had warned her about letting her personal life interfere with her work, she willed herself to stop thinking about the conflicting loyalties that were tearing her apart and to concentrate on the job at hand.
This third bedroom had been furnished as a home office. Or rather, thought Richards as she paused in the doorway to get an overall impression, it was furnished as someone’s idea of what a home office should look like. Except for bathrooms and kitchen, the entire house was carpeted in an off-white wall-to-wall Berber. In this room, a pseudo-Oriental rug with a dusty rose background lay atop that. White enameled bookshelves bloomed with a collection of porcelain flowers. No books. In a niche below the shelves, a three-story dollhouse built to look like an antebellum plantation faced outward. Complete with white columns and tiny pots of artificial flowers on the porch, it sat on casters and rolled out smoothly when Richards touched it. Instead of having period furniture, though, the interior rooms were all modern.
She pushed it back into place and turned her attention to the adult toys. A thin laptop computer sat on the pullout counter of a cherry table desk beneath a window swathed in dark rose drapes and sheer white under-curtains. A flower-sprigged mug that held scissors, a silver letter opener, and an assortment of colorful pens sat next to the laptop between a bottle of rose-tinted nail polish and a porcelain angel with bowed head. A locked three-drawer file cabinet beside the desk was also made of cherry. A vanity wall above the cabinet had been hung with a few plaques and awards from local civic groups. Several silver-framed photographs of Candace Bradshaw with various elected men sat atop the cabinet itself. No other women in the pictures. No picture of her daughter or ex-husband.
A sturdily built five-foot-ten redhead with freckled face and arms and a slight unease whenever surrounded by so much blatant femininity, Richards doubted that much real work was done here. Nevertheless, it was a place to start collecting names. When the SBI reinforcements arrived, they would take a stethoscope and tongue depressor to this room and to the computer, but it wouldn’t hurt for a CCSD deputy to check it out first.
She selected a likely candidate from the key ring found in Bradshaw’s purse, unlocked the cabinet on her first try, and opened the top drawer. This seemed to be general storage for her supplies: extra printer paper, ink cartridges, and other odds and ends.
The middle drawer held neatly labeled hanging files and was apparently devoted to Bradshaw’s work as a county commissioner. In addition to the minutes of the meetings and various reports, there seemed to be a file on each of her fellow commissioners, past and present. She picked one at random—Harvey Underwood. “VP at the bank. Approved B’s loan w/o proper collateral. [fd] Wife, Leila. Two daughters in Raleigh. G’children. Drives late-model Lincolns. Doesn’t drink or smoke. Sleeping with B, but I could prob. have him. Registered Repub, but can’t be trusted to vote the right way.”
There followed a list of issues that had come before the board and whether Underwood had voted with her or on the opposing side.
So she kept score
, thought Richards and a hasty flip through the other files confirmed it. There was a running tally on how each board member had voted since she became chair last year. The two Democrats on the board did not receive flattering comments. Jamie Jacobson seemed to be a particularly sharp burr under Bradshaw’s saddle and the dead woman had quoted some of the other woman’s comments with childish petulance, adding exclamation points and heavy underlining. The word
bitch
had been doodled in the margin.
She pulled a folder for Lee, Stephenson and Knott, the law firm where Major Bryant’s wife had practiced before she became a judge. It held a few newspaper clippings of a case John Claude Lee had won in a civil suit that
This third bedroom had been furnished as a home office. Or rather, thought Richards as she paused in the doorway to get an overall impression, it was furnished as someone’s idea of what a home office should look like. Except for bathrooms and kitchen, the entire house was carpeted in an off-white wall-to-wall Berber. In this room, a pseudo-Oriental rug with a dusty rose background lay atop that. White enameled bookshelves bloomed with a collection of porcelain flowers. No books. In a niche below the shelves, a three-story dollhouse built to look like an antebellum plantation faced outward. Complete with white columns and tiny pots of artificial flowers on the porch, it sat on casters and rolled out smoothly when Richards touched it. Instead of having period furniture, though, the interior rooms were all modern.
She pushed it back into place and turned her attention to the adult toys. A thin laptop computer sat on the pullout counter of a cherry table desk beneath a window swathed in dark rose drapes and sheer white under-curtains. A flower-sprigged mug that held scissors, a silver letter opener, and an assortment of colorful pens sat next to the laptop between a bottle of rose-tinted nail polish and a porcelain angel with bowed head. A locked three-drawer file cabinet beside the desk was also made of cherry. A vanity wall above the cabinet had been hung with a few plaques and awards from local civic groups. Several silver-framed photographs of Candace Bradshaw with various elected men sat atop the cabinet itself. No other women in the pictures. No picture of her daughter or ex-husband.
A sturdily built five-foot-ten redhead with freckled face and arms and a slight unease whenever surrounded by so much blatant femininity, Richards doubted that much real work was done here. Nevertheless, it was a place to start collecting names. When the SBI reinforcements arrived, they would take a stethoscope and tongue depressor to this room and to the computer, but it wouldn’t hurt for a CCSD deputy to check it out first.
She selected a likely candidate from the key ring found in Bradshaw’s purse, unlocked the cabinet on her first try, and opened the top drawer. This seemed to be general storage for her supplies: extra printer paper, ink cartridges, and other odds and ends.
The middle drawer held neatly labeled hanging files and was apparently devoted to Bradshaw’s work as a county commissioner. In addition to the minutes of the meetings and various reports, there seemed to be a file on each of her fellow commissioners, past and present. She picked one at random—Harvey Underwood. “VP at the bank. Approved B’s loan w/o proper collateral. [fd] Wife, Leila. Two daughters in Raleigh. G’children. Drives late-model Lincolns. Doesn’t drink or smoke. Sleeping with B, but I could prob. have him. Registered Repub, but can’t be trusted to vote the right way.”
There followed a list of issues that had come before the board and whether Underwood had voted with her or on the opposing side.
So she kept score
, thought Richards and a hasty flip through the other files confirmed it. There was a running tally on how each board member had voted since she became chair last year. The two Democrats on the board did not receive flattering comments. Jamie Jacobson seemed to be a particularly sharp burr under Bradshaw’s saddle and the dead woman had quoted some of the other woman’s comments with childish petulance, adding exclamation points and heavy underlining. The word
bitch
had been doodled in the margin.
She pulled a folder for Lee, Stephenson and Knott, the law firm where Major Bryant’s wife had practiced before she became a judge. It held a few newspaper clippings of a case John Claude Lee had won in a civil suit that
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