Touch of Evil (5 page)

The memory of his rejection still stung, enough to make her clarify, “You’re still the only ER doctor my son will let near him.”

He sighed audibly. “Let’s start this conversation over. First of all, how are you feeling? Stitches holding all right? I see you’re dressed to leave, but—”

“Dr. Sheffield made me promise to avoid break dancing, bronc busting, and head butting any suspects for the next few weeks,” she said dryly. “It was a tough call, but I caved, so he’s letting me go hold down the cushions on my sofa for a few days. But you’re not here to talk about me.”

This time, the pain in his eyes was unmistakable. “I’m really glad to hear you’re improving.”

“Good to know you weren’t rooting for things to go the other way. Considering how we left off.”

He shook his head. “You know me way better than that, Justine.”

She nodded. He
was
a good man. Smart and funny, kind and sexy—the thought kicked loose a memory of his gray eyes looking up at her as he’d kissed his slow way from her hip down to her thigh.

God,
she missed that. Missed the way he’d shattered the hard knot of tension lodged inside her. Missed
him,
beyond
the sex and the warmth of physical affection, and way beyond the fact that he had family money and a surname that was golden in this town.

He’d be a fool to tarnish his reputation by hitching his wagon to some train wreck of a woman. She’d done him a damned favor insisting that they stick to the original plan and keep things quiet.

Never taking his eyes from her, he said, “I really regret the way things—”

“I wanted to tell you,” she broke in, afraid to let him finish, to leave herself open to more pain, “I don’t know what I’d do without Gwen. She’s really good with Noah, too. Must run in the family.”

“My sister? She’s your babysitter?”

“She didn’t tell you?” Justine looked surprised. “I hired her about six weeks ago. Felt like I’d won the child-care lottery, getting someone so qualified to work for what I can afford. Especially a Bollinger.”

Everyone in town knew that, like Ross and their other sister, Gwen Bollinger had a generous trust fund, a legacy from their timber-baron grandfather.

Ross shrugged. “She likes feeling useful.”

“Guess that runs in your family, too.”

At the compliment, he blew out an audible breath, his expression making Justine pray he wouldn’t bring up their relationship again. Not when the wound was finally healing.

There was a hesitation before he thanked her and steered the subject back to his cousin. “You don’t really think Laney hung that rope herself, do you? If you had seen the shock in her eyes—hell, for a second, she thought I was playing some kind of sick joke.”

“Not very funny, if someone was joking,” Justine said.

“Not a damned bit.”

“I don’t like to prejudge, not before I’ve had the chance to talk to Laney. But you and I both know she could’ve found
out how to tie a hangman’s knot in next to no time if she decided that was the best way to get the department to reexamine her friends’ deaths. She has access to a computer, doesn’t she?”

“Sure. She’s using my old laptop.”

“If I could maybe get a look at it…” Justine would love to take a peek at the search history, or better yet, check out Laney’s e-mails.

But Ross was shaking his head, his expression hardening. “So you can try to dig up incriminating information on my cousin?”

“So we can rule her out.”

“Sorry, Justine,” he said. “There’s no way I’m letting you go fishing like that—or letting you talk Laney into it.”

Irritated, Justine frowned, knowing there wasn’t evidence for a subpoena. Not much chance of getting Laney’s voluntary cooperation, either, since Ross would surely warn her against it.

“Have you talked to your cousin lately?”

“Hardly at all these past few months.” He shrugged. “I’ve been at my sister Cherie’s down in Houston. That’s where my specialist is.”

She wanted to ask about his illness, since Gwen, who had no idea of Justine’s involvement with Ross, had offered up few details. But Justine bit her tongue, reminding herself she’d lost that right, that she’d given it up without even a whimper and had worked hard to convince herself it was for the best.

“It’s possible, I suppose…” Ross added.

“What’s possible?”

He tried to smile, though his eyes looked unhappy. “I’m guessing things must have been kept from me. Things my mother and my aunt thought might upset me. I gave them a real scare, I’m told, and my mom, especially, can be…”

“A mom?” Justine finished for him, imagining her terror if
something suddenly went wrong with Noah’s heart. Remembering her devastation after her husband’s stroke.

The thought drove deeper a thorn of grief, a buried reminder of the suddenness of Lou’s death. A reminder of the fragility of life. Suddenly, she wanted to sit down, to rest, or to get home to hug the son she’d come so close to leaving motherless. Orphaned, really, since her first husband, the asshole who’d fathered Noah, had apparently gone into the Deadbeat Dad Protection Program within a month of their son’s diagnosis.

What she didn’t want, had no damned business wanting, was a renewed connection to yet another man who could leave her in the lurch.

