THE NEXT MORNING MERCY LAID out the gifts her mother had given her since she’d come back from Afghanistan: at least a dozen outfits, due to her insistence that her only daughter needed an entire new wardrobe now that she was a civilian again and would be applying to law schools in big cities soon, preferably in Boston or New York. Her mother was not at all discouraged when Mercy went instead to Vermont and lived off her small pension and modest life savings until she could figure out what to do next; she believed that sooner or later her daughter would come to her senses and get a life. The life her mother had always wanted for her.
Martinez had also left an insurance policy, naming Mercy as beneficiary. But much of the small payout had gone to saving Elvis, and the remainder she’d earmarked for his siblings’ education later down the road. His Social Security benefits went to his mother in Mexico, and helped support the large family he’d left behind.
Her mother knew all this, and had told her more than once that the best thing she could do for his family was to become a lawyer and make a lot of money. Mercy hated this argument, if only because it did hold some merit. How could she help his family hiding out here in the woods? Couldn’t she help them more if she had a good job?
Understanding her daughter so well, her mother had not given up. Mercy figured that she never would. Martinez always called her stubborn, but he’d never met Grace O’Sullivan Carr.
The gifts were mostly work clothes, what her mother like to call “power suits,” featuring tailored jackets, two paired with pants and three paired with skirts, all in various shades of gray, from dove to charcoal. For “after hours” wear, she’d curated no fewer than four little black dresses. Her mother was very big on little black dresses. Nothing Mercy would actually be comfortable wearing, as they’d all show either too much leg or too much décolletage.
One shopping bag left. Mercy prayed for something normal, at least as normal as her mother could buy. She pulled out a navy jumpsuit made of light cotton jersey, with wide palazzo-style pants and a cold-shouldered top.
She grinned. She could definitely move in this, without showing too much skin. Even better, the pants had deep pockets, and she could add the Chanel fanny pack—a little quilted black purse on a leather and gold chain belt—at her waist. Plenty of room to carry a cell phone, her Swiss Army knife, and whatever else she might need. For once she was grateful for her mother’s obsession with pricey accessories, though she shuddered to think what this outfit, all told, had actually cost.
At one time, she’d considered selling all this stuff on eBay and giving the proceeds to the Martinez family college fund, but she just couldn’t do it. She loved her mother, even though she rarely agreed with her on anything, from career to clothes. She couldn’t give her gifts away, and risk hurting her feelings any more than she already had, simply by living her own life her own way.
Mercy showered, smoothed ointment over the tender skin chafed from the bulletproof vest, and slipped on the jumpsuit. She secured the Chanel purse belt around her waist, and added the gold hoop earrings her parents had given her on her eighteenth birthday and low-heeled gold sandals that she could run in if needed.
The worst thing about dressing like a girl was that you weren’t free to run, at least not very fast and not for very long. A girl never knew when she’d need to run like hell. Mercy liked to be prepared for that eventuality. She always laughed when she saw female cops on TV chasing down a suspect in four-inch heels. Like that was ever going to happen.
A glance in the mirror told her that she should add a little blush and mascara and lip gloss. She did not cover up her freckles with foundation, as her mother always advised her to do. Enough was enough.
Her hair. The only thing her mother hated more than her freckles was her hair. But there was no containing it in this humidity—and she doubted her mother would approve of her wearing her Red Sox cap with this ensemble.
She ran some styling mousse though her damp frizz and crunched the curls with her fingers. Au naturel would have to suffice, whether her mother liked it or not.
* * *
PATIENCE WHISTLED WHEN she saw Mercy.
“You look pretty good yourself,” she said, admiring her grandmother’s turquoise silk tunic, which she wore with black silk pants and silver ballet slippers. Dozens of thin silver bracelets jingled on her wrists.
“Too bad your game warden is on patrol,” said Patience.
“He’s not my game warden,” she said.
“Oh, but he could be.” Her grandmother winked at her. “Especially if he saw you right now.”
“Come on, let’s go.”
Elvis jumped up.
“Sorry, boy.” Mercy patted his head. “You’re staying home.”
