Chapter 2 Cosi #2
It whipped open before I had the chance.
“Well?” Ilsa asked.
“I’m sorry, Miss Poe. I don’t see signs of anyone but you and Larry.”
Her nostrils flared. “I’m not making this up.”
“Didn’t say you were.”
“He was out there.” Ilsa’s arms wrapped around her middle. “He was watching me. There have to be tracks somewhere. What about right along the house?”
There was a sliver of space beside the log exterior, six narrow inches where the eaves protected the ground from snow. “Could someone have shimmied along the house? Yeah. But it’s unlikely.”
There were dark circles under her eyes. Exhaustion written all over her face. Sometimes, when people were tired, their minds played tricks on them.
She rubbed at her temples, doubt filling her expression. “I swear, it looked like a person watching. And as soon as I looked at him, he ran off.”
“Probably a neighbor trying to hide the fact that they were here.” Though that neighbor still would have left tracks.
“That’s what your deputy said.”
“You’ve got two nosy neighbors in Sue Anne and Robert.”
“But instead of knocking on the door and introducing themselves, they spy on me?”
“I wouldn’t put it past Sue Anne. Look, it’s dark. It will be a lot easier to look around come daylight. How about I send someone out tomorrow to have a look around?”
She sighed, shoulders curling in on themselves. “All right.”
“Are you going to be okay out here? We haven’t seen the worst of winter yet either. Folks can get stranded out here for weeks.” This secluded cabin wasn’t a great place for a single woman. Plus there were plenty of bears and mountain lions that called these woods home.
“I appreciate the warning, Sheriff. I’ll be fine,” she said as a slight breeze lifted a few errant strands of her hair. It carried her faint perfume, citrus and vanilla, sweet and clean. The kind of scent a man breathes in deep, holds in his lungs.
Damn. I took a step away. A gorgeous woman who smelled that good? Trouble. I’d learned a long time ago to stay away from women who meant trouble.
“Sorry about your dad.” My manners kept me from walking away without condolences. “He was a good man.”
“Was he?” The question was asked so quietly I almost missed it.
“Yes, he was.”
Ike had been a good man. Sad. Lonely. Withdrawn. But a good man.
I’d been at the station when the call had come in the day he died. His boat had been spotted drifting next to Cotters Island, without Ike at the motor. We’d found his body washed up on shore not far from the boat.
From what we could tell, he’d gone out fishing one morning. He must have slipped and hit his head, then fallen into the water.
The last time I’d seen him, Ike had been at the bar, nursing a beer. He’d worn a haunted look, the expression of a man whose heart was broken.
If Ilsa wanted to know about her father, she’d have to ask. It was cold outside. And I was late for dinner.
“Good night.” I lifted a hand to wave goodbye.
She had already turned to lock herself in the cabin.
The drive home was slow, and the fried chicken I’d picked up at the grocery store had been in the back for so long that the Bronco and everything inside, including me, smelled like grease by the time I pulled into my garage. Good thing Spencer and I both preferred our fried chicken cold.
I hauled the paper bags inside, toeing off my boots in the entryway as Mom came storming through the living room.
“Hi. What’s wrong?” I asked.
Her long brown hair, streaked with gray, was coming out of its braid, like she’d been tugging on the end.
She grabbed her coat from the hook beside the door.
“Oh, nothing. My grandson is just testing my limits. Apparently, when I go through his schoolwork because I have the audacity to care about his grades, I’m invading his privacy and now he doesn’t trust me. ”
I missed the days when I’d come home to smiles. “Sorry. I’ll talk to him.”
“Good luck.” She didn’t bother putting on her coat. She just ripped open the door and made sure to slam it behind her.
I pinched the bridge of my nose. “Spencer.”
No answer.
Damn it. I carried the groceries into the kitchen. A half-eaten plate of beef stroganoff lay abandoned beside the sink. Next to it was a math test.
The red F in the upper right corner was circled twice.
What the shit? Math was Spencer’s best subject.
Meaning he had a B minus. In everything else he was lucky to get a D.
That B minus was carrying his grade point average and meant he could stay on the basketball team.
If he flunked math, the coach would sit him on the bench.
And if Spencer didn’t have basketball to fill up his free time, then he’d find something else to do, something that would likely get his ass in trouble.
