Helena's expression softened.
“Understood.”
I closed the folder.
Then asked whether the new command staff had been briefed on my appointment.
She nodded.
“Department-wide announcement went out this morning. Most supervisors attended the ceremony or watched remotely. Some patrol teams are still on staggered schedules.”
I smiled faintly.
“I expect we'll meet everybody soon enough.”
Helena laughed.
Neither of us understood how soon that would happen.
My house stood at the end of a quiet, curved street in Silver Crest Estates, a gated neighborhood lined with pale stucco homes, decorative stone walls, and carefully maintained landscaping.
Some properties were enormous.
Others were more modest by the neighborhood's standards.
Mine was a beautiful two-story house with white exterior walls, tall windows, a stone driveway, and a small front garden filled with flowers my mother had helped me choose.
I'd purchased it eight months earlier.
Not as a celebration of becoming police chief.
At the time, I was still serving as a senior commander in another Arizona agency while participating in the city's selection process.
I wanted a place closer to my parents.
A home with enough room for family gatherings.
And a quiet neighborhood where I could sit outside without listening to traffic from a busy commercial road.
The house was expensive.
I knew that.
It represented years of saving, careful planning, and a mortgage I intended to pay responsibly.
It did not represent somebody else's permission for me to live there.
My mother loved the property.
She especially loved the roses near the front steps.
Every time she visited, she brought another plant.
Sometimes a small flowering shrub.
Sometimes herbs.
Once, an enormous potted lemon tree that barely fit in the back of my father's SUV.
I asked where she expected me to put it.
She looked offended.
“Camille, you have a whole backyard.”
I laughed.
The lemon tree stayed.
Mom also bought the green garden hose that Nathan Cole would later turn against me.
It was an ordinary hose connected to an outdoor faucet, with an adjustable nozzle and a neatly mounted holder near the front flower bed.