Falling Hard and Fast (20 page)

She glanced up, interested, and turned her head to where the officer was sitting alone. “So that's your main opposition in the parish sharpshooting contest.” She faced Cage again. “I'm not surprised you beat him. He's the kind of
man to have technique down pat, but his kind lacks imagination.”

His brows climbed. “You think imagination is important when shooting at targets?”

She sat back as Becky slid her soup and a steaming “special” plate on the table before them. “I figure someone who knows how to think outside the lines might have an edge.”

Tucking her spoon into her bowl, she began to eat. He was slower to follow suit. She might like to keep herself held apart from the rest of the world, but as an observer she'd be perfectly suited for police work. She was a fair judge of character. He supposed that came in handy for a writer.

“Sheriff!”

He was no more than a third of the way through with his dinner when Ethel came to the booth to confront him, arms folded across her thin chest.

“I sure am enjoying your special plate today, Ethel.”

The flattery had no visible effect on her. “You need to see to that Billy McIntire again. Folks are saying he's having one of his spells.”

Giving an inward sigh, he set down his silverware. “Saw him just last week, Ethel. He seemed fine at the time.”

She glared at him, as if he'd just called her a liar. “My grandsons were messing in the woods near his place, and he almost scared them to death! They come up on him and he was acting right strange, moaning and crying out at nothing. Someone needs to make sure he's all right.”

There was no doubt from her tone who she thought that someone should be. “I'll do that, Ethel. But you tell those grandsons of yours to stay out of the woods until Donny Ray is apprehended. I don't know that he'd harm them, but it wouldn't be wise to test it.”

A startled expression came over her face. “I'll be sure to mention that to their mother. That girl can't be thinking straight, letting them kids run wild.” She turned half away, then back again, as if a thought had struck her. “You might
have a talk with the LaCostes, too. Their dog's been loose again, upsetting my chickens something fierce.”

To his credit, Cage's smile never faltered. “I'll check into it, Ethel.”

“See that you do.” She stomped back in the direction of the kitchen.

His attention shifted to Zoey. “You've just witnessed one of the more glamorous aspects of law enforcement.”

She smiled with a sympathy she wouldn't put into words. “Sounds like you're going to have your hands full. Who's this McIntire person Ethel was referring to?”

He went back to eating. “Just a poor lonely fella who never got over Vietnam. You must have seen him. He mowed your lawn.”

Zoey's spoon froze halfway to her mouth. Aware that he was watching her curiously, she brought it to her lips, swallowed, then set the spoon back in the bowl. “I can see how he might scare a couple of kids. I was a bit taken aback by him, myself.”

“He did something to frighten you?”

There was no need, she figured, to go into details that would just be embarrassing—to her. She shook her head. “Not really. I didn't realize he was there, and I looked up, saw him standing before the kitchen window. I was startled for a moment.”

“Billy wouldn't hurt anyone, but folks around here get spooked by him sometimes. Ethel's right. I'll mosey out later and see how he's doing.” A ghost of a smile lurked on his lips. “I owe him one, anyhow, since he gave me Oxy.” He reached across the table, picked up her hand. “Now that lunch is out of the way, I have something important I've been meaning to ask you.”

Her mouth went dry, as much from the thumb he sent skimming over her knuckles as from the intent light in his eyes. “What is it?”

“What are you doing for dinner?”

The breath that had been stopped up in her lungs slowly
released. “I'm letting you take me out. If you can fit me into your schedule after dealing with the LaCostes' dog, that is.”

His smile was slow and wide and devastating. “The trick to being sheriff, sugar, is knowing when to delegate.”

 

The McIntire place looked deserted. Cage walked up the new porch steps and peered in the screen door. He rapped against the doorjamb with his knuckle. “Billy?”

When there was no answer to his second knock, he opened the door and stepped inside. “Anybody home?” There wasn't a sound in the gloomy cabin. As he prepared to leave, his gaze landed on an object lying upon the table.

