Chapter 8
Rosie didn’t much care for working with the agents that had come in to run the stationhouse.
She supposed they were all right, but they were very intense and very up on the rules of their own.
She ran a tight ship, but they were making her crazy running around behind her, questioning every job she would assign.
There was a town meeting last night that introduced her as the temporary chief of police.
She tried to tell the people in town that she no longer wanted the job, but was helping out the agents in the stationhouse.
Getting them to understand anything was difficult when all they wanted was answers. Like, where did McGee go?
“He’s currently assisting the police with the ongoing investigation going on out at the Golden Sheep and the things they’re finding there.
” She didn’t tell them that they might never find the people who had killed thirty people, and that he was being investigated for his part in the mess up there.
As were the other men who had been out there that day.
“They have witnesses that are working with the police and agency as well.”
“What about the men that were out there? The other cops? Where are they?” Working with the agency, she told them. “That’s a lot of manpower that we don’t have around here while they’re doing that out there. What are we supposed to do if they come back here wanting to kill more of us?”
“The Federal Agency is working hard to keep all of us safe. And there is no reason to believe that anyone from the Sheep will be returning for more deaths.” She was asked if there was meth involved.
“I can’t talk about the investigation. I’m just as much in the dark as you guys are, as I was just a citizen when everything took place.
I’m only helping to assist the Agents while they help run the stationhouse for us, and they find a replacement for the Chief of Police.
We’ll be as safe as we would be with the men and women who worked here before. ”
“I heard tell that there was meth involved and that those people who were killed were making it right there in that restaurant. What do you have to say about that?” She said there was nothing she could say as she was being held to the ongoing investigation.
“You should have been in charge of the things going on out there. Ain’t a better chief of police than you were, and I say we vote you back into the job. ”
“I don’t want to work as the chief anymore.
I like what I’m doing.” He asked if she liked slinging pizzas.
“I do as a matter of fact. With me going to have a baby soon, it’s the safest job for me, and I’m happy to be able to see everyone that I worked with before.
It’s a wonderful job, and I’m happy to be doing it. ”
There were more questions than answers that she had for them.
There was a great deal of speculation going on as well.
It amazed her how many people knew just what was going on out there and had gotten it right.
As soon as the meeting was taken over by one of the Agents, she went to sit down next to Wylie.
He held her hand while they sat in the rows behind the podium.
There were people wanting her to answer more questions.
She did as best as she could and was allowed to do so.
They had briefed her on things she could talk about, and flat-out told her not to mention McGee.
All she could say was that he was part of the investigation, and that was the end of it.
Someone asked if the little pisser was going to be returning, and she let the agent field that one.
He said the same thing she had said. That he was helping with the investigation, and that was all he said.
“He was first on the scene and had given us vital information on what happened out there in this investigation. Without his help, we might well have never been able to solve some of the crimes that were committed that day. Trust me when I tell you that all the men working in this area have been giving us what we need, and we couldn’t have done it without them.
” He just worded it differently than she had, and that seemed to do the trick.
She did wonder what people would ask in six or seven months when McGee didn’t show up anymore for work. He’d be in prison by then, she surmised, and good luck with that. If only part of what he did out there were true, she’d bet that he’d be in federal prison for the rest of his life.
Rosie answered questions after the meeting.
Just saying what she’d been told to say and nothing more.
There wasn’t much she could tell anyone about what had happened out there.
Just rumors about things were all. There were a couple of things that had been confessed to, and she had a hard time believing that they were true, either.
Did they really eat around the dead while they were out there?
Only the ones there would know that for sure, and since they were in her jail, she did believe some of what had happened, like the moving of the dead.
She thought that Daniel McGee was just arrogant enough to do what he wanted when out on a crime scene.
And it would take a lot of balls to move the dead when you were working the scene.
Plus, she’d heard the story so many times that there was no way that she didn’t believe it.
She must have heard it fifty times over the last few weeks and knew that the people she’d had working for her were just stupid enough to do what they were told.
That was the only way that she could see that happening.
That McGee told them to move them, and they did.
Another thing that she thought was true was the meth lab beneath the building.
There had been a lot of fire and death for it to have been only a robbery, as was said of the place.
She believed that not only had Meth been made on the premises, but it had been sold there as well.
There were just too many incidents of people getting arrested around this area for that not to have happened.
She supposed she could have asked Hailey. She knew on some level she’d been involved in what had gone down. What it was she didn’t know, but she’d bet that was why she was missing so much work of late. Because she was talking to the Feds. But she wouldn’t ask her.
The trust that was growing between the two of them was great. Hailey didn’t hint at anything, but since she’d been talking to the feds, she’d seemed more relaxed. More of what she might have been like before all this went down. And Hailey had only just shown up as the Sheep was being investigated.
Gleason and Hailey seemed to be making their way into becoming a couple, too.
She’d not do anything wrong with that budding relationship either.
She wanted Gleason happy, and if it was Hailey, then that would be great as well.
She just hoped that Hailey was telling Gleason what was going on so he’d not be blindsided when things were brought out in a trial.
And she had to believe there would be a trial for the things that had happened out there.
Too many people had lost their lives for nothing to become of it.
Home now, she and Wylie made plans for dinner.
He’d forgotten that Gleason and the others were coming over for a refresher course on investing, and instead of making dinner, she had their cook make small sandwiches for them all, as all of them were coming for the course.
This time, David was running the class, and she thought that they’d enjoy it better if it were him instead of some stiff, rich guy who was paid to teach them how to do it.
They certainly loved the man and his wife.
She knew that Wylie called David dad most of the time and Alice mom.
She would get all teary-eyed when they did that, and she didn’t blame her.
The boys hadn’t had a good relationship with their parents, especially their father, since he killed their mom.
Rosie was getting things done around the office.
If not for the fact that the agents were in her way most of the time, she thought that she was doing well.
They were getting things looked at over the paperwork that had been filed by McGee.
Or the lack of paperwork. He would come into the office at eight and be gone by eight fifteen.
Going out to the sight where the murders had taken place seemed to be all that he wanted to be doing.
She wouldn’t have done it that way at all.
She would have gone out to investigate what had happened with the report of shots being fired, and when she saw what had gone down, she would have made some calls.
As it was now, they’d be lucky if the case was ever solved.
There was just too much going on at the site for anyone to know what had really happened and what had been tampered with to make it look like the killers had cleaned up their mess by moving the bodies.
She didn’t know a great deal about what had gone down out there, but she was willing to bet that someone had gotten away with murdering several people and blowing up a meth lab while they were at it.
Most of the men who had been out there that day would be lucky if they were to ever get a job again.
She could see that, as far as she was concerned, even if there was a confession about the murders, they’d be hard pressed to know what really went on out there.
She figured that she’d just do as she was told and couldn’t wait for the investigation to be over with so that she could get back to her normal life.
Whatever that happened to be at the moment.