A Killer Column by Casey Mayes

ditched haphazardly, and I had to wonder how long it had been since a maid had stepped one foot into the room.
    “Are you kidding me?” Jenny asked as she stared in disbelief.
    “Sorry, but it’s too late to back out now.”
    As Jenny surveyed the room, she asked, “How can anyone live like this?”
    “I don’t like it any more than you do, but we don’t have much time. Let’s dig in and see what we can find.”
    Jenny frowned, and then took a deep breath. “Okay, if you can do it, I can, too. I just wish I had some gloves.”
    “Or a biohazard suit,” I added as I looked around. “Do you want the living room or the bedroom?”
    “Could the other room really be any worse than this is?”
    “We could always flip a coin,” I offered.
    “No, I’ll take the bedroom.”
    “Are you sure?”
    “Yes. No. Yes. Forget it. I can’t stand the thought of what I might find in there. You take the other room, but you have to do the bathroom, too. Agreed?”
    Since I was lucky to be getting any help at all, I could hardly refuse her offer. “It’s a deal.”
    I started for the other room when she said, “Hey, wait a second. You gave in too easily just now.”
    “Just chalk it up to my easygoing nature,” I said.
    “I would, but we both know that you don’t have one,” Jenny said.
    “I’ll trade back. Just say the word.”
    She thought about that for a few moments, and then said, “We’ll keep things the way they are.”
    “Sounds good.”
    I left before she could change her mind again. It wasn’t like Jenny to be so wishy-washy, but then again, I’d never asked her to help me search a dead man’s room before and put her career in danger, so maybe it was exactly like her, given the circumstances.
    If it was any consolation, the bedroom was even worse than the living room had been.
    The only thing I could figure was that Derrick must have been living there more than a few days. Did that mean there was trouble in Paradise? I opened the closet door and saw that he hadn’t been staying there alone. A woman’s clothes were hung neatly inside, and from the look at one of the labels, it was a thin woman at that, a size 2, if the dress I pulled out was any indication.
    Did the clothing belong to his wife, or Mindi Mills? If it all belonged to his mistress, then where was his wife? Had the police even spoken with her yet? I wished I could pick up my phone and call Zach, but he was off somewhere thinking and brooding, and I knew he hated to be disturbed whenever he did that. I knew he would take my feelings into account when he pondered his decision, but it was my life, too. I’d just grown accustomed to the idea that he was out of the line of fire these days, though his consulting job put him in harm’s way enough as it was. Working as Asheville’s sheriff would be dangerous, though not as hazardous as running the Charlotte force had been.
    As I searched, I kept thinking about my husband, and the wonderfully strange journey our marriage had become.
    A thought suddenly occurred to me as I looked around the cluttered room. Where was Derrick’s planner? He didn’t believe in modern technology, clinging to old ways long past their obsolescence, and while other folks had upgraded to PalmPilots and BlackBerries long ago, Derrick had faithfully bought planners every new January to run his life by. Where could this year’s edition be?
    Maybe Jenny had better luck than I did. I walked back into the living room and found her sitting on the couch.
    “Have you had any luck finding a yearly planner?”
    “Like the kind we used in school?”
    “Yes, but a little nicer,” I said.
    “No, I haven’t seen anything like that. I did find these,” she said as she held out her hand. In her palm was a set of keys.
    “They must have been Derrick’s,” I said as I took them from her. “No car keys here, though.” I held one up. “This is probably a house or apartment key, and this looks like it goes to a mailbox.