Chapter 4 #2
“Gee, thanks,” Cap said. He took the card and pocketed it without looking at it.
“I don’t suppose you know anyone who works at said bank?” Shana turned to the Jeep, apparently resigned.
“I do.”
“You’ll need a court order to get it opened if you do find out Lake had a safety deposit box,” Cap said.
“I’ll let you know, Meet you at the Lucky Parrot in half an hour.”
Cap pulled away and Dane and Shana got into the Jeep.
“Call Penny and have her meet us for lunch. Tell her to bring the keys to her condo.”
*****
Shana went along with Dane. Maybe he was right.
Maybe there was a safety deposit box. But there was no way in hell he would be able to sweet talk his way into seeing inside.
This is what she was thinking as Dane pulled to the curb in front of Vineyard Haven Savings & Loan exactly in front of the double glass doors surrounded by white columns.
She’d always thought this bank must have been a church in a former life and had had its steeple chopped off when it became a bank. Literally and figuratively.
She pushed open her door.
“You’re coming in?”
“Yes.” She gave him a scowl when she wanted to give him the finger for asking. She was proud that she’d cut back on overreacting to his purposeful digs. Although she wasn’t sure that one was purposeful. She didn’t care.
He got out and followed her inside. She waited for him to catch up.
“Which one is she?” Shana looked around at the two tellers and the three desks. All were occupied by polished women of varying distances from their Miss America days.
Dane nodded to the left and headed to the desk of a woman who looked more like Snow White double at Disney than Miss America.
She only knew this after watching too much television in the middle of the night last winter.
Now Shana’s mother would think her mind had been lost to crazy American pop culture.
Snow White popped up from her chair and gleamed in Disneyesque perfection as Dane headed her way. He’d worried needlessly about Shana coming along. Snowy had no idea she existed.
“Dane Blaise. I’d recognize you anywhere—even after all this time.
I hope you’re not here to tell me the bank has been robbed.
” She didn’t put out a hand to shake his, but came around her desk and met him where he stood in front of her visitor chair in the glassed-in cubicle with the partitions not reaching anywhere near the tall church-like ceiling.
While Snowy gave Dane a welcome back hug, Shana looked up at the wood cathedral ceiling and figured it was an engineering impossibility to create glass partitions that went that high.
“This is my partner, Shana George.”
She came out of her reverie on cue and shook the woman’s hand. Snowy had dimples. Shana smiled but said nothing since she’d missed the part where Dane mentioned the woman’s name. The woman was blocking the name placard on her desk at the moment.
“I need your help. It’s a murder case, but keep it quiet,” Dane said.
Shana curbed her eye roll and adopted a serious expression. If Snow White had any brains she’d know it was mocking, but once again there was no need for concern. The woman invited Dane to sit while she went around behind her desk and back to pretending Shana was a fly on the wall.
“It sounds very serious, but how can I help?”
“We believe the murder victim had a safety deposit box in this bank.” He flicked a card onto the pristine blotter centered on her desk. It was the bank business card. “We found this in his pocket.”
Shana’s body started humming. She couldn’t help it.
Because he’d given the business card he found at the motel to Cap, Shana knew Dane had taken this card from one of the holders on their way through the lobby just now.
And they’d never found the card in Harvey’s pocket in the first place.
If she enjoyed Dane’s fabrications did that make her a bad person?
Snowy, whose real name was Fiona according to the placard front and center, studied the card more than long enough to know what it said, then looked up.
The excited gleam in her eye impressed Shana. Dane knew what he was doing. There was no denying it, though Shana hated it and would never in a million years tell him.
Her sigh escaped and Dane flicked a look at her. There was no way this kind of knee-jerk competitiveness between them was a healthy way to conduct a romantic relationship. The scowl appeared automatically and she aimed it at Snowy. She didn’t like the name Fiona.
“That’s an interesting theory. Let me check for you—what was his name?” Snowy spoke as if they were in church and rolled her chair up to her computer screen, at the ready to grant Dane the answer to his every prayer.
“Harvey Lake.”
“Oh dear. I remember him. He opened up a safety deposit box only a few weeks ago. Dane, I don’t know how to tell you this.” She bit her lip and looked genuinely troubled.
Shana paid attention. Dane hadn’t moved, but she noticed him tense, saw the tightening of his jaw in her peripheral vision.
“Tell me.” He didn’t lean forward, but gave the impression he was inviting Snowy to spill her deepest darkest secrets.
