“There. They’re coming.”
Lorna stared. “You told her he threatened you.”
“He did.”
“He said he was staying for his sister’s wedding.”
“You didn’t hear his tone.”
“I was standing beside you.”
“Lorna, whose side are you on?”
It was the question Candace had used in smaller arguments for years, but this time the stakes were different. Lorna did not answer. She looked toward the pavilion where Quentin was laughing at something a little girl had said. Her phone held his voice, his expression, and the exact words he had used. She could not make herself believe he was dangerous merely because Candace needed him to be.
Candace dialed another number.
“Wes? It’s Candace.”
Officer Wes Burnham answered from his patrol car near the county line. His first shift after vacation had begun with paperwork and two noise complaints, and he had hoped for a quiet return.
“Candace. Everything okay?”
“No. Dispatch has a call at the pavilion. I want you on it. Not some rookie.”
“Dispatch sends whoever is closest.”
“Wes, remember who bought the car you’re driving?”
Burnham exhaled. He had heard the line before, usually at fundraisers when Candace wanted a photograph. But today she sounded furious, and a furious Candace could make Monday mornings difficult.
“What kind of call?” he asked.
“Weapons. People who don’t belong here. A man threatened me.”
“All right. If dispatch assigns it to us, we’ll handle it.”
“Ten minutes, Wes.”
“I’ll do what I can.”
She ended the call without thanking him.
Across the park, Bethany’s phone buzzed inside her purse. It was a routine notice that an officer had been assigned to a weapons-related call at Lakeside Park. She was not watching the phone. Rowan had just brought her a cup of water, and Alma was insisting that they start dressing. Quentin had promised that the sabers were safe. No one in the family knew what Candace had said to dispatch.
Candace returned to her livestream. “Neighbors, help is coming,” she announced. “We’ll see whether the town takes safety as seriously as the people who pay for its cars.”
A viewer typed *Good for you.* Another wrote *Stay safe.* A third asked if she had actually seen anyone with a weapon. Candace did not respond to that one.
She was beginning to believe her own performance. The more times she repeated the word danger, the easier it became to forget the moment she had watched Quentin close a storage-room door and walk away.
Chapter 16: Two Officers in One Car
Wes Burnham had been a police officer for nineteen years, long enough to recognize the difference between a serious call and a nuisance that had learned to speak the language of emergency. He also had a mortgage, an aging father in assisted living, and the kind of professional habits that grow comfortable when supervisors stop asking questions.
Candace had known his wife before their divorce. She had helped the department pay for equipment when the town was short of money. She always remembered Burnham’s birthday and invited him to association dinners. It would have been easy for him to describe the relationship as community support. Sometimes it was.
But he had let her turn support into influence. He answered her calls quickly. He took her complaints more personally than those from strangers. When she said she needed an officer who understood the lake, he believed she meant him.
Casey Upton sat in the passenger seat with his notebook open. He had transferred from the county department because he wanted to work in a smaller place where people knew one another. He was learning that the same closeness could make impartiality more complicated, not less.
“We’ve got an armed-group call at Lakeside Park,” Burnham told him as the dispatch assignment came through. “Possible swords. Caller reports threats.”
