regulations. She’d just hung up when she heard Beau’s voice at the front of the house. She met him in the entry and directed Troy and his men to start clearing the kitchen.
“You aren’t having them throw away anything that might be evidence, are you?” he asked, first thing.
Sam bristled. “Good morning to you too.” She turned to go inside.
“Sorry. But seriously . . .”
“How would I know?” She led him toward the two untouched bedrooms and waved her arms wide to indicate the clutter in the children’s room. “This is how the whole house looked. Worse, in the living room and entryway. I literally could not open the front door when I first got here. And I didn’t have a clue that there might have been a crime until Rose took a close look at that coat.”
“You’re right. I didn’t mean to— Could we just start this conversation over?” He smiled at her, removed his Stetson and held it across his chest. “Good morning, Samantha Sweet, the light of my life. May I offer you a kiss first thing on this lovely day?”
She raised her eyebrows. “That might be taking it a little too far the other direction. But yes, a kiss would be nice.” She glanced toward the living room and, satisfied that the worker-guys were not nearby, went into Beau’s arms.
“Umm. Now I think I’m ready to show you the closet where the coat came from.”
He followed her into the master bedroom and peered into the now-empty closet.
“See? No sign of blood,” she said.
“I’ll bring in the lab kit and spray some Luminol around. Maybe we can dump some of the stuff off the bedding, and maybe clear the carpet too?”
“Let me get the helpers right on that. You just tell them what you want moved, and where.” She found the guys and told them to leave the kitchen for the moment and do whatever Beau asked.
Hey, this felt pretty good, having minions to order about. She wished she could get used to it, but the truth was that she did the majority of the labor on most of these properties herself. She took a sip from her coffee but discovered it had gone cold. She’d just come back inside after putting her travel mug in her truck when Beau caught her attention.
“No blood is showing up yet,” he said. “But do you want to see what I’m dealing with?” Without waiting for an answer he headed out to his cruiser.
Sam followed and watched as he retrieved a paper bag from the back seat. From that, he pulled a dark green trench coat and held it up by the shoulders. When he spread the lapels she saw what the fuss was about. The lining, which had originally been a tan plaid fabric was now stained a dark rust-brown over almost the entire torso area.
“That
“Enough that the wearer probably bled out. This isn’t a little cut.”
“And yet there’s no real damage to the coat. No bullet holes, no rips or tears.”
“The waterproof fabric probably kept all the blood on the inside, and the dark color obscured whatever seeped to the outside. It will go to the state lab to see if we can get some answers.” He refolded it and placed it carefully back into the paper sack. “Who knows? It could be animal blood. Or maybe someone was hurt and grabbed this to wrap around a wound. That’s why I needed to see what additional evidence might be in the house.”
“But, geez, Beau. If it’s enough blood loss to kill a person . . .”
“Exactly. I don’t think they died inside this house. There would have to be spillage outside the coat.”
“So . . . where does that leave us with the house? I need to get the place cleared and ready for sale pretty quickly.”
“I know. I’d say it’s okay to keep removing the small stuff. Leave the furniture for now—beds, sofas and such might be places that a murder could occur. Once we’ve got a few test results from the lab, I’ll know whether I need to come back.”
Sam fumed. Getting this place finished up would free her to work on her shop and the delay chafed at her.
He seemed to sense her irritation. “I know. Just a few days. Meanwhile, maybe I can get some information on the homeowners? Names, current place of residence?”
“From my semi-experienced observation,” —she looked up and grinned at him—“it looks to me like there was a woman and three or four kids here.” She pointed to the crib and three smaller beds, along with the lack of male clothing and personal items, as her reasoning. “As for names, I wasn’t given any. Do you want to speak directly with my contracting officer, or shall I give him a call?”
Truthfully, she didn’t expect a lot of cooperation from the crusty old bureaucrat and her instincts proved correct. But he did provide a number for someone else, which led to a series of call transfers until she got a person who would talk. That man furnished the name and past employer of Cheryl Adams. Her loan application stated that she’d moved to New Mexico from Nevada. Place of birth was Connecticut, and she’d held jobs in Washington state, Colorado, and Kansas. She had three children at the time she applied for her home loan, but that was four years ago and Sam guessed that the occupant of the crib came along during her stay in Taos. The USDA had no records of Cheryl Adams’s current whereabouts, and he somewhat snidely reminded Sam that they would probably be pursuing Adams for past-due payments if they had a clue where she was or a prayer of getting the money. They had no record of a male co-owner and her minor children, he said, were not the concern of his department. Whomever Adams might have chosen to co-habit with didn’t show up on their radar.
Sam passed all this along to Beau, for whatever little help it might provide.
Meanwhile, Troy and crew had nearly finished hauling out the smaller junk and the rooms felt much larger and more open with their minimal furnishings. Sam directed the men to remove a few more things then noted their hours so she would know how much to reimburse Darryl for their time, and sent them on their way.
Until Beau gave the all-clear, she couldn’t really apply cleansers or vacuum up possible trace evidence or get a whole lot further along toward completing the cleanup. With work at a standstill, she updated her sign-in sheet, posted the required USDA notices out in the yard, secured the doors and windows, and placed the keys in a lockbox on the front doorknob.
The small tasks kept her hands occupied, but she couldn’t clear her head of all the questions that ricocheted around in there. Was Cheryl Adams one of those sad cases—single mother, four kids with four different fathers? Was the blood on the coat hers? Maybe the man who’d once lived here, the owner of those battered boots, had been abusive toward Adams and she’d done something to him? Or, heaven forbid, maybe he’d injured one of her children and wrapped the little body in the old coat as he removed it from the house.
No matter how much she puzzled over it, Sam found no answers and the questions only became more and more disturbing.
Suddenly free of her newest break-in job, Sam reveled in the idea that a whole evening loomed ahead—time that she could spend on her shop. She left a voice mail message telling Kelly where she would be, stopped at the first fast-food place with a drive-up and came away with a bag of greasy, meaty goodness that she would call dinner.
The alley behind her new shop was quiet and she parked the Silverado beside her new back door. Ivan Petrenko’s vehicle sat behind the bookstore. While it was comforting to know that there were others nearby, she hoped to avoid any interruptions to her evening’s work. She reached across the passenger seat for her fast-food sack and the mid-weight jacket she’d shed as the day warmed up. And under the jacket, her secret weapon.
Sam wasn’t sure what possessed her to bring the magical wooden box with her today. Before this week she’d avoided taking advantage of its powers. Was it the vivid dream in which the old
Indoors, she switched on the lights. The retail space echoed with a satisfying emptiness. Sam had made more headway yesterday than she’d thought. The front of the shop contained only the nicest of the display cases, the ones she planned to keep, and the back room needed just a bit more clearing before she would be able to start bringing in her own fixtures. She wiped off a space on an old table and set her dinner and the wooden box there.
Closing her eyes, she placed her hands on the box. As the warm glow began to spread up her arms she
