Borrowing Trouble Read online

  “Look over there.” Colin cocked his head across the square, where Rhys Shepard got into his police-mobile. “If you feel your willpower slipping, just remember that her brother’s a hell of a shot.”

  Griff had heard all the jokes before. Robbing the cradle. Jail bait. You name it. But in his mind, the age difference wasn’t all that terrible. If Lina were thirty and he thirty-eight, no one would give a damn.

  Their food came out and Colin carried his over to the Nugget Tribune. Griffin figured Colin’s wife, Harlee, was pulling a late one. Unlike Colin, Griff ate in his truck and hurried home to nothing.

  That evening, Sloane had been on shift less than an hour when she got a call from Connie that kids had found skeletal remains on the shore of the Feather River, not far from the high school. The light was fading fast, but she assumed the call wouldn’t take long. The bones more than likely belonged to an animal that had washed up.

  She parked in the school lot, crossed the highway, and following Connie’s directions, scrambled down the embankment to a rocky beach below. Apparently, the spot was a popular hangout for kids after school. There wasn’t a lot for a teenager to do in this town. A small group had assembled at the base of the trestle bridge and waved her over. They were yelling something, but she couldn’t hear them over the sound of the rushing river.

  By the time she’d hiked to where they were standing, one of the kids had climbed up the embankment to a small turnoff where cars were parked, and turned on his headlights. Smart thinking.

  “It’s right there.” A tall boy with dark hair pointed to a pile of rocks. “No one touched it so we wouldn’t contaminate the scene.”

  Sloane smiled to herself. Everyone nowadays watched CSI. “Good job.”

  She stumbled over the rocky terrain to get to the spot where the boy had directed her, and sure enough, there was a skeleton. And damned if it didn’t look human. A torso, if Sloane was to guess. But she’d need the medical examiner to make an official determination. Given the lack of light it was difficult to see much, and she needed to be careful not to disrupt the area in case it was a crime scene.

  A couple of the kids came toward her. “Stay where you are. I want to keep this area clear.”

  “It’s a person, isn’t it?” the dark-haired boy asked.

  “Looks like,” she said, and got on her radio to ask Connie for reinforcements. They’d have to take pictures and do a grid search for the rest of the remains before carting off what they had.

  When she got off her radio she asked the boy, “Are you the one who found it?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  She’d need to take his statement. A crunching noise made her look up to see a man coming down the bank.

  “Sir, I need you to turn around.”

  “That’s my dad,” the boy said.

  “You must be Officer Sloane.” The man totally ignored her and kept coming. “Clay McCreedy.” He stuck out his hand.

  She refrained from rolling her eyes and shook it. “Okay, everyone, let’s take it over here.” Sloane herded the group as far away from the remains as she could.

  “Was the person murdered?” a girl with curly hair wanted to know.

  “More than likely not. But we’ll investigate.” She wondered if anyone—a hiker, hunter, fisherman—had gone missing from the town recently. Surely, she would’ve been briefed on something that important. “As soon as the chief gets here, I’ll need to individually interview you. Does anyone need to call home?”

  A couple of the kids got on their cell phones.

  She turned to the McCreedy boy. “Were you the one who called 9-1-1?”

  “I did.” This from the boy’s father. “Justin called me.”

  She couldn’t help herself and ruffled the boy’s hair. To this day she still called her dad when things went wrong. As far as she was concerned, there was nothing Marty McBride couldn’t fix.

  “I’ll need to interview you as well,” she told him.

  “No problem.”

  A few minutes later, Rhys and Jake parked in the turnout. From the top of the embankment, with a rope, Rhys began lowering large klieg lights. Clay helped Sloane untie them and sent the rope back up. Jake hiked down and Sloane showed him the skeleton. Together they strategically placed the lights to illuminate the area.

  “Looks like an adult from what I can tell,” Jake said. “Probably was unearthed after the last snow thawed, and floated down the river.”

  That’s what she’d thought too. “I scouted out the area the best I could, but I don’t think we’ll find the rest of the remains tonight.” Or ever. Animals had probably scattered much of them.

