Linda Crowder - Jake and Emma 02 - Main Street Murder (3 page)

Cheri had supervised staff in some capacity for nearly ten years and she was still saddened and surprised when a troubled employee was either not willing or not able to turn things around.  She’d earned a reputation within the bank of being tough but fair because while she gave employees every opportunity to excel, she did not hesitate to act when problems arose.

One bad apple spoils the bunch, she reminded herself and it was certainly true in managing people.  Turn a blind eye to a problem employee because you hate confrontation or feel sorry for the person and you can ruin an entire team’s performance and morale.  Cheri never lost sight of the pain it would cause the employee to be let go, but she believed that pain to be ultimately self-inflicted.

There was a light knock on her door as Cheri’s assistant opened it to show in both the supervisor and the employee in question.  Cheri rose to shake hands with each and her assistant quietly withdrew from the room, shutting the door behind her.

5

Spring warmed into summer and thoughts
of murder faded from the public mind.  The citizens of Casper were gearing up to host the Summer Solstice Rodeo, a Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association sanctioned event that drew barrel racers, bareback riders and bull riders from across the country. 

Cheyenne, the state capitol, claimed top
rodeo honors with  Frontier Days.  Founded in 1897, this “Daddy of them All” event was part of the national rodeo tour, dwarfing other Wyoming rodeos.  Casper’s Summer Solstice Rodeo couldn’t compete on so grand a scale but the community was justifiably proud of the event.

Most Wyoming towns, certainly of any size at all, hosted some sort of rodeo event.  Even tiny Shoshoni, on the shores of Boysen Reservoir, boasted a pint-sized rodeo ring.
  Rodeo was the marquee sport at several of Wyoming’s high schools and community colleges.

Emma had never been to a rodeo before moving to Wyoming, but it was so much a part of the fabric of the community that she had looked forward with excitement to her first Summer Solstice event.  Barrel riding, a women’s event where horse and rider work in perfect harmony to  complete a complex circuit of barrels within the arena in the shortest time possible, was Emma’s favorite event.

Kicking off the four day rodeo was a community parade.  During her first year in Casper, Emma had been surprised that most businesses closed on “parade day” to give their employees a chance to share the event with their families. 
Now she was always a little surprised that there was anyone left sharing the sidewalk with her as a parade spectator because it seemed like everyone was in it. 

Bands from the high school and both middle schools played Sousa marches, the city’s oldest World War II veteran rode in a convertible amidst the American Legion marchers who proudly saluted the
uniformed military in the crowd.  Even the Tiny Tots Tumblers showed off newly-mastered summersaults on their float, padded with brightly colored mats.

It was a celebration of all things summer in small town America,
thought Emma, though the people of Casper would have bridled to hear her categorize them as “small town” since Casper was the second largest city in Wyoming.  People drove hundreds of miles to “the big city” to shop in Casper’s big box stores and eat in her national chain restaurants.  Locals knew the best sites were often outside the chains.

With Wyoming having the smallest population in the country, Emma often heard people joke that there were more cows than people in Wyoming.   At least, she’d thought they were joking until Jake told her there were actually almost three times as many cattle in Wyoming as there were people.
  Cattle and sheep ranching, while no longer as dominant as energy and tourism, were still an important part of the Wyoming economy.

Emma
grew up in California, where she could drive for hours without ever leaving a metropolitan area.  There were more people in her home town than in all of Wyoming and her high school graduating class than in 46 of the smallest Wyoming towns.  She’d taken many drives around the state since moving to Wyoming and was always struck by the wide open spaces. 

Still, Wyoming had beautiful mountains, friendly people and the best trout fishing in the world.  Emma smiled to herself at the memories that last one conjured up.  When they were newly married, Emma was excited to embrace all of the to her exotic activities so dear to her new husband.  Jake loved fly fishing and he’d taken her to Wyoming’s famed Miracle Mile to show her the fine art of the sport.

Emma hadn’t counted on the 4am wake-up but she trundled out of her sleeping bag when Jake shook her gently that spring morning before he went out to start breakfast on the camp stove.  She’d struggled into hip-high waders, which Jake had been delighted to buy for her when she’d expressed an interest in fishing.  The waders, he’d told her, would keep her warm and dry while standing in the river.

She hadn’t, of course, realized what an exaggeration that was or that her concept of “warm and dry” didn’t match his but she found that out when she waded into the frigid river after breakfast.  “Why do we have to stand in the water?” she’d asked Jake after losing feeling in her feet. 

“Because that’s where the fish are,” he answered.  He had been patient with her, helping her master the flick of the arm and wrist so vital to successful fly fishing.  Well, thought Emma,
master
might be a bit strong for the level of skill she’d developed over the years but she did keep at it until she caught her first rainbow trout.  The fact that the fish had slipped from her hands the moment the hook was out and disappeared into the river was completely beside the point.

One
catch had been enough to satisfy Emma’s curiosity.   While she still enjoyed accompanying Jake on his fishing trips - in a small camper trailer now instead of a tent - she stayed on the shore. The waders Emma had passed along to a friend.

She was jolted from her wandering th
oughts by the sound of her name and to Jake jabbing her in the ribs and pointing up at a float.  She looked up to see Kristy sitting next to Cheri Jackson.  Both women were waving to her from their seat of the Casper Greeters’ Welcome Wagon.  Emma smiled and waved back. 

Cheri
joked that she knew everyone who was worth knowing in Casper.  She was a social butterfly, involved in every worthwhile civic activity she could fit into her schedule. She was a founding member of the Greeters, a welcoming committee that attended community events and helped new residents feel at home.

