Ben’s answering smile was strained. “I can only stay for a second or two.” He glanced through the window at his patrol car double-parked outside. “I just wanted you to know that the Portsmouth department has gone official, asking a lot of questions about Jane Rigsdale—and Will.”
“I’d have imagined Sheriff Nesbit would be tickled pink that Martin Rigsdale moved out of town before he got himself killed.” Sunny couldn’t keep the sarcasm from her voice. Whenever the election cycle came around, Frank Nesbit plastered the area with posters about his great job of “Keeping Elmet County Safe.” The problem was, many people suspected the sheriff of enhancing that safety record by playing with the crime statistics. That was why a political faction in Kittery Harbor wanted Will Price in charge. With his background as a state trooper and then as a Portsmouth cop, Will had credible police experience.
“Yeah, the sheriff’s glad about Rigsdale,” Semple said, “but he’s giving Will grief about his relationship with Jane.” He quickly switched conversational gears when he caught the look on Sunny’s face. “I mean, these days Will and Jane are friends, but years back they were pretty serious. It doesn’t look good for a cop to be close to someone involved in a murder investigation.” Sunny was sure her expression didn’t improve when she heard that. If there was one thing that trumped professionalism, it was politics. And Frank Nesbit was a master politician. That was how he’d won and so far kept the job as sheriff.
“If the sheriff had his way, he wouldn’t even let Will talk to Jane,” Ben said.
“It’s going to be tough for her,” he went on, “since she really doesn’t have many friends here in town.”
There it was—the Kittery Harbor Code, “Do right by your neighbors.” Unfortunately, the flip side of that translated into a kind of clannish mind-set: “To hell with outsiders.”
By moving out of Kittery Harbor, Sunny, Jane, and Will had all turned themselves into outsiders. Sunny might not like to think about it, but for a lot of folks in town, the jury was still out on the returnees. Yet Sunny also knew that she was a product of Kittery Harbor. “Do right.” “Never go back on your word.” Those were things that she she’d grown up believing—and still believed.
She sighed as Ben said good-bye and headed out.
*
Not long after Ben Semple went back on patrol, Jane arrived at the MAX office door. “I thought we could go down the block to Judson’s and pick up some sandwiches there,” she suggested. “My treat.”
Sunny nodded. “Sounds good to me.”
The deli counter was pretty busy—a lot of folks in the area had had the same idea for lunch. Sunny got Black Forest ham and Swiss cheese on rye with honey mustard. Jane got fresh turkey breast, coleslaw, and tomato on a roll.
“You’re brave,” Sunny told her. “If I ordered that, I’d end up with coleslaw on my chin.”
They both got lemonades, and Jane snagged a bag of chocolate-covered pretzels. They both headed back down the block to the MAX office. Sunny checked the answering machine and the e-mail. “Okay, no messages, no disasters—let’s eat!”
In moments they’d settled in around Sunny’s desk and unwrapped their sandwiches. “Now what’s this problem with the Portsmouth cops?” Sunny asked.
“It started with a call from that guy Fitch,” Jane said. “He was asking how often it happened that a medical professional broke a hypodermic needle in a patient. I said, quite honestly, I didn’t know. That certainly wasn’t something I’d try to answer off the top of my head. Then he asked if it had ever happened to me.”
Jane took a bite of her sandwich and chewed for a moment. “From the way he asked, I knew that he already had the answer.”
“Which was ‘yes,’” Sunny said.
