Page 535 of Cold Case, Warm Hearts

“Great. Because I’m bushed.” He picked up his pipe wrench, dropped it into an open toolbox, then closed it. “I’m going to put this in my truck.”

She followed him to the door and walked out onto the porch as he went down the steps, then strode out to his Ford.

Sinking down onto the steps, she stared at the skyline in the distance, the purple lip of the IDS Tower, the shiny white of First Bank Place, and the glass curtain wall of the Piper Jaffray Building. A wall of clouds had moved in behind it, now starting to clutter the sky, and the scent of rain stirred in the hush of wind. Gooseflesh rose on her arms, despite the scrub of heat.

Samson returned and sat next to her. Took another drink, staring into the quiet neighborhood.

“I keep thinking about all those people today. They go in to buy coffee…and their lives are over, just like that.” Eve touched the bottle to her lips. “It could have been me. I go into that place off Lake almost every day.”

“Yeah. Think of their families, their spouses,” Samson said quietly.

She picked at the label on the bottle. “There was a kid—two years old.”

“Aw, man.”

“I know. And…well, I had lunch with Inspectors Stone and Burke today. Rembrandt thinks it’s just the beginning.”

Samson glanced at her. “Rembrandt?”

She didn’t pick up the bait, despite his smile. “What if he’s right?”

“Why does he think there’s gonna be more?”

“Instincts, he says.”

Samson made a non-committal sound. Then, “Just do your job, sis. And let Stone do his.”

She nodded. Took another sip of her beer, Rembrandt’s voice in her head.He’s not getting away with this…not on my watch.

Yeah, well not on hers, either.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

"Idon’t know what you’re trying to accomplish, Rem. This is stupid.”

Burke has been muttering that for the last two hours as we’d driven up and parked outside one, after another, coffee houses in the West Minneapolis area.

I’m drawing a complete blank and that fact has me wanting to bang my head against the steering wheel. I try to picture the file, the names, but only the shots from the first bombing—and perhaps the last—stand out. The last was so much more devastating. Three other buildings evacuated, an entire city block destroyed, and eight lives lost.

I still can’t remember where either of them took place, however, and I’m not sure why. Maybe it’s because I focused so hard on the victims, their faces deep wounds etched into my soul.

I do remember snippets—a German Shepherd running the length of a chain link fence, barking. An ice cream truck—strange, right? Tiny bells, ringing as if oblivious to the sirens, the flames licking the sky.

I also remember mannequins littering the destruction. We panicked when we first arrived and thought they were bodies.

But as hard as I dig, I can’t place the location of either scene.

“We should have done this in daylight,” I grouse. We spent three hours after dropping off Eve tracking down the off-duty employees of the Daily Grind, interviewing them about other employees. Even had a sit-down with the managers and the owner at the station.

All the interrogations I know will lead to nothing. No one has a motive, even the means to pull off a homemade pipe bomb.

So I admit to standing against the wall, arms akimbo as Burke prodded them for clues.

Through another window, I watched John Booker meet with families—husbands, wives, parents…

Melinda Jorgenson has a name now, as does her son, David.

I shouldn’t have had that beer, because it’s been trying to come back up for hours. We finally left—I insisted on driving, and have been trying to jog my memory since then.

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