“Actually, we’re pretty close by,” Sunny told him. “Tonight was the memorial for Martin Rigsdale, and Dad felt we should go.” She glanced over at Mike. “Would you mind a trip to the police station?”
“As long as I’m not in custody, okay,” Mike replied, a twinkle in his eyes.
“Okay. We’re heading there now,” Sunny said to Will.
They got in the Wrangler and headed for the municipal complex.
“I don’t know how long this may take,” she warned Mike.
“It’s not as though I have anything pressing tomorrow morning,” he said. “You’ll have to worry about getting to work.”
As it turned out, neither of them needed to worry.
Sunny brought her Jeep up to the porch outside the station entrance just in time to see Tobe Phillips and Jane emerge from the building, laughing and smiling.
Behind them, she could see a glowering Detective Mark Trumbull standing at the glass panel.
Sunny shook her head.
He’s just not seeing things he likes through that door.
Sunny opened the
door of her SUV and got out. “Are you guys all right?” She honestly wondered if Jane and Tobe might not have been drinking, they were so giddy.
“We’re fine.” Jane got her laughter under control, but she still smiled at Sunny. “They came in towards the end of office hours, Fitch and one of the sheriff’s men. Rita was kind of hysterical—” Jane glanced at Tobe. “Or was that me? Anyway, Rita knew to call Tobe, and he was here waiting for me. Damn good thing, too, because without him I’d probably have said something stupid and be sitting in a cell by now.”
She lowered her voice, leaning toward Sunny. “I have to thank Will for suggesting Tobe. He was really great in there.”
Then Tobe took up the story. “I think they honestly expected to close the case tonight.” He wasn’t loud, but his face shone like a member of the winning team being interviewed in the locker room after the big game.
“They weren’t at all prepared when I brought up the connection between Martin and Christine Venables, and I think the political side of it really knocked them for a loop. They’ll have to do a bit of homework before they even start thinking of questioning Jane again. Thanks, Sunny.”
Mike opened his window and leaned out. “I guess I should say congratulations,” he said. “You don’t usually see people coming out of a police station looking so jolly. What had you laughing like that?”
“Hi, Mr. Coolidge.” Jane took a moment to introduce Tobe. “It’s nothing, really. I was just so sure when they took me in here that I wouldn’t be coming out. And then, as we were walking away, I began to tremble. I guess Tobe must have realized it. He took my arm and mentioned something silly from school.” A giggle escaped her at the memory. “It’s something I probably hadn’t thought about in twenty years. Next thing I know, I’m laughing, and so is he.”
“I guess that’s a good thing to get your spirits up,” Sunny said. “But did you realize that Detective Trumbull was on the other side of that glass door watching you?”
Hearing that sobered Jane up pretty quickly. She shot a glance at the door, but the space was empty now.
“Maybe that wasn’t such a good thing,” she said quietly. “I wouldn’t want him to think we were laughing at him.”
Tobe got a bit more serious, too. “Well, I don’t think it’s a good idea to go back inside and try to tell him,” He sent a considering gaze over Sunny and her dad. “I’m pretty impressed that you two showed up so quickly. Did Rita call you also?”
“Oh, Kittery Harbor has the fastest gossip service on the whole East Coast,” Sunny assured him, without giving her source. “That’s lucky. Also it’s lucky that we happened to be nearby. If we’d been a little longer hearing about Jane, you’d have gotten her out before we even arrived here.”
Jane, in the meantime, had finally taken in the way they were dressed. “You were at the memorial.”
“Briefly,” Sunny said. “Dad thought that making an appearance was the right thing to do. We were just on the way out when we got the call.”
“What memorial?” Tobe asked.
Jane explained about allowing Dawn to run a service for Martin.
“You didn’t do her any favor with that,” Sunny told her. “Martin’s snooty clients, or associates—I don’t know if you’d really call them friends—were treating her like one of the servants.”
“I didn’t twist her arm,” Jane said. “She wanted to do it.”
“Looks to me as if she was regretting that.” Sunny gave Jane a sidewise look. “Especially when Christine Venables showed up. A little bit of tension in the air.”
“Really?” Tobe spoke up. “Christine Venables is at this memorial?”
Jane shot him a look. “Before you ask, I don’t want to go there, even if I am on this side of the river.”
