Jenny looked injured, and Carmen frowned. Nancy wasn’t awake enough yet to have an opinion.
Laurene made a dismissive wave. “Jen... guys... I’m not making fun of anybody.”
Carmen said, “Kinda sounds like you are.”
“Well, maybe myself a little. The locals see my fine gay black ass, they are going to shit gold bricks, and start the gold rush all over again.”
That made Carmen laugh, Nancy too, and even Jenny managed a tiny smile.
“Hey,” Laurene said, “we’re all freaks to somebody.”
“You can’t just be figuring that out,” Nancy said.
But the other two had given all their attention over to Laurene, who not only was Harrow’s right hand, but the oldest and maybe wisest of them.
“I always lived my life the way I wanted,” she said, no laughter now. “Nobody could make me believe I was wrong — even when I was.”
That drew wry smiles out of Carmen and Nancy, though Jenny remained poker-faced.
“I really thought I was in charge of myself, if not my destiny — I mean, no cop thinks the world is anything but a random damn mine field. But I was in a relationship that was working, and I really thought I was the captain of that frickin’ ship too. Me and Patty. That was her name.”
Now it was Carmen and Nancy whose expressions had gone blank with the fear of getting too much information, while Jenny had tight eyes and a cocked head, like a dog just figuring out what those words its master had been blurting were all about.
“Since Patty died, though, I realize I wasn’t the one with the hand on the rudder. She’d been runnin’ things, all along. Made me think I was in charge. Out front, leading the way.” Laurene chuckled again, but this time there was no humor in it. “Leading the way? Hell, I lost my way.”
“We all do, time to time,” Nancy said, and Carmen nodded.
But Jenny said, bluntly, “I don’t.”
All eyes went to the petite computer guru.
“Never had a way,” she said with a shrug.
Laurene laughed. “That’s a good one, kid,” she said. “First joke I ever heard you crack.”
Jenny said, “Joke?”
Then the other three howled and, truth be told, Jenny was smiling herself, just a little.
They all rocked forward a little as the bus stopped. Looking past Carmen out the tinted window, Laurene made out a low, long building with a sign proclaiming they were parked by the Rolette County Sheriff’s Office.
In the aisle, Laurene Chase smoothed her blouse and pants with only moderate success, after ten hours on the bus, but for a couple of pee breaks. She slipped into a black Crime Seen! silk jacket, retrieved her carry-on-type bag from its perch, and headed for the front of the bus, Carmen and Nancy behind her, Jenny staying on the bus, still glued to her laptop.
They walked down the few stairs and outside into bright sunshine and a cold north wind. Behind their bus was the semi that was home to the lab and the mini production studio.
“Damn,” Laurene said, zipping up the jacket at the chill. “Wasn’t it just summer?”
“Not convinced it’s ever summer up here,” Carmen said, shivering as she stepped down, a hand trying vainly to keep her hair intact.
Blond Nancy, still wearing only a T-shirt and jeans and seemingly impervious to the windy North Dakota welcome, walked off toward the semi to collect her gear.
“Tough kid,” Laurene said, nodding toward the sound woman.
“Crew,” Carmen said with a shrug. “Different breed.”
The street was two-lane with curb parking, the buildings mostly one-story, a gas station across and down the only real sign of life, as cars pulled in and out. A parking lot to the right of the sheriff’s office revealed two cruisers and a four by four bearing the department logo.
From the semi, bulky Maury Hathaway emerged, lugging his camera, Nancy Hughes and Billy Choi tagging after. Hathaway, like Nancy, wore only a T-shirt, this one with a Phish logo, and jeans — in his fifties, he remained a teenager. Choi, his hair “Werewolves of London” perfect despite the wind, wore a black leather jacket over a black tee and black slacks.
Laurene gathered the camera crew plus Carmen and Choi trailing behind them, and left them grouped on the sidewalk like a parade that got sidetracked as she went in through the double glass doors. The meeting had been set up by Harrow via phone — all Laurene knew was the sheriff’s name, Jason Fox.
A tall, broad-shouldered Native American in uniform with sheriff’s badge loomed over a long counter. His hard brown eyes under a helmet of raven-black hair looked past Laurene at the group gathered beyond the glass doors.
So much for the redneck musclehead she’d pictured. Maybe the sheriff who got thrown out of office had looked like that.
“Sheriff Fox? Laurene Chase with Crime Seen!”
“Been expecting you.” His eyes went past her again. “Didn’t expect that kind of entourage, though.”
“Not really an entourage, Sheriff — that’s actually a very pared-down TV crew, plus a forensics expert working with us. I’m a crime scene analyst myself — on leave from the Waco P.D.”
He clearly liked the sound of that, his thin mouth even turning up at the corners enough to qualify as a smile. “Okay. You can let ’em in.”
She did, and soon they’d all shaken hands and made introductions, after which Sheriff Fox said, “Shall we move into my office? It’ll be snug, but you should all make it.”
The pebble-glass door had to be left open so that Hathaway could shoot from there. Otherwise the modest office accommodated them, but just — nothing fancy, a metal desk, computer desk next to it, file cabinet in a corner. Walls were spotted with diplomas, commendations, and some colorful outdoor pictures of sheriff and deputies in wooded areas.
The sheriff sat himself behind his desk, signaling for Laurene and Carmen to take the two seats across. Choi leaned against the file cabinet while Nancy ran the boom from the close-quarters sidelines. A file folder sat before the sheriff on the neat desk like a meal he was contemplating.
Laurene asked the sheriff for permission to start rolling and got it.
She asked, “Sheriff Fox, what can you tell us?”
Fox flipped open the file folder. “Burl Hanson was county comptroller.”
Not law enforcement, she thought, but another public servant...
“He came home from work and found something terrible.”
Chapter Fourteen
Two years before
Nola Hanson was a typical mother, convinced her daughter Katie was no typical child. And she had typically big dreams for her daughter Katie — Dr. Hanson, Katherine Hanson (Attorney at Law), Governor Hanson, Senator Hanson, even President Hanson. Ever since Hillary, all the doors were open now, weren’t they?
On the other hand, Doctor Hanson did have a real ring to it...
As for eight-year-old Katie, her biggest ambition was doing well at tomorrow night’s softball game.
“You’re sure he’ll be there?” the child asked for the fifth or sixth time.
The girl’s mother was at the stove, stirring chicken noodle soup. Patient with her blond, pigtailed interrogator, Nola said, “Your father’s working late today, so he can be sure not to miss an inning of the game tomorrow.”
Tall for her age, and slender, Katie slipped onto a diner-type stool opposite her mother at the kitchen island, and displayed a big grin made memorable by a missing front tooth, the new one about a quarter of the way in. Mother and daughter shared hair color and the same lively blue eyes. Nola, in her mid-thirties, had kept on a few pounds after giving birth to Katie, but Burl, her husband, not only never complained, he seemed fully in favor of the additional curves.