45ebf3c490593574dd454e5dfd5a5758

“Yes, but… is that blood?” She turned to her daughter. “What did you do?!”

Ruby rolled her eyes.“Enough with the hysterics, Mom. My period started last night, and I couldn’t find my tampons so I grabbed the first thing I saw.”

“But that’s my best T-shirt!”

“So? Just put it in the wash.”

“It won’t come out! You ruined my best T-shirt!”

Garth cleared his throat.“So if we investigate this blood we won’t find that it belongs to Lil Thug?”

“Of course not. That’s my blood,” said Ruby. “And I think it’s pretty disgusting that you would go through my stuff and pick things out of the trash like that.”

“The trash!” Mrs. Kettering screamed. “You threw my Chanel T-shirt in the trash?!”

Ruby shrugged.“Like you said, it’s probably ruined now, right?”

Cynthia Kettering pressed her lips together and turned to her husband.“You say something, Charles.”

Mr. Kettering looked a little uncomfortable.“What am I supposed to say?”

“Anything!”

“You can’t take your mom’s best T-shirt and use it as a… um, well… a, um…”

“Tampon?” Ruby suggested with a slight grin.

“Exactly.”

Ruby now reached out and grabbed the plastic bag from Garth’s hands, then handed it to her mom. “Here you go, Mom. Now you can wash it and be happy.”

“Hey, you can’t take that,” said Garth. “That’s evidence.”

“Try baking soda,” said Odelia. “And let it soak for a while.”

“Baking soda?” asked Mrs. Kettering hopefully.

“Can I have that bag back now please?” asked Garth.

“Yeah, don’t wash it before the stain is gone,” said Odelia. “Or it’ll never come out.”

“You think I can save my T-shirt?”

“Oh, absolutely.”

“Can I please have that bag now?” asked Garth.

“I’ll give it a try,” said Mrs. Kettering gratefully. “Thanks for the tip.”

“Hey, that’s evidence!” Garth cried, raising his voice.

“That’s not evidence, that’s my best T-shirt,” said Cynthia Kettering.

“Look, are you going to arrest me or what?” said Ruby.

“Nobody is arresting anybody,” said Chase soothingly.

“Look, I didn’t kill the guy, okay? So sometimes I steal stuff—big deal!”

“It is a big deal,” said Odelia. “Especially to the people you steal from.”

“Look, we’re going off track here,” said Garth. “You, Mr. Kettering.”

Mr. Kettering looked up with a jerk.“Me?”

“Yes, you. Did you hear your daughter leaving the cabin last night?”

“No, I didn’t, detective. I didn’t hear anything.”

“Now you wouldn’t be covering for your daughter, would you?”

“Covering for my daughter? No, of course not. I wouldn’t do a thing like that.”

“Or you, Mrs. Kettering?”

But Mrs. Kettering had her mind on other matters. She was still studying at her precious T-shirt.“I hope to God they’ve got baking soda on this damn boat.”

Garth changed tack.“So did you notice anything else last night? Anything out of the ordinary?”

“Nothing,” Mr. Kettering murmured. “Slept like a baby.”

“Are you a deep sleeper, Mrs. Kettering?”

“Oh, no,” said Mrs. Kettering. “I wake up from the least little thing.”

“And you didn’t hear anything out of the ordinary last night?”

“No, I most certainly did not.”

Garth consulted the floor plan.“So you’re across the corridor from…”

“From us,” Odelia supplied helpfully.

“And you didn’t hear anyone pass by your cabin last night? No voices in the corridor? No screams? Nothing?”

“No, sir,” said Mrs. Kettering.

“And how about you, Miss Kettering?”

“What about me?” asked Ruby, looking bored.

“You didn’t hear anything last night? Footsteps? Strange noises? People talking?”

“Nope.”

“Ruby likes to sleep with her headphones on,” said her mother. “She likes to listen to music.”

“Not Lil Thug,” said Ruby with a wicked grin. “That’s for old people.”

“Lil Thug is for old people?” asked Odelia.

“Sure. You know he’s older than my parents, right?”

“I hadn’t realized.”

“Botox. Can we go now?”

“One moment, Miss Kettering,” said Garth, once more producing the earring. “Does this look familiar to you?”

Three Ketterings stared at the earring, then shook their heads.“What is it?” asked Ruby.

“It looks like an earring,” said her dad.

“I know it’s an earring, Dad, but whose is it, and what does it have to do with anything?”

“That’s what I’d like to find out,” said Garth, a little grim-faced as he tucked the earring back into his desk drawer.

And as the Ketterings left the office, Dooley said,“I don’t think she did it, Max. Her mom would have heard her.”

“What if her mom did hear her, but was lying just now?”

“But why would she do that?”

“Because she doesn’t want her daughter to languish in some prison cell?”

“Oh.” He thought about this for a moment. “It’s possible,” he admitted. “But would a kleptomaniac commit murder?”

“That’s the big question,” I said, “And one Odelia and Chase will need to figure out.”

15

“Okay, so basically we have… nine suspects,” said Garth.

“Eleven if you include us,” Odelia pointed out.

“Yeah, but like I said before, I’m not including you.”

“That’s very nice of him, Max,” said Dooley.

“Very nice indeed,” I said. “Though if Odelia and Chase had killed Lil Thug we would have noticed, so…”