Sherry Lewis - Count on a Cop

by Her Secret Family

  Jolene, on the other hand, never quite felt she measured up. Oh, nobody said anything, but there were the looks her parents exchanged when she talked about work. The helpful suggestions her mother offered about visits to the cosmetic counter or some great sale on clothes Jolene would never wear. They tried to understand her choice of career and her driving need to make the world a better, safer place, but they just didn’t get it.

  Too bad Jolene couldn’t explain it.

  She’d never known what drew her to handcuffs instead of harmonic ratios and interrogations rather than the study of feudal indenture. She only knew she would never be happy doing anything else.

  Popping the CD she’d been listening to out of the stereo, she tugged her duffel bag from the backseat and hurried up the sidewalk. At the door, she took a steadying breath, pasted on a smile and knocked once before letting herself inside. “Hey! Where is everybody?”

  Her mother, the brilliant mathematician, appeared in the doorway at the back of the foyer, her pale hair gleaming, her face and makeup as fresh as if she’d started the day only a few minutes earlier. Jolene had spent a lifetime wishing she’d inherited even a fraction of her mother’s charm. For all the good wishes did.

  Jolene consoled herself with the knowledge that she was her father’s daughter—intense, dedicated and single-minded.

  “You’re here,” her mother said. “And right on time. I was afraid something would come up to make you late again.”

  Jolene winced. Eisley’s ultimatum had left her edgy. She had to keep that in its own compartment. This was family time. She left her duffel bag by the stairs and carried the groceries into the kitchen. “Where’s Dad?”

  “In his study. Shall I call him?”

  “Not if he’s busy.”

  Making a noise with tongue and teeth, Margaret waved away her objection. “He’s just researching. You know how he gets.”

  Grinning, Jolene tossed her purse and keys onto the table. “Don’t disturb him, Mom. He’ll leave the cave when he’s ready.”

  A frown creased the bridge of Margaret’s nose, but she nodded and returned to whatever she was doing on the stove, Jolene following. “I suppose you’re right. So, how is work?”

  Jolene sat at the table. “Work’s fine. How’s life at the university?”

  Her mother gave an absentminded nod. “Fine. Same as always, I guess.” She glanced up and brushed hair from her forehead with the back of her hand. “Did you get a chance to call Rachel Brennan back?”

  How long had she been here? Ten seconds? Twenty? Jolene slumped back and turned the crystal salt shaker in her fingers. That had to be some kind of record, even for her mother. For two solid weeks she’d managed not to think about the luncheon being planned by a few of the girls she’d known in high school, but she hadn’t even been in her mother’s house for two minutes before the subject was on the table.

  “No, I’ve been busy.”

  “But you are going?”

  “Probably not.” Jolene tried not to sound defensive. “We’re shorthanded at work, Mom. We have been for months now. Getting time away is next to impossible.”

  Margaret rolled her eyes. “Oh, but surely you can take an hour. They have to give you a lunch break. And you need to go. Those women are your friends.”

  “They’re acquaintances, Mom. Acquaintances I haven’t seen in more than ten years.”

  “Which is exactly why you need to catch up.”

  Propping her feet on an empty chair, Jolene wished she could find a way to avoid this never-ending conversation without hurting her mother. “I have nothing in common with any of them, and I have no desire to stand around Rachel Brennan’s dining room pretending to care about what they’ve been doing.”

  The crease above her mother’s nose deepened. “That’s antisocial, Jolene. That’s exactly the kind of attitude that makes me worry about you.”

  Ashamed at how quickly she could grow exasperated with her mother, Jolene let her head fall backward. “It’s not antisocial,” she said to the ceiling, “it’s self-preservation.”

  “It wouldn’t hurt you to have a few friends.”

  “I have friends.”

  “I mean friends outside the department. You should go out. Meet friends for dinner. Take in a movie with girlfriends. Date.”

  Mason Blackfox’s image flashed through her mind, but that only annoyed her more. Jolene met her mother’s hopeful gaze. “I date.”

