“They still have those sliders?” I asked as I twisted back around to face her. A mixture of beef and pork sausage, those sliders were famous around here. Once a month my dad used to close the bank for an hour and a half on Slider Fridays so he and the staff could enjoy a lunch together. Did the new manager do that? My dad had been a wildly popular boss. He would have been a hard act to follow, especially since he’d died so suddenly from a heart attack.
“Yes, ma’am. Logan Bend doesn’t have much, but we have our sliders.”
“I know. I used to live here.” Behind the woman, two metal desks held computers and stacks of files. The desks of the missing slider-eating cops, no doubt.
“You look familiar,” she said. “I’m Linda O’Brien.”
Before I could answer, a man came out of one of the offices and strode toward us, stopping just shy of Linda’s desk. His eyes narrowed as he took me in before his brows shot up in obvious surprise. “Carlie Webster? Is that you?”
For a moment I simply stared at him. Who was he? His eyes were familiar. Then the past and present clicked together. This was Deputy Ford. Or he’d been a deputy back then. Hadn’t my mother told me he was the sheriff now? Maybe. Half the time I only partly listened when she talked about people in town. It was my way of distancing myself. If I wasn’t interested in the present, the memories of the past didn’t hurt as much.
“I thought I knew you somehow,” Linda said. “You’re the other Webster girl.”
The other Webster girl. The sister of the murdered teenager. That would be the title of my biography if there were ever to be one. The Other Webster Girl. I could see the cover in my mind. A lone girl on a bench built for two. This was why I’d left here and never looked back. I hadn’t wanted to spend my life with that as my identifier. The sympathetic, curious look on Linda O’Brien’s face was all too familiar.
“I’m Sheriff Ford now.” He held out his hand, and we shook.
“Hi, Sheriff Ford,” I said. “It’s nice to see you.”
“And here you are, all grown up.” Ford rocked back on the heels of his cowboy boots. “It’s been a long time.”
“Yes sir,” I said.
“You haven’t changed much. I knew you right away.” He gave me a warm smile.
I smiled back at him. “Thank you. I feel about a hundred.”
“I feel you,” he said. “I just turned fifty-one.”
Fifty-one? How strange. Back then I’d thought of him as old when really he was only five years older than me. “How long have you been the sheriff?” I had a sudden flash of what he’d looked like back then. Chiseled features and bright blue eyes in combination with dark blond curls and a ruddy complexion had made him very popular with the ladies in town. I could remember a photograph in the paper announcing his marriage. My mother had joked that the hearts of half the single women in Logan Bend were surely broken over the news. This was before Beth’s murder. Back when my family still had lighthearted conversations about a variety of subjects.
“Couple of years now,” Ford said. “Not many choices around here, so they were stuck with me.”
“Logan Bend’s lucky to have you,” I said. Was that true? How would I know? The cops in this town hadn’t solved my sister’s murder. Maybe they were incompetent and always had been.
“It’s good to be a big fish in a small town.” He looped his thumbs under his belt. My gaze halted for a second on his large belt buckle. A rose was carved into the silver. Men here and their belt buckles. I’d forgotten that detail.
“What brings you by?” Ford asked. “Is everything all right with your mom?”
“Yes, she’s fine. I just wanted to—well, I wondered if you had any updates on my sister’s case. And I might have something for you. Something new.”
A quick glance in the direction of Linda O’Brien told me she was hanging on every word. It would be all over town by nightfall that the other Webster sister was back in town and asking questions for which there was no answer.
“Come on back.” Ford motioned toward his office. “We can chat in there.”
I followed him into a small office and sat in one of two metal chairs on the other side of an oak desk. He plopped down in the chair behind his desk, causing it to squeak. For a man in his fifties, he seemed fit and in good health, not in possession of a potbelly like so many men that age, including my ex-husband.
“Are you in town for a visit?” Ford asked. “I can’t remember ever seeing you back in these parts.”
“I don’t come home often. I’m an English professor in Seattle and have to go back in the fall.”
“I remember you were quite the bookworm,” Ford said. “Makes sense you became a professor.”
I blinked, surprised he remembered that about me. Actually, how did he know? My only interaction had been the night we had to come in for questioning. They must have studied our family at the time in an attempt to comb through all possibilities. “My mom needed some help getting her house ready. She’s selling and moving to that retirement community.”
“I’ll bet she’s real pleased to have you home.” His finger and thumb of his right hand played with his wedding ring.
I assumed she’d have been, but she’d been acting strange, almost secretive. For minutes at a time, she’d stare out into space. The thirtieth anniversary of my sister’s death was this coming August. I suspected that was on her mind. However, it didn’t explain the way she disappeared for long stretches to talk to someone on the phone. If I didn’t know better, I’d
