Page 26 of The Witch's Orchard
“He’s so good. He needs to be out there—in the world—becoming the guy he deserves to be. But… he can’t. Not until he can get past the grief and guilt he’s saddled with.”
“You think he blames himself?” I ask. It seems crazy, but I’ve seen crazier.
“I think so.”
“He was only eight when she was taken,” I say.
She shrugs and says, “I know. But he was right in the other room. And he was her big brother. He always will be.”
The double doors open, and the woman who’d been working out front sticks her head in the room. “Hey, some cops here to see you.”
“Oh?” Shiloh says.
“No,” the woman says, “Her.” She points at me.
“Ah,” I say. I toss back the last of my milk. “It’s about that time.”
EIGHT
THE COPS ARE WAITINGout front, beside Honey. Both men are wearing brown Marley County Sheriff’s Department uniforms. The taller one is probably mid-fifties, narrow-waisted and broad-shouldered with a grim mouth and a hard gaze underscored by dark circles. He looks like he stays up late, wakes up early, has been getting by on three hours’ sleep for most of his life and is just now feeling the effects.
“Annie Gore,” he says, more a barked statement than a question.
Dealing with cops in this job is usually smooth. They want a case solved, but they don’t have the time or the manpower to work it once all the leads have been exhausted and all the obvious pieces have been put together. Mostly, in those times, they’re happy to let you go about your business as long as you aren’t shooting up the place and causing problems. Sometimes, though, cops get aggressive about their turf. And cases like this one? Cases with kids involved? They stir emotions.
I run my eyes over his set jaw and the subtle splotches of angry red in his cheeks and figure this isn’t a situation where I can smooth-talk my way into an easy investigation.
“That’s right,” I say.
“I understand you’re a PI. I need to see your license.”
I take out my wallet and hand him my driver’s and private investigator’s licenses and my concealed-carry permit.
“You armed?”
“Yes.”
He squints at my various forms of ID and then hands them back to me with a low grunt. I get the feeling he was hoping I wasn’t on the level. Hoping I was just some chick waltzing around with a four-thousand-dollar gun strapped to my belt for shits and giggles and he could tell me to get out of town with a warning. That course of action having failed, he changes tack.
“Need to have a word with you.”
I look him up and down and then shift my gaze to the other guy. The shorter one—too young to be sheriff so probably a deputy—with warm pecan skin and bright brown eyes is stocky in the way college athletes gone to seed often are. I remember Leo calling it “hard fat,” and the corner of my mouth ticks up at the memory.
“That right there, Gore,” Leo had said, pointing at a Security Forces staff sergeant trudging across a base on the edge of a sweltering jungle, sweating like crazy and not complaining for a second. “That’s hard fat. Man’s been hitting the cafeteria extra hard, but he’s got some power in him. Like a bull.”
“A bull?” I snorted.
“Sure,” Leo said.
“Okay, so what are you?” I asked.
He grinned.
“Me? Hell, Annie, I’m a hawk. I go where I want, hunt what I want, do what I want.”
“And what am I?”
“Don’t you know?” Leo said, a deep laugh escaping his throat.
