Her smile faded when Burt said, “Considering all you’re asking for, I highly doubt that.” He then bid her a terse good-bye and hung up.
“Asshole,” Kat muttered.
Nick, who was sitting in front of her desk, looked up in surprise. “Was that for me or the mayor?”
“The mayor, of course.”
“I was just checking. You did slam a door in my face earlier today, although I think I deserved it.”
“You did deserve it,” Kat said. “But I’ll forgive you if you forgive me.”
“Deal.”
Between them was a club sandwich and French fries picked up from the Perry Hollow Diner. Kat grabbed a quarter of the sandwich and nibbled off a corner. Nick practically inhaled a fry and grabbed the file on Charlie Olmstead, which they had retrieved from the basement. When he opened it, a tuft of dust rose from the pages.
He read the report with care, not skipping a single word. In all her years as a cop, Kat had never known such concentration existed until she met Nick Donnelly. When he investigated something, it was like a spell had been cast over him.
“This is interesting,” he said. “After Charlie vanished, your father questioned everyone on the street.”
“Including Glenn Stewart?”
“Yep. He said he went to bed at nine and missed all the commotion.”
“Convenient alibi,” Kat said.
“Speaking of alibis, Lee Santangelo also said he was home alone that night. His wife was out of town. But according to Maggie Olmstead, Mrs. Santangelo was also there. She saw her in an upstairs window.”
“What did Becky Santangelo have to say about it?”
Nick grabbed his own piece of club sandwich and chewed slowly, lost in thought. With his mouth full, he said, “That she was visiting her sister that night. The sister backed up her story. So did half a dozen other guests.”
“At least my father was thorough,” Kat said, grabbing a French fry, “although I doubt he ever imagined I’d be looking through one of his old police reports.”
“Your father didn’t write the report.”
Kat froze, the French fry drooping an inch from her mouth. “Who did?”
“Deputy Owen Peale. Know him?”
“No. But I know someone who most likely does.”
They left her desk and edged out of her office. Lou van Sickle sat at her workstation, chowing down on her own club sandwich. When Lou saw them approach, she instinctively covered her fries.
“What do you know about the Charlie Olmstead case?” Kat asked.
“That was forty-two years ago,” Lou said. “How old do you think I am?”
Kat called her bluff. “Old enough.”
Lou gave her the stink eye, which was reserved for occasions when she was especially pissed off. Still, she answered the question. “I know what everyone else does. It’s no great mystery what happened to him. Or is it?”
Kat loved Lou like family, even though she was the town’s gossip champion. There was no way she was going to tell Lou how they were investigating the Olmstead disappearance.
Nick, however, showed no such discretion.
“His mother thought he was kidnapped,” he blurted out. “And we want to talk to the deputy who wrote the report.”
Since she had already used the stink eye, Lou gave Kat a you-know-better-than-to-get-yourself-messed-up-in-this look. Kat had seen it many times before, most notably when she had started sleeping with the colleague who would later become her ex-husband. That time, Kat should have followed Lou’s silent advice. This time, she plowed ahead.
“His name was Owen Peale,” she said. “I didn’t know him, so he had to have stopped working here when I was very young.”
Lou swiveled her chair until she was once again facing her lunch. “He quit before you were born. Went into private security because it paid more and he had three mouths to feed. Left without incident or animosity. I baked his good-bye cake. Vanilla with chocolate icing. Not my best work, if I recall. Anything else?”
“Is he still alive?” Nick asked.
“Last I heard he was. You can find him at Arbor Shade nursing home in Mercerville, because I know that’s what you’re going to ask me next.”
Kat gave her a hug and a peck on the cheek. “You rock, Lou. Seriously, you do.”
Nick also approached Lou, but instead of a kiss, he stole one of her French fries. Lou slapped his hand until he dropped it.
“Try that again,” she said, “and I’ll break your other leg.”
Sitting on the back porch, Eric held his cell phone in one hand and a lit cigarette in the other. He lifted them simultaneously, placing the phone against his ear and the cigarette against his lips. Both made him inhale.
He blew out a stream of smoke as the phone rang. And rang. And rang. He had never been much of a smoker, limiting it to a few bummed cigarettes in college dive bars and during breaks at stultifying writing conferences. He didn’t start in earnest until after he returned to Perry Hollow to care for his mother. The excuse he told himself was that it was spurred on by stress. That might have been true, but the real reason was more complex. It was his own little rebellion—a reckless laugh in the face of the sickness all around him.
Eric inhaled again as the phone ceased buzzing. In its place was a small blip, the telltale sign his call was going to voice mail. It was followed by a voice more tired and hoarse than the last time he had heard it.
“This is Ken. I’m not around. Leave a message.”
Eric closed his eyes. He wanted to hang up but resisted the urge.
“Dad,” he said. “It’s Eric. I guess you’re on the road making a delivery. Or—”
Drunk. That’s what he almost said. Drunk in the living room of whatever crumbling trailer he now called home or in some shithole roadside bar outside some shithole town along his trucking route. Instead, he settled on the more generic “somewhere.”
“Listen. I hired someone to find out what happened to Charlie. Mom wanted me to. I guess she always wondered what happened. Anyway, this guy asked me to ask you if you knew anything about it. I told him you probably didn’t, but he—”
Eric heard a sharp beep, followed by a click as the line went dead. He had rambled so much he was cut off.
“Crap.”
He dialed his father’s number again and waited through the requisite ringing before being connected to voice mail again. This time he was brief.
“Just call me back.”
Eric dropped the cigarette, ground it out with his sneaker, and went inside. In the kitchen, he placed the phone on the table and stared at it, more to kill time than anything else. He didn’t expect his father to return the call. He and Ken rarely talked. Just the usual birthdays and holidays, and sometimes not even then. So his hopes weren’t high.
Even if he did call back, Eric was certain Ken would have no idea why his mother suspected something more sinister about Charlie’s disappearance. As far as Eric knew, they rarely communicated after the divorce. His mother never talked about him. Ken Olmstead was another part of her painful past. Just like Charlie and his sealed-off bedroom.
The bedroom.
Eric