Line of Fire Read online

  “I’ve been out here for a half hour debating what I should do,” Cody said.

  “What do you mean?”

  “I got some information, but I’m not sure I want to tell them.” He tilted his head toward the station. “I don’t think they’d even believe me.”

  “But I might?”

  “They said you were psychic.”

  I nearly laughed. I was as psychic as he was. In fact, any talent I had came from him, though he couldn’t know it.

  “I’m not psychic, but I’ll listen. Do you mind if we walk while we talk? I’m really hungry.” I also knew the longer we stood here, the more likely the guard would alert the detectives and then whatever information Cody had might be lost to his fear of them.

  He blinked. “Well, sure. I’m feeling a bit peckish myself.” We’d gone a few steps when he asked, “What happened to your face?”

  “Someone didn’t like me snooping around.”

  “I’m not surprised. You shouldn’t be out here alone.”

  A lump grew in my throat, but I told myself it had nothing to do with his concern. “Well, with that wedding just finishing, I’m hardly alone,” I said.

  “Look,” he went on, as though our exchange had not taken place. “I don’t want this to come from me. I wouldn’t even come forward at all if it wasn’t for that little girl.”

  “Why is she your concern?”

  He stared down at the sidewalk, hunching in on himself. Several seconds of silence passed as we walked. “I promised myself I’d never stand by and see a child hurt, that’s all. Don’t make a big deal out of it. I ain’t going to start attending community events or run for office or anything. Like I said, I don’t want this to come from me. You said you were here to see if I was involved, well, I am now, but not in the way you might think. My only sin is trying to prove myself innocent. That’s why this information can’t come from me. They won’t believe how I found it. They’ll think I’m involved.”

  “But you aren’t?”

  “Not with drugs or with whoever wanted that girl.” Hunching over more, Cody rubbed his right leg.

  “You okay?” I asked, slowing my pace.

  “Yeah. It’s nothing.”

  I stayed at the slower pace. The station was comfortably behind us now, so I didn’t think the guard would report him—if he was even still watching. The glowing lights of Jonathan’s beckoned ahead, and my stomach twisted in anticipation. “Let’s talk inside,” I said.

  The place was nearly full, but a large group and several couples left as we arrived, so we were seated as soon as the tables were reset. Our booth was at the end of a row, and I was glad because Cody acted nervous, as if preparing to bolt.

  The waiter looked Cody over twice, and I noticed that the black parka was not only snagged but also old and dirty. His jeans were torn, and with the stubble on his cheeks and his wild white hair, he looked nothing like a man who donated to charities and owned a house on a hundred acres. But at least his coat was only snagged and not repaired from a gunshot like mine.

  I ordered a ten-ounce New York steak, and another to go for Shannon. I flinched a bit at the price, but I needed to recover my strength. Cody ordered his own steak, and I wondered if I’d end up paying for his and if I had enough money in my checking account. When the waiter understood that the extra steak and I were heading to the sheriff’s station after our meal, he offered to bump our order in front of the others. Before he left, he gave Cody another once-over, and I wondered if he thought I was meeting with a homeless informant.

  “So what did you find?” I prompted Cody when the waiter had finally left.

  Cody didn’t meet my gaze but looked around the restaurant, as though checking to see if we were being overheard. “I did some investigating on my own,” he said finally, “and I found out something. How is probably better left unsaid, but I—” He met my gaze, looked away and then back again, peering at me intently, whatever he’d been intending to say apparently forgotten. “Your eyes.” His voice was strangled.

  “What about them?” With the lamp light at our table, I could see the different colors of his eyes, but with Tawnia’s contact in place, he shouldn’t have been able to detect the slight color variation in mine.

  “You have heterochromia. Like me.”

  I blinked. “You can’t possibly—” But I knew what had happened. I’d rubbed my eye so much, I must have dislodged the contact. Greeley’s comment should have alerted me, and it would have if I hadn’t been so beat. Now I had to convince Cody it was a coincidence.

