River Bodies (Northampton County #1)(36)
“Just tell us what you know,” John said, talking for the first time, irritated with Toby’s jabbering.
Toby stared at him. After a second, he said, “Yesterday with the dogs. They found some of the guy’s blood. They know where he was shot and gutted and dumped into the river.”
Hap leaned on the railing next to John. “Well, we might have a problem then,” he said. “But it could go away with your help.” He nodded at Toby. “Maybe you could fix it for us so it goes away.”
Toby put up his hand to stop Hap from continuing. “I’m not doing anything illegal,” he said. “I’ve looked the other way on more than one occasion with the strippers and the gambling and whatnot. But this? Uh-uh.”
“It’s a simple request,” Hap said. “It shouldn’t be too hard, even for you.”
“No,” he said. “The state police are involved. It’s out of my hands. What do you expect me to do?” He rambled, whined. “I’ve got a wife. A kid.”
“All we need you to do is make sure John’s name is on that police report. You know the one I’m talking about. A couple of your men arrested some of our boys a few nights ago for partying in the streets. I believe they were charged with disturbing the peace.”
“They didn’t leave my men any choice but to haul them in. There were too many witnesses, too many tourists around.”
“I’ve got no problem with what your men did. They did exactly what I wanted them to do. And John was one of the boys they arrested. Isn’t that right?”
Toby stared at Hap with a blank expression on his face. Then it slowly changed as he started to understand it had been the Scions’ intention all along to create a disturbance, to have a bunch of the members arrested, to lock them up for the night for disturbing the peace, to give John an alibi. “Shit,” he said again and dropped into the chair on the porch. “You set it up.”
John remained quiet, watching Toby’s reaction carefully. He was more than a little uncomfortable putting his trust, his life, into Toby’s hands.
“So what do you think? Do you think you can make John’s name appear on that police report?” Hap asked.
Toby didn’t say anything for a long time. “Would you have asked Clint to do the same if he was still chief and not me?”
John was starting to understand what he hadn’t before. It wasn’t that Toby had a problem with helping them per se, but rather he was struggling to overcome his captain status. It had been five years since he’d taken over Clint’s position and become chief. But people still treated him as though he wasn’t in charge, asked him for things Toby seemed convinced they wouldn’t have asked if it were Clint wearing the chief’s badge. But Toby’s thinking was wrong. His question showed how little he knew of Clint, his former boss and friend.
“We would ask the same of Clint,” John said, his tone confident. At one time he’d asked so much more from Clint, more than Toby or the town could’ve possibly known.
“And what do you think Clint would say?” Toby asked. “I’ll tell you what he would say. No, that’s what he would say. He’d wash his hands of the whole mess and let the staties take care of it like he did twenty years ago when that first body washed up on shore . . . ” His words trailed off.
Hap raised an eyebrow. “I don’t believe that case was ever solved. Was it?”
“No,” Toby said. “It wasn’t.”
“And why do you think that is?”
Toby shifted his weight in the chair. “Are you saying Clint had something to do with it?”
Hap shrugged.
John looked at Hap, a look that said they were heading in a direction that John didn’t want to go. Of course, John wasn’t thinking about Clint, but rather he was thinking about Becca, Clint’s daughter. The more removed she was from him the better.
“So what’s it going to be?” Hap asked, narrowing his eyes and leaning in close to the chief. “Are you going to help us out or not?”
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Becca stayed on the dock when Parker went into the house to get ready for work. She watched the sunrise, in no hurry to rush back to her father’s bedside. The fresh air moved through her lungs easily. A damp breeze blew from the water despite the warmth of the sun’s rays slipping through the branches of the trees. She hugged herself against the chill. She’d forgotten how quiet early mornings on the river could be, how peaceful.
Her life on the other side of the river had left very little time for stopping, sitting, being still. Her mornings were spent running with Romy, focused on the trail, her pace, monitoring the dog, making sure the dog was getting the exercise she needed, resting and racing with the dog’s natural rhythm. And more times than not, Becca’s thoughts were on the animals in her care at the clinic. She made a mental note to call Vicky later to check on Maggie.
And then there was Picasso, the cat who had chewed an electrical wire, shocking and burning the inside of his mouth, lucky to be alive. Which reminded her of Lucky, Matt’s cat, although Becca couldn’t remember the last time Matt had actually fed the cat or cleaned her litter box. Becca missed the feline rubbing against her legs, the sound of her purr, her soft kitty fur.
Eventually, inevitably, she circled back to Matt, how he would hate sitting here, motionless, taking in the scenery. If he were beside her, she imagined he would be staring at his phone—texting, calling, working—missing the beauty around him.