Deborah nodded. “The other thing I wanted to tell you is some of the women in our dinner club are getting threats like those you’ve gotten.”
“How do you know about that? Not through pillow talk?”
“No! Judge Wallington. I gather he’d heard something and I thought it was common knowledge.”
“It’s not, so don’t repeat it. These women got letters? How can I get hold of them?”
“I’ll gather them up and drop them off to you. Okay?”
“Quickly, please,” Sarah said.
“How many women?” I asked.
“Six at least.”
“Well hell.”
Chapter Thirty-Five
Sarah
I walked Deborah to her car. “I meant what I said about Leslie—don’t put her in jeopardy. She’s got a bright future ahead of her with the skills she’s developing.”
She turned and examined my face. “Not everything’s about the job, Sarah. I learned that the hard way.”
I waited for her to continue.
“Lizzy and I were together nineteen years and eighteen of them, work came first for both of us. When she got sick, my priorities shifted. Now my only regret is that they shifted so late. My only consolation is that we had such loving times that last year.”
“I’m sorry, Deb, I didn’t know. We really lost contact, didn’t we?”
“Priorities, Sarah.” She opened the driver’s door. “Leslie’s really opened some windows in my stuffy old house. I hope they stay open. I hope I’ve learned how I want to live my life. If I think our enthusiasm is putting her in danger, I’ll change my behavior—but I won’t change my hope for something long-term for us.”
“All I can say is that I hope you find what I’ve found with Win.”
She grinned. “Love, ain’t it grand!”
I was frozen by the time I got in and headed straight for the coffeepot. “Deborah’s a tad giddy.”
“We should have them over for dinner some night,” Win said as she refilled her mug.
“Leslie’s my deputy and I can’t invite her to dinner.”
“Why not?”
“Because I’m her superior at work. It’d be seen as favoritism.”
Win looked away. “Well, we could have all your deputies and significant others over in shifts. Of course, Deborah may not want to accompany Leslie as her significant other. It doesn’t look like she’s out in the county. Personally, I’d like to reconnect. She seems very different from the driven snot I remember from high school.”
“Driven snot?” I asked. I’d never thought of her in those terms.
“Ms. Perfect.” Win shrugged. “Just an idea. Doesn’t matter.”
Win was pissed. Did she feel this was another incursion of my job into the life we were building? Was it? Did I keep all my deputies too distant?
Our ride in was silent, Win staring out her window. As we walked into the station, I picked up my messages, walked into my office with Win trailing and closed my door.
“This is new territory for me, Win. Give me a break and let me think about it.”
“Don’t take too long.”
“Dad always had the department for a cookout in the summer, but I don’t remember him inviting deputies over for dinner.”
“Skip it, Sarah. It’s not important.” She slumped on the couch and yawned.
“Don’t do that, Win. Don’t shut me out.”
She sat up straight. “I marched into your territory and I’m sorry. I hereby formally withdraw.” She gave a big, noisy sigh. “I just want us to have a community. A broad community, not just Micah and Nathan, though I thank our stars every day for them. I want our kids to have a community here. Plenty of aunties they can go to when they’re mad at us.”
Sometimes Win took my breath away with her sheer beauty, inside as well as out. She’d been thinking about the kids, I’d been thinking about departmental decorum. “Maybe dinner at Ruby’s could be a start.”
She turned on her high beam smile. “Atta girl.”
* * *
My preliminary interstate accident reports were on their way to the state police, so we headed out to Nathan’s. I’d handed the keys to Win as a peace offering, or maybe just so I could try to wade through the swamp of my feelings. I felt pulled in two directions and couldn’t see how I could just walk away from the duties I had sworn, both to the office and to Win.
Maybe I was just being Sheriff Drama. I sighed, leaned my head back and closed my eyes.
“You’re supposed to be riding shotgun,” Win said. “Not napping.”
I straightened up. “I was thinking.”