  “Who are you, really?” he grated. “And why are you here? It isn’t to find out if I’m guilty, is it?”

  “Look, just because I have the same condition you do, doesn’t mean—”

  “You also look like her. Not her hair or the eyes, but the shape of your face. I’m an artist. I’m good with faces. You look like her, and that’s why you seem familiar. Who are you?” His eyes dug into mine. “Tell me the truth.”

  I sighed. “Okay. But I really did come to see if you’re innocent. Or guilty.”

  “But no one hired you.”

  For the time being I would leave Tawnia out of it. He didn’t need to know there were two of us or that he had a grandchild. “I came because Laina Drexler told me about you. Or Laina Walkling now. She’s my biological grandmother.”

  “Laina.” The single word held a mountain of regret.

  “And I guess you’ve figured out that her daughter Kendall was my mother,” I added.

  He grunted as though the revelation brought his pain to a level he couldn’t hold in.

  “I want to know about my past,” I continued, keeping my eyes locked on his. “Part of that is finding out if you had anything to do with Jenny. I consult with the Portland police, and from what I’d read about the case you were their only suspect. If you didn’t do it, I felt that wasn’t fair to you or Jenny.” I waited a second before adding, “I wanted to know the truth for myself.”

  “I don’t want you here,” Cody growled. “I don’t owe you anything.”

  “This isn’t about you!” Anger overrode my other emotions, even the nameless ones I didn’t admit to. “I deserve to know what type of man my biological father is.”

  His lips twisted in an ugly sneer. “That man is dead. Long dead, and good riddance! Better you turn around right now and go back wherever you came from. I don’t have anything for you.”

  “You have information. Whatever relationship there is between us, I’m not leaving until we find Jenny Vandyke. So either you tell me what you know or I’ll tell the commander that you’re like me and you have information.”

  “Like you?”

  I nodded, holding up my gloved hands. “It started last year after my father—” I looked down at the table, swallowing hard before I contained my emotion enough to continue. “After my father drowned in the Willamette. I’d always been sensitive to things, but that’s when it really started.” When Winter died but also when I’d found Tawnia. Something horrible, something wonderful. Both traumatic. “Now this … ability … is how I help the police.”

  “They believe you?” He rubbed a hand over his unshaven face.

  “Not at first, and still not all of them, but I get results. I find people. The bottom line is all they care about.”

  He chewed on his lower lip in the same way that I often found myself doing. I watched him weighing his options: to run or to go ahead with the information. To talk to me or to lock me out. His privacy versus the trouble of dealing with me. Was there any curiosity in him? Did he want to know what had happened to me during all these years?

  My interest in him, of course, went far beyond the case. I wanted to know about his talent, about his mother and why she’d been in a sanitarium. I was afraid to say any of this now—afraid he’d turn me away. I’d experienced his guilt and self-loathing in the imprints at his house. If they had nothing to do with Jenny, it was possibly related to my mother. Perhaps he was not as disconnected
as he wanted me to believe.

  I tapped the tabletop. “Now what’s so important that you waited for me outside the sheriff’s office?”

  His nostrils flared, and he gave a sharp nod. “Okay, fine. I went to that kid’s house, the gas station clerk. I knew he was related to that stabbed man, and I wanted to find something to clear my name.”

  “Wait a minute.” A sinking feeling grew in my stomach. “You went to Kirt’s house? Don’t tell me that was you we were chasing.”

  One side of his face twitched. “Almost got me, too. I hurt my leg going out that window so fast. Ruined my good coat, too.”

  I leaned forward as far as I could over the table, talking fast and low. “Do you realize what they’re going to do to you once they realize you were inside that house?”

  He leaned over the table as well, both hands spread between us. “They ain’t going to—unless you tell them.” His expression changed. “Wait a minute. You didn’t find any of me on the things inside, did you? Maybe you already told them I was there.”

