Death by Tea, page 12
I scurried back so fast, I very nearly missed the bunk in my haste to sit. My heart was suddenly pounding in my ears, and a warm flush was rising up my neck. I’d been so sure she would round on Buchannan, I didn’t know what to do now that she was staring at me with fire in her eyes.
The chief started pacing in front of my cell. “I don’t know what to do with you anymore,” she said, aiming the words at me, though she didn’t look my way. “You repeatedly put yourself into situations you have no right being in.” She darted a glance at me. “What were you thinking? Attacking an officer? Krissy . . .” She shook her head in disappointment. It forcibly reminded me of all the times my dad acted that same way when I was younger and had done something stupid.
“I wasn’t thinking.” I said it as meekly as I could. “Eleanor was spying on me, and my ex was sending me lewd messages. I sort of snapped.”
“Well, sort of snapped is no excuse. You could have hurt someone, yourself included. What would you have done if Mrs. Winthrow had opened the door?”
I shrugged. “Yelled at her?”
“And would it have stopped there?” Chief Dalton finally approached my cell. Her eyes were hard, angry. I had the distinct impression she was reconsidering her view of me. “We can’t let this sort of thing slide around here.”
I felt all of the blood drain from my face. Could she really mean what I thought she meant?
“I’m sorry,” I said, words spilling out of me in a rush. I couldn’t imagine staying in that dusty cell for very much longer. “I’ve apologized to Officer Buchannan repeatedly. I’m much better now. I won’t yell at anyone ever again.”
Chief Dalton stared at me for a long time before giving me a helpless shrug. “There’s nothing I can do. You assaulted Officer Buchannan. You inflicted bodily harm upon him. We have strict rules against that, in case you were ignorant of the fact that throwing wild punches at an officer of the law is illegal. We might play it loose with a lot of things around here, but attacking one of my men isn’t something I’m going to let go.” She turned as if to leave.
“No, wait!” I leapt from my bunk and ran to the cell doors. “You can’t leave me in here!”
She paused and looked back at me. “Oh, I can,” she said. “And I will.” She took another step before stopping again. She didn’t look back at me when she said, “I’m starting to wonder if I was wrong about you.”
And then she walked away.
She actually walked away.
I was stunned. I mean, this was the same woman who had given me, a virtual stranger, her son’s phone number in order to hook us up. She’d ignored our breaking and entering, and my other little misdemeanors and misadventures, yet this time she was leaving me down here to rot with Buchannan.
That couldn’t be good.
I turned to face him.
“This is your fault.”
He actually looked surprised. “Me? I’m not the one who was throwing punches.”
“If you hadn’t been following me around, then none of this would have happened.” I wanted to shake my finger at him through the bars, but I was afraid he might bite it off if I did. “You put too much pressure on me and I lost it.”
Buchannan didn’t look the least bit sorry. He yawned and checked his watch as if I was keeping him from an important meeting.
I glanced back at the bunk and decided I didn’t want to take another dust shower. I started pacing my cell, hoping against hope that Chief Dalton would come back down and tell me she’d only been testing me before letting me go. Or at least move me to one of the other cells. From what she’d said, I was thinking there were better cells somewhere else in the building.
And if the chief didn’t show, I’d be just as happy to see anyone who wasn’t Buchannan. Even Paul would do, despite the fact he’d been ignoring me lately. At least then I could ask him if he truly thought I could be the killer. If that was the case, then I would know where I stood and could move forward with my life.
Pacing was getting me nowhere, and sitting and sulking just wasn’t my style.
But what could I do? It wasn’t like Buchannan was suddenly going to get chatty. I could ask him about David Smith or his antagonism toward me all I wanted and I wouldn’t get a damn thing out of him.
“I didn’t kill anyone,” I said, sulkily. Saying it made me feel better, though it didn’t seem to move Buchannan.
“We’ll see.”
“I still don’t get why you think I did it. Why would I kill someone I just met? In fact, I’d only said a few words to him before I left. Don’t you think I would have been smarter about it if I killed him? Leaving him in my own store would be pretty stupid.”