His expression sheepish, Ross waved off whatever he’d been about to say about his mother and confessed, “I had no idea Laney was living with Jake Willets. Her mother probably pitched a fit about it, had the whole family in an uproar, but I never heard a word. And I had no idea until last night that Jake and Hart were dead, to say nothing of Caleb.” With a shake of his head, he added, “I came home only a few days back, and my mom and aunt just left for a two-week cruise to celebrate their birthday.”

Justine shook off her discomfort, reminded her sluggish brain to focus on the job. “Your cousin’s claiming racial intimidation,” she said bluntly. “Are you aware of that?”

Ross looked flustered and off balance. “I heard what she said last night, but listen, Laney was upset. She just wants this break-in and these hanging deaths taken seriously, that’s all.”

“They will be,” Justine promised. “I’ll review the ME’s reports and follow up on LeJeune’s death. But I have to warn you, we’ll be looking at
every
possibility, which includes checking Jenkins Hardware and the Wal-Mart to see if anyone remembers somebody picking up a length of rope lately.
We get really lucky, we’ll match up an eyewitness with security video.”

“You’re going to be flashing around a picture of my cousin, aren’t you? Trying to prove your deputy was right about her.”

“As I said, it makes good sense to rule her out,” Justine said, taking her best let’s-be-reasonable tone.

“Then
you’ll
have to admit it makes good sense for someone to represent Laney’s interests. Especially since I have good reason to believe that Jake Willets’s death
was
murder.”

“What are you talking about?” Justine demanded. “If you have pertinent information—”

“I’ll be sure to stop by the sheriff’s office with it. But not until I’ve spoken with that lawyer friend of mine.”

There is no such thing as a minor lapse of integrity.

—Tom Peters, from
Thriving on Chaos: Handbook for a Management Revolution

Hanging as a punishment goes way back in this sad world. Way farther than the place those old Clint Eastwood movies show you, where they used to string up horse thieves in the Wild West. Farther than the British colonists, who cried out, “Witch!” then had themselves a big time stoning, drowning, and—you guessed it—bagging the heads of odd, half-deaf old ladies and pushing them stumbling up the steps.

(Did you stumble, on that last step? Did you close your eyes, dear?)

An interested party could keep following the thing right across the Atlantic. Follow it straight back to England, to the times when they called the noose a “collar.” This pop-eyed death has always been a real crowd pleaser, way back to the wild tribes who overran the Roman Empire.

And farther still, if you check out the Old Testament in the Good Book sitting in your church pew come next Sunday. You don’t believe me? Get a load of the seventh chapter of the Book of Esther, where the king says, “Hang him thereon.”

It even mentions gallows. Right there in the Bible, with all the rest of God’s good gifts.

Then was the king’s wrath pacified.

You study on that part, especially. Right there at the tail end of the tenth verse. And then you think of all the wrath left smoldering inside you. All the rage you still have left to pacify.

Justine’s father was shaking his head as he walked into the room, his silver Stetson in hand, along with several papers. At the sight of him, Justine felt awash in gratitude for his presence, at least until he opened his mouth and spoiled the moment.

“I see you’ve charmed another one of your constituents.” He looked back over his shoulder, in the direction Ross Bollinger had taken. “And a doctor at that. Don’t look for any contributions from your local medical professionals for your reelection campaign.”

“Hand me that notepad.” Staring up from the chair, Justine gestured toward the bedside table. “I want to take down this advice: ‘Give free pass to any potential contributors.’ Or is it just the ones with money?”

Still a tall and hearty man at the age of sixty-six, her father raked his hand through his thick shock of white hair and fixed her with sharp brown eyes. “Now, Justine, I thought you were the family expert on that sort of arrangement.”

Her throat constricted at the insult, but she wouldn’t cry. She couldn’t, so she slammed him with her fiercest look, one side of her mouth ticking downward. “If that comment’s the kind of help you’re offering, maybe you should go home now. Hunt down Bambi’s mother or watch some football with your buddies. I can get along without you. I have.”

“Hell, girl, you’re awfully cantankerous this morning.” Her father gestured toward the gauze square taped to the side of her head. “You sure that golf club didn’t knock something loose up there?”

“You sure you haven’t taken up the game?”

He chuckled, and his tone softened. “That’ll be the day. C’mon, Chili Pepper. Let’s get you home and get you tucked up on the sofa. Then I’ll make you some pancakes with extra syrup. You still like pancakes, don’t you?”

