A Cop's Promise

by Sharon Hartley

  “You interested in Lana?” Carlos asked, following his gaze.

  “I’m enjoying the view—that’s for sure,” Chip said.

  “She’s still a looker, but don’t get any ideas. Word is she never got over Danny.”

  Chip turned to the bar. “Did any of us ever get over Dan’s murder?”

  “Amen to that.” Carlos raised his beer mug and took a sip. “I can’t effing believe the cops never arrested anyone. Eight years, man.”

  “Had to be a mugging. The thief took his ring.”

  “But not his cell phone, I heard,” Carlos pointed out. “What’s up with that?”

  “Maybe they got interrupted. Or maybe he was too smart. A cell phone can be traced, give you away.”

  “Maybe.” Carlos glanced at his own ring, identical to one that Chip, Danny and every player had received after the state championship game. Chip hadn’t worn his for years, kept it tucked away in a dresser drawer. He hadn’t even thought about digging it out tonight.

  “Danny should be here,” Carlos muttered.

  Chip silently agreed, although he and Dan hadn’t been close since senior year. Chip stared into his beer, turning his mind away from those particular memories. He once thought he’d marry Lana Lettino, but he knew things about her brother that she didn’t, things that he hadn’t wanted to tell her.

  He’d gotten over his infatuation with Lana long ago and had even come close to proposing to his college girlfriend. But Carlos’s warning gave him an idea. Would Lana accept an invite to hash over old times, to see how they felt about each other? Or was it too late for them? He’d been crazy about her in high school. Seeing her brought back a lot of memories.

  Apparently this reunion was a night for reminiscing, something he rarely indulged in. What was the point? He preferred to look ahead to the next challenge.

  Still, Lana was a great girl and deserved to be happy. He hated to think she was stuck in the past. Did her date treat her right? Chip glanced across the room to where the guy flirted with Cindy Arroyo, and a tug of annoyance made him frown. Cindy’s short skirt and blonder hair than he remembered, along with plenty of cleavage and makeup, suggested she’d wanted to be noticed tonight.

  “Didn’t I hear Cindy Arroyo got married?” Chip asked.

  “Her divorce was final a few months ago,” Carlos answered. “You should ask her out. You’d have better luck there.”

  “Not my type.”

  Carlos laughed. “Hell, she’s every man’s type.”

  “Even yours?”

  “Rosa would kill me if I fooled around.” Carlos placed a hand across his heart. “I am a happily married man.”

  “Good for you, bro.”

  “Hey, you still fooling around with that rock climbing stuff?”

  Chip shrugged. “Occasionally I’ll do an easy climb, but the airfare out West is expensive and law school isn’t cheap.”

  “That’s some scary shit, man. I don’t know how you do it.”

  “I’ve moved on to other sports,” Chip said, assuming he meant the climbing. Law school was plenty scary, too.

  “Like what?” Carlos asked.

  “Dude.” Bubba approached and gave Chip a bear hug before he could answer. When the linebacker pulled back, he growled “Dude” again as he hugged Carlos.

  “What’s up, Bubba?” Carlos asked with a grin.

  “Feeling good,” Bubba said, lifting his almost-empty mug in a toast. “Great to see Coach, huh?”

  “Damn right,” Carlos said. “The man is a legend. I’ll never forget that call he made during the Miami High game our senior year.”

  “Epic, man,” Bubba agreed and launched into a description of the onside kick that had been mishandled and allowed Southeast to kick the winning field goal.

  Chip glanced to where Coach stood with his wife. Lana remained glued to his side, as if she were standing guard, listening intently to every conversation. Strange. Yeah, everyone loved Coach Robby, but he hadn’t realized she was so tight with the old guy. Actually, from what he could tell, no one knew what Lana had been doing since high school other than she’d graduated from Florida International University. What was her degree in? Where was she working?

