was my daughter’s teacher in elementary school.” Rita’s words were slurred. Not from the beer, but from a smoldering, toxic anger. “Nicole went from being a little girl who loved school to one who pretended to be sick every morning. I wanted to choke the dried-up old hag.” Rita sent Kir a defiant glare. “I don’t care if she is dead. She tormented the kids in her classroom.”
Kir didn’t look at Lynne but he felt her shudder. “I’ve heard that a lot.”
Rita polished off her beer. “Course, it’s terrible there’s some maniac out there killing women. It makes you want to lock your door and never come out again.”
Kir pushed a full bottle in Rita’s direction. “My father tried to warn us.”
“He did.” Rita grabbed the beer and lifted it in a toast. “To Rudolf.”
Kir raised the last beer. “Rudolf.” He touched his bottle to Rita’s then set it back on the table. He’d already had a glass of wine with dinner. Considering the condition of the road, that was enough. “I’ve been trying to imagine how the deaths could be connected.”
Rita shrugged. “They were all women who lived in Pike.”
“But why those women?”
Using the tip of her finger, Rita scooped the condensation from the side of the bottle. “Who knows? Convenience? They wore the same shoes. Could be anything.”
Kir settled back in his seat, covertly studying Rita’s expression. “I wish I’d read my father’s mystery letters. There has to be a reason he was the only one to get them.”
“You sound like a cop,” Rita muttered.
“It’s in my blood.”
Her lips twisted, a hint of grief in her eyes. “That’s true.”
Kir pretended to consider his words. “You know, you spent as much time with Dad as anyone.”
“True again.” Rita took a drink. It was a sip this time instead of a gulp. Maybe she’d decided to pace herself. Or maybe she sensed this was more than a casual conversation.
“Did he know the women who were murdered?”
“I’m sure he did. He knew everyone in town.”
“Is there a reason someone might think he was friends with the women? Or even enemies?”
She started to shake her head, then hesitated. “Oh, I guess Sherry Higgins did hire him a couple times when she was serving an eviction notice. I remember him telling me last summer that there was a renter who chained themselves to the fridge. He had to get bolt cutters to get them out. Can you imagine that?” Rita snorted. “People are strange.”
Kir frowned. “Isn’t it the sheriff’s job to help with evictions?”
Rita made a face. “Most people in Pike always thought of your dad as the sheriff, no matter how many years passed. Besides, I don’t think Sherry and Kathy got along that well. Something happened between them when they were younger.”
Kir couldn’t imagine Sheriff Hancock was very happy with Rudolf performing her tasks, no matter how much she might dislike Sherry Higgins.
“Did he do any work for the others?”
Rita stared blankly out the window as she tried to shuffle through her fuzzy memories. Kir didn’t hold out much hope. She’d probably been intoxicated for ninety percent of her conversations with Rudolf Jansen.
“Not that he told me,” she at last conceded. “I can’t remember him mentioning Randi Brooks or—”
“Brooks?” Kir interrupted with a lift of his brows.
“Oh, I mean Decker.” Rita wrinkled her nose. “Brooks was her maiden name. I don’t know why I keep forgetting that.”
“Wait.” Kir leaned forward. The name stirred a distant memory in the back of his mind. “Was her father Charlie Brooks?”
“Yeah, he died around five years ago. Heart attack, I think.”
Kir had a vivid image of his father returning home late one night with a bloody lip and a grim expression. He preferred to arrest his fellow citizens of Pike without using his weapon, which meant that more than once he was injured during the takedown.
“I remember Dad arresting him after he tried to burn down the gas station,” he revealed. “They’d fired him for stealing or something and he decided to torch the place.”
“Yeah.” Rita released a sharp crack of laughter. “He was friends with my husband. Both losers who used their fists instead of their brains.”
Kir tapped the end of his finger on the table. “That leaves Ms. Randall.”
“No one had anything to do with her,” Rita muttered, then her eyes widened as if she had a sudden inspiration. “Well, except the night Rudolf got confused walking home and tried to get into her house. Most people in town just took him to