Trading Places

by Fern Michaels

  “Yeah. I even talked to them. Mrs. Madsen said the only things they took were her pearls and her husband’s watch and a few dollars. Neighborhood theft, that kind of thing. It happens.”

  “Did Mrs. Madsen tell you they went through Tom’s box of things, which was in her closet? Did she tell you she hid his personal notebook?”

  “No.”

  “Well, she told me, and she also gave me the notebook. I kept a log myself. I’m going to work on it to match up the entries. Now who’s the smart one?”

  “So that’s what they were looking for? Your work notes. I more or less wondered about that. Most cops keep a notebook just like reporters do. Aggie, whatever you do, don’t share that with anyone in your department. If you’re not doing anything this evening, let’s get together and work on it. How about dinner?”

  “I can’t leave Gus by himself after he’s been alone all day. If you want to come over this evening and bring dinner with you, it’s okay. By the way, the house is bugged, but I disabled them. And Will Fargo came by with a basket of flowers that I shoved in his face. Dutch Davis did a drive-by the day after I got home. They want me to think they’re looking out for me. They expected me to die that night.” She shook her head and stood up. “I have to leave now, or I’ll be late. So, are you coming tonight or not?” She held her breath, hoping the response was yes. This guy could definitely grow on her.

  “Sure. Chinese at seven okay with you? If we crack this, I get the exclusive, right?”

  “Yeah. Seven is good, and Chinese is okay.” She gave an inward sigh of relief.

  Nathan stood up and shrugged into his raincoat. “You’re different, Aggie. I can’t quite put my finger on what it is, but I like the new you. I really do.”

  Aggie shrugged as her stomach tied itself into a knot. “A near-death experience will do that to a person. It’s a given that I wouldn’t come out of that the same as before it happened. Even Gus changed. You picked up on it yourself. Don’t knock yourself out trying to figure it out.” Damn, she’d wanted her response to be a little more flippant, a little more blaseé. Instead it had come out as angry and defiant.

  “No, it’s something else. I just can’t put my finger on it right now. I will, though. I think I’ll go over to the hospital to check on Will Fargo. Take it easy, Aggie.”

  “Yeah, you, too. If you find out anything, call me.”

  It was a three-story gray fields tone farmhouse weathered by years of sun and the elements. You could see it from the road even though the weeds were chest high. The late-afternoon sunshine shimmered on the diamond-shaped windows. A sign hung at the end of what was probably once the main driveway. Alex pointed to it. The lettering was faded from the elements but still decipherable. Spring Willow Farm.

  They’d arrived late on Saturday and spent all day Sunday cleaning and dusting the house. They hadn’t left the house until this morning to buy supplies.

  “This is the middle of nowhere, Aggie. Your neighbors are miles away.”

  “I know. Lizzie and I came here once right after we inherited it. We wanted to see if we should keep it and pay the taxes or sell it. It’s fifty acres. There’s even farm equipment in the barn although I don’t know if any of it works. We decided to keep it and split the taxes and the insurance bills. They grow a lot of corn and buckwheat around here. I have to get these seeds into the ground.

  “I wonder how Lizzie is doing? You don’t think anything will happen to her, do you, Alex? This is her first day on the job. I’m hoping she goes home for lunch and e-mails me.”

  “Your sister looked like a tough cookie to me. I think she can hold her own. If you’re going to stew and fret, we might as well go back.”

  “I’m not going to stew and fret. She’s my sister, I have a right to worry about her. She’s never been shy about opening her mouth. I’m just worried she’s going to say the wrong thing to the wrong person. Damn, I wish I knew where the chief is going to assign her. Lizzie doesn’t like to take orders, she likes to give them.”

  Alex looked at the area they’d walked off, which was to be Aggie’s truck garden. “US-huh. Okay, Detective Jade, let’s get on with your new career and get these seeds into the ground.”

  Aggie beamed her pleasure. “It’s nice out here, isn’t it, Alex? The air is clean and fresh, the sky is blue. There’s no smog. There aren’t any cops, just a sheriff.”

  “I don’t think I could live year-round in a place like this, Aggie. I need more life, more sound, more color.”

  She did, too, but she wasn’t going to admit it. Short-term was just fine. She pointed to the Rototiller and tossed him a packet of seeds. She grinned, both her thumbs shooting in the air.

  Aggie Jade was on a roll.

  Chapter Five

  Lizzie’s afternoon was just as boring as her morning until ten minutes before she was to go off duty. She knew who the big detective was the minute he entered the impound room. The pictures Aggie had showed her of the lumbering Dutch Davis didn’t do him justice.

  When she was a child, her mother had told both her and Aggie there was no such thing as an ugly person. She had lied.

  Dutch Davis was one of the ugliest people she’d ever laid eyes on, and she had laid eyes on many such people while living in Las Vegas. His stature alone was cause for alarm. He had to be at least six-foot-five. And he wasn’t just fat, he was spongy fat. It was almost impossible to see his mean little eyes in the folds and creases that lined his moonlike face. His nose was broad and flat as if it had been broken one too many times and never healed properly. Lips that were big and rubbery revealed teeth that were pitted and cinnamon-colored. If that wasn’t bad enough, half of his left ear was missing. He looked and sounded like a thumping barrel as he trundled down the hallway. The floor quivered under his weight. Lizzie felt a shudder ripple up from her toes.

