Deadly Places: A Mapleton Mystery Novella

by Terry Odell

  Half an hour before change of shift, the workroom was still empty, so Ed pulled a chair alongside Titch’s desk. “I’m touching base. From last night’s reports, it appears things have been quiet.”

  “Yes, Chief.”

  “I did have a question about the message you left on Laurie’s desk. The one in the red folder.”

  Titch squared his shoulders. “Chief?”

  “Since your note was on the envelope, not the folder, am I correct in assuming you found the envelope, added the note, then put it in the red folder?”

  “Yes, Chief.”

  Someday, Ed would be able to carry on a conversation with Titch, but the taciturn ex-military officer had become even more formal since Ed had moved into his new position. At least before, Titch had called him Solomon.

  “Did you see who put it on your desk?” Ed asked, although knowing Titch, the note would have said so.

  “No, Chief. Since it had your name on it, I put it in a red folder, in case it was important. Per protocol.”

  “Did you notice anyone here who wasn’t on duty? Someone from another shift, or someone Irv might have buzzed through?”

  “No, Chief. At the time in question, I was out on a call, backing up Officer Gaubatz. If you have questions, the log will verify it. When I returned, the envelope was on my desk.”

  “Relax, Titch. I’m curious, that’s all. I know you’re doing your job, and I don’t expect you to be chained to this desk for your entire shift. Your presence on the streets is just as important.”

  “Thank you, Chief.”

  “What about Deputy Baker? He might not remember the policy.”

  Titch thought about it for a moment. “No, I don’t think so. I was here before he returned from his rounds. Of course, it’s possible I’d stepped away briefly. I couldn’t have been gone more than a minute or two.”

  Did Ed detect a faint reddening at Titch’s neck? “You know, you are allowed to get coffee. Use the men’s room. Stretch your legs.”

  The flush spread to Titch’s face. He stared over Ed’s shoulder. “Yes, Chief. And I will be sure to reinforce departmental policy on messages for staff with Deputy Baker. Since you’re here, did you wish to address the troops at roll call?”

  Although Ed knew Vicky McDermott would go over everything with Titch before change of shift, he decided it made sense to repeat what he’d said at second shift, to make his presence felt. “Very briefly.” He explained about the overtime he was offering to anyone willing to put in some time at the parade. “I don’t want to pull anyone from the streets. The trick-or-treating should be almost over before third shift, but having the unit parked out front with an officer or two hanging around should be good PR.”

  “I agree, Chief.”

  Ed wanted to shout Stop calling me Chief, but it was a lost cause. “As you were,” he said instead.

  He leafed through the folders and messages on Laurie’s desk to see what had come in after he’d gone home. Nothing of significance, so he left them there and headed to reception. Irv sat at the desk, reading a paperback. “Evening, Irv.”

  The man jerked upright. “Hey, Chief Solomon. Haven’t seen you in a while.”

  “Guess our shifts don’t overlap too often now. I have a question about last night. Did anyone come to your desk?”

  The man’s brow furrowed, adding more wrinkles to his already wizened face. “No, not that I can recollect. Let me check the log.” Irv grabbed a clipboard, ran his finger down the list of names, then shook his head. “Nope. All quiet on that end. A few phone calls, all routine.”

  “If someone comes in and says they have a message for me, what’s the policy?”

  Irv didn’t hesitate. “I let them fill out a form and put it on Laurie’s desk.”

  “And if it’s already written? A note in an envelope addressed to me?”

  “Same thing.”

  “And what if they say it’s urgent they speak to someone?”

  Irv tapped the clipboard. “They give me the short version, then I call one of the guys on duty out here to talk to them. Then I make sure it’s in the log.”

  “Thanks, Irv. Keep it up.” Ed turned to go.

  Irv called after him. “Wait. Was that a test? Did I do something wrong?”

  Ed smiled. “No, it wasn’t a test. More of a clarification for me. I want to be up-to-speed on how things work.”

  “Fair enough. You have any more questions, you come to me. Always happy to answer.”

