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Her lips trembled, but she nodded in acceptance. “I don’t know much, Zeke. I know they were seeing some girl. They fought over her at first. Joe was angry with Jaime for a couple days, then . . . ” She blushed and shrugged. “You know how they were. When they argued over something like that, they either ended up both doing without it or sharing it. ”
He moved to the threadbare though clean easy chair as she sat on the matching couch.
“So they were sharing a woman? Do you know who it was?” he asked her.
“I don’t know if it had gone that far yet. ” She shook her head. “And they wouldn’t tell me who the girl was. They just said her daddy would have a stroke if he found out. That was a couple of days before you found them. ” A tear slipped down her cheek.
“You were close to your brothers, Lisa,” he stated. “You’ve always known what they were doing. ”
“And who they were doing,” she said mockingly, bitterly. “But they weren’t talking this time. They did that sometimes though, if their lover didn’t want anyone to know, then they didn’t tell, Zeke. You know how it is around here. Joe and Jaime knew how to keep their secrets, even from me. Most of the time I only found out by accident when they were dating someone together. ”
“Did they say anything more about the father?” he asked.
?
??They didn’t say anything more, period. ” She shook her head. “The next day I was at the hospital with Grandma. There was no time to question them, and I was worried about Grandma. I didn’t think. ” Another tear slipped free. “I just didn’t think to question them about it. ”
Another damned dead end and a secret that had killed. The story of his life for too many years to count.
“Were Joe and Jaime involved in anything else?” he asked her then. “Any kind of drugs?”
A flash of anger darkened her eyes. “Joe and Jaime didn’t do drugs, Zeke. ”
“We found evidence of pot in the house, Lisa; could they have been involved with anything stronger?”
“Hell, that’s like finding a beer in the house,” she exclaimed. “Come on, Zeke, pot’s not that big of a deal around here and you know it. Sure, they smoked a little of it, but never a lot. And Joe and Jaime didn’t do the hard stuff. ”
He tightened his jaw for long moments, staring back at her, hating the questions he had to ask.
“Lisa, I need you to think for me, to be very sure. Now’s not the time to try to protect Joe and Jaime, not if you want me to figure out what happened to them. Did you ever know of them doing heroin or anything stronger than a little pot?”
She stared back at him as though he were a stranger now. As though he were accusing her brothers of some heinous crime.
“Never, Zeke,” she finally answered. “And I would have known. Plain and simple, they didn’t have the money or the personalities for that junk. Joe and Jaime liked to play, they liked to have fun, and they didn’t consider hardcore drugs as fun. ”
He nodded at that. Joe and Jaime didn’t do hard drugs. That was what everyone said.
But someone was trying to make it look as though Joe at least had done something a lot stronger than a little pot.
“Zeke?” He turned to Rogue’s melodious voice, his body tightening, his cock giving an eager jerk at the pure, sweet sound that wrapped around his head. “Grandma Walker wants to talk to you. She said you can come in here and discuss her boys with her or you can face her once she’s strong enough to get to your office. It’s your choice. ”
He grimaced at that. Callie Walker was hell on wheels when she was pissed off. If she made it to the sheriff’s office, it would be an event no one was likely to forget for a while. Callie Walker would flay the hide off a man at twenty paces with a look alone.
He rose from his seat. “I’ll talk to her. ” Turning back to Lisa, he felt a senseless frustrated anger filling him. They were expecting him to fix this. To figure things out and make someone pay. He couldn’t make anyone pay without proof, and proof was sadly lacking.
Rogue watched Zeke as he moved into Grandma Walker’s room. She could hear his voice, low, deep as he talked to the old woman. It was gentle, soothing. Grandma Walker wouldn’t be with them much longer, and she knew it, ached because of it. The death of her two favorite grandsons hadn’t helped anything.
She wasn’t Rogue’s grandmother, though the old woman had all but adopted her. The relationship was distant—she was a cousin to Rogue’s father—but Rogue couldn’t have loved her more if she had been her own grandmother.
“He’s crazy about you,” Lisa said softly as Rogue moved into the room. “He couldn’t take his eyes off you. ”
Rogue snorted at that. “Not hardly, Lisa. ”
Lisa shook her head. “He’s always watched you just as hard as you watch him,” she said. “He likes to deny it just as hard as you do. ”
Who said she was denying her part of it?
Rogue let a soft smile tilt her lips as she sat down on the couch and drew Lisa down with her. The other girl was exhausted. She’d been trying to take care of her grandmother and her two twin boys at the same time for months. Divorced and on edge, the pressure was beginning to show on her pretty face.