Typical, she thought a few minutes later, as he opened the
passenger door to his loaded-out black pickup for her. Her father sliced her to the soul, then laughed off her furious reaction and confused her with an offer to do something fatherly. No matter how angry he’d been the last time they’d spoken, he stuck with her, clinging as stubbornly as a burr to horsehair.

As he climbed behind the wheel, she appropriated an old pair of sunglasses he’d left in his glove box and put them on to cut the morning sun’s glare. “Mind running me over to the office before we head home?” she asked. “I’ve got a little problem I need to take care of before things get out of hand. Shouldn’t take me any more than about—”

“Roger can handle it.” Her father’s seat belt locked into place with a decisive click. He turned the key, and the heman Chevy engine thrummed to life. “He told me all about it in the hallway.”

She should have known those two would bond, what with their shared disdain for her qualifications as sheriff. “Did Roger tell you he’s the one who aggravated the situation in the first place? The man wouldn’t know tact if it walked up and introduced itself.”

“You sure you’ve given him a fair shake? That you’re not just nursing a grudge ’cause he ran against you for the job?”

“No, sir,” Justine protested. “I’m nursing a grudge against him for calling me ‘Sheriff Bitchford’ behind my back, for arguing with me in front of my men, and for undermining me at every opportunity.”

Her father smiled, no doubt over “Bitchford.” Probably wishing he had thought of it himself. “That’s strange. He gave me the impression of a fellow who’s got the department’s best interests at heart. Struck me as a man of real integrity.”

Justine gritted her teeth, hurt by her father’s reliance on his fabled instincts rather than her word. Hurt even more by the fact that he would never call her a woman of integrity. And that she could never claim the appellation, no matter how hard she worked to make up for her failures.

“Roger could have won,” she said, “except he’s so bullheaded, he’s pissed off too many people.”

She might have said Savoy had pissed off the wrong people, those who drummed up support and raised funds for local candidates. Furious that he refused to play by the rules, that he had the nerve to treat them and their families with no more consideration than he’d give any other citizen, they’d thrown their support to Justine. Mostly because they’d felt certain she’d be easy to manipulate.

It had taken her a while to understand that and a while longer to comprehend that their support went far beyond the legal fund-raising and yard signs she’d expected. Still numbed by grief and reeling from the discovery that her husband of two years had left her broke, she had stumbled down the thorny path until she was ensnared.

“Stupid,” she muttered to herself as she leaned against the locked door. Bars of light strobed over her closed eyelids, sunlight filtering through the perpetually green branches of the stately live oaks that lined this neighborhood.

“Being stubborn doesn’t necessarily make a fellow stupid,” her father told her.

“I didn’t mean him, or you either.”
I meant me.
But Justine didn’t dare admit it. Because to her mind, her ignorance about the situation had been far worse than willful corruption. And her hesitation to step forward once the implications finally became clear had been an even greater failing. After all, what use had a dead man—even her late husband—for his reputation?

“You all right?” Her father sounded concerned. “You ought to sit up straight now. I don’t want you bumping your head if I catch a pothole. This county of yours ever hear of road maintenance?”

She opened her eyes in time to glimpse his worry before he looked away. She smiled, understanding that he didn’t like
her catching him, that he was more at ease with being a role model than a father. Or a human being.

Because she somehow loved him nonetheless, and especially because she knew what it was like to love a difficult child, she straightened and watched the row of grand old houses slide past. “I’m just a little tired. Sorry.”

“You aren’t the one who needs to be apologizing,” he said darkly. “You remember any more this morning? Remember who the chickenshit bastard was that hit you?”

She was tempted to name Roger to find out if their newfound camaraderie would prevent her dad from kicking Savoy’s ass. But as satisfying as that might be, she opted for the truth. “I still can’t come up with anything past getting into my SUV to go talk to the victim’s mother, and before that, bits and pieces from the crime scene.”

She saw glimpses of it, coming in flashes that held the surreal quality of half-remembered snapshots. Caleb’s bare feet, dangling a scant few inches shy of the muddy earth. His marked pallor, in contrast to the livid patches on his soles, forearms, and hands.

But there had been something strange about those forearms. Something she hadn’t noticed in either of the other corpses…

“Dad, you need to take a right here, to my office. Did you forget where it’s—”

“I’m doing what the doctor said.” Her father sounded adamant. “Getting you home for some rest and a good meal. Getting you well so you can take care of that boy of yours the way you used to.”

She winced at the last words. “How
is
Noah? Did you see him this morning?” Though he didn’t show affection in the same manner as a normal child, might not even consciously realize that he missed her, she knew he would suffer from this sudden disorder in his world.

“He’s a little stressed,” her dad said diplomatically. “Mrs. Crane didn’t know the way he likes to do things in the morning. I helped the best I could, but Noah—well, he wasn’t up for talking things through.”

