Page 248 of Love Bites

CHAPTER15

“You can’t go to the police,” Old Man Harvey told me as the two of us sat outside at Aunt Zoe’s picnic table in the twilight. Between us, we forked down the last few pieces of one of Beatrice Geary’s homemade cherry pies.

I swallowed a glob of sweet cherry goo. “Why not?”

“You don’t have enough proof.”

“I’m not saying Jeff’s guilty.” At least not out loud in front of mixed company.

Shivering in the chilly air, I zipped my jacket up to my neck. The afternoon storms had sucked the heat from the hills and left a damp, wet-dirt-scented nippiness in its place. As I shoveled the second-to-last piece of pie onto my plate, I looked at Harvey. “I just want to see if the cops already know about the swim team connection.”

“They do.”

I did a double take. “How do you know?”

“I talked to Coop after you called me about that team picture. He says the police looked into the whole swim-team deal when the second little girl disappeared. Checked out every one of the parents, including Wymonds.”

Coop?“Who’s Coop? One of your bar buddies?”

“Nah, Coop’s not much of a socialite. He prefers to drink alone.” Harvey stabbed another bite of cherries.

“How does this Coop guy know so much about the case?”

“Coop is a detective for the Deadwood Police. He’s also my nephew.”

I paused, mid-chew, on that little tidbit. “Your nephew?”

“Yes, my nephew. As in my uppity older sister’s youngest child. Anyway, Coop says that Wymonds has an alibi … of sorts.”

“What do you mean ‘of sorts’? That doesn’t sound very definite. Maybe they didn’t dig deep enough. Maybe they need to take a second look at Jeff.” They probably didn’t even know about the jacket back then.

Harvey pointed his fork at me. “You ain’t in Rapid City anymore, girl.”

No, I wasn’t. I’d left that glum existence that had been filled with long hours at the dealership and no free time to spend with my kids, who’d been growing up without a mom, as well as a dad. I’d showed up late to way too many birthdays over the years to ever return to that chapter of my life, but I had a feeling Harvey was talking about something else.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” I asked. Beware of flying monkeys and angry Munchkins?

“You can’t go accusing a local kid of something without having definite proof.”

“Definedefinite.”

“Blood on his hands.”

“What about the jacket?” I’d shown it to Harvey when he arrived with the pie.

“You know that’s not enough. Besides, there’s no blood on it.”

I frowned at the image that conjured up, pushing aside the last of my cherry pie. “We don’t even know what happened to Emma. What if I’m onto something.”

He snorted. “Your theory is as holey as my favorite Fruit-of-the-Looms.”

“I told you last night, your underwear as a topic of discussion is off-limits.”

Grinning, he nodded at the remains of my pie. “You gonna eat that?”

I pushed the plate toward him. “This counts toward our deal, you know.”

“What deal?”

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