Lisa Gardner - Love You More

Shane stocked a Remington shotgun, M4 rifle, half a dozen boxes of ammo, and a KA-BAR knife.

I took it all.

Bobby and D.D. were halfway to Trooper Lyons’s house when they heard the call- Officer down, officer down, all officers respond…

Dispatch rattled off an address. D.D. plugged it into her computer. She paled as the local map appeared on the screen in front of her.

“That’s right by Tessa’s house,” she murmured.

“And Trooper Lyons’s,” Bobby said.

They stared at each other.

“Shit.”

Bobby hit the lights, floored the gas. They sped toward the address in utter silence.

By the time they arrived, ambulances and police cruisers had already bottlenecked the scene. Lots of officers milling about, no one really doing anything. Which meant only one thing.

Bobby and D.D. climbed out of the car. The first officer they came to was a state trooper, so Bobby did the honors.

“Situation?” he asked.

“Trooper Shane Lyons, sir. Single GSW to the head.” The young trooper swallowed hard. “Deceased, sir. Declared at the scene. Nothing the EMTs could do.”

Bobby nodded, glancing in D.D.’s direction.

“Was he on a call?” she asked.

“Negative. Hadn’t reported in yet to the duty desk. Detective Parker”-the kid gestured to a man dressed in a gray heavy wool coat and standing inside the crime-scene tape-“is leading the investigation. Might want to talk to him, sir, ma’am.”

They nodded, thanked the kid, and moved forward.

Bobby knew Al Parker. He and D.D. flashed their creds for the uniformed officer handling the murder log, then they ducked under the yellow tape and approached the lead detective.

Parker, a thin, gangly man, straightened at their arrival. He shook Bobby’s hands with his leather gloves still on, then Bobby introduced D.D.

The snow was finally slowing down. A couple of inches remained on the pavement, revealing a churn of footprints as officers and EMTs had rushed to assist. Only one set of tire tracks, though. That was D.D.’s first thought. Another vehicle would’ve left some kind of imprint behind, but she didn’t see anything.

She related this to Detective Parker, who nodded.

“Appears Trooper Lyons drove behind the building,” he said. “Not officially on duty yet. Nor did he notify dispatch that he was responding to signs of suspicious activity…”

Detective Parker let that statement explain itself.

Officers on duty always called in. It was imprinted into their DNA. If you grabbed coffee, peed, or spied a burglary in progress, you called it in. Meaning whatever had brought Trooper Lyons to this remote destination hadn’t been professional, but personal.

“Single GSW,” Detective Parker continued. “Left temple. Shot fired from the front seat. Trooper Lyons was in the back.”

D.D. startled. Bobby, as well.

Seeing their looks, Detective Parker waved them over to the cruiser, which sat with all four doors open. He started with the bloodstain in the backseat, then worked backwards for the trajectory of the shot.

“He was wearing his duty belt?” Bobby asked with a frown.

Parker nodded. “Yes, but there are marks on his wrists consistent with restraints. Bracelets were no longer present when the first officer arrived, but at some point this evening, Trooper Lyons’s hands were cuffed.”

D.D. didn’t like that image-a bound officer, sitting in the back of his cruiser, staring down the barrel of a gun. She hunkered deeper inside her winter coat, feeling cold snowflakes whisper across her eyelashes.

“His weapon?” she asked.

“Sig Sauer is in his holster. But check this out.”

Parker led them around to the rear of the cruiser, where he popped the trunk. It was empty. D.D. instantly understood the significance. No cop, uniformed or otherwise, had an empty trunk. There should be some basic supplies, not to mention at least a rifle or shotgun or both.

She glanced at Bobby for confirmation. “Remington shotgun and M4 rifle are standard issue,” he muttered, nodding. “Somebody was looking for weapons.”

Parker studied both of them, but neither she nor Bobby said another word. It went without saying between them who that somebody was, a person who knew Trooper Lyons, could lure him out to his cruiser, and desperately needed fire power.

“Trooper Lyons’s family?” Bobby asked now.

“Colonel went over to notify.”

“Shit,” Bobby murmured.

“Three boys. Shit,” Parker agreed.

D.D.’s cellphone rang. She didn’t recognize the number, but it was local, so she excused herself to answer.

A minute later, she returned to Bobby and Parker.

“Gotta go,” she said, tapping Bobby lightly on the arm.

He didn’t ask, not in front of the other detective. He simply shook Parker’s hand, thanked him for his time, then they were off.

“Who?” Bobby asked, once they were out of hearing.

“Believe it or not, Shane’s widow. She has something for us.”

Bobby arched a brow.

“Envelope,” D.D. clarified. “Apparently, Shane handed it to her Sunday evening. Said if anything happened to him, she was to call me, and only me, and hand it over. Colonel has just left. The widow is now complying with her husband’s final wishes.”

Every light blazed in Shane Lyons’s house. Half a dozen cars crowded the street, including two parked illegally on the front yard. Family, D.D. guessed. Wives of other troopers. The support system, kicking into gear.

She wondered if Shane’s boys had woken up yet. She wondered if their mother had already broken the news that their father would never again be coming home.

She and Bobby stood shoulder to shoulder at the front door, faces carefully schooled, because that’s how these things worked. They mourned the passing of any law enforcement officer, felt the pain of the officer’s family, and tended to duty anyway. Trooper Shane Lyons was a victim who was also a suspect. Nothing easy about this kind of case or this kind of investigation.

An older woman came to the door first. Judging by age and facial features, D.D. pegged her to be Tina Lyons’s mom. D.D. flashed her credentials; Bobby, too.

The older woman appeared confused. “Surely you don’t have questions for Tina right now,” she said softly. “At least give my daughter a day or two-”

“She called us, ma’am,” D.D. said.

“What?”

“We’re here because she asked us to come,” D.D. reiterated. “If you could just let her know Sergeant Detective D. D. Warren is here, we don’t mind waiting outside.”

Actually, she and Bobby preferred outside. Whatever Tina had for them was the kind of thing best not shown in front of witnesses.

Minutes passed. Just when D.D. was beginning to think that Tina had changed her mind, the woman appeared. Her face was haggard, her eyes red-rimmed from weeping. She wore a fluffy pink bathrobe, the top clutched closed with one hand. In the other, she held a plain white catalog-sized envelope.

“Do you know who killed my husband?” she asked.

“No, ma’am.”

Tina Lyons thrust the envelope toward D.D. “That’s all I want to know. I mean it. That’s all I want to know. Find that out, and we’ll speak again.”

She retreated back to the tenuous comfort of her family and friends, leaving D.D. and Bobby on the front stoop.

“She knows something,” Bobby said.

“She suspects,” D.D. corrected quietly. “She doesn’t want to know. I believe that was the whole point of her statement.”

D.D. clutched the envelope with gloved hands. She looked around the snowy driveway. After midnight in a quiet residential area, the sidewalk studded with streetlights, and yet pools of darkness loomed everywhere.