Small-Town Secrets

by Linda Randall Wisdom

  Cole waited by his truck as Bree finished speaking to the man he knew as Kirk Bennett, an electrical contractor. She looked resigned as she walked toward Cole.

  “You’re late, Becker,” she mocked. “I would have thought you’d be hot on our heels a good three hours ago.”

  “Even we hotshot reporters have to have some downtime.” He looked past her. “What happened?”

  “Typical B and E.” She used slang for breaking and entering. “Mr. Bennett is now minus a big-screen television set, three VCRs, his computer, scanner, printer, fax machine and a nifty copier.”

  “Did Kirk tell you his wife left him a week ago?” Cole volunteered the information.

  Bree smiled as he figured she did when her son said something incredible. For a moment Cole thought she was going to go so far as to pat him on the head.

  “There were clues. Such as the half-empty closets and fast-food containers overflowing the trash cans, yet there wasn’t enough dust lying around to consider him a lifelong bachelor. I hate to tell you this, Becker—” she lowered her voice “—I’ve been doing this for a while. Clues are my business.”

  Cole grinned as he thrust his hands in his pockets and rocked back and forth on his heels. “Anything concrete I can report?”

  She shook her head. “Not at this time.”

  He reached out and touched her arm. “Bree?”

  She froze and just looked at him for a moment. “Good night, Becker.” She turned around and walked away.

  “Power of the press, Fitzpatrick,” Cole called after her.

  She waved her hand over her head in dismissal. “Goodbye, Becker.”

  “You’ll look back,” he muttered as he stood by his truck, watching her walk away. She didn’t look back once. “Lady, you’re tougher than I thought.”

  When Bree finished with the crime scene, she felt ready to crawl into a corner somewhere and sleep. Those two spoonfuls of dinner were nothing more than a dim memory. But reports had to be written and filed.

  When she walked into the station, it was quiet, with only the dispatcher and one deputy seated at a desk in the rear. She snagged a cup of coffee and found a stale bagel in a box on the table in the small break room. She sat down at her desk and started filling in her report on the burglary. By the time she finished her eyes burned with fatigue and the caffeine rush from the coffee was long gone.

  “Miss.”

  She looked up into the wizened face of an elderly man. “Can I help you?” Then she noticed the large cart of cleaning supplies next to him.

  His smile lit up his face. “I’m sorry to disturb you. I just wanted to empty your wastebasket,” he explained.

  Bree obliged by moving back. She picked up her wastebasket and handed it to him. He dumped the contents into a large trash bag and set it back down.

  “I heard you’re a real good detective,” he said. “Maybe you can help us.”

  “Help you?” she questioned, not sure what he meant.

  He nodded. He looked around. “Some things aren’t what they seem,” he whispered.

  “What do you mean?” she asked.

  “Please, do the right thing for us,” he said in a low voice before moving on.

  She watched him walk slowly from desk to desk, emptying wastebaskets.

  Do the right thing for who?

  She returned to reading over the report. Satisfied every i was dotted and every t crossed, she signed it and put it on Holloway’s desk. On the way out, she stopped by the dispatcher’s desk. Joe, the dispatcher who worked nights, looked up.

  “The janitor? What is his name?” she asked.

  “That’s Leo,” he replied. “A nice old guy. He lost his wife about eighteen months ago. Seemed really lost, so the sheriff offered him the job here, since our previous cleaning service wasn’t too reliable. We’ve never had to worry about Leo. He doesn’t disturb working surfaces or tell anyone what he sees here. There’s times we worry he’ll try to pick up something too heavy for him, so we tend to make sure he doesn’t overdo it.”

  Bree nodded. “Leo.” She tapped her nails on the counter surface. “I’ll remember that.”

  She thought about the elderly man’s strange words. She’d have to bring it up with Cole. See if he could tell her anything more about the old fellow.

