In Seconds

She grabbed his hand again. “It feels great to have you back.”

He hoped he could stay “back.” That being part of each other’s lives wouldn’t get too painful to endure, like it always had before. Maybe, as close friends, they could finally achieve some stability.

They drove, windows down and hands clasped, music playing loudly until they reached Libby. Then Rex spotted a pay phone at the edge of a video store parking lot and pulled over. “There you go.”

Laurel’s smile disappeared as her mood shifted. “You believe Mona.”

“I believe Mona heard Horse talking about you. Whether or not he really knows where you are…” He shrugged. “That’s what we’re hoping your mother can tell us.”

A click sounded as she released her seat belt. “What if they showed up at her house?”

“We need to know.”

She opened her door, but turned back. “But what if she gave them the numbers I called from?”

He pulled his bottom lip between his teeth as he considered her. “You won’t know until you ask.”

Myles stood in the opening of Jared’s cubicle. “Grab Linda and bring her to my office.”

Jared’s eyebrows rumpled as he twisted around. “Right now? I’m still pulling my notes together.” He tapped the cheap combination calendar and clock near his phone. “See this? Our meeting isn’t for an hour.”

“I don’t care. I can’t wait any longer.” Like yesterday, Myles had spent most of the morning on the phone with the concerned citizens of Pineview, repeating himself, mollifying, placating, soothing and promising to find a killer he wasn’t sure he could catch. He and his investigators certainly weren’t going to solve this case on what they knew so far. And the more time that passed, the weaker their chances grew. He had to have fresh information, and he had to have it right away. He also needed to keep his mind fully engaged. Even with the pressure he was under, whenever he stopped moving or had half a second to himself, he began thinking about Vivian.

He didn’t like that, mostly because he couldn’t come up with a consistent reaction. One minute he was reliving last night. The next he was picturing the rough-looking character who’d been in her kitchen this morning and wondering if their time at the cabin had been some sort of game.

Rex acted as if he belonged in Vivian’s house.

But a woman who just wanted a quick lay didn’t hold back the way Vivian had done…?.

“You’re a little uptight these days, Sheriff,” Jared complained. “If you don’t settle down you’re going to have a heart attack.”

“I’m thirty-nine.”

“Doesn’t matter. I’m talking about an hour. Sixty minutes. I can’t have sixty minutes?”

“I don’t need a typed report, okay? For right now, let’s bypass your meticulous but time-consuming process. I just want you to sit down in my office and tell me what you’ve got.”

“What’s the rush?” He rummaged around inside his drawer for a pen.

Myles spotted a pen on the floor and picked it up for him. Jared’s desk was no cleaner than his car. How he could create such orderly reports and detailed investigations out of this chaos, Myles had no idea. He obviously didn’t feel he could be bothered with the mundane details of life.

“I’ve got everybody and his dog blowing up my phone,” Myles told him. “And in three hours, I have to meet with the mayor and tell him that we haven’t got a clue who killed Pat. Needless to say, I’m not looking forward to that. I want to be able to offer more than what I’ve been telling the people who’ve checked in with me already.”

Wearing a put-upon expression, Jared jotted a few notes on the outside of a manila folder. “Fine. Give me ten minutes.”

“You got it.”

Myles planned to spend that time reading the coroner’s report, which the M.E. had faxed over a few minutes earlier. Instead, he received a call from Chrissy Gunther, who wanted to find out what he’d done with her tip about Vivian’s gun. He tried to convince her to trust him with the information, but she was having none of it, so he was infinitely relieved when Jared and Linda knocked on his open door. Waving them in, he told Chrissy he had a meeting. Then he hung up without even waiting for her to say goodbye.

“Sit down.” He eyed the files his detectives were carrying. Several were quite thick—a sign that they’d been doing their interviews. “So?” He rubbed his hands. “What have you found?”

Frizzy dark hair with a sprinkling of gray framed Linda’s face. The only way to tame it was to wear it in a ponytail, which she did, every day.

Dropping her stack of files in the middle of his desk, she slouched in her seat and met his gaze through a pair of glasses that always sat a little crookedly on her nose. “We don’t have a lot, but we’re making progress.”

That was a fairly standard answer. One he’d given himself at least a dozen times this morning. It wasn’t enough.