Her Hometown Detective

by Elizabeth Mowers

  “I get why you want to help me,” he said. “You need to know your shop is safe. You need to know that you won’t be accused of any future crimes.”

  “Yes, that’s the start of it, but that’s not all of it.”

  He turned. “You also want CeCe’s respect.”

  Faith cracked a smile. “I won’t hold my breath for CeCe’s respect. I’d settle for her keeping her thoughts to herself. She trades gossip about me like a kid trading baseball cards.”

  “I think you’re brave for coming back and starting over. You knew you’d have to face people like CeCe, but you chose to return anyway. That takes guts.” She stared at him as if uncertain what to say next. She fumbled over a few inaudible words, and he felt he had to help her. “You can just say thanks.”

  “You have no idea what that means coming from a person like you.” She readjusted in her seat. “I grew up feeling like I had no guts, no backbone. After the scandal with my dad broke, I had no choice but to toughen up. Eat or be eaten, right? Not a day goes by where I don’t wonder who I would be today if my dad had never been caught. What kind of path would I have found—for better or worse?”

  “Would you be here?”

  “Who knows. I probably would have never moved away, and you would have never heard of me.” Her eyes danced, the rising moon reflecting in them. There was something supernatural about the tint as they stared back at him, as if she could foretell his future but was biding her time before letting him in on it.

  “The moon,” he said, grappling for a distraction from Faith, from the ache coming over his body once again. It was an ache to draw her close and touch her and kiss her, like he’d done at Falcon’s Peak. “You can see it now.”

  It was true. The globe had risen above the tree line, looking close enough to touch. It cast an eerie glow over the street, lengthening shadows of streetlamps, cars and passersby.

  “I brought flashlights, but I don’t think we’ll need them,” she said.

  “You weren’t planning on chasing anyone on foot were you?” His tone was joking, but he wasn’t sure she wasn’t.

  “No. I’ll leave that up to the police.”

  “Good answer.”

  “What do you think your dad is doing on a night like tonight?”

  He groaned. “Huh, let’s see. He’s probably in his shack sharing beef jerky with Duke.”

  “That doesn’t sound too bad. Duke is a sweetheart. I’m packing bacon for him next time.”

  Tully studied her, surprised that she thought there would be a next visit with Walter and Duke. If she realized she’d misspoken, presuming more than she should have, she didn’t show it. Her face was as relaxed as Duke’s when he was ten minutes into a good belly rub.

  “I know you couldn’t get a good sense of it when we were there, but my dad adores that dog. He relaxes more when I’m the only one visiting. I get to see him with Duke, see how affectionate and doting he can really be.”

  “Bonnie always says that everyone needs someone or something to love in order to be happy.”

  Tully chuckled. “Is that all?”

  “Well, no. She actually says that everyone needs someone to love, something to look forward to and something to give them purpose every day.”

  “What about you? Do you think your motorcycle shop will give you purpose?”

  “I think so. I’ve wanted it for a long time, even when other people told me I couldn’t do it on my own.”

  Tully scowled. “Who would tell you a thing like that?”

  “No one worth mentioning. I stupidly believed they were right too. But Bonnie helped me find the courage to follow my heart.”

  “Is that why you named your store Heart Motorcycles?”

  “Pretty close. How about you? Does being a detective give you a strong enough sense of purpose?”

  “It sure does.”

  Her face eased into a pleased smile. “Really? What do you love about it?”

  He reached into the cooler as he considered her question. He retrieved two bottles of water and handed her one.

  “I don’t think anyone has asked me that before.”

  “Never? I hope you’ve asked yourself that question.”

  He wasn’t sure if he ever had. He’d known since the time he’d been a child that he wanted to be a police officer. Somewhere along the way that path had led to detective work.

  “I like learning about people’s behavior, analyzing evidence, discerning the truth from the lies. I have strong instincts as far as that goes, so I’ve learned to hone my skills. It helps me to excel at my job but it’s not why I love it.” He took a sip of water, contemplating. “I know what it’s like to be vulnerable, to need someone to look after you. People in this town have been doing that for me since I was a kid, and I don’t know how I might have ended up without them.” He thought of Miss Jenkins, of the Garners, of Charlie’s family. He’d heard folks say that it took a village to raise a child, and as far as his experience proved, that had been right.

  “Do you feel like you need to give back to the people of Roseley, then?”

  “I do. The people here sometimes feel like an extension of my family.” When Faith didn’t respond, he’d wondered if he’d lost her. Although she had returned to live here, he imagined her feelings about the town didn’t run nearly as deep as his. He searched to explain it.

  “When I was in the police academy, my field training officer described himself as sometimes being a sheep dog. Not all the people in my class identified with the job specifically in the same way, but his illustration resonated with me. Sheep dogs dutifully protect the flock—that’s how I try to serve this town. Diligently, fairly. So when you ask if that brings me great purpose, I can wholeheartedly say it does.”

  “Dutiful, protective—that’s you, all right.”

  “Do you think so?”

