Love Inspired Suspense April 2015 #2 (13 page)

“Always the optimist, Mick,” Reggie said quietly. “That's why we're here right now.”

It was. His disastrous optimistic view of Tucker Rivendale. “But isn't that why we got into the business in the first place? Believing that people can pay for their mistakes and be rehabilitated?”

“Pie in the sky.” His tone grew sad. “How many sob stories have we heard? Parolees who promised up and down they were on the right path and wound up in jail again in less than a year? All those pretty promises that turn out to be lies.”

And that was where he failed with Tucker, not being able to see through those false promises.

I'm going to make a good life for me and LeeAnn
, Tucker had said. The memory tortured Mick, the smile, the strong handshake.
Thanks for believing in me, man. You're the only guy who ever did.
Mick blinked back to the present to find Reggie staring at him.

“What happens when you've got too many years on the job and you can't sort out lies from truth? Even in yourself?”

The silence stretched between them. “I don't know, Reg. I have no answers.”

“Yeah, me, neither.” Reggie let loose with a bone-cracking stretch and sank back onto the sofa. “Enough soul-searching. Let's get down to business.”

Mick sat and told Reggie all the details about Charlie and Bruce.

“So Ginny is gone, you think? Skipped town, maybe?” Reggie asked.

“Probably, but she has or had some type of connection to the brothers. Maybe Rivendale does, too. They might be in the same business. The brothers were suspected of running a chop shop, and Rivendale is the best at jacking cars.”

Reggie's good eye narrowed. “Let me call a buddy of mine. Chop shops are his specialty. I'll run it down.”

“Going up to the roof.”

“Haven't released the crime scene. I checked.”

“I'll check again.”

Reggie considered. “Fair enough. Where's Keeley?”

“With John Bender.”

“Bender.” The pause spoke volumes. “What a guy.”

“Don't trust him, either?”

“I don't trust anyone and until we catch Rivendale, and you shouldn't, either.” Reggie walked him to the door and gripped his forearm. “He'll kill you if he gets the chance. Don't give him that opportunity.”

Mick nodded. “I don't intend to.”

FOURTEEN

K
eeley breathed in the smell of antiseptic as she stepped into the back room affectionately dubbed Bird ER. John was filling a feeder attached to the side of a seven-foot wire aviary in which the iridescent Anna's hummingbird zipped back and forth, observing his actions with curiosity.

John smiled at her. “It's so much easier now that she doesn't need syringe feeding. I think another week or so and she'll be ready for release.” His face grew sad. “I was just thinking how much LeeAnn loved to care for baby hummingbirds. Remember when we had six at one time? She camped out on the floor in a sleeping bag to feed them all.”

Keeley's throat thickened at the memory. She'd taken care of June at nighttime so LeeAnn could tend to the babies, no bigger than bumblebees. Thanks to LeeAnn's tenacity, they had all survived, every last precious bird. Keeley made a mental note to tell June about her mama and the baby birds. Maybe she could bring June to the clinic next week if Tucker was caught. It seemed a long shot, but she held on to it. Her life had to return to normal at some point.

John looked so crestfallen, she put her hand on his shoulder. “She would have been happy that this hummer is almost ready to see the world.”

He cleared his throat. “Yes, she would have been.”

Keeley did not want to indulge any other memories. Her heart was filled with the twin emotions of fear for Junie and tenderness for Mick. Mick... There he was again in her thoughts. If she didn't end the situation soon, her heart might be compromised.

There was no room for anyone but Junie.

None.

She set to work cleaning the cages of the downy woodpecker that was recovering from crashing into a glass door and a kestrel that was still underweight, probably ill from consuming a poisoned rodent. The pair of baby crows that had been saved from a menacing cat would be ready to be released soon. They squawked their disapproval of her presence.

John worked on updating his notes for each bird, in that meticulous, exacting way that made him a superb avian vet. She gazed at the pictures on the wall: photos of the birds rescued at the Bender Veterinary Clinic, and the staff. There was a photo of John standing next to an older man, both smiling stiffly in front of a neat stucco building.

“Is that your dad?”

He started. “Yes. I worked at his vet clinic for a while.”

“Why didn't you two go into partnership? Bender and Bender.”

He shrugged. “Sounds like a law firm. Anyway, we don't see eye to eye on things. He thinks he knows the right way to do everything, and he won't ever listen.”

“There can't be two head chefs in the kitchen?”

“Especially when one is wrong most of the time.” He continued writing, the mechanical pencil held delicately between his fingers.

Keeley swept up some feathers that littered the floor, one a bright green. She thought about a question she'd never asked John.

“What ever happened to the bird LeeAnn was rescuing?”

