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Carlita stared at Dernice. “Russell Sterling hired Elvira to look into his company’s finances?”

“Not technically,” Dernice said. “He hired her to have someone. That someone was me—to slide in undercover and try to determine why his books weren’t balancing. Sterling basically suspected an employee was stealing.”

“Were you able to get to the bottom of it?”

“Yep. It was a little tricky. He employs a lot of family members, which is why he needed someone from the outside to kind of…” Dernice made a smooth line with her hand. “…swoop in and try to figure out what was going on.”

“Who was it?” Carlita held her breath.

“I don’t know. I was able to narrow it down to employee identification numbers but didn’t hang around long enough to find out who it was.” Dernice went into a technical explanation about how she figured out the money discrepancies occurred at the same time every week. Not large amounts, but enough so that eventually it became a significant sum. “Sterling is el cheapo. He uses the old punch a card time clock which helped me track down the thieves’ ID numbers.”

“So, it was an inside job?”

“Most definitely,” Dernice said.

Carlita started to pace, struggling to put the pieces together. “But why break into the pawn shop and Colby’s Corner Store?”

“It seems random. I mean, why would Sterling’s thieves come over here to Walton Square?”

“Because they found out he hired Elvira’s company and were desperate to get their hands on the evidence before he did, so they broke in. They didn’t try very hard to get into the pawn shop. Maybe they broke into Colby’s because they were hungry.” Carlita blinked rapidly. “Unless it was Sterling. He left the fundraiser and then broke into our businesses.”

She immediately dismissed the idea. “He’s too tall. The burglars were both shorter than he is.”

“Sterling was at the fundraiser? I never saw him. Of course, I showed up late to the party because I had to work,” Dernice said.

“He must have been gone by then.”

“Let me finish going over the report.” Dernice grew quiet, poring over the information. “This sounds exactly like what happened to us.”

“Let’s go with the theory whoever they were knew about the investigation and were desperate to get their hands on the report, not knowing Elvira had already turned it over to Russell Sterling.”

“It’s possible, especially if it was a family member. Too bad we don’t have access to Elvira’s dark web. We could hack into Sterling’s site and figure out who it was.”

“Where is Elvira’s report?”

“Locked in the safe.” Dernice pulled a set of keys from her pocket. “I have the combination. By the way, she’s ticked about the damaged ductwork. Maybe if we tell her we’re hot on the trail of whoever broke in, she’ll give us access to her backdoor search engine.”

“It’s worth a shot.” Carlita took the folder from her and tucked it inside her purse. “I’ll try not to take much of your time.”

“Don’t worry about it.” Dernice patted the side of the EC Investigative Services van. “Hop in.”

“To ride halfway around the block?”

“Sure. I meant to park out front, but when I saw Vinnie, I couldn’t resist and had to stop to say hello. Not only is your son good looking, but he has the fancy word. It starts with a ‘c’”.

“Charm?”

“No.”

“Come-hither looks?”

“No, but you're close.” Dernice snapped her fingers. “He has charisma. You know, the vibe that makes you tingle inside.”

“Vinnie has had more than his share of women chase after him.” Carlita started to open the passenger door and hesitated. “Does Elvira know you’re driving her van?”

“Nope.” Dernice held a finger to her lips. “Please don’t mention it to her. She’ll throw a fit. I’m gonna have this thing professionally cleaned and detailed before she gets back. Hop in, but be careful. It’s a deathtrap, not to mention gross.”

Carlita cautiously removed several containers from the passenger seat and set them on the floor. She slid onto the seat and reached for the door handle, instantly regretting touching it. “There’s something sticky on the door handle.”

“It’s probably guava juice. Elvira’s been binging on it lately. She heard it has a lot of fiber.”

“Is she lacking fiber?” Carlita waved dismissively. “Never mind. I don’t want to know.”

“Personally, I find it’s too sweet, but she seems to dig it.” Dernice fired up the engine. She stomped on the gas and raced to the corner before making a sharp right. One more hard right and they reached the front of the building.

“That was quick.”

“The quicker, the better. Did you notice the rancid smell?”

“It smells like Elvira’s natto,” Carlita said. “It has a very distinct odor.”

Dernice made a gagging sound. “It’s disgusting.”

“I have to admit, I’m not a fan either.” Grabbing her purse, Carlita hopped out and followed the woman inside.

“Spy,” Elvira’s parrot squawked. “Carlita spy. Where’s Elvira?”

“In Alaska,” Dernice said. “Elvira is in Alaska.”

“Snitchy Snitch Alaska.”

“I wish you were in Alaska,” Dernice sighed.

“If you need a break while Elvira is gone, Gunner would love to have her over for a visit.”

