LITMIR.BIZ

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guess. We all liked Mrs. Thompson but she shouldn’t have come on to Devon. We were just kids.”

      Kala heard a whine in his voice that kids used when feeling hard done by. He wasn’t that far from being a child even though he looked like a grown-up young man.

      “Was Devon worried about anything? Anybody bothering him?” Gundersund asked.

      Charlie’s glasses reflected the light and Kala didn’t see his eyes before his head dropped. “Not that he told me.” He wiped the back of his hand across his nose. “I still can’t believe he’s dead. Seems like he’ll walk through that door any minute. We were best friends since grade five.” He dropped his head further and covered his eyes with one hand.

      “I think that’s enough for now.” A flurry of activity and Roslyn was on her feet, looking down at them on the couch. She put her hands on her hips. “Charlie needs time to grieve.”

      Gundersund took a long look at Charlie. “If you remember anything that could help us, Charlie, no matter how trivial it might seem, call us and we’ll follow up. Officer Stonechild and I will leave our contact information with your mom.”

      Charlie nodded but he didn’t make any move to get out of the chair. Kala followed Gundersund and his mom out of the living room. She stopped in the doorway and glanced back over her shoulder. Charlie was lying with his head against the headrest reading something on his cellphone.

      She reached Gundersund in time to hear him say, “You have another daughter.”

      Roslyn was pulling the front door open. “Tiffany. That’s her coming up the walk.”

      Tiffany’s wavy brown hair was now down to her shoulders but the scowl from the photograph was still on her face.

      “How old is she?” Kala asked.

      Roslyn turned to look at her. “Fifteen going on thirty. She started grade ten but doesn’t like school much. Hard to believe my three kids all have the same genes, they’re that different.”

      Kala smiled. “I’ve heard so many parents say the same thing. Where do you work, Mrs. Hanson?”

      “I’m a cashier at the Loblaws behind Princess. Doesn’t pay much but luckily Ashley got scholarships for nursing school and works part-time. The universities are fighting over Charlie. The one coming up the walk is my biggest trial.”

      “Well, sounds like you’re doing a great job.”

      Mrs. Hanson smiled at Kala for the first time. “It hasn’t been easy.” She caught Tiffany by the shoulders as she was trying to skirt by them. “Tiffany, this is Officer Stonechild and Officer Gundersund. They’re here about Devon. Did you see him on Monday?”

      “Why would I see him on Monday? He was Charlie’s friend, not mine. Ask Charlie.”

      Kala moved to cut Tiffany’s escape into the house. “Did you or did you not see Devon on Monday?”

      Tiffany stared at her with defiant eyes, a peculiar grey-green shade that reminded Kala of lichen. Her gaze was laser straight and unnerving.

      Roslyn stepped in. “Don’t be cheeky, and answer the officer.”

      “No,” Tiffany mumbled, her mouth holding the “oh” sound long enough to be rude. She turned her head to look at her mother. “I didn’t see him on Monday. Can I go now?”

      “Mind you do your homework before supper. I don’t want another note home from your teacher.”

      “I just have some math questions. What’s for supper? Not that rotten hamburger casserole again.”

      “Hot dogs, just so you’ll stop complaining.”

      Tiffany scrunched up her face and stuck out her tongue before slipping past her mother and up the stairs.

      Roslyn shook her head. “God keep me from striking that child. Ever since Wally passed … I don’t know how to handle her most days. I keep waiting for her to outgrow this phase.”

      “Thanks for your time, Mrs. Hanson,” Gundersund said as he walked down the steps, leaving Kala to offer words of encouragement and their business card. Kala followed her partner into her truck.

      “That family depresses the hell out of me,” he said. “Makes me never want to have kids. I’ll check in with Rouleau, and hopefully, we can call it a day.”

      Kala sat with her hands on the wheel, staring straight ahead. Did she want kids? Did she want Dawn back?

      Gundersund looked across at her and hit his hand against his forehead. “How insensitive of me. I’m sorry, Stonechild.”

      “It’s okay. Those kids depress me too.”

      “I should clarify that I’d gladly be a dad if I could guarantee that all my kids would turn out as great as Dawn.”

      She started the truck and glanced at him as she turned to make a shoulder check. “But there are no guarantees. There isn’t even a guarantee that Dawn will turn out okay with all she’s had to deal with. That’s my biggest fear in all this, that she turns into another kid like Tiffany in there with nothing but anger to get her through the night.”

      CHAPTER NINE

      Kala dropped Gundersund off at the car lot just after six and was home by six thirty. Not quite a twelve-hour day. They’d gotten off lucky.

      As they were leaving the Hansons’, she’d received a message from Rouleau to be at the station for a seven o’clock meeting the next morning, so another long day ahead on Thursday. She knew Forensics was also working late hours going through the physical evidence, including Devon’s cellphone and computer and all the notebooks they’d taken from his locker. When she called earlier, they had nothing to report. Three days after the murder and they had no motive and no suspects, aside from the obvious one. Jane Thompson could have sought revenge, or maybe Devon had rebuffed her attempts to start up again. Love and obsession could warp a person. Kala had seen the carnage wreaked by more than one rejected lover. In every case, temporary madness had consumed their being like a poison in the blood.

      She pulled into her driveway, stepped outside her truck, and inspected the property. Creeping darkness had cast long shadows across the lawn. The air had a crispness to it in the mornings and early evenings that hadn’t been present a week earlier. She’d think about taking Taiku for a week in Algonquin Park if this case ended quickly. Put the canoe in the water and paddle to a wilderness campsite. The leaves would have turned and the colours would be at their peak. Time away might help cure the fatigue that had overtaken her waking hours.

      She walked around the side of the house to the back deck. Taiku would have heard her arrival and be at the back door, waiting to be let outside. Her phone buzzed in her pocket as she reached the steps. She didn’t recognize the number but clicked on RECEIVE as she climbed.

      “Kala Stonechild?” the caller asked.

      A woman. Kala tried to place her voice but couldn’t. “How can I help you?” She opened the back door but Taiku wasn’t waiting in his usual spot. Strange.

      “I’m Dawn’s new child care worker, Caroline Russell. I’ve had a call from her foster family that she’s been skipping school. I understand you’re the closest she has to a relative with her parents in prison. I’ve been going over her file and would like to meet with you, if you have the time in the next week or so.”

      Had the universe been reading her mind? Kala took a second to get her head around the implications. “What happened to her other social worker? Tamara Jones?”

      “Tamara’s taken a leave of absence. The court has put Dawn in my charge.”

      Another one bites the dust. Tamara had been young and unbending — thought she knew it all because she graduated from a university course. Self-preservation told Kala not to get involved. The system had the power to destroy her hope. She hesitated but the

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