Lamey’s toad-like small head flushed an unbecoming red from his neck to the tips of his ears, more from anger than embarrassment, I was sure. Unperturbed, Andrea resumed a more upright sitting position than the one that had given Lamey an unobstructed view down the front of her scoop-neck black sweater. She answered instead of him.
“Hello, Leah. I’d invite you to join us, but I’m doing an in-depth interview with the sheriff for a profile in GO News this week.”
“A profile, oh, I see. Nice. I’ll look forward to reading it.” I turned to Lamey. “Acting Sheriff, I’m so glad to see that your calendar has opened up. I hope that means you’ll have time to sit down with our reporter soon. So far, you’ve turned down every request we’ve made to you.”
“Why would I sit down with you? Your paper is supporting David Cooper.”
His anger had slightly increased the high pitch of his odd, rather whistling voice, so that his answer sounded like the trailing notes of a badly played flute.
“Well, maybe if you had come in for a candidate interview like he did, you could have answered for your abysmal record. Who knows, maybe your explanation would have won us over,” I said.
“Ha! That’s rich. As though I’d ever get a fair hearing from your fake news outfit.”
“Just because you don’t like what we report doesn’t make it fake. Though I can see how actual journalism might be confusing to you, given the kiss-up coverage you get from GO News.”
I had chosen the phrase “kiss-up coverage” deliberately, but Lamey was too furious at my interruption of his tête-à-tête to do more than sputter, and Andrea was too cool to be baited.
She gave a slight toss of her head, brushing a lock of long red hair over her shoulder.
“At GO News, we think the media should support law enforcement, not tear it down.”
She gave Lamey a sweet smile, and he returned it with one of his own. Sickening.
“Yeah? Well, at the Himmel Times we don’t think it’s our job to be law enforcement’s lap dog—or lap dancer, as the case may be. I’ll let you two get back to your ‘interview.’ ” I turned on my heel and left the table before she could respond.
“What did you say to them? When you were talking to him, Sheriff Lamey got as red as this hot sauce,” Miguel said.
I shared the conversation with him.
“Oh, that was so savage! But Andrea, she is not going to forget that.”
“Good. She’s a backstabbing, unethical imitation of a journalist who uses her sexuality to get stories. I do not approve. Besides, what can she do to me, write a bad review of one of my books? She won’t be the first.”
He shook his head. “I don’t know what she’ll do, but if I know Andrea, it won’t be good.”
Gabe’s dog Barnacle treated me to such a frantic dance when I walked in the door that I knew Courtnee had not remembered to let him out as she had promised. Courtnee Fensterman is the Times receptionist. I grabbed his leash, clipped it on his collar, picked up a bag for his deposits, and we zipped down the back stairs. Usually, Barnacle enjoys a leisurely circular walk as he searches for the perfect spot to relieve himself. This time, he barely contained himself until we got outside.
“Hey, buddy, I’m sorry,” I said. “I should have double-checked on Courtnee and made sure you were okay. Don’t worry, I’ll have a word with her tomorrow.”
Barnacle is a small mixed-breed dog that Gabe adopted a few months ago when his eccentric owner, who wasn’t much into grooming for dogs—or people—had died. Now that he was regularly cleaned up and trimmed, it was easy to see that he had some cocker spaniel, maybe a little terrier, and an assortment of other breeds in his ancestry. He’s normally quite placid, and he doesn’t talk much. However, the sharp bark and disgusted look he gave my apology told me I wasn’t getting off that easy.
“Look, I know, I shouldn’t have asked her. And you did great, holding on that long. Next time, I promise, if I can’t get Coop, I’ll get my mother to do it. I suppose you’re going to tattle-tale to Gabe, aren’t you? How about this, we’ll go for a nice long walk, and we can work things out, all right?”
I took the little body shimmy he gave me as assent, and we started off toward Coop’s house. The long walk would be good for both me and Barnacle.
3
“You’re out kind of late, aren’t you?” Coop asked as he turned off the sander he was using in his workshop and smiled at Barnacle and me, in that order.
“Hey. Yeah, I’m trying to make up with Barnacle. He got stuck inside while Miguel and I were in Madison. Courtnee forgot about him. I told him you might have a treat here for him.”
“I think that might be true,” he said, bending down to give Barnacle’s head a rub.
“Is that the coffee table you’re building for Miguel?” I asked, pointing to an oval piece of wood that was taking shape.
He nodded.
“You know if this whole sheriff thing doesn’t work out, you could seriously turn pro.”
“This is how I relax. If I had to do it for a living, I don’t think I’d enjoy it as much.”
He’d started putting his tools away as he talked. Coop’s a lot tidier than I am.
“Let’s go inside. I’ve got a Diet Coke with your name on it.”
Coop’s kitchen is compact but well laid out. I pulled a chair up to the table while he got out glasses with ice and a Diet Coke for me, a regular for himself. He grabbed a doggie treat and tossed it to Barnacle before sitting down across from me.
“How was dinner?” he asked.
“The food? Great. The company? Greater. Catching Sheriff Lameass in a very cozy dinner with Andrea Novak? The greatest.”
“Andrea and Art? Was anyone else there?”
“Nope. Mrs. Acting Sheriff Lamey must be out of town. Or else Lamey killed her and buried her in the basement. Coop, this just proves what I’ve been telling you. Andrea’s got Lamey eating out of her hand. Wait, the visual I just gave myself is truly disgusting. Scratch that. But I hate that GO News is basically erasing you from the race. It’s all-Lamey, all the time.”
“I kinda prefer that to the stuff they were writing when I left the police department. They made it seem like I was fired for incompetence—without ever coming right out and saying so.”
“Yeah, well, I told you, your ex-friend Captain Rob Porter is a snake. I’m sure he was the ‘highly placed source in the Himmel Police Department’ they quoted. He hated you being better at the job than him, and he hates that you might become sheriff now. Face it, he just hates you.”
“No. He’s just an insecure guy who puts his career ambitions ahead of his friendships. I didn’t know that for a while. Now I do. People that know me know I was a good cop, and I can be a good sheriff.”
“Well, sure, that’s true. The trouble is, not enough people outside of Himmel know you. And you’ve got to reach voters across the whole county. As far as GO News is concerned, Lamey is the only viable candidate running, and you’re just a wannabe after-thought. You can’t ignore that they’re ignoring you. You need to push back. Why don’t you start talking about Lamey giving his buddy Bruce Dengler a pass when he resigned to ‘spend more time with his family?’ ”