He glances over at Jen.
“Oh, don’t look at me like that, pretty boy,” she says. “I don’t bite. Though, considering who you’re banging, I get the feeling you like that. I might be a little young for you, though. You like them old enough to play momma and give you a spanking.”
To his credit, Phil only meets Jen’s gaze with a level stare, and after a moment, she shifts in discomfort.
“You’re the one who’s embarrassed to be banging her,” Jen mutters.
“Or, perhaps, I am aware of the dynamic it suggests, given our respective positions in town.”
“Her being the local whoremistress, you mean.”
That level stare again, and under the weight of it, Jen mutters and glances away. Yes, Isabel runs the brothel, and for all my initial issues with that, I have come to agree with her “my body, my choice” stance and she has been completely receptive to all of my suggestions for negotiating this difficult ground.
The brothel is also the reason Jen despises Isabel. Not because she has a moral objection to it, but because she’s freelanced in that area herself, which is strictly against town policy. We keep the sex trade tightly regulated for the women’s safety; Jen sees it as an unfair monopoly.
“Yes, this is what I wanted to speak to you about,” Phil says. “Jennifer requested an extension. It was rejected. To the surprise of everyone, I’m certain, but mostly you, Casey, who has had to deal with her extensive criminal activity and complete inability to cohabit with other residents, particularly those in authority.”
“Fuck you, pretty boy.”
“I rest my case.”
“I’m part of the goddamn militia,” Jen says. “Sherlock here hasn’t pinned a crime on me in almost a year . . . because I haven’t committed any. Even those so-called crimes were bullshit. I got hungry and grabbed some extra food. I got cold and grabbed some extra wood. Which I paid back.”
“Only after you were caught,” I say.
“I was framed.”
“We found your fingerprints.”
Her jaw sets. “They were planted. You think I wouldn’t know enough to wear gloves?”
“No, I think you couldn’t bother wearing gloves, because it’s so much more fun to get caught and have the excuse to tell everyone how incompetent the new detective is.”
“That’s what this is about then. You vetoed my extension. Or you got that sheriff of yours—”
“Jennifer?” Phil cut in. “Please stop before you embarrass yourself further. Neither Casey nor Eric knew of your request for an extension. If they had, Casey would likely recommend it be granted, as she was the one who argued to allow you on the militia. Your continued attempts to paint her as your oppressor really do only embarrass yourself.”
Jen turns on him, but I step between them. “And as much fun as this conversation is, I’m going to need to bring it to a close. Jen? I’m sorry if you didn’t get an extension. The last time I heard, though, you were counting the days until you could leave. If you legitimately want an extension, I can provide a reference—I’m sure Will would too—but the council didn’t grant Sam’s, either, and we all argued to keep him.”
“Sam didn’t request an extension.” She looks from me to Phil. “He told us he’d changed his mind.”
“The point is—” I begin.
“They refused Sam?”
“He’d been here four years,” Phil says. “The council felt that was enough.”
“I want an extension,” Jen says. “I’ve earned it. You know I have.”
She’s keeping the defensive set to her face, but genuine panic shadows her eyes.
“I will talk to the council,” I say.
Her eyes narrow. Before she can speak, I say, enunciating firmly, “If I say I will, then I will. You still have another month, and right now, I have a bigger problem. You want to help? Go over to the clinic and see what you can do. Tell Diana I sent you and that I said ‘Thanks for breakfast.’ ”
“I need a code word?”
I don’t bother to answer. If she walked in without saying it, Diana would figure she was poking about, causing trouble, and send her packing.
I open the door. “You will see our situation at the clinic. If Diana doesn’t need anything, then your job is to find out how many people in town know about that situation. Track it. See what’s being said. Get back to me.”
“You want me to be your spy?”
“I want to know how much I can trust you.”
She scowls but leaves without another word.
Once she’s gone, I say to Phil, “That’s the sixth request for an extension the council has turned down since fall.”
