Conard County Justice (Conard County: The Next Generation Book 42) Read online

  “With friends. That’s different.”

  “Probably. Or maybe I’m just feeling like I’m wasting time.”

  He might be, she thought. Even he had lowered his expectations for these meetings. Justifiably so, considering she truly believed that these poker buddies would know nothing they hadn’t already shared in interviews with the police.

  She spoke. “Your brother’s secrecy didn’t help.”

  “I think he meant it to protect. And not just his sources. But yeah, he’s a blank slate in that regard.”

  “Tell me more about the story he did. The one that affected your career. It might have some clues in it.”

  He shook his head, and she thought he was going to shut her down. Then he said, “Not here.”

  “Okay, then. Time to go home.” She was surprised how easily she used that word, including him in it. Not “my home” or “my place.” Just home.

  Dang, she thought as they walked out to her car. How had he gotten past her barricades? She’d hated this assignment, distrusted him, and now she was taking him home with her.

  Egad.

  * * *

  THEY STOPPED AT the gas station and bought a six-pack at Duke’s suggestion. When they got back to her place, she started coffee in case Matt didn’t want a brew while he was there.

  Then she sat facing Duke across the table again. He seemed to prefer the kitchen to the living room for some reason.

  “That article?” she reminded him.

  “I didn’t forget.” He rubbed his nose and sighed. “It’ll give you some idea of the kind of reporter he is. Was.” The past tense came with obvious difficulty to him.

  Cat waited, giving him time to shift his thoughts around. Grief was doubtless weighing heavily on him since she’d brought up the matter that had caused him career problems. More important, it had caused a rupture between him and his brother. He probably didn’t want to talk about it at all.

  But she was hoping for something, anything, that might provide a clue to Larry’s killing. She doubted Matt was going to be able to provide it while they talked this evening.

  She’d known Larry herself, the whole time he’d lived here, and had learned very little about him. Maybe, just maybe, some of the poker players might have learned something over the cards and chips. The kind of free-ranging conversation that could happen with a few beers and having a good time.

  But how would they know it was significant? The department had already questioned them, and nothing useful had come up.

  Then another thought occurred to her. It wasn’t that they might feel freer talking to Larry’s brother. No, maybe Duke knew enough about Larry to elicit other kinds of information. Maybe he had some questions to ask that the cops hadn’t thought about.

  Maybe.

  She was still waiting for Duke to speak when her front doorbell rang. Matt had arrived ten minutes early, jacket open despite the cold, still wearing the short-sleeved white shirt and jeans he wore at the organic food market he owned.

  Cat introduced the two men and this time guided them into the living room. She asked Matt if he wanted coffee or beer, but he said he was fine as he settled on the edge of her recliner.

  Duke took the couch and Cat sat on the Boston rocker again. During her mom’s last month, Cat had added some cheerful pillows to it, to cushion her mom’s shrinking bottom and back. Cat didn’t want to remove them. There were few enough good memories left in this house.

  “How’s business?” she asked Matt, trying to ease past the initial moments of strangers meeting.

  “Good enough.” He flashed a smile. “Plenty of kitchen gardens around here, especially on the ranches. They provide a lot of our produce, and it sells as fast as they bring it in.”

  Cat arched her brow. “I have to admit I wouldn’t have thought organic foods would be popular here.”

  “You need to keep up with the times. Now the grocery store is carrying them as well.” His smile turned crooked. “I suspect they want to put me out of business.”

  “I hope not!”

  “Me, too.” Then he turned his attention to Duke. “I’m very sorry about your brother. He was a good guy, lots of fun. A shark at poker, though.”

  Duke managed a faint grin. “If he played it, he was good.”

  “Yeah, he had something of a reputation for darts, too. Anyway, it didn’t matter that he was fantastic at Hold’em. We all just had a great time, and since it was only for chips, nobody went away annoyed.”

  “So no money?” Cat asked, although she had already guessed the answer.

  “Not even penny stakes. No, it was just for fun.”

  “Did Ben Williams ever play?”

  “Ben?” Matt looked pensive. “I know him, but I don’t recall ever seeing him at the games.”

  Cat fell silent, hoping Duke would ask his all-important questions.

  Duke spoke. “Larry ever tell you what he did?”

  “Yeah,” Matt answered. “Said he was a reporter, some paper back East. He said he was working on a book. But I don’t remember him talking about it much. Just in passing.”

  “So you weren’t curious?”

  Matt shook his head. “Not my business. I don’t pry, Duke. A person tells me what they want me to know. God, it feels funny calling you Duke. How’d you get the last name and not Larry?”

  Another smile tried to be born on Duke’s face. “My military career,” he said. “Everyone started calling me Duke. It stuck. Before that I was Dan.”

  “Larry mentioned you once. He was awful proud of you.”

  That seemed to startle Duke a bit. But he said, “I was proud of Larry, too. Tough career.”

  “That’s something, coming from an Army Ranger.” Matt sighed, then leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. He looked down at his folded hands. “There must be a reason he was killed, but damned if I can figure it out. As far as I know, no one around here was mad at him. I guess that leaves kids who wanted something valuable and went too far.”

