us to save her.”
For that moment, I forgot all about Rufus Mayes and how much I hated him. All I cared about was that the body that lay in the concrete, the one that Rufus said was too far gone to be saved, was no stranger to me.
Sadie lay dead. A whimper of sorrow sounded in my throat. Rufus rose and I opened my mouth to accuse him of this, to accuse him of murdering my best friend to get to me. I wanted to tell him that his whole amnesia thing was a ruse, but when his gaze met mine, I knew he’d had nothing to do with this.
Sadness filled his eyes. It wasn’t the same sorrow that rocked my body, making my knees quake, but he felt sympathy all the same.
He squeezed my shoulder, and I turned away to call the police.
Chapter 8
I called the chief of police, Tuney Sluggs, who was as old as dirt—literally. The man must’ve been seventy-five with one foot in the grave.
He arrived at the scene in his bathrobe. At least he had the decency to keep it tied. I had no interest in seeing his boxer shorts.
All the other cops in town showed up, too—five in all. There hadn’t been a strange death in Peachwood in so long all the police were trying to figure out exactly how long it had been.
“I think it’s been twenty years,” one deputy said.
Another deputy, with thinning hair and a penchant for spitting out his dip juice at all the wrong times, replied, “No”—spit—“I’m pretty sure it’s been longer than that.”
“No, I say it’s been twenty,” the only one with common sense, Earl Granger, said. Earl was probably early forties and should have been police chief, but the folks kept on voting old Sluggs in. I think because they felt sorry for him.
Sluggs strode up to me. “You find her?”
Rufus stood beside me, and for the first time in my life I was glad for his company. “Yes, we did,” he answered.
“It’s Sadie March all right.”
I wiped away tears. “I know.”
“Can you think of any reason why she would be out here at night?” the chief asked.
“No,” I said. “I can’t.”
My mind wasn’t working. Too much had happened this evening. Rufus had shown up, throwing off my entire world, and now this. With Sadie gone, my universe had collapsed.
Sluggs rubbed a hand over his chin, where white stubble sprouted. “Seems to me that maybe she came out here to check on things, make sure everything was okay. Wore some pretty tall heels. Could’ve tripped over something, maybe the rope beside her.”
“Excuse me,” Rufus said, perturbed, “but should you be talking to us about this?”
The chief looked surprised, as if he’d forgotten that we were standing there. “Well, maybe I shouldn’t be.”
“Yes,” I snapped, “yes, he should be.” I scowled at Rufus. “He should be talking to us about this because she was my best friend and anything that we can tell Chief Sluggs would be appreciated, I know it.”
Sluggs got a distant look in his eyes as he stared over in the direction of where Sadie’s body lay. “The coroner should be here soon. We’ll see what we decide.”
“The coroner? Chief, with all due respect, there’s no way that Sadie would have come to the barn at night. No way at all unless she was meeting someone.” A memory pricked my brain. “She received a phone call today. It really bothered her. I’m sure if you checked her phone records—”
“There, there, Clementine. I know you’re upset, but let us handle this.” He patted my hand as if I were a child. “We know how to look into these things.”
Frustration built inside me, a rage so hot that I could barely contain it. “Things like this as in murder?”
Sluggs gasped. “Now let’s calm down before we start talking about murder.”
I opened my mouth to unleash a string of profanities at the chief, but Rufus dragged me away.
“Please excuse us,” he said to Sluggs. When we were out of earshot, Rufus turned to me. “It’s not going to help anything if you get on the chief’s bad side.”
“What do you know about it?” I snapped. Why do you even care? All you’ve ever done was hurt people, and now you’re trying to help me.
I wanted to scream at Rufus and shake him into remembering who he was, but stopped myself.
“The one thing that I do know,” Rufus said patiently, “is that the chief needs to do his job.”