“Spencer,” I hollered, this time with more bite. This yell, he’d better not ignore.
His bedroom door opened, and he came down the hallway that led toward his end of the house. But when he reached the kitchen, he didn’t cross the threshold. He hovered in the hall with a scowl.
His Levi’s were rolled up at his ankles. His plaid shirt was unbuttoned, revealing the plain white T-shirt underneath. There was a hole in the toe of his sock, a pair I’d told him to toss ten times.
I lifted the test. “What is this?”
Spencer huffed and crossed his arms. “Ask Grandma. She’s the one who went through my things without asking.”
“Because she cares. Lay off your grandma.” I sighed, dragging a hand over my face.
“She didn’t even ask. She just went to my room and dug into my backpack.”
“I said, lay off.”
His nostrils flared. A fuck you was written all over his face—he had the brains to keep his mouth shut. But I was taking Mom’s side, which meant now he was pissed at us both.
This kid. Fourteen and we were constantly butting heads.
Mom said Spencer was exactly like me and had been since he was born. We had the same brown hair. The same hazel eyes. The same chin and nose. When he filled out his frame and grew a few more inches, we’d probably have the same build.
All he’d be missing was a mustache.
But when Mom reminded me that my son was mine in every sense of the word, it had nothing to do with our looks. She was talking about attitude.
I was stubborn. My son? Gave stubborn a whole new meaning.
“Explain,” I ordered.
“What’s there to explain? The new teacher gave us a test. I failed. Seems pretty cut and dry to me.”
My molars ground together as I fought to keep my cool. That smartass tone of his was becoming a habit, and it grated on my last nerve. But over the last couple of years, I’d learned to pick my battles.
Mom liked to remind me that when I was fourteen, I’d been a smartass shithead too.
“What new teacher?” I asked. “What happened to Mrs. Riley?”
“She had a baby.”
“Already? I didn’t think she was due until spring.”
Spencer blinked.
“Okay, so this new teacher flunked your test.”
“Says F, doesn’t it?”
“Easy,” I warned.
That earned me an eye roll.
I fucking hated eye rolls.
“Did you try?” I regretted the question the moment it flew out of my mouth.
Spencer’s eyes narrowed. His arms uncrossed and his hands balled into fists at his sides. Then he was gone, stomping to his bedroom and slamming the door.
“Shit.” I flung the test through the air, letting it float to the floor.
He couldn’t fail math. It wasn’t an option. Getting benched wasn’t an option. Basketball was the only time Spencer smiled. He loved that team and sport. He was good too, the only freshman on varsity.
How could he fail? Spencer was smart. A lack of intelligence wasn’t the problem. But when it came to schoolwork, he applied the bare minimum.
Maybe another father would have pushed harder. Would have hounded his son to get perfect grades. But Spencer and I were at each other’s throats lately. At this point, I just wanted him to graduate.
I picked up the test, setting it on the table in the corner of the kitchen. Then I made my way down the hall, knocking on Spencer’s door.
“What?” he snapped.
I turned the knob, surprised he hadn’t locked me out. “Can we talk?”
He was on his bed, tossing a baseball toward the ceiling. “What’s there to talk about? I flunked. I don’t want to talk.”
“About math? Or the letter?”
Spencer snatched the ball from midair, shoving up to his feet so fast, a move like that would have made me dizzy. Then he threw it at the wood-paneled wall so hard it filled the room with a thwack. “No, Dad. It’s not about the letter.”
“Okay.” Definitely about the letter.
“I failed a test. The new teacher is a hard-ass, and now I’ll probably get kicked off the basketball team.” Spencer’s voice cracked.
And with it, my heart.
“I’ll talk to your teacher,” I said. “Find out if there’s some extra credit or something we can do.”
He scoffed. “We?”
“I’m decent at math.”
Spencer picked up the ball from the floor and flopped back on his bed, tossing it in the air again. “Whatever.”
Whatever pissed me off almost as much as an eye roll, but I bit my tongue. “I’ll stop by the school tomorrow.”
“Good luck,” he mumbled.
I sighed, backing away from the door, but before I retreated to my room to change and fold laundry, I paused. “What’s this teacher’s name?”
“Miss Poe.”
Of course it was. Fuck.