by Erica Abbott
Jean felt happy and relieved. “Sure. What do you want to talk about?”
She could feel Lea’s gaze on her in the shadows. Warmth began to seep into her belly, then slide lower into her body.
Lea said, “We’re really going to have a relationship, right?”
“Yes, please,” Jean murmured.
“Good. Come here.”
Jean moved closer, expecting a kiss. But Lea gently turned Jean in her arms so that she was holding Jean comfortably against her side. “What are we doing? Not that I mind,” Jean added.
Lea put her mouth close to Jean’s ear. “I have a meeting tomorrow night,” she began. “And I was planning on going into the office on Saturday afternoon to catch up on some work, so I’ll be downtown. I’m free Saturday night if you are.”
Jean felt a pleasant shudder run through her. “Do you want to come to dinner? I’ll make something easy. A casserole.”
“Um hmm,” Lea said softly. “I’ll bring wine.”
“That sounds nice.”
Lea shifted a little closer to Jean. “I want to make you happy. Tell me how, Jean.”
Jean was amused. “You want to sit on your parents’ porch and talk about having sex? What are we, fifteen?”
Lea laughed too. “At fifteen the only sex I was having was in my imagination.”
“Anyone in particular?”
“Yes, actually,” Lea admitted. “Cheerleader at our basketball games. Her name was Shasta as I remember. Legs up to her neck.”
“Shasta? Isn’t that a cola?”
“You’re funny. What about you?”
“At fifteen, I was learning all about French kissing from Stacy Miller.”
“Sounds like fun. But I was hoping to get farther than first base on Saturday night.”
“I can’t believe we’re actually talking about this in advance,” Jean said.
Lea nuzzled her hair. “Why not? Good sex is mostly about what happens in our heads anyway. I like to think about it for a while, don’t you?”
If she thought about it any more, Jean thought, she’d have to explain why she was taking her clothes off on the Hawkins’s front porch. “I do, actually,” she admitted. “I—”
“Tell me,” Lea said in a voice that made Jean’s bones melt.
“I like to take my time,” Jean murmured at last. “Go slowly, I guess.”
“I’m a very patient woman,” Lea whispered and Jean began to seriously consider whether she could get them both naked before anyone found them.
“God, Lea, come home with me,” Jean urged.
Lea kissed her temple. “Not tonight. Go home and dream about us together. Think about me when you’re at work tomorrow. By Saturday it’ll be wonderful. I’ll make it good for you, Jean, I promise.”
“What about you?” Jean asked. “Unless you don’t want me to.”
Lea’s arms tightened around Jean, the warmth from her body penetrating through Jean’s skin. “You want to know what will really get me going?” Lea said. “Making love to you. That’s all I’ll need. By the time you touch me, I’ll—”
Jean pulled Lea down to her mouth and kissed her hard. Long moments after, Lea said, “A couple more minutes of that and we’re not waiting until Saturday.”
Jean nipped at Lea’s neck. “Okay by me.”
“Are you going to behave or not?”
“Not.”
“Then you,” Lea said as she got to her feet and pulled Jean up with her, “have to go home now.”
Jean tried her best pout. “Don’t want to.”
“Come on. It’s a school night. I’ll call you at the office tomorrow when I get a minute.”
They walked out to Jean’s car. Jean could smell the faint scent of rain on the air for the first time in a long while. Behind them the dogs got up, stretched and ambled out with them like a canine body guard.
Lea got Jean settled and shut the car door behind her. Leaning down, Lea said, “Do me a favor? Call me when you get home. I want to know you’re there safely. Okay?”
“All right.” Jean found Lea’s courting style of her a little old-fashioned, but deeply charming. She drove back to the condo dreaming happily of Saturday night.
Chapter Thirteen
Lea’s hands were on her shoulders, the long strong fingers caressing Jean’s bare flesh. Jean could see the dark flecks in Lea’s eyes, feel Lea’s breath against her cheek.
“Jean?”
