Kip looked at me, a glint in his eye. "She's turning into a girl, isn't she?"
I grinned at him. "Yeah, I think so ... but somehow, I don't think Miranda's going to be like one of the girls on Who Wants to Be a Pop Star"
He shook his head. "Nope ... more like Dexter meets Tank Girl."
Yep, I thought, my son was pretty observant. I motioned for him to join me in the kitchen, where we decided on chef's salad for dinner. After setting Kip to tearing lettuce, I gave Murray a call. She was still at the office.
"Don't you ever go home anymore?"
Her voice told me I'd picked the wrong evening to tease her. "Coughlan left for the rest of the week, which would be just dandy except he dumped a stack of reports on my desk and told me to get them typed up. Em, this is work the clerks should be doing! I'm a detective, not his secretary, but he said if they aren't done by Monday, he'll write a warning in my file that I'm not keeping up with the work."
"Can't you go to Tad Bonner? Tell him what's going on."
Why was she letting this jerk walk all over her? Murray never let anybody take advantage of her, but it was like she was paralyzed when it came to this guy.
She hemmed and hawed and finally blurted out the truth. "I can't. Tad didn't want me to take this job. He said that he didn't think I had what it takes to be a detective. He didn't mean anything bad by it; he said I'm one hell of a cop, but that I just didn't have the personality to fit the job. I can't go to him now and tell him he was right. I'd be humiliated."
Incredulous, I stared at the receiver for a moment, wondering if I'd heard right. "Murray, you wouldn't be admitting he was right. You have some legitimate concerns with the way Coughlan is treating you. If Bonner can't figure out the difference between harassment and ineptitude, then he's a poor chief of police."
She stammered a bit more, then sighed. "Em, when I took this job, I swore I was going to make it work. I can't give up now, and I can't let anybody else fight my battles for me. I'll have the damn reports done by Friday. I know Coughlan doesn't think I can do it, but I'm going to prove him wrong. He'll be speechless."
She was going about this all wrong, I thought. No matter what she did, she'd never impress the man. I kept my mouth shut, though. She probably wouldn't listen to me on this anyway. "Hey, do you want to go camping with us this weekend? We've been planning on this trip for several weeks; I've got a nonrefundable reservation for one of the cabins at Tyler's Resort."
She perked up. "That sounds like fun. When are you leaving?"
"Friday night. We'll drive back on Sunday morning. Come with?"
After a brief pause, Murray said she'd love to come. "By the way, I saw you on television tonight... again."
I groaned. "I hate that bitch. So what's the scoop? Can I sue her?"
Murray snorted. "Sue her? You'd be lucky if the courts let you write her a fan letter. I'm fed up with the government. Before you know it, we won't have any right to privacy left at all." And then, before she could really get started, she cut herself short. "Soap box issue. I'd better stop before I lose track of time. I'll call you at the shop on Friday morning."
As I returned to my cutting board, I thought about Murray and her promotion. She was making a mistake if she thought Coughlan would break down and offer her the respect she craved. Men like that never did. If they couldn't fault you for one thing, they'd find something else wrong with you. Roy had taught me that lesson.
Kip and I were putting the finishing touches on the salad when the crash of splintering glass filled the air. I raced into the living room, yelling over my shoulder for Kip to wait in the kitchen. The huge bay window that overlooked our porch and front lawn lay shattered into a thousand pieces. A brick rested in the middle of the jagged fragments covering the living room floor. There was something painted on it, but I was barefoot and couldn't get to it without sh'ce-and-dicing my feet.
"Holy hell! Kip, get back in the kitchen," I said as he peeked through the swinging doors. I could hear Miranda's footsteps as she raced downstairs, and I yelled to warn her. "Don't go in the living room! Go through the hall into the kitchen, and stay there with Kip. Grab a pair of my shoes from the hall closet and take them with you before you do."
I gingerly backtracked into the kitchen. Kip stared at me, wide-eyed and frightened. "What's going on, Mom? Who's doing this?"
"I don't know, honey." I held him close for a moment, then brushed his hair with my fingers and picked up the phone, hitting Redial. For the third time in two days, some force had intruded into my life and destroyed my property. First, Randa's telescope, then the shop, now my house. Why were they targeting me? And what... or who ... would it try to destroy next?
Six
WHAT IN THE world is going on, Em?" Murray surveyed the damage to my living room window while a couple of uniformed officers poked around outside, hunting for footprints or other clues that might lead to whoever just destroyed my window. She held the brick in a latex-gloved hand; the writing along the side of it was in white paint and spelled out a nasty four-letter word that started with a c.
I motioned for her to wait a minute and went back into the kitchen. "Randa, you and Kip round up the cats and put them in the downstairs guest room with a litter box and water. We don't want the kittens getting into the broken glass. Use the hall if you can, instead of walking through the living room. Then, go ahead and make sandwiches to go with the salad, and eat. And both of you make sure you've got good shoes on."
Kip started to protest, but Miranda, sensing I wanted them out from underfoot, promised him the last piece of apple pie. I flashed her a grateful look as they got to work. I returned to the front porch, my stomach a tangle of knots.
"What's going on? I wish I knew. First Miranda's telescope takes a dive, then my shop gets trashed, then my home. I feel under attack."
I couldn't escape the thought that if either the kids or I had been in the living room when this happened, we could have been seriously injured by the flying glass. Murray was talking to one of the cops who had responded to her request for a uniformed team. While she was occupied, I took the opportunity to call Joe. I needed a strong shoulder to lean on, a masculine shoulder, and I needed it right now. He offered to come right over.
Murray and I sat on the newel posts by the porch steps. The other officers joined us. They hadn't found any indicators pointing to who might have done this. "The only evidence we have is that brick; we're dusting it for prints. There aren't any footprints in your front lawn that we cam find. Truth is, unless we lift a print, your vandal could be anybody." She glanced at the driveway. "Who's that?"
Horvald Ledbetter was coming up the stairs, a concerned expression on his face. "What happened? I saw the police cars and came over to see if you were okay." He looked worried, and I realized that maybe my neighborhood wasn't so aloof after all. I started to introduce him to Murray, then stopped. Great. Oliver, Ida's nephew, was right behind him. He startled Horvald as he pushed past the older man and craned his neck, trying to get a glimpse of the broken window.