No Perfect Hero(93)
“Yeah. I guess we both are.” I pocket my phone and push away from the deck railing with a smile. “C’mon. Let’s go tell Ms. Wilma she’s not getting rid of us yet.”
18
Detour (Warren)
Something just isn’t right here.
I’m no stranger to small town police work. In places like Heart’s Edge, murder doesn’t really happen.
When it does, it’s always an obvious crime of passion with a clear perp.
My case doesn’t qualify as that. One little argument in a bar, no one throwing hands, no one getting hurt, doesn’t set up motive for enough rage to drive a crime of passion.
It’s not enough to keep me here as a valid suspect, even if I’m the only option they've got right now.
So why am I still here, propped on the bench in the holding cell of the tiny local police station, pressing my knuckles into my mouth and asking myself – again and again – the only question that really, truly matters?
Who the hell killed Dennis Bress?
The most likely option is one of his drug associates. Maybe he crossed the wrong person.
Maybe he owed someone money.
Maybe they realized someone was onto him and got rid of him to tie up any loose ends.
Fuck maybe.
Something’s eating at me. Doesn’t feel right. I’m one bust away from bringing Bress in, and coincidentally, he dies.
Gunshot between the eyes, supposedly. I managed to get that much out of Sheriff Langley during my interrogation.
I doubt he was consumed with so much remorse and guilt that he took his own life over Jenna.
That doesn’t mean someone didn’t kill him because of my sister, and because I was getting too close.
Shit, what am I thinking? I can’t possibly be implying – even just to myself – that Bress was innocent, and I’ve been after the wrong man all this time.
Stewart fucking saw him. Stew saw him, and the other members of the unit backed him up. I have only his word to go on, but his word’s always been good.
And the only other person who could tell me the truth isn’t around to testify about her own death.
Something’s not adding up here.
I have to believe some rival in Bress’ business took him out.
Because the other option, the only other option, is that Stew either lied to me, or got everything wrong and doesn’t even know it himself.
PTSD has a way of doing that with traumatic events. It can rewire the whole damn memory until you see things that never happened and think they’re real.
Christ. Have I been blaming Dennis Bress for an accident all this time? Just because I put blind faith in Stew’s memory, when even he questioned it?
My face drops into my hands with a snarl. I look through my fingers at the scratches on the bench, mostly from years of other people locked up in here, wanting to leave their mark. Usually just for getting rowdy drunk or petty crimes.
There's a big etching in the corner, off in the shadows. A large number nine next to a jagged heart, and the words, Miss me? You will.
I snort. There's one more little legend for Blake to give Doc a heaping pile of crap over. I'm starting to think Nine disappearing – the only real jailbreak in Heart's Edge history – might be easier to solve than figuring out what the fuck happened to Bress.
Think, dammit, I tell myself.
What about the other people on their team? Granted, they’re more Stewart’s people than mine, people he’s served with, a few he still employs, but if he trusted them...
No. None of this fits together in my head. At least I have the cell to myself, though.
There’s almost never any reason to use it, outside odd, scary cases like Nine, unless Flynn takes it too far here and there and gets thrown in the drunk tank till morning for his own good.
He’s been staying more sober lately, so it’s just me, myself, and my circling thoughts, trying to shove a square peg into a round hole when the edges won’t line up. Sheriff Langley sits across from me in the single-room jailhouse, looking uncomfortable at his desk, trying to pretend I’m not in the room.
Neither of us can believe I'm here.
It’d be funny if I wasn’t so damned pissed.
Did someone set me up?
I’m pulled from my thoughts by the door opening. I thought it’d be Grandma coming to raise hell as the town matriarch, if she didn't march straight to the mayor's office first.
What I’m not expecting is for Haley damn West to come strolling in.
Instead of her usual ragged cutoff shorts or the skimpier things she wears for work, she’s done herself up in a pretty sleeveless dress in a summery blue. It's ladylike, clinging to her figure just enough to make my mind wander to my dick, the flare of her skirt adding a musical grace to those sweet fucking legs of hers.
Shame there's no conjugal visits in here.
She’s skimmed her hair up in a deliberately messy twist, loose tendrils framing her face, her makeup subtly done until those wicked, snapping green eyes look innocent, beguiling.
It’s almost like she’s a whole different person.
She flashes me a quick glance, a secretive wink, before schooling her face to solemn as she approaches the desk. Shit. She better not be about to do what I think she is.
“Officer,” she says pleasantly, offering her hand. “I didn’t get a chance to introduce myself this morning. I’m—”