“Actually—” He shuts his mouth. “Yes, you are correct.”
“There are more, aren’t there?”
He hesitates.
“Yes, there are,” I say when he doesn’t reply. “They just haven’t mentioned it publicly. Like Sam telling the other militia that he didn’t ask for an extension. Those who asked didn’t admit they’d been rejected. Has anyone gotten one since you’ve been here?”
“Mathias.”
“Yeah,” I say as I sit on the desk edge. “Mathias is special, in so many ways.”
“There were several granted after I arrived last spring.”
“When did they stop?”
He pauses. Then he says, “Late summer, I believe. However, no one who has requested it was truly essential services, which is the definition required for an extension. Sam qualified, and I was surprised his request was denied, but it was his third extension.”
Fewer extensions being granted. Fewer residents being admitted. I should be okay with that. Dalton has said that, ideally, he’d like to see a town of about one hundred and fifty. He’s done the math and calculated that fewer than one-thirty would risk essential services, but more than one-seventy means less choice in living quarters, fewer jobs, and lower overall resident satisfaction. Maybe this suggests the council is actually listening to him, rather than overpopulating Rockton to fill their own pockets.
“I’ll talk to Jen later,” I say. “Get a feel for whether she’s honestly looking for an extension or just being a pain in the ass. For now, we have a Danish tourist in the clinic.”
“What?”
I start at the beginning.
8
It’s a good thing Dalton had to head into the forest in search of Jacob. It’s much easier to deal with the council’s bullshit without also having to mediate between them and our sheriff.
I understand Dalton’s frustration. He has a town to run, and his focus is on the people in it. He is the shepherd, and he needs to make sure every one of his flock returns home healthy and whole. To the council, though, the residents are widgets in two-year storage, and what counts is how much they pay for that privilege.
If Rockton were a country, the council would be the corporate interests and Dalton would be in charge of social services. That leaves me playing politician and negotiating between the two.
Fortunately, I have a budding ally in Phil. When he was first exiled to Rockton, he’d been like the junior exec sent onto the work floor, supposedly to get a better understanding of the business from the ground up, but really all sides knew it was a punishment. In his case, a punishment for failing to protect a very wealthy client . . . who was also a serial-killing psychopath.
Phil had reacted like most junior execs sent to work among the masses—he’d waited for his bosses to realize that it was all a big mistake and that they couldn’t live without him. When that didn’t happen, he made the best of it. They wanted him managing the town from the inside? Then that was what he’d do.
The thing about being on the inside, though, is that your perspective shifts. If I’d told him about Sophie a year ago, he’d have scolded me like a child bringing home a stray—and potentially rabid—animal. He’d lecture me on all the ways my actions had endangered the town and then trot off to tattle to the council.
When I tell him no
w, he just sags, one hand going to his forehead. I push the lone chair from behind the desk and let him sink into it. I make coffee and, while it’s only 10 a.m., I add a generous shot of Irish whiskey. Tasting that, he hesitates, before his face fixes in a “fuck it” look and he downs the rest.
Phil’s equanimity restored, we discuss the matter. Never once does he chastise us for bringing Sophie in. He can be an ass, but he’s not an asshole. Not a monster. Not a sociopath. Living in Rockton, I’ve learned more about all three than I ever cared to.
Phil doesn’t suggest, even for a second, that we should have left Sophie on that lakeshore. Even in the beginning, he wouldn’t have done that, but he’d probably have suggested we pop a tent outside town and care for her there. Now he sees the ridiculousness of that. It will be far easier—and less suspicious—to feed her a story once she’s awake enough to ask questions.
The problem is that any story we devise still needs a helluva lot of explanation. Maybe not to Sophie herself. You were found by people in a small fly-in community. That makes sense. Or it does until we fly her back to civilization and she tells people about this town of two hundred souls that everyone knows does not exist.
