In Dog We Trust (Golden Retriever Mysteries) (41 page)

We talked about birds and the park for a few minutes, and then I headed back to Stewart’s Crossing, where my dog waited for me.

Caroline’s house was sold, and a young couple moved in. When I saw them a few days later, holding hands, I remembered moving into our house in Silicon Valley with Mary. For the first time, the memory didn’t hurt.

Gail introduced Edith to a stockbroker in town who helped her consolidate her accounts so she’d have less to keep track of, and I gave her a spreadsheet she could use each month to check off that she’d received the money she was expecting. She filled out endless forms for various banks and government agencies, and waited for everything to come together so she could get her money back.

In Caroline’s memory, I reread
Jane Eyre
, recognizing that like Rochester, I had a secret. His was a crazy wife hiding in the attic, and mine was the fact that I’d been convicted of a felony. His wife had died in the fire, freeing him to pursue a romance with Jane. Had Jackie’s capture done the same for me?

I was at The Chocolate Ear one Saturday morning, picking up a couple of croissants, when Gail and I got into conversation about a new movie that was opening, an adaptation of a Bronte novel. It was a chick flick, but my connection to the fictional Rochester, as well as the canine one, made me interested.

“You want to see it together?” I asked. “Maybe tonight?”

“That would be great,” she said. She looked at me. “You want to get some dinner beforehand?”

“I’d like that,” I said.

“Great. It’s a date.”

That it was. My first since the divorce.

We had burgers at The Drunken Hessian before the movie. It wasn’t the most romantic location in town, but I thought I’d better start slowly. After we gave the waitress our orders, I asked Gail, “So I understand from Ginny you were a hotshot pastry chef in New York. What brought you back to Stewart’s Crossing?”

“My mother got sick,” she said. “And my boyfriend wasn’t very supportive, and I was getting worn down from the grind in the city. I quit my job and came back here to take care of her, and after she got better I decided to stay.”

She sipped her beer. “How about you?”

I took a deep breath. “I didn’t have much choice,” I said. “My ex-wife divorced me while I was in prison, and my father died and left me the townhouse. She sold our house and shipped all my stuff here. So I followed.”

Her eyebrows raised, but she didn’t bolt, and I told her the whole story. Our food arrived and we kept talking, and in the darkness of the movie theater she took my hand and squeezed it. All in all, a pretty successful return to the dating pool.

A couple of weeks after the shooting, Rick came over on a Saturday afternoon. We sat out in the courtyard of my townhouse, drinking beer, with Rochester lying in the shade near us. Jackie was still in the hospital, recovering from her wounds. “She isn’t saying a word,” Rick said. “But there’s damage to her front bumper consistent with hitting Arsene Philippe’s motorcycle. We’re going to build the case by the book on this one, and we’re going to get her.”

She denied everything, from masterminding the students’ thefts to running me off the River Road, but Rick was accumulating evidence against her. When I tried to remind him of all that Rochester had done to help solve the mystery, he was polite but noncommittal. “It’s not something I can take to a judge.”

It was high summer by then, and a warm breeze blew through the courtyard. A couple of clouds drifted overhead, and the only noise was the low rumble of air conditioning compressors running all over River Bend. In the distance someone’s gate slammed shut, and Rochester looked up. “I’m thinking of taking the dog and heading for someplace cool for a while—maybe the shore, maybe the mountains,” I said to Rick.

Then I looked over at Rochester. “You like that idea, boy?” I asked. “Ready to retire from your career as a doggie detective and head for the hills?”

Hearing his name, Rochester looked up at me and wagged his tail, though I couldn’t tell if he agreed, or if he was just glad I was paying attention to him.

And as for me, I was just glad to have him around.

Want more of Steve and Rochester? Check out this excerpt from the next golden retriever mystery, THE KINGDOM OF DOG, now available from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Smashwords and other e-book retailers.

1 – Behavior Modification

Rochester nudged my knee as I was trying to write a press release. “What’s the matter, boy? You need to go out?”

I looked down at the golden retriever by my side. But instead of jumping up, he flopped down and rolled on his back, wagging his paws in the air like a stranded beetle.

“I don’t have time to play. I have work to do. Somebody has to pay for your kibbles and bits.”

That was the wrong thing to say. Rochester immediately hopped up and looked at me with big brown eyes. “Fine. One treat. Then you go lay down.”

He shook his head again, but I handed him the treat anyway. I kept a vacuum-sealed jar on my office desk, filled with tiny treats in the shape of T-bone steaks. He gobbled the tidbit, then trotted across the room, where he sprawled in front of the French doors and rested his head on his paws, staring at me.

We were both new at this full-time job business. When Rochester first came to live with me, I was working as an adjunct in the English department and Eastern College, my alma mater, and struggling to develop a freelance writing business. Rochester had gotten accustomed to hanging around me, and I’d come to appreciate his presence. When I was offered this job, I agreed to take it only if I could bring him to work with me.

He may be a golden retriever, but I think of him as a Velcro dog. He likes to stick to me. Maybe it’s because his first owner, my next-door-neighbor, was murdered, and he’s afraid that I might leave him, too.

Mike MacCormac, the director of alumni relations, agreed to my request because he was a dog lover himself, and because it wasn’t easy to find someone with my unique combination of writing skills and computer ability who was willing to work short-term for a not-quite-so-generous salary and some reasonable health benefits.

In two days, Eastern was going to launch a $500 million capital campaign to fund new construction, scholarships, and faculty chairs. Though my public relations job was only temporary, for the winter term, I was hoping to move into a permanent position with the campaign if Mike liked my work.

As I was finishing the press release, Mike stuck his head in my office door, holding a cup of coffee. “Hey Steve, did you get back the proofs for the program yet?”

