Jessica Beck - Donut Shop 17 - Old Fashioned Crooks (6 page)

I heard a gasp a
few tables beyond her, but I chose to ignore it.
 
It could go either way now.
 
Either Gabby would unleash her fury on
me for my boldness, or she’d let it slide and pretend that I hadn’t said
anything.

To my surprise, she
chose a third option.
 
After letting
out a startling laugh that got everyone’s attention, she smiled as she said,
“Too true.
 
The reason I ask is that
I just got a wedding gown in that will fit you perfectly, if you’re
interested.”

“Is it white?” I
asked her, still startled by her amiable response.
 
Maybe she was one of those folks who
just loved weddings, though I never would have predicted it based on her past
behavior.

“Of course it
is.”

“Well, that might
be a problem, then.
 
After all, I’m
not exactly a blushing innocent,” I said.
 
“I’ve been married before, remember?
 
How appropriate would it be for me to
wear white again?”

“You’re kidding,
right?
 
I had a customer who bought
a new gown from me every three years for twelve years running, each one whiter
than the one before.”

“Well, I imagine
that I’ll wear a nice pantsuit, or maybe even a dress, instead of a formal gown,”
I said.

“I have those,
too, you know.
 
I’ll keep my eye out
for something you’ll like.”

“Thanks,” I said.

“Happy to do it.”
 
A little wistfully, she added, “I just love
a good wedding.”

So, that
particular theory had just been confirmed, much to my surprise.
 
“I’ll be sure to let you know as soon as
I’m ready to shop for something.”

“Fine.”

Our food came as
Gabby left, and as Trish placed our orders in front of us, she asked, “What was
that all about?”

“Gabby wanted me
to look at a wedding dress that she just got into the shop,” I said with a
smile.

“Are you
seriously thinking about wearing a formal white bridal gown, Suzanne?” Trish
asked.

“Not a
chance.
 
If I did wear one, it would
be more for the irony of it, and there’s not going to be a single thing to mock
when I marry Jake.”
 
I studied the
food.
 
“This looks perfect.”

“It better be,”
Trish said.

“Grace, our
food’s here,” I said as I picked up a fry and ate it.

“One second,” she
said, and then she turned back to her screen.

“No hurry.
 
I’ll be happy to wait,” I said as I
picked up my burger and took a rather large and unladylike bite from it.

“There’s no need
to do that for me,” she said, and then she looked at me with a grin, spotting
the bite that I’d just taken.
 
“Why
am I not surprised?”

“Hey, I said that
I was hungry, too.
 
Did you have any
luck?”

Grace started to
say something when she looked around and saw several folks still watching and
listening to every word we were saying, and yet trying their best not to be
noticed doing it.
 
“After.”

“Then let’s eat,”
I said, agreeing with the sentiment.

As we dined on
that glorious meal, I couldn’t help but think about what Gabby had
suggested.
 
On the face of it,
wearing white was ridiculous, even if I was starting my life over with Jake by
my side.
 
I’d loved to play pretend
as a girl as much as any other girl I knew had, but this was not fantasy.
 
Marrying the man of my dreams, as corny
as that might have sounded if I’d said it out loud, was the reality, and it was
so much better than any scenario I might have dreamed up as a child.

After we ate and
paid for our meals, Grace and I lingered at the register for a second.
 
I’d tried to get Trish’s attention,
since she’d asked me to touch base with her at some point, but she was busy
dealing with a group of other customers.
 
I caught her eye and held up my thumb and pinkie, imitating a telephone,
as I mouthed the words, call me.

She nodded, and
Grace and I left.
 

“That was
perfect,” I said.
 
“Now back to
business.
 
Did you have any luck
finding either one of our last two suspects?”

“It was tough,
but I finally got a line on both of them.”

“Let’s hear what
you’ve got,” I said as we headed for my Jeep, now ready to tackle the world again
after filling our bellies.

Grace was
interrupted before she had a chance to get started, though, as my cellphone
rang.

“It’s Chief
Martin,” I told her after glancing at the caller ID, and then I answered.
 
“Hi.
 
Thanks for calling me back.”

“Suzanne, I need
you to come to my office at the police station right now.”

“Does it have to
be this instant?
 
Grace and I are busy
at the moment.”

“Sorry, but this
can’t wait.
 
