Leaning away from him, I looked up into his face. Had he sensed that I wasn’t really into him anymore, or worse, that another man was on my mind as I kissed him?
Unsure I wanted to know the answer, I asked, “Is everything okay, Jack?”
He sat back against the couch cushion and sighed again. “I’m sorry, Poppy. I want to be here with you, but something Cherise said to me today has me preoccupied.”
“Oh? What happened?” I asked, intensely curious about what she could have said to rattle him so much.
“I’m sure it’s nothing, but during one of her unusually emotional moments this afternoon she said she was relieved. I stood there in her kitchen stunned like someone had just slapped me across the face and then I asked what she meant, but she began crying and said it’s all been so hard on her to hear that the man she still loved was murdered.”
Cherise had said she was relieved that Lee was dead? Why would she say that?
Trying to appear as casual as possible so he wouldn’t think I was digging for information, I said, “Would you like a drink? I have beer and wine in the fridge.”
Nodding, he followed me into the kitchen. Reaching into the refrigerator, I grabbed us both a beer and popped the tops off. Taking my usual seat at my kitchen table, I watched with relief as he chose to stand and lean against the counter.
I took a sip of my beer and then picked up where we left off in the living room. “People often say things when they’re upset that they don’t mean, Jack. It is strange that she would say she’s relieved, though.”
He jumped at the chance to continue the conversation. “It was strange. That’s exactly what I thought right after she said it, but when I asked, she gave that excuse that it’s been hard knowing he was murdered.”
“Is it possible you misheard her or misunderstood what she meant?”
Jack thought about it and nodded. “I must have, right? I know Cherise had every reason to hate Lee, but she would never do anything like murder.”
“Did she hate him, though? She seemed to think very highly of him when we went out to her house to interview her the other day.”
“Hate might be too strong a word, I guess.” He lifted the beer bottle to his lips and took a gulp before continuing. “She should have hated him, but I think what she really felt was hurt. Even years later, whenever I’d see her she’d have that hurt look in her eyes any time I mentioned his name.”
I thought about when Alex and I had spoken to Cherise and remembered seeing a look of hurt pass over her face when she talked about Lee being murdered. But I hadn’t gotten the sense that the hurt came from her anger with him so much as her still caring for her ex-husband.
Still, she was the woman he left for a younger woman, who he married very quickly after divorcing her. While it wouldn’t be the nicest thing for her to feel, relief that he was gone wouldn’t be that terrible either.
And it certainly wouldn’t make her a murderer.
It would, however, be reason enough to encourage Alex to get that search warrant for her house. Maybe what she said to Jack was nothing. It probably was. After all, Cherise had the least to gain from Lee Reynolds’ murder. No life insurance. No hefty bank account. No beautiful townhouse. Nothing but knowing the man who left her for another woman was dead.
“Well, I better get going, Poppy. I hope we’ll get to see each other at least once more before I leave town.”
Jack set his beer down on the counter and walked toward me. Leaning down, he kissed me softly on the lips and smiled. “I’d hate to leave without at least saying a proper goodbye.”
He winked and turned to leave as I sat there replaying the highlights of our whirlwind romance. I’d been crazy about him and his fantastic stories of all the places he’d been in the world, and that free spirit in him had made me want him even more. But now I wanted something different than what he offered.
Someone different who I’d cared about for longer than anyone knew.
Chapter Fifteen
I wanted to show Alex whatever he thought happened with Jack the night before wasn’t going to get in the way of my work with him, so I got to The Grounds early and took my seat at our usual table with coffee for both of us. Nine o’clock rolled around, but he still hadn’t showed up and I began to worry that all the progress I thought I’d made the day before had vanished and for what?
Jack had given me some ideas about Cherise I wanted to share with Alex, but nothing he’d told me was worth damaging our partnership. As the minutes ticked by and our coffees grew cold, I couldn’t help but regret leaving his house to meet Jack.
Not that I knew what I would have done if I stayed. Would we have kissed across the counter if I wasn’t about to leave to go to another man? Would we have talked about the case more and then given in to what we both felt for each other?
The fear that whatever we did might ruin our work partnership never left my mind, so I didn’t know for sure if I’d ever act on how I felt about Alex. As I looked down at my phone and saw it was nearly quarter after nine, I wondered if it was all academic anyway. Every time he thought I was with Jack he pulled further and further away from me.
I watched the steam slowly evaporate from his coffee and checked the time again as it inched toward twenty after. Was Alex across the street at the police station just sitting in his office like he’d been last time, retreating from everything that was me?
A noise startled me, and I looked up to see him standing by our table smiling down at me. “Sorry I’m late. Derek was in full panic mode this morning because of some obscure AM talk radio magazine that called right at nine. Can I get you another coffee to make up for it?”
I nodded, unsure if I spoke that all the things I’d been thinking about him, me, and us wouldn’t come spilling out of my mouth before I could stop them. For twenty minutes I’d sat there worried that I’d ruined what we had together, and with just a smile and his simple explanation for being late, Alex had made me feel better about it all.
