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“Can I help you?” he asked the kid in his deepest and loudest tone.
The kid startled, and when she turned her face to him, he realized it was a teenaged girl. She squealed her surprise, lost her balance, and promptly fell inside through the window.
Super. Officially breaking and entering—or more like breaking and falling. He edged to the window, looked down at the display, and assessed that she wasn’t hurt. He didn’t see any bleeding or scratches, but she lay splayed across the floor in a heap, her dark brown hair forming a cloud around her head.
“Are you OK, kid?”
He pushed down the panic in his voice.Please.No more kids hurt on my watch.
“I’m fine! And I didn’t do anything wrong.” She pushed hair out of her equally dark brown eyes. Raised her chin, defiant. Nice. So it was his fault he’d caught her in the act.
“Except breaking and entering.” He took a deep breath in and let it out.
“What did you say?” The kid seemed confused.
Maybe she had a concussion.
“Get up. I’ll take you to the station, and we can call your parents.”
The last thing he wanted to do was be responsible for this kid, but she’d committed a crime right in front of his eyes, and he couldn’t let her go now. Knowing Sheriff Calhoun and his bleeding heart ways, he’d probably just give the girl a stern lecture.
“My parents? Why? Are you nuts?”
“No, but maybe you are. Then again, you probably didn’t realize a cop lives in this neighborhood. You picked the wrong house, kid.”
His voice sounded strained in his ears. The breathing exercises weren’t working. Again. He just wanted to get away from here and go back in his house where he could breathe. Why did this kid have to pick his neighborhood?
“I live here, you nerd.” She almost spat the words out, scrambling to her feet.
He was supposed to believe that.
“The front door is a better place to come in if you live here. And you can come out the front door now. I’m guessing the owners aren’t home.”
“You don’t believe me. Gee, what a shock.”
“Why should I?”
In his experience, best relegated to the deep recesses of his mind, kids rarely told the truth. He used to believe them as much as he believed anyone else, until he’d been burned.
“I can call my mother. She’ll tell you.” Her defiance continued, unabated. This kid was a piece of work.
“You better do that.”
He would have to talk to the kid’s mother anyway. Might as well have her come to him, and then they could all three drive to the station. He’d let Calhoun decide what to do with the kid.
The girl reached inside her jeans pocket for a cell phone. He watched as she pushed buttons and sighed with exasperation.
“No luck?”
“She never remembers to turn her phone off silent.”
Jack shrugged. He’d bet this kid had a million excuses, and maybe there was no mother coming at all.
One year ago,Maggie Bradshaw could only operate her own coffeemaker, but now she churned out one drink after another. Espressos, lattés, and chai to plain drip, and she had the recipes memorized. Not that she poured coffee from a pot often, but when she had an order like that, she stopped for a moment and took a deep breath.
Her favorites were the iced drinks, and during afternoon lulls she experimented with flavors and mixes. Vera Carrington, her boss and the owner of The Bean, loved Maggie’s creativity and even encouraged it. She even named one of the drinks that Maggie had concocted after her: Maggie’s Marvelous MysteriousMocha. It contained the secret ingredients—specialty chocolate mixed with just a hint of cherry.
“Taste this.”