You should come alone,
so ask Grace if she could meet up with you later,” the chief said.

“Is that an
order?” I asked, resenting his command.

There was a heavy
sigh on the other end of the line, and then Chief Martin asked me in a voice
full of contrition, “Just do this for me without giving me any grief, okay?”

“Fine.
 
I’ll see you in a few minutes,” I
said.
 
I’d never heard him couch a
request like that, and I wanted to see what this was all about.

“What’s up?”
Grace asked me as I put my cellphone back in my pocket.

“There’s been a
sudden change of plans.
 
I need to
drop you off at home, if you don’t mind.
 
The chief wants to see me in his office right away.”

“Without me?”
Grace asked, clearly unhappy about being left out.

“I’m sorry, but I
have a hunch that if I don’t go alone, I’m not going to find out what’s happening,”
I explained.
 
“Do this for me, could
you?
 
Is there anything that you can
do for an hour while I see what’s going on at the police station?”

She
shrugged.
 
“Actually, I’ve got a
pile of paperwork waiting for me, but I’d still rather go with you.”

“That’s my
preference, too, but I didn’t get a choice.”

After a few
seconds, Grace finally gave in.
 
“Fine, but you need to come by my place
the second you leave the station and tell me everything that happened.
 
Is that agreed?”

“Agreed,” I
said.
 

We got to her
place quickly, and I let her out.
 
As I drove back toward the chief’s office, I couldn’t help but wonder
what this sudden summons was all about.
 
Knowing that I’d find out in a few minutes didn’t make it any easier to
take, either.

When I drove up,
I saw him standing out in front of the precinct door, and by the expression on
his face, I had a hunch that I wasn’t going to like what was about to come
next.

The way it ended
up, boy, was that ever the truth.

Chapter 8

“I’m out here
because I wanted to speak with you first,” the chief told me after I’d parked
my Jeep in one of the spaces out front.
 
He’d met me halfway in the parking lot, and his expression hadn’t
softened during his stroll over.

“What’s going
on?
 
Nothing’s wrong with Momma, is
it?”

“No, of course
not.
 
Why would you even think
that?”

“Well, even you
have to admit that this is all kind of mysterious,” I said.

“No worries on
that front.
 
Your mother is fine.”

“Have you spoken
with her yet about what’s been troubling her lately?” I asked him.

“That’s why I
asked you to come by.
 
Suzanne, I’ve
officially resigned, once and for all, as the chief of police for April Springs.”

“I already knew
that,” I replied.
 
“You’re still going
to keep filling in until Jake can finish working his notice so he can decide if
he wants to take over, right?”

“I’m sorry, but it
looks as though that’s not going to happen.
 
I’ve already spoken with Jake this
morning, and so has the mayor.
 
It
appears that he meant what he said before.
 
Jake made it pretty clear that he’s not interested in my job, and I
can’t take another second of it.”

“Hang on a second
and give me a chance to talk to him before you do anything rash,” I said,
almost pleading with my stepfather.
 
If Jake would leave the state police and become our new police chief,
everything would be pretty much ideal for us.
 

At least that’s
what I believed.

“Call him and see
for yourself, Suzanne.”

I did as the
chief requested, and Jake answered on the first ring.
 
“I just have one question for you.
 
Did you turn down the chief of police
job?” I asked him before he had the chance to even say hello.

“Suzanne, I told
you all along that I wasn’t interested in taking over there.
 
Phillip clearly needs to move on, but
I’m not going to be the one who takes his place.”

Jake had already
told me that more than once over the past several days, but that clearly didn’t
mean that I’d accepted it.
 
“Think
about it before you do anything rash, Jake.
 
It would be perfect.”

“Not for me.
 
I’m sorry.
 
Suzanne, I hate to disappoint you, but it’s
not going to happen,” he said flatly, and I knew that it was true, no matter
how much I wished that it might be otherwise.
 
“Do you still love me, anyway?” he asked
in a softer voice.

“Only with all my
heart,” I said.
 
“I didn’t mean to
push you so hard.
 
If it’s not right
for you, then it’s not right.”

The relief was
clear in his voice as he replied, “I’m not saying never; I’m just saying not
right now.”

“Got it.”

“Listen, I hate
to do this, but I really have to go,” Jake said.

“Go.
 
We’ll talk later.”

