Moonshine Kiss (Bootleg Springs Book 3)

by Lucy Score

  “I’m sorry, Bowie,” I said simply. I was.

  “You come from good people. I come from misery, poverty, alcoholism. You don’t like being judged for being your father’s daughter? Imagine what it’s like for me.”

  I shook my head. I was worried about living up to my dad. Bowie was worried about living down to his.

  “Those answers you’re trying so hard to find?” he said quietly. “They will ruin someone’s life. Maybe my own. But you’ll have what you were looking for then.”

  “Bowie, you aren’t asking me to stop investigating a case because it involves your family, are you?” I almost wanted him to say yes. Because if he was making me choose between him and my job then he was the bad guy. Black and white. Uncomplicated.

  “Of course I’m not,” he said softly. “But you need to understand what you’ve done. You’ve taken that memory I’ve had of my mom and replaced it with something else. In twenty-four hours, you’ve taken a tragic accident that hurt us all and turned it into something even worse. A suicide? A hit-and-run? A tie to Callie Kendall?”

  I felt sick. But stayed silent. Sometimes people needed to get things off their chests without someone else telling them how to feel.

  “You’re pushing so hard to find my father guilty and what happens if he is? Do you think I’m going to be happy to have answers? To know that my father was so much worse than I ever knew? To know that I come from that? Both of them are gone, Cassidy. All I’ve got left are my brothers and sister. And what you’re doing is going to hurt them.”

  “I don’t know what to do,” I said, rubbing my arms against the cold that was blooming around my heart. Bowie was hurting and very politely lashing out. But not sharing my opinion was part and parcel of being a cop. Besides, what the hell good would my opinion be to him now? What if it was wrong, and I gave him false hope?

  “You said your dad had his suspicions about my mother’s accident,” Bowie said suddenly.

  “Yeah.”

  “But he didn’t come running to us about it.”

  “He didn’t have any proof,” I said lamely.

  “And maybe he was more worried about our well-being than a cause of death in an accident report.”

  I swallowed hard.

  “You seek the truth. That’s admirable, Cass. It really is. But sometimes it’s important to balance truth with compassion. Your dad does it every day. He doesn’t just try to solve. He’s there to serve.”

  Emotions were bubbling up in me like a geyser. “I don’t know how to do my job and not hurt you,” I told him, stalking over to the coffeemaker and pouring a mug that I didn’t want. None of this was fair.

  “I don’t know if you can,” he said quietly. “And I can’t ask you to choose.”

  “You can’t give up. You can’t give up on me. On us!” My voice rose.

  He looked down at the floor, hands on his hips. “Look, Cass.”

  “Don’t, Bow. Don’t say it,” I pleaded. It couldn’t end like this.

  He looked at me, his eyes blazing with pain that I’d thoughtlessly caused. “I want to be very clear. This is a fight. Not a break-up. Got it?”

  I felt hot tears welling up and managed a nod. A fight. Not a break-up. I clung to that.

  “Just a fight. But right now, I can’t talk anymore about this.” Bowie’s voice was rough. “And I’m real sorry, but the only examples I have are my parents. So I’m either gonna throw a ton of shit at a wall and drink too much or I’m not going to talk to you for a bit. Okay?”

  I handed him the salt shaker from my table. “Here. Throw it.”

  He set it down carefully.

  Damn it. I would have felt a little better had he hauled off and chucked the squirrel into the wall.

  “I know it seems like I’m asking you to choose between me and your job. And I don’t want you to have to make that choice. I really don’t. But right now, I can’t see a good solution. So I’m gonna go home and I’m gonna think. And you’re gonna stay safe and make good choices.”

  “I’m not one of your students,” I said, nerves making me snap at him.

  “I know that. But I just can’t give you any more right now. So I’m counting on you to take care of yourself for a bit until I can get my head on straight.”

  Damn it all the hell. He was a gentleman even in a fight.

