Jake had powered through his bacon sandwich. “You can walk me out,” he said. “I’ll catch you later, Coop. Sheriff.”
When Jake was gone, Sheriff Daniels took a sip of his coffee. “So. How are you doing, Cooper? How’s the new chief of police treating you? He still got you out on patrol?” He didn’t give me time to answer, since he already knew. “Aren’t you bored?”
“Bored? Listen to this. I answered a 911 call the other day. Someone broke into Old Mrs. Daily’s car in the middle of the night and stole thirty-two dollars’ worth of adult diapers.” I nodded solemnly. “It’ll be in the paper this week if you don’t believe me.”
He smiled. “Oh, I believe you. I don’t want to, but I do.”
The sheriff’s phone chimed, and he answered it. “Sheriff Daniels … Yes … A what? Instruct Miss Thomas not to touch anything. I’ll be right there.”
“What is it?” I asked, trying to keep the panic out of my voice at the mention of Lily’s name.
The sheriff stood. “Pay your bill, Coop. I’ll tell you on the way.”
I sat in the passenger seat of Sheriff Daniels’s truck as he took the winding road out to the Kaufman place. “How could the blood on Barb’s doors have come from a rabbit?” I asked. “How much blood can a single rabbit possibly have?”
“The test only said it was rabbit blood, not how many rabbits.”
“I’m thinking it would take a lot of them.”
“I would have to agree.”
“What does this have to do with the call you just got?”
“That call was from Drew Kaufman. Said someone sent Lil a package.”
“What kind of package?”
“Let’s just wait and take a look. I don’t want to speculate without seeing what we’re dealing with.”
He had brought me along, but he wasn’t being forthcoming. “Sheriff, why am I here?”
“Actually I came by Bryn’s hoping to catch you. I already spoke with the chief. He said he’d be fine with you helping the sheriff’s office with what’s going on with the Kaufmans.”
I waited for more. The sheriff had one arm stretched out across the steering wheel while the other rubbed the whiskers along his jawline.
“Coop, you and I go way back. I promised your mom and dad I would do right by you if you came to me looking for advice when you came home.”
“But I didn’t,” I pointed out.
“No, you didn’t. You always were stubborn. Insisted on finding your own way.”
“I mean no disrespect, but—”
“I know you don’t. And I figure you’ll find your way again eventually, but I need you now. I’ve been watching your career. You’ve got amazing instincts. You know how to read people. And you know how to work a case. That’s why I need you. And Lil needs you. If you can keep your head screwed on straight and not let your emotions get the best of you.”
“Sheriff… what does this have to do with Lil?” I attempted to keep my tone even. I lowered my right hand beside my leg and opened my fingers wide before curling them into a tight fist.
“You know that Lil’s luggage didn’t make her flight from New York, right?”
“Yeah. She mentioned it.”
“Well, the luggage was delivered yesterday. The word ‘slut’ was painted on the outside of her suitcase, and her night clothes inside were shredded.”
“What? Sheriff, why is this the first time I’m hearing of this?”
“They really wanted to keep it quiet. Lil’s very embarrassed by it. And of course we wanted to hold the information until we knew more.”
I stared out the window, processing this information. “What did the airport say?”
“They had no explanation. Our guess, someone grabbed her suitcase as it came around the carousel, disappeared with it into a bathroom, vandalized it, then returned later and tossed it back on the carousel after everyone was gone.”
“The airport should have security feeds if that’s what happened.”
“I’ve got a guy working on that.”
The sheriff drove up Barb’s long driveway and stopped outside the house. Before getting out of the car, he grabbed my arm. “Look, Coop. I love you like a son. We go way back. I also got a soft spot in my heart for Barb and her grandkids. But you and Lil have a history. If this isn’t something you think you can keep a clear head about…”
I stared across the seat at him. Studied his worried eyes. “If Lil’s in trouble, I’ll either work the case alongside you, or I’ll work it on my own.” When the sheriff didn’t let go of my arm, I added, “I’ll keep a clear head.”
