The Way of the Wicked (Hope Street Church Mysteries Book 2) by Ellery Adams Page A

noticed the scenery. Her mind was filled with Mr. Crosby’s anguished face. And when Brenda switched on the radio, Cooper didn’t pay attention to the music. She could only hear an old man weeping as if his heart had just been broken.

8
     
    Brenda dropped Cooper off at Door-2-Door’s side entrance and then sped away to attend a fall festival at her church. After replacing the black cooler beneath one of the lengthy stainless steel counters in the kitchen, Cooper located her friends. All six of them were contentedly snacking on ham and cheese biscuits and cookies in the volunteer lounge.
    “How’d it go?” Jake asked. “You look a bit green around the gills.”
    “Not green. Pink.” Trish eyed Cooper’s flushed neck and handed her a cup of water. “Maybe you’re dehydrated. You got back later than everyone else, too. Did you and Brenda have a really long route?”
    Cooper accepted the water and looked around the lounge. The other volunteers had left for the day with the exception of Eugene. He was sprawled out on two folding chairs in the back of the room munching on a biscuit. An empty chair in the adjacent row served as a table for his can of Pepsi and a paper napkin piled high with chocolate-chip cookies. A comic book was open on his lap and the young man laughed heartily as he ate and read.
    “I think one of the clients on my route was drugged,” Cooper said in a low voice. “A man named Mr. Crosby.”
    “I’ve heard about him,” Trish said dismissively. “Isn’t he a little batty?”
    “Maybe a little bit,” Cooper had to admit. “But I’m not talking about how he acted. When we first saw him, we actually thought he was dead. He’d been sitting in the same chair for twenty-four hours and he was still sitting there when Brenda and I entered his house. The poor man has no memory of what happened to him.”
    Quinton helped himself to a handful of cookies and offered one to Cooper. “Lots of older folks have memory issues. Mr. Crosby probably just forgot to go to bed and fell asleep in his chair. Why do you think he was drugged?”
    Cooper lowered her voice to a whisper even though Eugene was clearly absorbed in his comics. “You think it’s normal for someone to sleep for twenty-four hours? No.” She shook her head. “Not only that, but he was really upset about something that was taken from his house. I don’t know what it was and he wasn’t really making sense by the end of our visit. He kept repeating how his secret had been stolen.”
    Holding up a finger to stop Trish from interrupting, Cooper continued, “It’s clear that Mr. Crosby is wired differently than the rest of us, but he was thinking straight enough to be bothered that he had lost a whole day and that someone took an object from his bedroom.” She broke her cookie in half and stared at the crumbs on her lap. “Brenda’s delivered to this man before and she says he’s never had problems with his memory. And I’m no doctor, but Mr. Crosby just acted, you know, doped.”
    “I trust your instincts,” Nathan said loyally. “How did Brenda react?”
    “She was amazing,” Cooper replied. “She revived Mr. Crosby by tossing water in his face, changed his clothes, got his lunch ready, and tidied up the house within fifteen minutes. Thank the Lord she was there.”
    “I’m glad you weren’t alone,” Savannah said.
    “Brenda’s the one who suggested Mr. Crosby had been drugged. She was fighting mad about the notion,” Cooper added.
    “So Brenda’s probably innocent, unless she’s a great actor,” Bryant said.
    “I think we need to have a chat with Lali.” Jake folded his strong arms over his chest. “We need to have all the facts if we’re going to be of any help to these folks.” He tossed a napkin into a garbage can several feet away. “Time to storm the castle, folks. Who’s with me?”
     
    • • •
     
    When Anita heard about the impromptu meeting between Lali and the Sunrise Bible Study members,