Now that sounded more like my dogs. “Don’t feel bad. It’s not the first time Velma has been counter surfing.”
Toby tried to wedge himself in between Velma and my leg for exclusive welcome-home cuddles. He stepped on a purple duffle bag sitting by the door.
Isabel’s bag.
I stretched my hand toward it. “You don’t have to leave.”
All the smile drained out of her. “I think I do. If Jerrod is here in Fair Haven and knows that you’d be able to lead him to me, it’s only a matter of time before he finds me.”
Aside from the fact that my wedding would be cake-less if she left now, running off on her own didn’t seem like the safest thing to do. “We don’t know that it was your husband. I think this attack has to do with Mark’s case.” I waded through the happy dog mob toward her. “Besides, you’re safer here where you have allies and people watching out for you. We can work together. I’ll help you get a restraining order.”
“That puts you in too much danger. Look what it already might have done.” She sidestepped me and the dogs and slung her duffle over her shoulder. “But I want you to know that I appreciate what you did in letting me stay here. Not everyone would have, and it was the best night’s sleep I’ve had in months. When you live in your car, you see too much after dark, even in the nicest towns, to ever feel safe anywhere. I don’t so much sleep in my truck as I close my eyes and listen for danger.”
You see too much.
For days I’d felt like she wanted to tell me something and yet didn’t feel she could or didn’t know if she should. She’d been in the vicinity when Chief McTavish was taken. It wasn’t only her truck that was there since her truck was her home. And I knew from experience that she would have heard a car pull up—let alone two cars—and she would have been watching.
If she could identify the person who met McTavish that night, we might be able to show that there was a link between his disappearance and the corruption investigation. It could be what we needed to convince Detective Dillion to allow Mark to look at the file. The mastermind behind the corruption cover up in Fair Haven wouldn’t have gone to all this trouble if that file wouldn’t reveal him.
I spun around. “Did you see something last Thursday night? Two men in the Lakeshore Park parking lot?”
Isabel clenched a hand around her duffle bag strap. Her knuckles turned pink and white. “Nothing I saw is going to help you. I didn’t see faces. I can’t identify anyone.”
I’d learned with Isabel that what she didn’t say was as important as what she did. “Could you identify the cars? Or do you remember a license plate number?”
“Even if I could…” She shook her head.
Even if she could, she couldn’t very well give Detective Dillion her fake name. Purchasing a fake ID was a crime.
Reporting what she’d seen to the police would mean her real name showing up in the system as a witness. It could mean testifying at trial. Given what she’d told me about her husband and his law enforcement connections, that was as good as mailing him a letter with her return address on it. She might be able to hide until the trial date, but then he’d be waiting for her.
It was a lot to ask, and yet the stakes for me, for Mark, even for Chief McTavish if he were still alive, were so high.
Maybe there was a way we could both have what we needed.
“Mark and I need the police to allow us to see a file from an old case. We’re sure it’ll help solve this one. If we could show any sort of connection, it might be enough to convince them. You could tell the police what you know, but do it as an anonymous tip.”
Isabel tugged at the zipper on her bag. “My statement isn’t going to make the police believe you. It was a member of the police who took your missing man.”
A tremor ran up my legs, and I braced a hand against Velma’s back for support.
Suspecting something and hearing it confirmed were two very different situations. When you only suspected, you could still hold out hope you were wrong.
Now I knew. The man behind the corruption cover-up in Fair Haven was also the one who’d kidnapped Chief McTavish, killed Troy, and framed Mark for murder.
And my only hope of proving it lay in convincing a woman who saw the police as an enemy to trust them with her life.
23
I pressed my palms together in a prayer pose. “That’s exactly the information I need. Detective Dillion didn’t believe us when we told him the investigation Chief McTavish was working on and the recent murder were connected. This might convince him to let us see the file on Chief Zacharius’ death. If we find hard evidence in that file, we won’t even need your testimony anymore. We’ll have enough without it.”
At least, that was my theory, but I couldn’t let on to Isabel that I was less than completely certain.
She wrapped her hand around the strap of her duffle again like she wasn’t sure whether to set it down or walk out the door.
In a way, she and I faced the same challenge. The person we were up against was law enforcement.
Maybe she didn’t see that.
I lowered my hands in a sign of surrender, to show her that I had nothing if she walked out. “You weren’t able to bring your husband to justice for what he did to you, but you have a chance now to protect other people from a bad cop. Please. Help me.”
Isabel’s lips lost all their color, and her duffle bag slid off her shoulder. It hit the floor with a thud.
Then she drew her shoulders back into a line that would have made a military drill instructor proud. “You’re right. I can’t let other people be hurt without anyone to turn to the way I was. I’ll tell the detective what I saw.”
I called Elise and had her and Mark pick Isabel and me up. Fair Haven, unfortunately, didn’t have any places that rented cars. Until Tony either fixed mine—which seemed doubtful based on the damage I’d seen once the emergency crews got Mark and me out—or I bought a new one, I was without transportation. Driving there in Isabel’s food truck didn’t seem advisable in case I was wrong and her husband was the one who ran us off the road. Her truck would point her out to him immediately if he were searching for it.
I filled Mark and Elise in on our way to the police station.
Case Hammond sat behind the front desk, which was actually a relief. I’d been hoping to see either him or Henry. It was going to take a long time before things weren’t awkward between Sheila and me.
Elise and Mark took a seat on the bench along the wall, and I marched up to the front desk with Isabel in tow.
“We need to speak to Detective Dillion, please.”
Something flickered across Case Hammond’s face.
