by Hebby Roman
Yet Mark wasn't sure he was ready to take the chance like that with his money and energy. "Hopefully someone else will show interest before it deteriorates to the point where you won't have a choice. It would make a nice bar."
"It would." Mrs. Miller eyed him in thought. "And a bar would also give you boys more to do on the weekends." She chuckled.
The bell over the door jingled and Adam Ford walked in. Adam had not too long ago returned from Afghanistan and moved to Lovely at about the same time Mark had. The loner lived outside town in an old Victorian house he was in the process of restoring. Although not a friendly sort, more silent type, Mark genuinely liked the guy.
After Mrs. Miller greeted Adam, the men shook hands in greeting. Mark noted dark shadows under the eyes, haunted expression and a few days of beard growth on Adam's jawline. Typical of a man who'd not been well for a few days. It was well known, Adam suffered from severe PTSD, so Mark didn't question him. Instead he motioned to the list in the guy's hand. "What you working on now?"
"Drywall is finally all up. Starting the paint work this week." Adam looked past him to where the paint shelves were. "My mother picked out some colors. She threatened to disown me if I paint the walls white."
"Women have a thing against white walls, I guess." Mark recalled the different colors he'd painted his townhouse in Knoxville right after his ex-girlfriend moved in. After they'd broken up, he was left with walls painted in colors named after fruits and vegetables. "Wanna grab a bite after you're done?"
Adam hesitated and finally nodded. "Sure."
"I'll be outside." Mark waved at Mrs. Miller and left. He'd make sure Adam had a good meal before leaving town. If he guessed right, the guy hadn't eaten in a couple of days.
* * *
An hour later, Mark and Adam left the diner with leftovers in carry out boxes and fresh cups of sweet tea. Adam headed across the street to Miller Hardware. Mark walked alongside having forgotten his coffee mug at Mrs. Miller's store.
When he looked to Adam, about to say goodbye, someone ran into him so hard, Mark stumbled backward and dropped his food.
A young woman, he recognized as Eliza Brock, the short order cook at the Lovely diner, let out a loud yelp and began to cry.
He wasn't sure what to do. The food was beyond help, most of it splattered on the sidewalk.
He looked to Adam who remained frozen, his eyes on the shaken woman. As typical, both he and Adam were at a loss of what to do when a woman cried, and Eliza showed no sign of stopping, her face covered with both hands.
Mark took her elbow and guided her to the front of the hardware store under the awning. "Miss Brock, it's not that big of a deal. I was probably not going to eat it anyway."
"Huh?" She looked at him and he noticed a light bruise on her cheek. The pretty woman had intrigued him since first seeing her. When he'd heard she had a boyfriend, he didn't do anything about his interest. Her dark, chocolate brown eyes regarded him for a beat then flew to the spilled food as if for the first time noticing what she'd caused. "Oh goodness. I'm so sorry." Eliza pushed her hair away from her flushed heart shaped face. "So...you didn't see him yet?"
"Who?" Both he and Adam looked around to the almost empty street. The only pedestrian was the mailman who hurried out of the heat into the cupcake shop on the corner of the next block.
"Ed—Eddie. He's dead." She covered her mouth with a trembling hand, her eyes darting between him and Adam. "In his truck," she added pointing to a blue Ford Ranger parked down the street.
"I'll take a look." Mark looked to Adam who seemed to be making an effort not to sprint to his own truck by the way the man kept looking between them and his vehicle. "Could you walk her into Mrs. Miller's place? I'll be there in a few."
Without waiting for Adam's response, he rushed to the truck.
Eddie Mason was in the driver's seat. He leaned away from the door, looked to be asleep. Mark touched his shoulder. "Eddie? You all right?"
There was no response, so he stuck his head through the open window and peered at the now slumped man. Eddie was definitely not all right. He was dead. His throat slashed clean across from jawline to jawline. Blood had streamed down his chest and puddled in the dead man's lap.
