Chapter 2

Depending on who was telling the story, I had expected Liz Danger to be either Harley Quinn or Jane Austen. But this Liz Danger? She didn't fit either of those. She was a blonde, but it wasn't hot blonde and for all her Burney rep as a troublemaker, she just seemed . . . tired. And tense but putting a good face on it. She'd made me want to smile—do not flirt with women during traffic stops, Cooper—and spend some more time with her. Even standing on the side of the road talking about lug nuts with her had felt easy. And then there was the fact that when I called her license in, Steve Crider said, "Lizzie Magnolia is home again?" So that ‘M' on Liz Danger's license stood for ‘Magnolia.' Like she was some ante-bellum heiress in a big gown sipping mint juleps on the porch.

Shouldn't work. But it kind of did. Maybe if the heiress was a real live wire with a great smile and a beer in her hand . . .

"Thank you for this," she said from the back seat when I got into the cruiser. I looked in the rear view and saw her side by side with the giant red bear, smiling at me, and for a minute I reconsidered the no flirting idea.

Five minutes later, I dropped Elizabeth Magnolia off at Porter's Garage where we found out that Will Porter was already on the way to get her car and Patsy Porter was on the road home from Columbus, so Liz's cousin, Molly Blue, was coming to get her. Molly pulled in while the mechanic was still telling Liz all of this, so we stuffed that big bear into the back of her SUV and I went on my way toward my own problems.

I drove toward the biggest of the hills that loomed over Burney. At the base of the hill was the burnt out remains of what had once been the fourth largest cardboard factory in the United States, the basis of the Blue family fortune. A double-lane road wound past the factory and up the hill's knees, twisting and turning next to a steep ravine. A place might only be two miles ‘up the hill' as the locals put it, but that was a ten-minute drive if you were careful.

The hole in the guard rail on the hairpin turn bespoke someone who hadn't been careful. I went past the turn and pulled off onto the shoulder to get the cruiser off the road and parked. I got out and walked to the edge as a car passed me, going up the hill. A snazzy red Lexus, so the mayor, Patrick O'Toole, probably on his way to the Blue Country Club. Not one of my favorite people, and I definitely wasn't one of his since I'd arrested him for spousal abuse my first week on the job. George, my boss, had voided the arrest because O'Toole's wife had refused to press charges even though everybody in JB's bar had seen him hit her. O'Toole was more the chief's headache than mine—O'Toole's wife was George's ex-wife—so I tried to stay out of his way. George had enough problems.

I turned to look down into the ravine. A splintered tree fifty feet below was the only sign of where Navy Blue's car had ended up. The tree, once a tough oak clinging to side of the ravine was now leafless and forlorn and apparently dead, which was a shame. The Porters had had to call in help from the guy who had the big 18-wheeler truck rig to pull the car out. That was after I'd rappelled down to recover the body. Theirs had been more technically difficult, but mine had been harder in other ways.

Now one side of the torn guardrail stuck out over the void, twisted so that the flat side faced up. I sat on it and scooted out a little over the void, boots dangling, feeling the metal bend slightly. I'd grown to like the spot in the past few weeks because it felt like taking my feet off the ground disconnected me from Burney and the world. It's not that there's anything bad about Burney. It's like any other small town: politics and power plays over stupid small things at the top and mostly genuinely nice people everywhere else. Just sometimes I need a break from the world, especially lately.

I heard another vehicle coming up the hill and could tell by the slight engine knock it was the chief's big Suburban, outfitted with all the lights and bells and whistles as befitting a small town cop who wore four stars on his collar, sort of like Eisenhower, if he'd been in charge of a mess hall and not Operation Overlord.

I didn't look over my shoulder as the tires hit gravel, the engine turned off, a car door slammed, and boots crunched toward my location.

"What the hell are you doing up here again?" George asked.

I didn't ask how he found me. The laptop bolted to the dash in the cruiser had GPS and the mayor had just gone by. "Thinking, Chief."

He sighed, exasperated with me. "You don't get paid to think."

I gestured to the ravine. "Something's wrong about this."

"You gotta stop coming up here, Vince. You don't know this town yet. You're upsetting people."

He acted like I fell off the truck and landed in Burney yesterday instead of six months ago. "Maybe because I'm not from Burney is why I'm picking something up."

"The mayor would like you to stop picking things up," he said but without much enthusiasm as there was no love lost between the chief and the mayor and not just because of the aforementioned ex-wife.

"I'm off shift, Chief," I pointed out. "Seven minutes ago."

"You pulled Liz Danger over for speeding and you didn't write her up. Why not?"