Justine sighed, knowing her son would be upset for weeks by the change in routine. And heaven help them all if his favorite meal of grilled cheese (sharp cheddar on stone-ground wheat, halved on the diagonal) and soup (Campbell’s Cream of Tomato, made with two-percent-fat milk) didn’t come off as planned this evening. At precisely six thirty, and not a minute earlier or later.

“Did he use his cards, at least?” she asked, referring to the picture-exchange system with which Noah had made his needs known before he’d become verbal. Though the cards were a step backward, they certainly beat the hell out of a tantrum.

“Took me a while, but I finally got him to get me one and show me what he wanted,” her father said.

“Thank God you were there.” Justine meant it. Her dad might deny her his approval, but he’d do anything for his only grandson. Maybe because Noah looked so much like Ed Junior, her brother Eddie, lost so many years ago. The thought set off an uneasy flutter in her stomach.

Her father frowned. “Seems like Noah’s…Well, I’m sure it’s tough, you working so much. And without Lou or me around to help out…”

“I know, Dad.” Justine felt sick with the reminder that her son was regressing, that even with Gwen Bollinger’s help, something she could barely afford, Noah’s hard-won gains were dwindling, day by day. It made her furious at Lou, that he would talk her into moving out here and then die, leaving her in this situation. Alone again and close to bankrupt, with no choice except to return to the only career she’d ever known. And with so many expenses that running for Lou’s
office had offered her the only chance to avoid losing their home.

“I’m doing the best I can,” she said, more sharply than she meant to, but better that than crying.
Deputies don’t cry,
her dad had told her long before, back when Noah’s father had left her. It was a message she’d taken to heart, and one that applied doubly to an elected county sheriff. “But I really need to talk with this Thibodeaux woman about what happened last night.”

“Not now, you don’t,” her father told her. “You’re groggy, hurting, and your color’s off. And you don’t remember one damned thing about what happened.”

“If I go down there now,” she argued, “I can more than likely talk her into speaking to me without some lawyer mucking up the works—and before we end up with a bunch of salivating reporters jumping up and down and trying to second-guess us.”

“No, dice, Justine. You’re going to have to learn to delegate. Roger’s a good investigator. You’ve said that much yourself. ”

“Roger’s going to screw this up. He’s already lost his objectivity.”

“Your deputy said this woman played the race card.” Disdain leached into her father’s voice. “Said as far as he can tell, she looks and talks as white as you do.”

Justine huffed out a sigh, wondering if her dad had any clue how wrong he sounded and knowing there was little hope of convincing him on that count.

“The first victim
was
black,” she explained. “Hart Tyson—and I have to tell you, I nearly choked myself when we found him underneath that tree.”

“Under it?” Her father’s gaze sharpened, the investigator in him resurrected like a restless ghost.

“Yeah, the, um…the rope broke from his weight—Tyson
was close to three hundred pounds. Too bad it didn’t break in time to do him any good.”

“So you considered homicide? Maybe a few drunk crackers out to relive the bad old days and smear the name of every decent white man in the area?” If her dad had sounded contemptuous before, he seemed outraged at this thought.

“Sure, I considered it,” Justine said. “Tell you the truth, my gut told me murder. But this was one big guy, and mostly muscle. I can’t believe anybody strung him up without his say-so. Besides, his family members said he’d been in a serious funk about a recent divorce. And then we found a note inside his pickup, parked out in the weeds. Family members said it looked like his handwriting.”

“What’d the ME have to say about him?” Her father glanced at her.

Justine knew her mother would have chided him—or both of them—for talking shop, would have kept the conversation strictly focused on her daughter’s injuries and her grandson’s needs. But Belinda Little Truitt, of the once-wealthy Dallas Littles, had never understood that law enforcement was father and daughter’s lingua franca, that save for Noah, it was the only common ground they had left.

“I’ll tell you what.” As they passed a new drugstore near the edge of the historic district, Justine slid a sly look his way. “You turn around and take me to my office, and I’ll let you have a look at the medical examiner’s findings on both prior deaths.”

Beneath the brim of his hat, Ed Truitt’s forehead furrowed, and his thumbs beat a tattoo against the steering wheel’s edge.

Justine searched for a way to seal the deal. “Come on, Dad. I could really use your input, all your experience, on my side.” She nearly added
for a change
but managed to restrain herself.

Her dad pulled off the road into the library parking lot
and looked her straight in the eye. “Is it only me, Chili Pepper,” he asked, his thick white brows nearly meeting in the middle, “or are you this shameless about manipulating the bad guys?”