The Missing Dough(25)

“Where should I spread these out?” she asked.

“Bring that card table out from my office,” I suggested. “It should be big enough for what we need, and I don’t really like working at our prep station.”

“I can do that,” she said. “Here. Hold these while I go grab it.”

She shoved the papers into my hands and got the table out from storage. There was just enough room for it in our kitchen, and after she was finished setting the table up, I handed her half the stack as I glanced at the clock.

“Okay, we’ve got less than twenty minutes, so we’ll have to do a quick sort first,” I said.

“I’m fine with that. Let’s put the useless stuff in a pile over here, and we’ll keep the goodies here. Let’s get started.”

The first things I pulled out of my pile were the phone numbers she’d retrieved from the clothes hanging in the closet. “Should we just call these and see who answers?”

“We could, but then they’ll know what we’re up to. Let me call Josh first. I’ve got an idea.”

Josh Hurley was one of our employees and the chief of police’s son. I knew that his family wasn’t all that thrilled with him working at the Slice for a host of reasons, but I was glad to have him on my staff. He was working part-time during his first year of college, while my other part-timer was Greg Hatcher. He worked at the Slice as well, but he didn’t have to. In fact, he had more money than I did, but he loved the place almost as much as Maddy and I did, and we were both grateful to have him. Josh was our resident computer guy these days, and he rarely showed up for his shifts without some kind of computer in his backpack.

“Why don’t I call him,” I said as Maddy started to dial his number.

“That’s fine with me,” she said as she put her phone away. “You do that, and I’ll keep digging.” Ordinarily, I knew that she wouldn’t give in that easily, but there were other things to examine, and my sister’s sense of curiosity was probably as bad as mine.

“Josh, it’s Eleanor,” I said after he picked up.

“Hey, Eleanor,” he answered sleepily. “Was I supposed to work the lunch shift today? I must have slept in.”

“No, you aren’t scheduled until tonight. I need a favor, though.”

“Anything for you,” he said, coming more and more awake.

“I need you to check out some telephone numbers for me with that magic computer of yours.”

“I keep telling you, it’s not the computer. It’s the user.”

“Fine. Have it your way. Are you ready?”

“Give me one second. I need to turn everything on first.” As we waited, he asked, “What’s this about, anyway?”

“I’m just trying to track some things down,” I said. I wasn’t being vague because Kevin was his father. I hated dragging the two guys I worked with into my investigations. Sometimes it couldn’t be helped, but I never used them unless I had no other choice.

“Gotcha. Mind my own business,” he said with a goofy little laugh.

“That’s about it,” I said, smiling in return, though he couldn’t see it.

“Okay, fire away.”

“Let’s do these one at a time.”

I gave him the first number on the matchbook, and a few seconds later, he said, “That’s Beth Anne Osler. She lives at Two-Thirty-One West Avenue in Higgins Bottom. Do you need more info about her? I can do a search in no time at all.”

“I’m not sure exactly how much detail I need,” I said.

“Here it is, anyway. Man, this chick should learn how to set the privacy settings on Facebook. She looks like a real party girl, and when she’s not carousing around, she works at the power company in the collections department.”

“That’s great,” I said as I put the matchbook aside.

“I don’t know. It’s kind of a crazy lifestyle, if you ask me. You should see some of the pictures she has posted on her cube. Should I forward them to you?”

“No thanks. That won’t be necessary.”

“Okay, who’s next on your list?” he asked.

We quickly determined that the next two numbers belonged to women who were just as vapid as Beth Anne appeared to be, and when I got to the last one, I was expecting more of the same.

“Eleanor, this is a dude,” he said after he tracked down the number.

“What’s his name?”

“Bernie Maine. It looks like a new number, too. How is this guy even a part of something that has those three women in it? Forget it. Don’t answer that. I don’t want to get you into trouble with my dad.”