“About what?” she cries.
I turn my back on them. Taking Coulter by the bicep, I guide him through the front door. It’s colder and the wind has kicked up. A misty rain falls from a murky sky.
Coulter wipes his face with his sleeve, then turns and offers his wrists. “That’s not my rifle.”
I snap on the cuffs. “We’ll get it straightened out at the station.”
An hour later, Tomasetti and I are sitting in my office, drinking one of Mona’s coffee-chocolate-hazelnut concoctions. I’m wishing I had something a lot stronger. I booked Coulter into jail on a parole violation and contacted his parole officer. She sounded young and inexperienced—and surprised by the news. In the year he’s been out of prison, Ricky Coulter has been a model parolee. He holds down a full-time job and has never missed a single appointment. After hanging up, I recap the conversation for Tomasetti, and he tells me she just hasn’t been part of the system long enough.
“A few more years and nothing will surprise her,” he says.
“That’s really jaded, Tomasetti.”
“Reality is jaded.” He shrugs, unapologetic. “One day Citizen Joe’s a born-again Christian; the next he slits his neighbor’s throat over a parking space.”
“Nice.” I’m not going to admit there’s a part of me that agrees with him.
I sip coffee as I type the serial number of the rifle into an NCIC query to see if it comes back as stolen.
“So what are you thinking?” Tomasetti asks after a moment.
“I’m thinking I don’t like this.”
“You mean Coulter as a suspect?”
“I mean any of it.”
I finish typing and look at him over my monitor. He’s wearing a charcoal shirt with a black tie beneath a nicely cut jacket. His trench coat is draped across the back of his chair. I can smell the piney-woods scent of his aftershave from where I sit. He’s a nice-looking man, but not in the traditional sense. He’s got a severe mouth, and his eyes are too intense. But the overall picture of him appeals to me in a way that no other man ever has. I don’t know why, but that scares the hell out of me.
“The kids…” I shake my head. “I felt like the bad guy, taking him in the way we did.”
“You weren’t.”
“I know, but it felt that way.” I hit ENTER, sending the query, and lean back in my chair. “He seemed pretty adamant about the rifle.”
“You tell a lie enough times and you start to believe it yourself.”
For an instant, I wonder if he’s talking about more than just Coulter. I’ve told my share of lies. He knows about most of them, but not all. “Anyone ever tell you you’re cynical?”
“All the time.” Leaning back in the chair, he extends his legs out in front of him and stretches. “What else is bugging you?”
I think about it a moment. “When I saw the rifle in the closet, I got this strange feeling that I’d seen it before.”
“You mean recently?”
“I’m not sure. Maybe.” I reach for the memory, but it’s not there, like a hand grasping at smoke. “I was hoping to tie up the Slabaugh case with Coulter, but I don’t think he’s our guy.”
“To tell you the truth, I don’t like him for this or the hate crimes.”
“Where’s all that hard-nosed cynicism, Tomasetti?”
“At the risk of ruining whatever image of me you’ve drawn in your head, I don’t think a cop should let cynicism override good old-fashioned instinct.”
“Now there’s a novel concept.”
“Chief?”
I glance toward the door to see Glock standing there, looking excited. “Please tell me you have good news,” I say.
“A guy out on Township Road 2 remembered seeing a dark-colored pickup truck hauling ass last night near where you found Lambright. Says he noticed because the driver blew a stop sign, just about hit him.”
“Anyone get a plate number?”
He shakes his head. “Witness says he was moving too fast.”
“What about a description of the driver?”
“Don’t know. T. J.’s talking to the guy now.”
“Any word on Lambright’s condition?” Tomasetti asks.
“Broken ribs. Broken nose. Hypothermia. Emergency doc says someone worked him over good.”
“Just for being Amish,” I mutter. “Sons of bitches.”
“Maybe the truck will pan out,” Glock says.
I’m not as optimistic. “Run all blue and black pickup trucks, Ford and Chevy, registered in Holmes and Coshocton counties,” I say to Glock. “Run the drivers through LEADS, see if we get anything interesting.”
“I’m on it,” he says, and disappears down the hall.
I feel like breaking something, but there’s nothing handy, so I look at my computer screen to see if anything has come back on the rifle. Of course, there’s nothing there yet. The database is huge and queries take time. Something about the rifle niggles at me. Some insignificant memory on the edge of my brain. Something I thought wasn’t important but is. I know I’ve seen that stock before. But where?
I’m in the process of retracing my every step from the day before when it hits me. “Holy shit.” I jump to my feet fast enough to startle Tomasetti. “I think I just remembered where I saw the rifle.”
He arches a brow. “Lay it on me.”
I look at him, my heart pounding. “The Slabaugh place. Yesterday afternoon. In the mudroom.”
“Yesterday? Are you sure?”
“No.” But I am. The more I think about it, the more certain I become. I grab my parka. “Only one way to find out.”
Standing, he reaches for his own coat and sighs. “Cynicism outstrips faith in mankind once again.”
CHAPTER 11
Rain slashes down in sheets when we step out of the station. We hightail it to the Explorer, but we’re dripping by the time we buckle in.
“If you saw the rifle at the Slabaugh place yesterday, how the hell did it get to Coulter’s house?” Tomasetti asks.
I glance at him as I back out of my parking space. “Good question.”
“Are you sure it’s the same rifle?”
“I’m not one hundred percent certain. But it’s old, similar to one my dad used to own, so it caught my attention.” The tires spin on the wet pavement when I hit the gas. “It’s too similar not to check out.”
“Where did you see it?”
“The mudroom. Salome took me into the basement yesterday and I just happened to notice it.” I tell him about the mason jar and the missing cash.
Tomasetti mulls that over. “Any idea when the money was taken?”
“No idea. I sent the jar for latents.”
The windshield wipers wage a losing battle with the deluge as I turn into the Slabaughs’ lane. I park behind a buggy I don’t recognize, and I realize Bishop Troyer has probably asked another Amish family to stay with the children. I wonder if the social worker from Children Services has been in contact yet. I wonder how it went.…
Punching off the headlights, I twist the key and kill the engine. A few yards away, the house hulks, the windows utterly dark, and a strange thread of worry goes through me.
“Kind of early for bed, isn’t it?” Tomasetti asks.
“A lot of Amish farmers are up by four A.M. They go to bed early.” Still, I can’t deny the uneasiness slinking up my spine. The place looks deserted.
“I’d never make it as an Amish guy.”
