Chapter 4
FOUR
Crime scene tape should never be attached to lake grass. She'd expected the smell to disappear once she left the boat. No such luck. Every time she blinked she saw Bailey again.
Ferd stood off about sixty yards from the boat, breathing deeply to let her lungs clear. Fresh air wasn’t working. She needed a shower, STAT. Duke had called in a removal team and the ME and had handed over the scene, but she wasn’t ready to leave. Not yet.
“He’ll be worried. Want me to walk you home? I get not wanting to be alone after finding that.” Duke wiped his hands on an antibacterial wipe from the ME’s stash.
“That’s only part of my issue.” She glanced away. She was in no mood to be pitied. How much did she want to share with a guy she barely knew?
“More than the overprotective brother? Am I allowed to say that? I’d probably be the same if I had a sister.” His mouth flattened and he widened his stance slightly.
“I don’t have one overprotective brother.
I have him plus all the men who work at Wayside plus my father.
Eight of them in all. I came at nineteen to live there and became everyone’s little sister.
It was great at first. Now . . . their protection is a little like a cage.
” Now someone would hear her and share that with Connor, and he would say he wasn’t hurt while being all gruff and grumbly.
She shouldn’t have said anything at all.
“Which is why you didn’t apply to work in Piper’s Ridge.” He nodded and adjusted his sunglasses. “I get it. Sometimes you can’t grow up if you’re not allowed to.”
“That’s part of it. The other part is that Piper’s Ridge rarely hires and I didn’t want to wait.
You know, you talk like you’re old. You can’t be much older than me.
” Though the more she was with him, she was sure he had to be at least five years older than her.
He’d acquired a few lines at the corners of his eyes.
“If I had to guess, I’m probably five years older than you, but it doesn’t matter.” He headed back up the path, away from the scene.
“Wait. Something feels really off about this.” She followed him. Could she trust her own instincts? She wasn’t exactly a seasoned detective, but this didn’t look like an average case of a boat getting tossed around.
“Well, sure it does. We haven’t really started yet. The ME needs to let us know the cause of death. Might not be a crime, though he seemed pretty beat up.”
That was an understatement. If he died fighting to get control of his boat, he’d fought hard. “Do you think that’s likely?”
He looked around and only answered after. “One investigator to another, no.” He picked up his pace.
“You don’t have to walk me home. Your car is likely in the opposite direction, and you’ve had just as long a day as I have. Plus, you weren’t even supposed to be on duty today.” And he likely wanted a shower just as badly.
“I don’t mind. I gave the okay for you to help me today, so Connor can get mad at me.”
She laughed. “That’s kind of you, but that won’t happen. I live in this weird space where I’m too new at life to do anything right but old enough to know better. Sometimes I think he takes it too far, but he does it because he cares.”
He waited until she caught up then walked alongside her for a minute. “That’s really great, actually.”
Why agree or disagree when he didn’t know Connor? After Connor had told her she was welcome to stay while she healed, then proceeded to give her a ton of rules to follow, she wasn’t at a place where she could see how great it was. Not yet. “I guess you’ll see when you come in to talk to him.”
About twenty minutes later, Ferd pushed inside and Duke followed.
This would be bad. If Connor didn’t immediately assume things that weren’t true and never would be, Lacy would.
Lacy could think whatever she wanted. She’d be wrong, but she could think it all the same.
I’m allowed to talk to people who happen to be men, especially as an officer.
And if talking to Duke was the only way she’d be allowed to look at this case, then she’d be talking to him.
Lacy whipped around, her eyes wide. “Where in the world have you been? We’ve been calling for two hours.”
Ferd tensed and stopped, Duke plowing into her from behind. If Lacy could be that abrupt, so could she. “We found a dead body. Duke needed a little help getting to it.”
She heard his soft harrumph from behind her.
Lacy froze for a few seconds, her mouth slightly ajar and eyes wide. “A body? Where?”
Duke stepped around her. “While we were running, we came across a boat washed ashore.”
“Bailey?” Lacy flinched.
“Yeah,” Ferd confirmed.
“He’s been so erratic lately. He came to Wayside three days ago, walked right into my office, complaining about seeing strange men around the lake.
I thought he’d maybe started his daily consumption a little early and honestly didn’t give it any attention.
Guess I should’ve.” Her lips thinned and she blinked a little too rapidly.
“No, it wasn’t your fault. If he had any issues, he should’ve brought them to the police. I would’ve been told if he had.” Duke finally stepped forward to her side.
“I wonder if he wasn’t trying to warn us?” Ferd’s internal thoughts found their voice.
“Warning us about what?” Lacy asked.
“Strangers in the area. You didn’t experience it, because you were never new around here, but I have.
When Mom and I came five years ago, no one in town wanted to let us become part of the community.
We were outsiders. Thankfully, The Haven is a community all on its own.
Now Mom has lots of friends from church, but it took a year. People notice strangers around here.”
Duke glanced between the two but didn’t offer a speculation. Ferd almost wished he would. Then again, if he’d never come to Piper’s Ridge as an outsider, he may not see it. Duke stood up straighter as Connor walked into the kitchen.
“There you are. Ever heard of a phone?” he grumbled, then locked onto Duke. “What’s he doing here?”
“Connor, it’s fine.” Lacy moved to Ferd’s side. “He brought her home. They found something while running. I’m glad he was there.”
That wasn’t exactly what I said.
“What happened?” Connor shifted his focus to Lacy.
“It’s Bailey. He’s gone.”
Connor slammed a fist on the counter. “I tried to get him help.”