“When the fuck did Candy move into Cherokee Pines?” His question was directed to no one but himself, and Turner had already begun reaching for the phone. “Candy was supposed to be staying with Viv Newberry!” He’d already started dialing J.J.’s desk at the newspaper. All he could think was how ridiculous it was that he hadn’t known about this. After all, he knew about everything else in this damn county—who was three months behind on their mortgage, who’d just gotten a partial plate, who drank too much at the VFW’s Monte Carlo night fund-raiser, and who was stepping out on their husband, with whom, and with what frequency. Why the hell hadn’t someone had the presence of mind to tell him that Candy was staying with her mother, who happened to live where Gerrall Spivey worked?
But then again, why would they? No one had a clue it would matter to him this much. No one person knew how everything was connected—that the task force was investigating Bobby Ray Spivey and tailing his kid, that Turner would give a rat’s ass that Jacinta had moved to Cherokee Pines and that Candy was staying with her, or that he was still strung out on Candy, just like O’Connor had said.
Not even J.J. knew how bad he had it for Candy.
Turner slammed the phone down before the call could go through, his brain honed in on the word O’Connor had just used—“obsessed.” “I need to see a copy of Cabrera’s field notes.”
She shrugged. “Figured as much.” O’Connor reached into the briefcase she’d brought along and handed Turner a manila folder.
“Has he threatened her in any way?” Turner asked, already flipping through Dante’s transcribed notes, feeling the tension coil in his belly and chest as he read the undercover agent’s report. His heart pounded like he’d just sprinted up the side of a mountain. “Is she in any danger?”
“Not that I can see, but you’d know better than I would. I mean, is she the type who’d jump at the chance to take a romantic drive up to Preston Valley to see Gerrall’s etchings?” O’Connor laughed, clearly amusing herself. “And, hey, if she is, you might want to reassess your interest in her.”
Turner didn’t bother to look up from the report. Sweat had broken out on his forehead. His stomach had clenched. The idea of Gerrall Spivey being in the same state as Candy made his skin crawl, but reading of how he talked about her constantly, gave her gifts, and claimed she returned his affections made him want to throw up.
He had to get Candy out of there.
O’Connor sat back down in the chair across from Turner’s desk. “Anyway, as you’re probably reading right about now, Dante thinks it’s all in the kid’s head—a fantasy. And thank God there’s nothing illegal about fantasizing, because if there were, I’d be serving several consecutive life sentences—if you know what I mean.”
Turner kept reading. Dante’s notes on Gerrall were more detailed than ever before, and they revealed the kid’s expanded role in the operation. Apparently, Gerrall was now managing the dozens of “smurfers” his father paid to travel all over the southeast buying small quantities of cold medicine from mom-and-pop pharmacies. It was a way to bypass laws meant to curb meth production by stopping one person from buying large quantities of its essential elements—ephedrine and pseudoephedrine—found in common cold medicine. According to Cabrera’s notes, Gerrall returned from work every night about one-thirty A.M. with up to a hundred boxes of over-the-counter cold and allergy remedies. He met the smurfers at various points between Cherokee Pines and Preston Valley, including the Tip Top Truck Stop, Cabrera said.
The field notes mentioned that Gerrall spoke often about what kind of car he planned to buy for Candy, and carried a photo of her on his cell phone. Whenever he showed it to someone, he referred to her as his fiancée.
Turner felt his throat close up with rage and grief. If the Spiveys ever touched Candy, he’d shoot them where they stood and he’d deal with the ramifications later. “I need to keep this report,” he told O’Connor. He heard the agony in his own voice.
“Hey, have at it, but it’s in the task force database, like all our field notes.”
Turner looked up. “Thank you,” he said. “The state bureau is still tailing Gerrall, right?”
“Right.” O’Connor narrowed her eyes at him and was about to make some other biting comment when her pager went off. She snatched it from the waistband of her fitted trousers and frowned. “Gotta run,” she said, grabbing her briefcase and heading for the door. “Now you can make that call in private,” she said, smiling. “But have mercy on whoever dropped the ball on this one, okay, Sheriff? Ta-ta for now!”