John started. “What?”

“The day she was killed. You called her and told her about an injured Quaker parrot in the feral colony, didn't you?”

“Yes. I was busy, but she went immediately to see what she could do.” He looked at the floor. “I wish that I had gone with her.”

“How did you know about the bird? It was early in the morning.” She remembered it was a time when Junie was spending the night with her auntie Keeley. It gave her a pang to remember how she'd once been a mere auntie to the child.

He nodded. “Before six. Someone called the vet clinic and left a message after hours the night before, explaining they'd seen an injured feral parrot.”

“Who was it? One of your patients?”

“No. They didn't leave a name.”

“So what happened to the parrot?”

He tapped the pencil gently on his file. “I don't know. The cops said there was no sign of her ever having made it to the rooftop.” His mouth hardened. “For some insane reason, she met up with Tucker somewhere and they fought. He killed her before she could ever reach the building, most likely. Beast that he is.”

“Did you ever go back to check for the wounded bird?”

“Yes, as a matter of fact, when I could bring myself to do it, but I didn't see any sign of an injured parrot.”

Keeley swept the feathers into the dust pan. “There's a guy, isn't there, who sort of cares for that colony? What's his name?”

“Meeker, I think. Meeker something. Haven't seen him around in a while.” He put the file folder into a tidy drawer. “Why are you thinking about the parrot?”

“I don't know. I guess everything that's happened lately has brought that day back in living color.”

“Painful.”

“Yes.”

“People tell me,” he said carefully, “that the best thing to do is move on, don't dwell on the past.” His eyes shimmered with pain. “Have you been able to do it?”

“Not fully. You?”

He shook his head. “LeeAnn is perfect.”

She didn't correct his verb tense.

“There isn't another woman like her,” he said.

Keeley agreed. She wouldn't have even been able to make it this far if God hadn't delivered June into her lap, but she did not have the luxury of living in the past when He'd tasked her, no,
blessed
her, with the responsibility of her little girl's future. “It's hard, but I don't have a choice. I have to move forward for Junie.”

He arched an eyebrow. “I always knew that June was LeeAnn's, even though she tried to keep it a secret.”

“You did? You didn't let on that you knew until after she died.”

“I would never do anything to give Tucker power over LeeAnn or her child. He isn't a father.”

She sighed. “Thank you for honoring her decision.”

“And he's come back for June now, hasn't he?”

She nodded.

His mouth tightened into a line. “I'll do whatever I can to protect you both.”

“Thank you. We're under pretty close watch at the moment.”

John rapped the file on the desktop. “Don't trust him.”

“Who?”

“The parole officer. Don't rely on him for help, Keeley. He set Tucker loose to kill LeeAnn. He knows it. You can see the guilt in his eyes.”

She felt herself wanting to defend Mick, but nothing John said was untrue. “He's not a bad man. He made a mistake, the same mistake LeeAnn made in trusting Tucker.”

“LeeAnn was blinded by love. She would have come to her senses eventually. Mick has no such excuse. It was his job to know better.”

The hummingbird flitted back and forth, looking for freedom, perhaps. She wondered how Mick would feel if he was freed from the ponderous burden of guilt that weighed him down. Try as she might to keep him out of her thoughts, his face kept appearing in her mind's eye.

You've got to stop that
, she thought. She would not spend time worrying about Mick Hudson.

John's hard stare bored into her.

“You like him, don't you?”

She tightened her grip on the broom handle.

“I guess I wish Tucker's actions hadn't ruined him, too, but there's nothing I can do about that. I have to take care of myself and Junie.”

“Yes, that's all that matters. Family. Remember that I'm always here for you.” He flushed a deep scarlet and looked away. “Sorry. I miss her so much, sometimes I can almost feel her presence.” Tears glittered beneath his lowered lashes.

How much they'd all suffered. At least she had Junie. John had nothing but his birds. “Thank you, John,” she said. “You are a good friend.”

He nodded, gathering his folders without meeting her eyes.

She continued on with her rounds, freshening bedding material and filling feeding cups. The green feather stayed on her mind. Had the parrot somehow survived its injury? Or had it lost its life the same day as her beautiful sister?

Why had she never thought of it before?

* * *

Mick met Keeley at the house. He didn't ask how her time had gone with John Bender, though he burned to do so. She fixed peanut-butter-and-banana sandwiches for an early lunch before their meeting with Chief Uttley.

“I'm out of jelly,” she explained. He noticed she was also out of milk and eggs.

“This is good,” he said. He'd never eaten that particular combination and he was surprised that he liked it. He wasn't sure if it was the food or the woman who'd fixed it for him that made him enjoy it. When his phone buzzed, he answered.

