Page 43 of Mile High Mystery

“I’m saying it because I don’t really like beer. But you go ahead.”

He took a pale ale from the refrigerator and filled a glass with ice and water for her. She opened the pizza box. He studied the pizza before him. “Are those mushrooms?” he asked.

“Only on half the pizza. Your half doesn’t have any.”

“You didn’t think I could eat more than half?”

“If you do, you’ll have to pick off the mushrooms.” She popped a bite of the topping in question into her mouth. “I love them.”

He kind of liked that she didn’t back down or try to cater to him. Or pretend that she didn’t like mushrooms either—he had encountered women like that before, who tried too hard to please. Shelby clearly wasn’t trying to please him at all. How perverse was it that it made him like her more?

They sat and began to eat. For a while, neither of them spoke. Hunger sated, he began to feel a little better. “Any new developments?” he asked.

“Todd checked out of his hotel yesterday afternoon. No one seems to have seen or heard of Janie.”

“Do you think they’ve left town?”

“I don’t know. But I’m operating on the assumption that they haven’t.” She plucked a mushroom from her slice of pizza and popped it into her mouth. She wasn’t wearing any lipstick that he could tell, but her lips were a natural pink. They looked soft.

At the thought, he looked away again. “If they have left,” he said, “it blows away your theory that I’m in danger.”

“Maybe not in danger from them. But whoever killed Camille is still out there.”

Right. Sobering thought. “Have you found out anything more?”

“No. Has anything else happened to raise your suspicions? Have you seen anyone following you? Have you received any threats you haven’t told me about?”

The way she fired the questions reminded him that she was a law enforcement officer with a job to do. Not his friend, or date. “No. Honest.”

“I believe you.”

They finished eating. She slid the last piece of pizza toward him. “You can have this one. I picked all the fungi off it for you.”

The way she said it, with a sneer of sarcasm, made him laugh out loud. He ate the pizza, then stood to carry the box to the trash. “Thanks for dinner,” he said.

She rose also.

“You said you wanted to talk to me,” he said.

“Let’s go into the other room.”

They moved to the living room, and he settled on the sofa, her in a chair across from him, hands on her knees. “The results of the DNA test on the hair we found at Camille’s campsite didn’t find a match in our database,” she said. “That doesn’t mean the hair doesn’t belong to her killer, only that the killer might not be someone known to us.”

“Someone associated with the Chalk brothers, you mean?”

“They have a big organization. We have files on most of the principals, but it’s always possible they’ve brought in someone new. It’s also possible that Camille’s killing has nothing to do with the Chalk brothers. And it’s possible that the threat to you isn’t connected to Camille.”

He stared. “Are you saying my sister dies and someone steals my key and plants a mutilated stuffed animal in my bed and those are just two random things? Bad luck?”

“I’m saying I don’t know.” She moved to the edge of the chair. “Who knew that Camille nicknamed you after a bear?”

“I don’t know. I guess anyone who knew her. It wasn’t a secret.”

“She told me you were a bear of a man and a big teddy bear. Did she tell other people that?”

“Maybe. I don’t know.”

“Does anyone in Eagle Mountain know about it?”

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