Murder My Love Read Online Free PDF

you know her?”
    “She works at Community Hospital.”
    “Huff, are you sure?”
    Officer Huff proceeded to tell the Chief that the victim was Linda Greenwell and how he’d known her. He related how she had helped his father-in-law with his diabetic diet, how she’d come to his home and showed him how to shop for food and the proper way to prepare his meals. He went on to tell her what he knew, that she was not married, that as far as anyone knew she lived alone, that she was never seen around town with anyone. She seemed to be a loner.
    “Why didn’t you say something yesterday?” she inquired.
    “I’m sorry, chief. Seeing her savaged like that, someone I knew and admired.” His voice trailed off. He swallowed several times and continued, “I guess my mind was somewhere else. She was so good to Karen’s father.”
    The Chief asked if he recognized the young man who was shot to death. Huff shook his head. He said he’d never seen him before. The Chief patted Huff on the shoulder.
    “O.K., Huff. Good work. Now I want you to go to Community Hospital and snoop around. Find out all you can from the people she worked with.”
    Huff left the stationhouse relishing his assignment. For once in his career, he felt he could participate in serious police work, now that he was given something important to do. He began to fantasize that one of his final assignments would be like a drum roll ushering him into retirement. He thought that sometimes it took decades for fate to give meaning to a career. This assignment was light years better than handing out traffic tickets or refereeing domestic violence.
    Chief Wilson returned to her desk and was barely seated when a senior officer knocked on the door and walked in.
    “What?” the Chief bellowed.
    “I found the lady!”
    “What lady?”
    “The one who called in the shooting to Skinner on Sunday.”
    “And…”
    Detective Sgt. Devlin had knocked on every door on Elm Street asking if anyone knew Linda Greenwell. He’d asked them if they had heard anything unusual that day. Most of the residents were at church. Of the ones who were home, all were housewives except for one old man who was stone deaf and couldn’t possibly have heard anything. None of the housewives said they’d heard a thing. They were in their kitchens in the rear of their homes busy preparing their Sunday meals. All of them claimed that they knew nothing of the woman who lived in their neighborhood. On a hunch, Devlin went around to Maple Street and canvassed the homes whose back yards abutted the ones on Elm. To his surprise, he found a resident who knew something. She was a woman in her eighties. She wore a print dress that hung loosely on a frail body. Her short gray hair was neatly combed. She wore rimless eyeglasses and her wrinkled face bore no signs of makeup. Her back yard was one house removed from 172 Elm. On her back porch, there was one lonely potted geranium on a plastic table next to a wicker chair where she was seated. Devlin noted there was no fence or shrubbery to impede her sight of the house. She said she’d been sitting on her back porch on Sunday having a cup of tea and reading the newspaper when she heard a commotion across the yard. Devlin asked her to recount the events as best as she could remember. The old lady invited Sgt. Devlin into her house and asked him to take a seat in her living room. He sat in an easy chair and took noticed of a room that displayed old but elegant furniture, a couch, a side chair and a coffee table. The walls were papered with a flowered pattern. An ornate table lamp with its fringed shade caught his eye. A threadbare Persian carpet filled the room. Its bay window faced south and flooded the room with sunshine. A wedding photograph in a gilded frame hung over the fireplace. The room reminded him of his grandmother’s home. The lady offered him hard candy from a Wedgewood plate. He politely refused. She offered him home made cookies from a Waterford