“You look happy, Reed.”
“I am.” Reed had wondered if Hadley would bring Nora into the conversation. He’d met her a couple of years ago, and she was the first woman he’d connected with on a deeper level since Hadley had left town. Given that he had been eighteen years old, that alone told of her influence over his life. “Very happy. Nora is an incredible woman.”
“When is the wedding?”
There was no resentment or regret in Hadley’s tone. As a matter of fact, Reed detected a subtle sense of relief woven into her words. It was as if she had finally given herself permission to relax in his presence, and the atmosphere shifted into a newfound ease.
“Next summer,” Reed replied as he observed her continue her path into a full circle that brought her back to the entryway of the small kitchen. “Nora is a nurse practitioner, so getting time off this year was tight. Hadley, I have to ask…what is it that you’re looking for?”
“A whiteboard. Two, if you have them.” Before he could give her a response, she pointed her thumb toward the upper cabinets. “Was there an explosion of grey paint?”
“Some renovation funds became available this past Spring. I’m slowly choosing my projects to carry me through the winter. First, as I’m sure you noticed, is to replace a few of the boards on the wraparound porch. The last thing I need is for Earl Redding to sue the township if he trips while I’m escorting him inside to sleep off one of his stupors.”
“So the jail cell downstairs is still usable?”
“That jail cell will be here for generations from now,” Reed replied with a short laugh. He then regarded her a little more closely. “Listen, I’m asking you to tread carefully. I get the impression that you think Martin Cox might be involved in Missy’s abduction, but he’s lived here his entire life. He was married to Sarah for…hell, I don’t even know. Making accusations without evidence will only?—”
“Reed?”
He broke off the rest of his lecture when he realized that he’d jumped to conclusions. It was difficult for him to have someone else come in and actively search out mistakes he may or may not have made in a case so personal. Amelia Claymont brought him an apple pie every Christmas, just as she baked him chocolate cupcakes on his birthday.
He had done everything humanly possible to search for Amelia’s granddaughter, but there had simply been no leads. None, and he wouldn’t force the narrative just to ease his own conscious.
“I might not have wanted this assignment. As I’ve already stressed to you, I certainly don’t believe my presence will be greeted with open arms.” Hadley removed her blazer as she closed the distance to her desk. “But I will work this case the way I see fit. I also don’t plan to get in the way of your job. You havean entire town to look after, which means I’ll ask you for help only when needed.”
Reed didn’t like the prospect of her going off alone, interviewing the locals without him by her side. It was a recipe for disaster, but she hadn’t waited around for his reaction. He trailed behind her into the dining room, a space that had long since been transformed into a cluttered storage area.
The once elegant room was now filled with an assortment of items, like metal filing cabinets, gun safes, and office supplies. The sheer variety of objects crowded the room, but he soon recognized what she’d been after.
“I’ll get it,” Reed offered as he stepped past her. “As you can see, anything you need should be in here. While I’ve used software for my reports, I still keep a paper trail.”
“What about the older files? The ones dating back a few decades?”
“Downstairs.”
“This place is…” Hadley let her voice trail off.
“A work in progress,” Reed finished for her. He had finally managed to get the first of two whiteboards out from behind a few storage containers. He rolled it toward her while concentrating on the second one. “Like I said, I’m doing the renovations myself to save the town some money. The upstairs apartment is completely finished, and now I’m working on the main level.”
Hadley steered the first whiteboard, testing its wheels first, out of the dining room. Reed followed suit to find that she had already moved her desk toward the entrance of the kitchen. It didn’t block the doorway, but he would have to be mindful when turning that corner.
“I’ll be right back.”
Reed wasn’t sure what he’d expected when receiving the call from Sergeant Ellis Brosmer. The media had undoubtedly beena problem for the past week, and the mayor had repeatedly contacted both Reed and Turner to find a solution. Only there wasn’t a resolution, as they couldn’t just snap their fingers to produce the guilty party.
Hadley being sent in to oversee what was now considered a cold case certainly hadn’t been a consideration. He’d basically been given a twenty-four-hour notice. And as pleased as he was with how the two of them had handled her return, he found he wasn’t fond of being pushed aside.
Reed returned to the dining room to locate the whiteboard items he had stored in a small plastic container. He took a moment to center himself. Realistically, Hadley would be here until the festival. After she confirmed that he and Turner hadn't overlooked anything in the investigation, she would resume her duties with the Arkansas State Police. As for life in Whistlerun, it would continue as usual.
He reentered the main area right as Hadley returned with a large plastic receptacle herself. She carried it over to the first whiteboard and set it on the floor.
“Should we dive in?” Hadley asked without glancing in his direction.
She leaned down and popped the side clasps. Within seconds, she began pinning pictures to the whiteboard. Reed recognized a few of the faces from older cases, some way before his time. While she methodically worked to lay out what he assumed would be a pattern, he picked up the mugs and retreated into the kitchen. He gave them both a refill, picked up the box of donuts—courtesy of Nora—and returned to find Hadley still aligning photographs.
Without a word, he set her mug on her desk beside the white box of pastries. He retrieved a chocolate-glazed donut before walking to his own desk. He took a seat, noticing that Hadleyhad already opened the small plastic container with several black, blue, and red dry-erase markers.
He drank his coffee and ate his donut while making a few observations himself. She had approached the case with a level of preparation he would never have considered, and he was now uneasy about her attempt to link a series of abductions to a single individual. In a way, she was doing the same thing as the media, just with a different outcome.