She hesitated for another second while she stared into Dane’s eyes, then spoke with a tremble, afraid to disappoint him.
“Harvey’s family was already here with the key.”
“His family?”
“Yes, the man said he was Harvey’s brother-in-law, I believe.”
“Did he come in alone?” Dane’s voice was so quiet Shana could barely hear him. Snowy leaned forward, almost to the customer side of her desk.
“Yes, he said his sister was too upset to take care of such matters.” Snowy licked her lips. “I didn’t realize Harvey had been murdered. Mr. Parrish had the key to the box and Harvey’s ID.”
Dane smiled while she swore a blue streak in her head and jumped from her chair.
“Do you recall when Mr. Parrish came in?” Dane sat still.
“It was yesterday, I think. Or… I’m not sure.”
“It could have been before yesterday?” Dane stilled to the point of imitating a slab of granite.
“It could have been.” Her phone rang. She looked at it and looked at Dane for permission to answer it.
“We’ll be back. You look up the date when Parrish came in.”
“Thank you miss… Fiona.” She turned to Dane, who stood, coiled and moving with such control, that Shana feared he’d take off like a rocket if one wrong spark touched him, if one wrong word were spoken.
She looked up. He’d probably hit the ceiling if she said Del’s name out loud right now.
Snowy must have sensed the volcanic level of energy Dane was holding and murmured her apology and a goodbye without following them out.
*****
“Damn that f—cking Delbert Parrish. He is in this up to his slimy eyeballs.”
“You don’t have to sell me on his guilt. Thing is we have no evidence.”
He looked at Shana, took in the sparkle of her green eyes, how she kept her steps measured to his pace as they marched from the bank, Lock-step. She was his.
They pushed through the doors to the fresh sea air and sunshine outside. Shana was like the day. She reached for the Jeep’s door handle and he stopped her, turning her around and pushing against her against the car.
“You and I, we’ll get him.”
There was no startle in her eyes, only acknowledgment and a lusty smile.
When they arrived at the Lucky Parrot they found Cap already seated in their specially reserved clam-shell-shaped booth.
“No tequila,” Shana said.
“Are you my mother?” Dane hid his surprise.
“I’m your partner.”
That settled his nerves. Because he was thinking she sounded more like a wife than anything else and the clench in his chest at hearing it was scary.
“What did you find?” Cap interrupted his train of thought.
“Delbert beat us to it. He had the key. He emptied the box.”
“Shit.”
“What did you find out?”
“Agent Parrish is high up on the ATF pole in DC and universally disliked by everyone under him. He lives in Alexandria in a pricey house and throws his money around, according to my friend.”
“How does he get away with that?” Shana asked.
“His wife is stuffed. She’s a lobbyist.”
“Means nothing,” Dane said.
“All this means nothing except that I’ll go along with your continued interference in police business.”
“That’s swell of you, Cap. You’re a good friend.” Dane picked up his menu, not to read it because he knew it and could order whatever he wanted whether it was on the menu or not, but he found staring at words on a page helped him think. And he needed to think.
*****
“It means I’m having a shot of tequila,” Shana said.
It was an unfair test of Dane’s resolve for her to be agreeable, certainly an unnecessary one, and it probably could be classified as bitchy. Maybe testing him had become a compulsion with her because it was fun and empowering, but she knew it had its limits.
Dane shot a look at her. He said nothing. It was probably a lucky thing that he was preoccupied with the puzzle of Delbert Parrish, the possibly crooked ATF man.
Cap grunted. “As long as you’re buying lunch.”
Mary Lu, their perennial waitress, sauntered over to stand over Dane’s shoulder.
That would have annoyed Shana except she liked the young girl and had forgiven her for her crush on Dane.
She hadn’t met a woman on the island who didn’t have one.
Some women off island too, but she dismissed the bubble of jealousy before it could pop into anger.
“I’ll arrange the warrant to open the safety deposit box as soon as I get back to the office. You ask your client if she knows anything about it.”
“She already told us she didn’t have business at any banks on MV,” Shana said. She tried keeping the chip on her shoulder under control, but even she heard the defensiveness in her voice.
Of course she’d done her damn job.
She looked to Dane, but he was staring past her at the door. He had that shark look he got when he sensed trouble, like blood in the water. Even though he’d probably scold her for it, she turned her head to see what he was looking at.
Penny Lake walked toward them. She was accompanied by her brother, Delbert-stinking-Parrish, their friendly neighborhood ATF guy.