Troublemaker (16 page)

“Thanks. For now, my next goal is climbing those stairs. No offense, but your sofa is killing me.”

While Bo was doing her morning work, Morgan walked outside, both
to give her room to concentrate and for the joy of getting out in the fresh air and sunshine and pushing his body a little. Getting back into
shape wasn't going to just happen; he'd have to work for it, maybe harder than he'd ever worked before, because he couldn't remember ever being this weak before. He was already getting stronger, probably because he was eating more. Bo wasn't a fancy cook, but he wasn't a fancy eater; give him a good hamburger or spaghetti dinner any day, rather than some frou-frou arrangement of two green beans, a mushroom, and an ounce of sautéed chicken.

Because it would only be fair, when he was able, he intended to take over some of the household chores. He could vacuum with the best of 'em, and do laundry. From what he could see, she had almost no down time, unless you counted when she took the dog for walks.

Carefully he walked to the edge of the woods, then turned and looked back at the barn—house. It was an unusual place for an unusual woman. He was a man who liked women, so he pondered his hostess. She had walls—
serious
walls. Some women had walls because they were afraid, but he didn't sense any timidity or uncertainty in her. She was self-contained, confident in who she was and the choices she made, alone and happy to be that way.

He liked that about her because clingy, dependent people annoyed him. His own nature was to take charge and get things done, which was why he was in the GO-Teams to begin with. He liked the adrenaline rush, but he also liked the sense of accomplishment, of being able to do things the ordinary person couldn't do. He put his ass on the line every time he went on a mission; nothing about indecision and weakness appealed to him, no matter how it was packaged.

Bo's packaging was on the skimpy side, but appealing for all that. She was a little taller than average, thin, with long arms and legs, and no boobs to speak of. If she was bigger than an A-cup, he'd kiss her ass—and enjoy doing it, because though she might be skinny her ass had a definite curve to it. Her face was faintly exotic, all big dark eyes and a wide, soft mouth, more appealing than pretty. There was that word again: appealing. And he didn't need to think about how appealing she was. He was here to recuperate and wait for Axel's trap to be sprung,
then he'd be gone. He'd enjoy some flirtation, the zing of sexual attraction, if the circumstances were different. They weren't. There wasn't any point in thinking about Bo's curvy little ass.

Instead, he should spend his time going over and over everything that had happened the day he'd been shot, trying to spot the pertinent detail that had so far eluded him. Being relegated to the position of bystander rubbed him wrong. He was accustomed to swinging into action and doing what needed to be done, to being the bullet instead of the bait. He wanted to be doing something, anything, other than sitting with his thumb up his ass. He felt useless. Hell, he
was
useless. If anything happened, he wasn't certain he could save himself, much less anyone else.

Look at him now: he'd walked maybe fifty yards, and he was exhausted—though that was an improvement because when he'd arrived last Thursday, he'd needed help just getting into the house, and to the bathroom. It galled him that he needed to rest before he could make the return fifty yards.

At least he was upright, and in the sunshine. The bright heat felt good on his skin. He stood there listening to the birds singing as boisterously as if they were drunk, and his mind slipped back to that day.

Congresswoman Kingsley was at the top of his list for somehow being behind all of this, but he had to admit she was there solely because she was a politician. Other than that, he couldn't think of anything she'd said or done that was out of the ordinary. There was also her husband, Dexter the lawyer. Politician, lawyer to the power brokers—was there much difference between them? Again, Dexter hadn't done anything other than become a lawyer.

He replayed his chance meeting with them, everything they'd said, anything he'd seen, and nothing popped.

Next on his list was Brawley, who had made that phone call immediately after seeing him. But Axel had managed to trace the call, and the only call Brawley had made in that time frame had been to his wife. After checking out both Brawley and the wife, Axel had found nothing. They were regular citizens, with nothing suspicious in their back
grounds. They'd raised a couple of kids, had a few grandkids, went to church.