  No question Carlos was the team’s official gossip, but how the hell did he know she was still hung up on the loss of her brother? She was here with a date, even if the date all but ignored her. Chip took a swallow of beer. Yeah, he was always up for a challenge.

  Murmuring an excuse to Bubba and Carlos, Chip moved toward her. This was the perfect opportunity to spark something with her.

  “Lana,” he said to get her attention.

  She turned away from Coach. Her dark eyes widened when she recognized him. “Hey again.”

  “I meant to ask earlier about your sister. How is she?”

  A huge grin split her face. “Sandy is a mother. Can you believe it?”

  “So, you’re an aunt.”

  She nodded. “Mikey is four. How about your sister?”

  “Married and with two rug rats.”

  “That’s great,” she said. “Tell her I said hello. How about you? Married?”

  “Nope, and I don’t have anything steady going on, either.” Chip motioned with his chin toward Lana’s date. “Is that serious?”

  “Hardly,” she said, her voice filled with mock horror. “He’s a friend helping out a dateless pal.”

  “I find it hard to believe you can’t get a date.”

  Her smile faded. “I’m not much interested in dating.”

  “Why is that?”

  She looked away and shrugged without replying.

  So maybe Carlos’s report was right on, and she was still screwed up over Dan. Yeah, he’d been her brother, but it had been eight years. Wasn’t that enough time to grieve? An awkward silence fell between them.

  “How’s your mom?” he asked to spur the conversation back to life. He could still ask her out. He was just the guy to drag Lana into the present.

  Her mouth tightened. “The same. Bitter, alone and making everyone around her miserable.”

  “Sorry to hear that.”

  “Are your parents still gloriously in love?”

  He nodded. “Disgusting, isn’t it?”

  “No,” she said with a tinge of wistfulness. “Lucky.”

  “Listen, how about dinner next week?”

  Her mouth dropped open. “Wh-what?”

  “Don’t look so surprised. I’m asking you out for dinner and a few drinks. We could catch up.”

  “Oh,” she said. “I don’t—”

  Cindy appeared at Lana’s side and tugged her arm. “Come on, Lana. It’s time.”

  An expression of relief washed over Lana’s face.

  “Sorry, Chip,” she said. “Gotta go.”

  Obviously ecstatic to escape a hurtling bullet, she hurried away with members of her old cheering squad.

  Everyone turned toward the center of the room, where the ex-cheerleaders lined up, preparing to do their thing. Chip shook his head at the sight of the twins, Tina and Rena, who’d even managed to squeeze into their old purple-and-white uniforms.

  Hands on her hips, Lana pasted on a smile he recognized as fake, but she went through the crisp motions without missing a beat. He downed the last of his beer. God, but she did look good.

  He’d given it a go. She wasn’t interested.

  Was it because of something her brother had said to her years ago? Probably. Chip wasn’t sorry for what had gone down—he’d done it to protect Lana—but Dan had been beyond furious and had put a swift end to any chance Chip ever had with her.

  Too bad. But, hell, he didn’t have time to get something started with her or anyone else. Law school was eating up every dime and every second of his time. That was where his focus needed to be for the next
three years.

  Not on a crush from his high school days.

  CHAPTER TWO

  AFTER COACH’S PARTY, as promised, Lana stopped by her mother’s condo. It was almost midnight, so she entered quietly in case Mom was sleeping, although she claimed to sleep very little.

  “Is that you, Lana?” her mom called from the bedroom, where noise from a late-night talk show blared. Of course Mom was in bed. That was where she spent most of her time these days.

  “It’s me.” Lana moved to the bedroom door and paused, her gaze searching her mother’s face to evaluate her mood. An old cardboard box, one full of mementos from her brother’s time at Southeast High, sat on the bed, its contents covering the frayed quilt.

  “What’s all this?” Lana asked.

  “I’m helping your investigation,” Mom said. “Looking for clues.”

  “We’ve been through those boxes a hundred times.”