They moved together, skin against skin. Heat penetrated Jean to her core and Lea moved her hands down to—
“Ms. McAllister?” This time the voice jolted her out of the daydream. She’d been staring out the window, not seeing the splatters of rain against the glass. She fumbled for her glasses that were lying on her desktop.
“Yes? Sorry, Rita. I was thinking about something.”
“You looked a million miles away.”
Jean got her glasses on and managed a smile. “Something like that. What’s up?”
Rita stepped into the room and lowered her voice a bit. “I wanted to thank you for coming last night. I think Loren was really nervous about me meeting his parents and it was nice of you and Sheriff Hawkins to be there.”
“It was not a problem,” Jean said. “Linda’s a great cook. And by the way, I think Lea told you to stop calling her Sheriff Hawkins.”
Rita’s complexion reddened. “Well, yes, but we’re at work. She seems really nice. She always seemed kind of scary to me before.”
“Yes,” Jean had to agree. “She can be pretty scary I think, if she wants to be. But she is a really compassionate, kind woman.”
“Um. Can I ask you a question? If it’s too personal, you can tell me and I’ll go away.”
Jean thought she knew where this was going. “All right.”
“Are you…um, are you and Sheriff Hawkins…I mean, at dinner it kind of seemed like you might be…together.”
“Rita, I’m happy to tell you but for the moment I’d appreciate it if you would keep it confidential. Yes, Lea and I are dating, but I need to talk to Del before things progress much further. I haven’t had a chance to do that yet, so please don’t tell anyone, okay?”
Rita seemed relieved. “Of course not. Loren thought maybe you were going out, but I didn’t want to assume. Thanks for telling me. I promise to keep it to myself until you tell me it’s all right.”
Jean leaned back in her desk chair. “And are you and Loren getting along well?”
Now Rita was blushing dark red. “He asked me to go away with him next weekend. Jay can stay with his grandmother and he and I can, um, get to know each other.”
Jean grinned at her. “That’s fantastic, Rita. I’m so happy for you.”
“Me too. I mean, I’m happy for me too, but I meant I’m happy about you and Sheriff Hawkins. Loren told me she’s been really great to him, that she takes real good care of him and their parents. He kept talking about how he hoped she could find somebody again. Apparently he didn’t much care for her last girlfriend.”
“Really?” Jean’s curiosity as usual got the better of her discretion. “Did he say why?”
Rita was clearly eager to discuss the subject further. “He said the family only met her a few times even though they were together for years. He said Lea almost always saw her only on the weekends and that he never thought she was nearly good enough for his sister.” Rita gave Jean a happy smile. “He likes you a lot better.”
Jean returned the smile. “Glad to hear it. I’ll try not to mess it up, then.”
Rita said, “I really came in here to ask you if you need anything. I mean, you asked me about Todd’s notes and I didn’t know if you found anything.”
Sighing, Jean admitted she’d been unsuccessful. “I’m still not sure whether or not there’s anything for me to find, anyway. But if anybody says anything about Todd or any of his cases, let me know, okay? I’m still not sure why Todd was killed, but it might be connected to work.”
Rita looked thoughtful f
or a moment. “I did have a question this morning about him, now that I think of it.”
“Really? From whom?”
“Commissioner Forsythe. She came over to see Mr. Franklin, but he wasn’t here. When I told her that, she asked me an odd question. She asked me if I’d heard anything from Todd’s wife.”
“Heard anything? Like what?”
“She didn’t say. I just thought that was peculiar.”
Jean agreed. She couldn’t think of a reason why Carolyn Forsythe would care one way or the other. “Did she go back to her office, do you know?”
“I think so.”
Jean decided she needed to have a brief chat with Commissioner Forsythe. After a few minutes of rummaging around, she located a memo she could use as an excuse to go make the visit.
Carolyn Forsythe was sitting at her desk, staring out her window as Jean had been doing a few minutes earlier. Jean was pretty certain that her thoughts, whatever they might be, were quite different from Jean’s daydreams.
