Sally Espresso, Barista Detective

It's been 12 months since the subscribers to my Patreon thrilled to the coffee-fuelled adventure of Sally Espresso, to it's time to release it to the rest of you.

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“Sally Espresso, Barista Detective,” she says, slapping some sort of ID down on the desk.

“Barista Detective.” Brian Copp seems non-plussed by this.

“With the ongoing privatisation of the police force, speciality crime-fighting sub-contractors are the way forward. Consulting detectives for money laundering, drug crimes, gang crimes, locked room mysteries have been employed on an ad hoc basis for many years. It’s time for someone who knows their way around a cup of joe to get involved in coffee related crimes.”

Copp looks about. “I hate to say this. Because your pitch is horrible. But as it happens I do need someone who knows about coffee.”

“Yes!” says Sally punching the air. “But I brought these anyway.” Copp helps himself to one of the cups. “So what is it. Has someone been killed by an over-charged espresso machine? A gang of smugglers bringing in coffee beans in their cocaine shipments? Or two roasters sabotaging each other’s blends?”

Copp steps back, lifting the tarp. “Oh my,” said Sally.

There is a body face down in a brown pool, no cup or mug visible. “We need you to identify the source of the coffee,” says Copp, sighing to himself. This was not what he’d signed up for when he’d joined the Police Independent Co-Operative Trust as an Independent Contracting Officer.

Sally bends down and looks. “Oh,” she says in a small voice. Then “Oh no.”

She puts on her gloves and glasses, lowers her face right down to take a sniff. “Oh no. You’re kidding me.”

A dark-haired man with a delicate face arrives and holds up his wallet. “I think that you’ll find this is a job for me.”

“I do not believe it,” says Sally. “The first proper crime for weeks and you come in…”

“Johnny Darjeeling,” says the man. “Teapot Investigations.”