by Lara Lacombe
Kids were wrong about a lot of things.
Rena pulled into a parking spot at the side of the building. Unbuckled her seat belt. Opened her door.
“I’m not looking forward to this,” he said, his head turned away from his partner.
Rena sighed loudly. “I know. I’m going to miss him. I really wasn’t expecting Toby to do this.”
Toby Kingman had been with the Baywood Police Department for thirty-two years. He’d been A.L.’s boss for twelve and Rena’s for eight. Two months ago, before the murders had started, he’d given notice to his boss that he was retiring.
The hissing and moaning could still be heard.
Toby Kingman was a cop’s cop. Understood what it was to work the street, knew the bullshit that cops put up with. Didn’t back down from supporting his cops when they were right.
Didn’t protect bad cops, either.
That made him okay in A.L.’s book. He would miss the man. Two nights ago, they’d had his retirement party. The one that counted. The one where cops gathered in a dark and familiar bar and told stories, the kind where service was understood and really appreciated.
Tonight, the city was putting on some official thing to celebrate the event. A.L. would normally have skipped out, but the word had come down that attendance was mandatory.
“Rumor is that they’re going to announce the new chief,” Rena said. “It sort of lacks some class that they’d do that the same night that they celebrate Toby’s retirement.”
A.L. turned to look at her. “You were expecting class?”
“Neither of the two deputy chiefs want the job. Piss poor succession planning if you ask me,” Rena said.
“Not great,” A.L. agreed. Toby had been good at so many things but probably hadn’t given enough thought to who would ultimately fill his shoes.
“They’re going to have to tap the detective ranks. It should be you,” she said. “You’re the best detective on the force.”
“It won’t be me,” he said knowingly.
Rena didn’t argue. “You’re too cantankerous.”
A.L. shrugged. It was unlikely that anybody considered him management material, even though he’d done many of the right things. Had gone to college and earned a criminal justice degree. Gotten a beat cop job in Madison. Four years later, had transferred to the SWAT unit. Professionally, he’d had it going.
Personally, things had been rockier. Two years into his job in Madison, Jacqui had gotten pregnant. They’d dated for only six months, but he’d been confident they could make it work, and eight weeks before Traci was born, they’d tied the knot. When she’d been four, and the marriage was already on a downward skid, Jacqui had wanted him home more. He’d left the SWAT unit and moved back to Baywood to take the open detective slot. Things were better for a while but, ultimately, not good enough. The divorce five years ago had been a relief.
Rena got the rest of the way out of the car, slammed the door and started walking. “And,” she said, picking up the conversation, “they want somebody who will kiss their ass every now and then.”
“I kiss your ass. Isn’t that enough?”
“You maybe bite my ass, but you definitely don’t kiss it,” she said over her shoulder.
He smiled and caught up with her.
“It won’t be me,” Rena said. “I’ve been discounted.”
He didn’t bother to placate her and tell her that her thoughts were unfounded. She’d made the mistake of confiding in a friend, who hadn’t had the sense to keep her mouth shut about it at work, that Rena and her husband were taking fertility treatments. Sexism, just like racism and ageism, was real. She’d been labeled “on the mommy track.” Not in any file and never in any public venue. But that wasn’t where the real decisions were made. No, those still happened over beers by mostly white men.
“I think it will be Faster,” she said.
She was probably right. Christian Faster had been a detective for a few years. He was less than thorough, didn’t really give a shit about victims and cheated on his wife. But he was a supreme ass-kisser. “Who cares?”
“I do. You should.”
“Well,” he said, “we’ll know soon enough.”
The party was on the third floor, in the large conference room. On the way there, he and Rena stopped on the second floor, in the office that they shared with the four other detectives on the force. It was empty. Likely everyone was already assembled upstairs. Word would have spread quickly that there had been another murder, and cops weren’t immune to the need to ruminate and speculate. But even within the department, information was being handled carefully in a need-to-know manner. Members of the task force that had been initiated after the second murder would be briefed at the daily morning meeting. As the lead detectives on the case, either he or Rena had to be there to provide updates. It had been chaired by Toby. Now the new guy would have that responsibility. “I’m giving them ten minutes,” A.L. said. They needed to start dismantling Jane Picus’s life as soon as possible.
Rena nodded. And, like the good mind reader that she normally was, said, “We should probably start at the flower shop. They’re open until six.”
He checked his phone. It was almost five. The store was just down the street. “Okay,” he said. He looked at his partner a little closer. She really did look tired. “Hey, are you feeling all right?” he asked.
Copyright © 2019 by Beverly R. Long
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ISBN: 9781488063978
The Ranger’s Reunion Threat
Copyright © 2020 by Lara Kingeter
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
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