Curious, he picked it up, turned it over in his hands—a woman's barrette, delicately fashioned from wood and beads. Although it looked old, it had been cared for. Its surface was gleaming.

A footstep sounded outside and Cage looked up. Billy stared at him through the screen. “Whatcha need, Sheriff?”

Cage set the barrette down and joined the other man on the porch. “I was just looking for you, Billy.” He nodded toward Lucy, the hunting dog, and the two remaining pups he'd kept. “Been in the woods?”

“Checked my traps.” He whistled, and the dogs galloped over, nuzzled the hand he held out.

“Actually, I came out to see how you were doing.” Cage squatted down and reached over to ruffle one pup's fur. “Heard you might be having a bad spell.” His gaze lifted, fastened on Billy's face.

The other man hunched his shoulders, wouldn't meet his eyes. “Nothing new. Some trouble sleeping, is all.”

Cage rose, nodded. “I know what you mean. Things can work on a man's mind in the middle of the night, can't they?” Silent for a moment, both men looked into the distance, considering specters that picked the midnight hours to haunt.

“Well, I'll be getting back to town.” His tone sober, he
added, “I guess you know to get hold of me if you need anything.”

The big man's hands clenched, then relaxed. “I guess I do.”

Cage headed toward the steps, then paused. Turning back he said, “When I was looking for you, I couldn't help but notice that piece on the table in there. The barrette. Did you find it in the woods?”

Billy swung his head from side to side. “That was my mama's. She sure did set store by it. I try to keep it looking nice, like. The way it was when she was alive.”

“You didn't happen to find a locket when you were mowing Miss Prescott's lawn, did you? A real pretty thing, all gold and fancy?” He waited for the man to shake his head, then continued down the steps. “Just thought I'd ask. You be sure and let me know if you need anything, you hear?”

Billy squinted into the sun as he watched the sheriff turn his car around in the narrow lane. He wished he'd had the courage to confess to the man; wished he could clear his conscience of at least one of the ghosts that lingered. A pup jumped up, begging for attention, and Billy reached down to lift it into his arms.

No one would believe him if he tried to explain—not even Gauthier. More likely than not, he'd be packed off to one of those hospitals again. His hands tightened around the pup convulsively. He was never going back to those small dark rooms, never going back to those doctors that poked and prodded at a man's mind until he couldn't tell the waking nightmares from the ones in his sleep.

He wasn't going to chance that again. Not ever.

 

Cage barricaded himself in his office and attempted to concentrate. It seemed as if there were always a million little details to catch up on anytime he stepped out of the office for a bit. And before he left the room again, he was determined to find whatever it was in that pile of computer print
outs that still niggled at him with all the worry of a splinter under the skin.

Leaning back in his desk chair, he carefully began going through the information again. An hour later, his frustration was mounting.

Pushing away from the desk, he paced the room. He was spinning his wheels. He knew that, just as surely as he knew there was something—
some
thing—in those printouts that he wasn't catching. He rubbed his hands over his face. The small amount of sleep he'd been getting lately probably wasn't really conducive to conducting top-notch police work. All that had been happening recently—Stacy in the hospital and the hunt for Donny Ray—on top of their other ongoing investigations should be enough to exhaust him. But it wasn't exhaustion he thought of at the end of the day. It wasn't sleep he craved as twilight fell. No, that distinction belonged to Zoey Prescott.

She was just as much an addiction as his favored cigars that he limited so ruthlessly, just as much a need in the system, a fever in the blood. But unlike the tobacco, there didn't seem to be any way to restrict his craving for her. He no longer had the desire to try.

And she was going to be in his life for the long term. A rush of fierce satisfaction coursed through him at the certainty. He just needed to be patient, let her come to the realization in her own time, in her own way; helped along—subtly, of course—by him.

Just thinking of her brought a smile to his lips, one that quickly faded. Because he remembered something she'd said in the diner; something about thinking outside the lines. He looked at the sheaf of papers reflectively. Maybe that was his problem here. Maybe he'd get further if he stopped analyzing the crimes, and started focusing on the big picture.

