by Lisa Jackson
“Just a minute,” she said to her friends. Then she turned to loom over Pescoli. She wasn’t a short woman, but Wilda, the ex-bodybuilder, currently in black skinny jeans and a bat-wing T-shirt, had to be over six feet. With a hawkish nose, and eyes glinting with suppressed fury, she reminded Pescoli of a huge crow. “I heard you and your partner have been harassing my sons.”
“Just asking questions.”
“I know about you cops. It’s because of their damned father.” As she mentioned Franklin Bell, her entire face puckered, as if she’d just sucked on a lemon. “But they’re not like that worthless piece of crap. And they look out for each other. Have each other’s back. They’re good boys.”
How many times had she heard that phrase during this investigation? Every parent wanting to impress upon her that their kids were “good.”
“They knew the victim,” she said. “Both of your sons. Two girls are dead and each of them contacted Kywin.”
“Along with others.”
“Who live with an ex-con.”
“My boys are practically adults.” Again, the tightlipped expression. “I’d have them live with me, but I’ve got Greg and the girls—” She caught herself making excuses and said, “You can’t blame my sons for their father’s sins. I know that you busted Franklin a couple of times and that you hate him, well, fine. That’s . . . that’s your job, and the son of a bitch deserved it.”
“You pressed charges,” Pescoli reminded her.
“And I would again! He beat the crap out of me, wanted to kill me. I said he deserved it, didn’t I? He should be locked up for life!” Her color had risen. She was really working herself up, and Pescoli thought, with her size and musculature, she could still probably give her ex a run for his money when they got into it. “But Kip and Kywin, they’re not Frank.”
“Hey!” Billie O’Hara touched her friend on the arm. “Let it go. She’s been at my boys, too. Regan’s just doing her job.”
Wilda sent a withering glance at her shorter friend. “But she’s zeroed in on mine.”
“Don’t think that’s true,” Billie argued, gold hoop earrings catching the light as she shook her head. “I just don’t get why you aren’t all over Donny Justison. He was the boyfriend, right? And she broke up with him, I heard. He’s got a temper, that one.”
“But he’s the mayor’s son.” Terri Tufts joined the party. Added her two cents. “And she’s involved with Bernard Reece, so Donny, like Austin, has got a built-in attorney.”
“We’re looking at everyone,” Pescoli said.
“Well, just look at everyone equally,” Wilda advised, agitated. “My kids are innocent!”
Wilda seemed particularly upset, and Pescoli wondered if she knew something she wasn’t telling, too. She decided to press her. “Kip and Kywin know something, Wilda. I intend to find out what it is, and if they’re involved in the death of Destiny Rose Montclaire or Lindsay Cronin, I’m going to nail them.”
Her lips tightened. “I’m warning you. Back off, Regan. They each proved they weren’t the father of that girl’s baby, so leave them the hell alone.”
“I’m going where this investigation takes me, and if it takes me to Kip and Kywin, and I find out they’re complicit—”
“Did you hear me? You’re barking up the wrong damned tree. My sons are innocent!”
“Maybe if they stopped hiding things, we’d get to the truth.”
“You miserable—”
“Hey—” Billie cut Wilda off. “Let’s go into the bar. Get a drink. Forget this.”
Pescoli said, “Good idea. You don’t want to get in the way of a homicide investigation.” She was looking pointedly at the Bell brothers’ mother, and Wilda got the message.
“You’ve always been a bitch, Pescoli.”
Pescoli’s ire rose. “But a convenient bitch, right? When you needed me? When Frank was beating the living crap out of you in front of your boys?”
Wilda threw off Billie’s grip and hurled herself at Pescoli, grabbing her by her neck.
Despite her bulk, Pescoli moved quickly, took hold of the woman’s right wrist, and turned it back on itself.
Wilda shrieked and, with her free hand, slashed at Pescoli’s cheek, raking her nails across the skin, drawing blood.
Pescoli pushed a little harder on the arm and Wilda’s knees buckled as she fell against Grizz, her cheek pressed into his hairy belly, the heavy bear rocking unsteadily.