Buchannan’s eyes narrowed, as if he thought I was trying to trick him somehow.
“I didn’t kill him,” I repeated in the vain hope I would get through to him. “I didn’t even know the guy.”
Buchannan shrugged and looked away. No matter what I said, he wasn’t going to listen.
“Maybe you killed him and are framing me because you don’t like me,” I said, mostly under my breath but loud enough so he heard.
Buchannan took a step toward me, face going hard. “I am an officer of the law. I do not kill people. I keep people who do in cells like these.” He jerked a thumb at the empty cells. “Tread lightly, Ms. Hancock, or you’ll be spending a lot more time down here than any of us would like.”
“It doesn’t feel too good when people accuse you of things you didn’t do, does it?” I grumbled.
“I know you are sticking your nose in this business like you did before. If you didn’t kill the guy, then you need to stay as far away from it as possible. I don’t want you interfering. If I catch you snooping around, I’m going to stick you back down here and keep you here until the murderer is caught.”
I wanted to keep pushing, keep denying, but it was getting me nowhere. And if I kept at it, I’d inevitably spend the next week sitting behind bars, breathing in the ancient dust. I had no illusions that Buchannan wouldn’t stay true to his word. He was practically begging me to make a bigger nuisance out of myself so he’d have a reason.
“Can I have my call?” I asked, keeping my voice as steady as I could. I wasn’t sure if I wanted to scream and yell or if I wanted to cry. In all my life, I’d never spent more than a few minutes in a jail cell. The first and only time had been for one of those high school scare tactics where they take kids to a local jail, shove them into a cell, and then leave them there for a few minutes. The other inmates would heckle and jeer at you, and then it would all be over.
That had been a terrifying couple of minutes. This was simply embarrassing.
Buchannan looked like he might deny me my right out of sheer spite, but relented. He walked over, unlocked my cell door, and then took me by the arm, as if he thought I might make a run for it. He led me a dozen feet to the rotary phone sitting on the desk. I stared at it incomprehensively for a moment, not quite believing one of those things still existed, let alone worked, before picking up the receiver. I waited for Buchannan to take a couple of steps back before dialing Vicki’s number.
I was worried she might not be home—with the way my luck had been going lately, it felt a near certainty—but she answered on the second ring with a cheery “Hello?”
“Vicki.” I practically sobbed her name, I was so relieved.
“Krissy? Is everything okay? You sound . . . weird. Are you calling me from a tunnel?”
“No, just using an old phone.”
“Ah.”
“So, uh . . .” This wasn’t going to be easy. How do you tell your best friend you’ve been arrested and that the cop had a good reason for doing it? It wasn’t like I’d gotten drunk and accidentally flashed the neighbors or ran a red light. I’d actually hit a police officer. Never mind that it was Buchannan. The reality of the situation was finally sinking in, and I was quickly realizing I was the one who was a bonehead.
“Krissy?”
I sighed. What else could I do but tell her?
“I sort of got arrested.”
“Again?” I could hear the incredulous tone to her voice, tinny as it was coming through the old phone. “Please tell me you didn’t go snooping around and get yourself caught somewhere.”
“If only,” I said. “This time, I might have taken a few swings at a police officer.”
There was silence from the other end of the line.
“Vicki? Are you still there?”
“Yeah,” she said. “I’m just trying to take it in.”
“It was Officer Buchannan. He was sitting outside my house when I caught Eleanor looking in my window with binoculars. When I went out to yell at her, he sort of got in the way.”
More silence. And then a faint sound. At first, I wasn’t sure what I was hearing. And then it got louder.
“It’s not funny!” She was actually laughing at me. Some best friend! “I’m stuck in a dirty jail cell and will probably have to stay here all night with the fleas and who knows what else.” I looked down at my now filthy slippers. “And I’m wearing nothing but my underwear and a robe.”