  “When?”

  “I date.”

  “And the last time you went out with a man was—?”

  “I don’t know! I don’t keep track.”

  Dropping her feet to the floor, she plowed her fingers into her hair. “Why do we have to talk about this every time we see each other?”

  “I want you to be happy. I want you to have a full, rich life instead of one that’s so lopsided.”

  “I like lopsided.”

  “Apparently. But that doesn’t mean it’s a healthy way to live.”

  “Mom, please—”

  “Hear me out, Jolene, please. Every time I try to discuss this with you—”

  “I’m not like you, part June Cleaver and part Sandra Day O’Connor. I can’t do it all.”

  “Nobody can do it all, Jolene, and that’s not what I’m saying anyway. But shutting yourself away from everyone and everything that doesn’t fit into one compartment isn’t good for you.”

  Jolene was too agitated to sit. “I’m going to take my things upstairs.”

  “Do you see what I mean? You’re doing it again.” Her mother came around the counter toward her. “What are you so afraid of, sweetheart?”

  “I’m not afraid. I’m annoyed. There’s a difference.”

  “With me.”

  Jolene couldn’t bring herself to say yes. “With the situation, Mom. That’s all. It just amazes me that you of all people have this old-fashioned idea about a woman needing a man to be happy.”

  “Oh, honey, that’s not what I mean. Trying to get through life on your own the way you do…Well, you just make everything way too hard on yourself.” Her mother tilted her head, and the expression on her face brought back the newspaper photo Jolene had seen at Mason’s house. Funny that two people could look so much alike, and not quite fair that some stranger should bear such a striking resemblance to her mother when Jolene’s own resemblance was so weak.

  Desperate for a change of subject, Jolene said the first thing that popped into her head. “I saw something the other day that made me think of you.”

  “Oh? And what was that?”

  “A newspaper article. I swear, there was a picture of a woman who looked just like you.”

  Her mother pulled a bag of tortilla chips from the cupboard and tore it open. “Oh, surely not exactly like me.”

  “Maybe not exactly, but awfully close. She even had the same first name. It was a surreal moment.”

  Her mother pulled hot sauce from the cupboard and filled a bowl. “Margaret isn’t exactly an uncommon name.”

  “No, but it still caught me by surprise,” Jolene agreed as she moved a stack of mail from the table. “One minute I’m talking to this guy about his daughter, and the next thing you know I’m looking at a woman who could be you. You weren’t by any chance at the opening ceremonies for the Cherokee Cultural Center about thirty years ago, were you?”

  A loud crash cut off her laugh and brought her around the counter. Pale and trembling, her mother stood over the shattered serving dish. Jolene grabbed the broom from the closet.

  Her mother dragged her gaze up from the floor and touched one hand to her cheek. “I—I don’t know what happened.”

  “It’s okay, Mom. Accidents happen.” Jolene bent to sweep glass fragments and chips into the dustpan. “I’m sorry about the dish, but I have to admit that it makes me feel better to know that you’re human, too.”

  Still obviously stunned, Margaret pulled her hand away from her cheek. “That’s quite a thing to say. Of course I’m huma
n.”

  “I didn’t mean to offend you,” Jolene assured her quickly. “It was a joke.”

  “Well it wasn’t funny.” Margaret stepped over the shards of glass but chips crunched underfoot and her foot slipped a little in the hot sauce.

  She caught her balance, but looked so lost and confused, Jolene abandoned the broom and stood to face her. “Are you all right?”

  “I’m just tired. I didn’t sleep well last night and I have a headache.”

  “Do you need some aspirin?”

  “No.” Her mother looked down at her hands as if they belonged to a stranger. “I think maybe I should lie down for a little while.”

  “I’ll help you upstairs. “Jolene reached for her mother’s arm.

  Margaret jerked away and shook her head firmly. “No. I’ll just… I’ll be in my study.”

