Thoroughly 10 - What Are You Wearing to Die? by Patricia Sprinkle Page B

Buster, but I guess she didn’t.”
    “Not that I’ve heard, but I’ve been fishing all weekend. I had just gotten home when you called to ask me to supper.” He frowned. “I sure wish Starr had talked to me. We suspect there’s a meth lab somewhere in the area, but haven’t a clue where to look. Nobody’s buying any supplies they shouldn’t, and every lead we’ve gotten has fizzled out.”
    “Maybe Missy can help you.”
    “Not if all she knows is where Starr was going and why she dressed the way she did the day she died.”
    “It’s a beginning, Buster. She was probably killed by whoever was supplying her with drugs. Now if we—”
    Joe Riddley slammed one fist down on the table and roared. “Stay out of it, Little Bit!” I think he was as astonished as we were, because he swallowed and said in a normal voice, “The sheriff can take it from here.” He stood. “I’m getting some more tea. Anybody else need some?” I held up my paper cup and he strode off.
    “He’s really worried, you know,” Buster said unnecessarily. “Those boys are dangerous. He doesn’t want you to get hurt again.”
    “I’m not going to get hurt, because I’m not getting involved. The only thing I want to know from you is whether or not you’ve found anything that points to a suspect.”
    He didn’t say a word, just sat there eating his sandwich.
    I gave him plenty of time to speak. Finally I said, “I wonder why Starr was out on the bypass. She wouldn’t have used it to drive to Augusta, either from her house or from Trevor’s. How did anybody lure her out there to kill her?”
    “She wasn’t killed out on the bypass.” Buster finished his sandwich, wiped sauce off his hands and chin, and took a swig of his drink before he followed up on that bombshell. “We’ve been over every inch of the dirt on that roadside, and there wasn’t a speck of blood. None at her place, either, so she wasn’t killed there.”
    “Was she killed in the truck?” When I was a child, some slaughterers had fetched my favorite calf from Daddy’s farm and beat it to death with the head of an axe in the back of their truck, while my little brother, Jake, and I watched. Daddy never used them again, but that didn’t erase the memory. It still made me sick to my stomach to remember. I pushed my plate away.
    “She wasn’t killed in the truck and she wasn’t killed out at her place. Both of them were clean. We have no idea where he killed her.” Buster tore open the wet wipe that Dad thoughtfully provides with sandwiches just as Joe Riddley came back with our tea.
    “Did you solve it while I was gone?” he asked.
    “Nope,” I griped. “Buster just mentioned some ‘he’ who killed her, but he’s being as close as a clam.”
    Joe Riddley sat down, took a swig of tea, and said, “You might as well tell us, Buster, or she’ll keep us here all night. I heard a couple of mosquitoes on my way back out.”
    I was dying to press him: So who is it, Buster? How’d you find him? Anybody we know? I settled for a harmless question: “Why haven’t I seen a warrant?”
    Before he got around to answering, he had to finish his drink and neatly fold up all his paper. Sometimes Buster is too finicky to live. At last he said, “Judge Stebley was down at the detention center for a bond hearing Friday when the word came in, so I asked him to issue the warrant. The alleged perp is a kid of nineteen from Hall County, who was arrested up there a year ago for possession with intent to sell. He got probation, but he must have moved on to bigger stuff, because his conviction was for marijuana and Starr had been using meth. She was nearly eaten up with it. We identified him because he left some prints that matched up. His name is Roddy Howell.”
    That didn’t answer all my questions, by a long shot. “Have you talked to the guy?”
    “Nope. We’re still looking for him.”
    I pinched one of Joe Riddley’s fries, hoping salt might help settle my