by Amy Vansant
She looked at Emmitt. Blood trickled from the side of his mouth. “What did you do to him?”
Chuck grinned. “I side-kicked him in the face.”
“I’ll say.”
Charlotte’s arms felt jittery, adrenalin coursing her veins.
“Why don’t you hand me that,” said Chuck, reaching for the gun.
She handed it to him and turned to face the beach.
Declan.
“Declan swam out to save Seamus.”
Chuck scowled. “They’re swimming?”
Charlotte bolted for the beach.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Declan yelled at his uncle, but it didn’t take long to realize there had to be a good reason for Seamus to be splashing into the frigid North Carolina ocean. That’s when he saw the man with the gun.
“Stop!” he barked at the man.
At the sound of his voice, the gunman’s head turned, his arm swinging in tandem.
Oops.
That’s when it occurred to Declan that screaming at armed men wasn’t the smartest thing to do. As planned, he’d distracted the gunman from his uncle, but as the man turned his weapon towards him—
Declan dropped to the sand.
No gunshot rang out.
Crouched like a cat, he watched the gunman turn and hasten toward the Elder Care-o-lina. A thought occurred to him.
That looks like Emmitt.
Declan didn’t have time to wonder why Emmitt was trying to kill Seamus. He leapt back to his feet and sprinted down the shoreline. In the water, Seamus was swimming now, his body sweeping down the beach almost faster than Declan could keep pace on land.
His uncle had been snatched by a riptide.
Declan grit his teeth and pressed on, determined to race far ahead of his uncle so when he entered the water, the riptide could push Seamus directly into his arms.
Fifty yards ahead he veered into the ocean, diving through the oncoming surf once he’d reached a safe depth. He broke through a massive wave, duck-diving like a board-less surfer. His head rang with pain. The icy water felt more like a brick wall than a liquid.
Swimming between sets, he dove again as the next wave rose and crashed. After being battered by the surf, he broke through. The seas calmed and he found himself beyond the breakers.
Declan swam with long powerful strokes. At home he swam daily, but the glacial, frothing seas of North Carolina were nothing like his Florida lap pool. He pushed himself, knowing he had to reach Seamus before the riptide dragged his uncle under or hypothermia froze his limbs.
While he’d made it past the waves, the ocean still roiled with the force of the passing storm. Salt stung his eyes. Every turn of his head came with life-giving air and water, clamoring to fill his lungs.
He paused, allowing his legs to fall beneath him as he trod water and scanned the sea. He had to confirm Seamus’ location. If he lost sight of his uncle, he knew there would be little chance of finding him again.
He saw a commotion of splashing water fifteen yards away. Seamus whirled toward him, thrashing to stay above water.
“Float!” Declan screamed, returning to his breast stroke. He was nearly there.
When he paused a second time he found Seamus close, paddling for him. His uncle grabbed him, nearly pulling him under.
“You can’t—let me go, I’ll kill us both,” he sputtered.
Declan wrestled him still. “Stop it...stop fighting me. Relax.”
Seamus’ thrashing stopped and they flowed together in the riptide, gliding parallel to the beach. Declan felt his uncle’s body go limp.
A snake of red swirled around Seamus’ body.
“You’re hit?” asked Declan.
Seamus coughed as the churning chop peppered them with spray. “Shoulder.”
Declan curled his arm beneath Seamus’ and across his barrel chest, pulling him against his own body, keeping the older man’s head above water.
He twisted his torso, swimming diagonally toward shore, making slow progress as the riptide fought to pull them further out to sea.
Declan’s arms and back throbbed, his lungs aching from the seawater. Nearly spent, he found his speed increasing without extra effort. A forming wave engulfed them, plucking them from the grip of the riptide and tossing them toward shore. Declan let that wave and the next do the work until he could touch bottom.
“Do you think you can stand?” he asked.
Seamus’ lips were blue, his teeth chattering so violently he could barely speak. “Like nothing better.”
Finding his feet, Seamus shuffled forward through the shallow water, Declan guiding him as he fought his own exhaustion.
Shallows weren’t good enough. Dry land wasn’t good enough. They had to make it inside or they would escape drowning only to die from the cold.
“Sh...sh...shooter,” warned Seamus.
Declan scanned the shoreline.
“One thing at a time,” he said.
Charlotte appeared, waving with both hands high above her head as she ran toward them.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Everyone gathered in the great room to stare at the still unconscious Emmitt. He lay on the sofa, his wrists and ankles zip-tied.
Seamus’ shoulder wound had turned out to be more of a massive abrasion than a hole, caused by the close, but indirect, contact of a shotgun blast. It looked terrible, but Charlotte pointed out it was better than a trench through his skull.
The beach was still too swamped for cars to traverse, so there would be no trip to the hospital for the Irishman. Darla and Mariska played nurse, fawning over the wound, while Caroline barked instructions. Unable to find proper medical supplies, they’d rinsed out the mottled mess with vodka and cut a kitchen towel into a makeshift bandage, secured with duct tape.
“Bandage looks worse than the wound,” said Seamus, his lips still tinged with blue. The ladies had insisted on inspecting his wounds before they’d let him take a warming shower.
