Detective On The Hunt

Chapter 2

JJ rose from her chair when Sam escorted two women into the conference room. She’d noticed both women when she and Quint had arrived and had presumed Sam got busy on the way back or Lois had gone back on patrol and he’d had to wait until she returned. The women greeted her with friendly smiles and very curious gazes. Oh yeah, they were just like Carla and Patrick at home. In seconds, they’d summed her up, cataloging her from head to toe as efficiently as any machine.

After shaking hands, she sat down again and told them why she was in town, watching their faces when she named Maura. Recognition lit both pairs of eyes.

“Wild child,” Lois said immediately. She was the officer, the older of the two, compact and competent, her short hair colored a blast of fresh blue that suited her perfectly. “Lot of money, lot of parties, lot of spending. Drives a flashy little red convertible that I would look so good in—” she preened accordingly “—and thinks speed limits and red lights are more suggestions than actual laws.”

Morwenna, the dispatcher, was young enough to be Lois’s daughter, pretty, soft, her clothing bright and mismatched enough to present a danger to everyone’s vision. A faint hint of an accent came and went from her voice as she agreed. “I don’t think she’s a bad person. She’s just spoiled. But she’s very generous, too. We’ve run into her and her friend a couple times in Tulsa, and she paid for everyone’s drinks all night long, then took us to a late dinner—er, early breakfast when we were done. And her parties are always popular. I went once—too loud and too much booze and—” she glanced at Sam “—and, uh, weed for me. And the police show up at least every other time, and I didn’t want a lecture from you, Sam, for being at a party where the cops were called.”

Nothing new there, JJ thought. The cops at home had often gotten called to Maura’s parties. She’d held them at other kids’ houses because the Evans family home would have shaken on its foundations at such goings-on. She’d invited a few friends, who invited a few friends and so on, until two or three hundred people from all over that part of the state showed up. The liquor had flowed freely, the pot had perfumed the air and who knew what else the kids had been doing?

“You mentioned a friend,” JJ said to Morwenna. “Man or woman? Do you remember a name?”

The dispatcher propped her foot on the seat of her chair, wrapping her arms around one leg covered in Easter-patterned tights. The yellow chickies, white bunnies and pastel eggs were cute, but the lime-green shirt over a fiery-red tank… It would give Chadwick apoplexy if one of his dispatchers showed up dressed that way.

JJ liked the outfit for that reason alone.

“It was a girl, but her name was a guy’s name.” Morwenna pressed her lips together and quirked her mouth to one side while tugging on her ponytail. “Mick, Mike…no, Mel. The last name was common. Smith, Jones, something like that.”

Lovely. There was nothing so tedious as searching for someone with a common surname. It was one of Chief Dipstick’s favorite jobs for JJ. “Is Mel a local girl?”

“Not Cedar Creek. We thought she was a cousin or something. Blond hair, blue eyes, cute little nose—” Morwenna tapped her own less-than-little nose “—little Cupid’s bow mouth. Same attitude, same entitlement.”

“There was definitely a resemblance,” Lois said.

“They were really tight for a while. Mel was at her house all the time. She practically lived there. Maybe she did live there, at least for a while.”

That made sense. Maura had never been a quiet, rely-on-herself sort of person. She needed companionship and entertainment. All that traveling… JJ had thought she was getting acquainted with herself, plumbing depths that no one knew she had, but maybe not.

“What happened to Mel?” Sam asked.

“Maura said she went home. She was getting bored with Cedar Creek. She never mentioned where home was for either of them.”

“When was that?”

Morwenna shrugged, her vibrant image blurring in JJ’s gaze. “Three or four months ago. I’m not sure. We aren’t really friends. We just hung out a few times.”

JJ made a mental note to ask Mr. Winchester if there was an Evans relative named Mel—Melody, Melinda, Melanie. As far as she knew, the Evanses had no close relatives. Neither of Maura’s parents had had any siblings, and she’d been an only child herself. But in a lot of Southern families, the Logans included, a cousin was a cousin, no matter how many times removed.

