The Word of a Child. Janice Johnson Kay

making the streets safe, et cetera, et cetera,” Hugh added.

      Connor grunted. As a kid, he hadn’t been conscious of pressure from Mom to become a cop, the way John claimed to. He’d become one because his big brother had. There was no question, however, that Mom was proud of the fact all three sons were in law enforcement. And maybe she had no understanding of the need to grumble. A stoic herself, she had raised her three sons alone with grit and without whining.

      John gave himself a shake. “Back to your job. Why are you starting to hate it?”

      Hugh, the youngest and best-looking of the three McLean brothers, slumped lower in his chair. “It’s that fuzzy, did-he-or-didn’t-he crap,” he announced. “Here’s free advice—go back on patrol. Do some real police work.”

      John grabbed an empty and tossed it, connecting with Hugh’s chest. “You don’t think raping a thirteen-year-old is a crime? Arresting a rapist isn’t real police work?”

      Unoffended, Hugh crumpled the can in one hand. “I listen to Connor. These cases aren’t clear-cut. This one with the schoolkid isn’t a rape, it’s a…jeez, I don’t know.” He gestured vaguely.

      “A knife at the throat isn’t the only kind of force,” Connor said. “The power an adult—and at that a teacher, a figure of authority—wields over a kid is considerable.”

      “I know that. I’m not excusing it. I’m just saying, you may never know who’s lying. Don’t you ever hunger for a good, old-fashioned shooting at a convenience store?”

      Connor grunted. “Maybe.”

      “Maybe” wasn’t the real answer; “no” was. Sometimes he wasn’t sure he was cut out to be a cop at all. Going back into uniform didn’t appeal, and he wasn’t sure investigating murders or arson or bank robberies as a Major Crimes Unit detective like John would make his view of the world any sunnier.

      He was a cop, he was good at his job, and what else would he do? Until recently he’d never questioned any of the above, but lately he had felt restless. No, worse than that: he saw himself for the home wrecker he was.

      Today, he’d seen it in Mariah Stavig’s eyes. She hated him for what he had done to her family. And the little girl Simon Stavig had supposedly molested? She was probably still in counseling. She’d probably have hang-ups her entire life, and he, Detective Connor McLean, had done jack for her.

      John got the conversation back on the track. “Something getting to you about this case?”

      Connor rolled his beer can between his palms. “Just a weird coincidence.”

      They waited.

      He told them about Mariah Stavig, the teacher the girl had chosen to confide in, and how he had investigated her husband three years before.

      “Her face was familiar so I looked up the file.” He continued his story. “The case was ugly. A three-year-old girl who said Simon Stavig molested her, but without corroborating evidence we were never able to arrest him.”

      John studied him thoughtfully. “But you think he did it.”

      “Oh, yeah.” Connor shook his head in disgust. “He was one of those guys who got seriously pissed because we’d come knocking on his door. He wasn’t shocked, the way you’d expect. I mean, wouldn’t you be stunned if you were accused by some friend of Maddie’s? Nah, this guy wasn’t surprised. He was angry that we’d take the word of a kid that age.”

      John grunted. “This Mariah Stavig is still married to him?”

      “I don’t know. Now, she was shocked. I can still see her standing there waiting for her husband to say, ‘I didn’t do it.’ Getting more anxious by the minute when he didn’t. Big eyes, you know.” They were a mixture of green and brown that might make a poetic man think of the mossy floor of the rain forest. Not that he was poetic. “She was scared and puzzled. Even she recognized that his reaction wasn’t right.”

      “And now she had to call you to investigate some other guy.”

      “Yup.” Another swallow of beer seemed appropriate. Tonight he almost regretted that he wasn’t really a drinking man; the two or three beers that were his limit didn’t do much to drown the mocking voice that had lately been asking what good he was to the world. Irritably muting it, Connor said, “And she was damned upset when she saw that the luck of the draw had brought me.”

      “She blames you.”

      Connor shrugged. “Probably.”

      They all sat in silence for a moment. The syndrome was familiar to them all. The battered wife called the cops, then was angry at the one who responded for making her husband madder, for jailing him, for letting the neighbors see the trouble behind the facade of her happy home. The storekeeper didn’t blame the punks who robbed him, he blamed the cops who offered inadequate protection, who couldn’t make an arrest. People called the police reluctantly, then saw the officers who responded not as saviors but as symbols of whatever bad thing had happened.

      “You going to beg off the case?” Hugh asked.

      Connor frowned. He’d considered it. He couldn’t exactly be said to have a conflict of interest, but certainly this investigation would be hindered by Mariah Stavig’s hostility. On the other hand, Port Dare was small enough that he often encountered people he knew. The sexual crimes unit was all of two officers strong. Penny Kincaid had plenty to do without taking on a call that had been his by rotation.

      Besides, he was already hooked. He wanted to find out whether Tracy Mitchell was lying and why. And he wondered what had happened to Mariah Stavig in the three years since the case against her husband had been dropped. Despite her bewilderment at Stavig’s strange reaction to the investigation, had she maintained faith in her husband? Did she trust him with their pretty little girl? Or had she left the son of a bitch, and now had her struggles as a single mom to blame as well on the cop and social worker who’d come a’ knocking with an unprovable accusation?

      “Nah,” he said, with another shrug that expressed more indifference than he felt. “She called us. She’ll cooperate.”

      Hugh was apparently satisfied. He laid his head back and gazed dreamily at a wall of books.

      Big brother John, however, studied Connor with slightly narrowed eyes. “Reluctant cooperation from her is going to eat at you, isn’t it?”

      Connor pretended surprise and ignorance. “Why would it bother me?”

      “Could be I’m wrong.” John’s gaze stayed unnervingly steady. “But I don’t think so.”

      Connor swore. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” He, too, crushed his beer can in his hand, getting more profane when a jagged edge bit into his palm.

      “Sorry.” John didn’t sound repentant. He did, however, switch his gaze to his youngest brother. “So, what’s with this blonde you’re seeing?”

      Nothing was with her, Connor could have told him. She’d go the way of all the other petite blondes their baby brother dated. Hearth and home did not yet interest him.

      Truthfully Connor had a hard time imagining Hugh ever letting himself be vulnerable enough to experience anything approaching true love. Even with his brothers, he backed off from expressing emotion or admitting weakness. John thought Hugh had been hit hardest by their father’s murder; Connor privately thought the opposite, that Hugh had been young enough to be oblivious to much of their mother’s agony and to what he himself had lost.

      Either way, Hugh did more than avoid commitment; he made sure the issue never had a chance to arise. He’d been damn near raised by his big brothers. Hell, maybe he wasn’t capable of softer emotions. A man was what he’d learned to be. Honor mattered to Hugh. Duty. Family. Probably friendship. But tenderness and romantic love? Nah.

      Right now, Connor was just grateful for the change