Just to make sure, Mark pressed two fingers to the side of his throat and felt for a pulse. There was none. The man had not been dead long, his skin still warm.
There didn't seem to be any signs of struggle, almost as if Eddie had been caught off guard or while sleeping. Strange since it was early in the day and if he remembered right, Eddie should have been at the garage. He worked as a mechanic for Leroy Malone.
Mark did a quick calculation. He'd driven past where Eddie's truck was parked an hour and a half earlier after his patrol of the warehouse. If he remembered correctly, Eddie's truck had not been there.
With a gauging eye, he looked around the area, scanning first the ground around the truck and then the street and sidewalk. Other than a few blood spatters on the truck door, nothing out of the ordinary that he could see. He studied the door and handle. A possible print beside the window could prove useful.
Once again he peered into the truck. Eddie was not holding anything. His hands were down and open, one against the door, the other palm up on the passenger seat. He wore the usual clothing for a mechanic. Stained jeans and a utilitarian blue shirt with Malone's logo on the right upper chest.
On the seat next to him was a paper bag. Mark walked around the truck and reached in through the open window. With his pen, he pushed the edges of the bag open and looked inside. A sandwich and potato chips. A lunch indicated Eddie planned to go to work. He continued the inspection of the truck. Other than a couple of containers of oil in the floorboard behind his seat, the truck was pretty clean.
In the truck's bed, there was a small toolbox and rope.
Eddie had parked in front of a consignment shop, which would not open until the next day, being closed on Mondays.
The businesses across the street were just opening. He would go and ask if they'd seen something. Next to the shop was a real estate office with two apartments above. One belonged to Eliza Brock, he'd have to talk to the other resident to see if they saw or heard anything. The real estate office did not open until eleven.
Mark's next reaction was to radio his station and request back up. He almost laughed when realizing, he was the only deputy on duty for the moment. Up the street leaning on his truck was Adam Ford. The guy remained stock-still his gaze downcast, every once in a while he'd lift his head and looked over to where he stood.
Keeping watch. Always a soldier.
"Hey, Adam," Mark called. "I need your help. Get me some crime scene tape from my office and the camera. They're in the bottom right desk drawer of my desk." He tossed his keys at the approaching man.
Next he called Doctor Wilkes. The town's coroner and local physician assured him, to be there momentarily. Not enough in the budget for the county to splurge on a coroner's vehicle, Doctor Wilkes would drive the one ambulance, which they used for these instances. Not that anything like this had happened in a long time, people usually died of natural causes in this town.
A few minutes later Adam returned with the needed items. By then several of the town's people were milling about attempting to get a glimpse and asking him what happened. Mark ignored them, his mind on the murder.
Jerry Pike, an older man who worked as a handyman, gave Adam a hand, keeping people from coming too close while Mark marked off the area and began to take pictures.
Once he was done, Mark motioned for the ambulance drivers to come near and take the body out of the truck while he continued to snap pictures.
He looked to one of the medics. "Tell Doc I'll be by later today to talk about findings." Mark watched them slide Eddie's body into the back of the vehicle.
The first murder in Lovely in over ten years and it had to happen the week Sheriff Clark was on a cruise. Not that it would make a big difference, the sheriff would have expected Mar
k to handle it. After all he'd been a lead homicide detective in Nashville.
In all his years with the Nashville police force, Mark had only investigated gang murders. Most had the same M.O. and almost identical reasoning territory, drugs, or both.
Eddie Mason's murder was an altogether different ballgame.
Mark made a mental checklist. First he got a couple volunteers to stand by and guard the crime scene. Until the CSU from nearby Newton County arrived, it was best not to allow any nosy civilian to contaminate the murder site.
Next, he walked along the sidewalk towards the warehouse and scanned the ground for any blood droplets. The murderer took the weapon, which meant blood might have dripped from it, leaving some sort of trail. When he saw anything out of place, Mark marked it with a tented business card. All he had on hand. He walked to the end of the street, to the empty lot in front of the warehouse. It had to be where the killer had parked in order to make a quick escape and not be seen. He looked around and then up to the edge of the building. The apartment overlooking the parking lot was Eliza Brock’s.
