A Valley to Die For by Radine Trees Nehring Page A

too,” she replied. “I told you.”
    “Mrs. McCrite, I think you’d better come in the house with me, but for now, please don’t touch anything.”
    Puzzled, Carrie went with him to the front door. He moved aside, and she stared down the hall at the heap of things spilling out of the closet door. He indicated with a hand gesture that she should go in, so, stepping carefully over the jumble on the hall floor, she turned into the kitchen. The contents of the desk had been dumped everywhere.
    Since Carrie’s visit at 8:15 that morning, someone who didn’t care what kind of mess they made had searched the house. And, she thought, I’ll just bet these men think I did it.
    CHAPTER VIII
    No one ever mentioned lunch.
    After Carrie looked at the mess—hoping her unfeigned shock would help convince the two men she had nothing to do with making it—she answered questions through what seemed like three meal times.
    First, Detective Taylor had her stand in the door of each room and look around carefully, telling him if she noticed anything odd or missing.
    Other than chaotic heaps of JoAnne’s belongings, Carrie saw nothing to talk about. She did not say what seemed obvious to her, if what the searcher was looking for had been hidden in the first place, how was she supposed to know it was gone?
    One thing was clear—the person hadn’t been looking for money or valuables. JoAnne shopped with checks and credit cards, so she kept no money, except in her purse, which she presumably took with her when she left. The few good pieces of jewelry she owned were dumped on the floor with everything else. The television and VCR were untouched.
    Carrie did notice two things missing, but didn’t say anything about them, because they seemed so trivial. She didn’t see the pink envelope with her name on it or the picture of Susan and her family. When she’d told Sergeant Taylor about the missing address book, he hadn’t seemed very interested, and she supposed he’d think the missing card and photograph were even more trivial. Perhaps they were concealed in the mess somewhere and would turn up later.
    After she looked through the door of each room, Taylor asked her where she usually sat when she visited JoAnne. He had her sit there, and the questions continued.
    Storm and Taylor alternated, and she soon realized they were actually asking the same things over and over, putting questions in different words but repeating themselves anyway. And, she thought, they might as well be asking the cat.
    “Why would someone search this house? What did JoAnne Harrington do or know that could put her in danger? What did she talk about? Describe her life here. What did she do in Kansas City? Tell us all you know about her past. Tell us all you know about her family and friends. What did she do Friday? What did you do Friday? Saturday?” And, “Mrs. McCrite, couldn’t you have forgotten to lock the back door when you came to feed the cat?”
    Carrie talked, and answered, but everything came out sounding very simple, normal, and unimportant.
    The men didn’t ask her any questions about Henry. They wouldn’t think there was any reason to, she decided. After all, he was a fellow cop.
    Both men kept their voices low and were obviously trying to appear reasonable and kind. Sergeant Taylor managed it quite well, but Sheriff Storm didn’t. By late afternoon, Carrie was imagining herself screaming at him: “She grew bigger tomatoes than I did”—a statement JoAnne would have appreciated, since Carrie had never admitted it before—“so I killed her and searched the house for her secret fertilizer recipe.” Then Harrison Storm could breathe a sigh of relief and get on with whatever he usually did on Sunday afternoons.
    Well, she thought, as her stomach rumbled loudly enough for everyone to hear, this is hardly my idea of an ideal Sunday afternoon either.
    Finally she protested, with a choked sob that was as much frustration and anger as grief,