Bait

 

“You didn’t need to come in with me,” Piper said as Vin drove to the bakery with her on Sunday morning. “I just want to see if the traps caught anything and get it cleaned up.”

“You don’t like doing this.”

“How do you know?” she asked, turning her head to look at him. He’d been sweet since yesterday, but she was getting a little sick of him being in her way now. This was her business and she had to pull up her big girl panties and deal with it.

“Sam told me that you don’t like to deal with anything dead. You told me that too. Mice are nasty alive. Ever seen one in a trap?”

She shuddered. She didn’t want to do this but had no one she could really ask. She wouldn’t ask Sam to do it, even though deep down she wanted to. There were only so many things you could ask of your friends, she was realizing.

“No. But that doesn’t change the fact this is my business and I need to deal with it. If they aren’t caught or there is any sign of more, then I need to call an exterminator. I just wanted to avoid doing that. I wanted to avoid the cost too.”

They pulled in the parking lot, got out and made their way to the back door. “Do you always come in the back door when it’s closed?” he asked.

“No. I always come in the front, but I’m not going to open today, so I figured I’d come in the back. Even when I’m closed, I turn all the lights on in the storefront. Kind of like they know I’m in there baking and everything will be fresh when I open.”

She didn’t want to remember the last time she came in the back because she was afraid to walk down the alley to the front door. This was the first time she’d parked in the parking lot coming in so early since that day. She’d been parking right out front and running to the front door since and locking herself in, then moving her car when daylight came.

 She unlocked the door with Vin next to her. Not scared in the least. Not because it was daylight out. But because Vin was with her. And Vin made her feel like everything was right in the world, when she knew deep down something wasn’t. That she was trying to pretend it, but like so many things in her life, pretending didn’t make it go away.

“Where’s the light?” Vin asked.

“On the wall,” she said, feeling around. Hating the darkness so much. Hating that now she was feeling a tiny bit of fear, like she did that morning.

He pulled his phone out and turned it on, then aimed it at the wall, walked the few feet and hit the light. She wished he didn’t when she saw about ten dead mice lying in the middle of the floor. She didn’t even want to go into the storage room where the traps were.

“Don’t move,” he said. “Where’s the storage room?”

She lifted her arm and pointed to the door at the back and he pulled it open, then looked inside. “Two traps filled, the rest are empty.”

“I don’t understand what is going on,” she said, her eyes filling fast.

“Call the detective now. They’ve been poisoned so that they’d die in here.”

 

***

 

“Are you going to take this seriously now?” Vin asked Detective Myers.

“We’ve been taking it seriously and I don’t appreciate your tone.”

Vin ignored him. Piper was sitting on a stool by her large counter in the back, flipping through recipes in a book and making notes. He guessed she needed something to take her mind off of everything. Whatever worked.

“Don’t care what you appreciate. I told you all along something wasn’t adding up. Did you talk to Quinton Morgan?”

“Yes. I did. Scared the crap out of the kid. No way it’s him. Does he have a crush on Piper? Sure. He even admitted it. But he doesn’t have it in him to do any of these things. Besides, his mother was all but tying the apron around him tighter and pulling him over for a hug.”

Vin rolled his eyes. “That doesn’t mean he couldn’t do any of this.”

“I know. But I’m telling you, it’s not him, and I don’t have any reason to believe otherwise. I don’t have enough for a warrant to look for anything either. Even you know that.”

“Meaning what?” Vin asked, narrowing his eyes.

“Meaning that you and all your money and fancy titles and connections know enough.”

Vin looked over to see if Piper heard anything that was said, but she showed no reaction to the conversation. “What about McNulty?”

“He’s cleared. He’s been out of town for over a week. Not only that, the guy had no clue that Piper owned the business. Said he just started coming here and he’d never seen Piper.”

Vin wanted to address more with McNulty. About the allegations Piper made, but it wasn’t the time. It was in the past and right now there were other things for him to focus on.

“If you guys did your job I wouldn’t have had to reach out to any of my connections. I’m waiting on a few things.”

“Are you going to share what those things are?”

“Are you going to share with me what you find from the dead mice?”

Detective Myers just snorted. Vin didn’t think so.

An hour later, the detective left with the bagged dead mice. All but the one mouse Vin had hidden away for his own testing. No way he was handing everything over.

“Can we leave now?” Piper asked.

“Yeah. Tomorrow the detective is going to talk to your landlords and get a list of all the tenants. I want to install some security cameras here. So we’re going to the store to get them.”

“What? You can just do that? Buy them and install them yourself?”

“Low-tech ones, yes. Anyone can. I’ll monitor them on my computer. We’ll just put them by the doors for now. No reason to do more than that.”

“Okay,” she said. That she wasn’t fighting him should be saying something.

Once all the cameras were installed and set up, they left and went to get a late lunch. He would have preferred to go back home and do some more research, but what he wanted to do he couldn’t do with her around. He’d be accessing information that he shouldn’t be. Making calls that he didn’t want to explain. Those would all have to wait.

“Do you think we’ll find out who is doing this?” Piper asked.

“Yes,” he said. The question was when and if they could do it before it got worse.

“I just want it over. I can’t believe it’s been going on for so long and I had no clue.”

“You knew. You were just trying to tell yourself it was nothing.”

“I didn’t know,” she argued.

But he didn’t believe her. He knew she was lying to him, or at least to herself. “You’ve felt like someone has been watching you. It’s that internal feeling to be aware.”

“Do you really think it’s gotten worse because you and I are in a relationship?” she asked.

The guilt that question prompted didn’t surprise him. “Yes.”

“And now you’re trying to figure out a way to end things, aren’t you?”

“What?” he asked, shocked she’d ask that. “Why would you think that?”

“Because you’ve felt enough guilt over what happened in the army. And now you’re afraid I’m going to get hurt and it’s going to be your fault.”

“You aren’t going to get hurt. I won’t let that happen.”

“Are you wearing a gun right now?” she asked, tilting her head.

“Does it matter?” he asked.

“Which means yes. Back to my question, are you trying to find a way to end what we just started?”

“No. I’m not happy this is happening. Do I think it had to do with me? Yeah, I do. I even wondered if you were being targeted because of something in my life or my background, but this started before I moved here. The truth is, Piper, whoever this is wouldn’t have stayed in the shadows forever. You would have found someone at some point. Something would have triggered this. I’m glad it was me. I can protect you.”

Her features softened and her eyes filled. “You probably can. If you don’t get on my nerves being in my face all the time.”

He laughed, glad she was trying to find some humor in this situation. “You don’t think it’s one-sided, do you?”

“Oh really?” she asked, kicking him under the table.

“Let’s go home now.”

“Gladly,” she said. “Will you find a way to take my mind off of all of this?”

“You know I will.”