“Sarah, you don’t have to make any black-and-white decisions. Not all at once. We’ll take the challenges as they come. Together.” She took the turn at Nathan’s drive and pulled into the clearing. “Let’s use these opportunities to grow closer and stronger. I told you a long time ago—I know ‘sheriff’ is in your DNA. So we have to learn to live with it. We can, you know.”
“I’m trying to compromise, but I feel like I’m in a booby-trapped jungle, Win. I take one wrong step and I’m swinging upside down.”
“I’ll come cut you down. Promise.” She squeezed my hand. “Let’s go get the skinny from Nathan.”
Nathan stood in the doorway as we got out and by the time we’d walked inside, he was already seated at his console. “Lots to report, some of it speculative. Let’s go because I really need to strap on my snowshoes and get away from this stuff.
“I printed out everything I could find on our local suspects—there, box on the table. I’ll just highlight and you can go through the details on your own time.”
Nathan looked weary and I wondered how long he’d been at this without breaks or sleep. The printed files took up half a banker’s box. “Will do.”
“First, I found Greg Hall, our third impostor. Born Aloysius Brennan in Moscow, Montana. Moved to Algoma, Idaho when he was in eighth grade.”
“Grew up in Idaho?” Win asked.
“Yeah. Kind of a wild child, got sent off to military school for the last two years of high school. Did a tour in the army, but didn’t re-up. Hooked up with a militia a few years ago. It’s all in the file.” An image of a snake, coiled and ready to strike, came up on the monitor. “But the thing I’ve been working on is a group called1776 Corps. I got onto them from some emails they sent Greg—encrypted—that he stupidly forwarded unencrypted. Orders from them and copies of all that is in his file.” He retied his hair at the nape of his neck. “I think there’s a hell of a lot more to this group, but the digging is hard. They’ve got layers of safeguards. I’m going to back away for a bit.”
“Go snowshoeing,” Win said.
They knuckle-bumped and looked at me.
“All right. We’ll take the files, go over them and tomorrow, Win, we’ll go hit the trails. In the meantime, Nathan, please be careful. If you’ve exposed something hidden…subterranean, you could be a potent threat to them. You want to come stay with us?”
“Not necessary Sarah, but thanks. This place is wired better than Win’s and I have backups for the backups.”
“You have a defense system for an RPG?” Win asked.
Chapter Thirty-Six
Win
We got back to the station without incident. I could tell the constant vigilance was taking more of a toll on Sarah than she was willing to admit. She shooed me upstairs to the detectives’ loft with the files.
“Can I do anything to help?” John Morgan asked when I dumped the box on an empty desk.
I filled him in on what Nathan had done. “We need to collate these. See where these guys intersect—places, contacts. All of that.”
“How do you want to do it, Win?”
I thought a minute. Didn’t want this stuff on a computer, no matter how secure. “You have a free whiteboard?”
“Low tech on purpose?”
“You got it.”
He went to get one. As he rolled it into place,
he asked, “Where’s Des? I’ve still got a couple of treats I’ve been saving for her.”
“She’s at home on guard, hating it. But I just want some protection that’s not dependent on electricity.” I rolled my shoulders. “If this wasn’t a real threat, I’d be in deep shit.”
“You were a marine—you came back with PTSD? Or shouldn’t I ask?”
“Screaming case. I got help. It’s better now…but I have to stay aware of it.”
“This stress can’t be good for you, with Sarah at the center of the threats.” He crossed his arms. Rested his butt on his desk. “Maybe I shouldn’t have said anything. I don’t mean to pry.”
“I appreciate your concern. You have a question, you ask it. I can deal with that. If it’s too much, I’m real good at telling people to butt out.” I grinned at him. “I’m as worried about the stress on Sarah as my own. At least I recognize mine.”
“She does have a tendency to power through things. Sometimes I wonder how she does it.”
