A Body to Spare (The Odelia Grey Mysteries) by Sue Ann Jaffarian

back to Mom’s and take care of that.”
    “Come on over later for dinner,” I told him. “I’m thinking of either throwing a beef stew into the slow cooker or making meatloaf. It’s that kind of day, and I have the stuff on hand for both. Mom should be back by then, so bring her along if she’s not too tired. Have you heard from her?”
    “Yeah, just a few minutes ago. She said she won two hundred dollars playing a video poker machine.” He laughed. “Figures. She hardly gambles, and when she does, she wins. I also checked her blog, and there’s nothing there about the body found in your trunk. She posted about her windfall in the casino and about the show she saw last night, but that was it.”
    “Good,” I said and meant it. “Although once the news breaks about Zach’s identity, she might decide to blog about it, seeing that it will be out in the public arena.”
    “Yeah, I’m betting that too,” Clark said with a sigh. “But as long as it’s after the story goes public. I also checked to make sure there’s no way to track her physical whereabouts on her blog. I was pleased to see she’s been pretty careful to keep that private. All it says is that she’s a transplant from New England.”
    I shuddered. “That’s all we’d need right now—some ghoulish crackpot becoming a fan of Mom’s.”
    The rain was coming down harder, and it was getting colder. Still on the phone, I tucked my Kindle under one arm and Muffin under the other and made my way inside. The cat didn’t protest. Unlike Seamus, Muffin enjoyed being carted around like a furry sack of bones. “It’s getting pretty nasty out,” I told Clark once I was inside and had put the cat down on the floor. “I might not make that walk.”
    “Then I think going through the details of the kidnapping information will be a good job for you today,” Clark said. “That and making a nice big pot of beef stew.”
    “I gather you’re voting for that over the meatloa f ?” I smiled as I spoke.
    “It’s not even a contest,” he answered. “Any of that chocolate cake left that Jill brought last night?”
    “Yep,” I said after double-checking the fridge just in case Greg had taken the leftovers into work. Once again, I marveled at my husband’s intelligence. He’d taken the leftover store-bought cheesecake and left Jill’s cake for us. “Be here around seven.”
    “Okay then,” Clark said. “I’ll see you then, with or without Mom. Can I bring anything?”
    “How about some crusty rolls or French bread?”
    “I’m on it. Just call if you need anything else or come across anything interesting in your research.” He hesitated. “And call me if you hear from Elaine Powers.”
    I saluted the phone and ended the call.
    After talking to Clark, I prepared the ingredients for the stew and threw it all into my slow cooker. It would be perfect by dinnertime. Then I stretched out on the recliner with my laptop on my lap and kicked the foot rest up. Not happy with my lap being occupied, Muffin curled up on the back of the chair behind my head, purring a soft lullaby into my ear as I read every word of the information on Zach’s kidnapping that Clark had been able to get his hands on.
    As Clark had said the night before, it had happened after a Friday-night football game. Zach had gone to the game with three buddies. After the game, they had stopped off at a local pizza place to celebrate their team’s win. All three of his friends confirmed to the police that they had dropped Zach off at home between 10:40 and 10:50, before his curfew of eleven. One friend told the police he remembered Zach letting himself in through the side door by the garage. None of the other boys remembered seeing any evidence of Zach’s parents or sister when they left Zach.
    Sister? I didn’t recall anyone—the police or Clark or even my mother during her short research—mentioning a sister. I continued reading, looking for other signs of her. She showed up