Pinned for Murder by Elizabeth Lynn Casey Page A

I?”
    She looked back at the case, her gaze lingering on a chocolate-dipped donut drizzled with caramel, and swallowed. Hard.
    “You can deny it if you want to, but I’ll know you’re lying. You look as if you haven’t slept in days. Maybe even months.” Debbie reached in through the back of the case, extracted the object of Tori’s affection, and placed it on a doily-covered plate. “So what’s wrong? Is there anything I can do to help?”
    Reaching for the plate Debbie held in her direction, Tori closed her eyes briefly, the aroma of warm chocolate wafting its way into her nose. “Mmmm. You just did.”
    Debbie folded her arms across her flour-dusted chest. “While the business woman in me is happy with your answer, the friend side isn’t.”
    She stared at the plate.
    “Everything okay with you and Milo?”
    The corners of her mouth tugged upward. “Milo is great.”
    “Is there more damage at the library than you thought?”
    “Nothing I didn’t know about on Monday.” Setting the plate on the counter, she pulled her backpack purse from her shoulder and unzipped the top compartment. “How much do I owe you for the donut . . . oh, and for a hot chocolate in a to-go cup, too?”
    “Nothing,” Debbie said as she set about the task of making the hot beverage.
    “Debbie, I can’t take this.”
    The woman waved her off. “You’re not. I’m giving it.”
    “Thank you,” she whispered as she took the cup and looked down at the plate. “And you’re right. There is something wrong.”
    In an instant, Debbie was out from behind the counter, her hand taking hold of Tori’s upper arm and leading her to a table in the corner of the bakery. “Tell me.”
    Exhaling a piece of hair from her forehead, she dropped onto a wire-backed chair and reached for her donut. “It’s Rose. I’m worried about her.”
    Debbie paused, her hand on top of a chair. “Why? Is she sick?”
    “No. Nothing like that.” Tori slumped her shoulders as she leaned back, the allure of the donut dissipating in record time. “It’s just this whole thing with her former student and Martha Jane’s murder. It’s affecting her deeply and I don’t know how to help her.”
    “Affecting her how?”
    She sat forward, her elbows resting on the table as her hands sought the warmth from her to-go cup. “I’m not sure, exactly. Near as I can figure it’s a horrible case of disappointment . . . maybe even denial. Either way, she’s spent nearly three decades championing this guy—helping him, nudging him, teaching him, and believing in him. In that time she’s celebrated his successes and taken him under her wing whenever a challenge came up. Now, all of a sudden, he’s a very real suspect in a murder. Try as she might to discount the possibility as hogwash—
    Hogwash . . .
    Debbie sat down. “Tori? You okay?”
    Hogwash . . .
    “Huh? What?” Pulling her focus from some distant place, she forced herself to get back on task, to explain Rose’s situation to someone she respected for the ability to be levelheaded. “Oh. Sorry. I guess I kind of zoned out there for a minute. Anyway, try as she might to discount the possibility that Kenny was involved in Martha Jane’s death, Rose is realizing there are a few facts that simply can’t be explained away.”
    “Like what?” Debbie prompted.
    She raised her cup to her lips and took a sip, the warm liquid barely registering in her mind. When she set it down, she met Debbie’s gaze head-on. “First and foremost? The fact that Martha Jane wrongly accused Kenny of robbery.”
    “She made a mistake.”
    “You know that, and I know that. But neither of us experienced the humiliation Kenny must have felt when he was hauled down to the station for questioning in a crime he knew darn well he didn’t commit.”
    “Ahhh, I get it now. Rose is concerned what that humiliation may have set off inside Kenny in terms of anger, right?”
    Tori nodded, then reached out for her donut. Breaking