Chapter Four
The police station was busy today. Murder had a way of stirring things up. Men and women in dark blue uniforms strode in and out with purpose. Tom Briscoe was waiting when Beau walked in with Cassidy Jones. Opening the swinging half door attached to the counter, Tom motioned for them to follow him down the hall.
“You can change in the ladies’ room,” Tom said to Cassidy.
“Thank you.” She pushed open the door and disappeared inside, came out a few minutes later in clean jeans and a yellow sweater, her bloody clothes in the bag she had brought with her. Briscoe didn’t take them as evidence, since it was clear whose blood was on the clothes. Instead, he ushered the woman into an interview room, leaving Beau to cool his heels out in the hall.
Cassidy was a private investigator—he still found it hard to believe. Then again, maybe his dad was just working a con that backfired on him, hiring a woman he wanted to seduce, figuring he could get a little work out of her while he was at it.
It wouldn’t have been the first time.
Beau couldn’t help wondering if Cassidy had been attracted to his dad. She was somewhere near thirty, which meant the senator was almost twice her age. With her classic features, heavy dark curls, and those big green eyes, she was a beautiful woman. His dad had always liked a woman with substantial cleavage, and it was clear Cassidy Jones had more than her share.
But she obviously had brains, too, and that was a big negative to a man who needed to believe he was the smartest guy in the room.
Beau wondered what she was in there telling Tom Briscoe. So far she had done her best not to convict him with her words. Why, he had no idea, but he hoped that didn’t change. He was a well-known figure in the community, well liked by most. He gave to a number of local charities and had always been supportive of police.
He figured those things would help. He didn’t think the cops would rush to judgment, which would give him some time. Exactly what he would need if he was going to find the man who had murdered his dad.
The image of his father’s ashen face and blood-covered body appeared in his head. What did you do, Dad?
Who had his father cheated? Who had he pissed off enough to get himself killed?
It was going to take time to dig through the maze that was Stewart Reese’s life. Beau thought of Cassidy and what she might be telling the police. Finding his father’s killer could be even more important now. It might be necessary to prove him innocent of murder.
* * *
Beau decided not to call an attorney—at least not yet. Instead, after Cassidy Jones had finished her interview and left the station, Beau had given a clear and concise statement of events leading up to and including the discovery of his father’s body. Exactly the same story he had told before. The only thing he’d glossed over was why he had come to Pleasant Hill in the first place.
On the phone yesterday, Josie had told him that Missy didn’t want anyone else knowing the name of her baby’s father. She was ashamed of having been duped by a man old enough to be her grandfather.
If the girl wanted to keep the name secret, Beau sure as hell wasn’t going to tell anyone. Not unless he had no other choice.
As he walked out of the interview room, relieved to be finished, he glanced up at the sound of high heels clicking on the linoleum and saw his former stepmother walking toward him down the hall. Two years after his mother died, Stewart Reese had remarried a forty-five-year-old woman from Dallas named Charlotte Mercer. They had divorced last year.
Though she was as elegantly dressed as always, Charlotte’s dove-gray designer pantsuit looked slightly rumpled. Her mouth was tight, her blond hair not quite as perfectly groomed as it usually was. She looked . . . shell-shocked was the word that came to mind.
“Oh, Beau, I’m so glad you’re here.” Charlotte’s eyes welled as she approached. “The police called. They wanted to let me know what had happened before I heard it on the news. They said they had some questions. I told them I would be happy to help in any way I could. I told them I would drive down right away.”
Beau closed the distance, leaned in to kiss her cheek. “I’m sorry, Charlotte.”
She took a shuddering breath, but didn’t hug him. She wasn’t the hugging type. It was strange how much she reminded him of his mother.
“You know we still cared about each other,” she said, pressing a linen handkerchief beneath her nose.
He nodded, though he had no idea one way or the other. Maybe they actually had.
“It’s hard to imagine him dead,” Charlotte said. “Stew was a lot of things, some of which I despised, but he was a man who knew how to live.”
“I’m going to find out who did it,” Beau said. “You don’t have to worry about that.”
Her head jerked up. Hazel eyes zeroed in on his face. “What are you talking about? You have to let the police handle this. I want this over as quickly as possible. In the three years we were together, your father caused me enough grief to last a lifetime. I don’t need any more scandal.”
“He was murdered, Charlotte. That isn’t going to change. I’m going to find the man who did it. I won’t rest until I do.”
