Second Grave on the Left Read Free Page B

does missing persons at the station. And we’ll need to talk to the husband as well. What was his name?”
    “Warren,” she said, following me out.
    I made a mental list as we exited the restroom. After we paid for our coffee, I tossed Brad a smile and headed out the door. Unfortunately, an irate man with a gun pushed us back inside. It was probably too much to hope he was just there to rob the place.
    Cookie stopped short behind me then gasped. “Warren,” she said in astonishment.
    “Is she here?” he asked, anger and fear twisting his benign features.
    Even the toughest cop alive grew weak in the knees when standing on the business end of a snub-nosed .38. Apparently, Cookie wasn’t graced with the sense God gave a squirrel.
    “Warren Jacobs,” she said, slapping him upside the head.
    “Ouch.” He rubbed the spot where Cookie hit him as she took the gun and crammed it into her purse.
    “Do you want to get someone killed?”
    He lifted his shoulders like a child being scolded by his favorite aunt.
    “What are you doing here?” she asked.
    “I went to your apartment complex after you called then followed you here and waited to see if Mimi would come out. When she didn’t, I decided to come in.”
    He looked ragged and a little starved from days of worry. And he was about as guilty of his wife’s disappearance as I was. I could read people’s emotions like nobody’s business, and innocence wafted off him. He felt bad about something, but it had nothing to do with illegal activity. He probably felt guilty for some imagined offense that he believed made his wife leave. Whatever was going on, I had serious doubts any of it had to do with him.
    “Come on,” I said, ushering them both back into the diner. “Brad,” I called out.
    His head popped through the opening, an evil grin shimmering on his face. “Miss me already?”
    “We’re about to see what you’re made of, handsome.”
    He raised his brows, clearly up to the challenge, and twirled a spatula like a drummer in a rock band. “You just sit back and watch,” he said before ducking back and rolling up his sleeves. That kid was going to break more than his share of hearts. I shuddered to think of the carnage he would leave in his wake.
    Three mucho grande breakfast burritos and seven cups of coffee later—only four of them mine—I sat with a man so sick with worry and doubt, my synapses were taking bets on how long he could keep his breakfast down. The odds were not in his favor.
    He’d been telling me about the recent changes in Mimi’s behavior. “When did you notice this drastic change?” I asked, the question approximately my 112th. Give or take.
    “I don’t know. I get so wrapped up. Sometimes I doubt I’d notice if my own children caught fire. I think about three weeks ago.”
    “Speaking of which,” I said, looking up, “where are your kids?”
    “What?” he asked, steering back to me. “Oh, they’re at my sister’s.”
    A definite plus. This guy was a mess. Thanks to Norma, I’d graduated from taking notes on napkins to taking notes on an order pad. “And your wife didn’t say anything? Ask anything out of the ordinary? Tell you she was worried or felt like someone was following her?”
    “She burned a rump roast,” he said, brightening a little since he could answer one of my questions. “After that, everything went to hell.”
    “So, she takes her cooking very seriously.”
    He nodded then shook his head. “No, that’s not what I meant. She never burns her roast. Especially her rumps.”
    Cookie pinched me under the table when she saw me contemplating whether I should giggle or not. I flashed a quick glare then returned to my expression of concern and understanding.
    “You’re a professional investigator, right?” Warren asked.
    I squinted. “Define professional. ” When he only stared, still deep in thought, I said, “No, seriously, I’m not like the other PIs on the playground. I have no ethics, no code