Free Gone The Next by Ben Rehder Page A

sixty years old. Then, after about his eighth beer, the guy grins and tells me he’s on workers’ comp at the moment because of a back injury. Fell off a scaffold — but not really. He was faking it. Taking some paid time off. He deserved it, didn’t he? Perfect. That’s all I needed. I was literally seconds from sliding off my bar stool and walking out the door when he said, “Something else I haven’t told anybody...” Hard to resist a line like that. So I said, “Yeah?” and he leaned in closer and said, “I’m not proud of this, but one night last fall, I was a little bit buzzed, but driving anyway, and I hit a guy on a bike.”
    Whoa.
    That moment was similar to this one with Emma Webster, in that both of them had blurted out something big and unexpected. Hell, this wasn’t just big, this was enormous. I wanted to say, “Wait a sec, Emma, what did you just say?” But I played it cool, even though my heart rate immediately jumped up a notch.
    “That’s weird,” I said. “A little girl?”
    Emma Webster said, “I was walking by just as he was pulling into his driveway. I could see her on the passenger side. Probably five or six years old. Little blond girl. No car seat, and that’s what bothered me.”
    “This was recently?”
    “Oh, let’s see. Probably February or March. A few weeks later, I saw him again out by his mailbox. So I stopped and casually mentioned the little girl. I said something about a child that young needing a car seat. You know what he did?”
    “What?”
    She rolled her eyes. “He denied having that little girl in his truck. Said I must have been mistaken. I mean, I can understand him being embarrassed or feeling guilty for not having a car seat, but there’s no reason to lie about the situation. Just own up to the mistake and have a car seat the next time. If there is a next time. I never did figure out who that little girl was. Brian has never been married, and he doesn’t have any brothers or sisters, so it wouldn’t have been a niece.”
    By now, I could hardly control my expression or even sit still. The growing doubts I’d had about seeing Tracy Turner at Pierce’s house were quickly receding. “Maybe he was babysitting for someone,” I said. Did my voice sound odd? It did to me, but she didn’t seem to notice.
    “I wouldn’t know who, but I suppose that’s possible. Anyway, I don’t mean to go on and on — you probably think I’m a terrible busybody — but I saw you parked here and I wanted to be on the safe side. I didn’t mean to come on so strongly. But it’s been wonderful to meet Jim and Beulah’s grandson.”
    She was preparing to leave, but before she left, I needed to make sure she wouldn’t blab to her neighbors about what I was doing down here. Word might eventually get to Pierce, and now, more the ever, it was important that he not know I was watching him. I figured the best way to keep Emma quiet was the actual truth.
    So I said, “Emma, I’ll tell you a secret, if you want to hear it.”
    Hook, line, and sinker, all rolled into one.
    “What’s that?”
    “It is Brian Pierce I’m investigating. See, he claims he injured his arm at the restaurant where he works — and he probably did — but my clients hire me to check those kinds of things out. Make sure everything is on the up and up.”
    To me, this was boring, everyday stuff, but I could tell she thought it was juicy.
    I continued. “What I normally do is follow the person around discreetly and see what they do. See if they take part in some activity that they shouldn’t be able to do because of their injury.”
    She was intrigued, probably because she considered us to be kindred spirits. We both kept tabs on other people. “So you sneak around after them,” she said. There was definitely some amusement in her voice.
    “Well, yeah, but I’m sure you can understand why. When a guy like Pierce commits insurance fraud, the rest of us pay higher costs. Anyway, I felt like you