Somewhere Along the Way (17 page)

FRIDAY
FEBRUARY 8, 2008
COUNTY SHERIFF’S OFFICE

SHERIFF ALEX MCALLEN PULLED ON THE SNOW BOOTS that she kept in the supply closet at the office and bundled up against the cold. Though almost daylight, the snow was still coming down. If she planned to do any investigating, she’d better walk the streambed before it got any deeper. Any hope of a clue was probably long gone by this time.

With radio, cell phone, and broom in hand, she went out the back door of the sheriff’s office. Though she could have driven to the diner, she knew if she followed the creek’s path it would be shorter.

She walked across the back parking lot and the alley to the cottonwoods that marked the edge where the creek had once crossed through Harmony. Grabbing a branch, she lowered herself down the steep six-foot incline and began tromping along the uneven ground.

She watched carefully for anything out of order, but all she saw were a few animal tracks. A few dogs, a cat, and a raccoon had all left footprints in the white powder.

Snow circled around her, whispering of danger. Alex told herself she was in the center of town, within fifty feet of businesses and roads. This wasn’t some unknown landscape, this was Harmony. But it had been years since she’d explored the creeks. A few times in her life, when rain pounded hard and fast, the creeks had risen a few feet, but never to where they’d been when the town was founded.

Alex took big steps, feeling the bite of cold on her cheeks. She glanced up through bony branches. Buildings she knew well looked foreign and distorted from the back.

Twenty steps later, she saw the corner of the diner, painted dark blue. The snow swirled, making her feel like she was in the middle of a snow globe. A blue moon had once been painted on the back wall. Now faded and weathered, only the moon’s smile shone clearly in the falling snow.

Lifting her broom, she began to sweep away at the powder as she took slow steps forward. Five feet. Ten. Twenty, before she brushed away a few inches of snow and found what she was looking for.

The remains of what had been Gabriel Leary’s takeout supper. An animal had probably ripped open the paper bag. The sandwich was mostly crumbs, but the paper cup of soup hadn’t been touched. It still had a plastic spoon taped to the top.

Alex knelt and opened the soup, now frozen. She had told herself she believed Reagan and Gabe’s story, but a part of her had to be sure. She didn’t know Leary. If he had been doing something bad, he might have threatened Reagan. It was her job not only to check the stories, but to check the facts.

Looking up, she saw the break in the trees where he must have carried her out of the gully. The snow covered any tracks, but she moved over the ground, piecing every detail into place.

Gabe was a hero. He’d saved the girl’s life, but something didn’t fit. He was hiding something. She’d stake her career on it. When he’d looked up at her pointing a gun at him, it wasn’t that he hadn’t panicked. He hadn’t cared. She had the feeling he’d faced down a gun before, maybe many times. He seemed a man who didn’t care if he lived or died. No one gets that way without reasons.

Alex reached for her cell phone and punched Hank’s number.

“Harmony Fire Station,” he answered.

“You didn’t go home last night?” she said without identifying herself.

“Is this an official question?” He lowered his voice. “Let me rephrase that. Is this the sheriff or my future wife calling?”

“Either way, I have a gun,” she answered, laughing. “So, always tell me the truth. Did you sleep at the station?”

“Yes, and you slept at the office,” he answered. “If I’d have known that, I’d have been tempted to cross the street.”

“Don’t try to sweet-talk me, just answer a few questions, Chief Matheson.” She fought down a giggle. “You have any idea what your sister did with her client last night?”

“Nope. I never ask Liz what she does with any man. I’m probably not old enough to hear the answer. Now, my other sister, if and when she ever gets a date, I’ll be looking for body parts around the house. Claire doesn’t just hate men, she spends most of her waking hours trying to figure out how to torture them on canvas.”

“So, Claire’s still painting murdered men.”

“No, not just murdered, mutilated. Last week she shipped one off to Dallas called
Holidays, Just Hanging Out with the Boys
. It was a bar scene with men strung like Christmas lights along with the garland.”