The Wagon slowly moved past her, flanked by at least 30 members
wearing their distinct blue shirts who flitted back and forth between the wagon and the crowd passing out candy to the children.  Emma smiled when a Greeter had to run to catch up with the wagon, having stopped to chat with a friend in the crowd. Good natured ribbing turned his ears red as he reached into the wagon for more candy.

Cheri had
invited Emma to join the Greeters and she had gone to a couple of meetings but it wasn’t really her passion.  Kristy had volunteered to join, representing Emma’s practice, and she seemed to be enjoying herself immensely. 

Emma
had joined the Rotary when she moved to Wyoming, transferring her membership from California. Her client load had built steadily and while she was thankful, she had trouble getting away from her office.  Seeing what fun Kristi and Cheri were having with the Greeters, Emma made a mental note to start volunteering with the Rotary’s playground project.  Life had to be more than just work. 

Her thoughts on happier things, Emma missed most of the conversation behind her.  She jerked to attention when she thought she heard someone mention
Kristy’s name. 

“That’s her then?” she heard a man’s voice reply.  They were speaking in low tones so Emma strained to hear the first man’s response. 

“…take care of it….” she made out, then a few mumbled words Emma missed before catching just a name.  Shipton.  Where had she heard that name before?

Emma turned to see the backs of two men, pushing their way to the
rear of the parade crowd.  They were tall, or seemed so from her vantage point sitting on a folding lawn chair at the edge of the sidewalk.  They were dressed, as were many of the parade-goers, in jeans and t-shirts.  The shorter of the two was dark haired just beginning to turn gray.  The other had light hair that was just visible beneath a dirty baseball cap.

Shipton, thought Emma.  The men had disappeared into the crowd before she remembered why the name rang a distant bell.  The man killed in the apartment below
Kristy’s loft was named Shipton.  Vince Shipton. 

Emma’s heart skipped a beat when she remembered what little of their conversation she’d heard.  They were looking at
Kristy and talking about taking care of something that somehow involved the murdered man.

“Jake, did you hear what those men w
ere saying?” she asked her husband, poking him in the ribs to get his attention. 

Jake wrenched his
eyes from the all city marching band playing a rousing
How the West Was Won
and looked at his wife.  “What?” he asked.  “What men?”

Emma
scrambled to her feet, hastily folding her chair and tucking it under her arm.  “I’m sorry,” she said to a man whose knee she bumped with the chair.  “So sorry,” to a woman behind him who stepped aside to let Emma through.  Jake scrambled after her, apologizing to the same people as he struggled to catch up to her.

Reaching the back of the crowd, she caught sight of the taller of the two men about half a block to her right. 
Jake put his hand on her arm and shouted over the crowd noise, “What are you doing? The parade’s not over yet.”

Pressing herself against a storefront and shifting her chair to the arm opposite the parade crowd, Emma followed the men
, dragging a protesting Jake along behind her.  It was slow going because the crowd was large and several times Emma lost sight of the men for a minute or two before spotting them again, every time a considerable distance further ahead of her.

It slowed her down to have to weave around the edge of the crowd taking care to neither run into someone or knock into a store window with
her lawn chair.  Finally, Emma saw the bobbing head of the taller man turn left, away from the parade route and in the direction of the only parking garage in Casper.

Just as she thought she would close the distance between her and the men, the parade ended and the crowd surged toward the lot.  She lost sight of the men in the crowd and finally gave up looking for them. 

Disappointed and fearful for her friend, Emma fought her way across the street and walked the few blocks to her office.  Jake followed, still wondering what on earth had gotten into her. 

“What were you thinking?” asked Jake when she told him about the men.  “Are you insane? What were you planning to do if
we did catch up to them?  Hit them with your chair?”

Emma frowned.  She hadn’t thought about that.  She hadn’t thought about anything except the threat to
Kristy.  What would she have done?  Since she’d had to use her handgun to save Jake, Emma made a point of carrying it in her purse, but she hadn’t taken her purse to the parade. 

She never carried her gun in a crowd, she didn’t think it was safe, and she hadn’t been expecting to hear people talking about a murdered man in the crowd behind her. “You’re right, you’re right.  I just didn’t want to lose sight of them. “

Jake sighed.  “I know and I appreciate your quick thinking.  Following them at a safe distance was fine, just don’t approach them if you ever catch sight of them again.  If these men did have something to do with Vince Shipton’s death, I don’t want you anywhere near them.”

“Agreed,” said Emma.  She didn’t want to tangle with killers either.  Then she sighed, “But I wish I’d been able to see their faces.  When I
tell the police what I heard I won’t be able to give them much of a description.”

“
Are you going talk to Kristy?” asked Jake. 

“Yes, I should do that,”
Emma agreed.  She picked up her phone and dialed Kristy’s cell number.  The noise on the other end of the phone, since Kristy was at the post-parade BBQ in the park, made Emma repeat parts of her story several times before she could be certain Kristy understood her.

Emma frowned as she hung up. 
“She didn’t seem concerned.  She said they couldn’t have been talking about her.  She reminded me there were at least 10 or 15 women walking with the Greeters and they could have been talking about any of them.”

“
If they were even talking about someone in the parade,” observed Jake.  “They could have been talking about someone watching the parade from the other side of the street.”

“
It’s possible,”  Emma mused, not sounding convinced.  Jake raised an eyebrow at Emma, a movement that always annoyed her, mostly because she’d practiced and practiced in the mirror but could not get just one eyebrow to move independently of the other.