The Girl Who Told Stories - paperback

🔥New town. Same kind of bad guys.🔥

Once we were out of earshot, I took a notebook and pen from my purse and raised my eyebrows.

“What have we got?”

Brady looked toward the gas station.

“The station received an emergency call twenty-five minutes ago. I was the nearest responder, so I drove over, arriving seven minutes after the phone call. The convenience store didn’t have any customers, but the clerk was in the bathroom in significant pain. She had burns on her face and neck, so I called for paramedics. They arrived fifteen minutes after my call and checked the young lady out. Because she was in so much pain, they gave her a sedative and took her to Eastview Medical Center with the lights and sirens going.”

Eastview was the local hospital. It had a small ER and a fair number of doctors, but most serious cases would have gone to UNC Medical Center in Chapel Hill. I nodded and wrote down the information.

“Tell me about these burns,” I said. “Any idea how she got them?”

He looked down and then raised his eyebrows.

“The perps threw something at her face,” he said. “I don’t know what it was, but I called for a hazmat unit just in case. They’re coming in from Greensboro.”

“So it’s a chemical burn,” I said, grimacing. “Jeez.”

“Like I said, it’s ugly.”

I nodded and wrote that down.

“This isn’t the first gas station robbery lately, is it?” I asked. He said it wasn’t. “Did the others involve chemical attacks?”

“No, ma’am,” he said, shaking his head. “We’ve had five robberies so far, and the violence has escalated with each robbery. First one happened about six weeks ago. Our suspects have hit a new store about once a week. They always wear black ski masks, and there are three suspects in each robbery. Before robbing a store, they wait until all the customers leave. Then they go in.”

I wrote down the pertinent details.

“Are they armed?” I asked, glancing up.

“Yep,” he said, nodding. “At least two of them have semiautomatic pistols. It’s hard to tell from the surveillance video, but they look like the same guns at each robbery.”

“And you think it’s the same perps each time?” I asked, lowering my chin.
“Based on their body types and mannerisms, yeah,” he said. “And I’m pretty sure the suspects are male. We never see their faces, but one of them’s got a big Adam’s apple, another has hairy forearms, and the third guy just has big shoulders, a small waist, and large hands and feet. They always wear dark pants and dark shirts.”

“This is all good information,” I said, glancing toward the shop owner. He was on a cell phone. I’d talk to him soon. “What can you tell me about the robberies themselves?”

“They’re fast,” he said. “The perps walk through the front door wearing ski masks. One guy holds the door open, and the other two go inside. In each instance, they grab the clerk and pull him or her out from behind the counter. One of the bad guys holds the clerk at gunpoint, while the second robs the register. If the store’s got liquor, they steal a few bottles, too. Total take on each robbery is between two hundred and three hundred dollars plus the cost of stolen merchandise.”

I furrowed my brow. This was a lot of risk for three hundred bucks a pop, especially when it was split between multiple perpetrators. If they wanted money, they could have gotten legitimate jobs and made a whole lot more with much less risk. That made me wonder whether they did it because they liked it. It was a disturbing thought.

👉FROM: The Girl Who Told Stories, the seventh book in the Joe Court series. 😋

WHAT’S THE JOE COURT SERIES ABOUT?


Joe Court is a young detective in fictional tourist town and county of St Augustine, Missouri. The streets are well-swept, the surroundings are gorgeous, and the people are friendly—except for the murderers, of course. 



Beneath its beautiful exterior, St. Augustine is a county built on poison and lies. Its murder rate is astronomical, its government is corrupt, and drug use is out of control.
Joe’s there to clean the place up. It’s not going to be easy, but she’s exactly the right person or the job. 


The books are gripping, gritty murder mysteries. In each book, Joe Court investigates a crime—usually a murder, but not always—and takes that crime to a thrilling conclusion. I don’t like cliffhangers. The main story is resolved in each book. You’re going to find out what happened to the bad guys in each story. That said, there are side stories that continue from one book to another. A rumor in one book might turn out to be a far bigger deal than anyone anticipated in later books. Because of that, it’s best to read the story in order.