  “Well, we missed something,” her mom said triumphantly. “Something important.”

  “What?”

  Her mom held up an envelope. “A letter Chip Peterson wrote to Danny.”

  “Chip?” Intrigued, Lana approached the bed. “Where did you find that?”

  “In the bottom of an old duffel bag, between the pages of a football playbook.”

  “Seriously?” Her mom shoved the envelope into her hand, and Lana withdrew a message scribbled on lined paper from a school notebook. She read:

  I get it, Dan. We’re no longer friends, and that’s fine by me. I’ll keep your secret as long as you do what you swore. From now on any conversation we have will be strictly about football and the team.

  Chip

  Lana read the message three times. Secret? What was Dan’s secret? How had they missed this?

  Mom sat back and folded her arms. “I’ve always said Chip Peterson knew something about Dan’s murder.”

  “I know you did,” Lana said.

  Her mother pointed an accusing finger at Lana. “Chip hated Danny after that fight.”

  Lana nodded. And Danny hated Chip. Yet the police had cleared Chip and every other member of the team of any involvement in the murder. Her mother knew that, but she believed the police had made a mistake. Had they? The police hadn’t seen this note eight years ago.

  What had Dan sworn to do? Chip leaped to the top of her suspect list. She definitely needed to interview him.

  “I want to hear all about the party,” Mom said. “Did anyone act suspicious?”

  “Not really,” Lana said. “You should have come. Everyone asked about you.”

  A rare smile bloomed on her mother’s usually pinched face. “I’m surprised anyone remembers me.”

  “It was a lovely event, and Coach Robby was truly surprised.”

  “Was Chip at the party?”

  “Yes, he was.”

  “Did you ask him what the fight was about?”

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “I’m waiting for a more appropriate time for questions,” Lana said. “Tonight was just for observation.”

  “But you’ll talk to Chip?”

  Lana sighed. “Yes.”

  “Dan’s birthday is next month,” Mom said. “He would have been twenty-eight years old.”

  “I know, Mom.”

  “He might have played in the Super Bowl by now.”

  Maybe. Lana sat on the edge of the bed.

  “He was such a sweet child,” Mom said, her voice soft. “Do you remember his first peewee league game, how excited he was after?”

  “You know I do.” Who could forget? Danny had run in two touchdowns without any opposing player touching him. Eight years old and a star was born. On the drive home, he’d babbled on and on about the game, endlessly tossing a football into the air to practice his spiral. Lana, her mom and sister had been thrilled with her brother’s success.

  Their father, too busy with work, hadn’t been able to attend.

  Mom grabbed a tissue from a box on the nightstand and dabbed at her eyes. “I don’t have much time left, Lana.”

  Here we go. “What are you talking about, Mom?”

  Her mother drilled Lana with teary eyes. “Dan died a slow, horrible death. Not knowing who murdered him is killing me.”

  “Don’t talk like that, Mom.” Lana noted the changes in her mother since Dan’s death—the puffy eyes, the lines around her mouth, her thinning hair. Her mother was slowly dying a little more each day from the grief. Nothing Lana or her sister tried helped. Mom refused counseling or support groups. Maybe she’d experienced too much sorrow and loss in her life.

  “You’re still a young woman,” Lana said.

  “I don’t want to go to my grave without Danny getting justice,” Mom said, her voice now accusing.

  “I’m doing my best, Mom.”

  “Are you?”

  “I’ve started over from scratch. I’ve talked to the detectives who worked the case. I’ve reread every report generated by the investigative team.”

  Mom nodded. “What they call the murder book on TV?”

  “Well, it’s digital now, but yeah, same thing.”

  “Digital?” Mom asked, looking confused.

  “That means the reports are on the computer. I’ve gone to the property room and physically handled every single piece of evidence, made sure everything had been sent to the lab for processing.”

  “Had it?”

  “Yes.”

  Lana had spoken to a detective from the cold-case unit to learn how he started over on a case.

