The Heirloom Murders - Kathleen Ernst [85]
After a moment she said, “I haven’t decided.”
“Jesus, Chloe!” he exploded. “How can you even think of going back to someone who treated you so badly?” He didn’t know all the details behind Chloe and Markus’s breakup. But he knew enough.
She rubbed her temples. “It’s complicated. We’ve got a lot of history.”
Another bale popped from the chute and landed on the hay wagon. One of the neighbor kids, riding in back, grabbed it and swung it into place with expert ease. Roelke clenched his teeth. He hadn’t planned to ask Chloe about Meili; the personal question had just burst out. He had no tidy place to put her answer, though. No one waiting to field it and reach for another.
His hands itched for his pocketknife, but he’d left it at home. He picked up the bird’s nest.
Chloe gave him a level stare. “Don’t start on that,” she warned him quietly. “I know you don’t like clutter, but this is my house. And just so you know, the cardinal feather is still in my kitchen. You don’t like that, arrest me.”
He put the nest down and jumped to his feet. “Will you come for a drive with me?”
“Um … where to?”
“I don’t know. I just want to get out of here.” He had more to discuss with Chloe. He wanted to do it without wondering if Alpine Boy might show up.
She hesitated, then nodded. “OK.”
Roelke felt a little better as soon as they were in his truck, leaving La Grange behind. “Listen, we’ve had trouble getting along lately,” he said. “I’m really sorry about that.”
“I’m sorry, too.” She twisted in the seat to face him. “And I’m glad you came by. There’s some stuff I want to tell you about the Eagle Diamond.”
Roelke stared at the road. Some asshole had run him off the road and totaled his truck. Some asshole had likely made Bonnie’s life so miserable that she’d killed herself. Skeet Deardorff might be accepting a permanent job offer from the Police Committee this very minute. He really wasn’t in the mood to talk about the Eagle Diamond.
“I did some research in Madison today,” Chloe was saying. “And guess what? Valerie Bing left one little detail out of her article. I confirmed today that a hired hand was working with Charles Wood—”
“Who’s Charles Wood?”
“The guy who originally found the Eagle Diamond. Years later, a reporter interviewed a German immigrant named Albrecht Bachmeier who’d been working as a hired hand when Charles found the Eagle Diamond. I found the article, and listen to this: Bachmeier found another gem!”
“Yeah?” Roelke said, because he knew some response was required. His brain felt like split-pea soup.
“Don’t you get it? There might be a second diamond!” Chloe’s voice was triumphant. “And a diamond like that would be valuable both in monetary and historical terms. Dellyn’s dad was writing a book about the Eagle Diamond. If he’d somehow found Diamond Number Two, with provenance info, it would be a big deal.”
“OK, I get that,” Roelke conceded. “But who would care enough to break into Dellyn’s barn, and maybe even her house, to look for it? Who’d care enough to maybe attack you that night?”
“Maybe Alex Padopolous? He grew up right next door. His mom and Dellyn’s mom were best friends. It’s not a stretch to assume he knew about the whole Eagle Diamond thing. And Dellyn said he wasn’t real bright. Maybe what sounds like a ridiculous scheme to you and me makes perfect sense to him.”
“You can’t teach stupid,” Roelke muttered.
“And here’s another candidate—oh, watch that guy!”
“That guy” was a squirrel which seemed bent on flinging itself beneath Roelke’s tires. He swerved, and watched the squirrel scamper merrily away. Thank God for that. Roelke suspected that Chloe would not react well to a rodent tragedy.
“OK.” Chloe exhaled with apparent relief, and picked up her tale. “This seems less likely, but I’ll just lay it out there. Valerie Bing told me she’d put everything that was known about the Eagle Diamond into her article. But she didn’t.”
“Maybe she thought the idea of a second