Expecting to Die

pregnant police officer.”
“You’re a freak, Pescoli!” Wilda yelled. “Frank said you were and . . . and for
once that SOB was right!” She looked as if she wanted to spit on her, and Pescoli
glared at her, silently saying, Go ahead and try.
“Enough,” Billie declared. “Come on, Wilda. I’ll buy you that drink. A double
margarita.”
Terri, who’d been silent and staring at the fight in horror, cleared her throat.
“It’s still happy hour, right, Sandy?”
“Sure, sure,” the owner said, obviously just glad the fight was over.
Terri glanced down at Pescoli’s pregnancy bump. “You’re due soon. Real
soon. Shouldn’t you be on maternity leave?”
Man, she was tired of hearing that, but before she could respond, Terri added,
“Seems to be a lot of that going around.”
“What?” she asked.
“Pregnancy.” And for just a second, Pescoli thought she saw a glimmer of

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satisfaction in the twist of Terri’s lips—the smug look of someone who knows
something—a secret. Make that a malicious secret.
“And why would that be a big deal?”
“I guess it’s not,” Terri said. “Usually. Unless your husband is shooting
blanks.”
“What? Pregnancy?” Pescoli asked, pulling back on her temper with an effort.
There was a little glimmer of satisfaction in the twist of Terri’s lips. “Who?”
“Someone whose husband is shooting blanks.” She laughed then, a wicked
little chuckle echoed by her friends. “Forget it,” Terri said over her shoulder as
they headed into the bar, but Wilda waited till her friends were out of earshot to
add tautly, “I’m serious, Regan, you leave my boys out of this mess.” Then she
followed after them through the open doorway to the bar.
Watching them go, Sandy said, “What the hell was that all about?”
Sandy picked up the dropped bags while, from behind a fringe of long bangs,
she watched Pescoli nervously, as if she thought, as Wilda Wyze had charged,
the detective was unstable.
“A misunderstanding,” Pescoli said, accepting the takeout bags that Sandy
offered. “Wilda doesn’t seem to think I’m fit to do my job.”
“And you just proved her point,” Sandy said. “You nearly knocked down
Grizz in the process.”
“It would serve him right,” Pescoli said. “What’s with the Big Foot getup?”
“He’s just getting into the spirit of the upcoming holiday.”
“Please.” She snorted.
“You’re not into Big Foot Daze?” Sandy asked. “You know, it’s going to be
good for business. Rod Larimer came by and he’s rented out the Bull and Bear
for the next six weeks. The inn’s booked solid. And I’ve got reservations coming
in like crazy.”
“So Mayor Justison and Barclay Sphinx and the Big Foot Believers are right.
Sasquatch is good for the town.”
“You got it,” Sandy said as the phone rang and she grabbed it. Two couples
were coming into the foyer and they oohed and aahed over the stuffed grizzly
bear in his Sasquatch attire.
“Isn’t that cute?” one of the women said, and Pescoli couldn’t stand it another
second. She thought she might actually be sick if one more person tried to tell
her how great Big Foot was for the town. She headed outside and found her Jeep
where she’d left it, no ticket in sight.
She climbed inside and glanced down the street. She noticed, along with the
banners announcing the upcoming event, several carved wooden statues of Big
Foot, both male and female, on display. How had that happened? Had the

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merchants found the statues tucked away in their basements collecting dust, or
had they ordered them from the guy who did chainsaw art just out of town?
Whatever the case, Big Foot Daze was definitely happening. Like it or not.
At the end of the block, she turned onto the road leading across a set of train
tracks before it wound along the face of Boxer Bluff, past the area of older
homes where Mayor Justison lived, then higher still and past the sheriff’s
department on her way home. She caught a glimpse of her face in the mirror and
saw the red tracks on her cheek where Wilda Wyze had attempted to scratch her
eyes out.
The woman’s temper had skyrocketed from zero to sixty in half a second. Yes,
Pescoli had goaded her after Wilda’s initial attack, but the woman’s reaction was
way out of line. She was over the top. Was she scared for her sons, afraid they
were being railroaded, or was there more to her fury? Did she know something?
A secret they were harboring? If the altercation had done anything, it had
increased Pescoli’s suspicions about the Bell brothers rather than allay them.
Lost in thought, she drove by rote, stopping for stoplights and ignoring the
Braxton Hicks pangs that had started about the time she left the restaurant. All
the while, she was going over the homicide investigation and, more specifically,
replaying the scene with the women she’d just dealt with in the foyer of the
restaurant. While Wilda had definitely been the aggressor, Billie O’Hara had
played the part of peacekeeper. But what about Terri Tufts and her supercilious
attitude, the same knowing smile she’d displayed on the night of the vigil? What
had she said about Pescoli’s pregnancy? Seems to be a lot of that going around.
As if she were enjoying her own private and nasty joke.
Who was this husband shooting blanks?
She followed a minivan filled with kids and decorated with bumper stickers
proclaiming I H
EART
J
ESUS
as it buzzed along over the speed limit.
Pescoli was certain she was missing something, something important,
something that was scratching at the back of her mind, something she couldn’t
quite reach. But the aroma of the food was distracting her. Her stomach rumbled,
reminding her she hadn’t eaten in hours.
At the house, she found Bianca downstairs on the couch, her ankle propped up
on a pillow, Cisco and Sturgis curled up beside her, cell phone and iPad at hand,
television tuned to the news. Her hair was wet and curly, as if she’d just gotten
out of the shower, and she was dressed in pajama bottoms and a T-shirt. She
glanced up as her mother arrived, but couldn’t muster up a smile.
“Hey,” Pescoli said to Bianca as the dogs bounced off the couch to come greet
her.
“Hi.” Bianca’s voice was flat and she looked like she’d lost her best friend.

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“What happened to your face?”
“Long story,” Pescoli said. “Why the long face?” She dropped the sacks onto
the kitchen island, taking time to pet a madly barking and twirling Cisco. “Yeah,
I love you, too,” she said to the terrier, then scratched Sturgis’s ears as the lab
wagged his tail. When Bianca didn’t answer, she said, “Got your texts. What’s
going on?”
“Nothing.”
“Doesn’t seem like nothing. Especially when you kept texting me about
coming home.”
Bianca lifted a shoulder. Then, as if she couldn’t hold it in a minute longer,
she faced her mother and blinked back tears. “I’m off the show,” she said with
more than a touch of anger. “Michelle called a little while ago. Barclay Sphinx is
‘going in another direction.’” She cleared her throat. “Lara Haas is in and I’m
out.”

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