Sunny wasn’t quite sure how to handle this kind of confession. Then, summoning up her inner Mary Poppins, she briskly dismissed Jane’s worries. “It’s not just the patients who like you. Anyone who’s brought an animal to you knows what a good vet you are. That you care for their pets and their feelings. I know that, because I’ve seen you with Shadow. And then there’s the work you’re taking on with the foundation. You’ve done a lot for this town, and people know that. And they do like you.”
Sunny picked up her sandwich. “Now let’s stop the shop talk and eat our lunch. I want to get at those chocolate-covered pretzels.”
Jane laughed, but she still wavered on the edge of crying.
Sunny leaned over and patted her on the hand. “You’ve got friends you don’t realize—Ben Semple, for instance. And like it or not, you’ve got me. Will may face all kinds of problems if he talks to you, but that doesn’t stop him from talking to me, and then I can talk to you. I don’t work for Frank Nesbit.”
Jane really started laughing when she heard that. “And I bet he thanks God every Sunday afternoon for that.” She looked down at her food. “Okay. Sandwiches, then pretzels.”
Sunny gave her a bracing smile. Bur underneath it, she thought,
*
The rest of lunch passed in chewing and small talk—not at the same time. They did have manners, after all. When they finished, Jane took Sunny’s arm again. “Thanks. We should do this again.” She sighed, but then grinned, her confidence apparently back in place. “Maybe with less police involvement.”
Sunny saw her to the door and then went back to work. She had a couple of new listings to add to the local attractions database. It was a calming sort of job. Wrangling with computer code seemed so much more straightforward than dealing with people.
The phone rang, and Sunny found herself back in the human equation. Will was on the other end of the line. “Would you mind grabbing a quick coffee with me when you finish work?”
Normally, she would’ve accepted with pleasure. Now, though . . .
“Does this have anything to do with the conversation I had with Ben Semple earlier today?” Sunny asked.
“Could be,” Will replied cautiously.
Sunny threw up her hands in surrender. What was she going to do? “Okay,” she said. “How about that new little café that opened near the harbor?”
When Sunny closed up the office, she walked the short distance downtown. The cobblestone street at harborside was as quaint as ever, but almost deserted thanks to the icy wind blowing in off the water. As the only customer at Spill the Beans, Sunny got a warm welcome and her choice of tables. She chose the one in the corner under the heater and settled in to defrost. Moments later, Will came in, tall and rangy in a dark blue parka. His chiseled features looked more like ice sculpture, the tips of his ears and nose red from the cold. He unzipped his coat, showing that he was still in civilian clothes, and sat across the small table from her, blowing on his fingers.
“You can order one of those New York cappy-frappy things if you like,” he said. “I just want a nice, big cup of American coffee to wrap my hands around.”
“Or maybe you could wear gloves,” Sunny suggested.
“They’re with my uniform coat,” he told her. “So they’re waiting for me when I start my shift.”
Before Will could say anything more, the waitress arrived and took their orders—American coffee for both of them. When she left, Will leaned across the table. “Sheriff Nesbit had me come in early today for a ‘fatherly chat.’”
Since Will’s late father had been sheriff before Frank Nesbit got elected to the office, there were several layers of meaning for Sunny to unpack from that sentence. Will blamed Nesbit not only for driving his dad from office, but for the older Price’s death in an auto accident soon afterward.
Will sat silently for a moment as their coffees arrived. Sunny took a sip. “It’s pretty good, even if it doesn’t have a shot of hazelnut buffalo milk.”
Will just made a noncommittal sound, stirring his spoon in his cup.
“So what do you need to get off your chest?” Sunny prompted. “What did you and Nesbit chat about? Trumbull? Jane?”
“Both,” Will said. “I guess it got pretty loud. Ben must have overheard some of it.” He shot her an anxious glance. “What did he tell you?”
“Well, he mentioned that there might be a problem for a cop who was—‘close’ was the way he put it—with a murder suspect.” She frowned. “Does Nesbit think Jane did it?”
“He doesn’t care.” From the look on Will’s face as he sipped from his cup, he might as well have been drinking pond scum. “But he gave me a great lecture on avoiding even the appearance of impropriety.” He set the cup down a little too sharply. Coffee slopped onto the acrylic cover that protected the reclaimed wood of the table. “The big hypocrite.”
“So what’s the bottom line?” Sunny asked.
