To Sketch a Thief Read Online Free PDF

Tootsie might have been there all along and just escaped her notice.
    “I haven’t seen another dog since I’ve been here,” Rory said, flashing back to the photos on the mantel. So the little white dog with Hobo was a Maltese who presumably answered to the name of Tootsie.
    Marti’s eyes were filled with a new horror. “Do you think this was a dog abduction gone wrong?”
    “I think Tootsie probably just ran off like Hobo when the intruder left the door open,” Rory said. Why look for zebras when there were perfectly good horses around?
    Marti didn’t seem convinced; worry worked at the lines between her eyebrows. “I have a bad feeling about all this,” she murmured as the first police car turned onto the street, followed closely by an unmarked unit, both with sirens wailing.
    Rory wondered how it would have been possible to have a good feeling about her friend’s violent death, let alone her missing dog, but she chalked the remark up to shock. Surely Marti hadn’t meant it the way it sounded.
    The police cruiser pulled up to the curb and two uniformed cops jumped out, one of them holding a reel of yellow crime scene tape. The unmarked car swung into the driveway, coming to an abrupt stop inches from Rory’s Volvo, the rear half sticking out into the street. Two detectives emerged and conferred briefly with the patrolmen, who then began to set up a perimeter to protect the crime scene and keep the curious away.
    Rory met the detectives halfway down the walk. The older one was in the lead. Rory pegged him for maybe fifty, a hard fifty. He was tall and reedy, with hollowed cheeks that looked like he’d sucked a few too many lemons dry.
    “McCain?” he said, coming to a stop in front of her.
    “Rory McCain.” She nodded. “Detective Cirello?”
    “Can you show me some ID?” he asked, ignoring her question.
    Given the circumstances, Rory decided to let the snub go. After all, without ID she could claim to be anyone. For all he knew, she could be the killer. It wouldn’t be the first time that kind of thing had happened. And if the proverbial shoe were on the other foot, she might be just as wary.
    “I’m afraid I left it home,” she said, adding the short version of why she was at the crime scene.
    “Harvey, she’s the one headquarters vouched for,” the younger detective said. He had a thatch of red hair and the fullness of youth about his face. “She was with Homicide till a few months ago.”
    “Yeah, now I remember hearing about you on the news.” Harvey scowled at her. “Gave the department a bit of a black eye closing those cases by your lonesome.”
    “I just got lucky.” Rory shrugged, wondering what expression they’d wear if she told them she hadn’t done it alone, that she’d had help from a certain U.S. marshal who’d been dead for a century or so. “Besides, I was on the job at the time. My win was a win for all of us.”
    Harvey refused to be jollied. He turned his attention to Marti, who actually seemed to shrink under his scrutiny. “Who are you ?”
    Marti heaved herself up and tottered down the steps to stand beside Rory. “I’m Martha Sugarman,” she said respectfully. “I was a friend of Brenda’s.”
    “Did Brenda have a last name?”
    “Well, yes; yes, of course she did,” Marti said, flustered by his sarcasm.
    “And what would that be?”
    “Hartley. Brenda Hartley.”
    “She was the single owner of the residence,” the young detective said. “I checked it out.”
    “Don’t know what I’d do without Danny Boy the computer geek,” Harvey said dryly.
    To Rory there was nothing good-natured in the ribbing. She’d had enough. She was about to tell Harvey what she thought of his social skills, but Danny caught her eye and, with the barest of head movements, made it clear that he didn’t want her to say anything.
    “Where’s the deceased?” Harvey went on, oblivious to the undercurrent swirling around him.
    “In the kitchen,” Rory said tightly,