Janice Johnson - All a Man Is

Somehow the conversation drifted after that. First Alec and she exchanged their own experiences in higher education. She shook her head over her idiocy in dropping out before getting her degree, Alec telling her his father had belittled his own determination to get his.

“‘Why waste your time?’ he’d say. ‘You should have gone straight to the police academy. Think of the street experience you’d have by now.’ He’d shake his head. ‘You’ve been to school for thirteen years already. Why would you want to write a paper about Robert E. Lee’s military mistakes or the fact that some damn philosopher tried to prove himself wrong?’”

“Some damn philosopher?” she queried.

“Descartes. He was determined not to be smug in his beliefs.”

“So he tried to prove he was wrong.”

“Right.” Alec shook his head. “Funny Dad should have chosen that paper to disparage, because I take Descartes’s theories about self-doubt seriously. Whenever I go too far out on a limb, I think, hold on, remember Descartes, and take the other side. Sometimes I actually do convince myself I was wrong.”

“I’m impressed,” she said, smiling. “You actually demonstrate the value of those college classes on a day-to-day basis.”

He smiled, too. “I told you, I internalize everything.”

She had been so wrong about him, Julia thought as they finished dinner and returned to the Tahoe. Why hadn’t she ever noticed how different he was from her husband?

Of course, she knew the answer in part. While she was married, she hadn’t let herself dwell on any feelings in particular for Josh’s brother. And later—it had taken her a long time to emerge from the grief and the guilt, and by then she was consumed by her children’s needs. For all the time she and Alec had spent together, most of their conversations had to do with the kids, Matt in particular. It alarmed her a little to realize that this evening, she and Alec had been, for possibly the first time, only a man and woman. She couldn’t help wondering if he’d made any discoveries about her.

She was more self-conscious than usual when they got back to the duplex. The kids weren’t due back for another half an hour. I could invite him in, she thought, but had the unsettling thought that doing so might be dangerous. She didn’t dare betray her feelings to him, not if she was going to continue to depend on him the way she had been. She’d be foolish to misinterpret the expression in his eyes when he’d said, When you need something from me, tell me.

So she thanked him for dinner, made her excuses and shut the door firmly on the man standing on her doorstep. The one whose voice had become husky when he implied he would give her anything at all.

Inside, heart thumping, she knew her greatest fear having to do with him was that he’d give what she asked, but for all the wrong reasons. Even the idea of that was unbearable.

CHAPTER FOUR

“YOU DIDN’T FOLLOW instructions,” said the hollow voice. It wasn’t any more distinct than it had been during the previous phone call, but Alec was damn sure the speaker was the same man.

His phone had rung while he was waiting for a table at a deli near the police station and having the passing thought that he could have called Julia to see if she wanted to meet him. Of course, she’d probably have had to bring Liana, at least, which would have killed his fantasy of being alone with her, something he’d begun to crave.

Seeing the unfamiliar number, he had stepped back outside. Traffic noise wasn’t a lot better than the buzz of a roomful of people talking, but at least he wouldn’t be overheard. With his back to the brick wall, he gazed unseeing at passing vehicles. He’d trace the phone number, but he was betting on a throwaway.

The fact that he’d been thinking about Julia when this son of a bitch called to issue another threat roused all his protective instincts.

“Something you should know about me,” he said. “I don’t respond to threats or blackmail.”

“One last chance,” the muffled voice told him, and the call was over.

He brooded as he stowed his phone. The first call had come less than two days after Julia’s arrival in Angel Butte. He couldn’t see how her showing up could have triggered anything. Probably one had nothing to do with the other...but he’d been police chief here in Angel Butte since the first of April. Only now that he had family was anyone threatening him. Yeah, that made him nervous.

Today was July 12, which meant two weeks had elapsed since the first threat. That was remarkably patient of the caller, he reflected.

After a moment’s thought, Alec dialed the mayor’s mobile number. It only rang once.

“Raynor?”

“I just got a second anonymous call,” he said.

“Threatening?”

He thought about it. “By implication. I’m told I have ‘one last chance.’”

“Why aren’t they calling me, too?” Chandler asked.

“Good question. I’m the new boy in town. Your support for McAllister has to have more impact than mine.”

There was a pause. “Maybe, but could be they figure they undercut my support enough by getting the word out that I refused to hire him as chief of the department here in Angel Butte.”

“That’s possible,” Alec conceded. A smile twitched at his mouth. “It’s also possible your reputation precedes you.”

“As a hard-ass?” Noah Chandler sounded amused.

“Something like that.”

He chuckled. “You plan any action?”

“I don’t think I’ll bother with the campaign manager this time. I’m going straight to Sheriff Brock himself.”

“Good,” the mayor said. “You’ll let Colin know?”

Alec agreed he would.

“Anything on Bystrom?”

The subject of the previous Angel Butte police chief was a sore one for Mayor Chandler. Alec was more accustomed to the slow pace of justice. One of the reasons arresting officers were so careful to document their every action and thought was that, by the time that arrest actually came to trial, assuming it ever did, they’d long since forgotten the details. He understood the mayor’s frustration, though.

During what turned out to be an unrelated investigation last year, Colin McAllister had stumbled on evidence suggesting the former police chief was corrupt. With Chandler’s backing, McAllister had gotten a warrant for Gary Bystrom’s financial records, which showed a sizable second income from mysterious sources. Tracing the source of those deposits was something the federal Drug Enforcement Agency could do better than a local police department. Angel Butte P.D. was part of a regional coalition of law-enforcement agencies, including the DEA, focusing on drug trafficking. They were all working right now on tying failed raids or other favors to the dates of some of those payments to the former police chief.

In the wake of Bystrom’s resignation and the ensuing investigation, McAllister and now Alec had been forced to look hard at their own officers. Gary Bystrom hadn’t been known as a hands-on police chief. Somebody would have had to tip him off to upcoming raids or other actions for him to have useful information to pass on. To date, five officers had been identified as having accepted bribes, some directly from Bystrom, some from the same sources who had paid off the police chief. All five had been fired. Alec was far from satisfied that the house was totally clean, but was starting to feel as if this had become more of a witch hunt than a dispassionate investigation. It had been weeks since he’d found anything that would justify further warrants. If the department harbored any more crooked cops, he could only hope they’d see the writing on the wall and look for jobs elsewhere.

“I left another message with the agent in charge” was all he could offer now.