Free I Have a Secret (A Sloane Monroe Novel, Book Three) by Cheryl Bradshaw

décor was similar to most Italian restaurants I’d been in: Dangling vines of fake plastic grapes, bottles of red wine, and arched mirrors—lots of them.  Jesse sat across from me.  He shoveled a load of noodles into his mouth and didn’t seem to mind the Alfredo sauce dripping down his chin.  He retained his conversation without missing a beat.  I clenched my fists under the table and resisted reaching for a napkin.  He was a big boy, he could clean himself up.
    “You don’t know how many times I’ve thought about you over the years,” he said.  “Damn, it’s good to see you, and you’re lookin’ fine tonight…wooh-eee!”
    “Let’s talk about Doug,” I said.
    “Always Doug with you.  Man you’re tight, Sloane.  A hard ass, you know it?  You gotta loosen up.  It’s like you’ve never been complimented before.”
    I’d been complimented plenty.  The difference was always in who was doing the complimenting and whether it was wanted or unwanted.  Jesse either didn’t know the difference or didn’t care.  I drew in a long breath.  “Look, if you don’t want to answer my questions, fine.  I can leave.”
    I scooted my chair back, stood up and tossed my napkin in the center of the table.
    Jesse waved a hand in the air.  “Oh c’mon, Sloane.  Sit back down, woman.  I’ll answer anything you want.”
    I stood there, unmoved, and considered my options, mostly for dramatic effect.  When I thought it had reached its desired level, I lowered myself into the chair again. 
    “How much have you seen Doug over the years?” I said.
    He leaned forward and rested his elbows on the table.  “It’s a small town.  I’m a cop.  I see everyone.”
    “Let me rephrase—how often have you spoken to him?”
    “Pulled him over for drunk drivin’ a couple months back.  Guess that’d be the last time we were face to face.”
    “And?”
    Jesse glared at me.  “He was drunk, Sloane.  I just said that.”
    “Did you arrest him?”
    He shook his head.
    “Why?”
    He shrugged. “I don’t know. Should have, I guess, but I didn’t. I left his car there and gave him a lift home.”
    “That doesn’t make sense to me,” I said.
    “Why—because I’m a police officer, my only option is to arrest him?  I can’t be an officer and a friend at the same time?”
    “Arresting him is part of the job, right?  Who knows what could have happened if you hadn’t come along.”  I sighed.  “Look, I cared for Doug too, but if he was driving drunk one night, he was probably doing it a lot more than you thought.  Maybe locking him up for twenty-four hours would have taught him something.” 
    Jesse frowned and gulped back some beer.  “Nothing happened, and Doug’s not even alive now, so who flippin’ cares?”
    “You don’t need to do this, you know.”
    “What?”
    “Keep things from me.”  I reached for my drink and took a sip.  “Or maybe you do.  You felt sorry for Doug that night, and it kept you from doing your job.  The question is, why?”
    “What does any of this have to do with why he’s dead?  He wasn’t killed from a head-on collision.”
    My current line of questioning wasn’t working.  Next.
    “Trista said they had a daughter in college.”
    Jesse’s face tightened and he cleared his throat.  “Alexa.  Smart girl.  Pretty little thing too.”
     “What can you tell me about her?”
     “Uh, she’s their daughter, she’s in college.  I’m a cop, not neighborhood watch.  What more do you need to know?”
    “Seems a little strange to me that Doug and Trista would throw away their scholarships to stick around here and raise a kid when they were still kids themselves.”
    Jesse spun his bottle round and round in circles on the tablecloth.  “What did Trista tell you about Alexa?”
     “Long story.”
    He winked.  “I’ve got all night.”
    I shook my head.  “No—she actually said it was a long story.  That’s all I got out of