Murder Mountain by Stacy Dittrich Page B

knew it wasn’t Kincaid since the door didn’t fly off its hinges.
    “Yeah. Come in,” I sounded more tired than angry. It was Coop.
    “Jesus, CeeCee. Are you okay? I’ve known you for a long time and never heard you go off the wall like that.” He almost tiptoed into my office. I think he was actually scared.
    “I’m fine. I’m just thinking about what my new career will be when they fire me for that minor episode.”
    “I doubt if they’ll fire you. You may have a nice, long 30-day suspension, though,” he smiled.
    “What’s she doing now?” I asked, assuming she was already headed for the sheriff’s office.
    “Actually, CeeCee, I think she’s crying. You were a little harsh, talking about blowjobs amongst other things. I know you’re mad, but ...”
    “She insinuated that Boz’s death was my fault.”
    “We’re all on edge. I don’t think she meant it. Regardless of how she got her position, she is still the captain. I’ve never seen her fall apart like that; you definitely hit a nerve. Do you know that once she told me if there’s anything she’d like to achieve out of this job, it’s getting your respect?”
    “She said that?” I started to feel slightly bad.
    “Yup. She respects you more than you know. She would love to be like you, and it’s obvious she has issues with it. You know, maybe you could wait a while and go apologize. I’ll bet she’d accept, and that would be the end of it, no suspensions, firings, nothing.”
    “What? She owes me an apology ...”
    “Come on, CeeCee!” He interrupted me sharply. “Why do you have to be so goddamn stubborn? I need you to help me with this case! We all need you here, and you can’t help us if you’re suspended.” He looked me right in the eye, making me feel just a bit foolish.
    “I’ll think about it,” was all I could bring myself to say.
    And I thought about it. After about a half an hour, I finally gathered enough courage and swallowed enough pride to make my way to Kincaid’s office. Surprisingly enough, she apologized first before I said anything. I can’t say my apology was all that sincere, but at least I offered it. We were back to business within the hour.
    I walked into Coop’s office and told him I had smoothed things over with Kincaid, which seemed to make him happy. I asked him where he was on Boz’s murder.
    “I have to tell you, CeeCee. I have absolutely nothing.” He looked as if he wanted to spit. “I am completely at a dead end. I hope the crime lab has something, which I have a bad feeling they don’t, or else we’re stuck. The snitches are out, but that’ll take some time. We’ve been looking at Boz’s past cases to see if anyone threatened him or had a grudge, but so far, we’ve found zilch. What we need to do is find Andrea Dean.”
    I hadn’t paid that much attention to Coop personally that morning, but when I looked at him as he was saying this, I could see that he looked exhausted. I didn’t need to ask him if he had been awake all night.
    “I’m going to Andrea’s right now,” I announced. “You look terrible. I think you should go home and get a couple of hours sleep. You can’t be as sharp as usual being this tired, and I wouldn’t want you to end up missing something. Don’t worry, I’ll take a uniform with me,” I said, responding to his raised eyebrows when he thought I would go alone.
    “You’re right,” he yawned, rubbing his eyes with the knuckles of his forefingers. “Listen, I’m not going to go home, though. What I think I’ll do is hit the bed in the holding cell so I can be around if anything breaks.”
    “I’ll let you know if something does,” I said over my shoulder as I left his office, quickly stopping at my desk to grab my briefcase before heading for my car.
    It was still early in the morning, but I thought this would be a good time to catch someone at the Dean house. I couldn’t care less if I got Andrea or her mother out of bed.
    I pulled into the