by Lora Leigh
“Strange,” Zeke drawled. “I hear that who your sister sleeps with or how she lives her life really isn’t any of your damned business. If that’s why you’re here, then perhaps you should head back home.”
“Or perhaps I should just ask my sister about it,” John suggested.
Zeke leaned forward, his arms bracing on his desk. “Mr. Walker, before this goes any further let me warn you right now, I won’t brook any interference in my relationship with Rogue. You don’t want to make an enemy of me, and that’s something your contacts should have warned you of. You might think you see a dumb hick sheriff sitting in front of you, but let me assure you, Mr. Walker, this dumb hick knows how to hold on to what belongs to him.”
Thick lashes narrowed over violet eyes as John stared back at him. “Are parking lot brawls a requirement of holding on to your woman in this town?” he asked. “I stopped by Jonesy’s before coming here. His face is a little worse for wear and yours isn’t much better, even two days later. What did Caitlyn think of your beating up on the man that protected her for four years?”
“What did you think of the reason he received that beating?” Zeke’s smile was cold. “Or didn’t you ask him why it happened?”
“He said he was protesting your treatment of Caitlyn,” John said softly. “Are you denying it?”
Jonesy had lied. Zeke had to admit that surprised him. He hadn’t thought the bartender would bother to lie.
“What happened will stay between me and Jonesy.” He finally shrugged. “If you have any questions or objections, then I imagine you’ll take them up with Rogue.”
“With Caitlyn,” John stated again.
“How old are you, Mr. Walker?” Zeke asked then. “Twelve? I think by now you’re well aware of the name your sister prefers, as well as the one that suits her best. If you can’t stop with the immature comments, then you can leave my office now.”
Silence filled the room as John stared back at him with eyes that were like chips of violet ice. Finally, the younger man straightened in his chair and his expression smoothed out.
“Joe and Jaime Walker, and their grandmother, Callie Walker, were murdered, weren’t they?”
The change of subject didn’t surprise Zeke. Whatever answers John had been looking for about his sister had evidently been answered. The air of confrontational disrespect had evaporated and clear, icy purpose filled those violet eyes. This was a man on a mission, and his mission was identifying and eliminating the threat to his sister.
“Where do you get your information from?” Zeke asked rather than answering.
John’s lips titled. “Let’s say I have my sources as I’m certain you have your own, Sheriff. Joe, Jaime, and their grandmother were important to Caitlyn. But even more, they were close to her. I’d like to know if her life is in danger as well.”
“I don’t know.” Zeke leaned forward and watched the younger man intently. “At this moment, I don’t believe it is, but I’m taking precautions just in case.”
“By sleeping with her?” There was a spark of anger in his eyes now.
“By taking precautions,” he repeated coolly.
John grimaced heavily.
“I’m going to assume you didn’t stop and see your sister before you arrived here,” Zeke said, more than certain that was the case.
John grinned wryly. “My balls are still intact. What do you think?”
“I think your sister must have known how to use that knee of hers before she ever made an appearance in Somerset.” Zeke grinned.
“Let’s just say I’ve experienced her wrath more than once. But in all fairness, I’m the one that first taught her the maneuver. A girl has to know how to protect herself.”
Zeke inclined his head in agreement. “And sometimes, a fist is needed rather than a knee,” he told the brother as he thought about his fight with Jonesy.
“Then essentially, you have no idea who killed Joe, Jaime, and their grandmother, Callie?”
Zeke shook his head. “All I know is that a woman ties them together. Joe and Jaime were involved with a woman together; they were due to meet with her the night they died. A few days ago, their grandmother told Lisa she thought she might know who the girl was. She was supposed to call me. She was found dead the next day. It looked as though she had slipped in the bathtub, hit her head, and drowned. The coroner’s report says otherwise. Callie Walker was murdered, just as her grandsons were.”
John reached up and rubbed one finger over his lower lip thoughtfully as Zeke stared back at him.
“Rogue was attacked six months ago because of something someone thought she knew,” he mused quietly. “She was hospitalized for over a week, Sheriff Mayes.”
