Wild Goose Chase

Read Wild Goose Chase for Free Online

Book: Read Wild Goose Chase for Free Online
Authors: Terri Thayer
Tags: Fiction, Mystery, midnight ink
up.”
    For the first time, I looked down at my clothes and saw I had blood on my khakis.
    “I didn’t realize. I helped Myra stand up …” My voice faded.
    Detective Sanchez waited as I took my car keys off a hook on my belt. I described my car. I couldn’t get out of these clothes fast enough. A policewoman came in the room and handed me my bag, escorting me to a restroom and waiting as I undressed hurriedly in a cubicle with the door open. I didn’t look at the policewoman as I gave her my clothes.
    The T-shirt in my bag was a wrinkled ball, but an unworn jogging suit, along with clean socks and sneakers, lay alongside.
    Once changed into my running clothes, I was left alone in the conference room. I walked the length of the room, trying to assess what was happening. What were the police doing?
    Where was Myra? Surely if the police had wanted my clothes, hers would be taken. What would she change into? They would have questions for her, too. She must be going through hell, finding her boss dead. I couldn’t imagine how horrible that would be.
    My jumbled thoughts returned to what Sergeant Sanchez had said—that he was from Homicide. Why Homicide? Claire had obviously hurt herself and bled to death.
    I glanced at the clock on the wall. It was nearly three o’clock. I’d been alone in this room for nearly an hour. Enough. I would find that policeman, answer his questions, and get out of here.
    I strode to the door, pulling it open. Sergeant Sanchez was about to enter, followed by a younger man, also dressed in a suit and tie. The new guy was tall, and bulky without being fat. His shoulders were wide and I knew he’d played soccer in high school. I stared at him. The cognitive dissonance of seeing a familiar face in this room was muddling my brain.
    Sanchez moved past me across the room, straightening the wooden chairs, positioning them closer to the conference table.
    “Dewey?” the young detective said quietly. “What are you doing here?”
    That voice. The voice that was my lullaby. “Buster.”
    It was Buster, Benjamin Healy, Kevin’s best friend since second grade. I’d talked him into eating a tadpole when he was seven and I was nine. He’d beaten me at ping-pong one hundred and sixty-eight times one long summer. I’d towered over him until he hit a growth spurt when he was fourteen. My fifth child, my mother had called him, like the mythical fifth Beatle.
    This was Kevin’s best man.
    This was the fourth pallbearer who had helped my brothers carry Mom’s casket.
    This was the guy who had been leaving messages on my answering machine since November, looking for a date.

“Buster.” I saw by his sharp look that no one called him that anymore. He glanced over at Sanchez, but the thin sergeant was distracted, talking into his cell. Buster put his hands in his pants pocket, spreading apart his suit jacket, exposing the gold badge clipped on to his narrow brown leather belt. Detective Benjamin Healy, he seemed to be saying, that’s who I am now.
    “Sit down, Dewey.”
    Buster moved further into the room, steering me with a gentle touch toward the conference table chairs. Gone was the baby-faced kid. I could see the beginnings of wrinkles around his mouth and eyes. I wondered if they were squint lines or frown lines—wrinkles from the sun or the work he did.
    “Homicide, Buster?”
    “Just assigned, Dewey. Six weeks ago.”
    “Congratulations, but that’s not what I meant. Why are homicide detectives here? Claire had an accident.”
    “Routine,” Buster assured me. “Unattended death in a hotel room. Dispatch sends a team out.”
    Even though I’d seen Buster off and on over the years at family functions, right now I could conjure up only two images of him as an adult. One was from Kevin and Kym’s wedding, two years ago. Dodging the affections of an usher feeling entitled to a post-reception grope, I’d bumped into Buster, his arm slung around my brother’s neck, his grin mirroring

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