“I’ll call you
tonight if I can,” Jake answered, and I hung up, still a little stunned by the police
chief’s sudden departure.
 
I knew
that he’d been threatening to leave since his brother’s untimely demise, but a
part of me hadn’t believed it.
 

I asked the
chief, “What made you decide to act so suddenly?
 
I thought you were planning to hang on
for a while.”

“We both know
that there’s nothing sudden about it,” the chief said.
 
“In a way, this is all your fault.”

“How’s that
possible?” I asked him, not understanding what he meant.

“Well, I took
your advice and spoke with your mother.
 
She was upset that I was still working as the police chief, even after
I’d promised to quit.
 
She told me
that if I was going to leave, I needed to do it now.
 
The more
 
I thought about it, the more I agreed
with her.
 
I’ve been miserable just
hanging around waiting for someone to step in and take over.
 
I told the mayor my decision, and an
hour later, he had my replacement lined up, effective immediately.”

“He’s already
hired someone!” I asked shrilly.

“There was no
need to dawdle.
 
My mind was made
up, so there was no use delaying the inevitable.”

“Did he at least
promote from within?” I asked, hoping that Grace’s boyfriend, Officer Stephen
Grant, might have inherited the job.

“No, he’s hired
an officer from the Granite Meadows Police Force.
 
The man’s supposed to be good, and
what’s even more important, he can start immediately.”

“If he’s so good,
how can he just leave his old job without at least giving them any notice?” I
asked.

“I pulled some
strings to make it happen,” George said as he and a stranger approached
us.
 
“The mayor there owed me a
favor, so he intervened with the police chief.
 
Let’s go to Phillip’s office where we
can discuss this in private.”

“Hey, it’s not my
office anymore,” Chief, or Former Chief Martin, said.
 
“Ask Chief Tyler.”

“It’s not
official until tomorrow at eight AM, so you might as well call me Alex until
then,” the new chief said.
 
He was
tall and lean, somewhere in his mid-thirties, I’d say if I had to guess.
 
There was a scar on his left cheek, and
he had a full head of brown hair, and icy dark eyes that were almost black.

“That’s just a
formality, as far as I’m concerned,” the chief said.

“I don’t want to
go anywhere,” I said stubbornly, still reeling from shock about how quickly
things had just changed.

“Suzanne, we
couldn’t wait on Jake forever,” George said.
 
“He told me himself that he didn’t want
the job, and I had to do something, for the town’s sake.”

“I get it,” I
said.
 
“I just didn’t think that it
would all happen so fast.”

“There wasn’t
much choice.
 
Anyway, we all thought
you deserved to know about it before it became official.”

“Thanks for that
much, anyway,” I said.

“May I have a
word with you in private?” the new chief asked me softly.
 
I didn’t like the look in his eyes, and
I couldn’t read his expression.

“Actually, anything
you have to say to me you can say in front of my stepfather and the mayor,” I
said.
 
Let him try to isolate me
from my support and see where it got him.

“As you
wish.
 
I understand that you
consider yourself somewhat of an amateur sleuth.”

“I’ve never
called myself that,” I said.

The new chief
shrugged.
 
“But it’s true
nonetheless, isn’t it?
 
While my
predecessor here may have allowed you some latitude investigating crime as a
private citizen, be warned that I will not.
 
In my opinion, there’s no room in police
business for a rank amateur.”

“That’s a little
harsh, don’t you think?” Chief Martin asked.

Chief Tyler
stared at him for a second before he spoke.
 
“I’m not surprised that you feel that
way, given that she’s your stepdaughter, but that doesn’t make any difference
to me.
 
I won’t have her muddying
the waters in any of my investigations.”

“Hang on a
second,” George said in an amiable manner.
 
“Maybe we’ve all gotten off on the wrong foot here.
 
Chief Tyler, you should know that Suzanne
is a valued member of our community.”

“I don’t doubt
it, but unless she’s carrying a badge, she’s just going to get in my way.
 
Your honor, you might not like the way I
run the department, but I can’t take orders from you.
 
You can change your mind about hiring
me, or fire me later at any point you wish, but you might as well know up front
that you can’t tell me what to do, or how I should run my department.”

I half-expected
George to cut him loose on the spot, but to my surprise, he merely nodded.
 
“The point is a valid one.
 
After all, it’s your department.”

