Chapter Seven #2
Theo Weaver hurried into the living room with a frying pan in one hand, a cell phone in the other and an expression that looked split between caution and fear.
Add in the fact that he was wearing the joke apron his dad had bought Darius a few years back that read Don’t kiss the chef, I have trust issues and the sight might have been comical enough to force Darius to see the humor in it.
Instead, he grumbled deep.
It was the first time since Theo had moved into his guest bedroom after his graduation that Darius had legitimately forgotten that he now had a temporary roommate.
One who was, unfortunately, very smart.
Trying to avoid the obvious wouldn’t work here.
Theo’s wide eyes lost their worry. He lowered his phone but kept the frying pan level.
“Are we good?” he asked in greeting. Theo eyed the bag Darius had just thrown. Darius ran a hand through his hair and took a beat to crack his neck to the side.
“Sorry,” he said. “It’s been a day.”
Darius belatedly looked around for signs of another bag or purse. Theo caught the sweep.
“Winnie already left,” he said. “She said she couldn’t concentrate on her interviews after everything that’s been going on.” He smirked. “Between you and me, I think she just wanted to go gab with her dad and JJ about the whole wedding drama.”
Darius suppressed another grumble and followed Theo into the kitchen.
“Winnie doesn’t like gossiping,” he reminded the boy. “It’s one of the better traits of yours that you share with her. You two only give what you need to, and even then, it’s like an act of God to get information out of you. I can’t imagine if you two ever made another human together.”
Theo made a noise of disgust.
Darius didn’t think it was genuine, but he let his joke lie.
A bowl filled with scrambled eggs, sausage and other little things was on the counter. Darius was surprised to see a second one next to it.
“Winnie told me to make you whatever I was having for dinner and put it in the fridge just in case, but I guess your timing worked out,” Theo explained. “Though, honestly, I thought you wouldn’t leave the department at all tonight.”
Darius felt some of the anger in him release a little. He gave the boy a pat on the shoulder and a quick thanks. He made a mental note to return the favor to Winnie sometime soon. For all their fights and youthful annoyances, there was no denying these kids were thoughtful.
They settled into the small dining nook and ate their breakfast-for-dinner bowls in silence. Darius might have vented a little, but his shoulders lined with a tension that seemed to seep downward and spread. It was only after Theo placed his fork into his empty bowl that Theo addressed it.
“I’m guessing the Mitchell Keys lead didn’t pan out,” he said, as neutral as the sheriff when he was being matter-of-fact.
Darius glared. Theo raised his hands in self-defense.
“Winnie and I might be stars in the tight-lipped department but that can’t be said for a good majority of McCoy County’s finest. Try as everyone might, some information slips out. ”
Darius knew that no matter how hard he tried to keep a lid on the investigation Theo was right. Details and information would get out.
That’s why he hadn’t yelled at Eve right then and there in the meeting room.
You’re lying, he’d wanted to shout.
But, for one, he had never yelled at Eve a day in his life, and he wanted to take that achievement to the grave. And, for two, if anyone found out that Eve was lying about an alibi—an alibi in a murder investigation, to boot?
Darius shook his head now even at the thought.
It would get out. It would put suspicion on her. It could ruin her.
But what if she is involved? What if she’s covering for Mitchell?
These two thoughts had been on repeat since he’d had to let the couple leave. Darius hadn’t for a moment thought Eve had killed Gary or had a hand in his death, but would she really cover for Mitchell if he had?
It was a question that grated against Darius.
Maybe he had been wrong about her relationship with the younger Keys brother. Maybe she was in love with him. She was, he believed, lying to law enforcement for him. That wasn’t some typical friendly thing to do, was it?
Theo was still looking at him.
Darius sighed out and let his fork clink into the bowl beneath his hands.
“Everyone in the wedding party alibied out,” he skirted. “Almost all the guests came into town right before the wedding. There were only six who could have been here during the kill window. And, of those six, none had connections to Mr. Whittaker.”
“And no one knows where he was actually killed yet,” Theo added.
Again, he raised his hands in defense. This time he added a smirk.
“You can blame me hearing that from the sheriff himself. He pulled me and Blake into a video call to ask us career locals about places around here y’all might have not thought about. ”
If it had been anyone else other than Blake, Liam’s wife, Theo’s adoptive mother, and one of the fiercest former sheriffs he had ever known, Darius might have taken offense at asking outside of the department for help.
Instead, he knew to be grateful she had taken time out of her own job to try and give them more than they had.
Which was still almost nothing, if Darius were being honest.
“I’m assuming, since I haven’t been called in, that nothing came from that conversation?” he asked.
Theo made a gun with his hand.
“Bingo. Blake couldn’t think of anything y’all had missed, and now that she’s been back in town for years, she’s more of an expert on this town than me.”
Darius rubbed at his neck. Sighing wasn’t going to do a thing, but he felt the urge again.
So there was a strong possibility that it happened outside of Seven Roads, making an already-difficult search even more so.
“This is one of those few times I wish a victim had been more into social media,” Darius said after a moment.
“Mr. Whittaker’s last few days have been hard to pin down.
We can’t even confirm yet when he first got into town.
He’s not married or in a relationship either, so there’s no one who seems to have had a good itinerary for him leading up to the wedding.
Usually social media can help us with things like that. ”
For the next few minutes, they went back and forth with questions and answers that Darius had, for the most part, already gone over back at the department. No new insights sprang up, and no missing information shook loose.
Darius’s patience, however, dissolved into a tiredness that he decided not to ignore any longer. He warned Theo not to stay up too late, washed his dishes and only paused in the kitchen doorway as an afterthought.
“You and Winnie never asked about it, but I want to explain.”
Theo turned his way, bowl in one hand, dish soap in the other. His eyebrow rose. Darius, so sure in every word he spoke about work, felt an uncomfortableness ease into an explanation he hadn’t originally intended to give.
“Evelyn Myers used to live in the house next door,” he started, motioning to the house outside to the right. “We were friends as kids until her dad got a job up north and they moved. Today was the first day I’d seen her since then.”
“And she thought you two were still close enough to ask you to stop her wedding?”
It was a fair question for anyone to ask, and Darius couldn’t fault the boy for his bluntness.
In return, he gave a simple answer.
“I’m not sure why she wanted the wedding stopped, but I owed her a favor, so I was going to do it.”
“That’s a big favor to ask,” Theo said. “She must have really done something big for it to hold water all these years.”
Again, Darius stuck to a truth that was as honest as they came.
He nodded.
“She saved my life.”
He didn’t explain further, and Theo didn’t pry past that. Darius moved down the same hallway he’d walked since he had learned how to walk but paused at the door on the right. It was Theo’s room now: years ago it had been his.
Part of Darius was glad to have moved to the main bedroom at the end of the hall—it was bigger, he’d updated it, and there was an attached private bathroom that was nice too—but sometimes when his mind went to the past, he missed the one thing that his new room didn’t have.
The view from its window had been one of a kind.
This time, Darius did sigh.
It came out low and long enough to carry him back to the present.
That night he fell asleep quickly.
In the morning, he was up before his alarm went off at seven.
Despite forgetting to turn the heat on, he was surprisingly warm.
Then that warmth moved.
Someone was next to him in bed.
Darius’s eyes were open in a flash. Adrenaline exploded in his veins, and every muscle he had seemed ready to spring into action. It was only by the grace of God that he recognized who it was pressed against his side before his fight instincts fully kicked in.
The person in question was unbothered by the internal struggle.
Then again, Evelyn Myers had always been a heavy sleeper.