“If you have a better idea, let us know,” said Darla.
Declan entered the room, toweling his hair after taking his shower to warm his core. “He’s still out?” he asked upon spotting Emmitt.
Charlotte nodded. “Chuck got him good.”
Chuck grinned.
Wound bandaged, Seamus donned the dry sweatshirt Charlotte had fetched for him and leaned in to lightly slap Emmitt’s cheek.
“Hey, you, wake up. Let’s go.”
Emmitt’s eyes fluttered open and he jerked away from Seamus. He struggled to sit, an expression of both agitation and fear on his face.
“What’s going on? What is this?” he asked.
Seamus helped Emmitt right himself into a sitting position and then pushed him back down as he tried to rise to his feet.
“You shot me,” said Seamus, pulling out the collar of his sweatshirt and pointing to his kitchen towel bandage.
Emmitt gaped and froze that way, seemingly giving himself a moment to recall the details that led to his current predicament. “You tried to attack me,” he said after a measured pause.
Seamus leaned forward and stuck a finger in Emmitt’s face. “Why wouldn’t I? You were holding a gun on me.”
“You’d broken into my house!”
Seamus shut his mouth and straightened, scratching at his head with his good arm. “He’s got a point there.”
“What were you doing at his house?” asked Darla.
“Take it from the top,” suggested Charlotte.
Seamus looked at the others, all of whom stared at him as if he were the one who needed to explain his actions.
I’m the one who was shot.
He sighed. “Fine. I woke up too early and I couldn’t stop thinking about the squirrels and the body parts—”
“Body parts!” exclaimed Emmitt. “Who are you people?” He tried again to stand and Seamus put two fingers on his forehead to push him back down.
“Calm down.”
Emmitt remained still but for
his gaze, which bounced from person to person as if he thought any one of them might attack him at any moment.
“Keep going,” said Declan.
Seamus continued. “I wanted to find out if they were hiding a body in their basement and—”
Emmitt tried to protest again and was silenced by Seamus’ glare. He pressed his lips together and scowled back at Seamus as the Irishman continued.
“As I was saying, thanks to the squirrel, I knew their lower level wall had a hole. Turns out it was a big hole, so I slipped through it and pried the lock off the freezer.”
“Was there something in it?” asked Mariska, visibly tensing with excitement.
Seamus nodded. “Meat. Turkey, some steaks, two giant tubs of vanilla ice cream—” He looked at Emmitt. “Can’t you get something more interesting than vanilla?”
Emmitt squinted at him. “Why would you think there was a body in our freezer?”
“Why do you keep it locked?” snapped Seamus, sounding very much like the lawyers he admired on television.
Emmitt appeared unimpressed by his cross-examination, scoffing to make his disdain for Seamus’ logic known. “We have dementia patients. They wander off and do odd things. We keep it locked for their safety.”
“Seems pretty reasonable when he puts it that way,” said Declan.
“Why did Dinah say the freezer was broken?” asked Charlotte.
Seamus held up a finger. “Yeah, why?”
Emmitt rolled his eyes. “Because it is broken. It’s too cold and we can’t seem to turn it down. If you’d really looked at the food in there, you would have seen it’s all frostbitten.”
“Oh. I must have missed that. I was a little busy staring at your shotgun,” said Seamus.
Emmitt set his jaw. “Look, I was protecting the house. I never had any intention of shooting you. But then you tried to wrestle the gun—”
Seamus grunted.
“But you chased him down the beach with the gun,” said Charlotte.
“I wasn’t chasing him to shoot him. I was just chasing him. I didn’t know what else to do.”
Charlotte walked away from the group and returned with the butter dish. She placed it on the living room table in front of Emmitt before lifting the lid. Upon registering the contents, he jumped back in his seat.
“Is that an ear?”
“Yes. And that’s a finger and that’s a blob of flesh.”
Emmitt struggled against his bindings. “You people are monsters—”
Seamus slapped the top of Emmitt’s head. “Calm down. We found all of these things in the house. Squirrels and possibly your cats were bringing them to us like trophies.”
Emmitt fell still. “The cats? So they were getting out?”
“The hole in the wall, remember?”
“But where would they get those things?”
“That’s what we wanted to know,” said Declan.
“Should I tell him everything?” asked Charlotte.
Seamus crossed his arms against his chest and nodded. “Might as well.”
Charlotte took a deep breath and locked eyes with Emmitt. “We think these parts belong to Mr. Marino.”
Emmitt’s eyes grew wide. “Mr. Marino?” Why—”
Charlotte continued. “We know you’re pretending to care for him, but that he’s more than likely dead. There’s no point in denying it.”
Emmitt sat back, appearing defeated. He took a deep breath.
“He is dead,” he mumbled.
“So you admit you’re keeping his benefits?”
Emmitt nodded.
“Where’s he buried?”
Emmitt’s brow knit. “What?”
“Where did you hide the body?” asked Seamus.
“We didn’t hide the body. He’s buried in the cemetery.” Emmitt’s eyes began to water. “We didn’t mean to do it. I mean we didn’t do it on purpose.”
“You didn’t kill him?”
