Page 98 of It's One of Us

The cops step inside and Park leads them to the kitchen, handing the landline to one of them while he digs his license from his wallet, only partly listening to the Q and A between Westgate and the cop.

Bona fides established, the cop hands over the phone. Westgate, now utterly solicitous, says, “I’m sending my best tech over to redo your entire system, Mr. Bender. It will be a couple of hours. I’ll upgrade everything for you free of charge as well. I assure you this isn’t how we do business. I apologize.”

What he’s really saying isplease, please don’t sue me, but Park has bigger problems at the moment than going down that path.

“Thank you. We’ll talk again.” He clicks off the phone and puts it on the counter.

“Thanks for coming,” he says to the cops. “I need to check on my wife now.” He points them toward the door, but they stubbornly hold their ground.

“Detective Osley told us to stick around, sir. Seems like you’ve got a few issues today.”

“Fine,” Park says, starting for the stairs. “Help yourself to some water. I’ll be back in a moment.”

When he hits the stairs, though, he sees Osley striding up the walk wearing his boots and hat and gold glam sunglasses. His style screams country music superstar, not homicide detective. Park opens the door and intercepts him.

“This is completely out of hand,” he says, waving toward the crowd outside. “You have to get these people under control. They’re a danger to my family, to the neighborhood, and—”

Osley slides past him into the foyer. “Good to see you too, man.” Osley flashes him a smile. He follows Park to the kitchen—their de facto war room. He greets the patrols and dismisses them. “Go get the media out of here, would you? They’re becoming a nuisance.”

Happy for something tangible to do, the two men depart with alacrity.

Osley stows the sunnies in his pocket, one temple in, the frames dangling across the man’s muscled chest like a sunburst. “Wanna tell me what’s happening?”

Park does, quickly.

Osley whistles, long and low. “This kid’s been sneaking around you for quite a while, hasn’t he? How do you think he found you?”

“Has to be Winterborn. Or maybe that Discord group my daughter set up?”

“More likely he matched to you on the DNA site and decided to look up dear old dad for shits and giggles. Developed a fixation. Which would answer why we’ve found a fresh match—we’ve got his DNA in the system, and the ancestry database lawyers agreed to share what they have. We catch Peyton Flynn, we do a DNA test, and he matches, we got him dead to rights for Beverly Cooke’s murder. Got any coffee hot?”

“No. I don’t.”

“You should make some. You tied one on?”

Park shrugs. “Shit morning.”

“Yeah. I saw the presser.” Osley moves unerringly toward the cabinet with the coffee, expertly pulling together the pot and setting it to brew. Park assumes he must have seen Olivia do the same. It’s a violation, the cop’s familiarity with his home, his life, his thoughts. He wants to rush the man, throw him to the ground, stamp on his head a few times, but stays put. He needs a drink. Badly. But coffee will help, too.

“Yeah, well, I got ambushed.”

“No idea where she dug up the St. Louis story?”

Park stiffens. “No. And it’s totally horseshit. I had nothing to do with that girl’s death.”

Osley only says, “Hmm,” which is maddening.

Blustery now, Park spits out the words. “I want to know what your people are going to do about keeping my family safe while you search for Peyton Flynn.”

“Hmm,” Osley says again, but his booted foot is tapping. Nervous energy, a tell. If Park were to sit down across from him at a poker table, he’d only have to listen for the thicktap tap tapof Osley’s cowboy boot to know when the man was bluffing.

The coffeepot is now full of steaming dark brown liquid, and Osley helps himself to a cup, stevia, creamer. Takes a slurp, then raises a brow inquiringly.

“Yes,” Park says, annoyed to no end when Osley makes him a cup light, with two packets of stevia, like he’d seen him do enough times to make an impression.

Osley joins him at the table, pushes the cup across the wood.

“Listen. This is a weird case, no mistake. Personally, I believe ya. You’ve gotten the short end of the stick, and that’s not cool. I don’t know if you should be happy about finding all these kids, but the rest, from what I’ve seen, you’ve just been cursed with some seriously bad luck. It’s all circumstantial coincidences as far as I’m concerned.”Slurp.“It’s Moore who’s got her firebrand lit. That girl is serious about her shit, you know what I mean?”