“Yep.” We told them about the basement and, their interest piqued. We all trooped over to the lot, where Joe took down the ropes we’d put up to discourage sightseers from falling in.
Murray stared into the part of the chamber that we could see and turned to me, a puzzled look on her face. “Well, isn’t that a kicker? I never would have guessed. Those brambles are more tenacious than I thought—they make the perfect cover. And Horvald said there was a house here?”
“Yep. A three-story mansion, I gather. He said it burned to the ground from a lightning strike, almost fifty years ago on Halloween night.”
Jimbo shook his head. “Leave it to you, O’Brien, to stumble over a house burnt down by lightning. On Halloween, yet. You can’t help finding hoodoo even when you aren’t looking for it, can you?”
“Hey, I was born on Halloween, so don’t go knocking my birthday!” I laughed as we spread out and started chopping away.
About an hour into our work, we came to a second edge of the basement and had to haul out the mess we’d already cut away. While Joe and Jimbo kept making inroads on the thicket, Murray and I loaded armfuls of the thorny brush into the pickup beds. I was grateful for the thick jacket I’d decided to wear; the thorns snagged at it, but never managed to break through to my skin.
After a few moments, Mur stopped and leaned against the side of her truck. “Em, can we talk for a second?”
“Sure.” Grateful for a break, I propped myself on the back bumper and stretched. “What’s up?”
She let out a big sigh. “I don’t know what to do. The guys are being an ass about Jimmy. And the Chief didn’t come right out and say so, but he hinted that I deserve whatever flack I get if I continue to see ‘that scum,’ as he put it.”
Youch. Harsh. Usually Tad Bonner fought on Murray’s side, rather than attacking her. The turnaround wasn’t good news. “Have you told Jimbo about this?”
She shook her head. “No, and I’m not going to. I don’t want him punching out my boss, and I don’t want him to feel like he’s compromising my job. I’m so frazzled. I’m afraid this is the ammunition they’ve been looking for to get me fired.”
“Surely Deacon and Greg aren’t saying anything?” I couldn’t believe the two nicest guys on the force would turn against her.
“No,” she said, sighing. “Deacon and Greg and Sandy are great about this, even if they do think I’m out of my mind. But the guys who got passed over for promotion when Bonner appointed me head of detectives are talking behind my back, trying to stir up trouble.”
I didn’t know what to say. There wasn’t much I could say. I put my arm around her shoulder. “They just need some time to get to know him, to see he’s not the bad news they think he is. It’ll be okay.”
I was talking out of sheer bravado, but what else was I supposed to do? Tell her I thought she might end up having to choose between her career and the one man who had ever made her happy? Nope, wasn’t even gonna go there. She needed to keep a positive outlook and, whatever she chose to do, she had to make this decision on her own.
We were about to return to work when Randa came pedaling up on her bike. Surprised that she was home so early, I asked, “Is anything wrong?”
She shook her head. “No, but I need to ask you something.” With an apologetic glance at Murray, she added, “Alone.”
I walked her over to the sidewalk. “Where’s your brother?”
“I dunno, he left before I did. Probably over at Tommy’s. He said he’d call and leave you a message.”
“Okay. Well, ask away.”
“May I go to a movie tomorrow afternoon? I need to know now.”
Randa wasn’t a big movie buff, so her request struck me as odd, but I figured that her best friend Lori had talked her into going. Lori was the one person in the world who could take Miranda’s mind off star clusters and nebulas. “What’s the movie?”
“Alien Warlord.”
I glanced up at her, confused. Alien Warlord? Not sure I’d heard right, I said, “That isn’t exactly the type of movie you usually like. You sure you want to go? What’s the rating?”
She scuffed her foot on the ground. “PG-13. And yeah, well, see, the thing is normally I wouldn’t go see it, but Gunner asked me to go with him. And I . . . kinda . . . want to.”
Stupefied, my mouth dropped open. Gunner? Her English tutor who she’d been bad-mouthing for the past two weeks? I’d barely gotten over the fact she actually had a friend her age—Lori Thomas was Randa’s only real girlfriend. Now she wanted to date?
I managed to close my mouth before a bug flew in it.
“So, you want to go?” Act nonchalant, I thought. That was the key. I didn’t want to scare her off from the idea, even though the thought of her dating simultaneously overjoyed and terrified me.
She nodded. “Yeah, I guess I do. He’s nice enough, even if he is all hung up on English and writing.”
Gunner was actually quite the nice young man. I’d met him and he was polite and respectful. And he was in the same grade, so that wasn’t a problem. “Okay then, if it’s a matinee, sure. You can go.”