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DETECTIVE TROY PULLED up to the station and grabbed his notes and his coffee. He couldn’t wait to process his report. Yet, his mind was still on Dana Sweet.
He felt around in his breast pocket for his favorite pen. Oh, great! He must have left it at Dana’s place. He would have to return there later to retrieve it. He always filled out his paperwork with it.
What on earth was Dana doing there at the crime scene earlier anyway?
He knew that her life could be in danger if the killer found out that she was there snooping around. She meant a lot to him.
“Hey, Troy. How’s it going with the Barinotta case?” his pal Tex asked. Tex worked in homicide at the station.
“Not good. Seems a bit more complicated than it looks,” Troy said, draining the last of his coffee.
“So what happened there?”
“Body found at the bottom of the basement steps.” Troy threw his empty coffee cup into the recyclable bin. He then made his way into his office.
“That’s all? No trauma? No weapon?”
“Blunt force trauma to the head. The usual.” Troy really didn’t think he’d be dealing with this sort of stuff in a small cozy town like Berry Cove. He’d come here from the big city to escape all that. But he guessed there were always bad apples in every bunch.
“It happened right beside that Sweet girl, right? They were neighbors?”
“That’s right.” Troy flinched. He thought about that for a moment. It was bad enough that Dana loved to sleuth, but the fact that this cold-blooded murder occurred right next door to Dana got him even more anxious. If it were up to him, he’d have a car there every moment of the day, just to make sure she was all right. But he knew Dana. She’d have none of that.
“How’s she doing?”
“She’s coping, considering she just lost a neighbor,” he said, reorganizing his files.
He just hoped that she would leave the work to the boys in blue and let him do his job. But that was a lot to ask, wasn’t it?
“You’re worried about her, aren’t you?”
“A little,” Troy replied casually. He tried to play it cool.
“So when are you going to ask her out, bro?” Tex said, standing with a smirk on his face and a coffee in his hand as he stood by the door to Troy’s office.
“Too busy.”
“Oh, come on, Troy. We’ve had this conversation before, remember?”
Tex knew about Troy’s past heartbreak and the reason why he preferred to bury himself in his work instead of risking getting messed up again. His ex had ran off his with his cousin, of all people. That really stung, but he’d never thought he’d move on until he met Dana Sweet. She was different and opened up something inside of him. She was honest and sweet and kind, nothing like his ex-fiancée.
But what Troy couldn’t tell Tex was that he was in fact seeing her now—secretly. Taking it slow. Seeing how things went before committing to anything or making his relationship public and Dana felt the same way. Relationships were work, they were complicated enough without getting everyone else involved.
“If you don’t mind, I’d like to drop that subject,” Troy said firmly.
“Fine, bro. Suit yourself. I’ll drop it for now,” he smirked. He then crushed his empty coffee cup in his hand and threw it in the recycling bin. “See you later, Troy,” Tex said before exiting the office.
Troy thought about what Tex had said earlier. He was worried about Dana a lot these days. In fact, he thought about her every second of the day.
And unlike his ex-fiancée, Dana was sweet and caring. She actually cared about other people and in doing the right thing.
He admired Dana’s tenacity and her creativity in sleuthing. She was good. They had so much in common, unlike his ex-fiancée. And Dana had really helped him out on a number of cases to which he would always be eternally grateful for. But he worried about her safety. Whoever pushed Brenda Barinotta down that flight of stairs wouldn’t hesitate to do it again.
He didn’t know what he’d do with himself if anything ever happened to Dana Sweet.
He got up to head back over to Dana’s place to retrieve his lucky report pen. At least he would get a chance to check up on her again. What was he doing? Was he becoming overprotective of her?