Page 56 of Family Jewels

I had just sat down on a metal chair when my phone rang. I pulled it out of my purse and checked the caller ID.

It wasn’t a number I recognized, but I answered anyway. “Hello?”

“Rose, this is Deputy Randy Miller. Joe said you were going to call me with some information about Rayna Dyer.”

Of course he had.

“I’m free now,” he continued, “so I wondered if I could come by your office to talk to you.”

“You could if I were there. I’m at the vet with Muffy.”

“Is she okay?” he asked with a worried tone. He was one of the few people who appreciated my little dog almost as much as I did.

“Dr. Romano thinks she’ll be okay. He’s taking x-rays now.”

“What happened?”

Seeing no point in keeping it to myself, I said, “Raddy Dyer kicked her last night.”

“What?Does Chief Deputy Simmons know Dyer was at your place?”

“He knows Raddy showed up, but not the part about him kicking Muffy. And I don’t plan on telling him, or he might come back early from his trip.”

“Why didn’t you call the sheriff’s department last night?”

“Because he left, and I doubt he’ll be coming back. Not after the send-off I gave him.” No need to bring James’ name into it. “But he told me a few things I think you should know.”

“You mean that a man ran out of Rayna’s house and drove away?”

“Yeah,” I answered in surprise. “How’d you find out? Did you arrest Raddy?”

“No. He called it in. Said he saw a man running out after ransacking her room, but none of the neighbors remember seeing another carora man, while several of them sure remembered Raddy and the ruckus he made.”

“So Raddy’s a suspect?”

“Who said it was murder?”

“Come on, Randy. If she got drunk and drowned in her hot tub, why would you be so interested in her husband’s whereabouts?”

“Someone ripped her room apart, Rose. A crime was still committed. Do you know anythingelsethat might help?”

“Raddy told me she was dead when he got there. And yeah, he claimed there was someone in the house. He thinks the guy was looking for one of Raddy’s grandma’s necklaces. Rayna had a bunch of his family jewelry when they broke up, and while she swears she gave everything back to Raddy’s mother, Raddy claims one necklace is missing. Yesterday morning he asked Neely Kate and me to find it because he’d used it as a bet in a poker game.”

“How much is the necklace worth?”

“That’s the thing—I don’t know for sure. Raddy told us it’s real, but his mother and Rayna both claimed otherwise. But Rayna pawned one of the pieces, and itwasreal. Honestly, I don’t know. But the guy Raddy made the bet with believes it’s real, and he expects Raddy to pay up. It sounded like the other guys in the poker group think it’s real too.”

“Thanks, Rose,” he said. “Thisishelpful.”

“So what are you gonna do?” I asked.

“Re-question the neighbors. And try to find Raddy. He’s not in the clear, but if he’s not the killer, we’ll be interested in what he knows.”

“So shewasmurdered. How?”

“Dammit.” He groaned. “She was strangled.”

I was glad I was sitting down because I suddenly felt lightheaded. Strongly suspecting that she’d been murdered and hearing how it had happened were two different things. I couldn’t stop thinking about the fact that Neely Kate and I had talked to her less than twenty-four hours ago. “I hope you find whoever did this,” I said.