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"Thanks."
"What about Sally Buckland?" Caroline asked.
Dodge sighed but knew she would persist until he gave her a full explanation. "As I said, my one conversation with her didn't amount to anything. I called her--"
"Why were you calling her?"
"Because I thought maybe I could get more information out of her than Ski had. He's good, but his bedside manner needs some work."
"And yours has been perfected."
"Mother, please," Berry said wearily. "Let him tell us what he knows." To Dodge she said, "How did you obtain Sally's phone numbers?"
"I'll get to that. The point is, I called her cell phone several times. Got no answer but finally reached her on her landline. She was as evasive with me as she had been with Ski. The shooting here was none of her business, she hadn't seen any of the people involved since she left Delray Marketing, yada yada."
Berry asked, "Did she say I was lying when I called Oren a stalker?"
"Almost word for word what she'd told Ski."
"Incomprehensible," Berry murmured.
"I got the same runaround from the lady that Ski did. I decided to let her sleep on it, then tried calling her again this morning, hoping to catch her in a more cooperative mood. No answer on either number."
"She would have recognized your number on caller ID," Berry said. "She didn't want to talk, so she didn't answer."
"Figured that," Dodge said. "So I planned to drive down today for a face-to-face, see if I could get a better read, but you know what it's been like around here today."
She didn't know about the photos he'd tricked the deputy into giving him, and, for the time being, he wasn't going to tell her. Apparently Ski was of the same mind, or he would have told her about them. Oren's telephone call had knocked her on her can. Caroline was looking none too steady herself. Ski had put him in charge of protecting them, and that included withholding information that wasn't absolutely necessary for them to know. Knowing about the photographs would only add to their fear.
Dodge picked up the topic where he'd left off. "Yesterday Sally Buckland defended Oren Starks. Today he's using her cell phone."
Berry pulled her lower lip through her teeth. "That doesn't bode well, does it?"
"Not at all."
"I'm worried about her."
"You should be."
"You think she's in danger?"
Dodge frowned. "That wasn't what I was going to say."
"You're thinking so
mething," Caroline said. "What?"
"Starks and Sally Buckland could be in cahoots."
"I refuse to accept that," Berry said.
"Then give me something better."
"I can't, Dodge. But I know with certainty that Sally loathed Oren. Maybe even feared him just as I came to."
"Even antagonists can team up against a greater foe," Dodge said.
"Me? I'm the foe?"
