“What would I say?”
David pitched up his voice. “ ‘You should do it! You’d make so many people happy, and it’d give you something to do other than building machines and haunting local yard sales! Hee hee!’ ”
“ ‘Hee hee’?” Amie asked, indignant. “When have I ever said ‘hee hee’? Is that really how I sound to you?”
David dropped the voice. “For the most part, yes.”
Amie lay back down on the floor. “That’s not what I’d say.”
“What would you say, then?” David returned to the underside of the table, holding a Ping-Pong ball.
“I’d ask if you want to write another book.”
Amie looked over after a few moments of silence. David was turning the ball over in his hand, his thoughts elsewhere.
“Possibly,” he finally said. “When my niece was little, I thought I might like to write a children’s book for her.”
Amie gasped. “That’d be so cute!” she squealed.
David gave her a sideways look.
“Yeah, okay, I hear it now, I understand the voice. But if that’s what you want to do, you should do it.”
“Elle’s starting high school next year. She’s too old for children’s books now.” David released the Ping-Pong ball at the top of the ramp. It picked up speed as it rolled down, flying off the end and bouncing across the floor to the other side of the room.
“Too fast,” he muttered to himself. “Need to adjust the angle.” He began peeling tape off the ramp.
“I’m sure she’d still appreciate it.” Amie stared at the ceiling. “I know you don’t get to see her a lot. This could be a way to show you’re thinking of her.”
“I might’ve been able to pull it off several years ago,” David said. “But nowadays I don’t think Harry Jenkins would be able to sell anything other than a new Detective Richards mystery. Elle’s going to have to settle for the usual fifty-dollar bill on her birthday.”
“Fifty dollars? Pretty cheap for a bestselling author.”
“I spend a lot of money on duct tape.” Ramp adjusted, David went to retrieve the runaway Ping-Pong ball.
“You know you just told me your pen name, right?” Amie said.
“I’ve given up on the secret.” David grunted as he reached under the couch to grab the ball. “Read the books if you want; I don’t care.”
“Yay. I will. Thanks, Harry.” Amie sat up. “Maybe I’ll learn something from your detective that’ll help me figure out who killed Savannah.”
David gave her a strange look as he returned to the table. “Why would you want to figure that out?”
“Aren’t you curious?” Amie asked. “Especially since you might be a suspect. Don’t you want to clear your name?”
“Unless they take me away in handcuffs, I’m staying as far away from the situation as I can.” David sat on the table. “I’ve read—and written—enough mysteries to know that a suspect getting involved in a case only lands them in more trouble than they were already in.”
“Well, it’d be pretty hard for you to figure out who did it if you got arrested,” Amie pointed out.
“That’s why I keep you around. My girl Friday, working on the outside.” David tossed her the Ping-Pong ball, standing. “Drop that on the ramp, will you?”
Amie leaned over to deposit the ball. It descended the ramp at a much more leisurely rate than it had during the first trial. David stopped it with his foot as it reached the end of the ramp.
“Excellent.” He bent over to pick up the ball.
“Elena thinks Benny did it,” Amie said.
“Elena also thinks she can predict the future based on the phase of the moon,” David countered, sitting on the table again. “She’s a nice woman, but I wouldn’t put my money where her mouth is.”