If that wasn’t a clear sign that I shouldn’t endanger the relationship we already had for something more, then I didn’t know what was.
“You look a million miles away. You okay?” he asked as he sat down across from me.
“Yeah, I’m good. Just have a lot on my mind.”
Alex shifted in his chair and looked around. “The Grounds is pretty empty for a weekday. You know, I need to stop getting here late since you always take my seat when you get here first.”
The way his mouth hitched up told me he wasn’t upset, so I teased him about his choice of seating. “I can understand why you like this chair so much. It offers a pretty good panoramic view of the whole place.”
He swiveled his head back and forth to look behind him. “Exactly, which is why I hate this seat.”
As I sat there, he stood and said, “Switch so I can see things the right way.”
“You’re serious, aren’t you?” I asked in amazement as he stared down at me waiting to change seats.
“Yes. Switch seats.”
I did as he ordered and sat down with my back to the rest of The Grounds’ patrons. I never liked this seat either, even though I’d never disliked it as much as he had, obviously. Alex sat in his seat grinning like he’d just won the lottery.
“Are you happy now? I can’t believe you made me change seats with you. I think those chewing-outs by Derek are starting to get to your brain, Alex.”
He took a sip of his coffee and watched me with those dark eyes of his as I teased him. When I’d finished, he looked around the restaurant and then fixed his gaze back on me. “I need to sit in this spot so I can see everything going on. I can’t protect you if my back is to the door.”
“Protect me? From what? This is The Grounds. What do you think is going to happen? Is someone going to bean me in the head with a blueberry muffin? They do make the oversized ones exploding with blueberries here, so I can certainly see the need for some police protection from that.”
Alex screwed his face into a scowl I couldn’t tell was real or not. “Are you finished?”
“I could be. I just don’t know what protection I need here in a coffee shop.”
He looked at me and his expression changed to deadly serious. “You need protection all the time, Poppy. You and I investigate all kinds of crime, including murder. That can be dangerous. My job isn’t just to solve crimes but to make sure the citizens of Sunset Ridge are safe, and in my mind, you’re the number one citizen I have to make sure I protect since you can be in danger at any time by working with me.”
I opened my mouth to make a joke to alleviate the heaviness that had crept into our conversation, but it didn’t seem right. He wasn’t kidding about me being in danger. I guess in the back of my mind I’d always known working with him could put me in harm’s way, but he made me feel so safe I didn’t think much about it on most days.
“I wasn’t trying to make fun of that, Alex. I don’t have a reason to think about the danger I might be in working with you. I guess I just assume you’ll protect me, but I forget that for you to do that, you have to have things your way, like this whole seat thing.”
“I don’t want you to worry, Poppy. Your safety is uppermost in my mind all the time, so if someone wants to harm you, they’ll have to get through me first.”
He said that like it was the most normal thing in the world for someone to say to me, but as he drank his coffee and scanned the room, I saw him differently for the first time since we’d begun working together. For me, working with him was something exciting and fun. I got to investigate crimes in our small town and helped him figure out who was likely guilty, mainly because I knew most of the players in Sunset Ridge. While he did the actual police work of filling out reports and answering to Derek, I took advantage of the opportunity to pursue my avocation, but until that moment, I hadn’t thought of all he had to do for me to enjoy that chance.
“Thank you, Alex. I don’t say that enough. I know I’m not a real investigator, but you welcomed me as your partner when you joined the force. I don’t want you to think I don’t appreciate that because I do.”
He gave me a slow smile that reached his eyes and told me what I’d said made him happy, even if he didn’t want to admit it. “You’re as much an investigator as I am. This uniform and badge don’t make me that. All they do is make it easier to get people to talk about the things they’ve done.”
We sat there silently drinking our coffee as the people of the town he worked to protect came in and out, and I knew although he hadn’t said anything about dinner last night and my leaving right afterward, what I’d done when I went home was on his mind. I didn’t know how I knew, but something in the way he looked at me said he was worried. Did he think Jack and I were more serious than I’d acted like we were?
I finally broke the silence with what I thought was good news. “So I have some details on Cherise I think you might find interesting.”
His response was tepid at best. As he watched a man and woman on the other side of the coffee shop argue about something, he said, “Oh yeah?”
Not even a question about what I’d heard. Just a mild expression of notice, like I’d mentioned that the weatherman had said the temperatures were set to stay the same for the next week.
“Did you hear me?” I asked, sure he must have misunderstood what I said as he focused on the couple now flailing their hands and talking loudly about some book they’d both read.
He continued to stare at them for a moment and then turned his attention back to me. “Yes, I heard you. I’ve never entirely eliminated Cherise from my list of suspects.”
Talk about an answer that said little. Sure what Jack had told me would interest Alex once he opened his mind and ears to listen to me, I said, “Her brother-in-law told me last night that she said she was relieved Lee was dead.”
“Sounds like virtually every ex-wife in America to me,” he said as raised his cup to take another sip of coffee.
“You don’t think that’s a strange thing to say about someone she claims to have loved?” I asked, my exasperation rapidly growing at his behavior.