“I’m glad she found a direction.”

Hank groaned. “I guess I am too. Every painting seems to draw double the price of the last one. I just wish she painted bluebonnets or cats or anything except dead men. It creeps me out sometimes.”

They both laughed before Hank added, “Funny you should ask where Gabe is. You’re the second call about him this morning. Some man, sounding all business, called about a half hour ago and said he had to talk to Leary. He claimed he’d already tried the sheriff’s office and every hotel in town. Maybe Leary has more friends than we think.”

“Or enemies.”

FRIDAY MORNING
FEBRUARY 8, 2008
WINTER’S INN BED-AND-BREAKFAST

GABE WOKE TO THE SOUND OF SOMEONE CRYING SOFTLY. He stretched, remembering how Liz had clambered away from him just before dawn. She’d mumbled something about finding a real bed, and she hadn’t invited him to come along.

He rarely felt the cold, or the heat after years of taking whatever assignment the army had open no matter where it sent him, but he felt the chill of being alone when she left. Elizabeth Matheson was self-centered, chatty, and out of his league, but she certainly felt good under the covers.

He stood, thinking of what he would have done if she had issued an invitation to climb the stairs. He was far too screwed up to get involved right now, but it would have been tempting. Most of the night, while she slept, he watched her in the light of a dying fire, amazed that something so beautiful would allow him to hold her.

The few times in his life that he’d slept with a woman, it had been more a case of some lonely woman picking him up than him making the first move. Most of the time he’d been on leave somewhere, and the kind of woman who invited a soldier home wasn’t usually looking for more than a one-night stand.

He folded the blanket and heard the sound of crying once more. Moving through the still house, he followed the sound of a woman gulping down sobs as if trying to muffle her sadness from the world.

When he opened the kitchen door, he saw her. A thin shadow of a woman several years older than Martha Q. She sat up straight in one of the two kitchen chairs, fighting back each sob that seemed to rattle forth from deep inside her.

“Are you all right?” he asked softly so he wouldn’t frighten her.

She looked up at him, pulling her sorrow around her like a shawl. “I’m fine. You must be our new guest, Mr. Leary.” She moved with grace to her feet as she pushed a tear from her cheek. “I’m Mrs. Biggs, the breakfast cook. Would you like some coffee? It’s a little early for breakfast. We usually serve at nine in the dining room, but I start the coffee as soon as I get up.”

Gabe wanted to know what made this woman so sad, but he wouldn’t pry. “I’d love some coffee, Mrs. Biggs. Black and strong.”

She almost smiled. “Black and strong it is, then.”

“What is that wonderful smell?” he asked as he took the chair she hadn’t been sitting in.

“Pull-apart cinnamon bread baked with apple and pear slices.” Mrs. Biggs opened the oven and used one corner of her apron to pull a pan out. An aroma from heaven filled the warm kitchen.

Gabe winked at her. “Any chance that comes as the appetizer to breakfast? I missed dinner last night.”

“Of course it does. Only way to eat it if you ask me.” She flipped the loaf onto a plate and served it with butter on the side. “I’ve always had the thought that everyone should eat whatever they love most when they wake up. Starts the day off brighter, and on this snowy day, we could use a little sunshine.”

He settled at the kitchen table, drinking his coffee and munching on the best-tasting breakfast bread he’d ever tried, while Mrs. Biggs went about pulling eggs and sausage out of the refrigerator. They didn’t talk much; neither felt the need to. She’d ask if he wanted more each time she passed him and watched the slices of bread vanish one by one from his plate.

“I may eat all of this,” he finally said. “What will you feed everyone else?”

She smiled. “You’re it, I’m afraid. When Martha Q stays up after ten she never makes it down before noon, and your girl passed through here about the time I was getting started to tell me she planned to sleep through breakfast.”

“She’s not my girl,” he said. “She’s my lawyer, or was for about ten minutes last night.”

