by Jeff Shelby
I pressed the three numbers on the keypad and waited for the call to connect. When it didn’t, I pulled the phone away from my ear and looked at the screen. There was no service. I frowned.
The man trapped under the statue groaned, a little louder this time.
“There’s no service in here,” I said.
“Metal building,” he whispered. His eyes were closed again.
I nodded. Of course.
“Hold tight,” I told him. “I’m going to call for help.”
He said nothing, just gave the slightest nod of his head to indicate he heard me.
I pivoted on my heel, then paused.
“What’s your name?” I asked.
His eyes fluttered open again. “Kenny.”
“Kenny?” I repeated. I gulped. “The chef from O’Rourke’s?”
His nod was almost imperceptible this time.
This wasn’t the thief, and this wasn’t the kidnapper trapped underneath the statue.
It was the victim. He had been kidnapped after all.
I took a deep breath. “Hang on, Kenny. Help is on the way, I promise.”
I bolted toward the door, anxious to get outside so I could pick up a signal and place the call for help.
I shot through the door, my feet slipping as I moved from concrete to the grass, and ran right into something hard and solid.
Panic surged through me as I glanced up, expecting to see Lance Larson.
But it wasn’t Lance staring down at me.
It was Chuck Graham.
And he didn’t look happy to see me.
TWENTY SEVEN
CHUCK RIPPED THE PHONE out of my hands.
“What are you doing?” I asked. “Kenny is hurt. He needs help!”
He nudged me back inside the pole barn, not hard enough to constitute a shove but firmly enough that I knew he meant business. Once inside, he grabbed my arm and pulled me toward Kenny, then pushed me to the floor so I was seated next to him.
“What is going on?” I glanced at Chuck and then at Kenny. “I found the statue. And I found Kenny.”
Chuck sneered at me.
And realization hit like a lightning bolt.
Chuck wasn’t there to help.
“It was you all along,” I said slowly. “You stole the statue.”
Chuck’s sneer turned into a smile. “Of course I did.”
“And you kidnapped Kenny.” I glanced at the prone man next to me. His eyes were still closed, and every once in a while a soft moan escaped his lips.
“I didn’t kidnap him,” Chuck said. “He was in on it.”
“What?” I was at a loss for words. “How?”
“I don’t owe you any answers,” Chuck growled.
I tried to compose myself. I needed to figure out what was happening, try to make sense of the little bit Chuck was telling me.
“Was Lance in on it, too?” I asked, feverishly trying to connect the dots.
“Lance?”
“This is his property,” I said. “You guys were all in on it, weren’t you? All of you, ganging up on Mikey.”
Lance’s involvement made sense. Kenny’s did, too, considering his connection the former owner. But Chuck? Why would he sabotage a restaurant he was part owner of?
Chuck frowned. “This isn’t Lance’s property. It’s mine.”
I gaped at him. Had Dawn lied to me, too? Were all of them involved in a conspiracy against Mikey?
“I...I thought this was Lance’s property,” I said lamely.
Chuck just stared at me, his thin eyebrows drawn into a V. “It’s not.” And then, when I didn’t respond, he added, “Lance’s place borders this one. This is my uncle’s. It’s been abandoned for years.”
I felt a small sense of relief. At least Dawn had been telling the truth.
“Why did you do it?” I asked.
I didn’t expect him to answer but he surprised me.
He puffed out his chest. “For the publicity, of course,” he said, grinning.
I frowned. “The publicity?”
“Don’t you know there’s no such thing as bad press?” He scowled and shook his head. “I planned everything perfectly but that stupid partner of mine mucked it all up. Didn’t want me telling anyone.”
“But you did,” I said slowly. “The reporter who showed up...”
He nodded.
“And then...” I thought for a minute. “And then when that didn’t work, when Mikey didn’t bite, when he told you he didn’t want any publicity, you arranged for Kenny to be ‘kidnapped.’”