Mike typified the no-neck monster stereotype of college athletes. He was thick-set and muscular, with dark hair and a heavy five o’clock shadow, even early in the morning. At thirty-five, he was seven years younger than I was, though shorter and stockier.

“Just came in from the printer,” I said. “They misspelled President Babson’s name, but I already called and had them correct it.”

On his way to my desk, he stopped to scratch behind Rochester’s ears. “My Rottweilers would eat you up, Rochester,” he said. “You’re too sweet.”

I was jealous to see Rochester look up at him with doggy adoration. But I knew that the moment I called the dog to me, he’d be all over me, slobbering on my slacks, shedding on my chair, and keeping me from getting any work done.

I watched Mike read the page proofs, waiting for him to reach the section on the keynote speaker. He lifted the cup to his lips and I said, “Don’t!”

He looked up at me, then back down at the page proofs, then burst into laughter. “Keynote speaker: President John William Baboon?” He laughed so hard that the coffee in his cup threatened to spill over as his hand shook.

“Thought you’d want to see them misspell Babson yourself,” I said. “I couldn’t let you get some coffee in your mouth, though.”

“Appreciate that.”

Mike had been a football star at Eastern, then assistant coach, then director of athletics. He’d only been the chief fund-raiser for a year or two, and I knew he was depending on the success of the fund-raising campaign to keep his job. I had a lot at stake, too; I needed a permanent gig, if only to keep a roof over my head and Rochester’s and food on my table and in his bowl.

Mike returned the page proofs to my desk. “I need a favor. Can you run down to the printers and pick these up? We’re going to need them at four to start stuffing packets. We’re setting up an assembly line in the ballroom.”

Each guest was to receive a folder with information on Eastern and the capital campaign. I had written a series of flyers on critical areas in need of funding—the science labs, the music building, and so on. Every guest would receive a no-skid pad for the back of a cell phone, embossed with the Eastern logo, along with contribution forms and a host of other materials.

“Sure. I’ll head down there around 3:30 and pick them up.”

He stopped by the door on his way out. “With winter break this place is pretty empty, but I’ve rounded up every kid I could find and commandeered every staff member who didn’t have a good excuse. I’ve even got campus security roped in.”

Mike’s mention of campus security reminded me of my own past with law enforcement, as so many things did.

I served a short prison sentence in California for computer hacking, which led in no small part to the failure of my marriage. When I was discharged on parole, I returned to my hometown, Stewart’s Crossing, just down the Delaware River from Eastern.

I moved into a townhouse my late father had left to me and met my next-door neighbor, Caroline Kelly, and her golden retriever, Rochester. She was killed while walking Rochester, and my high school friend Rick Stemper was the investigating detective in her case. As a favor I agreed to take care of Rochester for a few days after her death.

He quickly won me over, and he and I helped the police figure out who killed Caroline. My ex-wife and I had tried twice to have a child, but she miscarried both times. A psychologist might have said that I was replacing those two lost children with Rochester, but all I knew was that I liked having the big, goofy guy around.

After I checked my press release one more time, then emailed it to my list of media contacts, I walked over to where Rochester dozed, and sat down cross-legged next to him. He leaned up and put his big golden head in my lap. I scratched under his chin and behind his ears, and he wiggled around and stretched his legs.

“Who’s a good boy?” I asked, leaning down to bury my head in the soft fur of his neck. “Who’s Daddy’s good boy?”

He sat up and put his front paws on my shoulders, licking my face, as I laughed and tried to wiggle away.

“Hate to interrupt your love fest, but we need to talk about Bob Moran. ” I looked up and saw Mike in my doorway again, accompanied by Sally Marston, the assistant director of admissions.

“Sorry,” I said, jumping up in embarrassment. “Just taking a puppy break. What can I do for you?”

Mike and Sally came in and sat down across from my desk. She was a slim twenty-four-year-old, the kind of girl who’d looked like she had played field hockey in high school and college. Her normal attire was a Fair Isle sweater and a kilt with a big safety pin in the side.

 “Bob Moran is a wealthy alum I have targeted for a major gift for the campaign,” Mike said. “He’s a continuous giver with a strong connection to Eastern.”

He looked over at Sally.

“He also has a seventeen-year-old son who applied for early decision,” she said. “A legacy kid like Marty who has a decent background gets right in, but his SAT scores are way down on the chart, and he’s barely breaking a C average at his prep school. So Joe turned him down for early decision and moved him into the regular applicant pool, where he has even less chance of getting in.”

Joe Dagorian was the director of admissions, Sally’s boss. “There’s the problem,” Mike said. “Joe refuses to admit Marty, which is going to kill any chance we have of getting a gift from his father.”

“You have to understand Joe’s position,” Sally said. “I’ve met Marty. He’s sullen and uncommunicative and there may even be something wrong with him mentally. He just doesn’t belong here.”

“But his father is determined that he go here,” Mike said. “He even offered to make a $100,000 donation to kick off the capital campaign if Marty gets an acceptance letter.” He turned to Sally. “Can you do an end run around him and send out the acceptance letter yourself?”

“You know I can’t do that,” Sally said. “He’s my boss. I’d lose my job.”

“Is Moran on your RSVP list for the party?” Mike asked me.

I flipped through the list. “Yup.”

“Well, it would be great if we could announce that hundred-grand gift. ” He looked at me. “You have a good relationship with Joe, Steve. Can you talk to him?”

That was not something I wanted to do, but Mike was my boss. “Sure. I’ll go look for him right now.” I gave Rochester a treat and told him to stay put, and walked down the hall to Joe’s office.

Joe was, in large part, the reason I’d gone to Eastern. When I was a high school senior, years before, and he was the director of admissions, he had convinced me to come to Eastern over the other schools where I could have gone. I had always appreciated the interest he took in me.