  “Imprints. I call them imprints, because the scenes and emotions seem to be imprinted on the objects. And no, I didn’t find any of your imprints. You stayed calm enough, apparently.”

  “I didn’t leave no fingerprints, either. But I would have been even more careful it I’d known you were—” He broke off. “Anyway, I had to clear my name.”

  “What you did is become more of a suspect. I’m going to have to tell them.” A part of me wondered if I’d known it all along. The way he’d moved, the car that had seemed familiar. Perhaps I’d already been protecting him.

  “Maybe they won’t care once they know what I found.”

  “Go on.”

  “There was this, uh, imprint on some keys I found.”

  “The one of the house or the back door of the gas station?”

  He blinked. “Oh, you found them. Well, both were suspicious, don’t you think? Anyway, I—”

  “Here we go, all nice and hot.”

  We looked up to see the waiter poised by the table, our meals on a circular tray in his hand.

  “That was fast,” I said, sitting up straight so he had room to place my food in front of me.

  “Well, if you’re working this late with the sheriff’s office, you probably need to get back, so I commandeered another order. Don’t worry. With the lineup of steaks we have, it will only mean they wait an extra minute or so.” He lowered his voice. “It’s about that little girl, isn’t it?”

  I nodded. A real sheriff’s deputy would have told him that information was confidential, but I was only a consultant. They didn’t pay me enough to avoid questions. Actually, I wasn’t being paid anything this time.

  “Poor little girl. I hope you find her.”

  I glanced at his name tag. “Thanks, Sheldon. We appreciate it.”

  “Your other order should be ready by the time you finish your meal.”

  He obviously didn’t know how fast I could eat, but I repeated my thanks, making a mental note to give him a nice tip. I hoped my checking had enough funds.

  Cody ignored the waiter, cutting huge slices of steak and forking them to his mouth with a steady rhythm. I stared, fascinated, imagining myself telling Tawnia that I’d finally discovered the source of our huge appetites.

  I pulled off my gloves and gingerly tested my fork. Just because Cody hadn’t run into a nasty imprint on his utensils, didn’t mean mine were imprint free.

  Satisfied, I shrugged off my coat before digging into my own steak. Cody left his coat on. “So,” I prompted. There had to be more to his story.

  “Didn’t anyone teach you not to talk with your mouth full, girl?” He pushed in two more pieces of meat. I wondered if in all his efforts to avoid the deputies he’d missed lunch and dinner.

  I rolled my eyes. “What was so interesting on the keys, the house or the—”

  “The house. It’s here in Salem, and I know where. Used to be a mortuary. It’s plenty big to hide drugs, and apart enough from other places that even if there were odd noises, no one would hear.”

  That meant a girl could scream to no avail. Or multiple girls.

  “I’m betting that’s where that clerk’s run to,” Cody said. “And those men in the imprint? I’ve seen them before, outside the elementary school.” The magnitude of what Cody said came to me slowly. I’d had doubts about ever identifying the house, but Cody knew the place and had recognized the men in the imprint. He might even be able to identify them from mug shots.

  But what had Cody been doing outside the elementary school?

  “Okay, you tell me the address, and I’ll get it to the detectives.” I sliced off a large piece of steak and put it in my mouth, knowing getting this information back to the police station was more important than my food and that the second he gave it to me, I’d have to leave.

  “You won’t mention me, will you?” Cody asked before bolting down another slice of meat.

  I sighed. “Not right now, but eventually they’ll have to know. The detective I work with isn’t going to let it go. He’ll want to know how I figured it out.” In the old days, I could have told Shannon to take a flying leap but not now. Romance had its drawbacks.

  He swallowed the food in his mouth. “You’re sweet on him, ain’t you?”

  “What’s the address?”

  He scratched the stubble on his face. “The thing is, I don’t know the address. I know where it’s at, that’s all.”

  “So how am I going to keep you out of it if you have to come along?”

  His eyes glinted. “Tell them I recognized the house from your description.”

  That might work for the others. Maybe even for Shannon, if I decided to keep him out of it.

