“How about your fingers?”
“I’ve had blisters before.” She’d done yard work for a couple of summers until she was old enough to get a real job. Then she’d worked as a dishwasher for a while during high school. In her effort to get the work done as quickly and efficiently as possible, she’d used the hottest water she could stand and had grabbed knives from the bottom of the sink by the blade a time or two, as well.
No one would have asked Lucy to be a hand model, even before her trek into craziness the night before.
“Emma called,” she said before he could ask another question. She didn’t consider herself a good topic of conversation at the moment. She told him about Frank Whittier’s expected presence at the wedding they’d both be attending that next weekend.
“A gift to us,” Ramsey said, echoing her first reaction to the news.
“I just want to make sure that nothing mars Emma’s wedding day. If we hear anything or notice anything or even know anything, we don’t move until after Emma’s wedding and reception are complete.”
Her adamancy sat kind of odd on her shoulders. She’d only ever protected the job, or Sandy, in such a way.
She wasn’t herself.
And she didn’t like that.
“I completely agree,” Ramsey said easily. “Claire Sanderson has been gone for twenty-five years. Frank Whittier has been a suspect almost all of that time. There’s nothing that can’t wait another twelve hours to move on, no matter what it is. However, it does mean that I’m going to be working during the wedding and reception.”
“Me, too. How could we not?”
“Technically it’s not your case.”
“I’m not being paid to solve it, that’s true. But then, neither are you. It just happens to be in your jurisdiction so you’re official.” She was half teasing. And completely serious, too. Finding Claire Sanderson was as important to her as it was to Ramsey.
And having Frank Whittier in their immediate vicinity for several hours was a godsend. One that she couldn’t let pass if she wanted to.
“I walked the storm sewer this afternoon,” Ramsey said, and a shard of fear went through her when she realized that she’d forgotten that he had a sewer to check out that day. One that could lead them to Claire.
“And?”
“I think I know how they might have gotten Claire out of the area.” He told her about the east end of the tunnel. About a park he’d discovered at the opening.
“Do you know if the park was there twenty-five years ago?”
“No, I don’t, but I suspect it was. The trees are mature. And the houses surrounding it look to be as old, or older, than the ones in Claire’s neighborhood. Just better kept. I’m going to check on the park as soon as I’m back at the office. I’m also planning to hire a forensic team, out of my own pocket if the department won’t spring for it, to go over that tunnel inch by inch.”
A detective didn’t make enough money to spend his own funds on an investigation. She’d never heard of such a thing.
“If you do have to pay for it, let me know and I’ll help fund the effort,” she said. She had savings. And no better way she wanted to spend it.
“I’ll know tomorrow when I present my request to the captain.”
“Tomorrow’s the day Wakerby meets with his lawyer, too.”
Another barge inched slowly up the river. She wondered where it was going. Where it had come from. And if the man who was captain of the boat, out on the water on a Sunday afternoon, had family.
“How are you doing with that?” Ramsey’s question was softly spoken. Personal.
“Honestly, I’m not sure.”
“Elaborate.”
“I wish I could.” She didn’t want to speak—and knew she had to. Her behavior the night before had thrown her completely off-kilter. And if she talked to anyone local, she could end up with a problem she didn’t want to have.
She could end up in counseling and off the detective squad.
This wasn’t about her professional life.