Chapter 10
J.J. glanced up from his desk and did a double take, obviously not expecting to see Turner barging through the center of the Bigler Bugle newsroom, heading straight for him.
Turner’s best friend grinned, pushed back his chair, and stood to greet him. “What an unexpected…”
“Ain’t a social call, DeCourcy.”
“… pleasure.” J.J.’s smile faded along with his enthusiasm. He raised an eyebrow. “What’s up?”
“Cheri in?” It was a rhetorical question. Turner cocked his head toward the publisher’s office at the other end of the newsroom, where he knew Cheri would be holed up.
“Sure is.” J.J. moved around his desk and started walking in that direction, with Turner right behind him. He tapped on the closed door while looking over his shoulder quizzically. “Everything okay, man?”
“Nope.”
“Come on in!” Cheri called out, her voice light and chipper from behind the door. Turner had to suppress a groan of frustration, because right at that moment, he was predisposed to fuckin’ hate “chipper.” In fact, he figured anything remotely “chipper” could just kiss his ass.
“Turner!” Cheri said, her eyes opening wide. “We’ve missed you lately! How’ve you been? Can you come out for dinner this week?”
Before he could stop her, she’d popped up from her desk and embraced him, then she gave him a friendly peck on the cheek. Cheri Newberry was so sweet. She smelled so nice. He’d always adored her. He still did.
But she wasn’t Candy.
He wanted Candy.
And for the ninety-fifth time that hour, Turner tried unsuccessfully to keep the sexual dreamscape from invading his brain—Candy’s little pink tongue and luscious lips, her long pale curls brushing down his brown skin, those thighs spread open over him.
Lord have mercy! Turner wiped his brow and sighed at his own pointless, pathetic stupidity. He had to pull himself together.
Cheri peered up at him. “You all right?”
“I wish everyone would stop asking me that damn question,” he snapped, immediately regretting it. Cheri hadn’t done anything—or had she? That was why he was here in the first place, right?
“Care to tell us what’s on your mind?” J.J. motioned for Turner to have a seat in one of the chairs but Turner shook his head.
“Thanks, man, but this will only take a minute.”
“All right,” J.J. said.
His two friends then waited for him to elaborate. When he didn’t, they crossed their arms over their chests simultaneously, which annoyed Turner something awful. A month of living together and they’d become a matching set of bookends? Did they now walk and talk alike? he wondered. Were they going to start completing each other’s sentences? Good God above, these two were irritating the living hell out of him lately.
“Turner?” Cheri lowered her chin and frowned. “You’re starting to worry me. Has something happened? Are Rosemary and Reggie okay?”
“Yes. Everything’s fine.” He cleared his throat. “Except for one tiny little thing.”
J.J. shrugged. “What?”
“It’s Candy! Would y’all be kind enough to tell me why you didn’t think to mention that Candy had moved in with Miss Jacinta out at Cherokee Pines? Would y’all tell me exactly how that little nugget of news slipped your damn minds?”
Once again, Cheri and J.J. reacted in stereo. Both sets of lips parted in surprise as
they turned to stare at each other.
Perhaps that question hadn’t come out as nonchalantly as Turner intended.
“Well…” they said together.
He was getting a headache.
“Hold up now,” Cheri offered, propping her hands on her hips. “If you must know, we didn’t mention it to you because she asked us not to tell you.”
His eyelid twitched. “Say what?”
“In fact,” J.J. said, “Candy made us promise that unless you came right out and asked, she preferred you didn’t know where she was staying. She figured—”
“She wanted some space to figure things out,” Cheri said, completing his sentence. “She thought it would be safer this way, you know, less of a temptation for both of you.”
Turner stood stock-still, hands at his sides, the heat rising in his face. “You gotta be kidding me.” He shook his head and laughed. He’d never heard anything so ridiculous in his life! God only knew what could have happened to her while she was trying to avoid him—no, Gerrall Spivey was no criminal mastermind, but he was mixed up in his daddy’s twisted business and keeping company with a bunch of Mexican thugs that would as soon shoot you as shake your hand, and now he was obsessed with her!