The giggles turned into loud laughter. Vicki managed to choke out “I bet you’re a sight to look at” between guffaws.
“It’s not funny,” I grumbled.
“You’re right, it’s not.” I imagined her wiping her eyes as she composed herself. “So you think you’ll be there overnight, then?”
I glanced at Buchannan. “Yeah. I don’t think they’re going to let me go until tomorrow.”
Buchannan nodded.
“I’ll head over to your place tonight and feed Misfit for you if you need me to?” She made it a question.
“Would you, please?” I didn’t want to think about what the terrible orange feline would do to my house if I wasn’t around to feed him. “And lock up, too. I wasn’t given the chance.”
“Will do.” She paused. “Will I see you tomorrow at work? You can take the day off if you need it.”
“I’ll be in.” I stared hard at Buchannan, daring him to try to stop me. There was no way I was going to stay trapped in that cell longer than I had to. If he tried to keep me past sunrise, I was going to claw my way through the concrete.
“Okay,” Vicki said, still sniffing from her laughing fit. “I’ll see you then.”
I hung up and let Buchannan lead me back to my cell. As soon as I stepped inside, he closed the door behind me and locked it. I trudged over to the bunk, eyed it with distrust, and then decided I couldn’t get any dirtier, so I sat down. With one last glare Buchannan’s way, I leaned back and closed my eyes, knowing that no matter how hard I tried, I wasn’t going to be able to sleep.
14
By morning, I was stiff, tired, and just about willing to do anything to be allowed to go home. The bunk was the most uncomfortable thing I’d ever had the displeasure of sleeping on. It felt like the mattress was full of rocks and razors. Every twist and turn sent stabbing pains shooting through my body. At one point, I seriously considered moving to the floor, but decided against it because, well, ew. Who knew what was down there.
Buchannan didn’t stay all night, thank God. He gave me some water in a rare act of mercy and then left about an hour after Chief Dalton had abandoned me. I kept hoping someone would come and rescue me, but all I got were a few polite check-ins throughout the night. I think it had less to do with making sure I was okay and more with gawping at what was probably the first inmate in a few months. Pine Hills was normally a low-crime area, at least until I got here.
Lucky me.
Footfalls echoed through the empty cells at first light. A female officer whose name tag read GARRISON opened the cell and stepped aside without a word. She wasn’t smiling and didn’t so much as soften when I gave her my sappiest “Good morning.”
She took me by the arm and led me back out into the harsh light of the station. Two police officers were at work, busily typing up reports or whatever they typed up. I didn’t know any of them, which was disheartening. I glanced toward Chief Dalton’s office; the door was closed, and I couldn’t tell if she was inside. The lights were off, so I was guessing no.
I didn’t have any personal belongings to pick up. My poor robe was grungy from my night in the cell, and my slippers were practically black now. I didn’t even want to know what my hair looked like, let alone my face.
Garrison kept ahold of my arm as she led me out to her cruiser. “Get in,” she said in a husky voice that hinted at years of smoking. I slid into the backseat—I apparently didn’t qualify for a comfortable front seat ride after my incarceration—and she closed the door firmly.
I didn’t bother with small talk. I doubted Garrison had much to say to me. I was just thankful Buchannan hadn’t been assigned to take me home. I think I would have rather stayed locked up alone than to listen to any more of his accusations.
As we rode toward my place, all I really could think of was Paul. Why hadn’t he come to see me? I was positive either Buchannan or the chief would have let him know about my predicament. If not, someone else would have called him to tell him. In this town, everyone knew just about everything that happened almost as soon as it did. The accuracy of the rumors were debatable, of course.
I was afraid I’d scared off Paul for good. He never came to see me, hadn’t been taking my calls. I’m sure he was busy with cop things, like trying to solve David Smith’s murder, but how much effort would it have taken to pick up the phone to give me a quick ring hello?
Will would have come to see me, I was sure. We might have just met, and barely spoken much more than a handful of words to one another, but he seemed the type not to let a girl suffer alone. Even if the chief warned him off me, I doubted he would listen. I wasn’t sure I could say the same about Paul.