Her lips thinned. “You listen to me, Beau Reese. Your father is gone. There’s nothing either of us can do to bring him back. It’s best for all of us if this whole thing disappears as quickly as possible.”
“You’ll only be marginally involved, Charlotte. Your marriage has been over for more than a year.”
“I know how this works. Your father was an important man. Reporters will show up at my door. They’ll be trying to dig up dirt on Stewart, and that will rub off on me.”
She wasn’t wrong there. Their divorce had been messy, to say the least. Infidelity was always a juicy subject for the tabloids. In this case, the tables had been turned on his dad. The senator had come home to find his wife in bed with a much younger man.
“I’ll be attending the funeral, of course,” Charlotte was saying. “But after that, I’m going to disappear for a while. Betsy Durant has invited me to stay with her for as long as I want.” Betsy Durant was a mega-wealthy patron of the arts, a Dallas socialite who owned a house as big as a palace in the exclusive Highland Park district.
“Betsy knows how trying all of this is going to be for me,” Charlotte said. “She insists I stay with her at least for the next few weeks, perhaps longer.”
Relief filtered through him. Charlotte would be busy in Dallas while Beau planned to stay in Pleasant Hill. He’d get a room at the Holiday Inn for the night and hope the crime scene was released sometime tomorrow. As soon as that happened, he would move into the house.
He needed access to his father’s study, to his private personal files. He knew where they were, had walked in on his father once when he was a kid, while his dad had had his special hiding place open. Beau had gotten a good talking-to for coming in without knocking, and neither of them had ever mentioned it again.
He’d decide whether to turn the information over to the police after he had looked at it. He needed to find out who benefited from Stewart Reese’s death. He needed to know the names of his father’s associates—and enemies.
Which one of them had hated the senator enough to kill him? Or hire someone to do it?
He thought of the pretty lady investigator and hoped to hell she didn’t cause him too much trouble.
“What about the funeral service?” Charlotte asked, regaining his attention.
It had to be done, but he wasn’t ready to think about it. “I’ll take care of it.”
She took a step closer, rested her hand on his arm. “I could take care of it for you, Beau. Get things lined up and then get your approval. I know how difficult this must be.”
It seemed like a cop-out, letting someone else make the arrangements for the last major event in his father’s life. On the other hand, finding his killer was far more important than handling inconsequential details.
“I could make sure it’s done in a tasteful style, something befitting a senator.” Of course she would think of that. “I could call his former assistant in the senate,” she said, “get a list of all the people who need to be invited.”
He nodded. “All right. When you have everything tentatively set up, let me know and we’ll go over it together.”
“Of course,” Charlotte said.
Beau looked up to see the door open and Tom Briscoe walk into the hall. Tom spotted Charlotte and headed in her direction.
“Mrs. Reese. I’m Detective Briscoe. I’m terribly sorry for your loss.”
She dabbed her handkerchief against her eyes. “Thank you, Detective. You know, even after our divorce, the senator and I remained close.”
“I appreciate your coming so quickly. The sooner we can find out what happened, the sooner we can get justice for Senator Reese.” Tom glanced at Beau over Charlotte’s head. “You can go now, Beau. I have your cell number. But don’t leave town just yet.”
“I’ll be staying out at my dad’s,” Beau said. He’d be busy. Along with finding a killer, he had a company to run.
He still hadn’t called Linc. His business partner would take care of things back at the office, he knew. He was a man you could count on. Truth was, Beau hadn’t called Linc because his best friend was the one person in the world who would hear the pain in his voice.
Beau headed out to his car, a million questions circling around in his head. For an instant he considered hiring the lady detective. She knew how to go about finding answers. Digging was what she did for a living. Then he thought of her pretty face, heavy dark curls, and sexy curves, and knew he couldn’t afford the distraction.
Better he figure things out on his own.
* * *
Darkness hung over the flat East Texas landscape by the time Cassidy returned to the guest house that evening. Dampness seeped through her clothes and a chill wind sent gooseflesh over her skin. Clouds crept past, obscuring the stars. The front door of the main house was still blocked off with yellow crime-scene tape but when she went around to the guest house, the police officer was gone and no tape blocked the door.
A few things had been moved around inside, drawers had been opened and closed, but she had only been there a few days and she hadn’t brought much with her from Dallas.
The police would have been looking for anything out of the ordinary, anything that might indicate she was connected in some way to the murder. She was a licensed PI, hired by the victim, a minor suspect with no apparent motive. But she had been at the crime scene and the police would be looking at every possibility.
