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“YOU HAD A GOOD TIME, didn’t you?” Morgan asked on the drive home from the Detweilers.
“Yeah. It was fun. Not like a lesson, or plain practicing.”
“You’re getting off easy this time. Next time, it’ll be plain practicing.” She poked him in the shoulder and grinned.
He threw a mock salute, matching her grin. “Yes, Ma’am. Mr. Detweiler said the first times, it’s about the notes, but then it all goes inside you and turns to music. Gets into your soul. Mr. Nakamura used to say ‘You have to feel it.’ I like the way Mr. Detweiler put it better.”
Morgan had trouble answering. Her music lived in her soul, and that’s why she was so conflicted. “Did Mr. Nakamura teach you rock and roll?” she asked instead.
Austin ducked his head, and Morgan knew if she looked at him, his cheeks would be a deeper shade of mocha.
“Mrs. Reardon let me play modern stuff after I finished my lessons. That’s okay, isn’t it? She said there were no rules about playing one kind of music.”
“She’s absolutely right,” Morgan said. “You have a special gift for classical, but as long as you don’t skimp on your lessons, variety is fine.”
Morgan wished her mother would’ve had the same attitude. Morgan wouldn’t have felt like she was breaking unwritten laws of music when she’d played around with the contemporary hits. When her mother wasn’t home, of course.
She did the best she could. She shouldn’t have tried to do it all.
Promising herself she’d learned from her mother’s shortcomings, Morgan told Austin that when he practiced at Randy and Sarah’s, he could play whatever he liked after he finished his lessons, just like at Mrs. Reardon’s. “We can order sheet music for songs you’d like to learn.”
“Cool.”
They drove up to the house, and Morgan stopped in back, by the garage. As she got out and opened the heavy garage door, then back into the car to park, then out again to close it, she added an electric garage door opener to her ever-growing beanstalk. Seemed as if every time she lopped off a branch, two more grew.
“Can we take Bailey for a walk?” Austin asked.
“Sure.”
As they worked their way around the block, Morgan wondered why Austin hadn’t shown more signs of grief after the initial shock of finding out his mother died. She didn’t get the impression he was putting up a brave front. Rather, he’d shoved everything away.
Morgan knew he’d have to face it, work through it, but she didn’t feel comfortable bringing it up. Not until she had a better grasp of how to handle it.
After Austin had gone upstairs to bed, Morgan settled on the couch with her laptop and checked her email. Her financial planner had responded, saying the numbers from Uncle Bob’s ledger might have represented investment accounts.
Every investment company uses its own numbering system. Unless you know where the money was invested, there’s no way I can think of to check.
He went on to cite a couple of examples from her own portfolio and said he’d send funds within a couple of days, with his usual admonition not to mess around with her investments.
The market’s in a crazy state right now. You don’t have as much to play with as last year, and I can’t predict what it’ll do next year. It’s a time to remain conservative.
She replied, thanking him for his time, agreeing that she trusted him to know what was best, that this was a one-time money juggle.
Should she bother asking Uncle Bob’s firm if they recognized the numbers? She composed an email, attached the photo she’d sent to her advisor, and hit send. A negative response, which she expected, would mean one more avenue crossed off her list. It would justify her decision to let the ledger mystery go into a what difference does it make? mental file.
An email from Cole quickened her heart rate. The subject line read just in case. He’d summarized what he’d found about crime in Austin’s neighborhood. The reports he mentioned corroborated Austin’s story about the shooting two years ago. He also included links to archived newspaper articles.
As expected, there had been quite the furor when the police officers had been judged as acting appropriately considering the circumstances. The two cops had been white and Latino, the victims Latino and black.
Morgan reflected on what Cole had said to Austin. That nobody really knows what’s going on in someone else’s head. People, she’d learned, believed what they wanted to believe, and that was often based on what they’d been taught to think.
Given that Austin was ten at the time, and more apt to believe his peers than the adults in his life, it made sense that he might not trust cops.
Would allowing more interactions with Cole or Randy help change Austin’s perceptions? Could she continue seeing Cole without being tempted to have more than a platonic relationship? Would that hurt her chances to get custody of Austin?
Sobs from upstairs sent her running. Austin was sitting up in bed, Bailey licking tears from his face.
“Momma,” Austin said, his voice teary and barely audible. “I dreamed she was here. But she’s not coming back. Why did she have to drink?”
Morgan’s eyes burned. Her throat closed, making it impossible to answer. She sat beside him, enveloped him in her arms, and joined him as he cried.
~~~
COLE FOLLOWED CONNOR to the lab. “Thanks for keeping me in the loop. Is this enough to pull them in?”