  “We’ve called for the coroner from the Plumas County sheriff. Someone from the office should be here soon.”

  “No one has gone missing in recent months?”

  “No one in the county who hasn’t been accounted for. It was the first thing Rhys checked.”

  Rhys came up on them, got as close to the bones as he could without disturbing anything. “It’s hard to say, but they look like they’ve been around a while. That, or animals and weather conditions picked ’em clean.”

  Sloane looked up to see Harlee coming down the side of the ridge on her butt. “We’ve got company.”

  Clay helped her down and she started taking pictures with her phone camera. Sloane suspected she wanted to get as many photos as she could before they kicked her off the scene.

  “Want me to shoo her away?” Sloane asked.

  “Nah.” Rhys let out a breath. “Before long the whole town will be here. Just keep her to the side.”

  “Okay.” She walked off to get witness statements and say hi to Harlee.

  “Is it human?” Harlee asked.

  “Yep. We think an adult, but can’t be sure.”

  “Any theories? You think it might’ve been foul play?”

  “Way too soon to know,” Sloane said. “I’ve got to interview the kids. Rhys wants you to stand back here.”

  “I’d love to get a close-up of the skeleton.”

  “I don’t think so, Harlee.” Sometimes reporters and cops forgot about the survivors. Not because they were naturally callous, but because the job could desensitize you. “So that’s Clay McCreedy, huh?” She nodded her head in his direction.

  “Yeah.” Harlee raised her brows. “What do you think?”

  Sloane’s lips quirked and in a low voice she said, “If word ever got out about this place, single women would flock in from all over the world.”

  She finished up with the witnesses. Got Clay’s statement too and sent everyone packing. It had gotten quite dark and Clay volunteered to take the kids without wheels home. Given that the man was Rhys’s best friend, she felt okay about him providing transportation. Sloane headed back to Rhys and Jake when her phone beeped with a text. She checked to make sure it wasn’t an emergency.

  Sloane McBride, you can’t hide. We’re coming to get you.

  They were back at it. Just when she’d thought they were finished making her life miserable. She let out a breath. It wasn’t worth changing the number again. They’d only find the new one. It was nothing more than a prank, Sloane told herself. Rhys flagged her over and she put the phone away.

  “This is your case,” he told her, and she felt a rush of excitement. Sloane could use the distraction—something a little more challenging than directing traffic.

  It would probably turn out to be nothing. Some of these old historic ranches were bound to have family cemeteries on the property. One of the graves had probably been unearthed in a recent storm. But Sloane liked a good mystery.

  After the coroner’s investigators came and combed as much of the area as possible using the spotlights, they carted away the skeletal remains. Tomorrow they’d send the torso to the sheriff’s lab and hope to get DNA. A forensic anthropologist would also determine the sex and age of the John/Jane Doe.

  With nothing left to do, Sloane went home, planning to return during daylight to search th
e area for more remains. Fingers, teeth, a skull, anything that would help them identify the body. But it could be tough. Even if they got DNA or dental records, if the person wasn’t in the system, they wouldn’t have anything to match them to.

  At the duplex on Donner Road, she found Brady sitting on the porch with the light on.

  “Heard they found a body over by the high school,” he said.

  “By the river. Skeletal remains.” By now, Harlee must’ve posted the story.

  “I gather you were there?”

  She nodded. “It’s my case.”

  “What kind of case is it?”

  “Too soon to tell.” She sat on the swing.

  “You eat dinner?”

  Her stomach rumbled in answer.

  “Come in, I’ll make you something.” He led her inside his apartment, an exact replica of hers, except without much furniture. At least it was warm.

  “You live light?” No pictures on the wall. No knickknacks. No nothing.

  Brady gazed around the living room at the thrift-store sofa, crate-turned-coffee-table, and flat-screen, and shrugged. “I’m hardly ever here.”