  “Are we going to survive this?” I asked, my voice barely above a whisper.

  He looked down at the floor again. “I don’t know, Cass,” he said finally. “But we will talk. Later.”

  He turned and headed for the back door.

  “You wanted me to share. I’m sharing. Now you’re sorry I shared.”

  The unfairness of it, of him closing the door between us, struck me in the stomach hard enough to knock the wind out of me. I sank down to the floor and gathered George in my lap.

  60

  Cassidy

  Dear Bowie,

  I think we both have some apologizing to do. Now, hear me out before you go and crumple this up and set it on fire and spend the next eight years ignoring me.

  I’m sorry for a lot of things. Mostly, taking you to see your mom’s car and spinning my theories for you. You wanted me to open up more, share more, and I did it, but not in the best way.

  My thirst for answers can block me from seeing the rest of the big picture. I’ve always needed to know the why and the how of things. Flaw or not, it’s served me well in my job. But I’ve never had a relationship to work my career around. You’re my first. Or, you were. Since you’re giving me the silent treatment, I’m not clear on the verb tense.

  I became a cop because of Callie Kendall. Her disappearance still drives me to distraction. What happened? Where did she go? Is she still alive? The idea that we may never know was and still is unacceptable. How else can I pick it apart, put it in a neat little box, and then fit it onto a shelf? I never thought that doing so would hurt you so badly.

  What I’m rambling on about, I guess, is that I shouldn’t have assumed that answers would be as valuable to you as they are to me. I thought if I gave you closure, you could move on.

  As a cop, I’m not supposed to let my opinion factor into how I do my job. But I guess I do every single day in invisible, incremental ways. So I’m sorry that I never told you that I believe your father is innocent. I never thought for a minute that he had anything to do with Callie’s disappearance or murder. He may have had his flaws—his many, many flaws—but he wasn’t a cold-blooded murderer. He also stood up and took responsibility for his mistakes.

  You might also like to know that my father feels the same way. Ask him about the lamppost story…if you’re still speaking to him that is. Even though I kind of hope you’re not because that means you picked him over me again and I’m going to stop thinking about it before I get mad on top of my sad. Anyway, I’m going to Connelly today. I hope you understand. There are families, yours included, that deserve the truth.

  Since this is a note and not face-to-face, I’m comfortable saying you also owe me an apology. You pushed me to share more of my work with you and when I did, you shut me out. I know, I know. I overshared in the most inappropriate and unforgivable way. I let my job stomp all over our relationship that I made you keep secret.

  We need to face facts. We’re both really new at this and we don’t have great guidelines for what a good relationship is. Your parents sucked together. And mine are ridiculously perfect together, except for the fact that my dad can’t string six words together and my mom organizes secret town meetings behind his back to do God knows what.

  My point is, if we’re in this, we need to find our own way. Forget your parents and mine. Forget Connelly and Callie. Please, let’s find a way to make us work.

  Love,

  Cassidy

  P.S. In case you’re never speaking to me again, I didn’t get a chance to tell Jonah, but that Shelby character is a journalist and I think she’s angling to get close to you all through him. Steer clear.

 
; P.P.S. Do you miss me?

  P.P.P.S. It’s almost Christmas so here’s your gift. Spoiler alert: It’s pajamas.

  61

  Cassidy

  “Here.” I dropped the file on the conference table with an audible slap. It was early, and I hadn’t slept. Bowie hadn’t answered any of my texts since last night. So much had happened between us that the idea of going back to pretending he didn’t exist was killing me.

  Connelly looked up, annoyed. “What’s this?”

  “This came from the scanning you assigned to me. Connie Bodine’s accident file, which I’m suggesting you consider reopening.”

  “That so?” he snorted, looking bored.

  “There were no brake marks at the scene. No evidence that she tried to stop before she went through the guardrail. My father wondered if she might have done it on purpose. But this damage is consistent with being hit from behind.” I tapped the picture with my finger.