Sam handed out notepads and pens from the battered desk and asked everyone to make a list of Maura’s associates. While the women started writing, Quint declined. “She was alone when I stopped her, and I didn’t know anyone at the party.” He shrugged. “I’m more likely to recognize those kids’ parents than them.”

JJ’s gaze settled on the stone in her ring. It was a Mexican fire opal, orange-red, her birthstone. It was a lucky stone, her mother had told her, symbolic of hope and innocence, a god’s tears turned to stone and colored with the fire of lightning. JJ wasn’t sure about any of that, but touching it did help her think better.

One of Mr. Winchester’s concerns that she hadn’t brought up earlier was the possibility that Maura was being influenced by someone. Con artists were always on the lookout for easy targets, and between her sorrow, her dependence and her immaturity, she would be one of the easiest. The payoff for the crook could be in the tens of millions of dollars. Was that Mel’s role in her life? Manipulating all that lovely money into her own greedy hands?

Or maybe she really was a relative. Or a friend. Maybe more than a friend. Mel had left Cedar Creek about the time of the change in Maura’s behavior. A broken heart could certainly explain a lot, especially with a twenty-five-year-old who’d already lost so much.

But shouldn’t that have strengthened the tie to her godfather? Would she actually threaten the only person left in her life because her girlfriend had left her?

Maybe. If she was distraught enough. If she’d thought he was too conventional to understand.

The women finished their lists at the same time and passed them to her. Morwenna’s, written with loops and swirls, was longer, while Lois’s, in graceful old-school cursive, was more detailed. JJ thanked them as they stood and, after a moment’s chitchat, left the room.

Sam slid a piece of paper down the table toward her. “She owns the house Maura’s renting. Quint will go with you.”

Annoyance flickered across Quint’s face, and for an instant, JJ was half insulted on two fronts. She had conducted hundreds of interviews all by herself and didn’t need help with this one. And Quint should have realized by now that she was fun. Smart. Could carry a conversation all by herself. She was an easy companion. And adorable.

And he was cranky. Not a people person. Not thrilled with the idea of giving up a good part of his day to babysit the out-of-town cop when he had better things to do. She totally got that. She had lots of better things to do than make sure Maura was coping. With all that money, Maura could buy everything she needed: someone to pamper her, take care of her, entertain her, have sex with her, clean up after her. She could even buy someone to love her.

She and Mr. Winchester had managed to temporarily buy JJ herself, though against her will.

“I don’t really need an escort,” she said, standing to her full height, unimpressive as it was with men who both topped six feet.

Sam’s smile was part genuine, part sly. “I promised your chief we’d do all we could to help out.”

She was considering baring her teeth at him when he went on.

“Besides, Mrs. Madison doesn’t take kindly to many cops. Quint happens to be one of the exceptions. She’ll be more likely to talk to you if he’s with you.”

So instead, she bared her teeth at Quint, disguising it as a smile. “Then I appreciate the offer. And I thank you for your time, Sam.”

Folding the notepaper into a neat rectangle, she tucked it into her hip pocket, slid the chair under the table and followed the two men out of the room. Sam turned immediately into his office. Quint moved toward the front door with long, natural strides, making for a pleasant view as she followed him.

Momentum carried her to the edge of the first step, where she stopped cold. “Holy cats, what happened with the weather?”

Quint drew up as he realized she’d gone stationary. “Cold front moved in.”

“Damn.” The sky had darkened, and the breeze had morphed into a merciless wind with a bite that made her so-cute-and-comfortable jacket totally inadequate. Too bad she hadn’t brought anything warmer. Too bad she didn’t own anything warmer.

She hugged herself tightly as she hustled down the steps and started across the lot. Her exposed skin was seriously cold, and the kind of bone-deep shivers that were actually painful were starting. She had no clue how many degrees the temperature had dropped while they were inside—thirty or more?—but it was way outside her comfort zone. She needed protection from the wind, and she needed it now.

Quint easily matched her stride. She knew a lot of men who used their longer, faster steps as a passive-aggressive outlet when they dealt with her five-foot-five-inch self. She’d long since stopped trying to keep up, especially when they were traveling in the same vehicle. Let them dawdle at the car, she’d decided, because generally they couldn’t leave without her.

