Murder in the Smokies - By Paula Graves Page 0,3
couldn’t hear what she said. “Let’s call in the Violent Crime Response Team. You know our techs aren’t trained to handle evidence retrieval at this level.”
Antoine grimaced. “What evidence?”
“My point exactly,” Ivy said flatly.
“Rayburn won’t like it,” Parsons warned.
Rayburn. Sutton searched his memory until he came up with a face to go with the name. Glen Rayburn had nabbed Sutton’s father, Cleve, at least once. Been a real bastard about it, as Sutton recalled. Not that the old man hadn’t deserved to be busted, but Rayburn had more or less told Sutton he’d be coming for him, too.
All Calhouns ended up in the cages sooner or later, he’d said.
Sutton had been smart enough to get out before he fell into his con man father’s undertow. He hadn’t had money for college, so he’d signed up with the U.S. Army and spent the next few years climbing the ladder through hard work and sheer cussedness.
That’s how he’d ended up at Cooper Security, working for Jesse Cooper and his trouble-magnet family. The head of Cooper Security had been looking to add people with Special Forces training to his staff. Sutton had fit the bill.
Parsons moved away from Ivy, pulling out his cell phone. She turned back to Sutton, cocking her head as she saw him watching her. She closed the distance between them with deliberate steps. “I thought you swore you’d never let the dust of Bitterwood touch your feet again.”
“That’s a little melodramatic.”
She shrugged. “You said it, not me.”
True, he had said it. And meant it. And if Stephen Billings hadn’t walked into Cooper Security two weeks ago looking for help investigating his sister’s murder, he probably would’ve kept that vow without another thought.
He’d told himself there was nothing back in Bitterwood to tempt him to return. He’d let himself forget Ivy and her loyal, uncomplicated friendship.
Too late now. Whatever connection they’d shared fourteen years ago was clearly dead and gone, if her cool gaze meant anything.
“I’m here on a job.” He kept it vague.
“What kind of job?”
Should have known vague wouldn’t work with a little bulldog like Ivy Hawkins. She’d never been one to take no for an answer. “An investigation.”
Her look of disbelief stung a little. “Someone hired you to investigate something here in little bitty Bitterwood?”
It did sound stupid, he had to admit. What ever happened in Bitterwood that interested anyone outside the city limits?
Maybe the truth was his best option. After all, she was technically an old friend, even if they were no longer close. And he might need all the help he could get to figure out who’d killed April Billings.
“I’m here to look into a murder that happened in Bitterwood a little over a month ago.”
“April Billings,” she said immediately.
He nodded. “Were you on that case?”
She shook her head. “She was the first.”
Something about her tone tweaked his curiosity. “The first?”
“Murder,” she said faintly. “First stranger murder in Bitterwood in twenty years.”
“And you’re sure it was a stranger murder?”
Her eyes met his, sharp and cautious. “All the signs were there.”
“I thought you didn’t investigate it.”
“I didn’t investigate it at the time it happened.”
“But you’ve looked into her death since?”
She cocked her head slightly. “Who sent you to investigate this case? Are you with the TBI?”
He almost laughed at that thought. His father had had enough run-ins with the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation that both their faces were probably plastered to the Knoxville field office’s front wall, right there with all the other most wanted. “No. Private investigation.”
“You’re a P.I.?” Her eyebrows arched over skeptical eyes.
“Sort of.”
Antoine Parsons returned, saving him from having to go into any more detail. “TBI’s sending their Violent Crime Response Team as soon as they can gear up and get on the road.”
“Good.” Ivy’s gaze didn’t leave Sutton’s face.
She was making him feel like a suspect. He didn’t like it one bit.
“Hawk, why don’t you go on home now?” Parsons suggested. “I’ll wait here for the TBI team and make sure our guys don’t make a mess. Get some sleep and we’ll hit the streets in the morning, see if we can find out why someone would kill Marjorie Kenner in her own home.”
In her own home, Sutton thought. Just like April Billings.
Had there been a connection between April and Marjorie? He supposed they’d been acquainted, at least in passing. At twenty, April wasn’t far out of high school, and her brother had told Sutton that his sister had been a Bitterwood High School graduate, though she and her parents hadn’t