  “Have a good night, Irv.” Ed went to his office to check his email, promising himself it was only to see whether Detective Rosen had responded. Mary Ellen had a valid point. He’d been trying too hard to keep on top of his former duties as well as be the perfect Chief, when all he needed to do was keep things running smoothly until Gordon got back.

  The niggling thought Mary Ellen had planted, that perhaps Gordon wasn’t planning to return, meandered through Ed’s brain. He dismissed it, just as he had avoided the topic when she’d raised it before. Maybe they could discuss it over dinner at the Black Bear.

  He scanned the list of messages, forcing himself to ignore anything that wasn’t from Colfax, Sam Fischer, or Detective Rosen. Since there was nothing from any of them, he shut off the computer. Tomorrow would be soon enough for the rest.

  Sounds from outside his office told him it was almost change of shift. McDermott and Titch would be going over anything pertinent, and he refrained from joining them. He made the reservations at the Black Bear Chalet, and thought about Mary Ellen waiting at home.

  Trying not to smile as he joined the briefing, he kept his remarks short, stressing the Halloween event. His inquiry about the message left on Titch’s desk was met with head shakes and blank stares, even from Deputy Baker.

  Chapter 7

  Pondering his red folder mystery, Ed drove home, his anticipation—and something else—rising, the closer he got to his house. Lights were on in the boys’ bedrooms. Doing homework, he assumed, although in reality, all it meant was the lights were on. By now, they might be downstairs watching television.

  Inside, Buster trotted over in greeting. Ed ruffled his fur. “Someone’s glad to see me.” Ed paused in the kitchen to pour himself a glass of wine, noting the level in the bottle was the same as when he’d left. Maybe his worries were for nothing. He poured a second glass.

  The boys were watching television. Jeremy glanced up. “Hi, Dad.”

  “Homework done?” Ed asked.

  Mitch rolled his eyes, a perfect replication of his mother. “Duh, Dad. No TV until homework’s done. We’re watching TV. What do you think? Aren’t you a detective?”

  “First, Mapleton doesn’t have detectives. Second, your tone is bordering on an inappropriate way to talk to your father. Third, where’s your mom?”

  Mitch ducked his head.

  “In the study,” Jeremy said.

  Ed wandered down the hall to the study and bumped the closed door with an elbow, careful not to spill the wine. “Honey, I’m home,” he said in his best Ricky Ricardo imitation. When she didn’t answer, he shifted the glasses to one hand and let himself in.

  Mary Ellen sat at the desk, staring intently at her computer, moving the mouse, clicking keys, apparently oblivious to his presence.

  “Honey?” he said again. “I’m home. And it’s not even nine.”

  She glanced over her shoulder. He set her wine on the desk. “Am I interrupting?” he asked.

  “Sorry. Last minute rush job.”

  “You know, you’re allowed to tell clients they need to give you a reasonable advance notice before they want their websites updated.”

  She shrugged. “He called right after you left, and I didn’t have anything else to do.” Her tone suggested she didn’t think he’d be home when he’d said he would.

  “Think you’ll be done by the time the boys go to bed?”

  “I should be. I need to upload a couple more images, check the links, and that should be it.”

&nbs
p; He leaned over her shoulder, enjoying her “Mary Ellen” scent. “You do charge more for these drop everything and fix this now clients, don’t you?”

  “Sometimes. Depends on the job. This one’s for Father McMahan, and I’m not charging him anything. It’s for the church website.” She pushed the mouse aside. “Have you considered a website for Mapleton? I could give the city a good price.”

  “I’m not sure. It might push the nepotism button.”

  “Well, there aren’t very many web designers based in Mapleton. I do have an insider’s view of the city.”

  “I’ll think about it. Might be something worth mentioning to the mayor. Meanwhile, I’ll hang with the boys.”

  Mitch and Jeremy were sprawled across the couch, so Ed sat in his easy chair and sipped his wine. The television was tuned to a police investigation drama, and Ed cringed at how much they got wrong. “You do know it’s not like that,” he said to the boys.

  “C’mon, Dad. It’s television. We know it’s not real,” Mitch said.

  “You figured out the bad guy yet?” Ed asked.

