“You play?” Roger asked and leaned down to pick up the ball. “I could use a little more competition to keep me in shape.” He grinned at Claire as she started to protest. “Face it, Short Stuff, you’re good for running me around, but not any real competition.”
Bo smiled at the outrage on Claire’s face. “Actually, I played a little in high school,” he said. “But not since, so I probably wouldn’t be any better competition than Claire.”
“He wouldn’t trade me in for somebody better,” Claire replied. “If he had any real competition and got beat he’d go home and cry like a sissy baby. And speaking of going home, I’ve invited Roger back to my place for a late lunch, and now that you’re here, you’re coming, too.”
“Oh no.” Bo took a step backward. “I don’t want to intrude.”
“Nonsense,” Roger replied. “It’s an eat-and-run for me. Besides, Claire already told me she made chicken salad and you don’t want to miss a chance to taste it. She makes the best.”
Claire looped her elbow with Bo’s. “No arguments. You’re coming to eat and once we’re finished you and I will have a chance to talk.” Her blue eyes radiated a steely strength.
“You might as well just give in,” Roger said. “When Claire makes up her mind about something it’s darned near impossible to change it.”
“Bossy little thing, isn’t she?” Bo replied, making Roger laugh and Claire sputter a protest.
Minutes later as Bo followed Roger’s car with Claire’s bicycle fastened to a rack on its back bumper and her in his passenger seat, Bo realized Roger was right.
Claire was like a force of nature, a whirling dervish of focused energy. Cyclone Claire, he thought with wry amusement as he pulled up behind Roger’s car in front of her house.
The moment they got inside the door, Claire pointed them to the table where the two men sat across from each other and talked about sports while Claire bustled to get plates and drinks on the table.
Bo almost immediately noticed two things about his male lunch partner. Roger appeared to be a nice man, and he seemed to suffer more than a little bit of obsessive-compulsive disorder.
Claire tossed his silverware next to his plate and he carefully lined up spoon, fork and knife and then moved his iced tea glass a half an inch to the right of his plate.
“We’re rolling our own,” Claire said as she placed first a large bowl of chicken salad in the center of the table and then a plate of soft whole-wheat tortillas next to the bowl. “Eat up,” she said and joined them at the table.
Bo grabbed one of the tortillas and globbed the chicken salad onto it and then folded it into a semblance of a sandwich. Roger carefully spooned the salad into equal mounds and then rolled the tortilla into a neat burrito.
While they ate, the conversation remained pleasant. It was obvious Roger and Claire shared the camaraderie of coworkers and an easy friendship.
Once they were finished eating it took Claire only minutes to clear the table. “Have you asked Mary out yet?” Claire asked Roger as he got ready to leave.
He winced. “I haven’t quite gotten up my nerve yet.”
“You’ve been saying that for a month now. For goodness’ sake, man, ask the woman out. She’s a terrific woman and I’m sure you two would have a good time together,” Claire said.
“I know, I’m working on it.” With a wave of his hand to Bo, Roger thanked Claire for the meal and then left.
Bo sat back down at the table and after offering him another glass of iced tea, Claire joined him. “He seems like a good guy,” Bo said.
“He’s a really nice guy,” she agreed. “He’s got some issues he’s working on.”
“You mean the OCD stuff?”
She raised a blond eyebrow. “So you noticed?”
“It was a bit obvious.”
“Not as much as when he first arrived in Lost Lagoon,” she replied. “His illness destroyed his first marriage, it was so out of control. He came here for a new start and he’s been working with Mama Baptiste using herbs and meditation techniques to help him.”
Everyone who had spent any time in Lost Lagoon knew Mama Baptiste. She and her son, Eric, lived two doors down from Claire and they ran an herb and apothecary shop in the center of town.
“Maybe Roger is your secret admirer,” Bo suggested.
Claire laughed, the pleasant sound swirling that crazy warmth through him. “No way, Roger and I are strictly in the friend zone. He’s got a major crush on Mary Armstrong, a waitress down at the diner, but as you heard he can’t seem to get up the gumption to ask her out.”
She waved a hand. “Enough about Roger.” She placed her elbows on the table and leaned forward, her gaze so intent he felt as if she were somehow peering inside his soul. “So, are you in for a little crime investigation or are you out?”
The fresh, slightly floral scent of her perfume drifted across the table as her gaze continued to hold him captive. He had arrived at the high school not knowing what his decision was, whether he intended to hang around and buy into Claire’s scheme of trying to find the real killer or get out of this town as fast as possible.
The light of her belief in him shone from her eyes. He bathed in it and realized he wanted this...his innocence restored among the people who had once been friends and neighbors.
“I’m in,” he finally said. He hoped in making that decision he hadn’t just made a mistake he would come to regret. Asking questions, talking to people and stirring up everything from the past also might stir up a killer’s rage.
* * *
CLAIRE GRINNED AT Bo and popped up from the table to retrieve a pen, a legal pad and a three-ring notebook complete with color tabs from a kitchen drawer. “I hoped that was going to be your answer,” she said as she once again sat down.
“What’s all this?” Bo asked as he gestured toward the notebook.
“I’m a teacher, Bo. I love lists and notebooks and any kind of office supplies.”
“You don’t have any flash cards stuck in there, do you?” he asked wryly.
She laughed. “No flash cards, I promise.” She was pleased that he’d decided to stick around and do a little digging into the crime that had forced him to leave town under a cloud of suspicion. She was also pleased that he apparently had a sense of humor.
She placed the legal pad in front of her and pushed the notebook to the side. “I figured we’d spend some time this afternoon coming up with a plan, names of people to talk to, the events that led up to Shelly’s body being found in the swamp, anything that might provide a clue as to who was responsible for her death.”
Bo raked a hand through his hair and leaned back in his chair. “It’s a bit overwhelming, trying to go back to a crime that happened two years ago.”
“Overwhelming is trying to keep second graders focused enough to learn math and reading,” she replied. “This is just a puzzle and we need to start at the beginning and work outward. I know Shelly was murdered around eleven thirty at night. I don’t know if I ever heard where you were at that time?”
When the murder had happened Claire had been as horrified as anyone in town, and although she’d tried to stay up on all the developments, she’d heard so many stories it was difficult to discern truth from false gossip.
“I was in my bedroom at my mother’s house in bed with a twenty-four-hour flu bug.”