Page 34 of The Deputy's Secret Double

“Right,” Jamie said.

“Maybe they knew you were out of town and wanted to take something?” JJ offered. She had a small cup of coffee and sat right at his side. Looking down at her, Price couldn’t help but feel she resembled a detective at an interrogation table taking on the job of good cop.

Her eyebrows were even drawn together in concentration.

Jamie didn’t seem to mind.

“I’ve already talked about that with Georgie. There’s nothing we can think of worth enough for someone to break in and be as vicious as that guy. Definitely not something worth trying to burn my house down over.” Jamie looked to Price. “My only valuables are the personal things I usually keep locked up in the closet and, thankfully, Georgie had already moved them to his car before all of this happened.”

“Personal things?” Price asked.

Jamie nodded.

“My social security card and birth certificate, a few family and sentimental trinkets, my favorite book signed by the author. Some other odds and ends.”

Price felt his eyebrow raise at that.

“You move all of that every time you leave town for work?”

That seemed excessive.

Jamie put on a sheepish look.

“You’re not the first person to ask about that.” He readjusted the Styrofoam cup between his hands. “I spent some time in foster care when I was a kid, and after being taken from a few homes with little to no notice and nothing but a trash bag to hold everything I owned…well, I’ve kind of gotten into the habit of taking my most valuables with me when I leave home for too long.” He shrugged. “Some people buy safes. I just carry around a cardboard box.”

Price felt for the man’s past experiences. He was about to point out that it was a trauma response that, at the very least, probably saved his most precious items from the fire, but JJ spoke up.

Her voice was still filled with syrup but surprisingly blunt.

“How long were you in foster care?”

Both men turned to her. She didn’t back down.

If Jamie minded past his initial hesitation, he didn’t voice it.

“Not as long as a lot of the kids I knew, but from four until around ten. My mom passed and then I was lucky enough to be placed with the Bells, even though I was in a different county.”

“I didn’t realize that,” Price admitted. He knew of the Bells, and had for years. He was older though, never having gone to school at the same time as Jamie.

“Not a lot of people knew at the time, since my parents traveled so much for their work,” Jamie said. “It wasn’t until I had settled in that they both changed jobs so they were always home.” He smiled. He was tired but it was warm. “They made sure to find ways to support me, and even as an adult they still ask for monthly updates on my local adoptees group. I don’t have the heart to tell them that we stopped meeting years ago.”

“Local adoptees?” There JJ went again. The question was harmless, but Price couldn’t help his gut from questioning the tone it came in. It didn’t fit but he didn’t know how.

Jamie nodded.

“There’s a few of us in town still who’ve been adopted. The Baptist church put the group together when I was in high school. A few of us from it still keep in touch.” He addressed Price next. “Josiah Teller was a part of it back in the day too. Him and Nancy Hernandez’s sister. The three of us used to be really close.”

Price knew Nancy Hernandez.

He knew her sister, Portia, too.

He didn’t know Portia had been adopted.

He also didn’t care.

Because he had stuck on one thing and one thing only.

Josiah Teller.