  Mitch snorted. “Yeah, in about ten minutes. It’s always someone who shows up in the beginning, then the cops say he couldn’t have done it, and you don’t see him again until it’s almost over, and they nail him. But we’re going to wait to the end to make sure.”

  “What’s it really like, finding the bad guy?” Jeremy asked.

  “A lot of work, asking a lot of people a lot of questions, and figuring out what they’re trying not to tell you,” Ed said. “Most of the bad guys are lying, so it’s a lot of sorting out the important lies from the ones that don’t matter.”

  Mary Ellen joined them a few minutes later, and they all commented on everything from the appropriateness of the women’s attire, to how the crime scene techs really worked, to whether or not a cop would be allowed to do the things they were doing. Ed savored a rare moment of family, not just the four of them in the same room.

  Later, Mary Ellen tucked alongside him in bed, breathing evenly, Ed got the feeling he’d rounded a corner into an old, familiar neighborhood he hadn’t been aware he’d left. He kissed the top of Mary Ellen’s head and drifted into sleep.

  He woke early, refreshed and wide awake. But instead of rushing to his laptop, or his phone, he crept downstairs and made the coffee. On a whim, he started preparing his Sunday morning pancakes. So what if it was Tuesday?

  Mary Ellen came down a short time later, wrapped in her pale blue fleece robe. Funny how sexy it looked on her this morning. She helped herself to coffee and raised her brows in question.

  Ed waggled his brows in response. Did she think he looked sexy in his sweats? Did the gray at his temples add to his appeal? Instinctively, he sucked in his gut. Not that he wasn’t fit, but it had been a few years since he’d seen the big 4-0. “What can I say? I had this sudden urge for pancakes.”

  Her expression said she remembered the first time they’d spent the night together, and he’d tried to impress her with his culinary skills by fixing breakfast the next morning.

  She leaned over and speared a cake, taking a bite. She chewed, swallowed, and smiled. “You’ve come a long way.”

  Jeremy, their morning son, swept into the kitchen fully dressed, hair combed, ready to face his day. “Wow. Pancakes? On a Tuesday?”

  “Set the table,” Mary Ellen said. “And then get your brother. We’ll eat together this morning.”

  After a brief interlude of sibling shouting, a pajama-clad Mitch stumbled into the kitchen, rubbing his eyes. “Why did I have to get—? Pancakes? On Tuesday?”

  He flopped into his chair, his gaze alternating between Ed and Mary Ellen, the amused expression on the boy’s face telling Ed he was going to have to give him The Talk pretty damn soon. How had they grown up so fast?

  Ed arrived at his office, acting like there was nothing unusual or wrong about rolling in after eight. Despite his internal argument that it wouldn’t make a difference if he arrived at six-fifteen or eight-fifteen, the anxiety he’d missed something important bounced around his belly. Laurie, who had a key to his office, had left the night reports in his inbox. No red folder this time. Rather than invite any potential questions as to why he was later than usual, Ed sat behind his desk and brought himself up to speed with what had gone down the night before.

  Bad choice of words, he thought, as heat rose to his face and a smile played along his lips.

  No bear sightings, nor any reports of anything attributable to a bear doing bear stuff in Mapleton. Maybe Miss Menard’s visitor had moved on. After setting the reports aside to be filed, Ed opened his email.

  When he saw Detective Rosen’s name in the list, Ed reminded himself his query to the detective was strictly for information-gathering, and—he checked the time stamp—getting here at five in the morning wouldn’t have made a difference. To prove it to himself, Ed bypassed the message and decided that today, he’d open them in the order they’d arrived.

  Which meant the one from the mayor was going to wait its turn as well. After all, when the man wanted something he considered important, he called.

  Ed reflected on his options as he went through the messages—most of these did little more than eat up his time, and could be fielded by Laurie. When he’d come aboard, she’d said she took care of routine correspondence for Gordon, but Ed had wanted a better feel for all things Chief Stuff, and had been dealing with the same general questions from citizens, requests for interviews, and complaints. Laurie was undoubtedly better at drafting responses than he was.

