“Okay,” Scott said, waiting until she had completed the task. “What do you and June need to talk about?”
“She’s been dating Clay and for some reason lying to me about it.”
His mind ticked through the new information. “You don’t think she would’ve gotten angry enough to kill him?”
“No,” Millie scoffed. “She doesn’t have a violent bone in her body, but I’m bothered she didn’t trust me enough to tell me the truth. Maybe I haven’t been as good a friend to her as I needed to be.”
Scott doubted that very much. He concentrated on keeping his vehicle on the road when all he wanted to do was punch his hand through a wall.
They soon reached Millie’s home, where the light poured from every window on the main floor.
Wolfe met them, striding out of the house with Brigid on his heels. “Hey, JT and the twins already started searching the forest,” Wolfe said, all business now. “I’m headed in the other direction.”
Millie could feel his pain. “Scott and I’ll search across the river just in case Kat headed that way. There’s a walking bridge a mile up as well as several shallow places he could have crossed on rocks.”
“I usually don’t worry about him,” Wolfe said. “He’s free to do what he wants, but...” An owl hooted loudly in the distance and Wolfe’s shoulders went back. “There are predators out there the cat doesn’t know.”
“It’s okay.” Millie quickly went in for a hug.
Scott’s heart thumped hard. She was a sweetheart and they had more important problems right now than a cat, but apparently the feline was part of the team. When somebody on the team found trouble, they all focused on rescue scenarios immediately.
He returned to his vehicle and dug in the glove box for a flashlight. “All right,” he said. “Millie, you’re with me.”
* * * *
After failing to find the cat, the somber group finished a late brunch, with Brigid typing away on her computer in the living room. Wolfe and the twins immediately headed back out to search for Kat while Millie and Scott cleaned up. Her great-aunt had gone back to bed, upset about the chief being shot. She said she just needed a little rest.
“Hey, I found something,” Brigid called from the other room.
Millie wiped her hands on a dishcloth and hurried into the other room. “What’s up?”
Scott stood in the kitchen and leaned against the wall, looking tall, dangerous, and somehow sleepy. It was an intriguing look on him.
Brigid looked over her shoulder. “I couldn’t sleep last night, so I used my laptop in my room. I wish I had heard you guys leave.”
How sweet. “There wasn’t much you could have done at the fire. We just provided some man power,” Millie said.
“Understandable,” Brigid said. “I worked on Werner Dearth’s financials all night.”
“Did you find something?” Millie asked, her breath catching.
Brigid tapped on her screen. “Kind of. He withdrew five thousand dollars a week ago.”
“Five?” Scott asked. “Henry Halcomb had double that amount. We need to trace a ten thousand dollar payment.”
“Yeah, but Dearth has withdrawn a lot of money the past two years in various amounts, ranging from five hundred dollars to a thousand. It’s probably walking-around money, but he could have saved up and come up with that ten grand pretty easily, based on these withdrawals.”
Millie wiped her hands on her jeans that were still wet from doing the dishes. Those darn dish towels didn’t work. She should invent a towel that truly dried everything. “Rubber bands secured the stacks of money we saw at Nancy’s house. It’s not like they were official from a bank or anything,” she said. Not great evidence, unfortunately.
Scott nodded. “I’ll tell you what, I don’t think they need more people looking for Kat right now. Why don’t you and I drive over to Richmond and see if Glen Baker will speak with us before heading into DC? I think it’s time we had another discussion with Werner Dearth to tie him to that hit squad.”
“You think he’ll talk to us?” Millie asked.
“Yeah, I think he’s arrogant enough to speak with us,” Scott said. “I’ll go in casual instead of looking like a lawyer, so maybe he’ll feel superior.”
As a plan it wasn’t fantastic, but at the moment it was the best they had. “I’ll run up and shower and change into something more appropriate,” Millie said.
Brigid coughed. “Hey. I’m still looking through CCTV from Dearth’s buildings, and a lot of people go in and out. I’m nowhere near the day of the murder.”