The council, not surprisingly, freaks out. We have a new liaison on that end. A woman named Tamara who, to be bluntly honest, sounds like the female version of Phil. She does exactly what I’d have expected of him a year ago, and it’s Phil himself who gets the worst of her patronizing “disappointment.” He’s the council representative here; we’re just the dumb cops.
Tamara takes the information, and an hour later, returns to convey more “deep disappointment” from the council. As they’ve reminded me before, Rockton is for Rockton residents, who pay for their safety and privacy, and it is our duty to provide that. We should have stabilized Sophie at the scene and then notified them to pick her up and discreetly deposit her outside Dawson.
I’m sure this makes sense to them. It would in a city or even a rural countryside. Here, though? The council wouldn’t need to send a plane because she’d be scavenger-chow before morning. I’m not sure they would send a plane. Just let the scavengers do their work for them.
Chiding us about resident safety is bullshit. Every resident who goes home is a security risk. Sure, they might not know our GPS coordinates, but like Sophie, they could provide a general distance from Dawson plus directional cues if they understand the basics of the “sun rises in the east and sets in the west.”
But there are ways around this, too. We can tell Sophie that this is a secret scientific facility devoted to climate change research, and she’d almost certainly keep our secret, given that outdoor enthusiasts tend to be more concerned about the environment than the average person.
I suffer the council’s condescending bullshit in silence. I don’t just sit there and listen, though. The lack of a visual screen means it’s like being on a telephone conference where my input is not required. I take out my notebook and start writing down questions to ask Sophie, along with avenues of investigation. When Phil glances over, I’m tempted to pretend I’m taking notes from the meeting. Then I decide “screw it” and let him see.
Phil glances at my notes and then snatches the pen from my hand. I’m reaching to take it back when he draws the beginning of a hangman game. I stifle a laugh and guess a letter, and we proceed, with random verbalizations of “uh-huh,” “right,” and “I understand” as we play our game.
Dalton couldn’t do this. He couldn’t make notes for his day. He couldn’t play hangman. He definitely could not manage those meaningless verbalizations. He’d need to argue and debate, his blood pressure rising until he stalked off, requiring a good hour of forest prowling before he was fit company.
After the hour-long reminder of why I hate the council, I return to the clinic to find Sophie unconscious. She’d woken and flown into a panic. Before they could find me, April sedated her again, since she’d been in danger of ripping open her stomach with her flailing.
That’s where my day hits a brick wall. Dalton has gone looking for Jacob, whom we need to find the missing tourists. The missing tourist we have is unconscious, and I’m not sure I’ll ever get more out of her. I’m not even sure she has more to give.
I spend the afternoon and early evening doing regular police work. There isn’t really enough in Rockton for a full-time detective. The last case I worked was a sexual assault: guy expects sex after a date, woman says no, he tries to change her mind by demonstrating his skill with a nonconsensual make-out session behind the Red Lion. All it took was a cry to bring someone running, and by then, she’d escaped. Dalton sentenced the guy to two months of literal shit duty, emptying toilets. Curfew from 9 p.m. until 7 a.m. One-drink limit. No access to the brothel.
I check in on both parties today. Is she okay? Is he still grumbling that we overreacted? We’re fine on both sides. She’s had no further contact with him, and he’s embarrassed and contrite. All good.
Then I follow up on a complaint between neighbors and a workplace-harassment charge. I also take a militia shift patrolling town, and finally I join Anders doing community policing—wandering about chitchatting with folks heading out for the evening.
The community service part is not Dalton’s forte, which is one reason Anders is such a critical part of our force. Everyone likes Will Anders. Everyone’s happy to talk to him. Today, our socializing has a purpose—seeing how many people know we have a stranger in town. According to Jen’s spy research, a few know there was an emergency, and many realize the clinic is closed except for emergencies, but their curiosity is purely the gossip-fodder kind. Rumors are currency here, and they want tidbits to share.
