Page 31 of Indigo Ridge (The Edens 1)

He laughed. “You’re quite good at losing your phone and keys. But you’re fantastic at ruffling feathers.”

“Ha ha,” I muttered, a smile on my lips. I’d missed Cole’s teasing.

“Rile ’em up, Winnie. If that’s what it takes until your gut stops screaming, ruffle all the feathers you need.”

“Thanks.” A knot of anxiety loosened in my stomach. Cole often told me what I already knew. That didn’t make his words any less powerful.

“Call me if you need to talk it through again.”

“Okay. Give Poppy a hug for me. Brady and MacKenna too.”

“Will do. I’ll shoot you a text with some weekends that work for us.”

“Can’t wait.” We said our goodbyes and then I sat back in my chair, staring at the mess of files to review.

Maybe I was reading too much into Lily Green. Quincy was a small town and I had to think that my officers had a good pulse for what was happening. If there was any reason to suspect foul play, they would have seen it, right? And Pops too. He hadn’t mentioned a thing about the suicides.

Except what if the reason no one had questioned these suicides was because they were from Quincy? I was the only person who hadn’t spent years working in this department. Not only that, but every staff member had been born and raised in this county.

Maybe to them, this was normal.

The saddest truth would be if they were right.

A knock came at the door.

“Come in,” I called.

Janice poked her head inside. “Emily from the newspaper is on line one for you.”

“Would you please tell her I’m in a meeting and take a message?”

“Sure thing.” She eased the door closed, leaving me to my own thoughts.

I swiveled in my chair, right then left, right then left. My eyes never wandered from the stack of files.

Why? Why was Lily’s death bothering me?

“No note.” That was the biggest missing piece.

“Her car.” Why had it been miles away from Indigo Ridge? Who’d taken her up there?

“Her shoes.” If she’d walked, where were her shoes?

On Saturday, after a fitful night’s rest on Friday thanks to the man who’d kissed me dizzy, I’d returned to Indigo Ridge. I’d canvased the area, hiking the ridge not once more, but twice. Then I’d walked the path to where we’d found Lily’s car again.

No clues in sight, certainly no missing pair of shoes.

What I really felt like doing with my day was heading out to the trail again, but the stack of files wasn’t getting smaller, so I took a sip from my now-cold coffee and got to work.

Eight hours and too-many-files-to-count later, there wasn’t anything particularly noteworthy, though I had added three more items to my list of new paperwork requirements. Janice had scheduled one-on-one meetings with every officer in the department, and starting tomorrow, I’d sit down with each to talk on an individual basis.

I had positive praise for each person—except Officer Smith—but there were critiques too. I doubted I’d win many friends by the time these meetings were complete, but whatever. This was my department now, damn it, and we were going to start creating reports worth reading.

By the time Janice came in to say good night, I was exhausted and starving. I was in the middle of packing up a few files to take home for the night when my phone rang. “Hey, Pops.”

“I’m grilling burgers for dinner.”

“I’m on my way. Need me to pick up anything?”