yahoos can go out and chop some wood while you decide what to do.”
He dashed his hand through his wet hair. “This is ridiculous. Sherlock, close it down or I’ll beat your butt.
”
She assumed a martial arts position and beckoned him with her fingers. “This is no time to mess with me, macho boy. Try it and I’ll flatten you.”
She was wearing a thick oversized hotel bathrobe, wrapped nearly twice around her. Her feet were bare and her hair curled wildly around her head. Her face was red with rage. And she wanted to fight him. How had it come to this? He laughed even as he wrapped his arms around her waist, threw her over his shoulder, and tossed her onto the bed. He fell on top of her, pulled her arms over her head, and held her down.
He said an inch from her nose, “Stop sneering at me. I know threats don’t work with you, so I won’t bother. Why don’t you tell me where you think we should start with all the info you extracted?”
It was terrible that she couldn’t indulge her anger at him, but she recognized the olive branch—really more of a twig—and the fact was, business was business. She saved her anger for later.
“Get off me, you baboon, so I can breathe.”
Savich rolled off to the side, but kept one leg on top of her.
“All right. My guess is that all that stuff Claudia told me probably happened in the past year or two. We have a number of details about Claudia’s mother that must have led to an investigation. And maybe Claudia is her real name. So you need to fire up MAX and get on it. Now let me go before I get seriously upset and hurt you.”
He leaned over and kissed her, still angry and frustrated, then rolled off the bed. He looked down at her for a long moment, brooding, before he walked back into the bathroom and shut the door. He heard her laugh and yell, “Hey, Dillon, maybe you should call Director Mueller, fill him in on what I got Claudia to tell me.”
Savich stood in front of the bathroom mirror, a razor in his hand. He’d heard every word quite clearly; Sherlock had a piercingly clear voice when she wanted to. But beneath that laughter, he thought, she was still angry at him, perhaps as angry as he was with her. He sighed as he soaped up his face. He was not in a happy place. He cut himself twice.
His phone rang again ten minutes later with the news that Moses and Claudia were no longer at the Denny’s.
Savich called Jimmy Maitland to give him a report, then Dix to say they wouldn’t make it for dinner. They had a lot of work to do.
CHAPTER 26
SHERIFF NOBLE’S HOUSE MAESTRO, VIRGINIA THURSDAY EVENING
RAFE MOWED ACROSS his corn on the cob without stopping. Rob, not to be outdone, managed an even wider swath of his own, four rows of kernels at a time. For a moment, Ruth thought he was going to choke. She clapped him on the back and handed him a glass of water, then gave him a thumbs-up when he sat back and smiled contentedly at his brother.
“Neither of you took a single breath,” Ruth said. “That’s remarkable. Next time I’m going to find really, really big ears of corn and test your limits.”
Dix looked up from his own corn at his boys, then over at Ruth. The boys acted natural around her, not at all prickly, as they often did when they thought a woman was threatening to take their mother’s place. She’d known them since Friday night. It was amazing how comfortable they all were. Dix said, leaning back in his chair, “Do you know I can’t remember ever felling an ear of corn in under six seconds?”
“We did it faster, right, Ruth?”
Ruth laughed. “I wasn’t timing you but I bet you beat that. My older brother and I always competed to see who could be the grossest as well as the fastest. Drove our parents crazy.”
Rob said, “Grandpa Chappy usually laughs when we do a gross-out for him, like stuffing chewed-up green beans in front of your bottom teeth and peeling down your lip. Uncle Tony gets all uptight and Aunt Cynthia looks like she wants to lock us in a closet.”
“How about your uncle Gordon?” Ruth heard the words come out of her mouth before she even realized what she’d asked.
“Uncle Gordon? Hmm.” Rob looked over at Rafe, then said, “Fact is, we’ve never been gross around Uncle Gordon. He always looks so perfect, you know?”
“So does your grandpa Chappy,” Ruth said.
“It’s not the same,” Rafe said, shaking his head. “And when the two of them are together they’re so busy fighting we might as well not even be there.”
“Isn’t that the truth,” Ruth said.
“How about you, Ruth? What did you and your brother do that was real gross?”
“Well, my favorite gross-out was chugging a Coke while I was ice skating. You come to a fast stop in front of one of your friends and belch really loud right in their face.”
The boys laughed. Dix knew that until tonight his sons had been putting up a brave front, trying to act as natural as they could while all hell was breaking loose around them—three people murdered in their town in less than a week while their father was the one responsible for finding out who killed them. Rob stopped laughing first. He looked down at the pile of baked beans on his plate. Well, impossible to ignore reality forever, Dix thought. He said easily, “Thanks for the visual, Ruth. When we go skating, no soft drinks allowed,” but the boys looked thoughtful. Rafe said, “I saw Uncle Tony scratch his armpit once, and when we were playing baseball, he was standing out in center field and he scratched—”
Rob cut his brother off. “Not in front of Ruth.”
“You’re right, Rob, too much information,” Ruth said, and saluted him with her glass of tea. Dix scooped another spoonful of green beans onto his son’s plate. “Eat and don’t smash them in front of your bottom teeth.”
Rafe shot his father a wary look and said faster than Brewster could swing his tail, “I went to see Mr. Fulton, you know, see where we might stand with his hiring me, you know, when my report card comes out.”
“This is a hardware store, right?” Ruth asked.
Rafe nodded. “Mr. Fulton said only six days had passed and nothing was any different at his store, and when would I have proof that my grades are up in English and biology.”
Brewster was trying to climb Ruth’s leg. She leaned down to pet his head and slipped him a bit of hot dog. But Brewster wasn’t hungry, he wanted attention. He rubbed the hot dog on her shoe until she had to lift her feet off the floor to avoid him. The boys laughed until she scooped Brewster up and hugged him against her chest. “What are you up to, smearing hot dog all over my shoe, making everybody laugh at me? I thought you were my hero.”
“Some hero,” Rob said, piling more potato salad on his plate. “Brewster was so small when he was a puppy we were afraid we might roll over on him during the night and squash him.”
Dix chuckled, one eye on Brewster. “He was hero enough to find Ruth. I’ve rolled over on Brewster myself and he’s survived. Now, Rafe, what did Mr. Fulton say about the job?”
Rafe swallowed a mouthful of hot dog bun. “Mr. Fulton asked me to spell ‘valedictorian.’ That wasn’t fair, Dad.”
“Did you even attempt it?” Ruth asked.
“Yeah, I did. I missed the e in the middle. It wasn’t fair,” he repeated. His father said, “I gather Mr. Fulton didn’t hire you?”
“He told me to bring him my next report card. Then he’d speak to you again.”
“Stup Fulton is full of surprises,” Dix said to Ruth.
“Ah, he asked me what you’re doing about all this violent stuff, Dad. I told him you and the three FBI agents are working real hard on it. He just harrumphed.” He looked down at his plate. This time his voice was as thin as the kitchen curtains. “And there’s the kids at school. They’re saying that you’re not as good as everyone says you are, that everyone in town’s getting murdered.”
“Well,” Dix said, “you don’t look banged up so I guess you didn’t get into any fights.”
“It was close,” Rafe muttered.
“I understand. But you managed to walk away?”