  She followed him into the kitchen. He’d hung all manner of pots and pans—good ones if Sloane had to guess—from hooks on one wall and lined shelves with cookbooks on the other. This clearly formed the bulk of his possessions.

  “Grab a seat and I’ll heat you up some potato-leek soup.”

  She watched him move efficiently through the kitchen, opening a bottle of wine, putting bread in the oven, and stirring the soup on the stovetop. Within seconds he put down place settings and the wine in the center of the table.

  “Let it breathe.” He must’ve known how badly she wanted a glass.

  “Can I help?”

  “I’ve got it covered.” On a board he diced vegetables. His big hands working the knife like it was a third arm. His biceps flexing through the sleeves of his thermal shirt. “A lot of people out there at the scene?”

  “Rhys and Jake. A bunch of kids, Clay McCreedy, and Harlee from the newspaper.”

  Brady smiled. “She gets around. What was Clay doing there?”

  “His son Justin was the one who found it. He called his dad. Clay called us.”

  “Did it freak the kids out?”

  “Probably a little.”

  “How ’bout you?” He smiled at her and she could’ve sworn that her heart skipped a beat.

  “I’ve seen worse. Hopefully we’ll find more. All we’ve got is a torso. We think the person was an adult.” She moved the wine to make room for the salad bowl he put on the table. “What did you do today?”

  “Met with Cecilia Rodriguez to finalize the menu for the reception. You going?”

  Everyone knew that Sloane had worked with Jake at LAPD and that he’d brought her here for the job. “Yep. I’m looking forward to getting dressed up and dancing.”

  He shot her another one of his amazing smiles. “It’ll be a good wedding. They’re nice people.”

  “I’ve only met Cecilia a couple of times, but I like her a lot. I met Jake’s ex number three once or twice. Her, not so much.” Then again, Jake had been a dog back in those days.

  Sloane was still on patrol when Jake was with the department. They met at the scene of a triple homicide. As the responding officer she was eager to help, doing any scut work the investigators needed. Jake, the lead detective, must’ve sensed her ambition because he let her stay involved in the case long after most patrol officers returned to the field. A few of the guys said he was probably trying to get in her pants. But Jake had always treated her with the utmost respect. Sloane suspected that she reminded him of his daughters. Besides, she got the feeling that he only catted around with women outside the department: police groupies who hung out at the bar where the RHD guys drank, hoping to get lucky. Some called them holster sniffers.

  Jake had been the one to encourage her to take the detective test. And he’d been the one to back her when she’d called him in a panic and told him how the department had turned on her.

  “Will you have to work the entire party?” she asked Brady, hoping that she might get a chance to dance with him. Feel those strong arms around her.

  “Pretty much,” he said, and ladled the soup into two bowls and pulled the bread out of the oven, serving Sloane first and then himself. “You want butter for that?” He didn’t wait for her to answer, just pulled a crock from the refrigerator.

  She waited for him to sit, gave them each a big portion of salad, and dug in. The soup was extraordinary—maybe the best she’d ever eaten. “Is that bacon in there?”

  “Yep.” He poured the wine, cut a slab of bread and put it on her plate. “Try that.”

  She spread butter on the slice, took a bite, and closed her eyes. “Holy cow, that’s good.”

  “I baked it this morning before I went to work.”

  She must’ve slept through it. Ordinarily she could hear him moving around and smell his coffee brewing. Thin walls. “You’d make a great husband.” The words were out of her mouth before she could stop them.

  “I don’t think so,” he said like it was a matter of fact.

  Since she started it . . . “Why not?”

  “Just not a settling-down kind of guy. I get itchy when I’m in a place or with a woman too long. How ’bout you?”

  “If I found the right guy. Not a cop, that’s for sure. You’d be surprised, though, how many civilian men have a problem with what I do.”

  “No I wouldn’t be surprised.”

  “Don’t tell me you’d have a problem with it.”

  “I don’t know, since it’s not an issue for me. But I can see why a man would worry about his woman. It’s a dangerous job.”

  “But a woman shouldn’t worry about her man being a cop?”