At the black pickup, he beeped the doors, slid inside and moved his black duty jacket from the passenger seat while she climbed up. Adjusting the mounted laptop to give herself an extra couple of inches of space took a second longer than it should have because the chills had worked their way from the inside out, and ditto with the seat belt. “Heat, please,” she requested before her teeth started chattering.

He gave her a sidelong look as he started the engine. “Are you that cold?”

“South Carolina has a humid subtropical climate. In Evanston, fifty degrees is a frigid winter day. I break out my jackets at sixty.”

He grunted before turning the heat on high. “Windchill’s supposed to drop to around ten. You might want to put on those jackets before we go see Mrs. Madison.”

“I didn’t bring them. It’s March. It’s springtime.” She tucked her fingers underneath each arm to stop them from turning blue. He didn’t even seem affected, and he was wearing short sleeves.

“Here, winter’s not over until summer.”

She luxuriated in the rapidly warming air blowing from the vents, finally loosening her self-hug so she could hold her hands out. When her heart had recovered from the shock and started pumping warm blood again, she settled back. “Why does Mrs. Madison not like police officers?”

“Family tradition. None of them were very good at walking the straight and narrow.”

They had plenty of those families in and around Evanston. Some of them were belligerent about it, but others, at least, disliked the police from the right side of the law. “And why does she like you?”

“She doesn’t exactly like me. She tolerates me. She and my mother’s family were neighbors.”

JJ doubted the first part of his statement. Once people got past his stiff, stern exterior, she figured, they liked what they found. Sam, Lois and Morwenna certainly seemed to have a bond with him.

She gazed out the window at the sometimes pretty, sometimes shabby, sometimes overcommercialized town that Maura had chosen to live in. It really wasn’t so different from Evanston. Smaller, not quite so prosperous, but she was certain it had its charm when the sun was shining and the air was sweet and warm.

She’d studied the Cedar Creek map, but it was always good to see exactly where to find the ice cream store and the grubby little hamburger joint that surely made the best burgers in town. In this particular case, they were south of downtown on Main Street. Another mile down, they passed a Whataburger, and her mouth started watering.

When she was a kid, every time they visited their grandparents in Florida, Grandpa had taken her and her sisters to Whataburger for a burger, fries and shake. Given that her mom and Grandma both had an unnatural aversion to fast food, it was always an absolute delight.

She intended to delight all over one later today.

When the street ended a moment later, Quint turned right. Three blocks later, he pulled into the parking lot of an assisted-living facility. Who’s going to take care of you when you get old if you don’t have kids? Mom routinely asked. You’ll wind up in one of those old folks places.

This one didn’t look so bad. The outside was well maintained, and inside, the lobby smelled of flowers and wood polish and, faintly, Italian spices, tomatoes and onions. Large windows let in a lot of light, and plants brightened even the darkest corners.

Quint signed them in, and they took the elevator to the third floor. Their strides weren’t so evenly matched this time. In fact, if she were a suspicious person, she would think he was practically skulking along the far wall, head down, shoulders hunched, face turned to the left. When he actually raised his right hand and pulled his hat even lower as they passed an open door, she made a quick note of the room number—318—then watched him revert to normal. Or, at least, his variant of normal.

Interesting.

With a silent sigh of relief at passing room 318 unnoticed, Quint stopped at 327 and rapped on the door. The voice that called a response was soft, frail, sounding like a fragile old lady summoning up her dying breath to invite them in.

He knew better.

Georgia Madison’s apartment consisted of a tiny kitchen that went mostly unused, a small living room and, visible through an open door, a bedroom. It was brightly lit to offset the gloominess outside, with table lamps and hanging globes of vivid colored glass. They were every shape and size: royal blue beside an orange the shade of JJ’s ring, sunny yellow and green and a red that set the standard for all reds.

Georgia was sitting in a recliner near the floor-to-ceiling windows. Her hair was a mix of faded black, steel gray and white, her face lined with wrinkles, her eyes displaying her perpetual distrust of the unexpected. When she recognized him, some of the distrust faded, only to return in intensity at the sight of JJ.