The shepherd whined his disapproval, looking to his favorite vet for support. But she shook her head at him. Defeated, he went back to his side of the sofa.
“Guard,” Mercy told him and locked the door behind her as she followed Patience to her “fun” car, the little red Mustang convertible that spent most of the year in the garage. Except for beautiful sunny days like this—yesterday’s storm a mucky memory—in summer and early autumn, that brief shining interlude between mud and snow.
“Your mother will be pleased,” Patience said as she peeled down the drive and out to Route 7A. When unencumbered by four-legged passengers, she liked to drive fast.
“I live to serve,” said Mercy, holding on to her seat.
“She loves you.”
“I know.”
“Be nice,” her grandmother admonished her as she shifted into high gear.
“I’m always nice.”
“You’re always polite. Polite is not the same as nice. Not when it comes to your mother. Or any mother, for that matter.”
They fell silent. Mercy closed her eyes and leaned her head back, letting the wind rush over her face as they sped down the road, sure to make it to the village in record time.
* * *
THE NORTHSHIRE HISTORICAL Society and Museum sat on the western edge of the village green. The large white building was built in 1825 in the Greek Revival style, with a long front porch supported by graceful fluted white columns that ran the full length of the façade. The gracious lady was festooned with red, white, and blue bunting in celebration of the Fourth, and a long banner topped the porch roof, proclaiming the “Arts of America Exhibition.”
Two police officers in dress uniforms flanked the double-door entry. A teenage girl decked out like she was going to her junior-senior prom checked the invitation list, while another uniform checked all the parcels and purses. Backpacks were not allowed.
Security was tight, thought Mercy, at least at the door. Inside, she could see an eclectic assortment of creatively attired artists and academics, well-heeled patrons, and local politicians and businesspeople in power suits, mixing and mingling and overindulging in the champagne passed around on silver trays by waitpeople in black and white formal wear.
Lillian Jenkins, chairperson of the society’s Arts in America Committee, stood just inside the entrance, at the head of the reception line. The restaurateur had abandoned her Vermonter Drive-In apron for a dazzling sparkly gold dress that befitted Northshire’s queen of the meet-and-greet. The little woman looked just like the firecracker she was.
Lillian embraced her and her grandmother in turn.
“You look very pretty,” she said. “Did you bring that handsome Troy Warner with you?”
“Uh, no.”
“I think they’re having a thing,” said Lillian to her grandmother.
“We’re not having a thing,” said Mercy.
Lillian ignored her. “At least I hope they are.”
“We’re just friends.”
“I thought you were smarter than that.” Lillian frowned.
“They don’t come any smarter,” said Patience.
Lillian beamed. “I knew it.”
Mercy capitulated. “He’s on patrol.”
“Then you’ll have to settle for his yummy captain.” Lillian waved her golden arm across the room at Captain Thrasher, a fairy godmother casting a spell. “Isn’t he something?”
The captain was resplendent in his dress uniform, with its tailored scarlet jacket and distinctive black trim and black leather belt, complete with gun holster and gear holders. Sort of a macho version of her own Chanel fanny pack, thought Mercy, and smiled.
Then the captain shifted on his feet, and she saw that he was talking to her parents.
“Chin up,” said Patience as they nodded goodbye to Lillian and moved on down the line.
“Let’s get this over with.” She didn’t know what was worse, having to make small talk with her parents or having to make small talk with Thrasher. Given how disappointed they all were with her right now for various reasons, neither was a prospect she relished.
Her grandmother took her arm in solidarity and marched her over to the distinguished couple and the dashing captain.
“Darling, how wonderful to see you,” said her mother, offering her a cheek.
“Hi, Mom.” Mercy kissed her cheek dutifully.
“Let me look at you.” She grabbed her by the shoulders and stepped back to inspect her. “Wonderful. I knew that color would flatter you.”
