Disappearing Nine Patch (A Harriet Truman/Loose Threads Mystery Book 9) by Arlene Sachitano Page A

surprise you, but we old people have social lives, too. You aren’t the only one who likes to go out to dinner with a handsome man once in a while,” Mavis scolded.
    “Do you have a boyfriend, too?” Lauren asked.
    “After this reaction, I wouldn’t tell you if I did.” She narrowed her eyes and glared at James.
    “Hey, what happens in my restaurant stays in my restaurant.” He mimed zipping his lips. “My lips are sealed.”
    “You do have a boyfriend,” Lauren chortled.
    “This isn’t about me, missy. We need to figure out what’s going on with DeAnn as well as figure out who sabotaged Beth’s car.”
    Lauren’s face became serious.
    “I’d almost forgotten about that part.”
    Harriet sipped from her water bottle.
    “We’ll have to wait for Morse to finish with whatever took her out of here so fast before she can check up on Juana. Then, I guess we’ll have to make sure Aunt Beth isn’t alone until we get to the bottom of this.”
    Lauren laughed again.
    “With you and Jorge fighting over her here, and Connie waiting for her at home, you probably have more coverage than you need.”
    James twirled his empty water bottle between his palms.
    “If you want, I can take you by your aunt’s house when she’s released and then back to my house for your car when she’s settled. Or, if you want, my mom can help me bring your car to you.”
    Harriet sighed, “I don’t think we need to bother your mom with this. It sounds like Connie and Jorge will be there with her. I would like to go by and make sure she has everything she needs, though.”
    “Rockin’ Robin” sounded from Lauren’s pants pocket. She pulled the phone out and tapped the answer button, stepped away from the group and covered her free ear with her hand while she listened. She spoke a few words, but Harriet couldn’t hear what she was saying.
    “That was Robin,” she explained when she’d rejoined them.
    “Yeah, we got that,” Harriet said. “What did she have to say?”
    “It is as bad as we feared. Molly’s body was found in Fogg Park. Robin said DeAnn wasn’t sure, but she thinks Molly was hit in the head. She was in the vicinity of where she was found when she was five.”
    Harriet looked up at the ceiling and sighed.
    “I guess any hope we might have had that Amber’s killer left the area was premature.”
    Lauren shook her head sadly.
    “It’s hard to believe there was anything Molly could find all these years later that would cause the killer to silence her.”
    Harriet looked at her.
    “But she said she remembered. It’s possible her so-called psychic really did say something that triggered her memory.”
    Lauren’s eyes got wide, and her mouth turned down.
    “Yeah. Molly was just the kind of person who would confront her killer by herself if she remembered.”
    No one could think of what to say after that, so the three women busied themselves texting the rest of the Threads while James gathered the empty water bottles and carried them to the recycling containers.

    Connie met Harriet and James when they arrived at Aunt Beth’s front door.
    “Where’s Beth?” she asked and stepped aside so they could enter.
    “Jorge is driving her. He’s being a total mother hen. I don’t think he’s driving over ten miles an hour for fear of jostling her around.”
    Connie led the way to the TV room. As promised, the hide-a-bed was freshly made with extra pillows stacked in the side chair. Connie had placed a pile of new quilting magazines on a TV tray next to the bed, along with an insulated water bottle and the TV remote control.
    Harriet fingered the magazine edges.
    “Looks like you’ve thought of everything. We might need to move her chair in the living room back a little. They’re sending her home with one of those knee scooters. She’ll need a clear path to the bathroom. I suspect the wider the space the better.”
    James slid the chair back and moved the side table that went with it, too.
    “The patient