Whiskey Rebellion (Romantic Mystery/Comedy) Book 1 (Addison Holmes Mysteries)

the latest will be fine.”
    “But aren’t I a suspect? Aren’t you supposed to tell me not to leave town?”
    “I think you watch too much television, Ms. Holmes. It should be pretty easy to get your whereabouts from the security cameras on the inside of the building.”
    “Hmm,” I said. I hadn’t thought about that, but I wasn’t exactly at my best at the moment. I looked at him and pleaded with my eyes. “No one can know about this, Detective. I made a bad decision, but I have a lot to lose.”
    “I’ll talk to Mr. Dupres myself and make sure he doesn’t give your name to the press, and there’s no reason for me to include your employment here in the report, only that you found the body.”
    “Thank you,” I said, and truly meant it.
    “Are you good at taking advice, Ms. Holmes?”
    “Not especially, Detective Dempsey.”
    His lips quirked a little. “I’m going to give you some anyway. You look like a nice kid from a nice family. Go back to your teaching job and stay away from places like this. It doesn’t suit you.”
    I knew everything he said was true, but that didn’t mean I particularly liked hearing it. It was like rubbing salt in an already opened wound, and I didn’t need some cop coming along to tell me that I’d done something stupid.
    “I’m thirty years old, Detective Dempsey. I stopped being a kid a long time ago, and sometimes decisions have to be made that aren’t particularly pleasant, whether people like you approve of those decisions or not. Now if you’re finished I’m going home.”
    I scooted out of the booth and grabbed my bag, prepared to make a grand exit when I felt his hand under my elbow.
    “Let me have a patrol car drive you home, Ms. Holmes. I’d hate to have to arrest you for drunk driving.”
    I could see the laughter in his eyes, even though his mouth was in a serious line. I would have jerked my arm out of his grasp, but I was afraid I’d fall over.
    Men like Nick Dempse y are extremely irritating to independent women like me. They like to be in charge and they always think they’re right about everything.
    The depressing thing is they almost always are.

    The drive back to Whiskey Bayou was somber to say the least, but at least the officer taking me home didn’t make me ride in the back of the squad car. That would have fueled the gossip flames of the few remaining tenants that were still in my apartment complex.
    I checked behind me to make sure the officer in my car was driving responsibly, and when I was satisfied he was, I turned back around and tried to find a comfortable position on the torn vinyl seat of the Crown Victoria.
    I noticed the Now Leaving Savannah sign and knew I’d be back home within minutes. Whiskey Bayou is a nice place to live. It’s a small town of about three thousand people surrounded by swamps and slimy creatures that bite. It’s an acquired taste, but picturesque in the daylight. And since it takes less than ten minutes to drive north to Savannah we’re not completely cut off from civilization. It just sometimes feels that way.
    We turned right on Main Street, just past the two-storied, red-bricked crumbling buildings and the giant sign that said Welcome to Whiskey Bayou—The First Drink’s on Us . An old depot that housed a train car graveyard sat on the left and a small diner, grocery store and park were on the right.
    The Whiskey Bayou residential area was constructed around the Walker Whiskey Distillery, which was built sometime in the 1800’s. When I was in college, I found out the Walkers were distant cousins of the Holmes, so I did my best to learn everything I could about whiskey just in case I was the last remaining relative someday and had a chance to inherit. Mostly everything I learned about whiskey was that it gave me a terrible headache and made my mouth dry.
    The roads around the distillery looked like something a drunken council member would plan out, with crooked streets, some of which dead-ended for no apparent reason, and roundabouts that seemed to have no exit once you were on them. I remember once when I was a child, my mom going around in circles for what seemed like hours until my sister, Phoebe, finally threw up all over the back seat.
    The officer who was driving me home seemed to be in the same predicament, and we went round and round until my eyes crossed and my stomach lurched. He finally flipped on his lights and broke several traffic laws once he saw the tinge of green my face had