Pescoli didn’t let go.
“Stop!” Wilda cried. “Stop! Stop!”
“Hey!” a sharp voice yelled.
From the corner of her eye, Pescoli saw Sandy, the owner, carrying two large bags as she and the hostess raced into the entryway.
“What the hell’s going on here!” Sandy demanded, dropping the bags. “For the love of God, Detective!”
Wilda whimpered and Pescoli yanked on her arm a little harder, tweaking those ripped muscles. “You don’t really want to attack a police officer,” she advised into the other woman’s ear. “Especially a pregnant one whose hormones are way out of sync.”
The big woman howled in pain.
“Stop it!” Billie cried.
“That’s right. Enough!” Sandy said, and Pescoli, breathing hard, released her grip and took a step back, allowing Wilda to climb unsteadily to her feet.
“You’re crazy!” Wilda cried, rubbing her arm and glaring at Pescoli. “Fucking Looney Toons. I’ll have you up on charges.”
“Good thinking,” Pescoli snapped. “Use that excuse after you attack a pregnant police officer.”
“You’re a freak, Pescoli!” Wilda yelled. “Frank said you were and . . . and for once that SOB was right!” She looked as if she wanted to spit on her, and Pescoli glared at her, silently saying, Go ahead and try.
“Enough,” Billie declared. “Come on, Wilda. I’ll buy you that drink. A double margarita.”
Terri, who’d been silent and staring at the fight in horror, cleared her throat. “It’s still happy hour, right, Sandy?”
“Sure, sure,” the owner said, obviously just glad the fight was over.
Terri glanced down at Pescoli’s pregnancy bump. “You’re due soon. Real soon. Shouldn’t you be on maternity leave?”
Man, she was tired of hearing that, but before she could respond, Terri added, “Seems to be a lot of that going around.”
“What?” she asked.
“Pregnancy.” And for just a second, Pescoli thought she saw a glimmer of satisfaction in the twist of Terri’s lips—the smug look of someone who knows something—a secret. Make that a malicious secret.
“And why would that be a big deal?”
“I guess it’s not,” Terri said. “Usually. Unless your husband is shooting blanks.”
“What? Pregnancy?” Pescoli asked, pulling back on her temper with an effort. There was a little glimmer of satisfaction in the twist of Terri’s lips. “Who?”
“Someone whose husband is shooting blanks.” She laughed then, a wicked little chuckle echoed by her friends. “Forget it,” Terri said over her shoulder as they headed into the bar, but Wilda waited till her friends were out of earshot to add tautly, “I’m serious, Regan, you leave my boys out of this mess.” Then she followed after them through the open doorway to the bar.
Watching them go, Sandy said, “What the hell was that all about?”
Sandy picked up the dropped bags while, from behind a fringe of long bangs, she watched Pescoli nervously, as if she thought, as Wilda Wyze had charged, the detective was unstable.
“A misunderstanding,” Pescoli said, accepting the takeout bags that Sandy offered. “Wilda doesn’t seem to think I’m fit to do my job.”
“And you just proved her point,” Sandy said. “You nearly knocked down Grizz in the process.”
“It would serve him right,” Pescoli said. “What’s with the Big Foot getup?”
“He’s just getting into the spirit of the upcoming holiday.”
“Please.” She sno
rted.
“You’re not into Big Foot Daze?” Sandy asked. “You know, it’s going to be good for business. Rod Larimer came by and he’s rented out the Bull and Bear for the next six weeks. The inn’s booked solid. And I’ve got reservations coming in like crazy.”
“So Mayor Justison and Barclay Sphinx and the Big Foot Believers are right. Sasquatch is good for the town.”
“You got it,” Sandy said as the phone rang and she grabbed it. Two couples were coming into the foyer and they oohed and aahed over the stuffed grizzly bear in his Sasquatch attire.
“Isn’t that cute?” one of the women said, and Pescoli couldn’t stand it another second. She thought she might actually be sick if one more person tried to tell her how great Big Foot was for the town. She headed outside and found her Jeep where she’d left it, no ticket in sight.
