“I didn’t realize you had so much room back here,” Joey says.
“The lot goes back into the woods, all the way to the creek.”
“Fenced all around?”
“Yes. There’s barbed wire down by the creek. We converted the shed so I’d have a place to work when school was out.” At Joey’s glance toward the Bender house, which easily runs four thousand square feet, he stammers, “I need quiet and privacy. It’s…contractual.”
“I’ll take a look around,” Will says, taking off to the right. He disappears, and moments later, there’s a frantic susurrus as the host of sparrows who live behind the cottage take flight, zooming into the air.
Joey follows Bender into the very misnamed “shed”—the small cedar-and-stone cottage has tons of light, space, and natural wood. The desk is live-edge wood and built into the wall, the bookshelves are stuffed, and the Aeron chair is original Miller.
“Olivia designed it for me,” he says, ducking his head in humility at her raised brow. “She’s an amazing designer. You could give her a cardboard box and five bucks, and she’d make it look like Buckingham Palace. This was a falling-down donkey barn when we bought the place.”
Joey takes in the disturbance—the glass shards, the open safe, the pens and papers covered in coffee.
“What did they get?”
“Money. Paperwork. Passport and birth certificate.” A pause. “A gun.”
“Registered?” she asks.
“Yes.”
“Concealed permit?”
“No. Just a regular home protection piece.”
She shrugs. No big deal, dude. Don’t be so fidgety. “Good. If it shows up in a pawn shop or on the streets, we’ll be able to track it down.”
“Do you think this is a coincidence?” Bender sounds worried.
“Do you?”
He flushes and chews a nail. When he speaks again, his voice is hard and flat. “Listen. You two keep showing up, dropping bombs that end my life as I know it. Reporters are bugging us. Now I find someone’s broken into my office and emptied my safe, and earlier, I felt like someone was watching me from the woods. No, I don’t.”
“Okay. Any cameras to your security system?”
“We have a monitoring system on the front door. Nothing back here, though. Since it’s locked inside the fence and has an alarm…”
She doesn’t bother stating the obvious—people jump fences all the time—just nods.
“You might want to give it a look, just see if it caught anything out of place overnight. Any more media calls?”
“That woman from Channel Four. She came by the house after you left.”
“And you talked to her?”
Bender gives her a look of extreme loathing. “No. Though I can’t say I appreciate you telling her about my connection to this case.”
Joey holds up a hand. “I haven’t talked to any reporters. Not my favorite, you know? And the PIO hasn’t made any statements. But they have their ways, their sources. What did she ask you?”
“Just to talk. Like she did when she called. I declined.”
“It’s going to get out eventually, Mr. Bender. The media listen to our radio calls. They know when something happens that will be of interest. The Cooke case is high profile. We’ve been here three times now. Add in your ties to the case, and the fact that someone’s been digging around in your personal things? As far as the media is concerned, where there’s smoke, there’s fire, you know what I mean?”
“There is no smoke, nor fire. I haven’t done anything wrong.”
Bender is clearly rattled. Interesting. “Right. But a tip can come from anywhere. Neighbors. Work. What did you say you do back here, sir? Something contractually private? Is that something that can be used against you?”
“No, it couldn’t.” He thinks for a moment, shakes his head again. “No. It’s…”
“You’re going to have to tell us at some point, sir. Why don’t you let me be the judge of whether your occupation has anything to do with this.”
“I can’t. I’d have to get permission.”
“Then I suggest you do that. It could be relevant.”
Will appears in the door. “Got some footprints in the mud back here. We’ll get the place dusted and take some casts, see what pops.” A car door slams. “Oh, team’s here. I’ll go get ’em.”
Joey looks toward the street; though she can’t see in front of the house from Bender’s office, she does have a view down the road. A derelict-looking white van with a ladder on top cruises by and disappears around the corner. She can hear Osley jawing with the team.
Joey stashes her notebook in her back pocket. “Good. Well, Mr. Bender, if you have no idea why you might be targeted, we will add this to our investigation. You get in touch when you’ve secured permission, okay?”
She is coming across like a bitch, she knows it, but come on, what in the world could a suburban English professor be doing in his back yard that needs this level of privacy and security? And if he does, why in the world would he keep the safe in an outbuilding instead of inside the house where the security system’s cameras would cover it? It makes all her radars go on alert.
He’s hiding something, her subconscious remarks. You know it, and he knows you know it.
Bender is fidgeting again, like a little boy who needs to use the restroom. She waits him out.
“Okay, you can’t tell anyone.”
She crosses her heart.
“I’m a ghostwriter. And no, I will not say for whom. But there was a thumb drive with a few manuscripts on it in the safe, and that’s gone too. I have to call New York and warn them.”
“Published or unpublished work?”
“What was taken? Unpublished. Next books in the series. I’ve been on sabbatical and drafting for the past few months, trying to get ahead so when I go back to work, I’m not overwhelmed.”
“I understand.”
“Do you?” His eyes find hers, imploring. A desperate man.
Something here…
“Yeah, I do. I have a friend who’s a writer. You’re not the only one in town. I’ll be discreet, Mr. Bender. My job is to solve crimes, not blab people’s secrets. Okay?”
His relieved breath comes out in a sour, coffee-tinged whoosh, and she takes a step back involuntarily.
Will, mouth running a hundred miles an hour at the two kids who’ve come to run the place—they are kids, my God, she’s getting old—is barking directions. She lets him give the instructions, then bids Bender and the team farewell. She’s not going to stand over them while they do their jobs. Nothing to be gained by hovering. Let Will do that.
No, Joey wants something else.
An audience with Olivia Bender.
19
THE WIFE
Olivia taps a nail against her teeth, waiting for Moore to pick up the call. When the cop finally does, her cool voice saying, “This is Moore,” Olivia breathes out a relieved sigh.
“Detective, this is Olivia Bender.”
Moore’s voice gentles. “I was about to track you down, Mrs. Bender. I was hoping we could have a chat.”