Tobe shook his head. “The thought never crossed my mind. I think you should go home.”
“We could give you a lift,” Mike offered.
At the same time, Tobe said, “I’ve got my car here.”
Jane had the grace to look embarrassed. “I don’t want to put you out.”
“It’s no problem, really.” Tobe smiled.
“And I suppose you guys have legal things to discuss,” Sunny added, thinking,
Sheesh, it’s like high school all over again. All the guys want to go with Jane.
Tobe led Jane off to his Lexus, and Sunny got back behind the wheel of her Jeep. “Okay, Dad,” she said, pulling on her seat belt. “Let’s get this show on the road.”
“Are you going to call Will and let him know how things turned out?” Mike asked.
“Yes,” she replied. “When we get home. I don’t like the idea of yakking on the phone while I’m trying to drive.”
Tobe and Jane pulled out of the parking lot ahead of them, and Sunny didn’t see the dark blue Lexus on her way home. The drive was uneventful. They arrived in time for Mike to catch his nine o’clock shows. Both of them changed out of their good clothes. Sunny pulled on a set of old sweats and went up the stairs to her room and the phone.
When she got Will, he already knew what had happened at the station. “So Phillips did a good job of getting Jane out, but Trumbull is furious. Apparently, they were laughing their heads off at him as they left.”
Who is he tapped into,
Sunny wondered,
the Mrs. Martinson of the police force?
“That’s not quite true,” she told Will. “Jane was wound pretty tightly after being hauled down to the station and questioned again. Tobe tried to loosen her up by reminding her of something silly that happened back in school. She sort of overreacted, and so did he.”
“And so has Trumbull,” Will said grimly. “He’s riding everybody to eliminate this Venables woman as a suspect so he can go back to concentrating on Jane.”
“Okay, not the best result, but that means he’ll be concentrating on somebody besides Jane—at least for a little while.”
“How was Jane?” Will’s voice got a little awkward as he asked.
“After she stopped laughing, she seemed like her usual self,” Sunny reported. “She declined to go to Martin’s memorial service, even though she wasn’t all that far away. And then she turned down my dad’s offer of a lift to go home in Tobe’s Lexus.”
“Did she?” Will was a good cop who didn’t give much away. But Sunny was willing to bet right now that he was wondering if he’d created a monster.
*
Shadow slammed into
the window, bouncing off painfully and falling to the floor below. He tried to shake the pain out of his shoulder and grimly trotted to a new angle, running, leaping, slamming into the glass, and rebounding again. The problem was there was no place level with the window, no place that allowed him any chance at a running start.
He sighed and sprang to the windowsill. Even if he could run straight at the glass, he wasn’t sure he could break it. Certainly, it had held up against his best efforts so far.
Shadow leaned down to lick at his shoulder. But that wouldn’t make the dull ache go away. He tried to distract himself by taking in the view. Outside, a big, snow-covered lawn stretched to a line of trees far away. Shadow pressed a paw against the glass, feeling the chill from outside work its way into the pads of his foot. It must be freezing out there for that much cold to come through the window.
But being out there would still be better than staying trapped in this place,
he thought.
The rattle of a key outside the door stirred him to action. He dropped to the floor and scurried to the cavelike bed against the wall.
Shadow hunkered down in the semidarkness, trusting in the color of his fur for concealment. He lay quietly as the One Who Reeks came in, quickly closing the door behind her with a heel. Again, she carried food and water in her hands. She peered around, trying to find him.
It would have been easy to leap out of hiding and frighten her. But it would be useless. As long as the door to the room remained closed, Shadow knew he had no escape.
The One Who Reeks came closer, filling the bowls against the wall. Tensed in the darkness of his artificial cave, Shadow held his breath as waves of scent poured off her. He wanted to make a noise of protest, but that would involve inhaling. He didn’t want a lungful of that stink.
Having arranged the food and water, the human retreated to the chair. Even though he’d slashed at it with his claws, it was still sturdy enough to sit on.
The One Who Reeks sat quietly, glancing in various directions. But Shadow saw that sooner or later, her eyes would flick over to the opening to this bed.
Of course,
he thought,
there are no other places in here to hide.
