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Reed followed his boss’s blocky form through the front door and down a short corridor. Stepping sideways, he squeezed past Don and managed to keep his features blank as he took in the large room. Damn, whoever had done this had really gone to town. He wanted to go to Sierra and look her in the eye, to make sure she was okay. But this was his first day on the job and he’d learned enough about his new boss to let him take the lead.
“You see what I mean.” Sierra gestured to the room and Reed detected a slight wobble in her voice. Now he really wanted to go over to her. Let her know everything was going to be okay.
“Mmm.” Don turned his head slowly, taking in the chaos, face calm and impassive. “Yes.” His voice took on an almost perfunctory tone. “This can’t have been nice to come home to, I’m sure.”
That seemed like a bit of an understatement, and Reed flicked a quick glance at his boss. Surely, Don realized how traumatizing a break-in could be? Reed caught the undercurrent of something else going on here, as if his boss had something against Sierra. Which was odd. He filed that fact away for later.
It was cold in here. Not as cold as outside, where the icy wind dropped the temperature by a number of degrees, but still cool enough for Reed to want to pull up his collar. He turned, and saw a wood-stove hunkered down in the corner of the room, but it was unlit. If that was her only form of heating, maybe she’d been too rattled to light it today.
“No, it did scare me at first. But once I was sure no one was still in the house, then I just got really angry.” She squared her shoulders. “I wanted to find whoever did this and give them a piece of my mind.”
Reed hid a smile. He could imagine her doing just that, her dark eyes flashing as she let her wrath fly.
“The hardest part was not cleaning everything up. I just want to get everything back to normal.”
“I can imagine,” Don soothed. “We won’t take long, and then you can get everything back to rights again. Okay?”
“That sounds good.”
“Do you know how they got in?”
“Yes, they jimmied the window in the bathroom,” she said.
“Mmhmm,” Don replied, tapping his chin and gazing down the corridor toward the bathroom at the end. “I’ll take a look in a sec, check for fingerprints, that kind of thing.”
Reed’s head came up at the Sarge’s comment, but then of course, they didn’t have special forensic officers to do things like dust for prints. Don’s comment from earlier this morning came back to him, they had to be jacks-of-all-trades out here. Reed would’ve liked to be the one to do it, with all his training he no doubt would’ve done a better job than Don, but again, his new status kept him from opening his mouth.
“Can you tell us what’s missing? Officer Kapua can take notes,” Don said, nodding in Reed’s direction, and he belatedly felt around in his police vest pocket for the little note book he always carried, casting a wry glance in his boss’s direction. Reed shrugged the small flicker of resentment away. He’d had supervisors like this before. Who liked to do things the old-fashioned way. The Sergeant didn’t take notes. Reed was the junior officer, and Don was going to make damn sure he knew his place.
Reed stepped over the lamp, still lying on the floor and made his way to where Sierra hovered next to the kitchen counter.
“Okay. Try and remember everything you can that might’ve been stolen,” he said and started writing on his notepad, catching sight of Don out of the corner of his eye. His boss walked over and peered in the door to what he assumed was Sierra’s bedroom. The stocky man frowned, and Reed guessed that room was as much of a mess as this one.
Sierra watched him with wary eyes, arms crossed in front of her chest, a protective gesture. But protecting herself from what, he didn’t know. Him? Don?
It seemed odd that someone would completely trash the place like this. Granted, he’d been to crime scenes where burglars had turned everything upside down to make sure they didn’t miss anything. But it didn’t seem like they’d taken much here.
“So, my computer was stolen, like I told you earlier.” She worried at her bottom lip with her teeth as he noted that down with his pencil. “I need that computer, it’s got everything on it. All my work, you know?”
Reed nodded and she fidgeted under his gaze, re-crossing her arms once, and then twice.
“They took all of my jewelry as well. Most of it was worthless, but there were a few valuable pieces. There was an antique ruby ring that belonged to my grandmother.” Sierra moved her gaze to stare out the window, a faraway gleam in her eye. “And a diamond necklace. My father gave it to me for graduation.” She gave a sad smile, leading Reed to believe it was more than just the monetary value she was worried about. It obviously held a great amount of sentimental value as well.
“And they took a stash of cash I had hidden away for a rainy day. Bastards,” she muttered under her breath. “It must’ve been at least two-thousand dollars.”
Reed gave a long low whistle. That was a lot of cash to have sitting around the house. And a lot of money to lose. But something about the whole thing didn’t sit quite right. There were a heap of other valuables in her house, like a state-of-the-art-smart TV, and expensive Bluetooth stereo and speakers. Thieves, especially groups of young thugs, often took the high-end liquor, expensive cosmetics, and any prescription drugs they could get their hands on as well. But when he questioned Sierra, she confirmed these items had remained untouched. Why had the burglars left all that? Not wanting to worry her, he kept his thoughts to himself.
“This is probably just the work of some bored kids looking for something to do, or druggies looking for money. Sorry, I couldn’t get any decent prints from the broken window,” Don said, returning from inspecting the bathroom, running his fingers down his mustache thoughtfully.
“No.” Sierra shook her head. “You’re right, I came to the same conclusion last night. Although, I did get Sam, my neighbor to come up and check it out for me. He wanted me to come down and sleep at their house, but I said I’d be okay.” Sierra looked a little sheepish, as if she was admitting to a weakness, having to ask her male neighbor for help. Most women wouldn’t have even dared stay in the house on their own after something like this. She was much stronger than she knew. “Sam also checked the security light for me as well. Whoever broke in just unscrewed the bulb to make sure everything would stay dark, so at least I didn’t have to replace that.”
With her hip resting against the kitchen bench, she watched them as they both took one last tour of her house, arms still crossed. It seemed to be her fallback, as if she was constantly on guard, constantly protecting herself from something. Tall and slender, standing on one long leg, the other booted foot balanced on the floor behind her. When she noticed him staring, that bow-shaped mouth tipped up at the corners in a half-smile. He had to physically drag his eyes away from her face. She was absolutely gorgeous, even dressed in her casual attire.
Once more, he found himself wondering about her. A single woman living out here alone. Well, he assumed she was single, there was no ring on her finger, and if she had to be asking her neighbor for help then there was no male person of significance around. She looked to be in her early to mid-thirties, but he could be mistaken. Was she older than she looked? There were fine lines around her eyes he hadn’t noticed last night, that hinted perhaps she had more experience in life than he first imagined. But then, who was he to talk? He was thirty-eight already, and he was none the wiser about life, women, or anything else that truly mattered.
He tore his gaze away, and did one last pass through the living area. He was drawn toward the floor-to-ceiling windows at the front of the room. None of them looked like they’d been tampered with or smashed, in fact they were amazingly clean.
“Wow, what a stunning view,” he breathed. “Now I can see why you live here.” Low, scrubby hills fell away before the house, ending in a hint of yellow sand as Snellings Beach curled away towards the headland. Then there was nothing but ocean as far as the eye could see. The water was indigo-blue today, topped with angry white caps as the wind and stormy weather whipped them up. But he could imagine this view when the sun was shining on a balmy, summer afternoon. It would be pure magic.