I stole a glance at the man trapped under the statue. Maybe he wasn’t trapped. Maybe it had all been a ruse to lure me in, to make me sympathetic and then vulnerable.
“Kenny was easily bought,” Chuck said with a smug smile as his gaze shifted to the man trapped under the cow. “A couple hundred bucks and he was all in. Helped steal the statue and then was totally on board with the kidnapping.” He kicked Kenny’s boot. “Isn’t that right, pal?”
Kenny moaned.
I tried to process it all. “Why is he stuck under the cow?”
“I don’t really know,” Chuck admitted. To Kenny, he said, “What happened?”
Kenny turned his head so he could look at Chuck. “The thing fell over. I was...” He licked his lips. “I was trying to move it and it fell. Right on top of me.”
“He has a concussion,” I blurted out. “And possibly internal injuries. He needs an ambulance.”
Chuck rolled his eyes. “The statue barely weighs anything. It’s plastic. That’s why we had it bolted down.”
He nodded at the cow statue and I noticed the holes in the cow’s hoofs. It looked like it had been crucified.
“Get up,” Chuck ordered, his eyes on the former chef.
Kenny shifted. “I can’t.”
Chuck gave him a disgusted look. “You are pathetic.”
Kenny tried again.
“Don’t move,” I told him. “You really could be injured.”
Chuck scowled at me. “You are a pain in the rear. Do you know that? None of this would have happened if it hadn’t been for you.”
“Me?” I squeaked. “I didn’t steal a statue or fake a kidnapping. And I didn’t tell Mikey not to contact the media.”
“But you supported his decision.”
“Of course I did. He’s my friend.”
“Well everything is a mess.” Chuck folded his arms across his chest. “And I blame you.”
“So what happens now?” I asked. “The statue has been found. Kenny, too. The grand opening is hours away and you didn’t get the publicity you wanted.”
“I didn’t,” Chuck admitted. “Instead, I got a whole slew of problems that need to be taken care of.”
His sinister tone sent a shiver down my spine. “What’s that?” I managed to ask.
Slowly, he reached his hand behind him and pulled something from his waistband.
A gun.
He pointed it at me.
“No one was supposed to get hurt,” he said. The gun was surprisingly steady in his hands, at complete odds with the sudden shakiness of his voice. “But now you have the potential to hurt me. And this is the only way to stop you.”
TWENTY EIGHT
KENNY WHIMPERED. “NO one was supposed to get hurt.”
“Shut up,” Chuck snapped. “Or you’ll be next.”
Panic seized me and I was suddenly having a hard time thinking straight. All I knew was that I was in a building on an abandoned piece of property. No one knew where I was. And someone was about to kill me.
Chuck surveyed the pole barn while keeping the gun pointed at me. “How can I frame this?” he mused out loud. “Or do I even need to? The property has been abandoned for years. It’ll take forever for law enforcement to find your body, especially with Sheriff Lewis in charge.”
I couldn’t argue with that.
“You don’t have to do this,” I said.
“Yes, I do.” His eyes were
wild, his lip curled in disgust. “You ruined this. You and your meddling.”
“I was helping a friend,” I said. I knew I needed to look for a weapon, for something I could use to protect and defend myself, but I didn’t want to take my eyes off the gun trained on my chest. “That’s all. We can end this right now. Just let us go, me and Kenny both. Return the statue and we can forget this ever happened.”
He laughed. “What fantasy world do you think I live in? I know you. You think you’re some great detective. There’s no way you’d let me walk away from this.”
“I would,” I said quickly. “I won’t say a word. I promise.”
The gun wavered in his hands. “Shut up.” His voice was desperate. “We just need to get this over with.” It was almost as if he was giving himself a pep talk.
“Please,” I pleaded. “Don’t do this.”