“It's Pickford. Dug something up you might be able to use.”

Mick was surprised. He had not thought the sheriff would actually follow through with checking out Uttley.

“My buddies had nothing much to say about Uttley. About ten years ago, though, he killed a female pedestrian while he was in pursuit of a suspect. Took a lot out of him. One of those bad things and not his fault. Other than that, they got nothing bad to say, and if they did they aren't going to blab it.”

He understood. The blue brotherhood. There might be a whole lot of things Pickford's buddies weren't ready to share. “Thank you.”

“And there's one more thing that might interest you. One of my guys knew of the brother Bruce.”

“From the garage?”

“Yeah. Said his cop cousin busted Brother Bruce a year ago for misdemeanor stuff here in Oregon, but he always knew the kid was into something they couldn't prove.”

No news there. He was about to end the call.

“I guess you can ask your former colleagues about it. Looks like your outfit handled his parole.”

Mike squeezed the phone to his ear. “What?”

Pickford paused. “I think you heard me. Maybe you should spend more time looking at your own people than rustling up dirt in our departments.”

“Who was his parole officer?”

“Guy named Reginald Donaldson. Know him?”

It seemed as if all the air was sucked out of the room. “Yes, I know him,” Mick said. “Thanks again.”

He disconnected and stared at the phone in his hands. Reggie was Brother Bruce's parole officer? Why had he concealed the fact? He sent a text.

Need to talk to you this afternoon.

There was no response.

Keeley frowned. “You look as if you just lost your best friend.”

Had he? No sense piling on to her worries until he'd checked it out. “Something I need to do later.”

“Okay.”

She went into her bedroom to grab a sweater and came immediately back with frown. “You fixed the window.”

He nodded.

“I told you it would have to wait.”

“Forecasting rain. You needed a window. I know a guy. It was cheap.”

She yanked on the sweater. “I didn't want that. I told you I wasn't going to replace it. Did you even hear what I said?” Storm clouds drifted through her eyes.

He shrugged. “You needed it.”

“I need a lot of things,” she snapped. “I need a new car and the roof fixed and a killer to be caught and my life to get back to normal, but I can't rely on someone else to suddenly fix everything for us.” Her voice rose with each word.

“I wanted to help.”

“So did he.”

“Who?”

“Tucker.” Her voice vibrated with emotion. “He fixed my car, hung pictures for my sister. She, we, let him into our lives.” Tears glittered, illuminating that blue of her irises to sapphire. “We let him in, don't you see? We trusted him.”

Mick's heart felt as though it had been sliced with a cleaver. Why hadn't he thought it out before he'd barreled ahead and went against her wishes? Big clumsy brute shoving his way in, knowing what was best for a woman who'd been betrayed by another brute not two years before. He let out a long slow breath. “I didn't think.”

Her arms were folded, shoulders high and tight, cheeks flooded with color. “You can't come in here and interfere. I need you to help me catch Tucker, nothing more. Do you understand?”

He realized that he'd also managed to shame her, expose her vulnerability in ways that made her feel small and inadequate. Worst of all, he'd scared her.

You're an idiot, Mick.
He stood and said the only thing he could. “I apologize. Sincerely.”

Her lips thinned into a tight line, nostrils flared as she fought for breath. “Never mind. Let's go meet the chief. I want this thing resolved as soon as possible.”

“So I can get you out of my life,” he knew she meant. He didn't blame her.

Mick Hudson, Class A jerk, was muddying the waters far more than he was helping. He thought about how she'd feel if she knew the anonymous money came from him every month. He knew how she'd see it. Interference, another way a man was prying into her life without invitation. He'd have to tell her, but maybe not until she'd paid off a few bills with the next check. At least he could give her that.

She walked by him stiffly, and he followed her to the truck, his spirit fallen to dirt level, worry about Reggie warring with regret at hurting Keeley.

In the truck, it was deadly silent.

“Again,” he said, clearing his throat, “I am sorry. I didn't think about how you'd feel. I was wrong.”

She looked out the window. “I know you meant well. It was easy to misunderstand when I said Junie and I needed you.”

“I overstepped. No excuse.”

Why had he thought to do it anyway? Because he couldn't stand the idea that she might be unsafe, compromised by the storm and whatever other forces were out to hurt her. It was one thing, one small thing that he could do to make her life better, and for some reason she was all he could think about.

Or maybe it was just because he was an overbearing jerk, one of those chauvinists who felt as if a woman needed a man to take care of them. “No,” he wanted to say. “I know you are strong, so strong it takes my breath away.” He couldn't say it. The only thing to do was get the meeting over with and get to the bottom of things with Reggie.