  She schooled her voice to neutrality. “Detective Davis, nice to see you again. How’s it going?”

  “It’s going. How’d you manage to wrangle this cushy deal?” A beefy arm waved to indicate the evidence room.

  “Dumb luck, I guess. I heard Will Fargo had an accident last night. Then the chief said half the staff is out with some kind of intestinal bug. I think I’m just filling in until they can find a replacement for Will. I understand he was hurt badly. Have you heard anything?”

  Dutch slapped a plastic bag with a knife inside under the grill. His voice when he spoke was a rich-sounding baritone, a direct contrast to his ominous appearance. “I need to log this in, Jade. I heard the same thing about Will but don’t know anything else. So, you’re the keeper of the keys.” He pointed to the vault that took up half the room. It was where the department held confiscated drugs and money.

  “During the day I am. I was just going off duty. Sign the form, Dutch, and I’ll log in the evidence.”

  “I thought you’d take the whole ninety days, Jade. Are you some kind of weirdo? Who gives up ninety days with pay to return to work?”

  Lizzie looked up from the form she was eyeballing. “People like me, who can’t accept the department’s investigation into Tom Madsen’s murder. It was such a high-profile case. You guys let it get cold. I need someone to explain that to me.”

  Dutch’s mean little eyes got meaner. “Are you saying what I think you’re saying, Jade?”

  Lizzie fixed her gaze on him. Fifty more pounds and he could have been a sumo wrestler. He was sweating. “Yes.”

  “You could make some serious enemies saying things like that, Detective Jade. We all busted our asses trying to find out what happened that night. We’re still busting our asses on department time and on our own time. Do you think you can do better?”

  Lizzie heard her replacement walking down the hall. She felt dizzy with relief when she unlocked the door, turned the keys over to Jim Windsor, and started to exit what everyone called the Fort Knox Cage.

  She knew right away that Dutch Davis wasn’t going to move out of her way. She moved to the right, he moved to the rig
ht. She sidestepped to the left, he moved left. Dutch Davis was one of those cops who didn’t believe women had the right to be cops, and all the sensitivity classes in the world weren’t going to change his thinking. He was a Neanderthal in more ways than one. Intimidation wasn’t something Lizzie subscribed to. “Do you mind moving, Detective Davis? I’m in a bit of a hurry.”

  He mimicked her, an ugly look on his face. Lizzie sighed. “We can do it the easy way or the hard way, Detective Davis. Which is it?”

  “Oooh, oooh, let’s do it the hard way, Detective Jade,” Davis mocked her.

  “This is the last time I’m going to tell you, either you move that fat ass of yours, Davis, or I’ll have to move it for you,” Lizzie said sweetly. She could feel her heart thumping way too fast inside her chest. Way too fast.

  He laughed, an ugly sound that matched the ugly look on his face. The laugh went with his appearance unlike his voice. “You and what army?” Out of the corner of her eye Aggie could see Jim Windsor’s hand go to the telephone.

  Her voice was still sweet when she said, “Me and no army.” He laughed again, the same ugly sound. That meant he wasn’t going to move. In the blink of an eye, Lizzie’s feet left the ground as she literally pirouetted in midair before her leg slammed straight out into Davis’s midsection. Her clenched fists came down on his shoulder with such force, his lunch spewed across the floor. Lizzie stepped over and past the mess. She turned to look at Jim Windsor, whose mouth was hanging open in stunned surprise. She shrugged for his benefit, saying in the same sweet voice, “You heard me asking him to move.” She leaned down, grabbed a hank of Dutch’s hair, and jerked his head backward. “Get it through your head, I’m the last person you want to go toe to toe with, Dutch.”

  She dusted her hands dramatically. And, I’m not even a cop. Lizzie could feel her heart beating a mile a minute as she signed out and headed for the front door, where she plowed into Nathan Hawk. She mumbled something but kept on going, rain sluicing all around her. She was drenched by the time she got to her car. She had to get out of there now. Decking Dutch Davis was probably a really stupid mistake.

  Nathan opened the passenger-side door on the run and literally fell into the car as Lizzie pulled away, her tires screeching on the wet asphalt, one of his legs dangling outside until Lizzie slowed the car.

  “Did somebody steal your hair spray?” he gasped as he righted himself, buckled the seat belt, and straightened out his legs.

  “Worse than that. I decked Dutch Davis in the evidence room.”

  Hawk stared at Lizzie in disbelief. “As in he hit the floor? I know that guy, he must weigh around three hundred pounds. Jesus.”

  “He’s all blubbery fat, but yeah, as in he hit the floor. Then I chopped at his shoulder. I might have broken it. I heard a funny kind of noise, but then it could have just been him puking all over the floor.”

  “Remind me never to make you mad. By the way, where are we going?”