  She was thinking about raiding her refrigerator the moment she got home, until she remembered that with two teenagers and one growing boy in the house, she’d be lucky if there was a crumb left. Jinx halting and emitting a low growl was her first warning something wasn’t right. She looked across the parking lot and saw Cole standing by her vehicle. Her gaze zeroed in on the two insulated containers he held. She almost snatched one of them out of his hand at the same time he held it out to her. She inhaled the bracing aroma before sipping the hot coffee.

  “I’m not here as a member of the press,” Cole assured her. “In fact, I would have brought you a doughnut, too, but I was afraid you’d shoot me for going the cliché route.”

  “You would have been safe as long as it was one of the custard ones with chocolate frosting on top. All they had left inside was a stale bagel.” She took another sip of coffee as she leaned back against her door. “If you try to sneak in a glazed doughnut you will be in serious trouble.” She named the item most identified with law enforcement.

  “Did Kirk accuse his wife of taking the items?” Cole asked casually.

  She shot him a look filled with suspicion. “What makes you ask that?”

  “Come on, Fitzpatrick, I already told you she left him. Sure, he’d want to blame her. She stopped by the office to bring her newspaper account up to date. She was pretty steamed at Kirk. Seems he’d been slipping off for nooners with his office manager, and Margaret found out.”

  “They’ll always get caught.” Bree looked around. Storefronts were dark, the street deserted. She wasn’t used to the quiet, but she knew it was something she could easily grow to like. No smog to cover the stars in the sky. She hadn’t wanted to come out here, but she was seeing that it was the right decision. “What do you know about the man who works as a janitor in the sheriff’s department?”

  “Leo?” She nodded. “A really nice guy.”

  “That I’ve already heard. Tell me something I don’t know.”

  Cole tipped his head back, so he could look upward. “Leo and Anna, his wife, moved out here about thirty years ago. His wife had problems with her lungs. Needed drier air. He owned a hardware store on the edge of town, did a good business. He sold it when his arthritis started to flare up. They did some traveling to visit their kids, and Leo got involved at the senior center when they were here. Almost two years ago, Anna died. Leo took it really hard. Understandable, since they’d been together for almost sixty years and they’d been childhood sweethearts. I heard Holloway asked him if he’d be interested in working there.”

  “He thought I could do something,” she mused. “But he didn’t say what.”

  “Maybe he knows something,” Cole offered.

  “We’ll see.” She finished her coffee and, with a smile, handed him the cup. She activated her door remote. The click of the locks sounded loud in the quiet night air. She opened the back door and gestured for Jinx to jump in. “Thanks for the coffee.”

  “My pleasure. Consider it my contribution to our police force.” He touched her arm lightly.

  He noticed the same fleeting look in her eyes that he’d noticed when he touched her a few hours before. She felt what he felt. Something arced between them that couldn’t be ignored for much longer. She stepped back to break the tenuous connection.

  “Just as long as you don’t expect me to fix your parking tickets,” she said in parting.

  “This time, she’ll look back,” he murmured as he watched her drive away. When her vehicle was out of sight, and she hadn’t, he added, “Damn. It’s a good thing I’m not a betting man.”

  The house was dark and quiet when Bree let herself in through the back door. Jinx immediately
headed for his bowl of kibble.

  “Gee, kids, you could have saved some for me,” she murmured, after looking in the refrigerator and realizing she’d been right. No leftovers.

  She settled for a container of cottage cheese and cut up a peach to go with it.

  As she sat at the table eating her meager late-night dinner, she thought back to other nights when she’d come home after overseeing a crime scene.

  Those nights she’d usually find a plate of food in the refrigerator and the coffeepot on. Even better to her was Fitz waiting to listen and offer opinions if she asked for them. She knew he hadn’t liked her working crime scenes at all hours of the day and night, but he’d never asked her to switch over to a desk job. Never asked that she cut back. From day one, he’d understood how important her work was to her.

  She recalled how he’d tease her that he was the one working a desk most of the time, tracking down white-collar crime, while she dealt with murderers. She told him that was fine with her, since she was too impatient with computers, while he considered them a valuable tool.

