Blood on Copperhead Trail

When she glanced at the door, Chief Massey had moved out of sight. She scanned the room and found him sitting by himself at a booth on the opposite side of the café.

“Maybe you should go talk to him now,” Ivy suggested. “While he’s a captive audience.”

Laney’s instinct was to stay right where she was, but she’d learned long ago to overcome her scared-squirrel impulse to freeze in place if she ever wanted to get anywhere in life. “Good idea.”

She pushed to her feet before she could talk herself out of it.

He saw her coming halfway across the room, his deceptively somnolent gaze following her as she approached, like an alligator waiting for his dinner to come close enough to snap his powerful jaws. She ignored the fanciful thought and kept walking, right up to the booth where he sat.

She extended her hand and lifted her chin. “Chief Massey? My name is Laney Hanvey. I’m an investigator with the Ridge County District Attorney’s office. I’ve left you a couple of messages.”

He looked at her hand, then back up to her. “I got them.”

She was on the verge of pulling her hand back when he leaned forward and closed his big, tanned hand around hers. He had rough, dry palms, suggesting at least a passing acquaintance with manual labor.

He let go of her hand and waved toward the empty seat across from him in the booth. “Can I buy you lunch?”

Not an alligator, she thought as she carefully sat across from him. More like a chameleon, able to go seamlessly from predator to charmer in a second flat. “I’m actually having lunch with one of your detectives.” She glanced at the corner where Ivy sat, shamelessly watching them.

Chief Massey followed her gaze and gave a little wave at Ivy.

Ivy blushed a little at being caught staring, but she waved back and then pulled out her cell phone and made a show of checking her messages.

“Good detective, from what I’m told.” Massey’s full mouth curved. “She’s the one who broke the serial-murder case a couple of months ago.”

“She didn’t have much help from her chief of detectives.”

Massey’s green-eyed gaze snapped forward to lock with hers. “Let’s just get things out in the open, Ms. Hanvey. Can we do that?” His accent was Southern, but sleeker than her own mountain twang she’d worked so hard to conquer. He’d come to Bitterwood from a place called Terrebonne on the Alabama Gulf Coast.

“Get things out in the open?” she repeated.

“You may think you’re here to ferret out the snakes in our midst. But you’re really here because your bosses in the county government have been wanting the Ridge County Sheriff’s Department to swallow up small police forces like Bitterwood P.D. for a while now. Ridge County could justify the tax increase they’re wanting to impose if they suddenly had a bigger jurisdiction to cover.”

Laney hid her surprise. For a guy who looked like all he wanted to do was catch the next big wave, Doyle Massey had clearly done his homework about Ridge County politics. “Technically, Ridge County Sheriff’s Department already covers Bitterwood.”

“If invited to participate in investigations,” Massey corrected gently.

“Or if the department in question is under investigation,” she shot back firmly. “Which you are.”

He gave a nod of acceptance. “Which we are. But I don’t see the point of fooling ourselves about this. You and I may both want to clean up the Bitterwood Police Department. But we’re not on the same team.”

“Maybe not. But if you think my goal here is to shut your department down, you’re wrong. And if you think I’ll go along with whatever my bosses tell me to do, you’re wrong about that, too. I’m looking for the truth, wherever that leads me.”

He lifted his hands and clapped slowly. “Brava. An honest woman.”

She felt her lips curling with anger at his sarcastic display. She pushed to her feet. “I expect full cooperation from the police department in my investigation.”

He rose with her. “You’ll have it.”

Frustration swelled in her chest, strangling her as she tried to think of something to say just so he wouldn’t have the last word. But the trilling of her cell phone broke the tense silence rising between them. She grabbed the phone from her purse and saw her mother’s phone number.

“I have to take this,” she said and moved away, lifting the phone to her ears. “Hi, Mama.”

“Oh, Charlane, thank God you answered. I’ve been tryin’ not to worry, but she was supposed to be home hours ago, and she’s always been so good about being on time—” Alice Hanvey sounded close to tears.

“Mama, slow down.” Laney dropped into the booth across from Ivy, giving the other woman an apologetic look. “Janelle’s late coming home from somewhere?”

“She and a couple of girls went hiking two days ago, but they were supposed to be home this morning in time for her to get to school. I knew I should have insisted they come home last night instead.”

“Hiking where?”

“Up on Copperhead Ridge. At least, that’s what she said. I’ve been trying to encourage her to get out and do things with her friends, like you said I should. I know I can be overprotective, but you can’t be too careful these days—”

“She’s old enough to go hiking with some friends. What do you know about these girls she went with?”

“They’re good girls. You know the Adderlys—they live over on Belmont Road near the church? Their daddy’s a county commissioner. I think you may have gone to school with his cousin Daniel—”

“I know them. They were supposed to be back home in time for school?” Laney interrupted before her mother went through the whole family tree. She knew the Adderlys well, even socializing with them sometimes as part of her job with the district attorney’s office.

“Joy and Missy are crazy about hiking club, and you know Janelle’s been walking up and down those mountains since before she could talk good, so I didn’t think it would be a problem. She’s so good about keeping her word—”

“You’ve tried calling her on her cell phone?”

“Of course, but you know how reception can be in the mountains.”

“Are you sure there weren’t any boys going with them? Or maybe they were meeting some boys up on the mountain?”

“She’s been sort of dating Britt Lomand, but I already called over there, and Britt’s home. He’s just getting over the flu—his mama said he’s been home all weekend.”

“Missy Adderly has a boyfriend.”

“They broke up a month ago,” Alice corrected. “Should I call the police and report her missing? It was awful cold last night on the mountain.”

Laney glanced at Ivy, who was watching her through narrowed eyes. “The police don’t normally drop everything to look for a teenager who’s a little late getting home, but I’ll see what I can do.”

“Please call me if you find out anything.”

“You call me if you hear from her. I’ll talk to you soon, Mama. Try not to worry too much. Jannie’s probably just lost track of the time, or maybe she was running late and went straight to school.”

“I never thought of that,” Alice admitted. “I’ll call the school, ask if she’s showed up.”

“Good idea. Call when you know something.” She shut off her phone and met Ivy’s curious gaze. “My sister went hiking up in the hills over the weekend with a couple of girlfriends, and she’s late getting back home. She was supposed to be home in time to shower and dress for school.”

“Cutting it close.”

Laney saw the conflicted thoughts playing out behind Ivy’s expressive eyes. “Yeah, I know. At that age, they think they get to make their own rules. But Janelle’s pretty levelheaded.”

“Guess that runs in the family.”