleft in his chin that used to weaken my knees seemed immature now in spite of new streaks of venerable gray at his temples.
    “That could be an historical artifact.”
    “ Really? How old?” He held the statue at arm’s length and peered at it.
    I snatched the statue and pressed it against my stomach. “Why are you