Chapter 5 – Mel and Dana Meet a 3rd Time
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Chapter 5 – Mel and Dana Meet a 3rd TimeMel
I was still in uniform. I unbuttoned my holster and stepped out the side door by the driveway. I moved quickly behind a shrub for cover. I kept low using first the house and shrubs to conceal me.
We were living in the old family home. God Bless Nana, may she forever rest in peace. She had really loved gardening and landscaping.
When I reached the back corner where the driveway side of the deck jutted off, I lost my shrubbery cover. I got as low as I could and crawled to the barrel and then to the tree the barrel was still, technically, tied to. I peered around the tree. There was someone standing up against the tool shed and she was looking right at me... Dana Rossi!
What the f—-? Why is she here?
Dana tapped her index finger against her lip, signaling me not to call out to her. Completely pissed off at her presence on my property, I scooted over to her quickly.
“What are you doing here?” I shoved her back against the wall. “Do you have a death wish? You could have been shot!”
She laughed, quietly, but she actually laughed. “You can’t shoot anyone with your gun in your holster Sheriff.” Sarcasm dripped with her words.
There she went again, making me feel like an incompetent hick town cop. I caught her wrists and pinned her arms over her head.
“I hate repeating myself. Why are you here?”
“We're trying to catch whoever sent you those pictures. Someone doesn't want you working with us and we're trying to find out who.”
“We're?” I asked. “Who else is here?”
“I have a couple of teammates strategically placed to watch the house and the street.”
“Look, if you're trying to scare me away from your case, it isn't going to work. Not if it intersects with mine, it isn't.”
“Yeah, because we all know how easy you scare...”
“You know, you're pretty sarcastic for a woman who's pinned against a wall. Obviously, you didn't learn your lesson the last time.”
She was getting on my last nerve and I wanted her off my property but I couldn't bring myself to let go of the annoying woman just yet. There was just something about her that got under my skin. It wasn't just that she annoyed me. I just couldn't put my finger on it. She was small but not fragile, smart but not completely confident in her abilities. She was a mass of contradictions and a major distraction. Being this close to her, touching her, was creating havoc between my brain and my body.
I need to quit thinking about her! Snap out of it! “You're trespassing, you know.”
“Where are the pictures?”
“What?”
“The pictures the stalker sent you? I want them. Where are they?”
“Those are evidence. They're in the evidence lock-up.”
“Yeah, and I'm the Queen of England. You don't strike me as the type to have others take care of something so personal Sheriff. I want to see if we can get prints off of anything.”
“That won't be necessary.”
“Why not?” Dana looked puzzled. “Oh, wait. I get it. You think you know who took those, don't you? Are they even related to either of our cases?”
I started to answer her but then Beth came out on the deck.
“Aunt Mel!” she yelled.
I dropped Dana's hands and she sank back into the shadows. I'd forgotten about Cole. Guilt washed over me.
“Coming sweetie!”
I used my cell to call the gas station before I re-entered the house. I let Kris know what happened and I told her I was going to take Cole over to the ER at Genesis Medical Center. When I entered the house, Beth was on me immediately.
“He says his head hurts Aunt Mel and he wanted some ibuprofen but I didn't know if he should have any.”
“We're going to run over to the ER and get him checked out. We'll let the doc decide what he can and can't have. If you're going with us, let's go.”
Kris got her backup to come in and close for her and she met us at the hospital. Cole was shaken up but otherwise pronounced healthy. The docs prescribed a couple of days of rest and warned him away from any more crazy stunts they didn't have ICD-9 codes for. He promised to behave but we all knew his promise would be forgotten and he would be on to something else in a few days’ time. That was Cole.
When we finally got home, Kris and the kids went on to bed. I was mentally drained and I needed to unwind. I grabbed a beer from my small stash at the back of the fridge. I started to close the door but then I paused and reached in for another.
I hadn't been sitting on the deck contemplating the stars for more than a couple of minutes when my hunch proved right and Dana joined me.
“How's the boy?” she asked as she pointed at the second beer.
I handed her the drink. “Cole is fine. He's a little banged up but he didn't get any more sense knocked into him, poor kid.” I changed the subject. “I figured you would be back around. You don't seem to give up easy.”
“I'm glad to hear that you're starting to see things my way.”
“Now don't go getting carried away. That was a nice way of saying that you're a very predictable sort of woman.”
Dana laughed. “And you're just a cranky old broad!”
“Who are you calling old?” When no answer other than more laughter materialized I turned the conversation back to why she was staking my place out in the first place. “You can go home. I'm safe here.”