Man, when did my love life get so complicated?
We pulled up in front of my house. Garrison got out of the cruiser, walked around to open my door, and slammed the door closed behind me as soon as I was out. She gave me a curt nod before getting back into her car and leaving.
“Thanks,” I grumbled. I turned for my front door, steadfastly refusing to look at the neighbors. If I saw Eleanor Winthrow today, I was going to throttle her.
I didn’t have my keys on me and was worried for a minute that I wouldn’t be able to get into my own house, but when I opened the screen door, an envelope was tucked by the doorknob. My key was inside. “You’re a saint, Vicki,” I said as I dumped the key into my palm. I unlocked the door, feeling somewhat better, and stepped into a disaster zone.
My mouth fell open in shock. An orange blur darted my way, and I just barely managed to close the door behind me in time. Misfit slammed into my legs, arched his back, and then took off running the other way. I barely saw him go.
I was almost afraid to step inside any farther. From where I stood, I could see more than enough damage. One of the dining room chairs was lying on its side. Everything on the table had been knocked to the floor, including a candle I’d purchased just in case Paul had wanted to come over for dinner some night. It lay broken in two halfway across the room. There were chunks missing from it where Misfit must have used it as a chew toy.
The living room was no better. The curtains were hanging crookedly, the screws that held the rods in place having come most of the way out of the wall. The arm of the couch was in shreds. Stuffing littered the floor from one end of the room to the other. Like the dining room table, the coffee table had been swept clear of items. A magazine lay in hundreds of pieces on the floor.
“Misfit!” I shouted, frustration growing. I kicked off my filthy slippers, determined not to make the house any dirtier than it already was, and stalked farther into the room. The kitchen was in disarray. The cabinet where I kept his treats was hanging open. Catnip and little chunks of kitty treats lay everywhere. His bowl was filled, as if he hadn’t bothered to touch it all night, and his water dish had little green specks floating in it.
I stepped into the hall. “I’m going to string you up!” I turned toward the bedroom. “Misfi-ugh!” I jerked back. A spot about a foot wide was soaking wet in the hall. One sniff told me what had happened.
I closed my eyes and counted to ten. I won’t kill my cat. I won’t kill my cat. I stepped over the wet spot and went into my bedroom. One of the pillows was on the floor, but otherwise the room seemed undamaged. Misfit lay on the middle of the bed, curled up as if he’d been sleeping there all day. He yawned, stretched, and gave me an innocent kitty blink. What kind of fool did he take me for?
I snatched him off the bed, turned, and carried him right back down the hall. I stepped in the wet spot again, which just about caused me to drop the squirming feline. I turned to the laundry room, intending to throw him into his litter box, but why bother? The room was covered in litter. It was as if he’d stood in the box and purposefully kicked every last bit of litter out onto the floor. It was in my clean clothes basket that was currently full of washed clothing I had yet to carry to my bedroom.
Misfit squirmed his way free, and I let him go. What good would punishing him do? It was me he was mad at, and really, he had a good reason. I’d abandoned him all night, left him alone to fend for himself. He’d gotten into the catnip, which often turned him into a whirling dervish, especially when I wasn’t there to monitor how much he consumed.
“I’m sorry,” I said, leaning against the wall. Misfit watched me from the edge of the bedroom as if unsure. “I’ll make it up to you.”
He watched me warily as I walked down the hall and past him, into my bedroom. I had a lot of cleaning up to do, but I didn’t have the energy or time for it. I had to be at work in less than an hour, and I was determined not to be late.
I stripped out of my dirty robe and underwear, considered dumping them into the trash, and instead dropped them onto the floor. I stepped into the shower and cranked up the heat. I scrubbed myself ragged, dried off, and then got dressed for work. I carefully stepped over the wet spot in the hall, grabbed some paper towels, and then dropped them on top of the spot to be cleaned up later. With one last glance at the ruins of my house, I grabbed my purse and headed for work.