  “And how do we know that didn’t happen in the ten years since that car was sitting in the junkyard?”

  “Because of the original accident photos,” I said, pulling out the next photo and laying them side-by-side. “Fresh damage. It would explain why she didn’t try to stop. She was pushed. Which is a valid theory based on the reconstruction scenarios I ran since I have so much time on my hands these days.”

  “Deputy, why are you wasting my time with this?”

  “Because when Jonah Bodine, Sr. left town after Callie Kendall disappeared it was in his wife’s Pontiac 6000. This car.” I pulled out a copy of the speeding ticket with the make and model circled. “The car was wrecked and junked less than a year later. It’s still mostly intact in the yard about ten miles outside of town.”

  Connelly paged through the file I’d compiled and then sat back in his chair.

  “I thought we had an understanding regarding the Kendall investigation,” he said, coldly.

  “We did. This was in the course of the administrative duties you assigned me.” You jackass.

  He steepled his fingers and looked like a movie villain. “Deputy Tucker, it’s come to my attention that you disobeyed a direct order.”

  “Which one would that be, sir?” I’d had a long, shitty twenty-four hours and I was just doing my damn job. “I’ve disobeyed plenty recently so you’ll have to be more specific.” God, that felt good.

  “The one where I told you to stay out of the Kendall investigation.”

  “I can’t help if the scanning you assigned me uncovered a connection to your case.”

  “Don’t be cute with me, deputy. You’ve done nothing but flaunt my authority since I arrived.”

  “I’ve done nothing but do my job to the best of my ability,” I countered.

  “You are dangerously disrespectful.”

  “I could say the same about you, sir.”

  “Turn in your badge, deputy. I don’t have a need for you anymore,” he snapped.

  I leaned into my greatest fear. This man who had despised me from the beginning wanted to take the last thing I had left.

  “I know why you feel this way. I know why you don’t trust me and the rest of our department,” I said, seething with rage. His eyes went icy.

  “Your badge, deputy,” he repeated.

  “You’re accusing me of letting my personal feelings get in the way of an investigation when it’s your feelings that are a problem.”

  He slapped a hand down on the table between us. But I cut him off before he could begin a tirade.

  “My research skills aren’t limited to old case files. I know about your cousin,” I told him and watched the anger bubble up inside of him. “I know she went missing when she was twenty. And while you and your family were leading search teams, the police chief was covering it up because his nephew was responsible. I’m sorry for your loss, sir. But you’re making a mistake channeling that rage into this investigation. We aren’t negligent. We aren’t complicit. We take our job of protecting this community seriously.”

  “Your job is to catch criminals and prevent crime, not date suspects’ sons.”

  All the secrecy. All the subterfuge. All for nothing. “I do my job damn well. And I’ll see who I please. In the meantime, maybe you should focus less on my personal life and more on your investigation. Have you even discussed those photos with the Kendalls?” I snapped.

  “That’s none of your concern, since after today you’ll be on the unemployment line!”

  “You want my badge, Connelly? I’ll turn it into my supervisor.” I was dead calm.

  “Get out of this office. I don’t want to see your face in here again, Tucker!” He was shouting now.

  I didn’t take my eyes off him as he raged and I didn’t turn around when the conference room door flew open.

  “Detective Connelly,” my father said, an edge to his voice. “If you have an issue with how I run my department, I suggest you take it up with me.”

  My father, the unflappable Sheriff Tucker, was about two seconds away from screaming bloody murder at Connelly. I could tell by the vein in his forehead that looked in danger of bursting.

  “Your daughter is too busy fraternizing with the Bodines to do her damn job! And you either don’t care or you’re too ignorant to know a conflict of interest when it sits down at your dinner table.”

  “I trust my deputies to make their own personal decisions and do their jobs.”

  I put my hand on my dad’s shoulder. When he looked at me, I shook my head. “Leave it be.”