“So do I.” I pulled the first file. “Let’s start on these. A sense of progress lessens my anxiety.”
Sarah didn’t show until quitting time. We’d filled the board with names, dates and places, all connected with lines and arrows. She frowned as she looked at it. “All of these guys were in Idaho?”
“At one time or another, probably a training camp. We need to ask Nathan’s contacts if they know where the camp is.”
“And what they know about it?” Sarah asked.
“Yeah. But I bet it’s not much. They run these militia camps like an army base—hard to get in or out.”
What I didn’t say was that if our guys had been trained in one of these camps, we had a bunch trouble on our hands.
* * *
When we got home, I dug out my burn phone and called Bill. “Thought we were supposed to meet yesterday?”
“Not possible.”
Why not? I didn’t ask because I knew I wouldn’t get an answer. I told him what we’d uncovered and asked him about 1776 Corps.
“We’ve been tracking them about ten years,” he said. “Potentially nasty group, but so far they’ve managed not to break any laws.”
“Any way I can get your files on them?”
“No, I just can’t because your security clearance went bye-bye when you left.” He breathed a heavy sigh. “I know I’ve done it in the past, but Congress is on our butt. How about I shoot them to Nathan?”
“Fine. Uh, any chance you could provide Nathan with some extra security?”
“You think he needs it?”
“Just a niggle, Bill. But if I’m hearing you right, if they discover he’s been snooping their patch…”
“See what I can do, Win. I suppose you don’t want him to know.”
“My first inclination is to say no, I don’t. But when you get everything set, I think you’d better tell him. Avoid unforeseen consequences.”
“Roger that. One more bit of business. I was going to set up a meet with you and Nolan. How does Bloomington sound? Thursday night?”
“Fine. Where?”
“There’s a bar on the outskirts, the Olive in the Bottom.”
“Sounds like a great place for the nineteen-fifties.”
“It was a dive back then, worse now. But a very empty place early. I’ll get there around five, you follow at five thirty and we’ll wait for him.”
“Do I have to come on to you like a cheap hooker?”
“Well, that’d be fun. How about a clandestine affair?”
“In your dreams. See you then.”
“Who are you coming on to like a cheap hooker?” Sarah asked, walking into the living room in sweats. “Do I need to hear about this?”
“Bill. Undercover meet with Nolan. I don’t have to be a hooker.”
“I can’t imagine you as a hooker.”
“I’ll take that as a lack of imagination on your part. Or do you mean I’d be a high-class call girl?” I held my hand up. “Never mind. Build a fire and I’ll change. Then we’ll snuggle.”
When I returned, Sarah was coming from the kitchen with two beers.
“I can’t imagine a more perfect place and time,” I said as I settled on the couch. I took the beer and pulled Sarah down on my lap. I buried my face in her chest. Held her tight. “Heaven right here and now.”
“What’s wrong, Win?”
“What?” I released my tight hold. “I can protect you when you’re in my arms. Like I’m protected in yours.”
She leaned back. “Is the stress getting to you?”
“Is it getting to you?”
Sarah leaned into me. Whispered in my ear. “Yes.”
I rubbed her back more. Up and down, up and down. “Don’t try to power through. John said that today. That you power through the rough stuff. But that just means you push the stuff down.”
She slipped off my lap and picked up her beer. “You’ve seen horrible stuff and so have I. All I know how to do is keep after the perpetrator until I put him behind bars. Prepare the best case I can for the prosecutor. Is that powering through?”
“Yeah.” I slipped my arm around her shoulder. “You never think about the energy it drains from you, trying not to think about it. Not remember it after it’s over.”
“I can’t dwell in the past, Win. There’s always something new on my plate every day I go to work. Gotta keep on truckin’. If I dwelt with the images I’ve seen, I couldn’t function. I can’t bring that stuff to the surface.”
“Don’t box both of us up in silence, Sarah. Just promise me you’ll talk to me when you feel the pressure.”