She handed Carolyn the memo and managed to discuss it convincingly for a few moments. Carolyn seemed troubled, so at last Jean asked, “Excuse me for asking, Commissioner, but you seem a little distracted. Is there anything I can do?”
Carolyn had a gold pen in one hand and she was drawing circles on a lined yellow pad. At first Jean thought she was going to deny any problem, but Carolyn seemed to change her mind. She answered, “How well did you know Todd Moorman?”
Interesting opening, Jean thought. She responded, “Only as a co-worker. He was a hard worker, I know.”
“Did he leave a family? I know he had a wife.”
“I don’t believe they had children. Someone told me they’d only been married a little over a year.”
“Oh.” She seemed simultaneously relieved and more disturbed. “Almost newlyweds, then.”
Jean remembered the brief mention Todd had made of his wife. He had seemed far from a man besotted with love. “I guess so.”
“Such a senseless death,” Carolyn continued.
“Yes,” Jean agreed, watching her carefully. “Just for a car.”
Carolyn appeared to be surprised. “That’s right, I’d forgotten. A carjacking. And they didn’t even get the car.”
“No.” The vision of Todd lying in his car swam before her eyes for a moment. Jean realized again that she had never quite bought the carjacking theory. Why wouldn’t the car have been taken? How long would it have taken to shove Todd out of the car and drive away? The killer could have been miles away long before the police arrived. No, it had to be an intentional shooting, not random. Frustration rose again. Why couldn’t she track down what Todd had been doing?
As she left Commissioner Forsythe’s office, she ran into Jaime Fontana, the board’s chairman. He seemed to have used even more Brylcream this morning, his black hair gleaming like onyx under the fluorescent lights in the hallway.
“Ms. McAllister,” he greeted her. “How are things going in the county attorney’s office?”
She wondered why he didn’t ask Del Franklin. Maybe he just couldn’t think of anything else to say to her. “It’s challenging,” Jean answered him. “It’s difficult to lose a colleague, especially so suddenly. And as you know, we’re not a large office, so we really feel shorthanded as well.”
“Yes.” He sounded distracted. “Well, there’s a budget for outside counsel. Del could certainly use that to hire some extra help if you need it.”
“That’s a good point,” Jean agreed, wondering again why she was having this conversation with him. “I’ll discuss that with him when I have a chance.”
“Good, good.” He rubbed his hands together and proceeded down the hall, already moving on to his next problem. She thought perhaps he was the kind of politician who only paid attention to people he needed.
Later in the afternoon she was able to complete her trifecta of conversations with the board members when Hayward Lyons appeared in her doorway.
“Commissioner, what can I do for you?” Jean asked politely.
He jerked his head toward Rita’s desk. “No one seems to know where Del is,” he complained. “Did he tell you where he was going?”
“I’m afraid I haven’t seen him today,” Jean said. “Is there anything I can help you with?”
“No,” Lyons answered abruptly and turned away.
The county building was just filled with charming politicians today. How on earth did these people win popular elections?
The high point of the day was the promised phone call from Lea. Jean smiled at the caller ID and said, “There you are. Busy day, I guess.”
“Hi.” Lea’s warm voice cheered her even more. “Yep, they’re all busy these days, it seems like. How is your day going?”
Jean snuggled back into her desk chair. Just talking to Lea made her feel young again, a time when love was an adventure to be anticipated rather than a trial to be endured. “A weird day but fine,” she answered. “No chance to do anything else in Todd’s office today.”
“Don’t,” Lea said. “As I told you before, you should let the professionals handle the case. We’re still running some background checks but it’ll take a while. Whoever is behind this has killed two men and we don’t need any more potential victims getting involved.”
“Are you always this bossy?”
Lea cleared her throat and Jean could hear the half smile in her voice. “Not always,” Lea said softly. “Only when it counts.”
Jean felt a warm tremor run through her. “Stop that. I’ve already been having enough trouble concentrating on work as it is.”