“You trained in forensics?”
“Better than anyone you’ve got.”
He nodded. “Good. Let’s go see what’s in this package.”
We stood in Barb Kaufman’s kitchen, staring into a box on Barb’s counter. The kitchen smelled of cake that was now cooling on the stove. Red velvet if I had to guess, my favorite of Barb’s. Lil leaned against a counter on the opposite side of the kitchen. Her blond hair was pulled back in a low ponytail, and she wore minimal makeup—a look I imagined she wore when she was working on her drawings or writing. She hugged one arm across her rib cage while chewing on a nail on her opposite hand. She stared straight at the box as if willing the contents to magically disappear.
With gloved hands, I lifted the object out of the box: a white-and-gray domestic rabbit mounted on a piece of raw wood. It was a nice piece of taxidermy, if you liked that sort of thing, except for the paring knife protruding from the rabbit’s chest. That was not the finishing touch you’d expect from your local taxidermist.
“We’ll dust for fingerprints,” Sheriff Daniels said.
I turned the rabbit around, examining each side. “There won’t be any.”
“Why not?” Lil asked. It was the first time she’d spoken since the sheriff and I had arrived. Her face was pale, and in the light of day I saw just how thin she was. Bryn had been right.
“Just a hunch,” I said. “Taxidermists wear gloves when they work, and there are few places on this where fingerprints could collect.”
“What about the knife?” Drew asked.
“We’ll dust for them, of course, but—”
“But no one’s going to send this kind of sick gift in the mail and tell us who he is,” Barb finished.
I nodded.
Barb wrapped an arm around Lil’s shoulders. She might be a seventy-four-year-old grandmother, but she always stood strong, and she acted years younger. If I hadn’t known Lil’s poor excuse for a mother, I would think Barb was Lil’s mom. She definitely played the part more than Linda Thomas ever had.
Lil shrugged away from Barb’s touch. “I don’t need someone feeling sorry for me right now.”
“Lily Marie Thomas, that wasn’t me feeling sorry for you. That was me letting you know that you’re not alone.”
Lil’s face fell. “I’m sorry.” Tears touched her eyes, but she quickly blinked them away. “What now?” She looked from the sheriff to me.
“Where’s your suitcase?” I asked.
Her eyes widened, and she shot a dark look at the sheriff. “You told him?”
“I’ve asked the Paynes Creek PD for help. Coop’s the best detective we’ve got in this town.”
“But he’s not a detective,” Drew said. “Are you sure he can handle this?”
“Drew…” Barb said with a tone of warning.
“What?” Drew said. “Am I supposed to act like just because Cooper and Lil were a thing when they were kids that he’s the best option for protecting her now? Are we just going to forget that he was fired from the FBI?”
“What? What is he talking about?” Lil asked. She pushed off the counter, and a little color returned to her cheeks.
“He was not fired,” Barb snapped. “And you are out of line.” She turned back to Lil. “This is a conversation for another time.”
Lil seemed to accept that, though tension was edged in her set jaw. She and I both knew we’d been more
than just childhood sweethearts the way Drew implied.
Sheriff Daniels held out his hands in a gesture of peace. “Cooper has experience with some tough investigations. He does good work, and I would trust him with my life. Now, I think this is just petty prank activity—someone trying to scare Lil—but I’m not going to write it off as such without a full investigation. And Cooper’s the man for that. He’s here because I’ve asked him to be here.”
Lil’s eyes narrowed as she studied me. Back when we were younger, no one could read what was on my mind or in my heart the way Lil could. I wondered if she knew what I was thinking now—that all I wanted to do was put my arms around her and tell her everything was going to be fine. That, and I wanted to punch Drew for minimizing the connection Lil and I once had—a connection I was sure was still there.
I knew I was going to have to come clean with her, and when I did, she was going to be pissed. At me. At her grandmother. At her cousin and best friend.
