Dead Tease (20 page)

“This could ruin that kid’s career,” said Lew. “What a shame.”

“A shame maybe,” said Osborne, “but that kid sounds like a real razzbonya. Worse than his old man.”

Two days later, Dani and Osborne met with Chet Tillman in his office at City Hall.

“What’s up, Doc?” asked Chet with a chuckle at his little joke. Osborne gave a polite smile in response.

“Chet, we have a problem,” said Osborne. “I understand that you and the town council have decided to bring your son in as a replacement for Chief Lewellyn Ferris. Is that correct?”

“You betcha,” said Chet, rocking back in his swivel chair and crossing his hands on his wide belly. “Yep, got Chet Junior starting day after New Year’s. We need young blood in the department.”

Osborne turned to Dani: “Would you download the Facebook file that Chet Junior posted, please?” Dani opened her laptop, hit a few keys, and waited. Meanwhile, Chet rocked back and forth in his chair while gazing out the window.

“Grouse hunting this fall, Doc?” he asked as the minutes passed.

“Ready,” said Dani. Osborne reached for the laptop, walked around the desk to stand next to Chet, and leaned over to show him his son’s Facebook profile and the ugly posting.

Chet stared. “So? I don’t see what the problem is.”

Leaving the laptop in front of the man, Osborne returned to his chair. “I didn’t think you would, Chet. So I ran it by Leo and Burt,” he said, referring to the county sheriff and his chief deputy. “They find your son’s language highly inappropriate for a law enforcement officer. They also said that numerous law enforcement agencies have fired officers in similar circumstances.”

“
Fired
?” Chet sat up straight, his face turning bright pink. “What the hell—
fired
?”

“Fired,” said Osborne in a quiet, deliberate tone.

“And you showed this to the sheriff’s department?” The incredulity in Chet’s voice made Osborne wish Lew was there to hear the conversation.

“I thought a professional opinion was in order.” Osborne knew he sounded like he was recommending twenty thousand dollars worth of dental implants.

“Hmm,” Chet swiveled his chair around to stare at the wall behind him. “Hmm.”

“Leo had a suggestion, Chet. Would you like to hear it?”

Chet made an attempt to brush back the hair that had disappeared from his forehead long ago. With a pained expression on his face, he said, “All right—what did Leo say?”

“He suggested you leave Lewellyn Ferris in her position for the time being and arrange for Chet Junior to join the sheriff’s department as a deputy in training. If he does well and understands the needs of the county and the town, then he will be promotable.”

“But he’s already put in five years on the force in St. Paul. You’re asking him to repeat that?”

“It may not be five years. If you and your son will agree to this arrangement and if that young man can prove that he has matured in his attitude toward the public whom he is expected to serve (Osborne left out the words he wanted to use:
serve not bully
) then he may have a successful career in law enforcement in this region.”

“I’ll take care of it,” said Chet. He pointed to the Facebook page on the laptop: “This stays confidential?”

“If your son will take it down it does.”

“Agreed. I’ll let him know he’ll be reporting to Leo.”

“Good,” said Osborne. “He should contact Leo’s assistant right away. There’s paperwork to be completed, tests to take—the usual.” He got to his feet as Dani scooped up and closed the laptop.

“One more thing, Chet,” said Osborne as he reached the door, “I’ll have Chief Ferris tear up those retirement papers.”

Chet nodded.

Two hours later, Chet Junior disappeared from Facebook.

Chapter Thirty

Late that evening Leigh settled onto the family room sofa to watch an
American Idol
episode she had taped two weeks ago. Hard to believe how life had changed in such a short time. She couldn’t get over how relaxed she felt. Even with Jim moved out, she was comfortable. His absence was hardly new, but how she felt about it was different.

The afternoon session with her therapist had helped. For one thing, deciding the friendly intimacy of their early years together was to be treasured, not resented, made her feel less duped.
People change
, she thought, pouring herself a glass of wine.
People change and you can’t stop that from happening
.

She realized now what she had refused to admit for so long: Jim desired other women. Maybe he always would. Did he substitute sex for intimacy? Maybe.

She didn’t. Friendship and closeness meant so much to her. And she was just forty—not too old to start over.

Leigh’s heart warmed at the thought of Ray Pradt. The relationship book she was reading talked about “transition people”: the people who attract you in the early months after you’ve ended a long-term relationship—they help restore your self-esteem. Could Ray be her “transition person”? Sure he was younger than she was, but so much fun! And so cute!

The sound of a car pulling up in the drive surprised her. Must be Jim back for one more suitcase. She got to her feet and peeked through the living room curtains. The sedan out front was not Jim’s car, nor the police cruiser that had been parked for hours in the drive. As she watched, a short, dark figure got out and walked toward the front door.

After one peal of the doorbell, Leigh opened the door. An elderly woman stood there. In spite of the warm, humid evening, she wore a purple trench coat, buttoned and belted. Leigh had never seen her before.

Her face was deathly white under flat black curls that appeared glued to her forehead. A slash of too-red lipstick emphasized the puckering around her lips. Intense black eyes searched Leigh’s face as she said, “I am so sorry to drop in like this, but I have a … a terrible favor to ask.” The woman choked, coughed once, and pressed a Kleenex to her eyes.

Leigh got the sense she was about to break down. “Cynthia Daniels was my daughter and I was hoping—I know this is a great deal to ask….”

“Oh golly, I am so sorry,” said Leigh with a surge of sympathy mixed with alarm. This was going to be difficult. “I’ll try to help, but I didn’t really know your daughter.”

As she spoke she wondered if this woman knew of her daughter’s obsession with Jim and her stalking of their home. She doubted it.