“So you do know who took the photos then?”
“Same person that always does. My stalker of many years, Sally.”
“Sally?”
“Yep. Sally.”
Dana raised an inquiring eyebrow that I could see even in the darkness that engulfed us.
“She's probably out there now fuming as she tries to photograph us sitting here, in the dark, drinking a beer together.”
Dana's head was on a swivel.
“Relax. She's harmless. She's been stalking me from afar for several years.”
“Why, pray tell, or do I even need to ask?”
“Oh she's not a scorned lover or anything like that. She's a wannabe.”
“Wannabe what?”
“Lover, scorned lover. Take your pick.”
“Did you ever date her?”
“I was friends with her sister. Didn't know her – she didn't live here. She came around for the holidays one year and never left... moved in with her sister. Deb though she could use a friend, so she had us meet. After meeting her, I asked her out.
Long story short, it was the worst date of my life and I never asked her out again but she would come looking for me. She followed me around like a puppy for months afterward. She wanted us to be friends and on and on. Then, when she realized I was seeing other women, the stalking started. It was pretty intense for a while but she's toned it down over the last few years. Now she comes and goes.”
“The pictures you got were of you alone, you with your sister and with your sister’s kids. You weren't with a woman or doing anything out of the ordinary. Don't you think those shots could have been from someone else, trying to send you a message?”
“No. I really don't. This is the usual M.O. for her.”
“You're pretty confident about that. You must have made quite an impression on that one date!”
Her comment lightened the mood and I laughed. It felt good to laugh. “I guess you'll never know, will you?”
“I'm not in the market for a date or for anything else anyway Ms. Crane. I'm a baggage loaded train wreck waiting to happen over here. Right now, my job is all consuming.”
“Is that so?”
“Yes. Now, I hate to keep coming back to beat the same dead horse but, speaking of my job, about those pictures?”
“I just told you the whole sordid...”
Dana interrupted. “I just want to send the whole mess to our lab and check for prints. If they all belong to your stalker, I'll be out of your hair. You can handle her as you see fit. If they don't belong to her, we've got a bigger problem on our hands.”
I drew in a breath and let it out. She wasn’t going to give up. “Come on in. Let’s get this over with.”
I led her from the deck on through the house to my den. I closed the door once we were in there. “Everyone else is in bed,” I said. “I don’t want to wake them.”
Dana looked around. “This is quite a bit different from your office at the station.”
“That’s because this is mine and that isn’t. I’m just occupying that office until a new Sheriff can be elected.”
She inspected some family pictures on my wall. “Not planning to run for the position yourself?”
“Nope. I like street work. You know, rounding up stray livestock and such.”
“Listen, I apologize for that. I...”
I waved her off.
“The good old boy voters down here aren’t likely to elect somebody like me even if I did choose to run. I don’t apologize for the way I live my life to anyone.”
“And you shouldn’t but, I think you’d be surprised at your popularity out there. You have a lot of respect from people in this county.”
“And you know this how...”
Arrrgh! What is that thing?” Dana, still looking around my office, had rounded my desk and spotted my full mount piebald deer in a lying position, head up, on the floor.
“It’s a piebald.”
“A what? It’s a, what do call them... a baby deer... it’s a fawn. Why do you have a stuffed fawn in here?”
“It’s not a fawn. It’s a piebald. You’re not a P.E.T.A. freak are you?”
“Pita freak?”
“P.E.T.A.” I spelled it. “The organization; not the food.”
“What does that have to do with anything?”
“Look, hunting is a way of life around here. I brought a date home one night that freaked out on me when she saw that... Started calling me an animal murderer...”
“I don’t hunt but my dad and others in my family do. I don’t have a problem with it. I’m a carnivore.”
“Good to know.”
She sighed. “We’re getting off track here... again. The pictures?”
I opened my desk drawer and pulled the envelope out by the edges of the corner. “I don’t know why I’m being careful now. You and I had our hands all over all of this the other day when we were picking everything up off the floor like two rookies.”
“True that, but don’t think I’m not going to take them and get them checked out anyway.”
“You know, we do have a perfectly competent lab here.”
“Which we both know you won’t send them to hence why they’re in a desk drawer in your home.”
I didn’t reply. She was right again. Damn her!
Dana took the envelope. “It’s getting late. Since it seems you feel you don’t need any surveillance, I’m going to head back to Cleveland. I’ll be in touch as soon as I have results from these.”
I walked her to the door... the front door this time. And then, just like that, she was gone.
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