“She doesn’t want to hurt you,” Cheri added. “She and Viv had a disagreement and she figured she’d just stay off your radar a bit. You know—put a little distance between the two of you so things could cool down.”
“You don’t say?” Turner nodded, wondering if he’d experienced any cooling sensation since the last time he laid eyes on her, touched her, smelled her, kissed her … and the answer would have to be hell, no. He’d only managed to make himself crazy thinking about her. Dreaming about her. Wanting her. “That’s what she said, huh?”
“Yes.” Cheri looked at him suspiciously.
Shee-it. Turner knew full well that Viv Newberry could drive a person to drink with her constant chatter and gossip, but at least she wasn’t keeping company with members of a drug cartel. Why couldn’t Candy have just stayed put?
J.J. jumped in. “Why are you so jacked up about this, Halliday? It’s just a retirement home. She’s hanging out with a bunch of senior citizens and you’re acting like you’re worried she’s wandered into a den of iniquity or some—”
As J.J. talked, Turner stared at his best friend. It took a few seconds, but he saw J.J.’s eyes widen in understanding, then narrow in concern as the reality of the situation dawned on him.
“Spivey,” J.J. whispered. It wasn’t a question.
“Exactly.”
“You mind telling me what y’all are talking about? Who’s Spivey?” Cheri rested her butt on the edge of her desk and folded her hands in her lap. She looked like she was making herself comfortable, settling in for a long story, which Turner knew was unnecessary, since he planned on making it real brief and real sketchy on the details.
“You might say I’ve got some history with the Spiveys.” Turner nodded at J.J. and took a moment to send him a silent warning—let me handle this. J.J. didn’t know about the task force investigation, of course, but he sure knew all about how Turner had tried to link Bobby Ray Spivey to Junie’s death. J.J. had helped him interview half of Preston Valley, in fact. But Cheri and Candy didn’t need to know about that.
Turner refocused on Cheri. “Gerrall Spivey is the twenty-one-year-old guy who works the front desk at Cherokee Pines in the evenings. Back when Junie was teaching, he was one of her students.”
Cheri’s brow crinkled. “Okay.”
“He lives out in Preston Valley with his daddy, Bobby Ray, a man who probably hasn’t done a decent day’s work since the first Bush was in the White House. The kid went to school most days hungry and dirty and beat down. Junie … she used to get all up in people’s business when it came to those kids, you know. She fought for them, made sure they had everything they needed, and tried to help Gerrall as much as she could. His daddy resented the intrusion something terrible.” Turner had to stop. He felt his throat begin to close up, and his eyes flew to J.J. for an instant, aware that he’d just said more about Junie in the last four seconds than he had in the last four years. J.J. smiled at him and nodded slowly, and Turner decided to continue.
“I had some words with Bobby Ray, and just before Junie died, I ended up having to sic Child Protective Services on him. They’ve never liked me much since, and the feeling’s mutual.”
“All right,” Cheri said, still puzzled. “So you don’t like the idea of Candy being around this Gerrall guy?”
“I suppose you could say that.” Turner had already sensed that J.J. was getting fidgety, waiting for an opportunity to add his two cents, which Turner couldn’t allow. “Jay. Walk me outside, would you, man?”
“Uh, sure.”
“That’s it?” Cheri’s hands flew up by her sides. “You come storming in here mad as a hen because we didn’t tell you where Candy was staying—and that’s it?”
“That’s it,” Turner said, already heading for the publisher’s office door.
“Don’t even try to bullshit me, Halliday,” Cheri said from behind his back, the chipperness back in her voice. “It’s not exactly a secret that you’re interested in Candy—and we think that’s great—but don’t you think it’s kind of silly for you to be jealous of some Preston Valley yahoo?”
Turner stopped. He froze. He turned around to face Cheri and could tell by her grin that she was enjoying the hell out of having a bird’s-eye view of all of humanity from way up in the publisher’s office. Turner shrugged and said, “You know what? You’re absolutely right.” Turner gave her a quick kiss on the cheek. “Thanks, Cheri.”