Because Steve Crider told me not to? Because I had my own personal code about pulling people over and it didn't mesh with the mayor's need for a quota? Because she'd looked like she was blowing the big red bear when she'd looked for her registration which had almost made me laugh out loud? "I gave her a warning. A welcome back to Burney gift." I looked back at the chief. "Is she welcome back to her childhood home?"

"Kind of weird she shows up after fifteen years the weekend her old boyfriend is getting married, don't you think?"

"I'm not supposed to think." I hadn't known Cash Porter was her ex-boyfriend. Because who dated who in this town fifteen years ago wasn't a priority in my life.

George tried to stop from cracking a smile and failed.

I added, "She said she was home for her mother's birthday."

"Hmm." George didn't seem convinced. "Get off that thing. It makes me nervous."

I'm the one on it, I thought. Why does it make you nervous?

"Navy was drunk and it was an accident. Let it go, Vince. This is what, the fourth time I've seen you sitting there?"

I pointed down toward the Ohio River, the setting sun behind hazy clouds. The Ohio is a wide and powerful river, with a very bloody history in Colonial times that I'd read about, and I enjoyed looking at it. "A good vantage point, Chief. I can see the town." Okay, it wasn't much of a town for someone from New York City, but it was my home now for six months and it was growing on me.

"Navy's death is signed off on," Chief reminded me. The more he tried to convince himself, the more I was sure something was off.

But I nodded. My friend Raina had told me that once something's signed off on, it just means the powers-that-be are done with it. It doesn't mean it's right.

"It bothers people when you're here," Chief said. "Bothers the mayor in particular. He's a good friend of the Blues. Doesn't want any scandal."

"Navy Blue wasn't wearing a seat belt," I said. "And no skid marks."

"So? He was drunk."

"Even black-out drunks are aware on some level," I said. "They hit the brakes even when it's too late. It's that animal part of our brain trying to stay alive."

The chief shifted uncomfortably in his high black cowboy boots which made as much sense as me wearing a Stetson in the Bronx. It was Ohio. Which made me wonder: what the hell are you supposed to wear in Ohio? I wore my standard black uniform of cargo pants, long sleeved shirt and gear belt, along with a vest, plates inserted. My fellow Burney cops tended to leave the plates out, but they'd never been shot at.

"Do you know his wife?" The chief asked.

"Margot Blue? I saw her at the funeral." Very young and very pretty, she'd also been pretty looped, but it was, after all, the funeral of her husband. "The little girl Peri is cute but quiet." Something wrong there, I thought, but that was probably because her daddy was dead.

"Know who Margot Blue's mother is?"

"Yes."

"Senator Amy Wilcox," he said as if he didn't trust my knowledge, since I wasn't supposed to think. He waited, perhaps for me to say something, then went on. "The senator doesn't want anything ugly coming out about her son-in-law's death. She has let the mayor know this. The mayor has let me know this. I am letting you know. It was an accident, Vince. Leave it alone." He didn't sound very enthused about passing on the message. "Get off of that damn thing."

"Sure, Chief." I scooted back and touched down in Burney once more. "Anything else?"

He hesitated. "There's a history to all these people, Vince." He indicated the town spread out below us. "The Blues were Burney for over a century. The last one, Cleve, Navy's dad, ran this place. And now we have this development south of town and the new senator is involved in it, and she's got Cash as her front man, and he's marrying Lavender Blue this weekend. It's all connected somehow. Be careful is what I'm saying."

That was a lot to think about for a guy who wasn't supposed to. I just nodded. "All right, Chief."

George sighed. "You should have ticketed Danger."

"So, she's not welcome back in Burney?"

He shrugged. "She's a wild one. Wouldn't hurt to reel her in." Then he changed the subject. "Cash's bachelor party is at JBs tonight. I know you stop by and check on the place sometimes. Might want to do that tonight."

"Roger that."

"Take care of yourself, Vince." He paused and then walked away without another word, got in his big Suburban and drove down the road again.

I got back in the cruiser, thinking about George. He was still upset about Liz Danger, which was just dumb. I'd heard that she'd done something to his campaign posters years ago when he was running for mayor, some stupid kid prank, and he was still mad about it. Possibly because he wasn't mayor now. Man knew how to hold a grudge.

Liz Danger did not look like a grudge holder. She looked like somebody who wanted to get out of Dodge as soon as possible without stopping to see her mother. I could understand the feeling. I'd gotten out of the Bronx just before my 18th birthday and been sworn into the military on the day I was of age. She did look like the kind of woman who'd be interesting to get to know better, but she was leaving right away, so I put her out of my mind and decided to check Navy's car again. The chief might have signed off on the wreck, but I wasn't ready to. I'd never been able to put it to rest since going down there and seeing Navy's body.

I pulled out to head back to the highway and Porter's garage. I had something to check on.