“I’m well aware of that, Mr. Walker,” Zeke stated quietly. “I intend to make certain it doesn’t happen again.”
“As am I.” John stood to his feet then. The deliberate slouchiness he had displayed when he first entered the office was no longer apparent. The younger man moved with unconscious grace and predatory awareness now.
“John.”
John turned back as he reached the door, his expression brooding.
“Yes, Sheriff?”
“I don’t need civilian interference in this. This is my investigation. Don’t forget that.”
His lips quirked. “I’m here, Sheriff, to see after my sister’s welfare.”
“As long as you stay out of my investigation,” he agreed. “And my relationship with your sister.”
John arched an eyebrow. “You’re not her husband, and that’s the only relationship I’m required to stay out of where my sister is concerned. Perhaps that’s something you’d do well to remember.”
John opened the door, stepped out of the office, and with a click of the latch left Zeke alone with that final thought. It was a thought that should have filled him with a sense of dread. That was his normal feeling whenever marriage was mentioned. Strangely, the dread wasn’t there now.
He shook his head at the thought of that, grabbed up his hat before strapping on his weapon and heading for the door.
“Kendal, radio Gene and inform him I’m heading out. I’d like to meet up with him at the diner in town before he takes over the evening shift,” he told his secretary.
“Gene called in while you were meeting with Mr. Walker. He had to take the rest of the day off to take his wife to the doctor in Louisville.”
“Alicia all right?” he asked.
Kendal nodded. “It was a checkup, but she wanted Gene to go in with her. I think they’re going to visit with their daughter Willa while they’re there.”
Zeke nodded at that. “I’ll head on out then.”
“Sheriff, you had a call from Teddy Winfred. He asked that you stop by his place when you can.”
Zeke stopped and turned back to her. “Teddy lives on the road that leads to the Walker twins’ place, doesn’t he?”
Kendal’s expression sobered. “About two miles.”
“I’ll head out there now.”
“Sheriff,” she called him back as he started to head to the door.
“Yeah?” He turned to her again, seeing the worry in her blue eyes.
“He asked me to make certain no one knew that he asked you to come to the house. And he asked that you keep it to yourself.”
“Did you tell anyone he called?”
She tilted her head and stared back at him in disbelief. “Not hardly,” she said mockingly. “I didn’t even tell Gene when he called in.”
“I’ll head on out there then.” He nodded. “Let the deputy on duty tonight know that I’m on call if he needs me.”
“Will do, Boss.” Kendal flashed him a smile as he left the outer office and moved quickly along the hallway to the exit.
Minutes later he was in the Tahoe heading out of town toward the Winfred place. Teddy Winfred was eighty if he was a day. He didn’t venture out of his mobile home often and he didn’t like visitors. He’d damned near run Gene off with his cane when the
deputy dropped by to question him after the Walker twins’ bodies had been found. He was also a close friend with Callie Walker.
Heading out to the Winfred place had put his plans to drop by Rogue’s apartment on hold though. The past two days had been hectic, for himself as well as Rogue as she worked at the restaurant well past closing. He’d picked her up after work and returned to her apartment with her where he stayed the night, but there was still an edge of tension between them that he hadn’t had time to deal with yet.
The appearance of her brother wasn’t going to help matters. He had a feeling John Walker was going to be more trouble than he was worth and definitely more than Zeke wanted to put up with at the moment.
If he was anything like his father, Calvin Walker, then he could become a hazard if he stayed in Somerset long. Calvin Walker had been a hellion when he was younger, more often in trouble than not, simply because he hadn’t known when to keep his nose out of others’ business. It hadn’t surprised Zeke at all that Walker had become a lawyer, and one in Boston nonetheless. Zeke bet he kept all the feathers ruffled there.
He grinned at the thought of it. He remembered Calvin, though the other man was a good decade and a half older than Zeke was. He also remembered how much his father and Gene’s had hated the other man.