On his way back to the site, he called Newton's police department. A team would be there in less than an hour to go over the truck and surrounding area. Mark let out a breath and wiped at his sweaty brow with a handkerchief. He had plenty to do before they arrived.
Once he got back to Eddie Mason's truck, he called deputy Scott and woke him up. "Eddie Malone was killed. I'm going to need your help. Meet me at the station in a couple of hours." He hung up after filling in the deputy on what happened. Scott insisted on heading in right away.
Mark found Eliza still looking quite shaken, holding a cup of tea. She sat on one of the chairs by the counter shoulders hunched with her hands curved around the cup as if it kept her grounded. The woman’s reddened eyes darted to him before returning to the floor.
Mrs. Miller gave him a wry look. "Don't go getting her all upset again, Mark."
All of a sudden, he wasn't deputy Hunter, but the guy who cut her grass on Sunday mornings. He almost smiled but then looked into Eliza's wide brown eyes and something in his belly flopped. "I just have a few questions, Miss Brock."
Chapter Two
These had to be the worst twenty-four hours of her life. First she'd had a run-in with her ex-boyfriend, Jay, the night before and now this. Eliza wished she could go back to bed, climb under the covers and sleep for the rest of the week.
Mark Hunter crouched in front of her. His serious hazel eyes met hers. Apprehensive at him being so close, she straightened.
A lock of his dark blond hair fell over his brow and stuck to his sweat-moistened forehead. Although he maintained a professional distance, it still felt as if the gorgeous man was too close for comfort.
She squirmed when his eyes moved to the bruise on the side of her face. The makeup she'd worn had no doubt washed away from crying. Even with heavy foundation and powder, it had been visible, now probably more so.
"Can you tell me how you came to see Eddie?"
After a fortifying breath she recounted. "I came down from my apartment, like always, to head to work. When I saw Eddie sitting in his truck, I waved." She looked past him toward the windows. "I thought it was strange that he didn't acknowledge me and seemed to be staring into space, so I waved again. When I got closer, that's when I saw his neck was cut and all the blood."
Mark nodded and wrote something on a small pad she'd not noticed before. "Why did you assume he was dead?"
The picture of Eddie Mason's unseeing eyes came back to her full force and she swallowed. "I don't know. Is he alive then? It's just that his eyes, he looked straight ahead and he didn't seem to be breathing."
"He's dead."
Her gut clenched, she didn't know Eddie well, more of a casual acquaintance. What had the man done to get murdered like that?
When Mark remained silent as if in thought, Eliza hoped she could leave and go to work. Pretend it was a normal day. Unfortunately the deputy didn't seem inclined to let her leave just yet. He rose and sat on the chair Mrs. Miller had vacated. Once again he studied her face, without expression. "Did you see anyone walking away from Eddie's truck?"
"No. I wasn't really paying much attention prior to seeing Eddie, but I'm positive no one passed me."
"So no one walked by you in the street then?" He asked once again meeting her eyes. The guy was extremely handsome. That coupled with her bruise and probably swollen eyes and red nose made her want to move away.
"The only person I saw this morning was Cassie Tucker when she arrived at her cupcake shop. I saw her through the window about a half an hour before leaving my apartment. That was about it."
The cupcake shop was a caddie-corner across the street from where Eddie's truck was parked and directly across the street from her small apartment above the real estate office. "Did you hear any arguing or voices prior to leaving your apartment? Perhaps spotted something when you looked out the window?"
She shook her head. "No only Cassie and just before that I had the blow dryer going and usually the radio is playing so I don't hear much until I walk outside."
"And you didn't hear or see anyone when you stepped outside your door?"
Eliza thought hard trying to put her morning routine back together. "Someone may have walked past as I went down the stairs. But I didn't pay attention to who it was. I think a man, but I couldn't say for sure."
