Celeste isn’t a murder suspect,” he answered. “When the FBI had Dorian in custody and questioned him, he contended that your grandmother had had no part in the robbery, but since he was claiming at the time that his partner had taken half the money and gone off on his own, there was no indication that Rider was dead or whether or not Celeste was involved. Now everything is in question again.”
“And at the very least Celeste could have been an accessory before or after the fact,” Eden contributed even as she cataloged the length and shape of his nose—a little long with a bit of a bump in the bridge that was somehow sexy….
“Like I said, there’s renewed interest in Celeste,” he repeated.
“And my part in this?” Eden prompted, fighting to keep her thoughts where they belonged and not on him.
“When Dorian was questioned he claimed that Celeste had gained considerable weight, plus there’s a woman in Bozeman who believes she might have worked with Celeste in 1968. We have a description from her for you to work into the whole picture and she also described Celeste as heavyset—”
“Celeste…my grandmother…was as near as Bozeman? I hadn’t heard that,” Eden said, shocked and yanked by that shock from studying his sideburns—not too long, not too short.
“Yes, it seems likely your grandmother was in Bozeman and calling herself Charlotte Pierce. Does that ring a bell?”
Eden shook her head. “No, the name Charlotte Pierce doesn’t sound familiar,” she said. “And I’m sure my family told you when they were dispatched to ask, but I don’t ever remember having any contact with anyone who might have been Celeste, either. Or with anyone who caused any kind of question in my mind.”
“That information was relayed and entered into the reports,” he confirmed. “But between the weight gain and the fact that a lot of years have passed to also alter Celeste’s appearance, we thought a computer image progression might help to approximate the changes as she aged, along with what she might look like now. If we can, we want to determine if she ever did come back to or through Northbridge again—the way she told several people she planned in order to see her sons again—”
“My dad and my uncle,” Eden said even as her gaze drifted to Cam’s wavy hair worn just long enough to be combed back on top and short everywhere else.
But they were talking about her grandmother’s appearance, she reminded herself, not Cam’s.
“So I’ll have the description from the woman in Bozeman,” she said then, “and what else? There can’t be many photographs of Celeste—I’ve never seen one.”
“Because your grandfather destroyed them all when she took off. The only picture we have of her is from the newspaper article written when she and the reverend moved to town. She was in her twenties in the snapshot and showing it around hasn’t done any good. We’re hoping that whatever you come up with will be more what she might have looked like later on and may spur someone’s memory. If Celeste did come through here she might have left behind some clue as to where she was headed after that, where she might be now if she’s still alive.”
“Or if she came into Northbridge and stayed—my sisters and cousins told me there’s speculation about that.”
“Some,” Cam conceded. “And that’s it. That’s where the case stands. Except that we’re getting pressure from the FBI and from the state investigators to get things moving on this. The skeletal remains were found at the start of November. Between waiting for the results from forensics and the holiday holdups, and then waiting for you to get here, the last two months and counting have just gone down the drain.”
He said that as if it were entirely Eden’s fault and made her feel the need to justify herself.
“I was working on another case before Christmas and then I had to get back to Hawaii to pack up my house—my whole life really—and arrange to get everything here. I just arrived this morning, driving my car behind the moving van. I had to wait for the truck to be unloaded and as soon as it was, I came here because I know this needs to get underway. If there was too much of a rush to wait for me, you could have had someone else do this for you. It isn’t even my official job anymore, I’ve quit to do other things and only agreed to do this one last case because I’d be in Northbridge anyway and it seemed dumb to make anyone else come in to do it.”
“You are the authority on dumb,” he said under his breath.
No, he hadn’t forgotten a thing….
“And I suppose,” he added facetiously before she could respond to his comment, “that you aren’t curious about any of this yourself.”
Not even disgust disguised the suppleness of lips that were perfectly shaped.
“Of course I’m curious,” Eden said. “I have a personal interest—this is my grandmother. The woman who ran out on my grandfather and abandoned my father and my uncle when they were little boys. And then to think that there’s any possibility that she’s actually been here, that I could have run into her at some point or even know her? Yes, I’m anxious to do this job and see who my grandmother might be. But what I’m saying is—”
“Yeah, I know what you’re saying—that there’s something in it for you but that we should still be grateful to have you.”
He might not be hard on the eyes but he definitely wasn’t going to make this easy.
“No, what I’m saying is that I got here as soon as I could but if that wasn’t good enough, you didn’t need to wait for me.”
“Apparently we did,” he nearly sneered.
Again Eden reminded herself that he had cause to dislike her and bypassed his less-than-subtle display of it. “Well, I’m here now and I’ll get this done. Although probably not before Wednesday because I’ll need a day to get myself organized enough to find the box with my equipment and software—”
“I’m just glad to hear you don’t want to do it this minute. I’d like to get home.”
In other words, he didn’t care about her explanation, he only wanted this meeting finished.
Eden was more than willing to oblige him—a feast for the eyes or not, she was hardly enjoying this.
“I’ve seen what I came to see, I think we’re done here,” she informed him.
“Does that mean I’m dismissed?”
“It just means we’re done for now,” she said with a weary sigh.
“Good,” he decreed, walking out of the small room just like that. Without another word or a backward glance.
Maybe he had some of that stuff fourteen years ago coming, Eden thought, losing her patience as she trailed behind to return to the outer office.
He put on his coat in silence.
Eden put on her coat in silence.
And they both arrived at the door at the same time.
“After you,” he said none too nicely, sweeping a long arm toward the station entrance.
Eden