  There had been more than talk about crime. They’d had discussions on David’s future. Whether they’d survive Sara’s teenage years. Playful arguments whether Cody’s stubborn nature was inherited from her or Fitz. Late-night talks that led into the bedroom.

  Then the day came when she’d lost her husband. For a time, Bree thought about giving it all up. About finding a cave where there was no crime and she could keep the kids safe. But with time came reason. Fitz wouldn’t have wanted her to shut themselves off for fear that what happened to him would happen to one of them, also. She’d returned to work, but it wasn’t the same. And her superiors knew it. Because of that, she was now living in a smaller town, where her area of expertise wouldn’t be needed as much. Maybe it was a good thing it wasn’t.

  Thoughts of Fitz led to thoughts of Cole. She thought of him standing out there with a cup of coffee for her. Unwittingly, a smile tipped the corners of her mouth.

  “A smile? What’d you do? Arrest a clown?” David asked, stepping into the darkened kitchen. He walked over to the coffeepot and poured himself a cup.

  Bree opened her mouth to remind him he had school in the morning and coffee would only keep him awake. Luckily, she shut it before she opened another rift. She hoped his friendlier nature meant he’d gotten over his earlier anger. She wanted nothing more than to return to the loving relationship they’d shared before.

  “Breaking and entering,” she replied. “If you hear of anyone selling a sixty-inch TV cheap, will you tell me?”

  “Oh, right. That will make me Mr. Popular in school,” he muttered, spooning sugar into his coffee. “I find out a kid at school suddenly has a big-screen TV and I mention it to my cop mom.”

  “That’s why we call them confidential informants,” she said glibly. “Don’t worry, I wouldn’t ask anything of you unless someone’s life was involved.” She spooned up cottage cheese and a slice of peach.

  “You trying to lose weight again?”

  “Excuse me?” She pretended offense. “Again? I haven’t gained an ounce since I lost the extra weight after Cody was born.”

  His grin sent a little pang to her heart. A grin that was identical to his father’s. “Sure, that’s why you went nuts trying to lose ten pounds before that dinner when Dad was honored.”

  “That was a special occasion and I was planning on wearing an extremely expensive gown. You guys never understand.” She finished her snack. “Cody go to bed without any argument?”

  “After he went out to his tree house to leave his treasure box in it,” he replied. “Sara did her usual suffering-soul routine. I told her she should try out for drama. She told me, well, you can imagine what she told me.”

  Bree sighed. “Yes, I can.” She pushed the cottage cheese container to one side and rested her forearms on the table. “David, we can’t have the fights. We’re all trying to make a new life here. We need to work together. We can’t do that with all these battles.”

  He looked at the table as he spoke. “I don’t want the fights, either, Mom. But you have to remember we didn’t want to move. All the books say not to make a major change right away. What could be more of a major change than resigning from your job, selling your house and moving more than a hundred miles away from everything we’ve grown up with?”

  “I didn’t want to move, either, but I also couldn’t stay in my job. You know what was going on. It was getting to where I wasn’t functioning efficiently. It came down to no choice but the one I made. In making it, I was thinking of all of us,” she told him. “Sara hated going to school every day. She couldn’t walk past the stadium without crying. You were angry all the time. Cody was just…” she paused to find the right word to describe her youngest’s frame of mind “…sad.”

  David got up and carried his mug over to the sink. He rinsed it out and put it in the dishwasher.

  “Dad’s dead, Mom. He died and you almost got killed,” he said bluntly. “But you didn’t die and we all went on. We’re all doing it our own way, and we would have been fine back where we knew everyone.”

  “I’m sorry, David,” she said softly. “Sorry for not talking to the three of you more about this. Maybe we should have kept up with the counseling longer.”

  He snorted. “Are you kidding? That psychologist didn’t understand us. He kept wanting us to show our feelings with drawings.”

  “Until you drew a very unflattering picture of him.”

  David grinned. “I thought it looked just like him.” He walked over and dropped a kiss on her cheek. “Okay, I’ll try not to give you such a hard time. G’night.”