"Who hit you?"
She'd convinced herself he wasn't going to ask the question. When he did Eliza's mouth fell open and her heart skipped.
Before she could answer he interrupted. "And don't tell me you walked into a door."
"I'd rather not speak about it." She jutted out her chin somehow mustering the courage to meet his gaze evenly. "It has nothing to do with this. Can I go now? I'm already an hour late for work."
He rose to his full height of about six-two and nodded. "Thank you for waiting to answer my questions."
Eliza stood as well and decided it was best to tell him the only other information she knew. "Eddie and Jay Garrett had a fist fight a couple days ago. I doubt Jay had anything to do with this, but maybe he knows something."
A frown crossed his face and he looked at her for a few seconds. "Thank you. Take care of that bruise."
Eliza looked to Mrs. Miller, who stood behind the counter and gave her a soft smile. "Thank you for the tea." She placed the cup on a small table and rushed from the hardware store. Her heart was beating erratically and her breathing was shallow. After all the crap she'd been through the last couple days, the last thing she needed was to pass out in the street, so she took a deep breath.
The deputy was handsome. She’d admired him when he stopped by the diner. She’d often wondered if the dated anyone.
"Stop being an idiot," she mumbled out loud to herself. "And you shut up," she told her stupid pounding heart.
The rest of the day went fast and wasn't too bad, all things considered. Since she mainly stayed in the restaurant’s kitchen, it was easy to ignore all the conversations. Lovely Diner was full the entire time, everyone congregating to discuss the murder. All day the buzz of voices, a steady stream congested the place with nervous energy. Each person who walked in was either questioned about what they knew or filled in.
Eliza plated the last order of hash brown casserole and eggs, the diner's bestseller and placed the dish onto the countertop to her right. She shuffled to the swinging doors and opened them to peer out. The restaurant was still packed with familiar faces. Anxious people who hoped to glean a new tidbit of information reassuring them Eddie's murder was an isolated incident.
The thought of going home alone brought equal parts nerves and anticipation to get away from all the speculation. With a nervous sigh, she wasn't sure if being alone was a good idea, but she didn't have any relatives near. Other than Cassie at the cupcake shop, her only acquaintance was Mrs. Miller.
When Phil, the burly owner of the diner came to take over cooking, she waved him off. "I've decided
to stay a bit longer. I'm not ready to head home just yet."
Phil gave her an understanding look, his bushy brows knitted together. "All right, you let me know when you're ready and I'll ask one of the guys to walk you home."
Chapter Three
If the front yard was any indication of what he'd find inside, Mark wasn't excited at the prospect of entering the Mason's home. There were black trash bags beside the driveway, which looked to have been three for a long time by the fact some had started to deteriorate. He pulled up past the mailbox, which leaned at such a sharp angle he wondered how the postal worker managed to get mail into it.
The old clapboard house used to be white, now closer to gray was the same style as other houses surrounding it, but the others were better maintained. He stepped onto the porch and took in the rickety screen door, a corner of the screening flopped down and the cording hung past the handle. Not much in the way of bug protection, Mark thought pulling it open to knock.
A few seconds after he rapped, a skinny woman wearing a dingy tank top with no bra underneath and jean cut-off shorts opened the door. Her reddened eyes immediately raked over his body making Mark feel as if he needed to go home and shower. With very hot water.
"Hello." Her voice was raspy from too many cigarettes. She reached up to her hair and attempted to pat down the tangled mess with no visible results. "You wanna come in?" She took a step back.
Since she was barefoot, he saw the remnants of red polish on her neglected toenails.
"No. Thank you. Mrs. Shelly Mason?"
She leaned against the doorjamb and attempted a seductive pose, her right hand on her non-existent hip. "Who wants to know?"
She knew who he was. Shelly Mason had been arrested for driving under the influence a year earlier and he'd been the one to process her after Sheriff Clark brought her in.
