California Schemin' - Kate George [39]
My heart sank. Abandoned for a hunk of meat. Why hadn’t I trained them not to take meat from strangers? For the same reason I didn’t lock my doors. I didn’t think it was necessary. There wasn’t much in my house worth stealing except me, apparently.
We pulled into the drive of a three-story house with the same brown and beige as the rest of the houses, the same lawn. The garage doors opened, and Moose pulled into one of the bays next to a limo identical to the one we were in. We all got out of the car, and Hammie escorted me into the house. Paris met us in the hall and followed along throwing daggers into my back with her eyes.
We walked through a kitchen big enough to feed the entire state of Vermont and into the living room, cozy compared to the kitchen, but still big enough to host a marching band. The ceiling was three stories high. I liked the windows, though. They rose from floor to ceiling giving a view of the foothills to the west. The back yard was a pool, cement pathways and big ferns.
“Where’s the security wall?” I turned to Hammie, but Moose answered.
“It doesn’t go all the way around.”
I looked at Moose with my eyebrows raised. “What’s the point of a gated community if anyone can just waltz right into the back yard?”
“The wall extends a mile beyond the last house at each end,” he said, “runs back a couple of hundred feet. There are motion detectors and security cameras so when someone tries to go around, they get picked up and whisked off to jail. One or two crooks tried it when the community first went in. They got maybe fifty feet into the perimeter before they were picked up. Don’t think anyone has tried it since then.”
Senator Wallace walked into the room, and everyone tensed. He had on tan slacks and a brown golf shirt and carried a worn briefcase. For some reason the briefcase reminded me that I’d been abducted and wasn’t here of my own free will. The smile faded from my face.
Wallace sat on one of the soft leather couches and motioned me to sit on the one across from him.
“Richard,” he said. “Kindly take Paris for a stroll in the yard. I need to talk to Ms. MacGowan. Mr. Moore, get the car ready.”
Paris made a face but didn’t protest when Hammie led her out the door. Moose disappeared back down the hall towards the garage as Wallace set the briefcase on the coffee table between us and extracted two photos from it. He set the photos on the table and used two fingers to slide them across to me.
“These are the two men who are responsible for my wife’s death. Do you recognize them?”
“Your wife’s death?”
“The woman you saw fall to her death from the Foresthill Bridge. She was my wife.”
“Your wife.” I fell silent. I didn’t want to push the innocence factor too much. I didn’t know exactly how much he knew.
The photos were five-by-seven head shots taken in black and white. A round-faced bald man with dark eyebrows stared at me from the first photo. The second had a thin face, dark, stringy, shoulder length hair and light eyes. I shook my head. Neither man was familiar to me.
“I didn’t see anything, Senator.”
“And your camera?”
He knew about my camera. If I hadn’t been sitting in front of him, I would have slapped myself on the head. Of course he knew. He probably sent the guys who broke into the cabin and car. I looked Senator Wallace in the eyes.
“If my camera picked up anything, I never saw it. The sheriff’s department took my memory card. I lost all the photos I had of my time in California.”
The Senator leaned into me, making me extremely uncomfortable.
“Bree, it’s very important that the people responsible for the death of my wife are brought to justice. I don’t think I can achieve that without your help. As far as we know you were the only eye witness.”
Besides the thugs who were with you and the suit in the woods. Too bad the bear can’t testify.
“Isn’t it the Sheriff’s job to bring these guys to justice?” I slid the photos back across the table.
“Sheriff Fogel is out