So far, while deciding whether or not to fire Jim, the clinic board had managed to keep a lid on that information. No one wanted the clinic to be tainted by full disclosure of the bizarre behavior of one of their esteemed physicians. “It will make our entire operation look schizophrenic—like we’re incapable of hiring stable people,” Jim had reported to Leigh.

“I would like to see where my daughter died. Just that. It will help me deal with my loss.” She shook her head and a tear escaped one eye. “Would you have a moment to show me? I’ll only take a moment….”

“Of course,” said Leigh, “if it helps you reach some sense of closure, I can do that. If you’ll wait one minute, I’ll get a flashlight and we’ll walk down to the boathouse.”

The woman dabbed at her eyes and blew her nose. “Thank you,” she whispered. “I’ll wait here.”

Leigh hurried into the kitchen and grabbed a flashlight from the utility drawer. Her purse lay on the counter. Leigh hesitated, then reached into her purse for the small handgun. She slipped it out of its holster and into the pocket of her sweat pants. Just to be safe.

Could be raccoons out tonight. Besides, something about the old woman arriving in the dark….
She felt bad thinking that way but she also did not feel safe.

“All set,” she said lightly, stepping through the front door. “Follow me and watch where you walk.”

The solar lanterns that Jim had had installed earlier that summer emitted a soft glow along the sloping path leading to the boathouse. As they approached, Leigh turned to see if the older woman was having any difficulty with the stairs leading onto the outer deck. Light from the moon overhead caught a gleam of metal in the old woman’s hand.

Leigh entered a dream. She saw fire spit from the barrel. She felt the handgun in her own hand as she fired. She woke in the emergency room with her husband sitting beside her.

“Jim? Am I alive?”

“Very much so, sweetheart. You’ve been out cold for over an hour.” He placed a cool washcloth on her forehead. “The neighbors heard gunshots and called nine-one-one. You are very lucky. The bullet from Mrs. Daniels’s gun grazed your skull. You’ll have a scar and a headache but you’ll survive.”

“Oh …” Leigh reached up to feel the bandage on the side of her head. “A lot of blood?”

“Don’t worry about that. If you’re feeling better, Chief Ferris needs to speak with you.”

Leigh pushed herself up on the pillow and reached for the glass of water beside the bed. “I’m a little shaky but I’m okay. What happened to—?”

“Your bullet hit an artery. She bled out before anyone could get there.”

“Jim,” said Leigh, tears pushing against her eyelids, “I want to sell the house. That boathouse….”

“I know.” Jim patted her hand.

Chapter Thirty-One

Osborne gazed out across the pond that fronted Lew’s property. Saucers of palest rose, lavender, and mauve hovered overhead as they sat in the wooden swing, swaying gently back and forth.

Fresh corn from her garden, a pan-fried batch of bluegills that she had caught with the fly rod off her dock that morning, and a lemon meringue pie that Osborne had tried his hand on—with moderate success—had made for a delicious late summer meal.

“Ray has been teaching Leigh how to fish for muskie,” said Osborne as he sipped his cup of coffee. “She wants to learn to fly fish and asked me to see if you might have time for a lesson or two?”

Lew leaned back, letting the light breezes off the water flow over her. Osborne enjoyed seeing her so relaxed. The retirement issue had been put away for the time being, erasing the worried look in her eyes.

Yes, Chet Tillman Junior would be working in the sheriff’s department, but Leo had assured Osborne that, given the Facebook misstep, the young deputy’s chances for advancement would be limited. At least, that was Leo’s opinion at this time. “He has a lot to prove,” the sheriff had said in a meeting with Lew, “a lot to prove.”

“I’ll be happy to get Leigh started with casting technique,” said Lew. “But I’ve got quite a schedule these days. She would be better off joining Trout Unlimited and attending some of their workshops. Think she’s serious about Ray? That could be a mistake.”

“Not sure,” said Osborne. “He told me they’ve talked things over—neither one of them wants a serious commitment.”

“We’ve heard that before,” said Lew with a chuckle. “The ladies always think they can change his mind.”

“Speaking of workshops, how is your online course going?” asked Osborne. Once the retirement issue was no longer a concern, Lew had enrolled in a graduate course on criminal psychology.

“Very interesting,” said Lew. “I’m studying personality disorders.”

“With Gladys Daniels as a case study?” asked Osborne. Lew gave him the dim eye. “Just kidding.”

“She fits the profile of someone living in their own weird reality, that’s for sure,” said Lew.

“She believed her own lies,” said Osborne. “For years.”

“She was canny,” said Lew. “If Bruce hadn’t found that envelope in the pickup that Alvin borrowed, if the blood splatters on Alvin’s shoes hadn’t matched Jennifer’s DNA—we may not have linked her to the killing of Jennifer Williams, but when the DNA analysis on the saliva matched hers, we had a connection.”

“I felt bad pressing his mother for information,” said Osborne. “She was able to tell us that Alvin did odd jobs for Gladys. That explains how they knew each other.”

“Even then I might not have had a case,” said Lew. “But with two of the bullets from her gun lodged in Alvin’s skull—the Wausau boys were able to match the bullets to that Smith & Wesson revolver of hers—”

“We’ll never know for sure,” said Osborne. “But I could swear that the knife Alvin used on Jennifer was one of Marv’s taxidermy tools.”

“Enough shop talk, Doc. Let’s enjoy the evening.”

They rocked back and forth. The lily pads were taking on a golden hue in the lowering sun; the rhythm of the swing matched the ripples on the pond. Sometimes an evening can punctuate your life with loveliness. It was that kind of evening.

Copyright © 2012 by Victoria Houston
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