  “I didn’t say that. What I said is it’s a dangerous job. For either sex. You ever have any close calls?”

  “Once.” But it shouldn’t have been a close call. It wouldn’t have been if her own guys hadn’t been gunning for her.

  “What happened?”

  “It was a domestic call. Robbery-homicide doesn’t typically handle those, but the husband was wanted for questioning in a liquor-store holdup. I wound up embroiled in a hostage situation without backup.”

  “Why didn’t you have backup?” he asked.

  Because no one came when she’d radioed for help. “It was a screwup. But it ended fine.” She really didn’t want to go into it. “Where in LA did you say you cooked?”

  “I didn’t.”

  She threw up her arms. “What’s the big secret?”

  “No secret. I’ll tell you my story if you tell me yours.”

  He really was an exceptionally good-looking man, but she wasn’t telling him anything. “Some other time.” She finished her soup.

  “You want more? Dessert?”

  “I’m stuffed. And I really should turn in. I’ve got a big day tomorrow.” She got up and started clearing the dishes.

  “I’ll get that, Sloane.”

  “Nope. Rule in my house was the chef didn’t have to do KP duty.”

  “Suit yourself.” But he came up behind her while she stood at the sink and looked over her shoulder.

  Sloane was no little wisp of a thing, but with his front pressed to her back she felt small, almost fragile.

  “My place didn’t come with a dishwasher, did yours?” he asked, and she shook her head, afraid if she talked she’d stammer. “I’ll wash the pot.”

  “I’ve got it.” It came out like a croak and she pretended to cough.

  He backed away and busied himself putting away the leftovers. Together they got the kitchen cleaned up in record time. She grabbed her jacket and scarf and headed for the door.

  “I’ll walk you,” he said.

  “I live three feet away.” Not to mention that she had a Glock strapped to her hip.

  “Indulge me. I know you can take care of yourself, but I’m a Southern guy. It’
s a manners thing.”

  “Okay.” She actually thought it was nice. And maybe, just maybe, he’d kiss her good night.

  The more she got to know him the more she liked him. After all she’d been through, it was nice to have someone she felt safe with. And the best part was he seemed so comfortable in his own skin. He didn’t have to one-up her or act macho to prove his manhood just because she wore a gun and carried handcuffs. With Brady Benson there was no question that he was all man. From his hard body to the confidence he exuded in everything he did. It was so appealing that she wanted a taste . . . his lips on hers.

  But when they got to her door and she turned the key in the lock, he went back inside.

  Chapter 6

  “Did you hear that they found a body yesterday at the Meet Up?” It was the first thing Lina said to Brady when he walked into the Lumber Baron the next morning.

  “What’s the Meet Up?”

  “It’s a stretch of rocky beach, across from Nugget High, where the kids go after school or after games, to hang out. And yesterday, Justin McCreedy almost tripped over a skeleton.”

  “I heard,” Brady said.

  “Then why did you ask?”

  “I didn’t know it was called the Meet Up. So what’s your brother saying about it?”

  “You know him. Rhys doesn’t tell us anything. But he put that new officer, the pretty blond lady, in charge of the investigation. Do you think it was a murder?”

  “I have no idea. What does the Nugget Tribune say?”

  “Not much. Hey, can I ask you something?” Lina followed him into the kitchen. “Do you know a real estate agent named Dana Calloway?”

  “I met her once.” She’d had clients who’d stayed at the inn. Came to pick them up to show them properties and wound up staying for breakfast. That was the extent of his knowledge of her. “Why?”

  “I just wondered what you thought of her.”

  “Is this about Griffin?” He knew Parks had dated the real estate agent.

  “Sort of. I’m just curious about her.”

  “Can I give you some friendly advice?”

  “Sure.”

  Brady pulled a package of Canadian bacon and a dozen eggs from the refrigerator and started on a hollandaise sauce. “Don’t go snooping into Griffin’s life. Guys don’t like it. If you’re interested in him, be straight with him about it. If he’s interested back, great. If he’s not, let him go.”