Page 110 of You'll Be Sorry

“Oh my God, your parents.”

“That’s a me problem. Though kudos to them for already mentioning hiring a lawyer. You were a juvenile and you served your time. That’s in our favor.”

“Bunny Borden,” she muttered.

“That’s gonna take longer to die down,” he agreed. “Oops, poor choice of words. Wait, is it too soon for me to joke?”

She managed a watery smile. “Never.”

“Who would know,” Theo asked more seriously. “Who would’ve been able to make the connection between the woman you are now and the girl you used to be?”

“I’m not sure. In theory, the only person left from those days is me.”

“Then maybe it’s not about the past, but the present.”

“What do you mean…” Her voice trailed off as understanding dawned. “This house, what’s going on with this property, this town.”

“Gotta admit, things have been hopping the past few days. If someone wanted to create a distraction, chumming the waters with salacious tales from your past is a good way to do it.”

Raquel frowned, scrubbed at her face. She could see what he was getting at, because there was no doubt being outed on the community board was creating a giant distraction. To keep them from learning more about the Dixons? Or working to identify the remains of the poor young woman in the well. Or…

Stories of treasure. A coded account of something far worse. Raquel stared up at her husband:

“It’s possible I didn’t quite tell Mason everything about the journal. I’m working on a few theories of my own. But I need a little more information.”

“Another source?”

“No. The cave. The place Mandy and I discovered yesterday. I want to see it.”

34

True to Mason’s prediction, everyone wanted to know about the latest development in the Dixon case, given the packed house in the midst of an earlier-than-forecasted blizzard. And true to her officer’s report, sitting on the riser in the front of the room was Austin Dekes, their normally solid-as-a-rock fire chief, not looking particularly solid at all.

Flushed face, unsteady gait, twitchy finger. All these years later, Austin hadn’t just fallen off the wagon but was packing his favorite shotgun to boot.

“He wants to know who did it,” Officer Sandford informed her.

“Did what?”

Officers Sandford and Childs exchanged glances.

“We don’t exactly know,” Sandford confessed.

“And the town residents?”

“Umm.” Now Childs’s turn. “They don’t seem to wanna leave the show.”

“Fuck me.” Not her most professional statement, but it had been that kind of day.

Both of her officers shrugged. “No one’s moved. Which isn’t a bad thing, as it’s kept the situation calm. But on the other hand…”

They had a hostage situation involving several hundred townsfolk. Mandy noticed that many of the volunteer fire department memberswere front and center. They’d probably attempted to talk their beloved leader down. Unfortunately, it hadn’t worked.

She could call state, summon the cavalry. God knew her tiny department wasn’t equipped for the likes of this. And yet as her father had always said, community policing was exactly that—about community. Absolutely, positively she wasn’t giving up on one of her neighbors now.

“I’m going in. Your job is to contain the perimeter. And bit by bit, let’s try to convince some of our overly curious residents that it’s time to leave.”

Her officers exchanged glances. Mandy got it. Like hell a bunch of bored locals were giving up front-row seats to juicy drama any time soon. Seriously, police academy classes didn’t come close to preparing a small-town cop for the likes of this.