Connor handed Cole a file folder. “Maybe. Would have been better if they hadn’t all been drinking the same kind of soda. I’ve got two matches, and you’ve got prints from three suspects. No way to know which two boys left prints in the car, or when.”
“And which one didn’t, either because he wasn’t there or because he was careful.” Cole opened the folder. Inside were copies of the pictures he’d taken, pictures of the Mustang, plus blowups of fingerprints. He was no expert, but he could see where the prints matched. “What happens next?”
“I’ve already informed Kovak. He said they’d bring in all three boys, question them.”
“With their parents,” Cole muttered. He thought about Alma Evans. “The parents will demand a lawyer be present. Not to mention that by now, the three of them have concocted a story to explain it all.”
“Ye of little faith.” Conner hiked a hip onto the edge of his desk. “Kovak and Detweiler know their jobs, and how to get to the truth. Even as we speak, I’ll bet one of them is following leads, questioning teachers and peers, gathering information, baiting their interrogation traps.”
“Wonder if they’ll let me sit in,” Cole said.
“I don’t see why not. It’s good training, and the kids know who you are. Makes it harder to lie when there’s a witness standing beside you. If they say no, the detectives will be recording it, so you can watch after the fact.”
“You know when this is taking place?” Cole asked.
“Nope. I’m a lab geek. I deal with the evidence, report my findings. The rest is out of my hands.”
Cole thanked Connor, went to the briefing room where Nolan was wrapping up announcements. If he asked, would she pull strings with Kovak to let him observe the interrogations?
Heads turned as Chief Laughlin entered the briefing room.
“Chief. Do you want to address the troops?” Nolan asked.
“If you’re finished,” he said. “It’ll be brief.”
“The floor is yours.” Nolan moved aside and Laughlin marched to the lectern.
“Pine Hills is our city, and you’re all here because you believe in making it safe for everyone.” He peered over his glasses, his lips curving with a hint of a smile. “Even though some of you became cops because you like the guns.”
Snickers rippled throughout the room.
“That being said,” the chief continued, all levity gone, “we’ve had recent incidents that bother me deeply. I want each of you to know that I—we—will not stand for any kind of discriminatory action at any level. You are all aware, are you not, of a recent attack on a high school student.”
Laughlin paused, swept his gaze across the room. Heads nodded in agreement. “I’m appalled to learn that this attack was prompted by nothing other than the youth’s sexual orientation, something, sadly, he’d felt necessary to conceal from his parents. However, due to counseling at the high school, he, as the terminology goes, came out to his parents and identified his attackers as three of his classmates. They are being dealt with, as are their parents.”
Cole figured this meant he wasn’t going to be privy to any interrogation techniques, but the good—much better—news was that they’d caught these creeps.
“While this case may be wrapped up,” the chief continued, “I want each of you to pay special attention to anything remotely resembling bullying. I—we—will not tolerate this in Pine Hills, the same way we do not tolerate religious or racial persecution. Any one of our citizens who puts so much as a toenail outside legal boundaries is to be reminded of the law in a polite, yet firm manner. I will be discussing this with the town council to see if there are any programs we can instigate to help educate the public.”
Cole wondered what Vance Ebersold would think of that.
The chief peered around the room again. “Questions?”
Head shakes.
“Very well. You’re doing good work out there. Keep it up.” The chief left, and Nolan dismissed the shift.
Cole headed for his apartment and called his sister.
“Hey, big brother. To what do I owe the honor of a call? It’s not my birthday, Christmas or Easter.” A pause. “It’s not Mom or Dad, is it? They’re all right, aren’t they?”
Cole chuckled. “Everything’s fine. Just wanted to touch base, say hi. How’s work, how’s Nan?”
“Fine to both. We’re thinking of a baby.”
Cole snapped his mouth closed. “Wow. Fantastic.”
“We’d thought about in vitro, but couldn’t decide on a donor or who would carry it. And about hiring a surrogate, but had the same donor issue. We decided there are already plenty of kids in the world who need a home, so it’s the adoption route.”
A smile spread across Cole’s face, radiating a warm glow throughout his body. “That’s fantastic. Have you told Mom and Dad yet? Takes the I want a grandchild burden off me.”
“No, and if you breathe a word, I’ll personally—no, Nan and I will both come down and do you grievous bodily harm. Operative word—thinking. We’re saving the news until we get further into the process—like do we want an infant or an older kid—rather than get Mom and Dad’s hopes up and have to disappoint.” She paused. “What about you? Found anyone for the I want a grandchild deal?”
Cole’s thoughts shot to Morgan and Austin. “Not yet.”
“That sounded more like a maybe to me.”
“It’s...complicated.”
“Isn’t it always? Good to hear from you, but I’ve got to get back to work. There’s a client I need to keep happy.”
Cole disconnected and stared into nothingness for a good, long time.