Дана Стейбнау - Spoils of the Dead

Her spine visibly stiffened. She rose immediately to her feet and extended her hand in a gesture reminiscent of snapping a salute. “Sergeant Campbell. It is very nice to meet you, sir. I’m Sally Petroff, your administrative aide.”

“I didn’t know I had an administrative aide, and it’s Liam,” he said, shaking her hand. Her grip was firm but didn’t linger. “Who hired you?”

“I interviewed for the job with Colonel Barton, sir.”

The “sir” indicated that addressing him as Liam would be a work in progress. Okay then, tit for tat. “It’s nice to meet you, too, Ms. Petroff. What’s your background?”

“I was born in Kapilat across the bay. I have an AAS in Business Management from Charter College in Anchorage, and I spent a year working under Audrey Pratt in Colonel Barton’s office, also in Anchorage. I’m fluent in APSIN, ARMS, IRIS, ALDER, and OARS, and I can write dispatches upon request.”

If she had survived training by Audrey Pratt, a martinet on the order of George S. Patton, she had smarts and stamina. He was mildly encouraged. “You’re a local,” he said. “Which means you know everybody. That will come in handy, since I’m not and I don’t know anyone.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Relax, Ms. Petroff. You already got the job.” She did not visibly relax, and he sighed inwardly. On top of everything else he had to break in a new employee, and he hated supervising. “Do I have an office?”

“You do, sir. Please follow me.” A door in the back wall led to a small hallway with four doors off it, two on one side, two on the other, and a fifth with a screened window through which he could see a corner of the cop shop. “Those two are interview rooms, that’s the bathroom, and that is the evidence room.”

“I noticed the bank vault-worthy lock. You have the code?”

“I do. Here is your office.” She opened the door and stood back. The room was just big enough to include a desk and a chair and two upright chairs across from it. There was a window in back of the desk, and that concluded the tour.

“Thank you,” Liam said. He perched one hip on a corner of the desk and folded his arms. The more he looked at her, the more she reminded him of someone but he couldn’t nail it down. “What is your job description, Ms. Petroff?”

She swallowed and, he could tell, immediately regretted this betrayal of nerves. “All dispatches go through Soldotna, but I field any local calls. I keep your paperwork in order—Ms. Pratt was emphatic on the subject of tracking your overtime—and I liaise with Chief Armstrong’s admin to ensure that all areas of our detachment are covered. You will have noticed the post has no holding cell.”

Sidney Armstrong was Blewestown’s police chief. “I have.”

“Since this post was built simultaneously with Blewestown’s new police headquarters, it was thought that as a cost-saving measure that this post could utilize their cells for any detainees we might have.”

Before Liam could ask what other cost-saving measures there had been because bitter experience had taught him that there were always more, invariably to the detriment of whatever his mission was wherever he had been posted, they both heard the outer door open.

A woman was waiting for them in the front office. Medium height, medium though very curvy weight, blonde/green. “Shoot me now,” Liam said.

“Sir?”

“Hey, Liam,” the blonde said affably. “How you been?”

“Ms. Petroff?”

“Sir?”

“Does part of your job description include liaising with the press?”

“Sir, I interned four weeks with public relations, during which I wrote releases, fielded inquiries, and briefed three times.”

“Excellent. Handle this, please?” Liam returned to his office and shut the door firmly behind him.

It opened as he was sitting down at his desk. “Nice try, Liam,” the blonde said no less affably than before. “Don’t blame the kid, she tried her best.”

From behind her Petroff peered with a worried expression. “Sir, I’m sorry, but she just wouldn’t—”

He waved her off. “Don’t worry about it, Ms. Petroff. Carry on.”

She did her best not to look too relieved.

“Don’t worry, kid,” Jo said. “This guy’s a magnet for action. You’ll be seeing a lot of me.”

The door shut softly and Jo sat down across from Liam. They contemplated each other for a moment.

Jo Dunaway was a reporter for the Anchorage News and, for Liam’s sins, his wife’s college roommate at the University of Alaska and lifelong best friend. She was a very good reporter and an even better friend, and she enjoyed giving him wedgies in both of those roles. Payback was a way of life for Jo, and he was pretty sure she wasn’t close to being done with paying him back for the heartache he had caused Wy in the early stage of their relationship. He didn’t whine about it because he felt he deserved all the grief she handed out, and he never, ever made the mistake of complaining about Jo to Wy as Liam liked his head right where it was, thanks. He had to put up with Jo personally, so he did. He had to put up with her professionally, too, but he was a lot less sanguine about that.

“Little bit wired,” Jo said.

“What?”

She hooked a thumb over her shoulder in the general direction of the front office. “Your sidekick.”

“Oh.” He couldn’t deny it, so he said, “You have to know Wy’s already here.”

She nodded. “We texted.”

“So. You’re checking out my new post instead of our new house, because…?”

“Mostly I’m down here for a story.”

“Swell. Can I call Wy for you?”

“We’re meeting for lunch out on the Spit. What’s hopping at your new post, Sergeant?”

“I’m not even officially here until next Monday.”

“Barton cracking the whip?”

He looked at her and she laughed. “Yeah. That would have been way too easy.” She stood up. “See you later.”

“Why?”

“Didn’t Wy tell you? I’m your first houseguest.” And she was gone.

Great. Although he supposed he should be grateful Jo hadn’t shown up yesterday. Possibly indicative of some small smidgeon of tact on her part.

He thought about it. Nah.

There was a tap at the door and he looked up to see Ms. Petroff standing in the doorway. “Who was that, sir?”

“That, Ms. Petroff, was an example of the species known as Homo americanus diurnaria. ” She looked confused, as well she might, and he relented. “She’s a reporter for the Anchorage News . Jo Dunaway.”

“Dunaway?” Her brow smoothed. “I’ve seen her byline. She wrote about Gheen.”

“She did.”

“There was another trooper—”

“Prince.”

“Is she still in Newenham, sir?”

“No. So far as I know she’s in Florida.” Because she had eloped with Liam’s father, that incorrigible womanizer otherwise known as Colonel Charles Bradley Campbell. Might be Brigadier General or Major General or even Lieutenant General by now. Probably never General, though, for which Liam sent up his heartfelt thanks to the United States Air Force. As a voter he thought his tax dollars could be better spent.

All of which Jo Dunaway knew full well, and with which information she used to needle him.

Ms. Petroff came all the way into the room. “Can I get you anything, sir?”

At least she wasn’t going to dig around for the details of the Gheen murders as so many did when they found out he’d been the investigating officer. He nodded at the screen of the desktop computer. “Can you set this up so it answers to my password?”

“Of course, sir.” He traded places with her and she busied herself at his keyboard. “There you are. Enter your password, confirm it, and you’re good to go.”