“Thanks for the offer. Give me a few more days, when Snitch is driving me crazy and I’ll be begging you to take her.”

“Ditzy Dernice.”

Carlita covered her mouth to hide her smile. “She learned a new phrase.”

“Unfortunately. I have no idea why my sister is so attached to this bird. If it was me, I would give her the boot.”

“Booty boot,” Snitch said.

“We’ve heard enough. I’m relocating you.” Dernice carried the bird and her cage out of the room and returned empty-handed. “Where were we?”

“Getting ready to look at Elvira’s report on Sterling Automotive Group.”

“Right. I’ll need to get it from the safe.” She left again and reappeared, waving a manila file folder in the air. “Elvira is gonna have a cow when she finds out I have the code to the safe. She’s the only person who is supposed to know it.”

“How did you find out what it was?”

“Easy. It’s her birth date plus her favorite number. It took me a few tries, but I figured it out.”

“I hope this won’t get you into any trouble.” Carlita frowned.

“Nah. If Elvira finds out, she’ll get over it.” Dernice pulled a chair around to the back side of the desk and opened the folder. Going page by page, she filled Carlita in on the investigation and how she’d infiltrated the company, befriended the employees and used the information to figure out how the thieves were stealing.

“Like I said, most of the office workers, a good number of the sales staff, and even the peeps who work in service are related to Russell Sterling. Based on what you told me and how reluctant he was to talk about it, something tells me he knows who broke into his business.”

Dernice sent a text to her sister, asking her to call. While they waited, they went over the police report. Finally, the phone rang.

“Hey, Elvira.”

“Hey, Dernice. How’s it going? Did you get a quote to repair the ductwork you damaged?”

“I’m getting several quotes. By the way, Carlita is here with me. I have you on speaker.” Dernice filled her sister in on what they had found. “Do you remember the Sterling Automotive Group investigation?”

“Sure. How could I forget? I hope Sterling fired the employees who were stealing from him.”

“His place got broken into a couple of weeks ago,” Carlita said.

“Seriously? Who was it?”

“I don’t know. I stopped by the police department and got a copy of the report. It sounds eerily similar to what happened here at Walton Square. Pete and I went by there earlier today. Sterling doesn’t want to talk about it.”

“Why not?” Elvira asked.

“My guess is the same people who stole from Sterling and burglarized his place broke into your office.”

“Ah. Maybe he knows who it was. Maybe it was a family member. He’s trying to cover for his family and has no plans to turn them in,” Elvira said.

“I was thinking the same thing. He somehow knows or suspects they could be behind what happened to us and, for whatever reason, is protecting them,” Carlita said.

“We have the employee numbers,” Elvira said. “The file is locked away in the safe.”

Dernice tapped the top of the stack of papers. “Got it right here.”

“The Sterling file?”

“Yep.”

“How did you get in the safe?” Elvira demanded.

“I figured out the code.”

“Great. Now I’ll have to change it,” she grumbled.

“We need something else,” Carlita said. “Dernice seems to think if we can access your dark web website, we can track down the Sterling Automotive Group’s employee badge numbers and figure out who it was that broke into his place and most likely broke in here.”

“Before we delve any deeper into this, why did they bust the pawn shop window and go rummaging around in Colby’s Corner Store?”

“Maybe to throw investigators off. I don’t think they had any intention of stealing from the pawn shop. The window they broke was the window to nowhere.”

“But they stole stuff from Colby’s place.”

“Colby’s Corner Store was a theft of convenience, if you ask me,” Carlita said. “So…will you help us get into Sterling’s site?”

Loud tapping ensued on the other end. “I would be breaking my promise to Sharky.”

“Then don’t tell us how to access his dark web,” Dernice said. “You have other sites.”

“True.” Elvira grew quiet…so quiet Carlita thought they’d been disconnected. “Hello?”

“I’m here. Okay. Fine, but only this once. Pinky swear that you won’t write down any of the login information.”

“I swear,” Dernice said.

“Ditto,” Carlita said.

“No. Say it. Say you swear.”

Carlita rolled her eyes. “I swear. I won’t write your login information down.”

“Good.” Elvira rattled off the dark web website’s address, her username and password.

While she talked, Dernice tapped the keys. “We’re in. Now what?”

“Must I do everything for you?”

Dernice mimicked a yapping sound with her hand and pointed at the phone. “Yes, please.”

Elvira directed her sister through the screens. In less than two minutes, they were in Sterling’s company files. “Go to the identification screen, type in the employee identification number and press enter.”

Dernice did as she instructed. She typed in the number and hit enter. Up popped an employee file. Her jaw dropped. “Good gravy. No wonder Russell Sterling doesn’t want the cops linking these burglaries together.”