She climbed inside and glanced down the street. She noticed, along with the banners announcing the upcoming event, several carved wooden statues of Big Foot, both male and female, on display. How had that happened? Had the merchants found the statues tucked away in their basements collecting dust, or had they ordered them from the guy who did chainsaw art just out of town?
Whatever the case, Big Foot Daze was definitely happening. Like it or not.
At the end of the block, she turned onto the road leading across a set of train tracks before it wound along the face of Boxer Bluff, past the area of older homes where Mayor Justison lived, then higher still and past the sheriff’s department on her way home. She caught a glimpse of her face in the mirror and saw the red tracks on her cheek where Wilda Wyze had attempted to scratch her eyes out.
The woman’s temper had skyrocketed from zero to sixty in half a second. Yes, Pescoli had goaded her after Wilda’s initial attack, but the woman’s reaction was way out of line. She was over the top. Was she scared for her sons, afraid they were being railroaded, or was there more to her fury? Did she know something? A secret they were harboring? If the altercation had done anything, it had increased Pescoli’s suspicions about the Bell brothers rather than allay them.
Lost in thought, she drove by rote, stopping for stoplights and ignoring the Braxton Hicks pangs that had started about the time she left the restaurant. All the while, she was going over the homicide investigation and, more specifically, replaying the scene with the women she’d just dealt with in the foyer of the restaurant. While Wilda had definitely been the aggressor, Billie O’Hara had played the part of peacekeeper. But what about Terri Tufts and her supercilious attitude, the same knowing smile she’d displayed on the night of the vigil? What had she said about Pescoli’s pregnancy? Seems to be a lot of that going around. As if she were enjoying her own private and nasty joke.
Who was this husband shooting blanks?
She followed a minivan filled with kids and decorated with bumper stickers proclaiming I HEART JESUS as it buzzed along over the speed limit.
Pescoli was certain she was missing something, something important, something that was scratching at the back of her mind, something she couldn’t quite reach. But the aroma of the food was distracting her. Her stomach rumbled, reminding her she hadn’t eaten in hours.
At the house, she found Bianca downstairs on the couch, her ankle propped up on a pillow, Cisco and Sturgis curled up beside her, cell phone and iPad at hand, television tuned to the news. Her hair was wet and curly, as if she’d just gotten out of the shower, and she was dressed in pajama bottoms and a T-shirt. She glanced up as her mother arrived, but couldn’t muster up a smile.
“Hey,” Pescoli said to Bianca as the dogs bounced off the couch to come greet her.
“Hi.” Bianca’s voice was flat and she looked like she’d lost her best friend. “What happened to your face?”
“Long story,” Pescoli said. “Why the long face?” She dropped the sacks onto the kitchen island, taking time to pet a madly barking and twirling Cisco. “Yeah, I love you, too,” she said to the terrier, then scratched Sturgis’s ears as the lab wagged his tail. When Bianca didn’t answer, she said, “Got your texts. What’s going on?”
“Nothing.”
“Doesn’t seem like nothing. Especially when you kept texting me about coming home.”
Bianca lifted a shoulder. Then, as if she couldn’t hold it in a minute longer, she faced her mother and blinked back tears. “I’m off the show,” she said with more than a touch of anger. “Michelle called a little while ago. Barclay Sphinx is ‘going in another direction.’” She cleared her throat. “Lara Haas is in and I’m out.”
CHAPTER 28
Pescoli rounded the end of the sectional while the dogs milled around beneath the counter, where the food still in the bags was probably getting cold. She took a seat next to her daughter. “What do you mean ‘Lara’s in and you’re out’?”
“Just that.” Bianca flopped back on the couch. “Michelle called.”
“What did she say?”
“She talked to Barclay. Like earlier today. And he . . . he’s thinking about ‘taking the show in another direction. ’” Bianca made air quotes with her fingers.
“After filming just one episode?”
“I guess.”
Pescoli thought the show was already scripted, at least loosely, and this didn’t make a lot of sense. “What other direction?”
