And There He Kept Her (Ben Packard #1)(4)

Packard towered over her. He had dark hair that had started to recede at the temples in his twenties, then decided to hold its ground, leaving him with a slightly irregular hairline in the front. He kept it short, just this side of a military cut. He wore a trimmed beard almost year-round now that beards on men were the style again. Eyes blue or gray, depending on the light. Women were drawn to the size and shape of him. Men were intimidated by it. He was an imposing figure in uniform, even the brown one worn by the sheriff’s department.

Packard followed Marilyn inside. “How’s he feeling?” he asked, keeping his voice low.

Marilyn shrugged a bit and waved her flat hand side to side. Packard nodded and followed her to the kitchen.

“Can I get you a cup of coffee?”

“If it’s not any trouble,” Packard said. Waiting with the old man and his wife at the scene of the bear attack had taught him it was easier to accept the first offer than decline ten more.

“No trouble at all. Go on in. He’s watching TV.”

The family room was on the back of the house. The Shaws’ decor was classic country. Varnished beadboard. A wallpaper border of chickens and checkerboard hearts that circled the ceiling. The family room was heavily carpeted, with bookshelves and an overstuffed sectional and framed wildlife prints. Scented candles in glass jars perfumed the air. Packard had to duck to avoid hitting a low bulkhead. Stan was lying back in a recliner, television remote on his belly, looking drowsy. He slowly turned his head. When he saw Packard, his face lit up. He struggled for a moment to right himself in the recliner. “Hey, you giant sonofabitch.”

“Hey, yourself.”

The sheriff had been a walking bull of a man. Only five foot nine but broad shouldered and wide through the chest, shaped like a potato on toothpick legs. Before the chemo, he had thick dark hair, gray just over the ears, that he kept swept back with pomade in a tamed pompadour. He was a foul-mouthed bullshit artist with men, a gentleman to the ladies, and a hard-ass on criminals. He and Marilyn taught Sunday school and marriage preparation classes at the Catholic church. The people of Sandy Lake loved him. He could have run for sheriff and won, uncontested or not, until the sun burned out.

Stan sat up in the recliner, a blanket over his legs. He looked more diminished every time Packard came by. A February snowman in March. His hair had come back thin and white. His scalp had spots and odd scaly patches crusted with blood.

Packard took a seat on the end of the sectional. A bass fishing show was on the flat-screen TV in front of them.

“You just missed that guy in the orange hat pull up a seven-pounder,” Stan said.

“Where they at?”

“Uh… Hell, I don’t know. I thought it was Minnesota. Could be anywhere.”

They watched TV for a couple of minutes; then Stan pointed the remote at the TV, turned down the volume, and asked what was new.

Packard told him about the budget review with the city council. They were underspent in overtime and fuel costs. “Warmer temps forced the ice fishing festival to be canceled, which helped keep overtime down. We’ve been so fiscally responsible I thought it was a good time to pitch the idea of hiring two new deputies. I assume they’ll approve only one. You all right with that?”

Stan shrugged. “You’re the one who has to be all right with it,” he said.

Packard had been hired by Stan Shaw eighteen months earlier as an investigator for the Sandy Lake County Sheriff’s Department, but for the last four months he’d been serving as acting sheriff, covering as many of Stan’s duties as possible while the sheriff went through a second round of treatment for colon cancer.

Shaw’s decision to appoint Packard came as a surprise to the county board of directors. Off the record, Shaw had told them his deputy with the most seniority was six months from retirement and didn’t want the job. The one with the second most seniority wasn’t fit to plan the holiday party let alone run the whole department. Shaw liked Packard for the job because he worked hard and came with no baggage. The sheriff, or the acting sheriff, had to be unpopular at times. Packard had no alliances, no grudges, no debts. He hardly knew anyone. Shaw told the board its options were Packard or no acting sheriff at all.

The other investigator in the department, and Packard’s closest ally at work, was Detective Jill Thielen. She was one who told Packard about the other deputies, all of them male, claiming it wasn’t fair the single guy who worked all the time got the acting sheriff job. They couldn’t be expected to put in the same hours he did.

“Congratulations,” Thielen told them. “Now you know how every working mother feels.”

That shut ’em up.

Marilyn came in with his coffee. Stan said, “Sweetheart, I just thought of another positive thing about colon cancer. This guy has to review the budget with the board. Not me.”

Packard smiled, then tried to swallow it when Marilyn tsked and shook her head. “We heard you respond to the bear call this morning on the scanner,” she said, changing the subject.

“Yeah, damn. I forgot to ask about the bear,” Stan said.

Packard told them about the old man with the dog and the other guy with the bloody hand. “I cornered the bear in the guy’s garage and shot it,” he said, sipping his coffee.

“What did you use?” Stan asked.

“Twelve gauge.”