She walked over and turned on the TV, found a news channel. The murder of a former Texas state senator dominated the news broadcasts. A reporter relayed the story, adding that Stewart Reese’s son had found his dying father; no suspects were yet in custody. There was a number to call at the bottom of the screen if anyone had information.
In the final portion of the broadcast, Beau walked out of the police station, head down, jaw set as he strode across the parking lot. Several reporters shoved microphones into his face, but he just kept walking, sliding gracefully into his low-slung sports car, leaving the media in his dust as they ran after him down the road.
She wondered if the police had insisted he stay in Pleasant Hill or if he would be returning to Dallas. He was head of marketing for Texas American Enterprises. Beau was a very busy man.
But the police would have more questions. Cassidy certainly did. She wanted to know exactly what he and his father had been fighting about the day before, wanted to know if the argument could have continued, could have led to a violent murder.
Wishing she could get into the main house, see if she could find the files she had a strong feeling were there, she sat down at her computer, which fortunately the police hadn’t taken, and went to work.
The senator had given her three names to look into. George Larson was his partner in Green Gables Realty, a chain of real estate offices that stretched east from Dallas to Texarkana and south as far as Tyler. Three months ago, the senator had insisted on selling the company, and apparently Larson wasn’t happy about it.
The second name on the list, Jess Milford, was the recently terminated foreman of Alamo, Stewart Reese’s construction and real estate development company, a man who had worked there for nearly twenty years. He might be carrying a grudge, the senator had said.
Last, Reese’s ex-wife, Charlotte Mercer Reese. According to the senator, Charlotte had never recovered from their divorce. She was fixated on Stewart and wanted them to get back together.
Cassidy had mentioned the senator’s suspicions to Beau but hadn’t given him her name or the others’. He’d been overwhelmed by his father’s death, but sooner or later he’d want to know. She hoped he hadn’t said anything to Briscoe. She wanted to do some preliminary research first, which would be a whole lot harder once the police got involved.
Then again, maybe the cops would get lucky and find the killer right away. The police force in a town of fifteen thousand was small, but Police Chief Eric Warren had a good reputation and Briscoe seemed capable.
A little before midnight, she pushed away from the computer. Her neck hurt and her eyes felt gritty, but she had the basics on all three people. She’d need more to figure out if any of them could be suspects.
Tomorrow she would head into town, have lunch somewhere the locals ate, and do a little shopping. In a small town, shopkeepers and restaurant owners knew pretty much everything about everyone. As long as it looked like you were going to spend money, they were happy to talk. You never knew what sort of useful information might surface.
She would see what she could find out about the murder, about the senator, and the three people on her suspect list. Well, four if she counted Beau Reese.
Thinking of him, Cassidy walked over to the window and looked out at the main house. A feeling of unease filtered through her. Beau and his father didn’t get along, but that didn’t mean there wasn’t a chance Beau knew where his father kept his personal records. If he did, he might go after them. There could even be something in those records he wouldn’t want the police to know.
No lights burned in the big house. The crime scene hadn’t been officially released, but the last two patrol cars had driven off several hours ago.
Knowing she shouldn’t, unable to convince herself, she turned and walked into the bedroom. After a quick change out of her yellow sweater into a long-sleeved black T-shirt, she dragged her hair into a ponytail and stuck it through the hole in a black, Maximum Security baseball cap. Her gear bag held a set of lock picks. She took the box out and stuck it into the pocket of her jeans, took out a small Maglite flashlight, and headed for the door.
It was dark out, just a sliver of moon. Dim rays threw shadowy light over the flat landscape populated with thick stands of oaks and dense leafy foliage along the creek beds. Dressed as she was, she wouldn’t be easy to spot.
Making her way from the guest house across the manicured yard, across the terrace to the back door, she used the lock picks, heard the click of the lock falling into place, turned the knob, and slipped into the laundry room.
The senator had given her the security code. She hurried to turn off the alarm. Odds were there was a wall safe hidden somewhere in the study, a problem since she wasn’t a safe cracker, but the combination might be hidden in his desk. Or maybe there would be a hidey-hole inside a piece of furniture. Finding it was a long shot, but she worked with a pro, the owner of the agency, Chase Garrett, so she knew where to look.
She wasn’t about to interfere in an ongoing police investigation by accidentally destroying evidence that might help solve the case. But there was a chance the senator kept his files somewhere else. The master bedroom would be her second choice.
Cassidy turned on her flashlight and followed the glowing yellow circle down the hall.