This time Mrs. Biggs did smile. “You could have fooled me.”

When he didn’t comment, she added, “How do you like your eggs?”

“A half dozen, over easy,” he answered. “Burn the sausage and those hash browns you’re making.”

She nodded and turned back to the stove. Gabe stood, leaned against the sink, and watched the snow outside. This was the worst storm he could remember in years. Or, maybe it was just the first he’d noticed. On bitter cold days he didn’t pay much attention to the weather; he just worked. Sometimes, when he was creating a story, he’d be lost in it for days, barely remembering to eat much less look out the window.

He usually drove over to Bailee and bought his groceries once a month, and if the trip had to be delayed a few days, he still had plenty of stock. Once in a while he had to turn on his computer just to see what day it was.

He sometimes thought he lived more by seasons than by months. He loved building a fire in the winter and drinking his soup out of the same mug he’d used for his morning coffee. In the spring and fall, long walks gave him a kind of peace, and in the summer, he liked lying out in the warm grass on hot nights just listening to the sounds around him.

As he stared out at the snow, he thought of the things he hated about living out on the farm. The silent, black night that left him waking sometimes and not knowing where he was. The fear that he’d die and have no one find him until his bones were chalk. The days that would pass without him hearing a single voice other than his own.

But there were things he loved too. He loved putting the stories he’d told himself since childhood on paper. He loved living with the few memories of his mother. Sometimes he wasn’t sure if he remembered her, or if he’d created her just to balance out his childhood a bit. He loved feeling safe, even though he never let his guard down completely.

Mrs. Biggs handed him his platter, then filled her own plate, and they sat down at the little table together as if they’d done so every morning for years. “I thought I’d keep you company if you’re eating in here. Guests usually eat in the dining room.” She pointed with her head to the door behind her. “When we have guests, of course. Most mornings I’ve been here it’s just me and Martha Q.”

“I would go in there,” he said as he poured ketchup on the eggs, “but since I don’t have any shoes, I thought I’d better stay in here if you’ve no objections.”

She nodded and lifted her fork. “I’d be proud to have breakfast with you, Mr. Leary. Shoes or no shoes.”

“And I you,” he answered, thinking that once in a great while you meet someone who somehow seems to fit in your world.

“Maybe when I finish I’ll talk my lawyer into taking me shopping. I haven’t bought clothes from anyplace but mail order for years.”

“You could go to the mall.”

Gabe laughed. “A few stores, a Penney’s mail-order place and fast food doesn’t qualify as a mall.”

“You don’t need clothes for work?”

He shook his head. “I work at home. I draw, and sometimes write graphic novels.”

She looked up, her eyes round in surprise. “You write dirty books?”

He laughed. “Graphic novels are like longer comic books. Trust me, they’re sold in stores. They don’t arrive wrapped in brown paper.” He’d never told anyone what he did. He wasn’t sure why he told Mrs. Biggs, other than it just felt right.

The one egg and toast she was eating seemed so little compared to what filled his plate. He cut off a slice of the breakfast bread. He’d already eaten a half loaf. Putting the slice on her plate, he said, “I saved you a piece.”

“I don’t usually eat sweets,” she protested.

“Me either. I don’t know how to cook them and what you buy in the grocery store tastes like cardboard.”

She laughed. “You’re right.”

He attacked his food. Between bites, he asked, “Where’d you learn to cook like this, Mrs. Biggs?”

“My second husband owned a bakery. He was a strong man who worked ten-hour days, six days a week, until the day he died last month. It was midmorning and he was lifting a wedding cake we were already late delivering. He yelled for me to go start the van, and then he stopped, set the cake on the counter, and fell over. His last words to me in the ambulance were to make sure one of the employees delivered that cake. He said, ‘We can’t afford to lose business.’ ”

“That why you were crying?” Gabe was sorry he’d asked once the words were out of his mouth. It wasn’t his way to pry. “Losing a husband must be hard.”