Death by Chocolate

said. “If she’s got problems, she caused them herself.”
    “What do you mean?”
    Savannah weighed her words,
wanting to be honest with the young man, but not spill more than was necessary.
She had learned long ago that in the course of an investigation, you had to
dole out information strictly on a need-to-know basis.
    “I mean,” she said, “that Louise
didn’t treat you very well, Tony, and you don’t owe her a thing. You just
remember that, okay?”
    He nodded, still looking
confused. ‘Yeah, okay.”
    At that moment the front
door of the house opened, and a woman who vaguely resembled Mildred the pharmacist
walked inside. She didn’t look at all pleased to see the gathering in her
living room.
    She would be even less
pleased when she found out who they were and why they were talking to her son.
    Dirk shoved a business card
into Tony’s hand and took the cigar box from under his arm. “Thanks a million,
buddy,” he said. “Give me a call if you have any questions. I’ll be in touch.”
    As he and Savannah sailed
past Mom, she said, “Who the hell are you?”
    “Public servants, ma’am,”
Dirk replied. ‘Just servin’ the public.”
    “Protect and serve,”
Savannah added as they darted out the door.
    They reached the sidewalk
and Dirk’s Buick without further interference.
    “Pretty good,” he said as
they climbed inside. ‘The kid didn’t lawyer up, and he gave us our first big
break.”
    “And his momma didn’t take
a bite outta your ass.” She smiled and looked at the cigar box which he was
slipping into a brown paper evidence bag. “All in all, not a bad afternoon’s
work.”
     
     
    When Dirk found out that he
wasn’t going to be able to get a search warrant for Louise’s place until the
next morning, Savannah decided to call it quits early and spend some quality
time with her sister.
    But upon arriving home, she
found the reception decidedly chilly. Cordele was sitting in Savannah’s
favorite reading chair, writing in a rather somber-looking black journal of
some sort and had little to say to her in the way of greeting. The cats sat on
the ottoman in their usual places, one on either side of her feet.
    At least they were happy to
see her. They jumped off the footstool and ran to her, mewing, tails arched
like big black question marks.
    As they tangled themselves
around her ankles, she bent and stroked their glossy coats, wondering as always
at the quality of unconditional love offered by animals.
    “Okay,” she said as she led
them into the kitchen, “your love is somewhat dependent upon a never-ending
supply of food and a clean litter box, but...”
    After scooping some smelly
goop into each of two bowls and refreshing their water, she went to the
refrigerator and looked inside. “Hey, you want a glass of lemonade?” she called
to Cordele. “I just squeezed it this morning. It’s the real thing.”
    “Does it have sugar in it?”
came the first words heard from the living room.
    “Ye-e-es.”
    Whoever heard of lemonade
without sugar? she thought as she poured herself a tall glass. What a
chucklehead.
    “I can make you some iced
tea,” she offered, trying to sound more generous than she felt. “No sugar.”
    “With caffeine?”
    She gritted her teeth. “I
wasn’t going to add any, but it’s just regular ol’ tea, so...”
    “Then it has caffeine. No,
thank you.”
    “At least she said ‘Thank
you,’ ” Savannah muttered. “Otherwise I might have had to beat her into a—”
    “Are you talking to me?”
    “No. Just mumbling to
myself.” She took her lemonade and walked into the living room, resisting the
urge to run upstairs to her bedroom and nail the door shut. “Are you hungry for
supper yet?”
    “No. I’ve been working on
my journal this afternoon, and, to be honest, I’ve sort of lost my appetite.”
    Savannah sank wearily onto
the sofa and propped her feet on the coffee table. To heck with it. Who cared
if one’s tabletop got scratched? Who cared if one’s younger sister sat on a
fence post and spun clockwise.... or counterclockwise, for that matter?
    “Lost your appetite, huh?”
she said. “Been reminiscing again about rotten cats caught in briar patches?”
Cordele shot her a hostile, hurt look over the top of the journal. “No-o-o. My entries
are about painful, wounding events that are a little more recent.”
    “How recent?”
    “Yesterday. Today.”
    “Damn, that’s what I was
afraid of,” Savannah mumbled and buried