The last person on Morgan's list was the one he was most reluctant to think about: Kodak. He and Kodak had been in so many firefights together he couldn't say who had saved the other's life the most times. Kodak knew where he lived, wouldn't have had to hack any files to get his address . . . and yet, Kodak was sharp enough to have done exactly that as a means of throwing suspicion away from himself.

But then he came back to the same bottom line he'd reached on the others: he couldn't think of any reason why. From Axel's interrogation of Kodak after the ambush, he knew that Kodak had indeed had a lady companion that morning, that he'd spent the day with her. She'd gone home after an early dinner. Everything looked normal; there were no suspicious calls made to or from Kodak's cell—or even his lady friend's cell—and no sudden transfer of funds from his bank to that of Albert Rykov.

They hadn't even been able to track the money backward. Rykov had made a sizable deposit, but it had been in cash at the Bank of America ATM on Pennsylvania Avenue. Security cameras had recorded it; Rykov had been alone. The money was a dead end. It wasn't even gratifying to know that someone had paid twenty thousand in cash to have him killed.

Everything led to a dead end. No one he'd seen that day had said or done anything suspicious. He was no closer to figuring out who'd tried to kill him now than he had been when it first happened.

He heard a muffled but happy bark and turned to see Tricks barreling toward him, tennis ball in her mouth, which explained why her bark had been muffled. Bo was following behind. Tricks reached him and dropped the ball at his feet, then took off running. Careful to keep his balance, he bent to pick it up and hurled it over her head. It bounced, she leaped and caught it, and immediately she froze in place with her head proudly lifted, waiting to be praised.

“Good girl!” Bo called, clapping her hands. “That was a beautiful catch.” She reached him and said, “You've been out here a while. Are
you okay?” Her dark eyes were calm, revealing nothing more than a casual concern.

“Yeah, just thinking.”

“You didn't move for a good forty minutes. Do you want to go back in before I take Tricks for her walk?”

Meaning she wasn't certain he could make the short trip on his own and didn't want to leave him there until she got back. The reminder of his weakness frayed his temper, and he started to snarl an answer before catching himself. Snapping at her wouldn't help him recover any faster, no matter how much it galled him to have to accept her help.

On the other hand, maybe there was an upside to this.

He said, “My knees got a little shaky. I thought I'd rest a while before trying to get back to the house.”

Strictly speaking, none of that was a lie. His knees
had
gotten a little shaky when he'd walked out. He'd also rested. But he could easily make the return trip to the house—okay, if not easily, at least without falling on his face.

“Lean on me,” she said without hesitation, though again there was nothing to read in her face that hinted at any great concern. She stepped close and shoved her shoulder against him the way she had the day he arrived, her right arm around his waist. He looped his left arm around her shoulder and let a little of his weight rest on her as they slowly walked back to the house, Tricks prancing in escort.

He looked down at the top of her head, at the sun gleaming on the thick, rich darkness of her hair. She didn't do anything special, he didn't think; her hair reached the middle of her back and all she did was pull it back and clip it at the base of her neck. If she wore any makeup, he couldn't see it, though he wasn't exactly an expert in the makeup department. He noticed lipstick, or if a woman wore enough eyeliner that she looked like a raccoon. Other than that, he was a guy, which meant he was fairly oblivious.

Her skin was smooth, with a healthy sheen to it. A faint peach-hued flush had warmed her cheeks. Beneath his hand the bones of her shoulder felt fragile, not much thicker than a child's. There was nothing
childlike about her, but the feel of her shoulder clasped in his rough fingers made his stomach tighten because it reminded him that she had jumped headlong into a fight without regard for her own safety, that she'd been punched in the face by some low-life son of a bitch who needed to be shown a thing or three about what happened to jerks who hit women.

“Are you okay?” she asked again, frowning as she slanted a look up at him, and he realized his breathing had gone deeper and faster as anger bubbled his blood.

“I'll make it,” he said roughly, sidestepping the question. Yeah, he was okay. He made himself a promise: Before he left this place, he'd make it his mission to track down that bastard and make him wish he never saw Hamrickville again.

