"That's when I decided to pull up stakes. Coryn, my daughter, was out of the house and on her own; I'd saved up enough money to make a new start. It was time. When this place came on the market, and it was in your hometown, I couldn't believe it. The coincidence was too much to ignore."
"Like a sign?" he suggested.
She made a face. "I don't believe in that junk. But I wasn't going to ignore it, either."
"Christ," he told her, waving a hand around at the clutter, "I'm going to feel pretty bad if it goes belly-up."
"It won't," she said simply. "I did my homework, too. I'm not a total romantic."
"But a bit of one."
"Yeah," she conceded after a pause. "I guess." She was silent before adding, "That's why I drove up to Thetford to find you, after reading about the accident. I wasn't really going shopping."
"I wondered," he admitted, sitting very still.
"I did want to offer any help I could," she said quickly. "I meant that. Still do. But I suppose I wanted you to know I was in the area, too, for what it was worth."
"A lot."
She'd been staring into the middle distance at that point, but his rejoinder made her look at him directly. "Really?"
"Yeah," he said simply.
She pursed her lips. "Wow. I thought for sure you'd already have someone in your life…" She abruptly held her hand to her forehead. "Hold it. That came out wrong. I mean, not that you wouldn't, but that if you don't, that I wouldn't be-"
"I don't," he said, hoping to end her embarrassment.
Her face was by now bright red. "Okay. Sorry. I'm not a stalker or anything."
"I know."
"I just-what with the bar being in Brattleboro, and what I said about your getting me to leave Gloucester-sort of-well… it just seemed stupid not to get in touch somehow."
Now it was his turn to stand up and at least lean in her direction, since the bar was between them-the very safety barrier she'd once told him was a blessing for most barkeeps. "I'm glad you did, Lyn. It means a lot to me. Kind of a right time, right place thing, if you know what I mean."
"Those aren't too common, right?" she asked, taking a half step toward him.
"So they say."
They stood there for a few seconds, seemingly frozen by in-decision, before he finally moved back, undraped his coat from the back of the adjacent stool, and said, "Well, I've got to get back north."
"Oh, sure," she said, leaving her post and heading back around the end of the bar to meet him. "Give your mom my best."
He was close to the door, moving reluctantly, slipping his coat on. "I'm glad you came up when you did, when I was on the sidewalk."
She reached him and laid her hand on his arm. "You've got a lot on your mind right now."
He nodded silently, welling with emotion that he'd been suppressing for days.
"That's okay," she said. "I'll be here." She took his hand, removed a pen from her breast pocket, and wrote a phone number on his palm. "That's my home. Call anytime. I mean it."
He opened the door with his other hand, letting in a sharp sliver of cold air. "I will." He quickly leaned forward, kissed her on the cheek, and let himself out.
RadMan: so wut u do for fun Suze: soccer and shop RadMan: ur parents strict Suze: there assholes RadMan: oh why Suze: cause they r RadMan: i drive Suze: i cant no licens RadMan: so wut do u like to chat about – do u have any wishes Suze: yeah i wish i had a car RadMan: why Suze: so i could drive ya RadMan: well i got a car Suze: can i have it RadMan: only gfs can use my car Suze: so what does that mean RadMan: u really want my car Suze: for real RadMan: what do i get then
Chapter 9
"Oh, please. Parole and Probation? You have got to be shitting me."
Sammie Martens sat back in her chair and studied the ceiling without response, well used to her colleague's harangues, which, for him, passed for humor.
"Those guys are such cowboys. Not even cops, for Chrissakes."
Willy Kunkle looked across the small office they all shared, to see what effect he might be having. "Run around like they own the place," he added for good measure.
She didn't move, refusing his bait despite the temptation he was clearly counting on.
"Not to mention there's not a rule they don't break."
He saw her face crinkle in pain, as she absorbed this last crack. She straightened, put her elbows on her desk, and studied him as if he'd just emerged from a test tube. "What did you just say?" she asked, caving in at last.
He smiled at her innocently. "Not that I have a problem with any of that. When do we leave?"
She groaned and got to her feet. "Now." She pointed at his withered left arm, an appendage he usually kept anchored to his side by shoving its hand into his pants pocket. "Why didn't you join them after you lost that thing, instead of coming back to the cops?"
He rose, too, and joined her at the coatrack near the door. "You and I weren't an item back then," he explained. "I had to come back to irritate you."
"And that's changed now that we are?"
He patted her butt on his way to grabbing his parka. "Yeah. 'Cause now you love it."
She headed out the door. "You are such a jerk."
He laughed and followed her into the overheated second-floor hallway of Brattleboro's municipal building, where the VBI had a one-room office for its four regional agents. "So, what's the deal?"
"With P and P?" she asked. "We gotta interview Dave Snyder about one of their ex-parolees-someone named Andy Griffis."
"Griffis?" Willy commented, following her toward the stairs. "He's dead. What do we care?"
She half turned to respond, "How did you know that?"
He poked her in the small of the back. "You gotta keep up, girl. Plug into the gossip."
Say what you might about Willy Kunkle-that he was irascible, disrespectful, impolitic, and prone to cutting corners-he was still a cop's cop and made an art form of knowing everything about everybody who'd ever had a run-in with the law. He had an encyclopedia in his head about the people you'd never want to invite home.
As if to prove the point, he added, as they headed down the stairwell, "He was Gunther's case from when we all used to work downstairs. He hung himself."
Downstairs meant the Brattleboro Police Department, where Willy had also once been a detective. Of their squad, only Spinney had come from outside.
"Hanged himself," Sam corrected.
"Whatever, and you didn't answer the question."
"Joe asked me to look into Griffis because of the car crash that put Leo and his mom in the hospital."
Willy reached out and grabbed her arm to slow her down. "Whoa. I thought that was an accident."
"It is on paper," she answered, still walking toward the door to the parking lot.
"Meaning what?"
She shrugged. "Not sure. He didn't go into details. Just asked us to get what we could on Griffis."
Which vagueness, of course, only appealed to Willy's sense of balance. "Cool," he said as they stepped outside.
In the town of Brattleboro, Parole and Probation was housed in what used to be a bright pink chocolate factory, adjacent to both a popular restaurant and a stunning view of the confluence of the West and Connecticut Rivers. It was wrapped in greenery and appointed with enough small architectural details to make it look like an Italian villa designed by someone who had never traveled overseas.
To many observers-and many in law enforcement-the setting and history of this halfway house for the unfortunate was apt for both the town and the state in general, given Brattleboro's and Vermont's reputation for being less than draconian in their treatment of the legally wayward.
That said, the facility's interior was pretty standard office building, and nothing about its layout or the attitude of its occupants implied any coddling of the clientele. This was immediately demonstrated by the receptionist behind the bullet-resistant window when Sam and Willy walked in-especially after she caught sight of the latter and leaped to a reasonable conclusion.