  “There was another break-in,” Cat remarked. “Just the other day. No one was home.”

  Matt nodded slowly. “I heard about it. Burglaries have never been a common problem around here, but they happen every so often. Still, a group of kids wanting electronics or valuables... Why would they kill Larry?”

  “I think we’re all wondering that.”

  “Yeah.”

  For a half minute or so, they all remained quiet. Cat wanted to make sure Duke had a chance to ask any questions he needed to, so she let matters rest.

  Duke spoke again. “My brother was an investigative reporter.”

  Matt sat upright. “Really? Hell, he must have had some stories to tell. He never said. Was he good?” He caught himself. “That didn’t sound the way I meant it.”

  “It’s okay,” Duke answered. “I was just wondering if he’d said anything about his job, more than just that he was a reporter.”

  “Not around me.” Matt put his hand to his chin, then dropped it. “You think it had something to do with that?”

  “I don’t know,” Duke replied. “I wish I did.”

  “But doing investigative stuff...he must have run afoul of people.”

  “It’s possible.”

  Matt thought about it, then shook his head. “He didn’t say anything to me about his work. Not even what he was writing a book about. Maybe it had something to do with his reporting?”

  Duke gave a small shrug. “I wish I knew, but Larry never struck me as the type to try to write a novel.”

  Now, that was a bit of information they hadn’t had before, Cat thought. It seemed Duke still thought the book might be an investigation. As far as she knew, no one else had thought that to be relevant. Writing a book sounded like an innocuous thing to do.

  But considering how angry Duke had been about
a story that hadn’t even been about him, she could imagine a whole lot of reasons that others might have been even more furious. Or might think they had something to fear.

  The fear idea nearly made her jump up, but she held on to her cool, not wanting to halt the growing conversational flow between the two men. After all, it had so far yielded one potentially useful nugget, maybe two, and nuggets were rare in this case thus far.

  Matt spoke first. “I gotta admit, the idea of Larry being killed during a burglary bothers me. It has from the time I first heard. It’s kind of random, you know? I’ll be the first to admit I never really got close to Larry. I mean, it was only a couple of months, and we didn’t get to the confessional stage, just the level of being friendly and having a good time. I never got the sense that anyone hated him. And I never got the sense that he was trying to get information from someone, like he was working on a story. If he was, it wasn’t one from around here.”

  Cat caught herself. “Okay, that almost made me laugh.”

  Duke jerked around to look at her. “Why?”

  “Imagine an investigative reporter from a big daily newspaper actually spending his time investigating anything around here. I mean, man. Our paltry scandals would probably bore him to tears.”

  One corner of Duke’s mouth lifted, and Matt smiled widely.

  “Yeah,” Matt said. “And since there are hardly any secrets in this town, nobody’d want to read the story anyway. A city council member was inebriated and had to be assisted to his front door? Joe XYZ, a teacher, is having an affair? Great gossip.”

  “And not worth wasting ink on.” Cat nodded.

  “Definitely not the stuff of headlines,” Matt agreed. Then he sighed, and his face drooped. “Larry became a headline.” He shook his head. “I’m still having trouble grasping it. And for you, Duke, it has to be a whole lot harder.”

  Duke spoke slowly, as if dealing with his feelings was tough. “Larry and I hadn’t lived in each other’s pockets for a very long time. We’d get together once or twice a year. He wasn’t part of my daily life, is what I’m saying, but he was always there. Now I can’t even pick up a phone to call him.”

  Cat understood completely. She still ached from wanting to be able to talk with her mother about most everything.

  Matt left shortly, having offered nothing more about Larry’s murder, but Duke seemed satisfied with the conversation.

  Then Duke left a few minutes later, explaining that he needed to go for a run. He didn’t look dressed for it, but Cat didn’t argue. Maybe Matt had stirred up some of his memories and he needed to run off sorrow.

  She had some other things to think about now, possibly useful things.

  And she also needed more details on the second break-in. Was it related in any way to Larry’s?

  She was tired of being left in the dark.

  Chapter Six

  Duke hit the pavement, his booted feet pounding. No stealth there, but no reason to care about it. He’d get to the motel, change into his running gear and do his miles.

  Maybe hit the truck stop diner for a late-night breakfast. He didn’t figure Mahoney’s BLTs were going to hold him all night. His calorie consumption had sometimes caused Larry’s eyes to widen.

  Well, hell, when you kept yourself in prime condition, worked out like a lunatic and had a lot of muscle mass to support, you ate a lot. More than average, anyway.

  He’d also learned a long time ago that he lost weight while on a mission, so it didn’t pay to start off too lean. Everyone lost weight in a war zone. Maybe it was the lousy food. Maybe it was the tension. Maybe it was as simple as troops not wanting to eat. He didn’t know. He just saw the results.

  Carrying a couple of extra pounds never hurt. But just a couple. If he ever stopped working out like a demon, he’d have to watch it.

  Random thoughts, a meaningless diversion produced by his own brain. He was aware of it, the times his mind wanted to take a vacation from something. It could be dangerous under some circumstances, so he was usually good about stopping it.