James Maynard had been Thad Mayes’s deputy for several years when Thad had held the sheriff’s office. The two men had made it a point to harass Calvin as often as possible. They considered it a game, a way to feel superior. Thad hadn’t always run his office with any sense of justice. Unlike Zeke, he had seen it as a means to power, a way to keep others beneath him, and a way to ensure that he was accepted in the upper-class level of the county at the time.
Thad’s dreams hadn’t been Zeke’s, but his father had drawn him into the dark underbelly of that life anyway. He wasn’t the county’s sheriff; he’d been Dayle Mackay’s sheriff, and what Dayle wanted, Dayle got. When Dayle had ordered Thad to prove Zeke’s loyalty to the League, Thad had done it in a way that had destroyed the boy Zeke had once been.
Blood stained his hands. It wasn’t innocent blood, but it was still murder. It was still a nightmare for the fourteen-year-old child he had been at the time. And it still held the potential to destroy him.
It had left a legacy that Zeke was still sometimes forced to fight. Through those years, Gene had always been a phone call away. A friend that knew the darkness and shared it with Zeke. For a while, Zeke had been certain that Gene had gotten out of the League. Recently though, Zeke had been forced to wonder if that were indeed true.
There were times Zeke wondered if Gene would ever be fully out from under his father’s thumb. There had been a time when Zeke had thought Gene was his own man; now, he wasn’t so sure of it.
Thoughts of Gene brought Jonesy to mind. Danny Jones was another wild card, and one who had been a part of Thad Mayes’s inner group of friends at one time. Danny “Jonesy” Jones had slipped out of that group when he had defended Calvin Walker against Thad Mayes and James Maynard. That had finished Jonesy’s friendship with Zeke’s and Gene’s fathers.
That information had come through the investigation the previous year. It was in the files his contact in Washington had finally gotten for him. Jonesy had once been rumored to be in the selection process for the League when he had learned what it was and how it would affect his friendships and his life. He’d chosen the friendships and had been targeted by Thad several times because of it.
It wasn’t surprising that when Rogue had found herself in trouble after arriving in Somerset, Jonesy had stepped in. And now that Rogue was involved with Zeke, Jonesy felt threatened, both personally and for Rogue. That didn’t excuse his treatment of her, and Zeke would never forget how Jonesy had bruised Rogue’s delicate arms. He didn’t trust the other man; there was something about his temper that bothered Zeke. It wasn’t just anger that drove Jonesy. There was something more. Something that had Zeke’s nerves on edge.
He pushed those thoughts to the back of his mind to consider later as he pulled into Teddy Winfred’s driveway.
The white single-wide mobile home sat peacefully within a small clearing surrounded by oak, pine, and dogwood trees. The yard was neatly cut, and old Teddy’s late-model Ford pickup was parked next to the mobile home.
Zeke parked the Tahoe, turned off the ignition, then moved from the truck and strode up the graveled driveway to the front door.
The door opened as he stepped onto the faded porch, and a grizzled Teddy Winfred met him with a wide smile on his wrinkled face. Teddy still possessed most of his natural teeth and didn’t mind bragging on them with his wide smiles.
“Teddy.” Zeke shook his hand. “Kendal said you called and asked me to drop by.”
“Come in. Come in.” Teddy’s smile flashed again as his faded hazel eyes sparkled with humor as he led the way into the scrupulously neat little home.
A threadbare couch and recliner sat in the living room, facing a wide-screen television. Zeke knew Teddy’s sons, one a minister in the county, the other a store owner, made certain their father was well taken care of. It was one of their biggest gripes that their father refused to give up his independence and move in with one of them.
“How are you doing, Teddy?” Zeke removed his hat as he took the seat Teddy waved to.
“I’m doing good, Zeke. Real good.” Teddy nodded his bald head before wiping a hand over it. “I heard about Callie, how she died and all. I got to thinking about those grandsons of hers and them dying. There’s word going around, you know, that they were murdered. That concerned me some.”
Zeke sat forward in the chair and watched the old man.