Filled with a rush of renewed interest, he headed back to his chair to start all over again. He'd been concentrating on the MOs, and no particular pattern had emerged. It was time to readjust his thinking; to look for something, no matter
how insignificant, that was reminiscent of Janice Reilly's murder.

He found it a half hour later—a detail slight enough to make him question its importance. Kathryn Barker, murdered six years earlier, had been shot, execution-style, in the back of the head. Her body had been found in her motel room with no other wounds except her lacerated knees and legs. The bits of glass embedded in her skin had matched the shards found on the floor of the bathroom, and were determined to have come from the bottles of the same wine she'd shared with her killer.

They hadn't found glass in Janice Reilly's knees and shins, he remembered grimly, but slivers from redwood chips. Quickly he skimmed through the rest of the reports, but could find no others that made a reference to similar injuries. He made a list of the investigating officers in each of the cases before him and reached for the phone.

As he began dialing it occurred to him, with a sense of irony, that one of the most puzzling details about Janice Reilly's murder just might lead to its solution.

 

The knock on the door rattled the glass in it, before the knob turned and it was pushed open. Cage looked up from the notes he was taking and continued listening to the Shreveport detective he had on the phone.

“Thanks a lot. I'm not sure where I'm going yet with this information, but I have a feeling it's gonna help. Yeah, I'll be sure to do that.” He replaced the receiver and looked at his visitor quizzically. “Shouldn't you be off duty, DuPrey?”

“Yes, sir, but I thought you should be brought up-to-date first.”

Releasing a breath, Cage twirled his chair around to face the younger man. It was already after six. The rest of the phone calls would have to wait until tomorrow. “You made the trip out to the LaCostes'?”

“Yessir.” The younger man's face bore a sheen of per
spiration, silent testimony to the fact that he'd been out in the heat, which had returned to brutal after the recent rain. “They promised to tie up their dog, but I can't see that it'll do much good, seein' as how he'll just chew through the rope again. I advised them to get themselves a stout length of chain, and they agreed to think about that.”

“Well, I appreciate the update.” Dismissively, Cage returned his attention to his files. Moments passed, and the deputy remained where he was.

With resignation in his voice, Cage inquired, “Was there anything else, Roland?”

“Fact is, sir, I think there might be.”

Silence stretched. “Well?”

DuPrey's throat worked, and he wiped his palms along the sides of his uniform pants. He was the picture of a man screwing up his courage.

The chair squeaked as Cage settled back in it once again. Experience had taught him that this wouldn't be a quick process, and prompting would only slow the man further.

“Do you recall my suspicions about those strangers who appeared in town last summer?”

The memory wasn't a particularly pleasant one. “The ones you were convinced were here to case the bank? I seem to recollect it. Why?”

“It turned out they were only carnival workers, staying here while they worked the parish fair.” The dull flush of color on the man's cheeks could have been caused by remembered embarrassment. It certainly should have been. It had only been quick thinking and fast talking that had saved them from a false arrest charge. That, and a case of Cage's finest Scotch.

Perhaps realizing that dwelling on the memory wasn't in his best interests, Roland hurried on. “Well, I learned my lesson that time, Sheriff. I surely did. That's why I came to tell you first, this time.”

There was a dull throb starting in the center of his forehead. Rubbing at it, Cage asked, “Tell me what, exactly?”

“About the newcomers to town, sir. Two men, staying at the motel out on Route 20. Fairly tough-looking individuals, I've heard tell, and I got to thinking, the parish fair ain't for another month yet. You don't suppose they'd send workers this early to set up, do you?”

It was surely a phenomenon peculiar to small towns that every person passing through was subjected to the most avid interest, if not downright suspicion. Not for the first time, Cage reflected on just what Zoey had gone through when she'd first come to Charity.

Choosing his words carefully, he said, “Well, I surely do appreciate the way you stay so observant, Roland.” Because the stress of the day seemed to call for it, Cage took out the lone cigar he'd tucked into his pocket that morning and thought about lighting it.