  But what did it really matter, right then? His grief over Larry was growing, not easing, and he felt like he had a crushing weight on his chest, as if his heart didn’t want to beat again.

  He jumped into his running clothes quickly: navy blue fleece workout pants—not shorts, because it was chilly out there. A long-sleeved white sweatshirt. Running shoes, which were at least a decent brand that fit.

  The point of this was to heat up, not cool down.

  The last thing he grabbed was a flashlight with an orange translucent cone on it. Because this time he was running toward the mountains, hoping to get some uphill work, and he needed to be sure cars could see him.

  While he didn’t much care about his own life right then, he did care about a motorist who might hit him. Why give someone nightmares for the rest of his life?

  At first he jogged slowly to warm up his muscles, but, at the outskirts of town, with the mountains a dark silhouette against a sky dusted with stars, he hit his full pace, an all-out run.

  He might have recalled nights spent in hostile mountains where he had to be alert for every little thing, nights when he’d slept sitting up with his rifle across his lap, nights when he’d been all alone and surrounded by threats or with comrades as uneasy as he was. Nights when terrible things had happened, things that he would never be able to expunge from memory.

  He’d slipped down that path before, and sometimes he just let it happen, knowing he couldn’t always stop it.

  But not tonight. Tonight, Larry ran alongside him, residing in his memory, his easy laughter still audible in Duke’s mind.

  He’d never hear that laugh again. He’d never again listen to his brother’s laboring breaths as he tried to keep up with Duke’s pace. They’d never again share a few beers and shoot the breeze for hours.

  Never.

  He hit an upslope, and his calves reacted as if they were glad to meet it. Power surged through him, sweeping him upward. The flashlight he carried gave him just enough light to see the ground ahead of him, to avoid obstacles.

  Cars were few and far between, however. He’d expected more traffic, but maybe he wasn’t on the state highway. He had no idea and didn’t care.

  He heard Larry as clearly as if his brother were running beside him. “Think about it, Dan.”

  Think about what exactly? That Larry hadn’t been working on a novel? As far as Duke was concerned, that was a given.

  That maybe someone had been afraid of what Larry was writing, or afraid of something Larry knew?

  Likely. Larry had never made a big deal out of it, but Duke was aware that his brother had received death threats. How many or over what, Duke didn’t know. Larry had mentioned them a few times but had always laughed them off.

  “They just show me that I’m doing it right,” Larry had said.

  Well, yeah. Duke’s career had been shredded by Larry doing the right thing. He was sure Larry hadn’t intended that, but his brother was like a bloodhound on a scent trail. He wouldn’t be diverted.

  “Maybe you shouldn’t have laughed them off, Larry,” Duke muttered, keeping his breathing as even as he could. Deep, deep breaths, but regular. No oxygen deprivation allowed.

  Duke was thinking as he ran uphill. Okay. That thing that Matt had said about maybe someone had been afraid of Larry... That could put a different spin on all this.

  He’d seen Cat stiffen when that came out and was sure she’d had the same thought. Why would anyone here even consider the possibility? No one here, evidently, had the least idea of the kind of stories Larry had worked on.

  Like all the time he’d spent on domestic terrorism, revealing links between some of the groups. Larry had mentioned he was still receiving threats a few years after the article was published.

  What about other things? Duke tried to remember
all the articles his brother had written, but the simple fact was he hadn’t heard about any number of them because he’d been overseas for long periods. Impossible to really keep up, and Larry almost never mentioned his work on postcards or in the occasional telemeeting they had.

  Not that Larry would reveal anything until his story was published, and even then he kept a lot close to his vest.

  Duke was sure there were more kernels of information in Larry’s brain than he could ever use in his published articles. Tips, clues, people, things he couldn’t substantiate well enough to write about. But they’d all remain in the stew pot, because Larry never knew when one of his gleanings might prove useful at a later date.

  Damn, Duke wished he had even a remote idea what Larry had been writing about. Maybe something had come together in a way that needed more than six or eight pages of newsprint. Something big enough to make it worth a few hundred pages.

  It wouldn’t surprise Duke to learn that.

  He shouldn’t be surprised if Larry’s investigations had gotten him killed. The warnings had been there. But the idea was useless unless he could discover what his brother had been doing.

  Crap.

  Duke turned at the top of a long slope and began to run back down. Not as fast, because downhill was always tougher to negotiate without falling. But fast enough.

  Larry. Damn it, Larry.

  Duke had known his own job was dangerous, but he truthfully hadn’t believed Larry’s could be this dangerous. If it was.

  That was the next thing he needed to figure out. He’d go talk to this other guy at lunch tomorrow, but he expected to hear pretty much what he’d heard from Matt.

  Stupid idea, questioning his poker buddies. Except for one thing: that someone might be afraid of Larry.

  After his own experience, Duke figured that wasn’t a far reach. Larry had exposed a terrible crime, murder for hire, but Larry had walked away alive, and for all that Duke’s career had gone into free fall, he was still here. Still wearing the uniform.