The female two-legs rocked almost imperceptibly in her seat, waiting for Shadow to show himself. Grimly, he kept his place, motionless, watching her. It wasn’t easy. Under the stink she gave off, he could catch the whiff of food. That was torture, to have food in his nostrils and none in his belly, but he refused to follow the temptation out into the open.
Then came other torments. His stomach might be empty but other parts of him were getting full. He had to use the litter box—and soon. Otherwise, he risked fouling this pleasant nest, the one Good Thing in this awful place.
The urge became painful, but still he held his place. He didn’t know how long the One Who Reeks sat there, trying to force him into the first move.
At last, though, she gave up. The human rose and went to the door. For a wild moment, Shadow considered leaping after her, running for the door as she opened it. But the long inactivity had sapped the strength of his muscles. He’d probably fall over his own paws—and worse, considering his overfull condition, mess himself.
So he forced himself to stay motionless while the One Who Reeks opened the door and closed it behind herself. Then, ever so carefully, he climbed out of the bed and went to the litter box. And then, when he was comfortable again, he went for a drink of water and some food.
In spite of his hunger, Shadow didn’t eat greedily. He checked the impulse, taking small bites. Then he went back to the bed. He still hated this place, but at least there was food.
*
Sunny shut the
kitchen door. The morning sun was bright but treacherously misleading. Not only was the air cold, but chilly blasts of wind made it feel worse.
I only hope Shadow is someplace safely indoors,
she thought.
He picked a really awful time to go a-wandering.
Ice patches had reappeared in the roads, messing up traffic. But Sunny managed to get in at a reasonable hour and started work.
She’d just about cleared her desk of the day’s major tasks when Ollie Barnstable came in. He was more of a mess than usual, wearing a leather trench coat that he seemed to believe gave him a secret agent–style image. Instead, it made him look more like an overstuffed piece of furniture. He couldn’t get the thing buttoned across his widening middle, which meant he must be freezing in this weather. That, and the flight up from New York, made his always uncertain temper a little worse than usual.
He came in waving a fluorescent orange poster. “This is your cat, isn’t it?”
Sunny gave him a smile. “Don’t tell me you found him!”
Ollie glowered at her. “Don’t tell me you used office equipment to make these.”
She did her best to look innocent. “Well, Ollie, we don’t have any paper like that around here, do we?”
“Guess not.” Still looking suspicious, he loosened the belt that barely managed to keep his coat closed and dropped into the chair opposite Sunny’s desk. “Sorry about your cat. You weren’t out traipsing around looking for him during office hours, were you?” That was the important point for him.
For a second, Sunny thought about referring Ollie to Tobe Phillips to improve his cross-examination technique. But she decided no good could come of being snarky. Instead, she contented herself with a simple, “No. But a lot of folks were very helpful, putting up the notices around town.”
He nodded absently, not really paying attention. “And nothing else interesting happened while I was gone?”
“Just business as usual,” Sunny told him. “How was your trip?”
“A waste of goddamn time,” Ollie growled. “This guy kept stringing me along, keeping me in New York, because his buddy was busy scaring up investors down in Miami. Supposedly, this clown had a million-dollar idea. They’d picked up this resort down in the islands—a place that went bust—and planned to renovate it for a whole new market. I wasted nearly a week trying to figure out what it would be. Gays? Rehab junkies? Religious nuts? Sex freaks? So when this guy comes to show me his plans, it turns out to be a concierge hotel for pets! What a stupid idea! Who the hell cares that much about pets?”
He glanced down at the Day-Glo flyer in his hand, and his usually pink face turned almost a radioactive red. “Uh, not to say that people don’t care about their pets. I mean—”
Sunny decided to let him off the hook. “I know what you mean, Ollie.”
As she spoke, the office door opened. In came a very unhappy-looking Ben Semple, accompanied by Detective Fitch.
“The sheriff sent me over,” Ben said, his words and expression showing that he didn’t want Sunny thinking this was his idea. “I believe you know Detective Fitch of the Portsmouth police.”
Fitch’s thin face looked more like a ferret’s than ever—a ferret about to make a snack out of a baby mouse. But his voice was bland and official. “Ms. Coolidge, I’m asking you to accompany me down to the station. We have some additional questions to ask you about the murder of Martin Rigsdale.”
Ollie’s eyes went from the uniformed cop, to the detective, to Sunny. “Oh, yeah,” he muttered. “Business as usual.”