  I drew out my phone and pressed Shannon’s number. “Look,” I said when he picked up. “I know where the house is, the one I saw. Or at least I know how to find it. I’ll explain when I get to the station, but the thing is, Cody Beckett has to come along for the ride.”

  “What? How’d he get into this?”

  “He’s the one who knows where it is.”

  “How?”

  “It’s a long story,” I said. “Well, actually it’s not all that long, but I’d rather tell you in person. We’re only a minute away. We’ll be right there.”

  “You’re not here?” Worry crept into his voice.

  “At a restaurant, just down the street. They have great steaks. Don’t worry. I’m fine.”

  His laugh sounded forced. “I should have known.”

  “Don’t be so snide, or I’ll eat the one I planned to bring back for you.”

  “You’re giving up one for me? Wow, that’s got to say something.”

  All at once that something stretched between us, taut and warm and wonderful. “I’ll see you in a bit.” I tried to swallow the sudden lump in my throat.

  “See you. Be careful.”

  There he went, destroying the moment by reminding me that he was president of the Autumn Needs to Be More Careful Club, but since we’d been jumped that day and shot at several different times, I decided not to take offense.

  “I will. But honestly, I’m a minute away, and the street is full of people.”

  I was smiling when I hung up. I took another bite and then motioned to the waiter, who hurried over immediately. “We have to go now,” I said, not masking my urgency.

  “You want to take your food with you?” His words faltered as he saw that we’d both eaten most of our steaks and that Cody was doing a great job with his rice and vegetables. I hadn’t touched mine; carbs didn’t go nearly as far to restoring my strength after imprints.

  “No, thanks,” I said, pulling out my wallet.

  Cody coughed and pulled a small wad of cash from the pocket of his parka and peeled off some bills. “This should cover it,” he told the waiter. “Keep the change.”

  The waiter’s eyes widened. “Thanks, sir.”

  “I can pay for mine,” I said.

  “It’
s paid for.” Cody waved the waiter away and arose stiffly to his feet. “If it bothers you, think of it as payment for trying to clear me.” He started toward the door of the restaurant with obvious difficulty, his leg apparently having grown stiffer during the inactivity. I wondered if he should see a doctor.

  I hurried after him. “I don’t want payment.”

  He stopped and stared at me. “Then why are you here? You want something, all right. It’s just not money.” He didn’t wait for a reply but turned and limped along the aisle.

  He was right. I did want something. I wanted his quilt. I wanted his memories. I wanted to hear his side of what happened the night Tawnia and I were conceived.

  “Miss!” The waiter hurried toward me, carrying a carton that he placed in my hands.

  “Thank you.” Hard to believe I’d forgotten food. If he found out, Shannon would never let me live this down.

  I reached Cody as he opened the restaurant door and held it so I could precede him outside. “Thanks,” I said automatically.

  He grunted in reply.

  We covered several yards in silence. The streets didn’t have as many pedestrians as when we’d entered the restaurant, though we hadn’t been there long. Even many of the cars parked along the street had cleared away. It was cold enough that I wished I’d worn an extra pair of socks inside my boots. Maybe two.

  I pondered what I should say to Cody, but I didn’t know exactly what I wanted from him. I’d have to let it all play out. Right now I needed to focus on the case.

  Two men stepped out from behind a white van, the first one grabbing Cody before I could scream a warning. His fist plunged into Cody’s stomach. Without so much as a grunt, Cody was swinging back. Cody matched him in height, but his attacker was less than half his age.

  I mentally kicked myself for being so hung up on what I was feeling about Cody that I hadn’t anticipated the danger of the parked van. If I’d been paying attention, I would have made us cross to the other side where attackers couldn’t hide, or waited until we had company from the restaurant. Instead I’d put us both at risk.

  The other man lunged for me. I dodged his blow and followed with two jabs and a roundhouse. He was shorter than the other man but lean and tough. More than enough match for me in training.