“A direction that doesn’t include me. Or our family.” Bianca sunk lower on the cushions, her lower lip protruding, disappointment emanating from her in waves.
“Is he going to play up the feuding families angle?” Pescoli asked. Wasn’t there something about that?
Sighing, Bianca plucked at a nonexistent piece of lint on the arm of the sectional. “I guess. But it’s all because of Lara. She’s the last one who saw Big Foot, and Barclay is all over that.”
“Thinks she saw one.”
“Doesn’t matter. And then that Big Foot Believer guy, Carlton Jeffe, got a visual of a Big Foot on film with his drone . . . so it’s probably the same one that chased Lara. She was already on the news talking about it. First at the hospital and then at her home with her mom and dad there.” Cisco abandoned his position under the counter and hopped up onto the couch. Bianca absently stroked his rough coat.
“Okay, I see Lara’s got the media attention right now. But I thought they had some kind of plot line sketched out.”
“They did. Do. But after the pilot, where I’m the one who is chased by Big Foot, they’re going to focus on Lara, even make her live with one of the feuding families or something. They’re going to cut something into what we’ve already filmed, focus in on her at the campfire or whatever, so the viewers can connect with her or something. That’s what Michelle said. Then they want her to recreate what happened to her, when she went back searching for her cell phone, like she lost it during the party scene. They’ll make it fit in with the story and then follow her story line.”
“And what happens to your character?”
Pushing a lock of wet hair from her face, she said, “Don’t know. Michelle said she’d keep me posted.”
“Michelle still on the show?”
“Yeah. Remember: She’s the cop! She’s you.”
“I know, but if you’re out, I thought they might get rid of your mother as well, come up with some other investigator, or something.”
“Well, they didn’t,” she huffed, crossing her arms over her chest. “Michelle and Barclay are tight.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. She said she went to some seminar he gave a few years ago, or something, and I think they’ve kept in touch ever since, though, I think she kept it kind of a secret, didn’t want anyone to know.”
This was news. “She knew him before he showed up here?”
“I think.” Bianca nodded, her wet curls bouncing on her shoulders. “Well, kinda.”
Huh, Pescoli thought, filing the information away. “Well, I wouldn’t worry about it too much. If the reality show is in this much flux, if the episodes aren’t set in stone, which seems to be t
he case, then just do your job, best as you can and maybe things will change again.”
Bianca lifted a skeptical brow. “You’ve met Lara, right?” she said sarcastically. “You know it’s impossible to compete with her. At least for male attention. Just ask Maddie.”
Pescoli remembered that Maddie had been in love with TJ O’Hara, but he, like most of the other boys around that age, was forever lusting after Lara. “So you think Barclay Sphinx isn’t immune to her charms.”
“If you mean her boobs? Then no. It’s disgusting.” Scowling, she said, “I don’t want to talk about it anymore.”
“Okay. I’ve got dinner. It might be getting cold, but burgers, fries, and a spinach salad.” Bianca was forever trying different diets and every once in a while she was off meat, professing to be a vegetarian. But not always, so when Pescoli brought home takeout, she always hedged her bets.
“Are you going to tell me what happened to your face?” Bianca asked.
“Oh. Well, your mother got into a catfight.”
“For real?”
“Apparently Wilda Wyze doesn’t like how I’m treating her boys. You know, like they could be suspects.”
“So she fought you?” Bianca was both incredulous and somewhat impressed. “Don’t you carry a gun?”
“I usually don’t need a sidearm to pick up takeout.”
“So you just let her claw you?”
“Well, that’s not really how it went down. She took offense to the fact that we’ve been questioning her sons.”
“And she attacked you? Are you kidding me?”
“It was a . . . scuffle. She came at me, and I . . . convinced her to back off.”
“You mean, like a fight? You’re pregnant!”
“That is a fact. And Terri Tufts commented on it, too.” Without explaining how physical the altercation actually became, she told Bianca about meeting the three women in the foyer of Wild Wills, the accusations and the fight.