A Killer Past by Maris Soule Page A

Back in the days when knowing if she was being followed or not was important, she would have known. Back then she could identify all makes of cars. Doing so had helped her avoid mistakes. Kept her alive.
    Two teenagers came out of the restaurant, their jeans low on their hips and hoodies covering their heads and torsos. One walked with a limp. The other held his arm by his side.
    The two from Thursday night?
    She wasn’t sure. Her eyes weren’t as sharp as they used to be.
    They were talking to each other, walking slowly toward the black car. Mary stepped closer to the gym door, triggering the automatic opener. Without looking away from the boys, she stepped inside, and then stopped. A girl came out of the restaurant behind the boys, half-running until she caught up with them. The boy who’d been holding his arm by his side handed her something – using that arm – and she pulled his hood off his head, rose up on her toes, and kissed him.
    He had blond hair.
    Not the boy from Thursday night. The three didn’t even stop when they reached the black sedan, simply kept walking.
    With a shake of her head, Mary turned and headed for her locker. She was getting paranoid in her old age. Gang members wouldn’t be driving a sedan. Not one as new-looking as she’d been seeing. They’d be driving an SUV, or a truck … or a beater.
    And how could a car following her – one she was sure she’d lost – know where she was going?
    Think things through , Carl used to tell her. Don’t let your emotions rule your head.
    Of course, if she’d listened to her emotions on her last assignment, a young mother would still be alive.
    And so would Pandora Coye.
    Mary considered that as she spun the dial on her lock. If she hadn’t killed the wrong woman, if the agency hadn’t agreed to allow her out, where would she be today?
    Probably dead, she decided.
    Back when she turned thirty, she’d already become disillusioned with the agency, and had started questioning her assignments. She should have questioned her last assignment, done her own research. Never again would she allow someone else to control her actions.
     
    Jack stared at the report Police Chief Tom Wallace, known by allas Wally, had just dropped on his desk. With their limited number of officers, the Rivershore Police Department wasn’t large enough to have special units devoted to homicide, drug enforcement, vice, or gangs. Jack handled the majority of those cases, which up until a few years ago hadn’t been an overwhelming assignment.
    Not that Rivershore didn’t have problems before the economy went bad, but those cases were usually confined to misdemeanors. Now, along with the increase in robberies, there’d been a spike in drug arrests. The meth labs were his biggest concern. He’d seen too many of Rivershore’s citizens wasted on the drug. He worried about the impact on the families, especially the young children. Marijuana busts had also increased. He found it amazing how many farmers swore they had no idea how marijuana plants had popped up in their back yards or cornfields.
    They’d rarely made an arrest for cocaine or heroin until Jose Rodriguez moved into town. Jose had been twenty-two when he decided to take up residence in Rivershore, Michigan. With him he brought a prison record and an attitude. In the two years since his arrival, gang violence among the Mexicans had increased, along with the drug problem.
    Jose’s parole officer swore Jose wasn’t involved, that the man had turned over a new leaf. Neither Jack nor Wally believed that was true, but so far they hadn’t been able to prove otherwise.
    Jack put down the report he’d been given and looked up at Wally. ‘Is this Pedro Rodriguez any relation to our boy Jose?’
    ‘That’s for you to find out,’ Wally said. ‘The guy had a kilo of cocaine in his car when Stewart stopped him. Stu says he couldn’t believe it.’
    ‘How’d he find it?’ Jack asked. ‘Did he get a tip?’
    ‘Nope.’