“If you’re going out with Sam, you’ve got a high bullshit tolerance,” Porter said. He was trying to smile, but it wasn’t reaching his eyes.

“I put up with him somehow,” I said.

“I guess you aren’t here just to say hi?” The name on his tag read “Carpenter.” Was his name Porter Carpenter? Almost as challenging as Sister Mendoza.

“I wish,” Sam said, and I realized that his speech had slowed down a bit and his body had relaxed. He even looked a little younger. He was home. Funny I hadn’t noticed that until now. “I’m afraid we had some trouble this morning.”

“I been out to the animal shelter,” Porter said. “Your problem related to that?”

I let Sam tell Officer Carpenter all about it, and he did a quick job of it.

“So you think this was at least partly Jim Collins’s doing?” Carpenter asked. “Jim wasn’t too bad until the vampires came out, but that tipped him over the line because that was about when Della died.”

Della had been Jim’s wife. I filled that in from Sam’s brain.

“Then the weres . . . Well, it just made him nuts. Especially when Don shot your mom. He and Don were big buddies.”

“So it was okay for his big buddy to shoot his own wife?” Sam asked bitterly.

“Sam, I’m just saying.” Porter shrugged.

“I didn’t see any evidence Jim Collins put the sign on Sam’s mom’s lawn or that he killed the dogs at the animal shelter,” I said, trying to get the conversation back on track. “At least, none that you could take to court. Maybe you found something?”

Carpenter shook his head. I knew he hadn’t looked. I was getting a whole lot from his head that scared me.

Sam said, “The dogs are dead, and nothing’s gonna change that. I’d like whoever did that to go to jail. But right now, I’m more worried that someone’s going to disrupt the wedding.”

“Do you think they’d do that?” Porter Carpenter asked, genuinely taken aback. “Ruin your brother’s wedding day?” He answered his own question. “Yes, I reckon there are a few people who would.” He thought for a moment. “Don’t worry about it, Sam. I’ll be there in my uniform, right outside the church. I’ll have another deputy with me, too. We’d have traffic duty anyway. Where’s the reception going to be? Church hall?”

Sam nodded.

Good. Close and quick to get to, not much exposure, I thought.