  I didn’t want or need him to fight this battle for me.

  Walking through the conference room door, I took a hard right into my father’s office. I was done. I was beyond done. I dropped my gun and my badge on his desk, dumped the cruiser keys into the top drawer and grabbed my coat from the rack near the back door.

  “What in the ever-living fuck just happened in there?” Bex asked, pale-faced and big-eyed standing in the doorway of the property room.

  “I resigned,” I said flatly.

  She tugged on her earlobe, nerves radiating off of her. “You did what now?”

  “Apparently I can’t serve the people of Bootleg Springs if I’m in love with one of them.” And apparently I couldn’t be in love with Bowie if I was still digging into his parents. So I had no job and no boyfriend.

  It was all bullshit. My boyfriend was mad at me for doing my job and my job was mad at me for having a boyfriend.

  Well, I’d gone and shown them. Yep. No job. No boyfriend. Fucking great. Oh, Lord. I couldn’t breathe.

  “I’m goin’ in there,” Fanny Sue said, putting her patrol hat on and straightening her clip-on tie.

  I pushed out into the winter day feeling as numb as a block of ice. My uniform rubbed at my skin like I was suddenly allergic to it

  Everywhere I looked, it was business as usual in Bootleg. We had a few tourists in town for cross-country skiing and holiday shopping. The storefronts were busy. Yee Haw Yarn and Coffee was full to bustin’ with coffee seekers and the monthly knit-in.

  Mona Lisa McNugget was struttin’ right on down Main Street holding up both lanes of traffic.

  This was my home. These were my people, my family.

  I wasn’t sure what the emotions were brewing in my chest. I felt lost and lonely.

  62

  Bowie

  I gave the signal, and Scarlett heaved the barn door closed.

  “If I can get y’all’s attention,” I said, standing up on a milk crate at the front of the barn. If we were going to keep doing these meetings we were gonna need a stage or something.

  It was a damn cold night this close to Christmas, but half of Bootleg had shown up. They were huddled up together on the benches trying to keep warm and catch up on all the gossip.

  They were too busy catching up to hear me.

  “Hey!” Gibson stood up. “Everybody shut up!”

  It had the effect of a record scratch, and in seconds everyone was staring at me expectantly. Oh, Lord. Where to begin?


  I brushed my hand over Cass’s note tucked in my pocket and cleared my throat. “I’ve called you all here because we have a problem.”

  A hand raised in the back. “This about you and Cassidy courtin’?”

  “Uh. What?”

  Minnie Fae stood up in the second row in her yellow and orange cat sweater. “That’s old news. Also, this is Fluffins and he’s lookin’ for a home,” she said, holding up a cat that matched her sweater.

  “Y’all better not have called a meetin’ regarding old news!”

  “I’ve known for weeks! Since Thanksgiving at least.”

  “Does Fluffins have all his shots?”

  “How did y’all know?” I asked.

  About a dozen people piped up at the same time.

  “Saw you kissin’ on your back porch when I was walking by at six in the morning.”

  “You two were holding hands under the table at the Christmas Carol Singalong!”

  “There’s security cameras on Mona Lisa’s coop.”

  “Okay. All right.” I held up my hands. “Yes, Cassidy and I are dating.” Or, at least, we had been. We’d both screwed up. Her note yesterday had been dead-on. I’d asked too much of her without proving enough of myself. I’d asked her to step into the gray areas of her job for me without having earned it. Then, when she’d given me what I’d asked for, I turned my back on her. Oh, and then she lost her job over the whole disaster.

  This damn mess was bigger than I could fix alone. And I needed the town’s brain power behind me.

  “What y’all probably don’t know is Cassidy lost her job yesterday,” I started again.

  “Tell us something we don’t know,” Wade Zirkel hollered from the back.

  “Anyone know what she said to that snake in the grass Connelly? I heard he was foamin’ at the mouth when she walked out.”