  Faith nodded slowly, stare unflinching. “I know so.” After a few beats she shifted in her chair, voice growing softer. “Can you tell when someone is trying to hide something from you?”

  Sometimes. Right then he knew what she was really asking. She wanted to know if he could read her feelings for him. He knew that was what it was, because he’d already been asking himself the same thing. He’d been reading her since the day she’d rolled into town and had thrown his world off-kilter.

  “Yes.”

  “Always?” She was baiting him. It had him leaning closer to double down on his confidence.

  “Why don’t you put me to the test?”

  The corner of her mouth flinched. “Who says I’m not already?”

  “Okay,” he said. “Your body tells more of the story than you even realize.”

  “I’m listening.”

  When he leaned more heavily on the armrest of his chair, he saw her breath catch. She was working to keep her control, her confidence.

  “Are you still married?” he asked, studying her. There was that mouth flinch again.

  “What makes you ask if—”

  “Your new last name is an obvious reason. You’re also a woman seeking out family and stability. Perhaps you’re coming off a broken relationship. Maybe you have a desire to start over or prove something to yourself. Maybe you want to prove yourself to someone in your past. Your dad? An ex-husband?”

  Her jaw tightened, the jaw muscles flinching a warning sign for him to tread more carefully.

  “Which is it?” she said. “My dad or ex-husband?”

  He took her hand and turned it over in his. The skin up her forearm broke out in goose bumps under the heat of his touch. He enjoyed the story her body told him now. “I noticed the other day that you don’t have a mark on your ring finger. Either you were never married—” he rubbed his calloused thumb down the delicate length of her finger “—or the marriage didn’t last long enough to leave a lasting impression.”<
br />
  She squeezed her eyes shut as if recalling a memory.

  “Unfortunately, any time a marriage ends, it leaves an impression.”

  “How long were you married?”

  “The divorce paperwork was finalized before we made it to eighteen months.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “I’m not. I learned a lot from my failed marriage to Kyle. Bonnie helped me understand why I married him in the first place. She and her late husband, Paul, really steered me to turn my life around for the better.”

  “I think I like your friend Bonnie more and more.”

  “Her friendship is one of the best things that ever happened to me after I moved away.”

  “So this Kyle guy...” At the mention of his name, she quickly claimed her hand back to the safety of her lap. Tully had tripped up, a rookie move. “Is he out of the picture?” She bit her lower lip before nodding. It wasn’t exactly the kind of answer he’d been hoping for. “People are usually lying when they bite their lower lip like that.” She released her lip quickly. “Is he still around?”

  “Maybe you really do know your stuff.” She laughed, uncomfortably. “He still calls, but I don’t usually answer. He’ll eventually tire of being ignored. At least I hope so.” She took a drink of water, studying him for a moment. “What about you?”

  He shook his head. “Single.”

  “Has there ever been anyone serious?”

  “Define serious.”

  “Have you ever been engaged?”

  “Never. I don’t see myself getting married.”

  She tipped her head, perplexed. “Anything to do with your dad?”

  Tully shook his head again, more violently than he had intended. With it, a calm recognition, a knowing, came over her face. Perhaps, he thought, she could read his tells too.

  “Anything to do with your mom?” She said it softly, like she was gently easing off a bandage that had been covering a wound for a long time. He sucked a breath.

  “I don’t talk about my mom,” he muttered.

  “I know.” Her voice lulled. “When you mentioned her the other day, you made it seem like she had died.”

  “She may as well have. It’s how I’ve thought of her for a very long time.”

  “Do you think of her a lot?”

  “Sometimes.”

  She didn’t speak for a while, letting his answer hang longer in the air than he’d intended. Finally, she continued.

  “When I graduated high school, my mom moved to Florida to escape all the public scrutiny caused by my dad. She calls from time to time. Sometimes she invites me down to Florida for a visit, but I never go.”

  “Why not?”

  “A relationship works both ways. She hasn’t been back to Michigan to see me since I was seventeen, and for ages before that she wasn’t emotionally present in my life anyway. I got used to surviving without her.”

  “I’m sorry you had to do that.” He pursed his lips, the words failing to convey all he felt. “You should never have had to go through that. Mothers should be more.”

  “Something tells me you know what I went through,” she said. This time her hand found his arm, encouraging him to share something he’d sworn not to relive. He’d normally slip away, redirect, change his line of questioning. But in her he sensed a kindred spirit of sorts, someone who knew how to touch and hold and whisper to make that deep well of pain settle down again. Someone who had yearned for a little settling of her own. “Something tells me, John, that you know better than most people.”

  He wasn’t the detective to her nor the golden son of Roseley—dutiful, constant, faultless, or so he felt he had to be most days. She saw him as something else, something like her. A person who could lay his past demons on the table in front of her without worrying she couldn’t handle them. Something told him she wouldn’t disappear into uncontrollable pity, because she had had her own hurts, her own demons that could nearly match his own. Her touch was soft and comforting, but her will was strong enough to handle it, handle his past.