  “So maybe that note from Chip will help,” Mom said. “It’s something new, right?”

  “Maybe. I know you don’t want to hear this, but some murders are never solved.”

  “But you’ll solve Danny’s,” Mom said. “I know it was someone on the team.”

  “And I agree with you.” Lana had to give her mother that, although it was dangerous to encourage her. Eight years was a long time.

  “You do?”

  “That’s what the evidence points to.”

  Her mom placed a cold hand on Lana’s arm. “Promise me you won’t stop until you find whoever murdered our Danny,” her mom begged. “We’re the only ones who care anymore.”

  “Mom.”

  “Promise me.”

  Lana placed her fingers over her mother’s hand and squeezed. If she found Danny’s murderer, maybe her mother could rejoin the living.

  “I promise,” Lana said.

  * * *

  LANA PULLED A U of M baseball cap low over her eyes, shoved sunglasses that covered most of her face onto her nose and shouldered on a backpack. With her hair pulled back in a ponytail, there was nothing the least remarkable about her appearance. Her own mother might not recognize her. She wore casual jeans and a T-shirt, similar to most of the other students swarming over the University of Miami campus at 10:00 a.m. on a Monday. She even fell into the right age span, especially for law school.

  No one would suspect she was a cop working undercover. On her own hobby case admittedly, but still. She definitely blended in.

  She moved into The Bricks, an open-air courtyard, dotted with orange umbrellas shading concrete picnic tables. She assumed the name was because of the brick flooring. About half of the seating was full of students, most chatting with colleagues, open books before them. Palm trees swayed over an elevated central rectangular pool with a fountain that gurgled soothingly. The sleek modern building behind her housed a food court.

  Nice place to study.

  Too bad her quarry wasn’t here.

  She dropped her backpack onto an empty table and took a seat.

  Chip Peterson had classes all day at the law school. Odds were he’d show up at this courtyard at some point for lunch or to take a break. She didn’t expect to l
earn much with today’s surveillance, but wanted to observe Chip when he wasn’t aware people who knew Dan were watching. She wanted to see if any unusual behavior popped out. She wanted to get a better feel for her subject.

  A murderer, especially one who had slashed as violently as Dan’s killer, wouldn’t—couldn’t—change his behavior overnight. Or even in eight years. So she wanted to see who Chip hung out with. Or was he a loner and avoided making friends? Every bit of information would help her.

  Aberrant behavior usually started young, and she’d known Chip as a boy. She’d rewound every memory from that time over and over and had to admit she’d never seen Chip torture helpless creatures, act mean toward any person or animal, or even behave dishonestly.

  But he’d definitely been on the wild side, scaring her more times than she could remember, racing toward her on a skateboard, flying over a curb. He’d reach down and grab the board, do some impossible trick and then land safely almost every time. Once he’d knocked her sister, Sandy, over and made her cry. Lana frowned, remembering how sorry he’d been afterward. He’d even taken Sandy for a ride on his precious board, giving her the thrill of her young life. After that day, her little sister had worshipped Chip.

  Lana took a deep breath, inhaling a whiff of stale grease drifting from the food court. Okay. Maybe Chip didn’t fit her profile of the murderer perfectly, but something had happened to cause that huge fight between Danny and Chip, and she intended to find out what. Who had thrown the first punch?

  She opened one of her old textbooks on criminal justice and pretended to read, all the while scanning the crowd for her subject. She’d been shocked into horrified disbelief when Chip had asked her to dinner, forcing her to join Cindy in the cheer she’d intended to avoid. Jeez. Definitely not what she’d expected. What would he think if he knew she suspected him of murder?

  Besides, she didn’t have time to date. Her job, her mother and now this investigation took up all her time. But the more she thought about Chip’s offer, the more she warmed to the idea. Why not take him up on the invite? What better way was there to get to know someone than a face-to-face conversation in a restaurant?