“If you all don’t mind, I’d like to speak to Claire in private. Certain details of the investigation are somewhat sensitive.”
Ruth didn’t bother to hide her disappointment as Claire rose and led the way to her office. Riley shut the door, then stretched out in her visitor’s chair, rubbing at his forehead. He looked tired, she thought. His day likely had been even harder than hers. She’d only had to deal with one robbery while he’d been faced with a whole crop of them.
“Would you like some coffee?” she asked. “Or I’ve got tea.”
“I’m good, thanks. If I have any more caffeine today, I’m going to be jumpier than a grasshopper on lawn-mowing day.”
“You have information for me?” she asked.
“I guess you could call it information. For what it’s worth anyway. It’s not much, I’m afraid, but I did tell you I would pass along what I could. We found a possible eyewitness who saw a suspicious vehicle pulling away from the pizza place at an odd time in the early hours of the morning. A late-model dark blue or green or black extended-cab pickup truck. The eyewitness didn’t get a good look and is uncertain whether it was a Dodge or a Ford.”
“Great. That should narrow it down to, oh, maybe half the town.”
“I know it’s broad, but at least it’s something. Not all the security cameras in the other businesses were disabled. We’ve got security footage at the bike shop that shows three different individuals at the scene, but they’re all wearing ski masks and cheap disposable raincoats over their parkas to hide any identifying clothing.”
With some degree of shame, she realized she hadn’t given much thought to the rest of the affected stores. “Was the damage serious at the other businesses?”
“It varies. Computers, a little cash. They took a high-end mountain bike from Mike’s Bikes.” Despite the fatigue still etched into his features, his gaze seemed to sharpen. “Yours was the only store to see actual vandalism.”
Lucky her. “I still don’t understand why. Maybe they were angry that I didn’t have much for them to steal for their trouble.”
“Could be. Or maybe it was more personal. I’m sorry, but I have to ask, Claire. Can you think of anyone with a grudge against you, besides Dr. Asshole?”
She stared at him and then started to laugh. She couldn’t help herself. “Jeff? You think Jeff had something to do with this? That’s completely insane! He would never be involved in anything like this. Anyway, he has no reason to have a grudge against me. If anything it’s...”
“The other way around?”
Any trace of laughter shriveled. “Jeff and I have tried very hard to get along, for the sake of our children.”
“Ah, that rare beast, the amicable divorce.” Although he spoke in a light, mocking tone, she saw something in his eyes, some hint of bitterness, and she remembered the raw shock of his parents’ breakup. She and Alex had just been starting their senior year, so they would have been about seventeen. Riley would have been about fourteen, she estimated. Although she had seen it all through the prism of her best friend’s experience, she knew all six of the McKnight children had been confused and angry, devastated by the destruction of what had always seemed a happy family to everyone in town.
She knew Riley had struggled the most, the lone male left in a household of women after their father abruptly moved away from Hope’s Crossing to follow his own scientific ambitions.
“We’ve worked to make it as amicable as possible,” she finally answered stiffly. She really hated talking about her divorce.
“What about the new wife? We believe at least one of the individuals on the security footage might be a female.”
She tried to picture Holly skulking around town with a band of cat burglars, breaking into businesses, stealing bikes and computers and trashing String Fever—and Genevieve Beaumont’s wedding dress. The image was even more amusing than the idea of Jeff on a wild crime spree.
“You’re telling me you suspect that a woman who is five months pregnant might be some ruthless criminal mastermind?”
His dimple quirked. “Hard to say under the plastic raincoat whether she was pregnant. But, okay, probably not.”
“A word of advice. You might want to rethink dragging Holly into your little room with the lightbulb for an interrogation.”
He gave a full-fledged grin at that, all those shadows of earlier gone. He’s a pest, she reminded herself, but it was very tough to remember that when he gunned her engine like it hadn’t been revved in a long time.