“Oh, yeah? Any particular reason?”
“Stop fishing for compliments, Sheriff. I’ll discuss this with you tomorrow. Unless your plans have changed for tonight,” she finished with hope in her tone.
“Afraid not,” Lea said sadly. “But we’ll have dinner tomorrow, come hell or high water, all right? I’ve gotta go, but if you’re up for a late-night conversation, I’ll call you when I get home tonight. It’ll probably be pretty late.”
“Gosh, whatever will we think of to talk about late at night all alone in our own beds?” Jean asked.
“Now who’s being distracting?” Lea laughed. “I’m trying to drive here and you’re discussing dirty late-night phone calls.”
“I said no such thing,” Jean protested.
“Save the denial, Counselor. You want prurient discussion after midnight you’ll get it, all right.”
“Prurient? Did you store up that word for a special occasion?”
“I was saving it just for you. Told you I like smart girls.”
“Stop talking now,” Jean sighed. “I’m going to go back to work and try very hard not to think about you any more. Goodbye.”
Jean managed not to think about Lea more often than every other minute for the rest of the workday.
* * *
Saturday morning was bright and warm, but from her western windows Jean could see clouds building over the mountains. She was full of energy from last night’s telephone talk with Lea, which fulfilled its promise for prurient content. Now Jean attacked the condominium with mop and dust cloth, cleaning and shining while the washing machine thrummed with a load of sheets and towels. Once the bed was remade and the fresh towels hung up in the bathroom, Jean found herself with nothing left to polish.
She assembled the casserole, layering tortillas with chicken, cheese, onions, peppers and enchilada sauce. It would take a while to bake this evening and she could have a glass of wine with Lea while it cooked.
She took a shower and spent a pleasant few minutes debating what to wear. Jeans and a blouse with the matching black bra and panties, she thought, casual on the outside and a little naughty underneath. Then, restless, she decided to go into the office until Lea was ready to come over.
The clouds that had been fluffy white that morning were now darker, their flat bottoms crowding the sky in a threatening canopy of gray. The usually dry air smelled of the comi
ng rain and Jean welcomed the thought of the dinner she would share with Lea, the two of them snug in the condo against the showers outside. It had been so long since she’d been with a woman she hoped she hadn’t forgotten what to do. Jean laughed at herself as she pressed the elevator button. She was pretty sure it would all come back to her quickly.
Jean cleared her desk of everything she could do on a Saturday afternoon. She drafted routine letters and reassigned work to the paralegals. The pile of professional journals still crouched on her credenza, trying to lure her into catching up on her reading but she resisted. The connection between the Lambert case and Todd Moorman’s murder seemed obvious to her and she wished she’d found something in Todd’s office to help Lea and Detective Munson.
One more try, she said to herself. She went down the hall and into Todd’s office.
She’d searched every file and every drawer of Todd’s desk and examined his computer files. What else could she look for? Opening his desk drawer, Jean spotted Todd’s card with his Westlaw number and password printed on it. Like most attorneys, he kept it handy for his frequent logins to the computer-assisted legal research database. Westlaw permitted the researcher to enter a word or phrase as search terms and then designate the specific database to be searched. State or federal statutes were popular choices, but the most frequent use of the database was to find relevant case law from a specific jurisdiction. The long, grinding task of looking up case law in multivolume digests had been replaced with a few keystrokes. Jean knew the trick was determining what search terms to enter. Getting the right phrase to produce the desired result could take several tries.
An idea struck her. Jean turned on Todd’s computer and logged onto his Westlaw account. On the home page was the tab she remembered: “Last Research Trail.” The tab permitted the user to resume research without having to reenter the search terms. She clicked on the link and read the page as it loaded.
The search term Todd had last entered appeared in the box and got Jean’s full attention. “Malfeasance Committed Prior to Taking Office.” It didn’t make immediate sense to her but she looked at the list of cases the term had pulled up. She clicked on the links to the Colorado case law one by one and scanned the case reports themselves.