I blinked back tears. Was this really going to be the end? I was going to die over the world’s largest cow statue? I thought about Laura and her upcoming wedding. I thought about Luke and his budding musical career. And Gunnar and Declan. And Mikey and Charlotte and little Olivia. It felt surreal, sitting in an abandoned pole barn, a man trapped underneath the tail of the world’s largest cow statue, another man aiming a gun at me and fully intending to shoot me dead. How had I gotten myself into this mess?
“Please,” I whispered again. “Please don’t do this, Chuck.”
He startled at the use of his name. And then a slow grin spread across his face. “Funny how things come full circle, isn’t it?”
“What?”
“You,” he said, nodding in my direction. “The body you found on Len’s property. The skeleton.” He let out a little cackle. “That’s gonna be you. Someone is going to visit this pole barn years from now and find you here, just like you found the body at Konrath’s place.”
“My place,” I countered. “Not his. Mine.” I don’t know why that particular comment bothered me, but it did. That house, that farm, was mine. I might be at death’s door, staring down my executioner, but I wanted that fact made perfectly clear. Maybe it was because I felt like I had so little control over what was happening to me that I wanted to at least correct his false narrative. Or maybe shock was focusing my energy and outrage on inconsequential things. I didn’t know and I didn’t care.
I stole a quick glance at Kenny. His eyes were wide open, filled with panic. He opened his mouth to say something but no words came out. I wondered if he too was in shock.
“I’ve wasted enough time,” Chuck said. His pointer finger slipped into position, locked in on the trigger. “Time to get this over with.”
I couldn’t move. I couldn’t breathe.
The whole world flashed before my eyes and I squeezed them shut. But then I forced them open and shifted my gaze so that it wasn’t on Chuck. I didn’t want the last thing I saw to be the face of my executioner. I focused on the open door, the door that was open just a crack. The sunlight streamed in, casting ripples of light on the concrete floor. I wasn’t a praying person but suddenly I started thinking about what I would see on the other side. If there was an other side. I closed my eyes again and said a silent prayer to anyone who might be listening.
A thump and a groan startled me and I turned. Kenny had somehow managed to free himself and he’d brought Chuck down to the floor. I let out a half-gasp, half-shriek as they writhed around on the floor, both of them scrambling to get ahold of the gun that lay within reach of both of them.
I lunged for it, diving face-first at the concrete.
But I was too late.
Chuck’s hand closed around it before mine got there and he smashed the gun into Kenny’s face with a sickening thud. Kenny immediately slumped to the floor like his entire body had turned into a bag of sand.
I gasped again.
Chuck grinned, his lips and teeth bloody. “Let’s finish this, shall we?”
I wanted it to be finished. All of it. I just didn't want me to be finished, but I knew that's what Chuck had in mind.
And then I froze.
Because from the door, a voice spoke. A voice I recognized. A voice I hadn’t heard in over a month.
“Drop the weapon.”
TWENTY NINE
“DECLAN?”
I stared at the man standing at the entrance to the pole barn. His reddish-brown hair was just a bit longer than it was the last time I'd seen him. His face was shaved clean and his cheeks were pink. He wore a windbreaker zipped up to his neck, blue jeans, and sneakers. He looked like someone out running an errand to the grocery story, or maybe out for a casual hike. He didn’t look pastorly—Declan never did—and he didn’t look like a superhero on a mission to save someone, either.
Maybe I was imagining things. Maybe the shock and stress of having a gun aimed at me was causing me to see things.
I blinked.
He was still there.
He was not a hallucination. At least I didn’t think he was.
“Declan?” Chuck echoed.
I now knew for sure that I wasn’t imagining things.
Declan’s eyes were locked on Chuck. “What’s going on here?” he asked casually.
He looked the same. Same copper hair, grown out just a little longer than usual, and same friendly, disarming smile. He could have been asking someone about the weather, his tone was so calm and non-threatening.
“What...what are you doing here?” Chuck sputtered, his eyes wide. “You’re...you’re in Brazil.”
“I was in Brazil,” Declan corrected. “Came back just this morning, as a matter of fact.”
