A Son's Tale

“And all of this is because you want to find out what happened to the missing box of evidence.”

“It’s part of an ongoing investigation so I can’t disc

uss details.”

Cal frowned. “Do you have a body, Detective? Have you found Claire?”

“Look, Professor, I appreciate your help. I can’t really say more, but I will tell you that this has to do with more than just Claire Sanderson. I was working on another case when I discovered the box missing.”

“So it really isn’t about my father?”

“I don’t know that.”

Frustrated, but appreciative that the detective was telling him as much as he could, Cal got off the phone with Miller and grabbed his briefcase. He had a class to teach.

And a woman to see there who, though they weren’t seeing each other yet romantically, still made his world look a hell of a lot better than it ever had before.

* * *

“OKAY, FRANK’S GOING to pick you up at school and drop you off at tryouts. I’ll pick you up there,” Morgan told Sammie as she dropped him off at school Wednesday morning. “You have everything you need?”

The boy, wearing his new sneakers and a University of Tennessee T-shirt and basketball shorts, all compliments of the Whittiers, smirked at her. “I’m ready, Mom. Frank said so. Quit worrying.”

She was a mother. It was her job to worry. Which he’d realize when he got older.

“Just remember, the other boys are all older than you. This is only your first time trying out.”

Looking at her with those expressive brown eyes, Sammie said, “Jeez, Mom, don’t you think I’m going to make it?”

“I think you’ve got a good chance, Sammie. I just don’t want you to give up if you don’t.”

“I’m not a quitter. That’s what you’ve always said. We Lowens don’t quit.”

“That’s right. We don’t.” She smiled at him. He was her son. For a while she’d almost forgotten what that meant. After years of fighting against her father’s manipulation, she’d almost given in to it. And lost her son in the process.

Thank God for Cal. He’d been put in her life for a reason. A very good one.

And it wasn’t just Cal. With Frank in Sammie’s life, her son had been almost a perfect child at home, and since she had no social life, she now had time in the evenings to spend on Mark Twain.

Wishing her son luck and giving him an extra long hug filled with all of the love she had stored up inside, she sent him off into his world and turned her car toward her own class.

* * *

WITH FINGERS THAT FUMBLED in his haste to not get ahead of himself, Ramsey Miller dialed a number he now knew by heart from the phone on his desk in the eighth precinct of the Comfort Cove Police Department.

Lucy had been on a case for a couple of days. She’d sent a text the night before that she’d wrapped it up—the body of the dead woman had led to the arrest of the woman’s husband—and was taking a couple of days off.

“Yeah? What’s up?” She sounded sleepy.

“Sorry to wake you.”

“No, that’s okay. I should be up, anyway. I have to get Mom’s breakfast this morning.” Lucy lived alone, but across the street from her mother who was not well. The woman who cared for her mother was good to Lucy, working unusual hours as they fit Lucy’s schedule, so Lucy generally gave the woman time off on her own days off.

“She in bed again?” Ramsey asked. Did Lucy ever notice that her mother always took to her bed on Lucy’s days off?

“Yeah. She had a spell last evening, apparently. Marie called just before she left.”

Sandy Hayes could get around well enough if she stayed off the alcohol. And took her depression medication. She seemed to prefer having Lucy there to take care of her.