  “Good night, David,” she murmured.

  Bree cleaned up her own dishes and set the house alarm.

  When she went into her bedroom, Jinx laid down on the carpet just outside her door.

  When she finally fell asleep she realized that instead of Fitz’s face crossing her mind’s eye as it usually did, Cole Becker’s crept in instead.

  “Dammit, Becker, do you have to be everywhere?” she cursed, punching her pillow into submission as if it was the man himself.

  Chapter 5

  The bulging folder insisted on calling her name. She had no idea why she kept it. At first, she used the excuse that it wasn’t something she could just throw in the trash. Every time she’d seen Cole, she didn’t have it with her, so couldn’t return it to him. That she could have just slid it into a big envelope and dropped it in the mail hadn’t occurred to her.

  Instead, it lay on her nightstand along with the mystery novel she’d been reading. So far, she’d been able to ignore the silent call, and pick her book up instead.

  It wasn’t as easy tonight as it had been the night before. She settled in bed with the covers draped over her drawn-up knees. She picked up her book, dislodging the beige folder, which fell to the floor, spilling out its contents.

  “Damn,” she muttered, climbing out of bed to gather them up. After she’d put it all back together, she started to toss it back on the nightstand. Except something stopped her. Instead, she tossed the book aside.

  “The killer’s the brother-in-law, anyway.”

  Bree sat cross-legged as she pulled out the papers. She fanned them in front of her, glancing at each page, determining what order she would put them in. She grumbled under her breath as she reached for her reading glasses and perched them on her nose.

  In the end, she arranged them according to date of death. Then she picked up the one that was the oldest and began reading. Before she finished the first paragraph, she absently reached for a pen she kept in her nightstand drawer. As she read, she underlined sentences, scribbled in the margins and marked anything that stood out.

  “How did you get hold of these, Becker?” she murmured, once she finished the third report. “Who did you blackmail?”

  When Bree had read all the reports, she sorted them again, this time putting accidental deaths in one pile and deaths by na
tural causes in another. Then she picked each up and read it again, sorting further.

  Two hours later, the papers lay in an orderly manner across the width of her bed.

  She saw them as an excellent reason to call Cole, and not just because she wanted to hear the sound of his voice.

  “He’s not the only man in the world, Bree,” she told herself.

  You haven’t seen anyone better, have you?

  “No, but why him? He’s irritating as hell.”

  Irritating, maybe. Cute, a definite yes. Call the man.

  “I don’t know his number,” she said in a righteous tone.

  That’s what directory assistance is for, smartie.

  Bree gave up the argument with herself.

  She picked up the phone, and a few moments later had the number she’d requested.

  “What?” A sleepy, and grumpy, male voice echoed in her ear.

  “Gee, Becker, I’ve had friendlier greetings from serial killers.”

  “Fitzpatrick?” He perked up. “Do you realize what time it is?”

  She glanced at the clock. “A little after midnight. You have a problem with that?”

  “If you don’t, I guess I don’t, either.” The soft rustle of bedclothes sounded across the phone line. It brought intriguing images to her mind. “You going to tell me why you felt the need to call me in the middle of the night?”

  “I just finished reading all those lovely reports you gave me.”

  “And you felt the need to call me at midnight to tell me that?” he grumbled. Then her words acted as an effective wake-up call. “And?”

  Bree chuckled. “Gee, Becker, that got your attention, didn’t it? I have to say, it’s interesting reading.” She grabbed the second pillow and placed it behind her, punching it into shape to provide the proper backrest.

  “There’s something there, isn’t there?”

  “You definitely know how to dig for information,” she told him. “I can understand why you feel there were some inconsistencies.”

  “There were. Look at Elsie Tremaine. She was never sick a day in her life. Not even a cold.” Anger and frustration colored Cole’s voice. “She taught a couple exercise classes at the senior center. Then all of a sudden, she falls and breaks her hip. Within three weeks, she’s dead from a post-operative infection.”