Five Female Gumshoes

By Laura Ware

Female private investigators.  They make up 1/3 of the total PI population, and like their male counterparts they get paid for finding things out.

            In this mystery collection of five never-before-published short stories, we meet five different female PIs.  Some new to the work. Some at it for a while.  Some face personal obstacles to overcome.  But there's one thing in common – solving the cases put before them.

             Join them while they discover the truth, no matter what. 

• Language: English
• Publisher: JJ Press
• Release date: Jul 27, 2021
• ISBN: 9798201251130

Laura Ware

Laura Ware writes in a variety of genres. Her novels are mostly inspirational fiction, although she is currently working on a fantasy series as well. Her short fiction ranges from mainstream to fantasy/science fiction and several things in between. Her stories have been published in a number of Fiction River anthologies, including Past Crime, Last Stand, Editor’s Choice and Feel the Fear. Laura also writes a weekly column for the Highlands News-Sun and her essay “Touched by an Angel” was published in Chicken Soup for the Soul: Random Acts of Kindness in 2017.

Book preview

Five Female Gumshoes

Five Female Gumshoes

Laura Ware

JJ Press

Contents

Introduction

Who’s Your Daddy?

The First Case

Expectations

The Sins Of The Fathers

A Hot Tuesday Afternoon

About the Author

Acknowledgments

Other books by Laura Ware:

To my father.

I miss you.

Introduction

I love mysteries.  I enjoy reading them and have fun writing them.   

I love private eye stories.  The men and women who take on that task are (usually) focused on finding out the truth when no one else can figure it out.  It’s not always an easy task, but they almost always pull it off. 

I was fascinated to learn that only about 1/3 of private investigators in the United States are women.  That led me to devote a collection to five such heroines, women who are in many ways working in a man’s world.  And they succeed. 

In Who’s Your Daddy? we meet Jennifer, a recovering alcoholic who is bound and determined to make a father do the right thing. 

The First Case introduces Connie, a young PI on her very first case who winds up dealing with old high school friends. 

In Expectations Anna must overcome her chronic pain while looking into a suicide that isn’t what it appears. 

The Sins of the Fathers is about Terry, who has to untangle a theft and family secrets to learn the truth. 

And A Hot Tuesday Afternoon shows us Megan, who hunts a bail jumper and must contend with an angry family member who wants to find him first. 

I think you’ll enjoy a look at these five female gumshoes.  They are all different, yet share a passion for getting at the truth.  So, turn the page and join me as we peek at their stories.

Who’s Your Daddy?

Jennifer sat in her sedan, looking at the brightly lit front of the bar. It was paneled in wood painted a light gray, the door leading inside several shades darker. A plank above the door read Larry’s Liquor Shack. Faint music reached her ears, a country song she didn’t recognize.

She tried to tell herself she was fine. Her sweaty hands gripping the steering wheel so tightly the knuckles whitened was normal, wasn’t it? Her stomach fluttered. The Big Mac she’d inhaled on the way up here informing her it wasn’t settled.

Making herself take a deep breath, she forced her hands to relax their grip, then let go of the steering wheel. She flipped down her visor, snapping on the dome light so she could check herself in the mirror. Her brown eyes were way too wide, her skin too pale.

It’s just a bar, she muttered to herself. You’ve been in bars before.

It was before that worried her. Before was when she used alcohol to dull pain and loneliness in her life. When she drank so much, she’d have no memory of how she got home the next day. When worried friends hid her car keys from her and insisted on driving her home.

That was then, she whispered. This is now.

She thought about calling her AA sponsor Margie, but dismissed the idea. Margie would tell her the last place she needed to be was a bar and to wait to catch Brian Tate somewhere else.

But Jennifer was on a deadline. Sam Johnson, the lawyer who’d hired her, told her that they needed Tate’s response sooner rather than later. Jennifer had spent a good bit of that day tracking down his whereabouts since he had ditched Port St. Lucie six months ago.

She’d already tried to catch Tate by phone, but the number was no longer in service. By the time she’d gotten to Daytona from Port St. Lucie, he was off work. And after she convinced his boss at the golf store to talk to her, he told her he’d probably be at this bar.

So here she was, probably being stupid. Maybe she should find a hotel room and try to catch him at home or work tomorrow. One more day couldn’t hurt, could it?

The door to the bar opened and a laughing couple stumbled out. The held on to each other as they staggered across the packed dirt parking lot and got into a black pickup not far from Jennifer’s vehicle. The truck roared to life and backed out of its spot a little more quickly than she would have advised. She watched as it turned onto the two-lane road that led to a busier street not far to the west.

She hoped they would get home okay.

After snapping off the dome light, she checked the clock on her dashboard. 8:04 pm. How long had she been sitting here, dithering? Surely not that long – it had already been dark when she pulled into the parking lot.

She glanced in the rear seat of her trusty Toyota Corolla. Her small blue overnight bag sat there, along with her black laptop case. Unsure of how long it would take to actually talk to Tate, she’d tossed some things in her suitcase in the event she didn’t want to make the drive back that night. Her two cats, Zeke and Gwen, might not like the fact she didn’t come home but they had kibble and would be fine.

All she had to do was pull out of the parking lot and hunt down a reasonably priced hotel. Her phone could probably find one for her in seconds. And she wouldn’t have to risk going back to a world she’d so recently escaped.

But one beer wouldn’t hurt, a voice whispered in her head. Remember how good it felt, sliding down your throat? Come on, just one. I promise.

Jennifer jammed her foot on the brake and yanked the car into reverse. She needed to get away, away from the bar before the voice persuaded her to go in. Because she knew it was a liar. It wouldn’t be one drink. Or two.

She turned onto the road the pickup had taken and headed for the street to the west. There was a Wawa there, she could get herself a pint of ice cream and a soda to silence the voice. Then find someplace to regroup, maybe call Margie after all as she scarfed down something, hopefully chocolate, to distract her from the voice.

Tate would have to wait until tomorrow.

Alittle over twelve hours later, after treating herself to a nice country-style breakfast at a Cracker Barrel she’d located, Jennifer found herself at the door of a rental apartment she’d tracked Tate to.

The complex was small, with maybe a dozen apartments that looked like small houses. They all looked alike, tan stucco with brown accents. The buildings formed a U-shaped pattern around a parking lot with a limited number of spaces.

Jennifer had squeezed into a space next to an oak tree that was bare, not a surprise in February. It was a tight fit, forcing her to slither out of her car so as not to bang her door against the silver sedan next to her.

There didn’t seem to be a doorbell handy. Sipping her to-go coffee, Jennifer knocked briskly on the door. She took a step back and waited.

After a couple of minutes, she decided to bang on the door more loudly. This time, her knuckles let her know they felt abused by this tactic. Shaking her hand, she waited another minute.

She was about to knock a third time when the door swung open. A man in his early twenties with short blond hair, blue eyes, and a bad attitude, barked, Who are you?

Jennifer noticed he wore a white t-shirt and a pair of loose black shorts. No shoes. That and the attitude made her think her quarry had been asleep. Well, he was about to get a wake-up call.

She already had her ID in her hand. Jennifer Rogers, private investigator. I’m looking for Brian Tate. She held out her ID for him to examine.

She noted the look of panic that flashed across his face. The hand on the door twitched, as if he were considering slamming it in her face. Swallowing, he said, Never heard of him.

Jennifer cocked an eyebrow. She had a picture in