Hopefully, she would forgive them for keeping my secret. But I would never have forgiven myself if my circumstances had pulled her back to a town she’d run so fiercely from. She had deserved to follow her dreams and find happiness.
She took a step toward me, and I thought she was going to demand the truth right then and there. She would want to know why Drew doubted my abilities before she could trust me to look into what was happening to her now.
But instead she turned to the sheriff. “I’m very thankful, Sheriff, for your investigation. But you’re wrong about one thing already. These aren’t petty pranks. They’re just the latest three incidents in a long string of threats directed at me. Though the blood does take things up a notch, and the knife another notch still.”
Barb let out a gasp. “Sweetie? What are you saying?”
She hugged herself with both arms. Pain etched into the creases forming between her eyes as her brows pointed in.
“Lil?” I said.
She turned to her grandmother. “I’m sorry, Grammy.” She bowed her head. “I didn’t want to worry you.”
Barb touched Lil’s chin, forcing Lil to look at her. “That’s nonsense. There’s not a day that goes by that I don’t worry about my grandchildren. Whatever this is, we’re going to get to the bottom of it. But first you have to tell us what’s going on.”
She took a deep breath. “Someone has been stalking me for months. And it appears that whoever it is has followed me to Kentucky.”
“Stalking you? How? Do you know who?” I vomited a deluge of questions. The idea that someone had been threatening Lil just wasn’t something I was prepared for.
Lil glanced uncomfortably at her grandmother, then back at me. “No, I don’t know who. And it wasn’t a big deal at first. Just a few gifts and messages here and there. Nothing threatening. Not like—”
“Like a knife into the chest of a rabbit?” Drew interrupted.
“Oh, my dear child!” Barb stepped to Lil and wrapped her in her arms. Lil looked at me, then the sheriff over Barb’s shoulder. Her eyes said everything. I knew her well enough to know she hated how much her grandmother worried about her.
Sheriff Daniels cleared his throat. “Lil, would you mind terribly if we discussed this further at the station. We don’t have to do it today, but soon. I’d like to get a timeline of everything just in case the blood on your grandmother’s door and this latest gift are related.”
Lil stepped out of Barb’s arms. “I’m fine, Grammy.” She turned to the sheriff and gave him an appreciative look for delaying the questioning. “I’d be happy to do that.”
Thirteen
Lil
Bryn was chatting with a couple at the far end of the counter when I walked into the coffee house. When she saw me, she lifted her chin and motioned for me to head toward the office in the back.
“Tricia, I need to take care of something,” she called to one of her servers.
After I confessed the truth of my stalker, I managed to stall Cooper and the sheriff from asking too many questions in front of Grammy. Instead, they left for Otis Jett’s place after I promised to come to the station and tell them everything about the person who’d been stalking me.
Otis was a trapper and taxidermist who liked to collect and sell rabbit and fox furs. I doubted he had anything to do with any of this, but given the rabbit blood and now the stuffed rabbit, it made sense for them to talk to him. And their little field trip gave me time to hunt down my cousin and interrogate her about why she had kept Coop’s return to Paynes Creek and his trouble with the FBI a secret from me.
I refused to bother Grammy with my anger and confusion. She was already dealing with so much, and I just hated to burden her with how much it hurt me that no one told me that Coop had been forced from his dream career and returned to Paynes Creek. Besides, I wasn’t even sure I had any right to these feelings.
But if anyone understood how much I would hurt to know Coop was having a tough time, it was Bryn. At the same time, she should have known I’d want to know.
Once Bryn and I were in her office, she closed the door. “What happened? You look like you just lost your favorite—”
I narrowed my eyes at her.
“You know about Coop,” she said. When I said nothing, she took a step forward. “Okay… Let’s sit down. I know this is bad, but we’re going to talk our way through it.” Bryn motioned toward a loveseat.
“If you need to sit, sit.” I crossed my arms. “But start talking.”
She sat, then patted a cushion beside her. “I really need you to sit, too.”