  Dumbfounded, Jolene watched her mother disappear down the hallway. She stood without moving, clutching the broom in both hands, until she heard the door close. Then, because she didn’t know what else to do, she slowly bent back to the task.

  Her mother had seemed fine when Jolene first came in. She’d even seemed okay after their argument. She’d seemed perfectly all right, in fact, until the moment Jolene asked about that photograph.

  But why had that upset her?

  Jolene wouldn’t call her mother prejudiced, but she had always distanced herself from the Native American culture in Tulsa. Theirs was probably the only house within two hundred miles without a single piece of native art. But surely her mother hadn’t reacted like that because of one teasing comment.

  No, there was definitely something else going on here.

  Determined to figure it out, Jolene pulled two bottles of water from the fridge and carried them to her mother’s study. A chill traced her spine as she approached the door, and Jolene imagined she could feel her mother’s negative energy trying to turn her away.

  This wasn’t the first time she’d imagined something like that, but these days she kept her impressions to herself. An overactive imagination, her mother had always said. Trevor had teased her mercilessly when they were younger, and Ryan thought she was two sandwiches short of a picnic for even suggesting she could feel another person’s energy.

  But she could feel something today, something so real it felt as if she’d walked into a pocket of hot humid air. She knocked softly on the door. “Mom? Can I come in?”

  A long silence. She knocked again, louder this time. “Mom? I’m worried about you. Let me in—please.”

  Her mother finally opened the door and let Jolene inside. When she resumed her seat behind the desk she sat still as a stone, her fingers unmoving, her mind obviously a million miles away.

  Jolene put a bottle on the desk in front of her. “What’s wrong, Mom?”

  Margaret’s head snapped up. Instead of the reassuring smile Jolene hoped for, her mother’s face paled. “Nothing. I’m fine.”

  “I don’t believe you. You’re not acting like yourself.”

  Margaret smoothed a hand across an open file folder and Jolene didn’t miss the slight trembling of her fingers. “I’ve been having trouble sleeping, that’s all.”

  Jolene moved a stack of books from a chair. “You were fine when I got here,” she said, sitting. “Was it something I said?”

  Margaret laughed sharply. “Honestly, Jolene, what an imagination you have. I’m tired, that’s all. It’s nothing to worry about.”

  “That’s why you broke your favorite serving dish?”

  Margaret frowned. “I dropped the dish because my fingers were still wet. It was an accident, nothing more.”

  “But—”

  “But nothing!” Her mother’s voice came out sharp and taut with tension, at odds with the careful smile she wore. “Really! This is too much. I said I was tired, and that’s all there is to it. Let’s not make a huge deal out of one clumsy mistake.”

  The rebuke was unlike her mother. “I know you’re hiding something from me. The only thing I don’t understand is why. We don’t keep secrets in this family, Mom.”

  Margaret snatched up a file folder and tossed it into a stacking tray. “I will not have you treating me like a suspect in one of your cases, Jolene. I simply will not have it.” Standing abruptly, she began shoving folders into the drawers of her credenza. “Is it too much to ask for a little privacy once in a while? Space to think? Do I really need to share every thought that goes through my head with you?”

  Margaret kept her hands busy. “Honestly, Jolene, I don’t know why you’re making such a big deal about some old picture.”

  Jolene caught her breath. “I wouldn’t make a big deal out of it,” she said cautiously, “if you’d just tell me why it bothers you so much.”

  “It doesn’t bother me. Everyone has a double—at least that’s what they say.”

  “But it wasn’t your double, was it? It was you in that newspaper article.”

  Margaret briefly glanced up from the file in her hand. “I don’t even remember. It was all such a long time ago.”

  Jolene had spent too many years on the police force not to recognize a bald-faced lie when she heard one. “How did you become involved in the Cherokee Cultural Center?”

  “Does it really matter?”

  “Apparently it does.”

  “Do you tell me everything that happens in your life?”

  “I think I’d explain something like this if you asked.”