“Thanks for
nothing, old friend,” I said to him, and then I stormed off back to my Jeep.

“Suzanne, let me
explain,” George said as he started to follow me.

The mayor might
have had a perfectly rational reason for behaving the way he just had, but that
didn’t mean that I had to like it, or even make nice with the new chief of
police after the scolding that I’d just received.
 
Chief Tyler had made it pretty clear
that he didn’t care all that much about my opinion, so why should I care about
his?

As I drove past
the three of them, I saw Chief Martin mouth the word “Sorry” in my direction,
but I didn’t offer him any response, or even acknowledgment.

I was too mad to
trust myself.

Things had
suddenly been turned upside down, but there was at least one comfort in what
had just happened.

I still had until
the next morning to find Rick Hastings’ killer before I had to worry about the
wrath of Chief Tyler, and I meant to get busy.
 
If it meant that Grace and I had to stay
up all night tracking down the killer, then we would just have to do our best.

It might be a
long shot, given the current state of our investigation, but it was all of the
time that we had left, and I meant to make the most of it.

“So, what was the
big secret?” Grace asked me as I walked up the steps to her front porch.
 
She was out there waiting for me, but I
wasn’t all that eager to deliver the news I’d just received, especially not
after the reception I’d just been given by the new police chief.

“Apparently
there’s a new sheriff in town,” I said, trying to lighten my message.

“Suzanne, we
don’t have a sheriff,” Grace said as my humor fell flat.

“We both know
that I meant chief of police.
 
Apparently,
Chief Martin has officially stepped down, or he will tomorrow at eight AM, and
George has already hired someone to take his place.”

“Is it Jake?”

“No,” I said.

A hopeful look
shot through her gaze.
 
“Stephen?”

“Again, no.”

“Who is it,
then?”

“Some guy named
Alex Tyler,” I replied.
 
“He’s been
working in Granite Meadows, but come tomorrow morning, he’s going to be our
problem.”

“What’s he like?”
Grace asked me.

“Well, to begin
with, he told me that our time as unofficial investigators was about to be over.”

My best friend
looked surprised by the news.
 
“He
can’t do that, can he?”

“Evidently he
can.”

“Don’t
worry.
 
George will step up for us,”
Grace said confidently.

“Grace, the man
was standing right there when Chief Tyler read me the riot act, and so was my
stepfather.
 
Neither one of them
lifted a finger in our defense.
 
It
looks as though we’re about to be out of business.”

“Suzanne, we
can’t just take this lying down.
 
We
have to fight back.”

I shook my head
as I answered, “What are we supposed to do?
 
He’s going to be the one in charge
around here.
 
He told the mayor
right in front of me that George could fire him, but he couldn’t tell him what
to do, and our old friend agreed with him.”

“That doesn’t
sound like George, letting this guy just roll over us like that,” Grace said.

“Whether we like
it or not, I have to grudgingly admit that he’s got a point.”

“Chief Tyler?”
Grace asked me incredulously.

“No, of course
not.
 
I’m talking about George.
 
He hired this man to run the department,
so he can’t very well dictate terms to him.”

“So then we’re
just giving up?” Grace asked as she stared hard at me.

“Not on your
life.
 
We have two more suspects to
speak with, and until tomorrow morning, we can do whatever we choose to without
asking anyone for permission.”

“Then what are we
waiting for?” Grace asked as she jumped up.
 
“Let’s get cracking.”

“What did you
uncover about Amanda and Denny?” I asked as I joined her at my Jeep.

“Apparently
Amanda works at an auto repair shop in Union Square.”

“She’s a mechanic?”
I asked her, startled by the thought of it.

“No, not that
there would be anything wrong with it if she were.”

“Of course
not.
 
What does she do there, then?”

“She’s the office
manager,” Grace said, and then she frowned slightly.
 
“In all honesty, I don’t know who
actually owns the place.
 
There are
some shell companies holding the incorporation papers, but I couldn’t figure
out where they ultimately led.”

“Maybe we’ll ask
her when we see her,” I suggested.

“We can always try,
but I doubt that she’ll tell us, not after someone went to so much trouble to
hide the fact on paper.”

“How about
Denny?” I asked.

“I found out that
he lives in Union Square, too, but I still can’t figure out what he does for a
living.
 
From what I’ve been able to
gather, he makes his money in the shadows, much like Rick Hastings did.”