W
HEN BO STEPPED INTO THE STATION WITH TRICKS
beside her, the first person she saw was Warren Gooding. If he hadn't seen her too, she'd have silently backed out and not returned until after he left. Unfortunately, he
did
see her, so she was denied the coward's way out. Her stomach tied in knots at the thought of the coming confrontation because it wasn't going to be pretty.

Loretta, the dispatcher, peeked out from around her cubicle and mouthed “
Sorry
” at her. Bo gave a slight nod to let her know it was okay. What could Loretta have done, thrown the man out? She only wished. Physically Loretta could have, because she was a big woman, but that would only make the inevitable meeting that much more hostile.

“Mr. Gooding,” she said calmly. She didn't feel calm, but she could act calm. Telling him he was a jerk and his son was a jerk wouldn't accomplish anything. She tried to picture the path she walked with Tricks, the peacefulness of the trees and wind and sun. Maybe that happy-place stuff really worked; it was worth a shot.

“I'd like to talk to you in private.” His tone was curt, his scowl saying that he wasn't in a placating mood. He was a tall, heavyset man, and would have been good-looking if his discontent with the world and everyone he knew wasn't evident in his expression.

“Certainly.” If she'd been a betting person, she'd have bet every cent Axel was paying her that she knew what he was going to say. He thought
he was a special snowflake, that the rules that applied to everyone else didn't apply to him. She wasn't looking forward to his outrage when he found out no snowflakes were special, that they all melted.

The station house was a mostly open floor plan, with a few desks and chairs scattered around. The town's money could only go so far, so functionality was the name of the game, with decoration and status far behind. The best that could be said of her area was that she had the newest office chair, which was to say it was less than ten years old. Maybe. She led the way to her desk, indicated the visitor's chair. He glared around as if the layout of the station was her fault. “I said
private.”

“I heard what you said, but this is as private as it gets. I don't have a private office. Our only other option is to step into the bathroom, and no offense, but that isn't going to happen.” She could just see that, yelling back and forth over the toilet—though she hoped it wouldn't come to the yelling part. The hope was a small one, but miracles did happen every now and then.

His head swiveled back and forth as if looking for an office to appear out of thin air. Frustrated, he turned back to glare at her some more.

“Please, have a seat.” She indicated the visitor's chair. After hesitating a minute, not wanting to give in but having no other option, Mr. Gooding dragged the chair over so he was mostly sitting beside her, rather than in front of her. She slid her own chair back and swiveled it so she was facing him. They weren't meeting as equals, and she didn't want him to think they were.

Tricks had gone to greet Loretta and now came prancing toward the new person. When she was a few feet away, however, she got a distinct look of doggie distaste on her expressive face and came to a halt. Bo kept watch on her, ready to intervene if Tricks decided to greet Mr. Gooding with her usual enthusiasm, but after studying him for a second Tricks backed away and went to her bed. Evidently ill temper smelled bad.

Good girl!
There was no evidence that Tricks was telepathic, but Bo sent her the approving thought anyway.

Mr. Gooding scowled at Bo as if she were the cause of all his problems. “I want you to drop the charges against Kyle,” he said abruptly.

A lead-in exchange of pleasantries would have been nice, but so much for that. She suspected Mr. Gooding wouldn't know “pleasant” if it bit him on the ass. “Why?” She kept her tone calm, the word faintly puzzled.

His face got red and his voice got loud. “Because that bitch he married—”

She held up her hand, cutting off his outburst. “I'm not involved in his marriage. Whether or not Emily presses charges is up to her. The only charges I'm involved in are those of assaulting a police officer and resisting arrest.”

“He said he didn't know it was you.”

“Yes, I know. I didn't know it was him, either, when I entered the bakery and found him in a fight with Officer Tucker. How is that pertinent?”

“He'd never have swung at you if he'd known,” Mr. Gooding charged. His face was still red, and his fists were clenching and unclenching.

“Doesn't matter.”

