Саманта Сильвер - Barking Up The Wrong Tree

“Fine. You girls win. Come back a week from Friday. Strawberry, and chocolate pecan are the two flavours.”

Sophie and I looked at each other, eyes gleaming, barely able to contain our excitement. I was so going to gain like 20 pounds this summer, and it was going to be delicious.

Sophie ordered a club sandwich, then we settled in while Betty went to take the orders from a large group of Japanese tourists who had arrived and taken one of the corner tables.

“I’m going to be all over that chocolate pecan cheesecake,” Sophie told me, rubbing her hands together.

“Shh, keep your voice down,” I scolded. “No one else is supposed to know about that.”

“Oh, I’m sorry, I forgot, I wouldn’t want to get your boyfriend into trouble.”

I rolled my eyes while Sophie laughed at me.

“Oh no!” I said, keeping my eyes rolled. “I rolled my eyes at you so many times now they’re stuck! I guess my eyes are going to be like this forever. Thanks Sophie!”

This time it was her turn to roll her eyes. “You are the lamest person I have ever met, I don’t even know why I’m friends with you.”

Our bonding moment was interrupted by Bella coming back with our plates of food. I took the opportunity to ask her about Antonia.

“So I heard Antonia got taken in for questioning by the cops a second time,” I started as I picked up a fry and started munching on it. Betty leaned her arms on the counter.

“Yes, it’s unbelievable. I don’t think she could have done it. In fact, I know she couldn’t have.”

“Really? Why’s that?” Sophie asked. I couldn’t help but notice the gleam in her eye; Sophie was desperate to clear Antonia’s name so we could focus on Kelly.

“Well the police came in the other day and asked me about Antonia’s whereabouts the day of the murder. And you know, she was here! I remember it clearly, because she came in at around 10 and started telling everyone that she had it under good authority that the city was actually buying their paint to re-paint the post office from a box store in Portland instead of from the local hardware store. And I have tea with Patricia Wilson every week, and her nephew works at the hardware store, and he told her about the big order they got for the paint. So I told Antonia she was mistaken. She didn’t take too kindly to that and stormed off. I didn’t think much more of it until she came back an hour later an announced that Andrea had been killed.”

“So Antonia was definitely here when Andrea was killed. So she couldn’t have done it.”

“That’s what I told the police. Exactly.”

Betty went off to help other customers while Sophie and I ate our food. I smiled at Sophie, who was now free to explore the idea that Kelly was the murderer as much as she wanted. After all, the police’s prime suspect had been eliminated from the suspect pool.

Betty mentioning Jason reminded me of something he had said the other day, however, and I had suddenly gotten an idea of how I could figure out how exactly Andrew Powers had spent his day off. By tomorrow, I was hoping I would have either eliminated another major suspect, or confirmed that he was in Willow Bay. If I was lucky, that was.

Chapter 16

As soon as I got home that afternoon after work, I went into my bedroom to my desk where I kept my laptop. I created a new user in Chrome and made a fake gmail address. Then, I went to a stock photo site and started browsing pictures of girls who looked both provocative, but still pretty cute.

I ended up settling on a picture of a girl that looked a bit like a selfie taken in a park. The sun kissed her hair as she posed for the photo. The revealing top meant a bit of her cleavage was visible, and she was doing a duck face to the camera. Perfect for the reason I wanted it.

I smiled as I downloaded the picture, then opened up Facebook.

My fingers hovered over the keys for a minute. Was this really a good idea? I mean, it wasn’t like I was going to be doing this for any bad reason, I just wanted to see if there were any clues as to what Andrew Powers had really been up to the day of Andrea’s murder.

The rationalization helped steel my resolve, and a few minutes later I had a fake profile made. Maria Stevens lived in Portland, was twenty three years old, liked rock bands and cheesy movies. I liked a bunch of random pages, friended a bunch of random people Facebook recommended for Sophie when I chose her old high school, and twenty minutes later I had a few friends who had accepted my request (mainly male) and a pretty legitimate looking Facebook account.

I smiled to myself just a little bit. I felt like a bit of a hacker mastermind. Hitting up the search bar, I typed in “Andrew Powers”. His profile was the second one down, and I clicked it. He didn’t really have much information publically available; just his profile picture and cover image. I clicked to add friend.

If I was lucky, Andrew would be a frequent user of his Facebook account, and I wouldn’t have too long to wait. It had actually been Jason telling me about the article he was writing about catfishing people online - pretending to be someone you’re not to get someone to enter into a relationship with you on the internet – that gave me this idea to check on Andrew Powers’ day.

I had no intention of getting into a relationship with him, of course. I just wanted to see if he’d posted anything about his personal day.

After making the friend request, I found myself getting too edgy just sitting at the computer. It seemed like every two seconds my eyes went up to the little friend icon at the top of the screen, desperately waiting for Andrew Powers to accept my friend request. I went out to the living room and started helping to chop up some vegetables for the enchiladas Sophie was cooking up for dinner.

“Hey! Angela! Are you even listening to me?”

“What’s that? Sorry,” I said, giving my sister a sheepish look as she waved her hand in front of my face. “I’m just a little bit distracted, I’ve got a plan to hopefully find out what Andrew Powers was doing the day of the murder.”

“Well it had better not involve any magic,” my sister scolded. “And it had certainly better not involve breaking any laws.”

“It definitely doesn’t involve magic. And I’m pretty sure it’s not illegal,” I added hastily. Was pretending to be someone you’re not online illegal? Surely not. Hopefully not.

“Well as I was saying, I think we should look at Sophie’s idea that the niece is behind all this. I don’t like that Kelly girl. I get the feeling she’s the type who would do anything for money, and who loses her temper quickly when she doesn’t get what she wants.”

“I agree,” I replied. “I think she definitely could have done it. Though I think Sophie’s extra pissed at her because she almost got Sophie arrested.”

“I think Sophie almost got Sophie arrested,” I muttered.

“Fine, next time I won’t step in to defend you,” Sophie said, crossing her arms. I held up my hands in surrender.

“Hey, I’m grateful for that, don’t get me wrong! I knew she wasn’t the nicest person, but I never actually expected her to grab my hair and try and throw me to the ground.”

“And all because you wouldn’t give her Sprinkles,” Sophie said, looking over to the dog who was nicely sitting on the floor, looking up at the counter in case gravity decided to work in his favour. She reached down and gave him a pat on the head. “We’re never going to let that mean lady take you, are we? No we’re not! No we’re not,” she said, ruffling his fur. I smiled to myself. Sophie was definitely getting attached to Sprinkles. He normally liked her, though for the moment I could practically see him drooling. Humans came second to the idea of food, even if it was just vegetables.