Death and Relaxation (Ordinary Magic #1)(88)

Out here in the light of day, it seemed like a far-fetched idea. But then, this was Ordinary. Far-fetched was sort of our middle name.

“Dammit.” I dug a clean plastic sandwich bag out of my glove box and got out of the Jeep. I walked to the neighbor’s house, scanning the ground. The gravel didn’t seem disturbed. The bushes weren’t broken. I paced a grid of the cul-de-sac, slowly covering the area. Any evidence from the shooting would have been found by Myra, Jean, and the crime scene techs.

The road was churned from the vehicles that had come and gone since I’d been shot, obscuring tire tracks and footprints.

Maybe Dan did it. Maybe he was angry enough about not winning the contest that he shot me.

The wind stirred and a flash of color under the glossy leaves of a salal bush caught my eye. I bent, groaned at the pressure in my side, and picked up the item with the baggy.

It was a thin purple feather. Weird.

I dropped the feather into the bag and tucked it in my coat. I scanned the area one more time, but didn’t find anything else. Time to go talk to Dan.

Traffic was stop and go all the way down Highway 101, the frequent pedestrian crossings adding to the mess. Businesses lining the street had put goods on the sidewalk with big “sale” signs to lure shoppers. It was a town-wide festival and rummage sale.

My heart lurched. Was that Ryder’s truck turning out of traffic and down a side road? The light changed before I could get a better look, but my heart still raced.

Ryder Bailey was the last thing I wanted to deal with today, or ever. My plan was to ignore our night together, ignore our friendship, and ignore he existed until it no longer hurt to think about him.

You dumped me while I was recovering from a gunshot wound. Jerk.

What was it with men dumping me when I was at my lowest?

I turned into the station and strode to the door. The sign on the door said: Closed. We kept the office locked up on festival days, since we usually pulled double shifts with crowd control. I keyed in the code and flipped on the office lights. The door snicked shut behind me. I didn’t lock it. I was in. If someone came by looking for the police, I’d be here.

But first, Dan.

I walked down the other hallway and keyed in the code for that locked door, which opened into our two-cell holding area.

Dan sat on the edge of a small cot behind bars, his arms resting on his legs, his head hanging, fingers worrying at a hangnail. He was muttering quietly to himself—Pearl was right, he really did talk a lot—but stopped when he heard the door open.

“Delaney!” He jumped up to his feet and grabbed the bars.

My hand shot instinctively down to where my gun would be if I were carrying.

Maybe Pearl was right. I wasn’t steady yet, still too jumpy from the last few days. I took a deep breath and tucked my hand into my pocket to hide how much it was shaking.

“Hey, Dan.” I leaned against the wall farthest from him, my other arm across my ribs protectively. “We need to talk.”

“I’m so sorry, Delaney,” he blurted. “I didn’t know! I don’t know how the bullets got there. I just wanted to scare you. That’s all. I didn’t know. I didn’t know.”

He was babbling. I watched him plead with me. He might be faking it, his panic nothing more than realization that he had made a mistake and he was going to pay for it for a very long time.

I didn’t want to believe him. Dan Perkin was a pain in the neck on pretty much all levels. He had no real friends in town, and I didn’t think anyone would feel the least bit of remorse if he were locked up for life.

But my job was to look at the facts objectively.

And I was damn good at my job.

“I need you to calm down,” I said in the tone of voice I used when trying to talk Kressler and Wallery out of their garbage barrel battle. “Can you do that for me?”

He scowled like he was about to go off on a rant, but then he looked me up and down and slumped, pressing his forehead against the bars.

“Yeah,” he said. “I can be calm. Am I gonna need my lawyer here? Because I think she’s running the tie-dye booth.”

“No, you won’t need your lawyer. I’m not trying to trap you. I just want to ask you a couple things.”

He nodded, his forehead rubbing on the bar.

“Did you buy dynamite and blow up your garden?”

“I…” He licked his lips, his gaze skittering. “Yes,” he whispered.

“Were you having thoughts about blowing up Chris’s beer vats?”

He nodded.

Okay, two for two. Pearl had been right.

“Did you try to blow up Chris’s beer vats?”

He shook his head, miserable, though I didn’t know if it was because he hadn’t had a chance to blow up the beer or because I’d asked him about it.

“Did you kill Heim?”

He jerked away from the bars. “What? No! Why would I do that?”

“He was a judge in the contest, Dan.”

“I’d never!” he sputtered. “Never! Kill someone? I wouldn’t. I can’t believe you would accuse me.”

“You pointed a gun at me, Dan,” I said quietly. “And you pulled the trigger.”

“I…I didn’t know it was loaded. I don’t know how that happened, Delaney. You have to believe me. I didn’t load that gun.”