A Billy Jo McCabe Mystery Box Set

Chapter 5

Chapter Five

“Mark, how many times have I told you? If you finish the coffee, put another pot on.”

Mark was behind his desk in the police station, filling out another report about the missing girl and the fact that no one at the wilderness camp seemed to know anything. The problem with that was that someone always knew something.

The way the social worker had pulled out of there without another word to him, he knew that as long as this girl’s case remained open, she would likely continue to be a thorn in his side.

“Didn’t you hear me?” said Gail Shepard, the chief’s wife. “I’m not your mother, you know. Taking the last of the coffee and shoving the pot back on the burner is not only a fire hazard but also makes it damn impossible to clean all the burnt-on crud.”

He lifted his gaze to her. She wore a brown cardigan over the Roche Harbor Police Department T-shirt and a pair of blue jeans. He supposed her light shoulder-length hair had once been blond, and her hazel eyes often found humor. She didn’t pack a gun, ever, because she only ran the office and showed up when the chief wasn’t in. Maybe that was why they were still together after thirty years.

He realized she was expecting him to answer. “I see we’re out of sugar. Had to take my coffee black.” He leaned back in his chair.

She shook her head as she kept walking. “You always take your coffee black, Mark.”

“I take my morning coffee black,” he said. “Afternoon coffee calls for sugar.”

And for coffee at night, he added a splash of whiskey, though she hadn’t figured that out yet.

He lifted the coffee and took a swallow of the bitter brew, then glanced to the door of the office as it opened, and who walked in but the very thorn in his side, that damn social worker, Billy Jo?

He really didn’t feel like going another two rounds with this lady. Whatever she was saying to Gail, she was smiling—which he hadn’t thought was possible.

“Mark, visitor,” Gail called out to him, gesturing.

He didn’t move from where he reclined in his old office chair. Instead, he put his mug down and closed up the case file on his desk just as Billy Jo approached. The smile disappeared the closer she got.

He made no move to stand up even though he could almost hear his dad in his ear. Show some respect! She was still a lady, and he knew his dad would likely have given his ear a tug. Maybe that was why he had to fight the urge to roll his shoulders. He was the one in charge here. He was the cop.

He could feel the argument coming as she dragged her gaze over his desk, pulled her arms across her chest, and stopped in front of him. But she didn’t say anything for a minute.

He figured two could play this game. He thought he should feel awkward about staring at her so blatantly, but he didn’t. He really could be an asshole when he wanted to be.

“Yes…?” He gestured quite rudely, then rested his hands back over his belt buckle.

“I understand the chief isn’t in,” she said. So that was who she was there to see. He wanted to laugh, because she wouldn’t be the first woman to want to go over his head.

“It’s his day off,” he said. He realized he could have done the polite thing and asked her to sit, or maybe he could’ve stood, but leaning back and ogling her was more his style right now. There was just something about her that brought out the fight in him.

She nodded and then lifted her hands. “Fine, so when will he be in?”

He said nothing for a second, shamelessly allowing his gaze to drag down over her and back up. He wondered how long she’d stand there and just take it.

She didn’t move, and she didn’t seem embarrassed in the least. He was positive something flashed in her eyes, which simmered with the kind of anger that should’ve been a warning to him. He pulled in a breath, because it seemed she wasn’t someone to fill the silence, though he thought that was something women were known for.

“You can try him on Monday,” he said. He could have said anything else, and he didn’t miss the way Gail was now watching him from behind her desk at the other end of the bullpen. Evidently, she had figured out there was an issue.

“Honey, he’s off on weekends,” she said. “If it’s urgent, I can get him a message, but otherwise, Mark here will look after you. Right, Mark?”

He didn’t miss the motherly warning.

“What can I do for you, Billy Jo?” he said, gesturing again, though he had no intention of getting up.

“Well, I would like to go back out to the camp and have another look around. I’ve made some calls, and apparently there are two girls Shay bunks with. I’d like to have a word with them. Also, I’m not really sure what the procedure is here for starting a search party.”