Her mother was a slim pale blonde impeccably dressed in one of her perfect little black dresses, the compleat rich man’s wife, no hint of the canny lawyer on display now. Her father stood beside her, a tall, stooped man who looked more like a professor than the adroit attorney that he was. Mercy was struck as always by how harmless they seemed when encountered outside the courtroom, just your average middle-aged American marrieds of means whose benign appearance completely hid the sharks that lurked beneath the surface.
“I’m surprised to see you here,” said her father. “In that getup.”
“That is not a getup, that is Ralph Lauren,” said her mother. “She looks lovely.”
“You do look lovely, Mercy,” her father said. “It makes a nice change from fatigues.”
“Pay no attention,” Patience said to Captain Thrasher, who was watching them all very intently with those extraordinary eyes. “We appreciate those in uniform.”
“This is my daughter, Mercy Carr,” her father told the captain. “And my mother-in-law, Patience O’Sullivan.”
“I know the captain,” said her grandmother. “He’s the fine human to a magnificent Maine coon cat named Crispus.”
Mercy smiled as she shook the man’s hand. Crispus Attucks, a former slave, was the first casualty of the American Revolution, killed during the Boston Massacre in 1770.
“She knows everyone,” Mercy’s father said.
“At least everyone with a pet,” her mother added.
While her family sparred, she waited for the captain to fire a shot of his own. He may look the charmer, but she knew from Troy that he was a tough and demanding officer of the law. In his own way, his exterior was as misleading as that of her parents. She could only imagine what else they might have in common.
“I had an extra ticket,” said Patience, turning her attention to the captain again. “And Mercy was delighted to come along as my plus one.”
She smiled a warning at her grandmother not to overdo it. Thrasher could not have been pleased about the ruckus she’d caused at the taxpayers’ expense at the parade yesterday. Troy was probably paying the price for it right now, in extra patrols or paperwork. She wondered what price the captain would have her pay for her part in the fiasco.
“May I steal your granddaughter for a moment? I’d like to show her something.”
Before Patience could protest, the captain touched Mercy’s shoulder and guided her over to a finely rendered pen-and-ink drawing of Shakespeare’s Dark Lady by an up-and-coming young artist from Burlington. She hoped there was no hidden meaning in that.
“We have a mutual friend,” he said.
“Yes.” She waited to see what he would say next.
“You’ve distracted him,” he said. “And not in a good way.” He smiled slightly.
“I’m sorry.” So much for hidden meanings.
“Are you?” He frowned. “You keep turning up at our crime scenes. And now you seem to see criminal activity wherever you go.”
“Elvis was alerted to something, sir.”
“The dog.” Thrasher crossed his arms in front of his imposing, scarlet-clad chest. “You and your dog caused the service some considerable embarrassment.”
“I am sorry about that. But three people are dead. A young mother and her baby are missing. And that man Max Skinner is involved somehow. I think he’s the man who broke into my house.”
“Understood. But you can’t prove any of the allegations you’ve levied against him. He and the Herbert brothers have been released for lack of evidence.”
“That was a mistake. Sir.”
“Calling out the bomb squad is an expensive proposition for a false alarm.”
“Better a false alarm than an unfortunate outcome.” She paused. “And what about Dr. Winters?”
“Dead end, according to Harrington.”
Mercy frowned.
“Harrington is not happy,” said Thrasher, lowering his voice. “And when Harrington is not happy, our mutual friend is at risk.”
“I understand.” Now she knew why Troy Warner preferred being alone in the woods with Susie Bear on patrol. “I wouldn’t want to hurt our mutual friend in any way.”
“Good.” Thrasher pursed his lips. “I know that you served with distinction in Afghanistan, and I appreciate that. But you are a civilian now.”
“Yes, sir.” She caught sight of her mother coming toward her and for once was glad of it. “I must get back to my family.” She turned her back on him and went to join her mother.
“Let’s take a look at the exhibition, shall we?” Her mother squeezed her arm. “There are some people I’d love for you to meet.”
Which Mercy knew was momspeak for “Have I got a man for you!” Or as she had come to think of it, another bad first date waiting to happen. But if the alternative was another warning from Thrasher, she’d sooner make the rounds with her overzealous mother.