Stitch Me Deadly Read Online Free PDF Page B

pills that were in the guest room. If you know anything about them, call me immediately. This is not a joke. The pills were prescribed for someone named Selena Roxanis, and they’re called Halumet. Please call my cell or call the Tallulah County Sheriff’s Department as soon as you get this message. I’m in big trouble, Mom.”
    I ended the call but didn’t put the phone back into my purse. I clutched it as if it were a lifeline.
    “Manu, what am I gonna do? Will they believe me? Will they realize I’d never even met Mrs. Ralston before yesterday?”
    “Okay, listen to me,” Manu said. “We don’t have much time. I know you had nothing to do with Louisa Ralston’s death. But you don’t need to go into that interrogation room blind.”
    “Am I going to be arrested?”
    “No. I’ll stay with you.”
    “Thank you. You don’t know how much this means to me,” I said. “Do you need to call Reggie and let her know?”
    “I’m fine. Please listen to what I’m telling you. I expect them to question you and then let you go.”
    “Do I need a lawyer?” I asked.
    “Not at this point. You didn’t touch the prescription bottle at the shop, and you said you hadn’t seen it before then.”
    “I hadn’t. I swear.”
    “I believe you. Once you allow the officers to fingerprint you, your prints will be compared to those on the bottle, and you’ll be exonerated.”
    “But that doesn’t prove anything, does it? What if I wore gloves?”
    Manu sighed. “Did you wear gloves to open the bottle?”
    “No.”
    “Then please don’t say things like that during the interrogation. If you—or anyone else—wore gloves to open the bottle, then there probably aren’t any prints on it.”
    “Oh. That’s good, then,” I said.
    “That’s very good.”
    “Unless Mom stole that bottle from this Selena chick for some reason and then wiped the fingerprints off of it. Maybe she was planning to kill someone with it. Selena, I mean. Not Mom.”
    “Can we please not borrow trouble? I’m trying to help you, Marcy.”
    “I know. I know. I’m sorry. I’d never seen that bottle until just a few minutes ago. And I’ve never touched it, so my fingerprints are definitely not on it.”
    “Good. Now, simply retell your story. The officers will take your prints, see that there’s no reason to suspect you in Mrs. Ralston’s death, and I’ll bring you back to your shop.”
    “Yeah, but here’s the problem, Manu. I told my story back at the shop, and now I’m on my way to jail. Apparently, my story isn’t good enough.”
    “Your story is fine,” he said. “It’s the truth. The investigators are only trying to shake you up. They’re seeing if you change your story or confess to something. Everything will be fine.”
    I didn’t say anything, but I was thinking, The last time you told me that, I got ordered to come to police headquarters.
    Manu pulled in behind the two officers and parked in the first available visitors’ spot. He opened the car door for me, and I got out as the Tallulah County investigators waited on the sidewalk. They looked very tall and very imposing from where I stood.
    The two men led Manu and me through a couple sets of locked doors and into an interrogation room. The room had green-and-yellow-plaid industrial carpet that had a coffee—I hoped—stain or two, yellow-green walls, and metal chairs with rust-colored padding. A gray metal table was bolted to the floor in the middle of the room.
    I was instructed to sit on one side of the gray table. Manu had to sit in a chair near the door, and the detectives sat opposite me at the table.
    “Let’s reacquaint ourselves,” said the lead investigator, pressing the PLAY button on a tape recorder. “I’m Detective Bailey.” He had thinning dark blond hair and a bushy mustache. I got the feeling he was attempting to be friendly, but his demeanor barely rose above civil.
    Detective Bailey gestured to his partner. “This, of course, is Detective