A Killer Past by Maris Soule Read Free Book Online Page A

talked to the owner this morning. It was left there by a little old lady.’
    Jennifer’s eyebrows rose, and she sat back. ‘You’re kidding.’
    ‘Not at all.’
    ‘So were the boys telling the truth last night? Do you think an old lady did that to them?’
    Jack started to shake his head, but shrugged instead. ‘I’m not sure what to think.’
    ‘Stewart thinks they were so high they probably did it to each other.’
    ‘Hospital tested them, didn’t it? What did the tox screen show?’
    ‘Traces of coke, but mostly marijuana. We even found a bag in the tall one’s shoe. They were definitely flying, but I don’t think they were high enough to make up a story like that.’
    ‘This old lady’s in her seventies. About your height. Think you could have taken them on? Both of them?’
    ‘Wow. I don’t know.’
    Jack watched her chew on her lower lip, then take a sip of her iced tea. He knew she was remembering the boys from the night before and the injuries they’d sustained. He liked the way Jennifer Mendoza’s mind worked. In the two months since she’d been hired, he’d watched and listened as she learned the routine and worked with Stewart VanDerwell. She asked questions, followed up on leads, and wanted facts. No jumping to conclusions. No taking the easy way out.
    She was young and enthusiastic, and he envied her that. She also knew how to take a joke. She might consider Stewart a dream, but so far her partner had played two pranks on her … or tried to. One was the old standby of having a friend lay in a casket in the local funeral home, and then having someone call in a 10-34. From what Stewart said the next day, when they went to investigate the open door, Jennifer had no idea what was going on and screamed like a banshee when the guy sat up in that casket.
    It was the second prank Stewart tried that backfired.
    Jack sat back in the booth as the waitress brought his beer. ‘Same as usual?’ she asked, and he nodded, then added, ‘Easy on the onions.’
    Once the waitress left, he looked at Jennifer. ‘That day you said you had a terrible headache and couldn’t drive, did you know Stewart had put Vaseline on the cruiser’s door handle?’
    She grinned. ‘When he made such a big deal about me driving, Iknew something was up. And to squelch a rumor, I did not wet my pants that night at the funeral home.’
    ‘Well, you wouldn’t be the first if you had,’ Jack said. ‘That’s one of the oldest pranks around.’
    ‘What about you?’ she asked. ‘When you started, did they give you a rough time?’
    ‘Not here. When I was hired here, I’d already put in ten years in Chicago. I think they were afraid to pull anything on me.’ And he knew they felt sorry for him back then. Losing your partner in a shoot-out was one of the worst things an officer could go through.
    ‘What brought you here?’
    He chuckled. ‘You mean to Mayberry?’
    ‘This town isn’t that backward.’
    ‘And it never has been, but Rivershore also never has had the same level of crime as Chicago. Still doesn’t. Our stats may have gone up over the years, especially regarding gang violence, but it’s still a nice place to live. And that’s why I applied here. In Rivershore there was a good chance my boys would have a father as they grew up, and my wife would have a husband, one who wasn’t so stressed out from the job and so cynical about mankind that he turned into a drunk. Also, my wife grew up in Paw Paw, and we decided Rivershore was close enough that we could easily visit her folks when we wanted, but far enough away that my in-laws wouldn’t always be over.’
    Jennifer said nothing for a moment, then nodded. ‘I can’t imagine what it would be like to lose a partner … to have something happen to Stewart. I mean, he’s got little kids.’
    Jack did know what it was like. ‘My partner, Craig, had four. Two boys and two girls. His wife remarried after a few years, but she said things were never the same