After dinner, I’m in the station doing that most dreaded of law enforcement duties: paperwork. We have less than 5 percent of what I did down south. There’s zero council day-to-day oversight, so there’s no need to keep records beyond Anders jotting down something like “Jen is in the cell overnight for Jen crap.” Case notes are only for ourselves. There are no trials. Dalton is judge, with us playing jury as needed, and our idea of court proceedings is having a beer on the back deck to discuss what to do with an offender.
At first, I’d been horrified. This is not due process. But . . . well, if we are completely sure we have the right person, and they did what they are accused of, then I’ve realized I’m okay with skipping the formalities. As I discovered, in Rockton, we are always sure. The old Mountie motto has never held truer: We always get our man . . . or woman. It’s too small a community to steal something, assault someone, or break any law without leaving proof or witnesses.
That night, my paperwork is just jotting notes in the logbook for the two complaints I followed up on. I’m finishing when night-chilled hands slide around my waist, and I jump as Dalton lifts me from my chair. I twist in his grip, and before I can give him shit, he kisses me, deep and hungry, backing me onto the desk and easing between my knees.
When he breaks the kiss, he nuzzles my neck with, “Missed you.”
“I see that. Long day?”
“Very long.”
I try not to tense. “And unproductive?”
“Nope. Very productive, which is why I return to you in a very good mood.”
I wrap my legs around him, pulling him closer. “I see that. Also feel it.”
He chuckles. “I return bearing excellent news, which is going to make you very happy and that makes me very happy. Like returning with a stag over my shoulder. Only cleaner.”
I wriggle closer, hands entwined around the back of his neck. “You found Jacob.”
“I found Jacob, who told me exactly where we need to look. Also, you’re going to be an auntie.”
I blink up at him. “What?”
“Yep. April just told me she’s—” He sputters a laugh. “And I can’t even finish that sentence.”
“So no baby?”
“Yes, baby. No, April.”
I pause. Then I gasp. “Nicole and Jacob?”
Dalto
n nods.
I let out a whoop and kiss him, only breaking away to say, “Is Nicole here? She needs to see April. She—”
Dalton cuts me off with a kiss. “She’ll be here next week. They’re in a good hunting spot, and she feels fine. They’re already planning to spend the summer closer to Rockton, and they’ve agreed to overwinter here so they aren’t in the bush for the birth.”
I kiss him again, pouring all my joy into that kiss and getting all his back. A year ago, this might not have been such cause for celebration. We’d have been happy for them, of course, but it would have brought up the question of babies for us—a difficult subject in light of my medical history. But now we can be genuinely, unabashedly thrilled at the prospect of a baby in our lives, having come to realize that it’s possible to love kids and not be ready to have one ourselves just yet.
“So . . .” Dalton says, tracing his fingers down my cheek. “Make my day complete and tell me how the council congratulated us for our compassionate choice and careful handling of the situation.”
He sees my expression and winces with, “Shit. Sorry,” and a quick hug. “I was kidding. While I’m sorry you had to deal with that shit, I’m not sorry I got to skip it, which is probably part of my good mood.”
“They were pissy. I handled it. Phil did his part, too. He’s really stepping up.”
“I want to say I’m glad, but part of me wonders if it might not be better if . . .” He shakes his head. “I’m overthinking it. I’m glad he’s stepped up, too. You can tell me all about it later. For now . . .” His lips lower to my ear. “I think Storm is really eager to get home.”
I glance at the dog, who’d followed Dalton in and collapsed by the fire. Storm sees me looking, lifts one furry brow and sighs.
“She really wants to go home,” Dalton says.
“Or someone does.”
“Someone who had a very good day.”
“And wants a very good ending to it?”
“Seems fitting, don’t you think?”
I kiss his cheek and turn to Storm. “Come on, girl. Time to head out.”
A Stranger in Town: a Rockton novel Page 7