Questions consumed me; not about his return but how he had come to be standing in that pole barn. At that exact moment.
I thought back to the frantic moment before Kenny had attacked Chuck, when I’d focused all my energy on that open door and sent a prayer skyward.
Maybe there really was a big guy upstairs after all.
Declan shoved his hands in his pockets and stepped further into the building. Chuck still had the gun pointed at me but he suddenly looked unsure of himself.
“Any chance you can put that away?” Declan asked, nodding at the weapon in Chuck’s hands. “Guns make me a little nervous.”
Chuck tightened his grip on the gun. “Why did you have to come here?” His voice was almost a whine. “I like you, Pastor.”
“I like you, too, Chuck,” Declan responded.
“I don’t want to have to kill you, too.” Chuck sounded like he was pouting, like we were forcing him to do something he didn’t want to do even though he was the one holding all the cards.
“So don’t,” Declan suggested. “Maybe you don't kill anyone. Let’s put the gun down and talk about this.”
His voice was so calm, so soothing, like a lullaby being sung to a baby. I immediately relaxed, despite the fact that I wasn’t in any less danger than I’d been mere minutes before. In fact, I should have felt even more on edge because it wasn’t just my life and Kenny’s hanging in the balance now: Declan’s was, too.
“No.” Chuck’s voice wavered on the single word. “I’ll kill you, too, if I have to. No one will know.”
Declan arched a brow. “No? I have people waiting for me right now at St. Simon’s. People who knew I was headed out here.”
Chuck’s expression turned to one of panic. “Why did you have to go and do that?” He didn’t wait for a response. “I know,” he said, almost as if he were trying to convince himself of what he was about to say. “A lover’s quarrel. That’s what people will think happened. Murder-suicide. Everyone knows you two had the hots for one another.” He thought for another moment, then nodded to himself. “Yeah. They'll think you came back from Brazil to be with her and it all went wrong between the two of you.”
“Better make that three of us.”
I jerked my head, refocusing on the entrance. Gunnar strolled in, a grim smile on his face.
Chuck let out a howl of displeasure. “What are you doing here?”
Gunnar nodded in Declan’s direction. “Same thing as him.”
Chuck’s eyes were wild. “Stop! Don’t come any closer or I'll start shooting!”
Both Gunnar and Declan froze in their tracks.
“Put your hands up!” Chuck screamed.
They complied.
Chuck’s attention was focused on the two men standing in front of him. The gun was aimed between them, which meant it was no longer pointed at me.
I glanced at Kenny. He was still out cold.
I had to think and I needed to do it fast.
I looked around the building, once again searching for something I could use to defend myself. There had to be something I could somehow use as a weapon or at the very least, something to distract Chuck.
And then I saw it.
It was a long shot. I knew this.
The leather collar wrapped around the cow statue’s neck.
I darted a look at Chuck. Declan was talking but the roaring in my ears drowned out his words. Chuck seemed focused on whatever he was saying. I shimmied closer to the front of the statue, trying not to draw attention to myself.
I reached out slowly, my fingers fumbling with the clasp. It came apart easily and I tried not to make a sound as the collar dropped from the cow’s neck and into my lap. It was heavier than I expected and I didn’t know what I was going to do with it but at least I wasn’t empty-handed anymore. I swallowed hard a couple of times and the roar in my ears lessened.
“....understand,” Declan was saying. “Perhaps I can say a prayer before...” His voice trailed off. “Before you do what you’re going to do.”
Chuck used his free hand to wipe the sweat off his brow. “A prayer?”
Declan nodded. “A simple blessing. Last rites, that sort of thing.”
The gun shook in his hands and after a moment’s hesitation, Chuck gave a slight nod. “Fine. Do it fast. I don’t have all day.”
I wondered what else was on his schedule. A lunch date? A few errands after he gunned four people down in cold blood?
“Can we all bow our heads?” Declan asked politely.
