“Any leads?”
“Not a one,” Sarah admitted. “He didn’t find a single fingerprint at Mattie’s house . . . well, except for Mattie’s. It was the same with the others.” Her eyes returned to her mirrored self, and she fussed with the sweep of hair over her ears. “Who knows, maybe they were smart enough to wear gloves or wiped off what they touched. Anything’s possible these days.”
Helen sighed. “The times are certainly changing, aren’t they? It hardly seems so long ago that locks were out of the ordinary here instead of commonplace.”
“It’s all the drugs,” Sarah said, retrieving her bag from beneath LaVyrle’s countertop. “Frankie says crimes all over have skyrocketed because of people buying crock . . .”
Helen stifled a grin. “You mean crack?”
“Crock, crack”—the sheriff’s wife wiggled her fingers—“whatever it’s called, it’s taking this country to hell in a hand basket.” She dug inside her purse and withdrew a pair of bills, leaving them lying atop LaVyrle’s station. With a snap, Sarah shut her bag, and her chin jerked up. “Well, I’ve got some shopping to do.” With a final glance at the mirror and a pat to her hair, she flashed Helen a buck-toothed grin. “See you later.”
“Good-bye, dear.”
A head popped around the corner and a timid voice squeaked out, “Missus Evans? If you’re ready, I’ll shampoo you now.”
“Of course, Mary.”
“And don’t forget to give Mrs. E a nice long conditioning,” LaVyrle’s sturdy tone reminded the girl as she grabbed the broom and swept out her cubby. “We can’t have her leaving here with her hair looking as dry as straw.”
“Flattery will get you nowhere, LaVyrle,” Helen quipped over her shoulder as she followed the girl to the shampoo room.
As Mary worked the soap into her scalp with nimble fingers, Helen closed her eyes. She thought of Sarah Biddle’s remarks about Mattie Oldbridge being robbed, of several other such thefts in River Bend in recent months, which the sheriff attributed to boys from the valley searching for things to pawn to get money for drugs; and she wondered what the world was coming to when a town of two hundred or so, snugly set between the river bluffs, miles away from the big city, wasn’t even safe enough.
About the Author
SUSAN MCBRIDE is the USA Today bestselling author of Blue Blood, the first of the Debutante Dropout Mysteries. The award-winning series also includes The Good Girl’s Guide to Murder, The Lone Star Lonely Hearts Club, Night of the Living Deb, and Too Pretty to Die. She’s also the author of The Truth about Love & Lightning, Little Black Dress, and The Cougar Club, all Target Recommended Reads. She lives in St. Louis, Missouri, with her husband and daughter.
Visit Susan’s web site at www.SusanMcBride.com for more info.
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TO HELEN BACK
THE TRUTH ABOUT LOVE AND LIGHTNING
LITTLE BLACK DRESS
THE COUGAR CLUB
TOO PETTY TO DIE
NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEB
LONE STAR LONELY HEASRTS CLUB
THE GOOD GIRL'S GUIDE TO MURDER
BLUE BLOOD
COPYRIGHT
This book is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogue are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Excerpt from Mad as Helen copyright © 2014 by Susan McBride.
TO HELEN BACK. Copyright © 2014 by Susan McBride. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
EPub Edition MAY 2014 ISBN: 9780062359759
Print Edition ISBN: 9780062359766
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