LITMIR.BIZ

Скачать книгу

list. Fact is, I offered him the job and he turned me down flat. I think he and Beth have had enough excitement to last them several lifetimes. They’re both content to make their way as the humble keepers of the Blackberry Inn. Can’t say as I blame them.” She slowed the car, glanced at Jax with a smile. “Here’s the house that comes with the job.”

      Jax looked, then looked again. “You’re shitting me.”

      “Nope.”

      She’d expected the house, a perk that came along with the job as police chief, to be a functional cracker box at the edge of the village. Instead, Frankie was pulling into the driveway of a flat-roofed, white Victorian that took her breath away. Tall narrow windows were flanked by forest-green shutters, with elaborate scrollwork trim in that same green, as well as mauve. The paint was new. The place looked perfect.

      “Town claimed it for back taxes and other money owed a while back. They did some initial repairs, and kept it in tiptop shape since. Were thinking about selling it, but we had a budget surplus this year. I convinced them to offer it to the new police chief, make up for the pay being lower than you could make elsewhere. Told ’em we’d have to do something special to get someone good enough to fill my shoes.”

      “Must be some damn big shoes,” Jax muttered. “What are you, a twelve extra-wide?”

      “Ahh, it’s not so much. Used to be twice this size,” Frankie said. “But an entire wing had to be torn down. Wait till you see inside.” She shut the motor off and got out, making footprints in the snow. She tugged her furry collar up to her ears and trudged forward, taking a set of keys from her black, leatherlike cop-jacket’s pocket.

      Jax got out, too, waiting for her parents to join her before hurrying toward the front door. She was nearly there when a large black-and-brown dog lunged out from underneath the front porch, barked twice with its pointy ears laid back, then turned and ran away. It vanished into the woods across the street. Jax just stood there, staring after it and swearing under her breath.

      “That was a police dog, wasn’t it?” Mariah asked. “I think it’s a sign!”

      Jax pursed her lips and refrained from correcting her mother. She’d always referred to German shepherds as “police dogs” and always would. “That was one sad-looking case,” Jax said. “Seemed as if it’s been living on tree bark and swamp water.”

      “Oh, don’t worry about that dog.” Frankie shook her head so that her tight silver curls bounced. “He’s a menace. We’ve been trying to collar him for a year without any luck. He’s cagey enough to get by on his own.”

      Jax tipped her head to one side. “That’s odd, isn’t it?”

      “How so?” Frankie asked.

      Jax shrugged. “He’s no mongrel, looked like a purebred. He must have belonged to someone once.”

      “I didn’t know you were a dog lover, Jax,” Frankie said.

      “I could care less about dogs.” It was a lie and she knew it, but she didn’t want to go blowing her anti-girlie image by painting herself as a bleeding-heart puppy cuddler. “You have a father who’s a vet, you pick up a few things, that’s all.”

      “Well, that mutt may be a purebred, but I can tell you he’s one hundred percent pure pain in my backside now. Don’t worry, Jax, we won’t let him pester you. Come on, come see the house.”

      Jax nodded and followed Chief Frankie inside, trying unsuccessfully to put the dog out of her mind. It wasn’t easy. His brown eyes had met hers for just a moment, and managed to beam right past her hard-shell exterior to the soft, mushy parts she didn’t let anyone see.

      She didn’t like those parts, kept them concealed and confined. Mostly because she lived and worked in a man’s world and she’d learned to act the part. But she knew, too, it was partly because her sister had been soft. She’d been friendly, open and utterly trusting. Jax had learned at sixteen where those soft parts could get you. In her line of work, and in life in general, a woman just couldn’t afford to indulge them.

      Still, the whole time Frankie showed her around the house, which was just as gorgeous on the inside, she kept thinking about the dog. And before the tour was finished, she’d decided to pick up a bag of dog food and leave some out for him. Of course, she wouldn’t tell anyone. But she’d always had a soft spot for strays.

      “Now, the fireplace has been checked over thoroughly. It’s ready to use, but there’s also a new furnace in the basement that heats the place just fine,” Frankie said.

      Jax nodded, and couldn’t help imagining the redbrick fireplace aglow with a big fire, even as she walked around the living room. When she got to the far wall, she hugged her arms. “Chilly on this side of the room.” When she spoke she could see her breath. “Whoa, real chilly.”

      “Must be the side the wind’s blowing on,” Mariah said, smiling. Her mother, Jax realized, wasn’t going to find any fault with the house that might become her daughter’s new home. No matter what.

      “It’s always chilly on the east side of the house. I suspect it could use another layer of insulation,” Frankie said. “Upstairs there are three bedrooms and a bathroom. One bathroom down here, as well.”

      “More than one cop needs,” Jax said.

      “Sure wouldn’t be as cramped as your apartment in Syracuse, would it, Cassie?” Mariah asked.

      It wasn’t really a question.

      “Come on, let me show you the kitchen,” Frankie said.

      As they trooped through the place, Jax looked back to see her father standing on the far side of the living room, studying the clouds of steam his breath made, a frown etched on his brow.

      “Dad?”

      He glanced her way, softened his face so the frown vanished.

      “You okay?” Jax asked.

      He nodded and joined her in the dining room. Mariah and Frankie were already in the kitchen, chattering. Benjamin slipped an arm around his daughter’s shoulders. “The place seems lonely,” he said. “Almost…sad. I think it needs you.”

      “Yeah?”

      “And it would make your mother awfully happy.”

      “I know, Dad. I’m considering it, I really am.”

      “That’s all we can ask.”

      She could have told him she was thinking this whole thing a little too good to be true, and trying to figure out a way to find the catch in the entire offer without hurting Frankie’s feelings. Hell, they were just going to hand her a house? Something had to be off. If there wasn’t, she’d be an idiot not to take the job. Still, as she took the grand tour, liking the place more with every room she saw, she knew there had to be a downside.

      Later, as they drove away from the house, Jax noticed a shape peering out from beneath the snow right beside the place. “Is that a foundation?” she asked.

      Frankie glanced where she was looking and nodded. “That was the wing that had to be torn down. It was never part of the original structure, anyway. It was added on in the seventies—seventy-five, I think. Two-car garage and a game room on the ground floor, extra bedrooms up above.”

      “So what happened to it? Why’d it have to go? Shoddy construction work?”

      Frankie shook her head. “There was a fire couple of years back. Sad story, really. A woman was killed.” She narrowed her eyes on Jax’s face. “That’s not gonna spook you now, is it?”

      “I don’t believe in ghosts, if that’s what you mean.” Right, so what was that little shiver up her spine just now? she wondered. And deep down in her brain an irritating voice said, “Hey, kid, maybe you just found your downside.”

      Frankie brightened. “Good. Because I’d like you

Скачать книгу