Shrugging, he made that face people made when they had to eat their second favorite meal instead of what they really wanted. If there had been a caption under a picture of him at that moment, it would have read meh.
“I can’t believe you’re not more enthusiastic about this. Cherise telling someone she’s relieved her ex-husband is dead seems pretty damning to me.”
“Why? Because Jack said it was so?” Alex asked, his voice sharper than usual.
So that was it. He felt fine discounting what I’d learned the night before because it had come from Jack.
I still believed this was important, even though it had come through someone he didn’t like, so I defended my position. “No, because she had a real beef with Lee after he left her for a younger woman and she owns the exact caliber gun that killed him.”
Alex sat motionless, not even scanning the restaurant as he focused on me for a long moment and then nodded. “Fine. Maybe we’ll take a ride out to see her after I finish my coffee.”
“What if she’s getting rid of the gun right now? Don’t you think we should get out there as soon as possible?” I asked as he gave me his meh face again.
“There’s been someone watching her twenty-four-seven, so if she’s planning to do anything, we’ll know about it. Derek agreed to the search warrant this morning, so it’ll be ready by the time I finish my coffee. There’s no hurry, Poppy. If she shot him, it’s not going to hurt the investigation if we find out ten minutes later.”
I couldn’t believe my ears! This wasn’t the man I knew and admired for being a great detective. Was he acting like this just because I’d heard it from Jack? I couldn’t understand Alex disregarding a lead just because he didn’t like the person who’d given it to me.
“You’re behaving so strangely, Alex. Why? What is this about?”
He didn’t answer, instead looking away at the table with the couple who had stopped fighting. The look on his face was one of unhappiness, but I thought I saw anger in it too.
I didn’t want us to continue being like this every time Jack’s name came up. Alex may have been jealous or whatever he was feeling about me being with him, but I couldn’t stand seeing him shirk his responsibilities because of it. I needed to clear the air now or this would dog us every step of the way from this point on.
“You don’t have to be like this, you know? He’s just a guy I had a nice time with, but it’s nothing serious.”
Alex turned back to face me and said not a word. His stony expression gave nothing away about what he thought of what I’d said, and for one of the few times since we’d started working together, I didn’t know what to say.
Then just as I was beginning to wonder if he’d even heard what I said, nevermind what he thought about it, he stood from the table and tossed his coffee cup into the garbage. “Ready for another road trip to Cherise’s house?”
I stared up at him in amazement. “That’s it? You don’t have anything else to say?”
“Nope. Ready to go?”
So that was that. We weren’t going to talk about Jack or anything having to deal with him. Alex’s smile told me he had heard what I said about Jack not being someone serious in my life, and I suspected that made him happy. But whatever he felt about it, he wasn’t going to share that with me.
“I’m ready. Are we okay?”
Without missing a beat, he nodded. “We’re good. Let’s go see if that relief Cherise felt was because she was the one who killed our victim.”
He strolled past me toward the front door like nothing had happened, and as I walked with him across the street to get into the car, I had to admit I didn’t want to talk about Jack with him anymore either.
Alex knocked on Cherise Reynolds’ black front door two times before she answered. Recognizing us immediately, she smiled and said, “Come back for another look to see the newes
t updates? Did she finally agree to a remodel, officer?”
He held up the search warrant and in that flat, official voice he used right before he marched into someone’s house to rifle through their belongings, he said, “This is a search warrant for your home, Cherise Reynolds. Please let us pass.”
She looked at me and then Alex before returning her attention to me. Eyes wide, she pleaded, “This isn’t necessary. I would have let you in to check for whatever you’re looking for without the warrant. I have nothing to hide.”
We walked into her home to the sound of saws and hammers and saw half a dozen construction workers watching us as we began our search. Cherise continued to explain that she didn’t do anything and if we’d only ask, she’d tell us where to find what we were looking for. Her voice verged on frantic with every minute that passed without a word from us.
“I’ll do anything to help find Lee’s killer. I swear. Just tell me what you’re looking for.”
Finally, I couldn’t stand just letting her watch in ignorance of our purpose there and said, “You told us you and Lee hadn’t seen each other in ages. Do you still want to claim that?”
“Yes! I hadn’t seen him in months.”
Alex finished checking through the couch cushions in her living room and pointed to the rest of the house. “I know you have a legally registered .38 Smith and Wesson. If I’m going to have to check every inch of this house for that gun, you better believe this place isn’t going to look like it does now when I’m finished.”
Cherise reacted immediately to his threat, her expression a mixture of relief and anger. “You could have just told me that’s what you were looking for.”
“Didn’t you say you were terrified of guns the last time we asked you about one?” I asked, reminding her of the lie she’d told us just days earlier.
A look of terror crossed her face and she turned toward her bedroom. “I haven’t shot it in months. I swear.”
Alex followed her gaze and headed toward the only bedroom in the house. We followed him and stopped just inside the doorway. Cherise pointed to the nightstand next to her bed.
Top of the Hour Page 17