  Lizzie kept her gaze on the rain-slicked highway. “I’m going home. You hopped in my car, so I guess that means you’re going home with me. I thought you were bringing dinner later this evening. Don’t tell me you’re one of those guys who arrives early and stays all night.”

  “Only when I’m invited. I’m talking about the all-night part. But to answer your question, my nose told me there was a story to your bolting out of the station. I am bringing dinner, but that’s later. This is a good way for us to spend some quality time together. You know, Aggie, I might be able to help you. I’ve been on this case since it went down. If we pool our talents, we might get a bead on what happened. Just give me some kind of warning if I’m pissing you off, okay? You sure are different these days. You were never lean and mean like this before. It takes a little getting used to.”

  Lizzie frowned. Obviously, she was acting in a manner that was raising red flags. Aggie would have a fit if she ever found out. She made a mental note to tone down her rash behavior. “I’d never almost been killed before. My dog was almost killed. My partner was killed. I think that might explain any behavioral change you’re noticing. Wouldn’t you agree?”

  “Well, yeah, but it’s more than that. It’s not like we spent a lot of time together where I could study you. Madsen was always around. You used to smile a lot. I always thought you had a nice smile. I kind of thought that in private life you might be one of those warm, fuzzy people you hear about. I particularly liked that little crooked tooth of yours.”

  Oh shit. “Some of my teeth got chipped and they capped them while I was in rehab. I think it happened when I hit the concrete. I really don’t remember anything other than having a sore tongue from where the broken teeth kept rubbing. Imagine you noticing something like that.” Liar, liar, pants on fire.

  “I’m a reporter, I’m paid to notice stuff like that. It was a little personal, too. I wanted to ask you out a couple of times, but you were involved with Madsen.”

  Lizzie took her eyes off the road for a split second. “I never knew that, Nathan.”

  The reporter looked embarrassed. “I didn’t exactly shout it from the treetops, Aggie. I did make discreet inquiries, but everyone said you were involved. Would you have gone out with me?”

  “Yeah. Tom and I broke up three months before…you know, before…We were on iffy ground for six months prior to that. I had put in for a transfer because our relationship was starting to throw off my timing where our partnership was concerned. I’m not sure if he knew about the transfer or not. When the transfer came through, and the chief assured me it would, I was just going to say good-bye and move on. It’s weird. Sometimes when I allow myself to think about it, I think he knew, and other times, I’m not sure. Can we talk about something else?”

  “Well sure,” Nathan said affably. “How do you like this lovely spring weather?”

  Lizzie risked a quick glance sideways just in time to see a wry grin on the reporter’s face. Tongue-in-cheek, she said, “I’m loving it. We need the rain. It’s supposed to get cold tonight. Cold enough to make a fire. I love a good fire.”

  “With popcorn?”

  Lizzie tapped her horn lightly at a Saturn that appeared to be stalled. The driver rolled down his window and motioned her to move around his vehicle. She did. “I like popcorn. I don’t think I have any, though.”

  “I like the fluffies. The ones that pop first. Lots of butter and salt. Great roughage.”

  Lizzie laughed. “Me, too. Guess I won’t have to water all the new plants for a few days,” she said as she swerved into her driveway. Aggie had told her Nathan lived in a condo. “How do you like condo living? I would have taken you for a backyard barbecue man.”

  “I’m strictly a takeout man. I can make coffee and boil an egg or maybe make some toast, but that’s about it. I don’t starve.”

  Minutes later, Lizzie stretched her neck to look in the backseat. “I forgot and left my umbrella back at the station. We have to run for it. I can put your clothes in the dryer,” she said, swerving into her driveway on two wheels.

  Nathan clutched the strap overhead, his breath exploding out of his mouth before he stepped out of the car. Cops, with their defensive-driving techniques.

  Lizzie stifled her laughter. She was sure that when he left his house earlier in the day he’d looked all creased and polished. Now he looked mussed and wrinkled in his khakis and a pale blue button-down shirt.

  “It’s a warm rain. Did you ever take a walk in a spring rain, Aggie?”

  To Lizzie’s ears it sounded like the most important question in the world. He appeared to be waiting for her response. She wasn’t sure if he was holding his breath or not. “I guess I did when I was a kid, but what comes to mind more than anything was stomping in puddles. As an adult, no, I can’t remember ever taking a walk in the rain. Isn’t that something lovers do?” She looked up at him, a wicked gleam in her eye. “Was that a trick question, or was that your way of asking me to go for a walk in the rain?”

  “I saw some really grea
t puddles farther down the road. Wanna give it a shot?”

  “Well, sure, Nathan but let me get…Gus first. Were they big puddles?” she called over her shoulder.”

  “Oh yeah.”

  “Then I’m your girl.” Lizzie unlocked the front door and whistled for Alice, who came on the run. She kicked off her shoes and hung her jacket on the doorknob. Alice bounded ahead of her and down the steps, where she skidded to a stop in front of Nathan. She growled deep in her throat.

  Nathan backed up a few steps. “What’s with that dog, Aggie? He used to like me.”

  “He’s just…schizy these days. They called him a loose cannon at the station. He has a right to be suspicious of everyone these days. You said something about some big puddles.”