“No, we didn’t kill him! His checks just kept coming. They forgot to file the paperwork and we didn’t go out of our way to correct the error.”
“But then who is this?” asked Charlotte, pointing to the body bits in the butter tray.
Emmitt shook his head. “I have no idea.”
Charlotte flopped into the only remaining empty chair. “That means we’re not any farther along on this mystery than we were when we found the finger.”
Seamus leaned in to pull his face close to Emmitt’s. “Where’s James?”
Emmitt frowned. “Last I heard, with his mother in Florida.”
Seamus straightened. “Really? Can you prove it?”
“No. I wake up one day to find he’s gone and all I have to show for a five year relationship is a note saying he’s moved to Florida.”
“Did he say relationship?” asked Carolina.
Darla leaned over and whispered something in her ear and Carolina’s eyes widened. “Oh.”
“Did you have a falling out over Marino?” asked Seamus.
“No. Keeping the checks was his idea. He was so excited about it. I was surprised when he left, because I had finally relented and agreed not to report Marino’s death, just to keep him happy.”
“So that’s why Dinah seemed so weird about James? Because he left you?” asked Charlotte.
Emmitt nodded. “She’s furious at him for breaking my heart. She won’t even let me say his name.”
“What’s the timeline here? When did Marino die and when did James leave?”
“Marino died four months ago. James only left about a week ago.”
Charlotte scowled at the butter tray. “Four months? I think these are too fresh to be that old.”
“Especially if they weren’t kept in a freezer,” said Darla.
Seamus found himself locked in a gaze with Charlotte. They were thinking the same thing.
James disappeared a week ago.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Seamus was about to ask if James had any tattoos when there was a booming crash outside. The crack! sounded like an enormous firecracker exploding in the front yard. Everyone jumped, gasping and slapping their hands to their chests.
“What was that?” asked Mariska.
The sound had come from the front of the house. With the exception of Emmitt, who remained zip-tied on the sofa, the others scurried toward the foyer. Charlotte reached the knob first and flung open the front door.
The Reptile sat in the middle of the road, its backend pressed against a tree. The pine had toppled and now leaned on a neighboring tree, propped like a drunken friend.
The Reptile’s engine revved, pushing the bus deeper into the trunk, wheels kicking sand in all directions.
The group remained on the front porch, too terrified to try their luck crossing the path of the truck.
The wheels stopped whirring. Before anyone could move, The Reptile lurched forward and crushed the mailbox in one deft motion.
The snakes eyes glowed and blinked several times before the truck shuddered into silence. As it did, a giant forked red tongue shot from the front grill, unraveling across the ground as a monstrous hissing noise filled the air.
“Did you know it could do that?” asked Declan.
Seamus shook his head. “No idea.”
In the driver’s seat, they could see Dinah in a full-blown panic, hands fluttering and she tried again to start the vehicle.
Seamus stomped down the stairs, muttering.
“For the love of! If she gets that thing started again she’s going to take out the porch and kill us all.”
He slammed the driver side of the bus with the palm of his hand until Dinah opened the window and peered down at him from her perch in the driver’s seat.
“What are you doing?” he called up to her.
She slammed the window shut again. They heard the bus groan as she tried to shift into gear once more.
“Be careful—she’s gonna flatten you like a bug!” screamed Darla.
Seamus search
ed the porch for help that wasn’t coming. Everyone stared back at him, helpless, including the dogs, whose faces he could see peering from the windows. Even Darla’s little hot dog was there, her face appearing every few seconds, ears flapping out, as she leapt up to snatch a peek at what the taller dogs could see standing still.
Seamus took a deep breath and bolted in front of The Reptile to get to the doors on the opposite side. The truck lurched again as he crossed its path, and the group on the porch all gasped in unison. Luckily, the engine shuddered out once more, without moving the truck an inch from where it nestled on the mailbox.
Seamus resumed his banging on the opposite side of the bus.
“Open the door, dammit!” he screamed again.
“You killed Emmitt!” Dinah yelled back at him, wild-eyed.
Seamus stopped banging and took a moment to compose himself. “We did not kill Emmitt.”
Dinah started the truck once more. “I saw you. That man kicked him dead and then you carried him into your house and I found his toe in the living room.”
“His toe?” Seamus jumped as the truck shifted into reverse and blasted back into the trees. This time, the rear end wedged between two pines before the engine died.
Seamus tilted his head back and stared at the sky.
“Go get Emmitt,” he said to no one in particular, but loud enough for all to hear.
“Why?” asked Darla.
“She thinks we killed him. Go get him.”
Declan, Bob and Chuck went inside and returned with Emmitt, his ankles released and hands still bound.
Seamus pointed at him for Dinah. “See? We didn’t kill him.”
Dinah stared through the front windshield.
“You shot him.”
“He shot me,” said Seamus, pulling his shirt away to show her the bandage.
“Why would he do that?”
Seamus waved a hand at her. “It’s a long story.”
“Did he give you that big lump on your head?”
Seamus felt the lump on the side of his forehead where the hammer had struck him while trying to pry away the freezer lock.
“Maybe,” he said.
She scowled. “What about his toe?”
