Chapter 8
“Colby Kendrick, meet Juvenile Detective Carly Devon.”
Colby shook hands with the tall, obviously fit woman with the cropped, tousled blond hair. Despite the chill, she was wearing a short jacket that he belatedly realized was so she could easily get to the weapon on her hip.
He’d been a little nervous about them calling in law enforcement, and a bit more afraid that a female juvenile officer would lean toward Liz’s side. But Quinn had insisted she was a straight arrow, and it didn’t matter who she had to stand against, she’d proven she’d stand for the right.
And if he went by the way the dog, Cutter, greeted her, he’d have to believe it.
He cast a glance toward the kitchen, where Ali and Hayley were planning out her approach to Liz. He had the feeling he was going to be thankful Ali couldn’t hear them, given the questions he was likely about to be asked.
“I heard you built the new veterans’ meeting hall out at Douglas Rockford’s place,” she said after petting the dog.
That unexpected observation startled him as much as that steady, assessing, bright blue gaze unsettled him. Together they made him feel as if he were being tested somehow.
“Where’d you hear that?”
“My husband. Parker Ward.”
Colby blinked. He remembered the man on Drew Kiley’s team, and the stories of how he’d nearly destroyed his life by turning whistleblower on his evilly corrupt boss. “You’re Parker’s wife?”
“Yes.” She smiled. “I kept the old name because it was too big a pain to change all the legal and badge-related stuff, and Parker didn’t care.”
“He’s had…bigger things to worry about,” Colby said.
It was coming back to him in a rush now, how Foxworth had helped Parker, too, in the end hooking him up with Drew’s company. Had this woman helped in that?
“Indeed he has,” she agreed, and pride echoed in her voice. The kind of pride he’d never heard in Liz’s voice, talking about him. “But he told me how much all of Drew’s crew liked working with you. And that you’d volunteered for the veterans’ hall project.”
“I…yeah.” It was starting to hit him, all the people he knew or had worked with who had Foxworth to thank for the better lives they had today.
He knew they’d also helped a guy who had ended up at Sarge’s encampment for veterans.
Plus, they’d helped Sarge himself when setting up the refuge for vets who needed a place to get their feet under them again had run afoul of some bureaucrat.
“He also said that you did it for materials cost only.”
He shrugged. “Sarge is doing a great thing there. I wanted to help.”
He saw the woman nod as if she’d heard what she’d expected to hear. Then she looked at Quinn and said, “So, that…theoretical situation you wanted to discuss?”
Colby’s jaw tightened nervously at the “theoretical.” Quinn had promised him they’d stay in what-if territory, that they would not reveal anything that would make the detective feel as if she had to step in.
At least, not yet. He had to trust them, these people he’d only met hours ago.
And when it came to Grace’s welfare, it was hard to trust anyone.
But the Foxworth name was as unassailable as any name could be, at least around here.
“Seven-year-old child. Divorced parents. Father, working guy, clean record and clearly loves the girl. Mother, wealthy family, with influence she uses like a sledgehammer. Also uses the girl as a weapon against the father. No physical abuse that we’re aware of.”
The detective shifted her gaze to Colby. “Let me guess, she’s also making the father seeing his daughter as difficult as possible?”
“Yes,” Quinn answered for him.
The woman’s gaze never left Colby. Clearly she knew he was the father in question. “And how far has the father had to push, to see his child?”
“So far just the broken window I mentioned,” Quinn answered, “to check on the girl who was locked in her room, nearly hysterical.”
Detective Devon nodded, still looking at Colby.
And then she shifted her focus to Cutter, who had walked over and sat at—in fact on—his feet, but turned to face her.
The dog looked up at her steadily. And as if that had been the deciding factor, she looked back up at Colby and said, very quietly, “I won’t step in officially unless I absolutely have to.
Unless I’m ordered to. Does she have that kind of influence? ”
He let out a weary breath. “Afraid so.”
“Mostly local, though,” Quinn put in. “Not so much on the other side, or down in Olympia.”
“All right,” the detective said. “That tells me who not to ask for information, if I need it.” That caught Colby off guard and his eyes widened. And then Carly Devon smiled, widely, and shifted her gaze to Quinn “Guess I’ll stick to Brett.”
“Always a good plan,” Quinn said with a grin.
Under the circumstances it took him a moment to put it together, that they were referring to the other local detective who had been instrumental in that takedown of the crooked governor, Brett Dunbar. And once more he felt that wave of wonder, that he had people like this on his side.
“I checked as you asked, Quinn, and as of half an hour ago, no reports on a broken window from that address,” she went on, snapping him out of his reverie.
“Figured,” Quinn said. “So she’s not playing by the common rules.”
“She doesn’t think she has to,” Colby said before he could stop himself. He had to remind himself to word the rest carefully. “Plus…she’s the type who might keep that as a secret weapon. Her family’s big on that.”
“Tell her about the story you found,” Quinn said,
It was difficult, sharing how wrong he’d been about the life he’d foolishly thought he had. But that story Grace had written, those two and a half pages of her surprisingly well-formed printing, had been the thing that changed everything, the thing that had opened his eyes.
“You know,” the blonde said when he’d finished, her tone carefully neutral, “a lot of people would have shined that on as just a kid’s vivid imagination, maybe after watching some movie with a monster in it.”
He shook his head. “Not Grace. When I talked to her about it, she said it was real, that she only made it a monster in case Liz found it. So she could pretend just that.”
The detective’s brows rose. “Smart indeed.”
“Yes. And she doesn’t lie.” Surprising himself, he smiled.
At the detective’s questioning look he explained.
“Once when we were in a hearing, the family court officer asked her if she liked her home. She said yes, but it would have been better if I’d built it.