“Why did that concern you, Teddy?”
“Well, Zeke.” He rubbed his gnarled hands together before clasping them slowly. “Callie called me that morning. The morning she drowned.” His hazel eyes darkened with sadness. “She said she thought her grandsons had been murdered because of some girl they were seeing. She asked me if I knew who it was.”
“Why would you know who it was, Teddy?” Zeke asked.
Teddy sighed. “I always know when folks come and go up this road. And Joe and Jaime, they did a lot of fishing here behind the house in the creek. Sometimes, they’d be drinking and talking and their voices carried real good here.”
Zeke nodded encouragingly. “Did you hear something before they died?”
“Well, see, that’s the problem.” Teddy scratched his head thoughtfully. “I heard them the night before they were killed. They were drunk as skunks out back, laughing and cutting up. I opened the back door so I could hear better.” He grinned unapologetically.
“Old folks like to live vicariously through young, dumb kids like that, you know.”
“I can imagine, Teddy.” Zeke chuckled. “What did you hear Joe and Jaime talking about?”
“Well, they were talking about a girl. Joe said he was getting serious about her, and Jaime laughed, said if Joe was serious, then he would get serious, too.” Teddy shook his head. “Those two got into some wild games with the girls, you know?”
“I know.” Zeke nodded again.
Teddy shook his head and breathed out roughly. “I told Callie what I’d heard and she said she was going to call you. But when I got hold of her granddaughter the other day, she said she thought maybe Callie hadn’t had a chance to talk to you.”
“Callie didn’t have time to talk to me, Teddy,” he affirmed. “I wasn’t aware she was trying to contact me until after her death.”
Teddy’s eyes glittered with moisture then. “She was killed, wasn’t she, Sheriff? Because she was trying to figure out who killed those grandsons of hers.”
“I don’t know, Teddy. Until I find out who the boys were seeing and if she had anything to do with it, then I can’t say,” Zeke stated.
Teddy breathed out slowly before rubbing the side of his wrinkled face.
“What else did you hear the boys say that night, Teddy?” Zeke asked.
&nb
sp; “Just between me and you, Zeke?” Teddy asked. “Callie was going to talk to you and she ended up drowning in her bathtub. I don’t want to drown in my bathtub.”
“I can understand that, Teddy.” He nodded. “This stays just between the two of us.”
Teddy nodded again. “I didn’t hear much, and that was what I told Callie. They were talking about being serious about this girl, and Joe said they’d have to be real careful for a while, because her daddy would kill them if he found out. They seemed to talk like they might be a little worried about that. Then Jaime said he had a way to take care of it. That he knew how to keep her daddy quiet. He told Joe he had information, that he knew that her daddy was a part of those men they were looking for last summer and that her daddy wouldn’t want anyone to know just how deep he was in that group. Now, I took it at first as just talk; you know how young boys get, and Joe and Jaime could be a little paranoid sometimes about stuff. But when I told Callie what was said, she went real quiet for a long time. And she says, ‘That was what I was afraid of, Teddy. That was what I was afraid of.’ And she hung the phone up then. Next I heard, she was dead.”
The girl’s father was a part of what happened last summer. Joe and Jaime had given the Mackay cousins and DHS information then that led to uncovering the identities of several citizens involved in the Freedom League.
“That’s all she said? She didn’t give you a name, Teddy?”
Teddy shook his head. “She didn’t say a name, Zeke. She hung up and that was the last time I talked to her.”
Zeke stared back at Teddy thoughtfully.
“And you think Callie figured out who it was from that information?” he asked.
Teddy sighed. “I just know what she said and how she said it. And I knew Callie. She knew something. And I think that something got her killed.”
Zeke was pretty damned certain it had. He considered the information Teddy had given him. There wasn’t a name to go on, but there was definitely information here that Timothy Cranston needed to know.
The suspended Homeland Security special agent could have information there that Zeke could use. Zeke knew there were files that the DHS agent had on suspected homeland terrorists, though Zeke hadn’t been given the privilege of going through those files.