“The hell you say it doesn't matter!” His voice rose again.

“Mr. Gooding. Even if he didn't know who
I
was, he definitely knew who Officer Tucker was.”

“We don't live in this town, we don't know every half-ass cop by sight.”

“That's possible,” she allowed. “However, I assume you and your son both know what a police
uniform
looks like. Officer Tucker was in uniform.” God, this was unpleasant. The knots in her stomach were turning into faint nausea; that happy-place stuff wasn't working. She didn't enjoy confrontation, but neither did she back down from it. All she had to do was remain calm.

“My boy could do time over this when it doesn't amount to a hill of beans. Neither you nor your deputy are hurt. There's no point in dragging this out, in ruining his life because he and his sorry-ass wife got in an argument. Tell me what this department needs and I'll make sure you get it. A new squad car? An add-on to the building so you'll have an office?”

Well, that was brazen, even for him. Outraged, she sat there for a minute. He probably thought she was weighing the offer; instead she was wondering how hard it would be to hook her feet under the railing of his chair and tip it over backward. Maybe he'd bang his head as hard as she'd banged hers during the scuffle with his son.

No, she couldn't do it. That way lay madness—intensely satisfying, but still madness. When she could control her tone and keep it even, she said, “Are you seriously trying to
bribe
me? Because if you are, hold on while I get my phone so I can record all this.” She did just that, fetching her phone out of her bag and tapping a few icons. She laid it on the desk. “Would you repeat all that, please? About buying us a new squad car or adding on to the station building if we'll drop our charges against Kyle?” She lifted her brows in inquiry.

He looked in real danger of exploding, or maybe stroking out, but he saw the quicksand at his feet. “I categorically deny I was trying to bribe you! That's ridiculous! These charges against Kyle are ridiculous—”

“Don't bother recording it,” Loretta said laconically from behind her partition. “I
heard
it.”

His head whipped around; in his choler, he'd forgotten about Loretta, perhaps because she was out of sight and no calls had come in. The red color in his face deepened into puce. Before he could dig himself in any deeper and the situation became even more of a powder keg, Bo took a deep breath and willed herself back from the edge.

“I suggest we let this case play out within the confines of the law. Kyle has no prior charges—or any that stuck, because you're always buying him out of trouble, which should tell you something right there”—she had to put that in, accompanied by a flinty-eyed look, but then she pulled herself back to calm—“so I doubt he'll do any hard time, though the judge might give him some short time in the county lockup. I doubt even that. Likely he'll end up with probation. I don't know, but it's my best guess.”

Instead of seizing the opening, Mr. Gooding went on another angle of attack. “But he'd still have a
record
. My boy has all he can handle, with
his slut of a wife taking everything he has. He can't even get his own stuff from his own house because she's got a restraining order against him. She'll probably sell all his guns—”

Please, Jesus, let it be so,
Bo silently prayed. Aloud she said, “I understand Emily packed up Kyle's things and sent them to your house. What else does he need? Make me a list and I'll make sure he gets it. And don't say guns, because I'm sure you don't think Kyle needs access to any weapons until he's calmed down.”

“Those guns belong to him.”

“Then they'll be granted to him in the divorce settlement. Don't worry about the guns. It isn't hunting season, and if he did something so stupid with one that even you couldn't buy his way out, he'd go away for a long, long time. Hard time, too. The best thing you can do now is sit on him and keep him out of trouble so things can calm down.”

His fists were still clenching and unclenching. Unable to corral his fury at being at a disadvantage, he jumped to his feet so violently the chair fell over backward anyway. Tricks gave a startled yelp and shot off her bed, darting to Bo and pressing against her legs.

“I'll be pressing charges against
you,
missy!” Savage outrage thickened his tone. “You made threats against my son—”

“You mean that part about tearing his fucking head off?” put in Loretta, still hidden by her partition. There was a snicker. “Yeah, everyone took that real serious, considering he weighs about twice what she does.”