J.J. was all over him as they raced down the wide front stairwell of the Bugle building. “What the hell was that?” he asked. “You’re seriously worried about that Gerrall Spivey kid being around Candy? Because of your suspicions about Junie?”
“Maybe,” Turner said, suddenly feeling a little defensive.
“But we’ve never found anything that connects the Spiveys with Junie’s death, man. We talked to damn near everyone in Preston Valley! We’ve gone over every detail a thousand times. I know it would be a relief for you to have somebody to blame for—”
“Not this shit again,” Turner said, laughing bitterly. “That’s just what Reggie said to me recently, that I need to blame somebody for Junie’s dying to make sense of it, but that’s not it at all. I want the truth, Jay. That’s all I’ve ever wanted. And part of the truth is that Candy is living where Gerrall Spivey works, and—believe me when I tell you—that kid is not to be trusted and I don’t like it one damn bit.”
By this time, the two men had pushed their way out of the newspaper building’s front doors and were on the sidewalk. Turner was headed to his department-issued SUV parked at the curb when J.J. put a hand on his arm.
“Are you falling in love with her?”
Turner spun around. “That’s crazy.”
J.J. scrunched up his mouth and shook his head. “You know what’s crazy, man? To lie to yourself about how you feel. Now that’s some crazy shit. Not to mention lying to your best friend in the whole world, which is just plain dumb. So just don’t do it—don’t be crazy and don’t be dumb.”
Turner looked up and down the sidewalk to make sure no one could overhear this conversation before he spoke. “It doesn’t even matter, Jay,” he said, hearing the surrender in his own voice. “Candy’s already told me I don’t have a chance in hell with her because she’s leaving town as soon as possible. The girl can’t stay put in one place to save her soul. So that’s it. It doesn’t matter what I feel or what I wish was possible. There’s nothing to be done about it.”
The police radio on his belt suddenly squawked to life. Turner was needed at the scene of an accident on Highway 25. “Gotta run.”
“You’re wrong, man.”
Turner looked up at J.J. and laughed. “No, I’m pretty sure I gotta run out to this motor vehicle accident, since it’s my job.”
/>
“You’re wrong about Candy.”
“Really?” He sighed and looked up at the sky for patience. “How do you figure?”
J.J.’s smile was sly. “There is definitely something you can do.”
“And what would that be?”
He rested his hand on Turner’s shoulder. “Don’t let her go, man. Simple as that. You make it worth her while to stay.”
* * *
“I’ve always liked to lick the frosting,” Hugo said, wiggling his eyebrows as he raised another forkful of cake to his mustachioed lips.
“This is exquisite! So light but so flavorful,” said Mildred Holzmann. “Would you make us another one for Friday’s bridge club? Do you know how to make pineapple upside-down cake? My mother used to make that during the Depression—such a lovely combination of sweet and tart. Do you think you could, Candace?”
“Now why would she go and waste her talent on something like that?” Jacinta scraped the last few crumbs from her dessert plate, then used her fingertip to remove a fleck of frosting stuck on Hugo’s chin. “Pineapple upside-down cake is a throw-together kind of cake, Mildred. Anyone can make it. But this cake is a real bakery confection. Something like this takes time and skill.”
“I’d be happy to,” Candy whispered to Mildred, who looked near tears after mentioning her departed mother.
“And after that, you’ll make a German chocolate cake,” Hugo decided. “I’m cuckoo for anything coconut.”
Jacinta giggled like a sixth-grader. “You are the funniest man,” she said, pressing the sweetheart neckline of her muumuu against his upper arm.
Candy decided the time was right to step out into the lobby and give Gerrall the cake she’d promised him. He’d made such a fuss over her this evening when she’d arrived with the dessert, insisting that he help her find a spot for it in the dining room, telling her how delicious it looked, how amazing she was, and how long it had been since he’d seen something so beautiful. By that point, Candy knew if she didn’t promise the guy a slice it would have been an obvious swipe.