“Yes.”
“Honey cashew chicken for dinner or beef fried rice?”
“Both.”
“I’ll bring enough to feed Dad too should he wander in. Let him know.” He disappeared out the door.
Evie picked up the last thing he had left on the table. A roll of sweet-tarts. She thoughtfully opened the end of the roll and slipped one out.
“And you were worried about first impressions because…?”
“Shut up, Ann.”
Ann laughed and settled on the chair across from her, held out her hand. Evie passed over the candy. “Was that normal Gabriel Thane?”
“Pretty much.”
“I think I can turn down the heat in this place. He must have been born flirting with his nurses.”
“He does have that effect,” Ann agreed.
“Think he killed the Florist family?”
“I think you can mark him off the list. I wouldn’t assume the same for his deputies.”
Evie looked across at Ann. “Ouch.”
“Look hard and look deep,” Ann repeated.
“Yeah.” Evie slipped another sweet-tart from the roll. “I see why you like the Thane brothers. Josh is the one I haven’t met yet, but from what you’ve said, he sounds like a nice guy too.”
“He’s more laid-back than Gabriel and Will, probably goes with being the youngest.” Ann glanced at the time. “I’m going to head back to Chicago earlier than planned if you think you’ll be all right on your own here.”
Evie smiled. “I’ll be fine-thanks for all the help, Ann, getting me this far.”
“No problem. I’ll be here early Tuesday morning. If you solve either case while I’m gone, I’ll buy the hot fudge sundae.”
Evie nodded in appreciation of the subtle encouragement. “An excellent motivator. Call me when you land so I know you’re safely home.”
“Will do.”
Ann collected her jacket and briefcase and headed out.
Evie had the post-office building to herself. She tapped her foot on the cement floor and heard the echo. She wrote radio at the top of her to-do list.
She walked over and locked the door, then turned to the mostly blank crime wall she was filling and looked at the neatly stacked boxes waiting for her. “Okay, Florist family. What do you have to tell me?” She carried another box over to the table, pulled out her chair, and opened the top folder.
She finally felt as though the chaos of her arrival was ending and life was getting back to normal. She had a case to work. That felt really, really good.
FIVE
Gabriel Thane
The post office lights were on, but Ann’s rental car was gone. The yellow convertible still sat on the street where Gabriel had parked it. He tapped on the door glass, pleased to see Evie had locked herself in.
Evie came over to unlock the door. “Dinner,” he said by way of a casual greeting, nodding to the two sacks he carried. “Sorry I’m later than I intended.”
“No problem. How about over there?” She pointed to a free table.
“Ann get away okay?”
“Yes. She’ll call when she’s home.”
He unpacked the disposable plates and utensils he’d brought and set out the meal. Ann’s wall was mostly as he had seen it earlier, while Evie’s wall had grown considerably in details. “You’ve been busy.”
“First day game plan-get set up.”
“What’s day two?”
“Shove case details in my mind until they leak out.”
Gabriel smiled at Evie’s description. He began to walk through the Florist crime wall, reviewing the photos, the timeline. He paused at the end to review her list of questions. “I don’t know whether to be insulted or impressed,” he said, “that you want my alibi for the night they went missing.” She’s not messing around.
“Someone in the department. Someone in the county. Maybe job-related-a person Florist arrested. Or it was a family thing.”
Gabriel knew he was a good cop, thought of himself that way, but she said it so casually. Someone in the department… Or it was a family thing. It felt hard to breathe.
He turned toward her and found her watching him steadily. He pushed his hands into his back pockets. “You’re right. But those aren’t casual categories.”
“Going to get protective, Gabriel?”
He thought about the missing deputy, his wife and son. He let out a huff of air. “No. You ask your questions. That’s why you’re here.”
“Was he having an affair? Was she?”
Gabriel simply grimaced. “I’d say no, but we’ll check it again. You don’t mince words.”
“I don’t like wasting time. If this was a typical case, it would have been solved by now. In order to discover what someone else didn’t see, I’ve got to come at it from as many hard angles as I can find.”
This wasn’t going to be a casual look at the case, a simple review of what others had done, but cutting through that work to discover what others had missed. “Evie, I think you’re going to wear the department out over these next couple of weeks.”
Her eyes glinted with humor. “You’ll all survive me, Gabriel.” She turned back to the table. “Let’s eat.”
Gabriel dished out fried rice onto his plate, sampled it, added extra soy sauce. Evie, digging into the honey cashew chicken, asked, “Tell me about the Florist case.”
He glanced over and was glad to see she’d found her appetite. He gave her the summary from his point of view: “Twelve years ago, the Florist family left their home on a Thursday evening in August for a three-day camping trip with friends. They never arrived. Vanished somewhere between here and the campground located at the north end of Carin Lake, a distance of about thirty miles. Their friends notified the police just after seven o’clock Friday morning when they still hadn’t arrived and calls went unanswered. Police found nothing at the house, found no sign of the truck they were driving or the camper they were towing along the possible routes they might have taken. They simply disappeared-a deputy, his wife, and their eleven-year-old son. A massive search and parallel investigation began, with hundreds of officers involved. It generated no answers to the mystery.”
“That’s what interests me the most, Gabriel. Three people vanish, and the case remains unsolved. It’s got me more than curious.”
“Having known them, the words I’d use are sad, mad…”
“Point taken.”
Gabriel set down his fork, shook his head. “Your objectivity will be an asset, Evie, and I shouldn’t knock it. Most who have worked this case over the years come to it with perspectives of having known one or all three of them, or they know their family members in the area.”
“I can appreciate this case is personal for all of you,” Evie replied. “I truly don’t mean to sound distant or cold about them. Talk to me about the family. I’d like to know how you remember them.”
From the years of thinking about this case, Gabriel could recall them as clearly today as when he’d last seen them twelve years ago. “Susan May Florist was a part-time bank teller. She also worked a day a week at the local bakery icing cakes. I’d see her at department picnics, baseball games. She had a nice laugh and a kind heart. She always made a point of asking about the Thanes.” He sipped at his soda, glanced over at the photos on the wall.
“Their son was into baseball. Joseph Patrick Florist-everyone called him Joe-was a good kid, polite, curious, fascinated by what his dad did, still young enough to hold a bit of hero worship for his father. I tossed around a ball with him, took him fishing a couple of times. I knew him enough to like him.
“Scott Simon Florist worked a civilian job at the courthouse for several years before deciding he wanted to join our police force. He entered the academy older than most, joined the PD as a patrol officer, wanted to become a detective and put in the work to get there. He was a smart man, a good cop. I didn’t work directly with him, since he mostly partnered with Phil Peters, but our paths would cross in the break room, at training classes, sometimes at the firing range. He had a reputation for being careful with the details. And he was good with kids. A fifteen-year-old got picked up for vandalism, Scott would take the case, nail down the details, and figure out if there was something going on at school or home before he wrote up the report. He’d take the extra time. I respected the guy.