Her Grave Secrets (Rogue River #3)(7)

“Someone gave him the drug,” Stevie stated. “There’s no way he took it deliberately. My father never drank anything stronger than beer and that drug’s reputation is its fantastic high. He wouldn’t be interested in that. Someone gave it to him to kill him.”

“Now, Stevie, let’s not—”

“Don’t ever ‘Now, Stevie’ me.” She spun around, fire in her eyes. Her gaze so closely resembled Bill’s that Zane caught his breath. “He was murdered. And we’ve wasted over two months of investigation because we made assumptions.”

“We haven’t been wasting time. Not at all. We’ve tried for months to trace the manufacturing site of the C-22. We simply didn’t know that investigation would be related to your father’s death. This has been our department priority since the end of May when Hunter died from the drug.” He wanted to pull her close and comfort her, but she had a “stand back” signal on her forehead. Against every instinct, he stayed put.

She turned away and paced around his desk. “We need to look harder. I could have done more to try to find the source of the C-22. We need to interview Loretta again. Perhaps she’s been holding something back. Since her drug-dealing husband died, maybe she decided she’ll just live like nothing ever happened.”

“Stevie—”

“I’m sure Loretta or her son Russ must know more. Hell, his dad was dealing the C-22. Kids listen and watch their parents when they don’t know it.” She paced another circle, cracking her knuckles and staring at the floor. “Kids always know more than they tell us.”

“Stevie!”

She stopped and looked at Zane. “What?”

“Slow down.” Zane held up his hands. “We’re on top of the investigation. Loretta and Russ have talked to us until they were blue in the face. This report from the medical examiner gives us a new direction to explore, and we’ll do that after we carefully study all the angles.”

Stevie stood frozen, blinking rapidly.

To hell with it.

He strode to her and pulled her roughly into him. She wiggled in his arms. “Hold still,” he ordered. “You just found out your father was murdered. Let me hold you.” He felt her soften as she exhaled and buried her face in his shoulder.

“I don’t know what to think,” she whispered.

“You don’t need to know what to think. This is one hell of a shock. Let’s let it sink in first.”

“Oh, my God. How will I tell my mother?” Her words were muffled in his shirt. “This is going to kill her. I just spent an hour with her talking about Roy’s death. That absolutely tore her up.”

Zane tightened his arms around her. “I think Patsy suspected that Bill was murdered. That’s why she asked me to take another look at it. This isn’t going to be easy for her, but I think she’s better prepared then you were.”

Stevie lifted her head and wiped at her nose. “She already knew Roy had money problems. She and Dad loaned him money last winter.”

“Aw, shit.”

“Exactly. And I thought she was going to fall over when I mentioned all the new equipment in Roy’s shed. She wondered if it doesn’t belong to him.” Stevie sounded hopeful.

Zane doubted it. If Roy had been storing a boat for someone, whoever it was would have come looking for it by now. “I put in requests for his banking and credit card records. We’ll start looking for a money trail.”

“Do you think he had anything to do with my father’s death?” she whispered.

“I don’t know, honey.” Zane squeezed tighter, praying Roy hadn’t hurt Bill. “I don’t know.”





CHAPTER FOUR





Sheila peeked around Zane’s office door and fluttered bright-green eyelids at him. “Seth Harding from Rogue County Sheriff’s Office is here and would like a few minutes of your time.”

“Absolutely.”

She vanished and Zane tried to remove some of the mess on his desk, but the stacks of files on the corners simply grew taller. He closed his e-mail, where he’d opened some of the photos Hank had sent from Roy’s autopsy. Zane glanced at his watch. He had a call with the medical examiner in a few minutes.

Seth knocked twice on the open door and stepped in. Zane came around his desk to shake his hand. He hadn’t seen the drug task force investigator in a few weeks. He’d been at the last family dinner at Patsy’s house, where Zane had noticed that Seth and Stevie’s sister, Carly, appeared to be tentatively putting their marriage back together. Carly had recently been physically assaulted by the father of one of her child welfare charges, and Seth’s intervention had kept the man from killing her.

“Seth. How’s Carly doing? Her shoulder back to normal?”

The investigator winced and frowned. “Yeah, pains her occasionally, but I’d say she’s fully recovered.”

“Sorry, should I not bring it up?”

“It’s not the shoulder. Or the assault.” Seth paused. “It’s the risks of her job that continue to bug me. You should know how it goes.” Seth’s gaze begged for a little commiseration.

Zane grinned. “They’re Taylor women. What’d you expect? I can’t stop Stevie from being a cop any more than you can keep Carly from helping kids who need it.”