She leaned her head on my shoulder. “I can try, but no promises.”
“We can’t live in fear. It’s moments like this that sustain us.” I wrapped my arms around her and kissed her. “There’s this beautiful Persian word. Jaaneman. Used like ‘sweetheart’ or ‘darling.’ In a kind of basic translation, it means ‘soul of me.’ That’s who you are to me. My soul.”
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Sarah
I tried to lie quietly at Win’s side and to pretend I was asleep. I watched snowflakes drift down outside the window, a slow waltz in white on black. I contained the feelings I’d accumulated as a cop in a small subterranean room of my psyche. If I didn’t, I was terrified of my actions at the next incident, the next crime scene, the next time I had a criminal at the end of my Glock.
I had to contain the anger, the rage and the pain in its underground chamber or I’d never be able to pick up the Glock again. Talk about the pressure, Win? Sure, I could do that. But what caused the pressure-cooker? I had to keep that small room locked and guarded. I had to.
As the sky began to lighten, I fell asleep, finally worn out by my interior battle.
When I woke, the sun was high in the sky and I felt befuddled. I slipped into my sweats and walked into the living room. Win worked on her computer, totally engrossed until I moved into her peripheral vision.
“What time did you finally fall asleep?” she asked without looking up.
“Any coffee left?”
“Thermal carafe on the counter.”
Mug in hand, I moved behind her to see what she was working on. I sipped and tried to focus on the screen, but Win was scrolling too fast for me to follow. “What’s this?”
“Some intel on 1776 Corps that Nathan sent.”
“This is my day off, Win.”
“You just woke up.” She stopped scrolling. “You want to hear what MCIA dug up? Or should I wait until Wednesday after class to call you? Tell you what these reports say?”
“Stop with the sarcasm, Win. Let me get some coffee in me, and breakfast too.”
Win took my free hand, laced her fingers through mine. “Coffee, food, back to bed—is that your plan for the day?”
“Sounds good to me.” I leaned down and kissed her. “Doesn’t sound awful to you, does it?”
“Go shower. I’ll make your breakfast.”
When I sett
led down to eat, awake after my shower, I watched Win across the table. The frown lines on her forehead told me she was distracted by the train of thought I’d interrupted.
“You hear anything from Micah?”
“He said he was taking it slow and didn’t want to ruffle feathers. It’s a pretty closed community down there and, according to Dad, it’s way too easy to step in shit and track it all over the county.”
Win’s frown deepened. “What about Deborah? Anything from her?”
I shook my head.
Win let out a gusty breath. “No wonder they’re ten steps ahead of us.”
I returned my attention to eating. I wasn’t getting involved in policing, at least not this early in the day. Win had cheered when I told her about taking another day off and now, it seemed, all she wanted me to do with it was work.
Win took her mug to the sink, rinsed it out and returned to her computer. I couldn’t figure out if I was angry with Win or myself. I wanted the pressure off, the threat to end. So why the hell couldn’t I make the effort to work with her, even on my day off?
I figured I could at least call Dad, see if he’d made any progress. I’d just hung up the dishtowel when the warning system beeped. I grabbed my Glock and took up a post by the shutter. I eased it open and waited.
“All clear,” I said when Deborah’s vehicle pulled into the clearing. Des didn’t even get up from her place in front of the fire.
I opened the door for her while Win put away her weapon. “Morning. What’s up?”
Deborah walked in, a large manila envelope in hand. I reached to take her coat. “I can’t stay, but I knew you’d want these. I called all our dinner club members and found out most of them had received these damn letters. That’s almost thirty women, Sarah.”
“Damn.” I took the envelope.
“Can you make a list of those who haven’t?” Win asked.
“Sure,” Deborah said. “Can I drop it off on my way home? I’m due in court.”
Win nodded. “One quick question—how formal or informal is this group? I mean, do you take anybody who wanders in? Do you pay dues? Have officers?”
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