Chapter Twelve #2
“I did. Come on back.” She led them past the displays of mattresses that had Sam yearning for a nap to the workstations in the back of the showroom where three other male associates were seated.
“These officers are from the MPD,” she said. “They’re here about Peter.”
“You’re his ex-wife,” said one of the men, an older guy with a shock of white hair and a beer belly.
“I am,” Sam said, her teeth gritted.
“He didn’t think too much of you.”
“The feeling was mutual.”
“So what’re you doing working on the investigation into who killed him?”
“Doing my job the same way I’d do it for anyone else.
I don’t like people who hurt kids and dogs, but I go after their killers the same way I do anyone else.
” Sam wasn’t sure why she was bothering to justify herself to strangers, so she took control of the conversation.
“What can you tell us about him that might help us find whoever did this to him?”
They exchanged glances before one of the other men said, “We didn’t know him all that well. Kept to himself pretty much.”
The others nodded in agreement.
“He wasn’t much of a mattress salesman,” another guy offered. “He had the lowest sales of any of us.”
For some reason, that information made Sam sad for the man who’d caused her so much grief.
“He was always on time to work,” one of them said. “Early, even.”
“That’s true,” the woman said. “He told me once that he was turning things around and this job was part of that plan. He went to every training they offered at the corporate headquarters, some of them on his own time.”
Sam took notes, trying to reconcile the man she’d once known with the description of him that these people were giving her.
When they were married, he’d worked for a national telecom company developing award-winning advertising campaigns.
That Peter wouldn’t have been caught dead attending mattress-salesman training on his own time.
“Did any of you meet his friends or hear of anyone he hung out with outside of work?” Freddie asked.
While the men shook their heads, the woman bit her lip as if pondering whether or not she should share her thoughts. Sam gave her the death stare and watched with satisfaction as she wilted under its potent power.
“He had this one friend, Donny, who would stop by sometimes while we were working.” She blushed to the roots of her blond hair. “He liked to flirt with me and last week when he was in, he asked me out. He gave me his card and said to call him if I ever wanted to get together.”
“Would you mind letting us see the card?” Sam asked.
“Of course not. I’ll get it.” She went to her cubicle and returned with a flashy business card for Donny Bautista, Entrepreneur.
Yes, it said that. Sam wanted to snort with laughter at anyone who’d list that as their title on a business card, but rather than laugh, she took down the Oxon Hill, Maryland, address as well as the phone number and handed the card back to her.
“Could I get your name and number, too, please?”
Her eyes went wide with what might’ve been fear. “You’re not going to tell him I sent you to him, are you?”
“No, your name won’t come up. I only need it for the possibility of follow-up questions.”
“Oh,” she said haltingly. “Okay. It’s Lucy Kaul.” She gave Sam her phone number.
“Thank you for your time. This has been very helpful.”
“We hope you find whoever did this to Peter,” Lucy said, her eyes brimming with emotion. “He was a good guy. He didn’t deserve this.”
Sam didn’t necessarily agree that he was a good guy, but she definitely concurred with the latter statement.
Outside, she took deep breaths of the fresh air and gazed up at the bright sunshine. Still recovering from the days in the dungeon, she would never again take things like fresh air, blue sky and sunshine for granted.
Avery pounced immediately. “What’d they say?”
Sam filled him and Gonzo in on what they’d heard inside.
“It’s ridiculous for you to tag along with us.
Why don’t you two go to Peter’s building and talk to the neighbors again.
” She gave Gonzo an imploring look, basically asking him to take Avery off her hands.
The agent was always annoying, but in his current unhinged state he was only adding to her anxiety.
Besides, she needed a minute alone to check in with Shelby to find out what the hell had happened between her and Hill.
“Come on,” Gonzo said to Hill. “Let’s go talk to the neighbors.”
“Fine,” Hill said begrudgingly, “but let us know if you get anything.”
“You do the same,” Sam said, rolling her eyes at Gonzo behind Hill’s back.
Gonzo’s grimace nearly made her laugh, but she didn’t dare when Hill was in such a foul mood.
“What crawled up his butt and died?” Freddie asked when the other two left in Hill’s car.
“He told me earlier that he and Shelby have split.”
“What? Isn’t she about to pop any second now?”
“Yep.”
“Damn,” Freddie said. “What could’ve happened that would break them up when she’s about to have a baby?”
“God only knows,” Sam said as a sinking suspicion that she didn’t want to know overtook her. Despite that, she still fired off a text to Shelby.
Saw Hill and he told me you guys broke up. What happened? Are you ok? Let me know if you need anything. We should be home later.
As they walked to Freddie’s car, Sam took a good look around to make sure no one was paying her more attention than they should.
She didn’t see anything to be worried about, but that didn’t mean the coast was clear.
Even during the height of her issues with Peter, when she’d realized he’d been following her, she hadn’t felt quite as paranoid as she did now with the unsettled threat against their family looming over her.
“We need to run Bautista,” Sam said, flipping her phone open to call HQ.
“Do it on the tablet.” Freddie pointed to the thing the department had given them for fieldwork.
“Why the hell would I do that when I can make someone else do it for me?”
Freddie rolled his eyes and pulled the car into traffic.
When the dispatcher answered, Sam asked to be put through to the pit.
“Where, please?”
“Oh my God! Who trains you people? The Homicide detectives’ pit. Hurry up about it.” While she waited, she said to Freddie, “Remind me to talk to the chief about training these people better.”
“I’ll make a note,” he said.
The phone rang and rang in the pit, but no one picked up. “We need some more people.”
“Or you can run Bautista on the tablet and have the info in under a minute.”
“Fine! Tell me how to do it.”
“If you’d attended the training session—”
Sam glared at him. “If you finish that sentence, I’ll write you up for insubordination.”
“I’m just saying…” Step-by-step he walked her through the process of using the tablet to search the department database for information.
“What the hell kind of keyboard is this anyway?”
“It’s called a touch screen. If you’d take a look past the 3G, you’d discover a whole new world out there waiting for you to catch up.”
“I’m perfectly happy in the 3G. Ah, fuck, now I’ve got to start all over again because this stupid thing is so touchy.”
Freddie wisely rolled his lips together to keep from laughing.
“If they call this efficiency, I’d hate to see what they come up with next.”
“It’s efficient if you know how to use it.”
“This is why I need to do the driving and you need to do this crap.”
“You won’t hear me arguing, but since the Secret Service brought you to work today, you’re stuck with the tablet. Or you can drive my precious Mustang.”
“I’ll take the tablet over this backfiring piece of crap.”
“I’m wounded on behalf of my piece of crap.”
After a few more autocorrect disasters and some additional muttering on her part, Sam finally managed to complete the search for Bautista. “He’s got a few misdemeanors, simple assault, shoplifting, open container. Nothing major.”
“See? Was that so hard?”
“It was ridiculous.” Stashing the hated tablet between the seats, Sam stared out the window, wishing to be anywhere but in the midst of an investigation into her ex-husband’s murder by torture while a threat hung over her own family.