“
Shut up!
” he roared, pivoting and taking a threatening step toward the partition. “This stupid town is taking orders from two ignorant pussies and I—”

Loretta slowly stood up, all six-feet-one and two hundred seventy-two pounds of her rising from behind the partition. Her chin was tucked, her eyes bright as she eyed him as if he were steak tartare and she was a starving lion. “I'll bet my pussy against yours any day, hoss. If you want to know who I am, the name's Loretta Hobson, from out Lister Road. You've probably heard of my family? The Mean-As-Shit Hobsons? I'll take you on any day.”

His head jerked back. Everyone in the county had heard of the Mean-As-Shit Hobsons. Cross a Hobson, and you were likely to find your house burned down—and that's if they were in a good mood. The worst part of it was they were pretty damn smart and had never been caught at anything.

In a very level tone, Bo said, “Mr. Gooding, I think it would be best if you leave now. Just be patient, tell Kyle to act smart for once in his life, and let things settle down. I'll forget this one time that you tried to bribe me, but if you try such a thing again, I'll arrest you on the spot. Are we clear?”

He was still watching Loretta as if she were a cobra and had him hypnotized. Loretta barked, “Are we clear?” and he visibly jumped, his head swiveling toward Bo. His cheeks had lost all their color, but malice burned in his eyes.

“I'll have your job for this,” he uttered almost soundlessly. “Wait until the town finds out you're shacking up with some guy who turned up out of the blue.”

That hadn't taken long, she thought. Morgan had been at her house for a whole four days. “Oh, you mean my old friend who
just had open-heart surgery
and can barely walk? That guy? Sure, go for it, but be prepared to be laughed at.”

That information was almost too much for him to process. He teetered on the verge of a violent explosion, but self-preservation kept him from going there because he seemed to sense that Bo and Loretta were a hair's breadth from putting handcuffs on him. He couldn't bear to admit defeat but had no other option. Finally he simply turned and stomped out, leaving the door standing open in his wake.

Blowing out a breath, Bo closed the door and turned back to Loretta. They grinned at each other and met halfway across the office for a high five and a fist bump. “I'm so glad you're a Hobson,” she told Loretta.

“It comes in handy.” Loretta blew on her nails, buffed them on her shirt. “I can't wait to tell my brothers. They'll get a kick out of it. You really got a man living with you?”

“For now, poor guy. He just got out of the hospital.”

It was the description of “poor guy” that did it because no woman described a romantic interest that way. Losing interest, Loretta said, “Hope he feels better soon,” and dropped the subject.

The excitement over, Loretta returned to her cubicle and Bo sat at her desk. Tricks sniffed around before deciding to take a nap. After thinking the situation over for a few minutes, Bo called Mayor Buddy and filled him in on her encounter with Warren Gooding.

He sighed. From the sound, she could just see his face, homely but pleasant, settling into lines of concern. “I knew he was going to be a problem. Still—he did just give us leverage, and we might be able to work it to our advantage.”

“I'm torn,” she admitted. “I dislike him so much I'd love to file bribery charges against him, but overall that wouldn't be good for the town. If the sawmills closed because he wasn't there to run them, that would hurt some innocent families who depend on the jobs.”

“It's your call. If you want to file charges, I'll back you up.”

Letting go of the vision of Warren Gooding behind bars, Bo gave her own sigh. “Strategically, I think we'd be better off not filing charges, but not letting him know.”

“I agree. I'll talk to the town council about this whole situation. I don't want everyone getting sucked into what should be a private divorce situation. Bad blood can cause trouble for years. Harold Patterson”—that was the barber—“is already up in arms because he's been sweet on Miss Doris for years, not that she's having any of it, but he thinks he can impress her by taking up for her and Emily.”

Bo rubbed her forehead; she could feel a headache coming on. The way the lives of people in small towns were woven together was foreign to her, but over the years she'd gotten sucked into it anyway, and damn it, now that she knew these people, she
cared,
however reluctantly. It was disturbing that she even
knew
this many people. If she'd known this would happen, she might never have taken the job of chief.