He said nothing, just stared at her. He could see there was way more she wanted to say. Evidently, she’d done her own digging after he pulled the two counselors aside and had a word with them. He was still convinced the girl would turn up. It was an island! It wasn’t as if she could just walk off. He’d planned on making a few more calls to her foster parents, anyone who actually knew her.

“Look, I don’t like you,” Billy Jo said. “I’m just going to say it. I think you’re arrogant, and you could be a good cop, but I think you believe you’re better than anyone else. You have a chip on your shoulder, or maybe you spend so much time looking in the mirror that it keeps you from figuring out that maybe, just maybe, if you let your pride go, you might actually get some work done here.”

His feet hit the floor, and he stood up until he towered over her. It wasn’t lost on him that she never stepped back as he moved into her space. In fact, all she did was look up. She didn’t flinch, and there wasn’t an ounce of wariness showing.

“You come in here and try to bust my balls…” he started.

All she did was angle her head. “I came in here because there’s a girl out there, in trouble, and apparently, without the police stepping in, no one is going to look for her. Since you’re it, fine, I’ll be the bigger person and put aside my feelings. Now, again, a search party. I would like to get one started. She’s probably lost and alone and scared. Then there’s the question of the marks on her.”

He pulled in a breath and pulled his hand down his face. “Look, I’m as concerned as you are, but we’re not calling in search and rescue for a lost girl on the island right now. How we go about things here is that we put a notice in our community newsletter to check if anyone has seen the girl. This isn’t the city. This is an island, and the only way off is the ferry, so someone has to have seen her. We also need a photo of her to put up.”

Billy Jo reached into her purse and pulled out a laptop, then set it on his desk and opened it up. “I have her photo here. It’s in her file.” She turned the laptop to him, and he took in the dark complexion, the dark hair in a messy braid, and the dark eyes that didn’t smile. It really did look like a mugshot. He had to remind himself he was the one in charge.

“Email it to me here.” He pulled out a card with his name, phone number, and email and tossed it on the desk, and Billy Jo picked it up. He walked around her toward Gail, who was watching him make his way over. “Gail, can you put the girl’s photo up on the electronic community notice? Let folks know to call the office and tell us if they’ve seen her.”

The chief’s wife lifted a brow. He thought more was coming as she leaned over in her chair to look around him at Billy Jo. “Sure,” she said. “Anything there you want to tell me about?”

All he could do was shake his head. Something about the social worker brought out everything uncivil in him. “Nope. Oh, and she wants to have a word with the chief about me, evidently…”

Gail made a face. “Really? I thought it was the chief who asked her to come in.” She glanced up with that look of hers that told him she knew way more than he did. “Because, after all, Mark, a new social worker on the island would be something the chief would want to know about. If you’d read the weekly newsletter I did up, you’d know we were expecting Billy Jo McCabe, and her first order of business was to meet the chief.”

Why did it feel as if he’d just been reprimanded again?

“Just get the photo up,” he said a little too sharply.

He turned back to see Billy Jo standing behind him, her purse over her shoulder and her laptop tucked back inside. Something about having his foot jammed in his mouth didn’t sit right with him.

“So who, again, is it you want to talk to?” he said.

Billy Jo didn’t smile as she pulled her arms across her chest. “The girls she bunks with. According to her foster parents, who shipped her off to this camp, she didn’t have a mark on her when she left. So if something happened at the camp and there was an altercation with one of the other kids, maybe, just maybe, one of them knows where she is.”

He made himself pull in a breath, and he looked over to Gayle, whose expression said everything. Why in the hell hadn’t his first call been to the foster parents? Maybe because he didn’t have the same information Billy Jo did.

“Fine,” he said. “But before we go, I know you know something, and I want you to tell me what it is. Tell me what’s in her file, because the sooner we find her, the sooner we can be out of each other’s hair.”

It was her expression that bothered him, the way she suddenly smiled so brightly. “That’s fantastic. Let me pull out my file, and maybe we can have this wrapped up before the sun sets.”

He heard a soft laugh from Gail, then gestured toward her. “Well, what are you waiting for? Get to it, already,” he said—but he immediately knew he was going to hear from the chief for snapping that way, so he forced himself to take a step over to her and lowered his voice as he said, “Please, Gail, and thank you.”