“First time you come to see me in months, and you bring a copper with you?” She shook her head with mild disgust. Then she broke into a smile for him. “How are you, Quint?”

“I’m good, Georgie.” It was a blatant lie, and going by her second head shake, this one with mild sorrow, she recognized it.

He gestured to JJ, who’d stopped beside him. “Mrs. Georgia Madison, this is JJ Logan. You’re right, she is a cop. But she’s not out to get you.”

“All cops are out to get everyone.” The old lady gave JJ an appraising look, then nodded. “Sit. Ask your questions.”

JJ chose the couch, settling naturally into that perfect posture he’d noted earlier. Quint sat with a creak in the rocker a few feet to her left. The chair was old, the finish faded, but it was comfortable in ways a brand-new one could never be. He’d always sat in this chair when he’d visited the Madison home as a kid. It had squeaked badly even back then, and rocking in it had been one of his pleasures, until the inevitable warning from whichever adult was closest to please stop that.

He hadn’t thought about the chair, or those visits, or that time of his life in a very long while.

“How did you know I’m a cop?” JJ asked.

“Really? That’s the question you want to lead with?” Georgie gave an eye roll and a sigh, both heavily exaggerated. “It’s the look. Quint has it. That good-looking Little Bear kid he works with has it, that little guy, Harper—hell, everyone down there at thug headquarters. All good cops have the look.”

JJ considered, then accepted her answer as a compliment if her satisfied look was anything to judge by. “Do you prefer that I call you Mrs. Madison, Miss Georgia or Georgie?”

“Quint’s the only one in this room who can call me Georgie. For all other coppers, it’s Mrs. Madison.”

“All right, Mrs. Madison, can I ask you a few questions about the woman renting your house on Willow Street?”

“You can ask whatever you want, and I’ll answer whatever I want. And of course it’s my house on Willow Street. It’s the only house I own.” She humphed. “So? What do you want to know? I’m ninety-six years old, honey. Time’s a-wasting.”

JJ muttered, “And they say the good die young.” Her voice was barely a whisper, and her mouth hardly moved, but that wasn’t going to save her, Quint knew. Georgie heard everything.

Georgie’s brows drew together in a frown. He thought for half a second about intervening but decided against it. The old woman was more than happy to spread her ire around, and he was more than willing to let her. Instead, he sat back, rested his ankle on the other knee and rubbed at a scuff on his boot.

“Let me tell you something, little girl. Disrespecting a fragile elderly woman that you want information from isn’t the smartest way to go. My hair may be gray, my bones may be weak and my body may be giving up while I’m still using it, but my hearing is as good as ever, so a little politeness is in order here.”

Quint waited for JJ’s flush, for her eyes to widen with dismay and words of apology to tumble out of her mouth. That was how people always reacted to Georgie, especially coppers. But not this one. JJ arched one brow and fixed her steady, challenging gaze on her adversary. “That politeness extends both ways. Besides, I bet you never aspired to be good or die young, so that’s probably more of a compliment than an insult.”

Okay, she’d surprised him. He wouldn’t be surprised by Georgie’s response, because he had zero idea what it would be. He’d never known anyone who, when dressed down by Georgie for her attitude, displayed even more attitude.

He should have left JJ downstairs in the lobby. Better yet, he should have just called Georgie and asked about Maura. But hell, who ever would have thought he would be the more tactful of any two people in the world?

Georgie’s stare simmered for a long moment, then she pointed one long, thin finger JJ’s way. “You should be scared of me.”

“Ha. You never met my grandmother Raynelle. She was a lot like you, only she was really scary.”

Georgie considered the name a moment. “I don’t know any Raynelles. Where are you from?”

“South Carolina.”

“And they say Southern women are genteel. Apparently, they never met you.” Georgie snorted before relenting. “You’re right. I never did aspire to be good, just like you never cared about being genteel. And you can call me Miss Georgie. I like the la-di-da sound of that. So what do you want to know about Maura Evans?”