the task of filling her display case with breakfast treats. It took effort for Dev not to get sidetracked by her blueberry scones.
“But she’s coming back to work, isn’t she?” Delilah’s concerned face was back in place.
“Not the way she is now…” Dev said gravely. “Not with whoever’s doing this still on the loose.”
“Shit…” Delilah stopped, the muffin she held suspended midair as she took a moment to study Dev’s face. “What are you gonna do?”
“Same thing I always said I’d do,” Dev replied. “Take over as long as she needs. Longer, if that’s how long it takes to catch this guy.”
Delilah shut the back panel of her glass case. “What makes you think it’s a guy?” she challenged with an eyebrow arch.
“Physical evidence at the crime scenes have been indicative of intruders who were men. And you need to stop sleuthing,” he scolded. “This isn’t Murder, She Wrote, Jessica Fletcher.”
“The fact that you even remember her name proves you loved that show just as much as me. And even if the ones who did the dirty work were men doesn’t mean they were the only ones involved. Face it—we’re smarter than you.”
“On that note…” Dev picked up his cup. “Have a good morning, sis. I gotta open the store.”
“At least take a scone,” she smirked. “You were eye-fucking them so hard, it made me blush.”
Alright. Maybe he had been. But, still… “You know I can’t eat those.”
“Uh-uh…” she tutted. “Can’t isn’t the same as won’t.”
“You won’t accept that I genuinely love my green juice.”
“And you won’t accept that you can eat a scone every once in a while without turning out like mom.”
This last word of uninvited commentary was delivered more gently than the others. It was an observation Dev had never bothered to deny. He did like to eat healthy. He didn’t want to have a heart attack before forty, like their mother. She’d been too heavy, had carried too much stress, had become diabetic at a frighteningly young age. He shared her genes and she had died too young.
Instead of answering, he looked at his watch. Five fifty-eight in the morning.
“I’ll turn the sign around,” he said, giving the counter a single knock before picking up his mug and heading out.
“You coming to The Big Spoon later?” she called after him.
“It’s delivery day. I’ll be there.” he called back over his shoulder.
He flipped the chalk board sign that hung on the glass pane next to the entrance to the side that said, Come in. We’re open!
The old-fashioned motion bell made a sound as he walked out the door.
Dev had always loved this time of day on Oliver Street in Sapling. The morning rising over the mountains in the summer was halting and picturesque. The road was so straight, it looked like a runway that blazed a trail toward a ramp up to the sky, bisecting Elk Mountain and launching the sun.
It had inspired many an early-rising tourist to try to get a good shot, and you could do it if you stood right in the middle of the road. The streetlights, still on at this hour, added to the runway effect. The whole scene left Dev feeling grateful and awestruck and small.
He stopped then, as he had many mornings before, in no rush to get to work and rightly convinced this may be today’s greatest peace. Even his sleepless night and the long day ahead of him couldn’t dampen this. He breathed in the crisp air and sipped his coffee even more slowly than he made his block-and-a-half stroll to The Freshery, his feet walking the double-white divider lines like a balance beam.
He sensed, more than heard, that something in the air had changed, and he was disbelieving when he heard the otherworldly chop of the blades cutting the air and interrupting the silence of the morning. The part of it that wasn’t disbelief at the sound Dev didn’t think anyone had heard in Sapling in many years was déjà vu.
The only helipad in Sapling was owned by Donovan Packard—the same man who had turned it back into a boom town some forty years before. He’d discovered the town on a summer trip spent hiking the Southern Rockies. In the seventies, Sapling had been a tourist town in decline. Resorts at Aspen and Vail dwarfed the once-popular ski runs on the other side of Elk Mountain. Fewer people from outside came to fish and boat on Grand Lake.
But, lumber … Packard had seen an opportunity there. The