  “Like what? Some old, silly picture in the newspaper?”

  “An old, silly picture that claims you were married to some stranger just a few months before I was born. Yes. I do believe I’d explain it to you if our situations were reversed.”

  Her mother turned away.

  “Who is Billy Starr, Mom? Were you his wife?”

  Margaret gripped the back of a chair and held on tightly. When she spoke, her voice was a whisper. “Yes.”

  Jolene had thought she was prepared for the answer, but it nearly buckled her knees. “Why didn’t you ever tell me?”

  “Because I didn’t want you to know.”

  “But why?”

  “It was a very brief period in my life. We spent less than a year together before they shipped him off to Vietnam, and he was only there a few weeks when he was killed in action.” Margaret rubbed her arms. “He was one of the last men killed in that horrible war. I guess that was supposed to make me feel better. I don’t know what it was supposed to do for you.”

  Jolene recoiled sharply. “For me?”

  Margaret’s eyes, filled with misery, met hers. “Surely you’ve figured it out.”

  Bile rose in Jolene’s throat as a new, ugly truth rose up in front of her. “Are you telling me that Billy Starr is my father?”

  “Isn’t that what you want to know?”

  No! Reeling, Jolene tried to speak, but her voice caught in her throat. It seemed to take forever to get it out. “Billy Starr is my father?”

  Margaret’s anger disappeared as if someone had flipped a switch. “I was only a few weeks pregnant when he shipped out. I didn’t know at the time.”

  The room receded. Everything Jolene had ever known to be true… Her hands shaking, she stumbled to the door.

  “Jolene! Wait!”

  “I have to get out of here.”

  “No!” Margaret shoved past her daughter and stood between her and the doorknob. “He was a good man, Jolene, but he was gone and I was young. My parents were upset that I’d fallen in love with someone who wasn’t…like me. I hadn’t seen them in nearly two years because…because of the marriage. But I needed them. I was twenty-two and a widow. I had no idea what to do or how to get on with my life.”

  Jolene stared her down. “So they made you lie to me?”

  “They didn’t know. I thought if people knew you were mixed race… I wanted you to have every advantage.”

  It was too much to absorb all at once. “You wanted me to have every advantage but the truth,” she said.


  “Does…Daddy know? Or maybe I shouldn’t call him that anymore. Does Lawrence know? Or did you lie to him, too?” The stricken look on her mother’s face brought one brief twinge of regret, but Jolene’s shock and outrage were far stronger.

  “Yes, he knows. He married me before you were born. He took the two of us in without even batting an eye, and he’s loved you like you were his own.”

  She was dimly aware of her brother standing in the middle of the kitchen, as she gently moved her mother aside and let herself out.

  She had no idea where she was going or what she’d do when she got there. The only thing she knew for certain was that her life was never going to be the same.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  “BAD NEWS, CHIEF. Those phlox you ordered? Not here yet.”

  Chief? Mason looked up from the landscape plans he’d been reviewing. Doug, he thought the guy’s name was. A new member of his crew. Had he meant that the way it sounded?

  Doug couldn’t have been more than twenty, and he didn’t look especially bright, but he’d been working hard. The sweat-damp hair and stains forming under his armpits were proof of that. He waited for Mason’s response with barely concealed impatience, shifting from one foot to the other and chomping on a piece of gum, but his broad face seemed open and his expression honest.

  Mason shrugged off the potential racial slur. He’d been in a foul mood since Friday night. “The name’s Mason,” he grumbled. “Use it.”

  Doug lifted one bony shoulder as if to say whatever. “So what do you want us to do?”

  Good question. “Who did you talk to at the nursery?”

  Doug shifted the gum to the other side of his mouth. “I dunno. Some guy.”

  “You didn’t get a name?”

  “Didn’t know I needed one.”

  “Always get a name,” Mason said, his voice tense. “Then we know who to call again.” He ran a hand across the back of his neck and tried to decide what to do now.