“Fine.” I sat on the edge of the sofa. “I’m sitting. Now tell me why Coop lost his job with the FBI, and why you—my best friend in the whole world—kept it from me. Hell, Bryn, you didn’t even tell me he’d returned to Paynes Creek.”
“Okay. Where do I start?” She twisted her hands in her lap. “Cooper came home eight or nine months ago after an FBI case he was working on went bad. I don’t know the details. Grammy might. Coop doesn’t exactly confide in me.”
“Cases go bad all the time. What was so special about this one?” I said aloud. “Drew said he was fired. Is that why he’s working some ridiculous glorified traffic cop job?” It broke my heart to think he’d been released from the job that had meant everything to him.
“There was an investigation. I don’t know the details.”
I stood and began pacing, then faced Bryn. “So you knew. Grammy knew. Obviously Drew knew. Why did none of you tell me about Cooper coming home?” Questions I had wanted to ask ever since the night I had arrived in Paynes Creek, but didn’t think I was entitled to, spilled out.
“When he first came home, Cooper asked Grammy not to tell you. Said he needed a little bit of time first. After that, I guess it just seemed easier to keep the secret going. Not burden you, ya know?”
“Coop asked Grammy not to tell me. Which means she asked you, Drew, and the rest of the family to keep it from me as well.”
Bryn nodded weakly. “He claimed he needed to heal, and he said you were happy in New York. Insisted he was thrilled that you were finding such success and insisted he didn’t want to burden you with his problems.”
“You knew when you came to see me at Christmas.”
“I did.” She bowed her head.
“You saw me.” I slammed a fist against my chest. “Did I seem happy to you?”
A tear slid down Bryn’s face as she shook her head. “No. I knew something was wrong. And that things didn’t get better after the holidays. But don’t you see? That’s why it made sense not to burden you with news of Coop.”
I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. Because I’d made Bryn promise that, I was alone in New York as my problems got worse. That isolation was on me. Had Coop been alone, too? Or had his family been enough? “I don’t know how to deal with what I’m feeling. What if I could have helped him? You of all people know how much Cooper Adams has meant to me all these years.” I walked to the door.
“Lil, stop. P
lease don’t leave like this.”
I faced her. “You and Grammy kept something really important from me. Did you think I wouldn’t find out Coop was back in town? And that something awful had happened to him?”
She stood. “I know. You have no idea how sorry I am. But Coop—”
I pulled open her office door and left before she could tell me again that Coop hadn’t wanted me to know he was in trouble.
My phone rang as I walked slowly to Grammy’s car. After having trouble with my rental car, Grammy insisted that I just turn in the car and borrow hers for the week. When I dug my phone from my bag, I saw that it was my agent calling. I’d been ignoring her calls ever since I’d gotten back to Paynes Creek. The day before I flew home, my publisher had called my agent and broken the news that they would not be purchasing my latest book. They cited “disappointing fourth-quarter sales” as the reason. Word on the internet was that all the big children’s book publishers had struggled in the fourth quarter, and that they had cut many of their biggest names. In other words, publishers had decided to cut their expensive clients in hopes of picking up lesser-known authors whom they could lure into far less costly contracts.
But I couldn’t avoid my agent forever, even if now was really bad timing.
“Hi, Rachelle.”
“Hey, Lil, hon,” she said in a thick New York accent. “I know you’re trying to spend time with the family, but I was hoping to submit your manuscript to some other publishers. I think I have a boutique outfit that’s interested in picking up your new series. Can you send that manuscript over to me ASAP?”
I squeezed the bridge of my nose. “Sorry, Rachelle. I should have called you back sooner. Here’s the thing—I just don’t know if that’s what I want to do now. Getting dropped by my publisher was a big blow, but… well, I’m wondering now if it was a sign.”
“A sign? It was a sign that your acquisitions editor is a jackass and those executives don’t know what the hell they’re doing anymore. That’s all. There are plenty of other publishers.”
Truth is in the Darkness (Paynes Creek Thriller Book 2) Page 7
