One Was a Soldier

“Let’s hope he remembers to turn his darned phone on so I can at least leave him a message. Unlike you.”

He slapped the front pocket of his jeans and drew out his blank, inactive cell phone. “Sorry.” He thought for a second. Did he want to know? “Harlene? Why did you call Clare’s number to reach me?”

She laughed in his ear. “I may be old, but I haven’t forgotten what it’s like. I figured you two would be making up for lost time.”

“Oh.”

“And Erla Davis mentioned to me that she saw you walking down her street and getting into your truck real early last week when she was headed out to open up the diner.”

Oh, shit. “Okay. Thanks. I’ll see you soon.” He hung up. Clare raised her eyebrows.

“Eric’s called in sick, and Harlene can’t raise Noble. I’ve got to go in.”

“How did she know you were here? Did you leave word at the station?”

“Are you kidding? No. She called my cell, and when that didn’t go through, she called here next. Seems the waitress from the Kreemy Kakes diner spotted me picking up my truck a few mornings ago.” He pinched the bridge of his nose. “I guess I’m not as good at sneaking around as I thought.”

Clare laughed. “Don’t look so grim about it.” She crossed the floor and wrapped her arms around his midsection. “I’m not complaining.”

“God. I’m sorry.” He pressed his lips against her hair. Over the aroma of the sausages, he could smell her, vodka and tomato juice and Clare. “I’ve got to go. If it’s anything like last weekend, it’ll be crazy today. I don’t want you to feel like I’m running away from this conversation, but I don’t know when I’ll be able to get back.”

“I’ll be at the Ellises’ tonight anyway.”

“Tomorrow?”

“Sunday.”

He groaned. “I’m in the seat all day Monday, but I’ll be free by dinnertime.”

She shook her head. “I’ve got a premarital session at six and a building and grounds committee meeting at seven.” She slanted her eyes up at him. “You could sneak over later that night.”

“No.” His voice was stonier than he intended. Probably because the idea was so damn appealing.

Clare growled with frustration and pushed him away. “Go. Finish getting dressed. While you’re at it, consider that I’ve been taking it easy on summer schedule. The Sunday after Labor Day is Homecoming Sunday, and everything starts up again: adult ed and weekly community suppers and all the committees. I’ll be twice as busy as I am now.”

He stumped upstairs, worrying about how much of herself she was going to pour into those meetings and suppers and lessons. Wondering how long after he asked her they could get married. Assuming she said yes. He was pretty sure doing it at lunchtime in Judge Ryswick’s chambers was out of the question.

When he returned, feet in boots and his less than pristine uniform blouse tucked into his jeans, she handed him a paper sack. “I’ve put a sausage in a bun for you.”

He grinned.

“Don’t say it,” she warned.

He took it with a quick kiss instead of a joke. “I’ll call you.”

“Oh, yeah. That’s what they all say.”

He thought about it all the way to the station. He hadn’t set the scene very well. Hell, he hadn’t set the scene at all. She hadn’t gotten any courtship, just awkward years of being the semi-sorta Other Woman, followed by hush-hush sex. Maybe he ought to put on the brakes and do the dating thing for a while.

But dammit, he didn’t want a girlfriend. It was ridiculous, for a man his age to have a girlfriend. He wanted a wife. He wanted a house with both their things in it, and joint bank accounts, and someone saying, “Hi, honey,” when he got home at the end of the day.

He just had to come up with a decent time and place to ask her.

***

The first thing he saw when he arrived at the station was Lyle MacAuley, coming through dispatch from the squad room. “What are you doing here?” Russ asked.

“Paperwork for a shoplifting bust.” Lyle shook his head. “Used to be, you’d show up at the Super Kmart, and it’d be some kid with a CD jammed down his pants. Now it’s professionals. You should have seen this pair. Slits sewn in their jackets and everything.” He followed Russ into his office. “Don’t need a fence anymore. Sell the stuff on eBay.”

Russ picked up the BOLO sheets Harlene had left on his desk and leafed through them. “Hmn. Anything going on I should know about?”

“Not particularly. Anything going on that I should know about?”

Russ’s head came up. “What’s that mean?”

“Oh, I dunno.” Lyle crossed his arms over his chest.

“You overheard Harlene, didn’t you?”

Lyle dropped his arms and his pretense at casualness. “Reverend Fergusson’s had to deal with a lot of gossip around this town over the past few years. Now, when she went away to Iraq, it all sort of died down. So I can’t figure why you seem hell-bent on making her the subject of conversation again.”

“What are you, her father?”

Lyle splayed his hands on Russ’s desk and leaned forward. “Whyn’t you just ask the lady to marry you? God knows why, but she seems pretty fond of you. Just make an honest woman out of her before talk spreads. If it was anybody else, it wouldn’t make a damn bit of difference, but she’s a minister, Russ. What are the people in her church going to think when it comes out you’ve been spending your nights over to her place?”

Russ threw the sheets on his desk. “I know that. You think I don’t know that?”

Lyle opened his hands and raised his bushy gray eyebrows.

“I was ready to ask her the day she got back. There just didn’t seem to be a good time to do it.”

“It’s been two months already. I think you’d be able to find five minutes somewheres.”

Russ glared at his deputy chief. “Clare’s had too much to deal with, readjusting to civilian life.” He pushed away from his desk and walked to one of the high windows overlooking Main Street. “She’s not sleeping well. She’s drinking too much.” He rapped against the glass pane, and a startled mourning dove flew off the granite windowsill. “She’s trying to be there for her congregation, and it’s sucking the life out of her. I didn’t want to put one more thing on her plate.”

“Give the reverend some credit. Near as I can tell, she’s never shown any reluctance to tell you to go soak your head.” Russ let out an involuntary laugh. “If you’re crowdin’ her,” Lyle went on, “she’ll let you know.”

The intercom buzzed. “You two done in there?” Harlene’s tinny voice asked.

“Yeah,” Lyle said. “You can stop pretending not to listen now.”

“I got the manager from the new resort on the line.” Harlene sounded tart. “Says she’d like to speak with Chief Van Alstyne, if he happens to be available.”

Russ looked at Lyle. “She asked for me?”

“Maybe she knows you’re gonna be in the market for a reception hall.”

“Not if an asteroid hit and it was the last building left in New York.” The resort might be the fanciest spot in three counties, but as far as Russ was concerned, it was the open vortex to hell. He wouldn’t have been surprised to find the place had been built atop an Indian burial ground, like in the horror movies. “Put her through, Harlene.” He punched the speaker button. Lyle moved a stack of old circ sheets off the wooden chair on the other side of the desk and sat down. “Van Alstyne here.”

“Chief? This is Barbara LeBlanc, at the Algonquin Waters. Look, I have a problem here that I think is one for the police, but I need it to be handled sensitively.”

“Okay. What’s up?”

“A man came in about an hour ago, looking for one of our bookkeepers. The front desk associates told him she didn’t come in during the weekend, and he parked himself in the lobby and said he’d wait. They were a little nervous, because it seemed, well, very stalkerlike behavior, so they called me, and I went to talk to the man and