  He tugged at the collar of his T-shirt, pulling it down to expose a scar over his collarbone. It was low enough on his chest that he never had to reveal it, never had to worry that it would peek out of his shirt and elicit questions. Aside from Samantha and his father, only Charlie as a boy had ever asked about it. Even through high school when he’d changed in locker rooms with teammates or had spent summers cutting lawns or swimming shirtless, no one mentioned it. He wondered if it was because everyone already knew. If it was an open secret following him since childhood.

  He refused to look at it in the mirror and sometimes he could almost forget about it, at least, for a while. “I got this scar the last night I ever saw my mother.”

  Faith reached without hesitation to press her thumb over it. He stiffened, surprised at her boldness. Not since he’d been stitched up in the hospital had anyone ever touched the scar, but her hands made quick work on it now. Her eyes followed the path of her fingers. The jagged line from the crook of his neck ran down along his collarbone before disappearing beneath the folds of his shirt.

  “Oh,” she sighed, pressing her hand firmly against the scar. For a second, he thought she might cry. But when she finally lifted her eyes, he saw the fury blazing in them. In law enforcement, he’d seen that same look over the years. He’d had it himself every time he’d met with a survivor or faced evil. Though he could tell that she had jumped to the wrong conclusion about the scar, finding her both concerned and outraged stirred something in him. Until now he’d never felt like he needed to explain. If the secrets of his childhood had been lying dormant, hibernating for all these years, Faith Fitzpatrick made him ready to wake up. He dropped his hand, letting the fabric cover the exposed skin. She settled back in her chair, letting him begin.

  “I want you to think of the most glamorous woman you can,” he began. “Picture her. Whatever room she enters, she fills it from ceiling to floorboards with her presence. That,” he said, “was Evelyn McTully. That was my mother.”

  He paused, remembering the good bits. There had been good bits, he was sure of that. He knew he hadn’t imagined her love or playfulness; otherwise, the pain of losing her wouldn’t cut so deeply.

  “She was always the life of the party and craved attention like oxygen. She thought she was too big for Roseley or for most cities, I think. I doubt she wanted to get married, at least not in the sense that most people think of marriage. She liked the idea of getting married, of having children. She liked the idea of a lot of things.”

  “How did she fall for your dad?”

  “Ah, the age-old question.” Considering his parents had seemed to come from two different planets, Tully had asked himself that very thing. “It was a case of opposites attracting, but I overheard her yelling at him one time. She said he’d promised to take her out of Roseley and move them to Paris. I have a hard time believing that, because, well, you met my dad.”

  “Maybe he was a lot different when he was younger?”

  “I figure he was enamored with her, and Evelyn could certainly dominate a conversation. She most likely thought my dad’s lack of interjection meant his acquiescence.”

  “Although, who knows,” Faith said. “Maybe he wanted something different in Paris with her.”

  “Possible but not probable. At any rate, he changed his mind when she got pregnant. He wanted roots for Samantha and me. He bought my mother a house he couldn’t afford and tried to make her happy. I’m sure, outside of moving to Paris, he would have promised her the world if it would have made her settle. She wanted something else.” He stopped, remembering how he would have promised his mother anything too back then if it would have made her stay.

  “I was only eight when she left so I remember a bit more than my sister, but as hard as I try I can’t recall the days leading up to that last night with her. I
don’t remember my parents having any big fights before that night, at least none bigger than usual. I don’t remember her hinting at it or packing suitcases or kissing us goodbye. I was supposed to be in bed sleeping, but something woke me up that night. It was probably the front door opening and slamming, but to this day I’m not sure. So much of the night is seared into my memory and other bits are foggy or missing completely.

  “Samantha was sleeping in the bedroom next door, so I crept to the landing above the stairs to listen by myself. Their voices were muffled, occasionally an angry word or two would rise above the fray, giving me more questions than answers.”

  He clenched his fists and released them again. Recalling it all, putting it into words for the first time, had him grasping for some semblance of control. He was used to knowing each word before he spoke it, but this was foreign. It was like trying to describe his impression of an abstract painting. He knew it could be done, but it would be far from eloquent.

  “I overheard her telling my dad that she had another family and was leaving us for them...”

  “She had another family?”

  “That’s what she said, but I’ve wondered over the years if it had been a lie. My dad thought she was pregnant with someone else’s baby, but I don’t know for sure. I only rely on facts, and I don’t have any evidence there were other children. Another man, yes, but not another family.” He’d allowed himself to picture other children before, but the thought of half brothers or sisters having 100 percent of his mother while he and Samantha lived with her absence made him think dark and twisted thoughts. It wasn’t who he was, and it wasn’t what he would tolerate in himself.

  “How do you know there was another man?”

  His voice scraped his throat gravelly as he continued, “I saw him in the car. He was a shadow, like a bass hiding under a dock, but even at eight years old I knew she wasn’t just leaving—she was leaving with him. He was waiting in the dark to claim her and take her away from us. How another man could do that, I’ll never understand.”

  Faith nodded. He read acknowledgment in her face that told him she’d asked herself the same kind of question, wondered to herself how people could do the things they did. After a few moments, she spoke, cutting to the worst of it. “John, tell me about the scar.”