Then they asked her if she had her own room, and had enough clothes and things.
And she said yes, after her mother got her own stuff.
So they asked her if she had everything she needed, and she said no. ”
His throat tightened, and he couldn’t go on. But it appeared he didn’t have to, because Ali had come up behind him and said quietly, “And I’ll bet she said it was because she didn’t have you.”
He nodded, not even surprised at her accurate guess.
He was remembering that hearing so vividly now his eyes began to sting all over again.
He looked up at Ali, marveling anew at how she had stepped up on his side when they’d met less than—he glanced at the time stamp in the corner of the camera feed on the flat-screen—five hours ago.
He didn’t realize he was shaking his head until the detective asked quietly, “Problem?”
“No, I just… This morning I was dealing with this alone, with my gut telling me I was going to lose and be lucky if I didn’t end up in jail. And now…” He gestured toward Ali first, then Quinn and Hayley as they came out to join them.
“They do have a way,” Detective Devon said after being introduced to Ali. Then, smiling widely, she said, “I owe them—and their boy Cutter—for my current state of delirious happiness. And I’m just one in a long line.”
“You met Parker on one of their cases?”
She nodded, confirming his earlier guess. “And the team matchmaker,” she said, nodding toward the dog, “decided then and there Parker and I needed to be together.”
Ali laughed at that. “The team matchmaker?”
“You laugh now, but just you wait.”
Colby wasn’t sure what that was supposed to mean, but he was too transfixed by the delighted look on Ali’s face to speak.
The detective got to her feet, looking at Quinn and Hayley now. “All right, I’ll do a bit of research, find what you asked about. If anything changes, you need more, or need me to step in, you’ve got the number.”
“Thanks, Carly. Say hello to Parker for us.”
“Oh, I’ll do more than hello,” she promised with a wink.
“That,” Hayley said with a grin after she’d gone, “is a happy woman.”
“And Parker’s a happy—and lucky—guy,” Colby said.
“What was that about Cutter being a matchmaker?” Ali asked.
“He just knows when two people should be together, like she said,” Hayley answered.
Colby was sure he looked as doubtful as Ali. Enough that Quinn grinned at them. “He started with me and Hayley, and he hasn’t let up since.”
If there was anyone Colby would have thought wouldn’t buy into that kind of fanciful idea, it was Quinn Foxworth. And as if he’d read the thought, the man laughed.
“Yeah, I know. And I was a very, very tough sell. I mean seriously, a dog? But if you still don’t believe after nearly twenty times without a miss, you’re not hard to convince, you’re blind.”
He shifted his gaze to his wife, who had walked over with Ali. The wife he so clearly loved and apparently would not have were it not for that dog who was now sitting watching them intently.
“You get a plan worked out?” Quinn asked.
“We did,” Hayley confirmed.
“All right.” He shifted his gaze to Colby. “Big question I have to ask. Do you know if there are any weapons in the house? Does she own any?”
Colby blinked. “Uh… I don’t think so.” His mouth twisted. “She considers herself above such things, but I know the Hollens have armed security when they need it.”
“Typical,” Quinn said, then shifted back to his wife. “So what’s the plan?”
Hayley looked at Colby. “First of all, to ease your mind, Cutter is now acting as Ali’s for the duration. He’ll keep her safe, and Grace.”
He couldn’t deny he was relieved. But also puzzled. “But he hasn’t even met Grace.”
“But he’ll have her scent,” Ali said, “and Hayley says that’s enough.”
“How…?”
“I have a sweater she forgot last time she snuck over here.”
“We’ll give Cutter a good sniff,” Hayley said, “and that with the command ‘protect,’ he’ll know what to do.” She smiled. “Not that he wouldn’t even without that. The ‘protect the children gene’ is built in, from what we’ve seen.”
“So I’ll go over with him, pretend he’s mine. She doesn’t hate dogs, does she?”
“No. As long as they don’t track dirt into her house, she doesn’t react much to them.”
Ali wrinkled her nose. Colby almost smiled. “I’ll still try to make nice with her,” she said. “Grace told me she likes fancy wine?”
Colby smothered a snort. “Yeah. Top-of-the-line stuff. French, mostly.”
Ali smiled. “Hayley says they can handle that.”
Colby looked at the other woman questioningly. Hayley nodded. “We have a couple of bottles that were a gift from a client. Very high-end. Not to our taste, so now it can be put to good use.”
“Anyway,” Ali went on, “I’ll take her the wine, and if I can get her to drink some and relax a little so we can…talk. And since I know nothing about conducting an inquiry or investigating—” she held up what looked like a pair of pearl earrings “—I’ll have Foxworth in my ear, guiding me.”
He should have guessed, given what Foxworth had accomplished around here, but somehow it was only now registering just how sophisticated and well-equipped they were. But was it enough, when his little girl was involved?
“But if she finds out Grace has been sneaking over here—”
“We’re going to send Grace a message to stay quiet about that. Cutter will deliver it.”
He blinked. “What? How?”
“He’ll manage. He always does,” Quinn said.
“Will she recognize your writing? In a note?” Hayley asked. “We need her to be sure it’s you.”
“I always put a star after I sign it. Because…she’s the star of my life. So she’d know if it wasn’t there, that it wasn’t really from me.”
“Brilliant,” Ali said approvingly.
He smiled at her, but it was a bit wry. “Not feeling it, at the moment.”
“Then we’ll fix that, too,” she said, with a certainty he wished he could feel.
And he’d like a lot more of that look she gave him, too. After years of Liz’s haughty looking down her nose, he definitely liked Ali’s smile and, even more, her obvious approval.
Whether he deserved either, he wasn’t sure.