  He admitted he’d been trying to do too much himself. Time to cut some strings. After all, she opened his snail mail and screened it. Since emails addressed to Ed came to his computer, he’d felt an obligation to deal with all of them directly. No more.

  He called Laurie in, and they worked out a system where he’d forward the time waster messages to her, then she’d draft a response and shoot it back to him so he could modify it if necessary, then copy and paste it as a direct response from himself. Her smile said he’d made the right decision.

  He went back to his email and opened the one from Detective Rosen.

  M.E. said cause of death for Cardona was a diabetic coma. Man had a history of neglecting to monitor his insulin levels. Ruled it natural causes. However, given your query, I’ll ask whether it could have been homicide.

  Ed replied with a thank you. The seeds of doubt had been planted, although Ed had no evidence the M.E. might have been too hasty in his declaration.

  He opened the email from the mayor. A request for a summary of everything Ed had done for the town of Mapleton? By Friday? Ed looked at the forms the mayor wanted him to fill out. Fifteen pages? Compiling the information Mayor McKenna wanted would take at least a week.

  This had to be some kind of game.

  Chapter 8

  Ed printed out the form and summoned Laurie into his office again. After all, if this was a routine process, complex and aggravating as it might be, Gordon must have dealt with it, which meant Laurie had seen it, too.

  “These are new under Mayor McKenna,” she said. “And he gave Chief Hepler three months before asking for one. Most of the numbers are already in the various departmental spreadsheets. It’s a matter of pulling them and entering them into the new format. If you’d like, I can do that part of it, and you can do the subjective parts.”

  Ed sighed in relief. “Please. And, in case I haven’t told you, I couldn’t do this job without your help.”

  She grinned. “Glad to be of service, Acting Chief.”

  With that out of the way, Ed did his crossing guard duty, promising the kids a look inside a real police car and a chance to meet a real police dog if they came to the Trick or Treat Parade. When he returned to the station, he plunged into Chief Stuff, wondering again why he hadn’t utilized Laurie more. He’d known from day one he needed help. Gordon had told both of them to work together. Pride? Stubbornness? Control Freak? Or all three?

 
His mind strayed to Charlotte Strickland’s interview. Should he call the Weekly? Talk to Paul Lipsky, the editor? Ask him to consider all angles before approving it? Edit it judiciously? It wasn’t as if Ed wanted to shackle the press, or tell them what to write. On the other hand, there was no point in printing alarmist articles.

  And then here he was, turning to Laurie again.

  “They met for lunch at least a couple times a month,” she said. “As time allowed, or the need arose. Nothing regular on his schedule. I never got the impression Chief Hepler tried to get the editor to see things his way, but they both had—have—the best interests of Mapleton at heart.”

  “I’ll see if Mr. Lipsky is free for lunch.” He paused. “Or is scheduling meetings something else you did for Gordon?”

  “Sometimes,” she said. “Depended on how cop-related it was, or how flexible his schedule was. I’d be happy to set things up with Mr. Lipsky.”

  Ed pondered that. “No, this time, let me.” Before she left, he added, “And if there are any other of these touchy-feely things Gordon did you think I should be doing, let me know.”

  “Will do, Chief.”

  Not Acting Chief. A load of tension he hadn’t been aware he’d been carrying left Ed’s shoulders.

  He called Paul Lipsky, and they made arrangements to meet at Daily Bread. “I’m still learning the ins and outs,” Ed said over a pulled pork sandwich. “Even though my position is temporary, wherever possible, I want to maintain the status quo. However, I don’t want to be considered a lame duck Chief who’s sitting around waiting for Chief Hepler’s return.”

  Lipsky had sounded pleased, and Ed made a mental note to be sure to let the editor know he had the same concerns as Gordon about working together with the press.

  Meanwhile, time for more Chief Stuff. He looked at the form the mayor wanted. There were eight fields that required more than statistics or yes-no answers. He’d tackle two a day. The first was What suggestions do you have for a better utilization of manpower? Easy. More officers, more money. But he didn’t think that would fly. Nor would, Why should it matter? I’m only filling in. He’d never liked essay questions. He’d contemplate his answer while he checked his email.