LITMIR.BIZ

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to head toward his vehicle. He looked happy to see Alex—no doubt, anyone who could hit a triple during overtime had the sheriff’s approval—but he didn’t look as happy to see Vince.

      No surprise there.

      Vince and the sheriff were well acquainted thanks to the run-ins with the law of Vince’s uncle, dad and brothers. Okay, Vince hadn’t been completely immune to getting into trouble. He just happened to be the Frenci who learned from his mistakes.

      “Tell the sheriff everything,” Alex ordered.

      “I think the sheriff already knows everything,” Vince said. “Tamara was at the police station this morning. But that doesn’t mean he’s doing everything he can.”

      “What do you think I should be doing, Vince?” Jake asked.

      “More.”

      “You’re right,” Jake said. “There is more I should be doing. Questioning you, for one. You arrived at the scene rather conveniently.”

      “I got off work at five. The church is right on my way home. Plus, you know I work there.”

      “What made you stop this time?” Jake asked.

      “I saw Tamara just standing there, not moving. It wasn’t that hard to tell something was wrong.”

      “Never took you for being a concerned citizen.”

      Jake was cop through and through. His grandfather had been sheriff, then his father and now Jake. Vince’s family helped keep Jake’s family in business. Drew had been in and out of jail his whole life. Vince’s father, pretty much the same until he disappeared. Vince’s brothers, especially his next oldest brother, Mickey, knew the facility well.

      Vince had already been behind bars once. When he was sixteen, he’d been caught stealing a car. His brother Darren had actually stolen the car, but Vince was driving it when the police cruiser had pulled up behind them.

      Jake’s father had been the sheriff back then.

      “Because of Alex, here, I knew some of what Tamara had been going through back in Phoenix. There’s not a chance I’d just drive by if she needed help.”

      “And I’m glad you stopped, but I’m not glad you’re dragging everybody into my business,” Tamara said, walking over to stand next to Vince.

      “Forewarned is forearmed,” Vince started.

      Alex finished for him. “This is our business, too, and—”

      “And I would have informed you about what’s going on once I figured out exactly what is going on,” Tamara remarked.

      “It could be a month before that happens,” Vince said snidely. “Sheriff Ramsey, with all due respect, you need…”

      Tamara put her finger to her lips, and Vince hushed.

      “I can tell you what the sheriff’s doing,” Tamara said. “He’s assigned deputies to drive by my apartment every hour. He’s waiting for a call back from the detective in Phoenix who handled my case. He’s advised me to move in with Lisa and Alex. I’m the one who wanted to hold off for a while. If there’s something that can be done, he’s been doing it.”

      Jake looked at Vince. “For years, you’ve been taking care of the grounds at that old church. I’d think you’d know if something funny was happening around the place.”

      “Nothing funny has happened except for Tamara buying it and nobody, including me, realizing it was for sale.”

      Before Jake could reply, he got a call and took off at a jog toward his car. Vince followed Alex and Tamara back to the bleachers. Lisa tapped her foot impatiently.

      “Well, did you find out anything?” Lisa asked.

      “Just that there’s nothing yet to find out,” Tamara joked.

      It was a feeble attempt, and Vince admired her all the more for making the effort.

      “Spend the night at our place,” Lisa said. “If you don’t, I won’t get a wink of sleep.”

      “The sheriff has a deputy driving by every hour,” Tamara told Lisa. “I’ve got about ten phone calls to make and I’m expecting about ten phone calls back.”

      “Spend the night,” Alex urged. “Tomorrow morning things will look better, and maybe Lisa won’t be so stressed.”

      Tamara glanced at Lisa, and finally at Vince. “Okay, it’s probably a good idea. Not that anything’s happened today. Everything happened yesterday.”

      Alex, Lisa and Amy headed for their van while Vince walked Tamara across the parking lot. His truck was parked behind her car, and it would be easy to make sure she got what she needed from the apartment and then was on her way to Lisa’s place.

      As they walked, he half expected her to give him grief for telling her sister about the warnings, but she was quiet. A bit too quiet.

      “Are you all right?” he said.

      “No, not really. I haven’t been all right since all this started. And I hate that it’s starting again—the not knowing, the people offering to help when they haven’t a clue how.”

      “That would be me.”

      “Yeah, in many ways, that would be you. It’s just as bad watching people who you expect to be there for you pull away.”

      “That would be your ex-fiancé, Terry?”

      She didn’t answer. And, in typically lawyer fashion, her nonanswer was louder than words.

      He didn’t know how to respond. This wasn’t the time for small talk or jokes. When she got to the edge of the sidewalk, she stopped.

      “We can cross the street now,” he said quietly after a moment. “There’s no cars.”

      She didn’t move, and suddenly he remembered her stance yesterday, when she stood on the old church’s sidewalk, unmoving. She looked exactly the same.

      He looked across the street at Lydia’s house. It was too dark to see the door.

      But it wasn’t the door she was looking at. It was her car. The tires facing them were flat. Not just a bit low but full-out, no-longer-round flat.

      “You didn’t have any flat tires when I arrived,” he growled. He took two steps into the street, thought again and turned around to take her by the hand. Together they circled her car.

      All four tires were destroyed.

      “This only proves,” he pointed out, “that you need to be with family, friends, until we sort this out, because somebody’s out to get you.”

      “No,” she said. “Because whoever’s out to get me is willing to get whomever I’m with.”

      All four of Vince’s tires were destroyed, too.

      FOUR

      The next morning, Vince’s brother took care of the tires. After Darren checked out the rest of the car, Tamara packed a suitcase and headed back to Phoenix. She’d been very lucky when she’d arrived in Sherman two weeks ago. She’d signed a lease on her sister’s old apartment, already furnished, and then scouted the town for a place to hang her shingle. She’d lucked into the old church because her landlord was the one selling it. Now she hoped severing her ties in Phoenix would be as easy. She needed to deal with putting her condo on the market, packing up or putting into storage her belongings, which she’d left with middle sister Sheila, and trying to find out just exactly what Massey’s new lawyer was up to.

      It took two weeks for her to change the For Sale condo to a For Rent condo after realizing nothing was selling; two weeks to recognize that the belongings she’d left at her sister’s really belonged at the Goodwill since she didn’t really need anything; and two weeks to realize

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